Homily for Friday
Week 1 of Ordinary Time
Jan. 14, 2022
1 Sam 8: 4-7, 10-22
Provincial House, New
Rochelle
“All the elders of Israel came to Samuel and said
to him, ‘Appoint a king over us, as other nations have, to judge us’” (1 Sam 8:
4-5).
On Wednesday, Fr. Joe told us that the will of the superiors isn’t necessarily God’s will.[1] Today the author of 1 Samuel tells us that having a king to rule Israel isn’t really God’s will: “the people are rejecting me as their king” (8:7).
Time
and again the Israelites have had to be rescued from their enemies by a hero—a
“judge”—raised up by God for the occasion.
As Samuel’s life is coming to a close, they decide they want a more
stable system of protection and governance:
“Appoint a king over us” like everyone else has. “We too must be like other nations, with a
king to rule us and to lead us in warfare” (8:5,20).
Samuel
outlines for the elders of Israel what the kings of the nations are like: laying on heavy taxes, claiming the best
land, impressing soldiers and other servants and valuable livestock. In the 19th century, Lord Acton aphorized,
“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Ancient emperors, medieval monarchs, and
20th-century tyrants demonstrate the truth of that. If half of what we read in 1-2 Kings is true,
it wasn’t much different in Israel. And
Samuel didn’t even mention financial and moral corruption.
The
Psalmist warns us not to put our trust in princes; trust God alone
(146:3). That was Samuel’s position, as
well.
Samuel’s
cautions to the Israelites could also be read as cautions to anyone who holds
authority, and not only earthly princes.
Pope Francis is always chastising clerical careerists, in the Vatican
and elsewhere. I’m sure we don’t have to
look that far afield to take heed of Samuel’s words, to take heed of how we
exercise any authority we have as teachers, administrators, or superiors, how
we treat the people around us, how we use the “perks” of office, how we use the
goods of the community.
In
the Gospels, Jesus cautions his disciples against exercising authority like
Gentile rulers, lording it over their subjects.
In today’s reading, he shows us how the Son of Man uses his
authority: for the physical and
spiritual healing of people—healing which, we might easily overlook, begins in
our passage with his “preaching the word to them” (Mark 2:2). God’s word is the 1st curative in what’s
often called “the cure of souls.”
Attending diligently to that word and making it known to others is as
much a proper exercise of our authority as Don Bosco’s sons as diligent
obedience, chastity, poverty, and amorevolezza.[2]
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