September bodes change: the season will change from summer to autumn, "summer mode" for families will change as vacations end, school begins, and leisure passes to duty and obligation. "Newness" is in the air. A good time for us to look what is old and crusty in our spiritual life, and seek to bring newness to it.
Jesus came among us to give us a new way of approaching life, one not bound by "the traditions of the elders" but one based on the freedom that comes with love. St. Augustine put it clearly: "Love God and do what you will." Was he taking an risk of total moral anarchy, or was he reflecting the newness that Jesus offers? How much of our ways of doing things are based on the spoken or unspoken dictum: "We always did it this way." How can change and growth take place with that attitude? When Jesus' disciples were chided by the Pharisees for not following the ritual washings, Jesus bounced back with the retort, that "Nothing that eners one from outside can defile that person; but the things that come from within are what defile," and lists evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, and folly." (cf Mk 7: 21-23). Quite a list, but "right on" as we say.
Our response can be echoed by this beautiful hymn:
Your words to me are life and heallth;
Pour strength into my soul;
Enable, guide and teach my heart
To reach its perfect goal.
Your words to me are light and truth;
From day to day they show
Their wisdom, passing earthly lore,
As in their truth I grow.
Your words are perfected in one,
Yourself, the living Word;
Within my heart your image print
In clearest lines, O Lord.
Bro. Rene
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