Reading
Matthew 11:16-19
16 “To what can I compare this generation? They are like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling out to others:
17 “‘We played the pipe for you,
and you did not dance;
we sang a dirge,
and you did not mourn.’
18 For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon.’ 19 The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is proved right by her deeds.”
Comment
Jesus reproaches the Pharisees with derision, accusing them of behaving in a childish manner, discontented both if invited to rejoice in his ministry - when he sits down at the table with sinners to reconcile them to God - and if called to do penance for their sins - with reference to John the Baptist's invitation to conversion and penance.
Every believer runs the risk of falling into this attitude when he complains of excessive laxity on the part of his brothers or, conversely, when he justifies his own infidelities by considering the gospel too demanding.
Some believers would like to follow Christ only at the wedding at Cana; others cultivate a faith imprisoned by legalistic rigor, but more commonly the widespread attitude is one of indolence, like that of bored children sitting in a square.
Jesus calls us to reconcile the joy of the announcement of salvation and the need to follow him by taking up our cross. This means participating fully in the paschal mystery, in the death and resurrection of Christ, and welcoming him in his entirety.
We are not the ones to judge the ways in which God acts on men to favor their spiritual development, because although the same God works in everyone (1 Cor 12:6), some are called by a voice crying out in the desert, others with words of consolation and joy. As Ecclesiastes warns, there is "a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance" (Eccl 3:4). God knows how to treat each of us, sometimes speaking with thunder on Mount Sinai and sometimes gently exhorting us from Mount Zion.
Prayer
O God of justice and mercy, grant us to live ever more deeply in the baptismal mystery, to be filled with your grace, in the preaching of your gospel. Amen.
- Rev. Dr. Luca Vona
