• About The Alternate Path

The Alternate Path

~ Thoughts on Walking the Path of Christian Discipleship

The Alternate Path

Category Archives: Jesus

Thoughts on the Sunday readings: “Christ crucified” (3rd Sunday of Lent – B)

07 Saturday Mar 2015

Posted by mcummins2172 in Christ, cross, Jesus, salvation

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Christ crucified, cross, Jesus, salvation

Jesus-Christ-from-Hagia-SophiaIt has been said that when it comes to Jesus there are basically only three options to choose from: either Jesus is a madman, a lunatic (How many people throughout the centuries, struggling with sanity, have concluded that they must be God?), either he is a liar and therefore one of the most evil people of all history, someone willing to deceive generations into the belief that he is God or lastly, he actually is who he says he is.  These are the options we have to choose from and if we are to be authentic in life then at some point we must each make a choice.

For Christians it all comes down to this one person who lived nearly two thousand years ago, who was poor, who never travelled in his adult life beyond his immediate area, who did not seem to have any formal education, who preached the good news of a God of love and humility and who was put to death by the powers that be.  If you are looking for an ascetic or a yogi to follow, then do not look to Jesus, he was neither.  If you are searching for a great philosopher or guru then do not look to Jesus.  If you are looking to a man of success in order to feel validated and bask in the glow of, then do not look to Jesus.  Jesus is none of these things.  He is something totally different all together.  Jesus cannot and will not be captured and contained by any of our definitions and biases.  Jesus can only be encountered.  It is because of this truth that Paul is able to write, “…Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified…” (1 Cor. 1:22).  “Christ crucified” – these two words held together break every human presumption about God and how he operates, about what it means to be human, about life itself.  For Christians it all comes down to a person – to Christ crucified.

In his book, “The Lord” Romano Guardini writes:

God did not reveal himself merely by teaching a truth, giving us commands to which he attaches consequences, but by coming to us, personally.  His truth is himself.  And to him who hears, he gives his own strength, again himself.  To hear God means to accept him.  To believe means to accept him in truth and loyalty.  The God we believe in is the God who “comes” into heart and spirit, surrendering himself to us. 

The “temple” Jesus will raise up is not a building, not a compilation of religious laws and precepts, not a system of political or philosophical thought, not an idea of a better world.  The “temple” that will be raised up is Jesus himself, “Christ crucified.”

We cannot constrain Jesus, neither can we explain him away nor fit him into a nice, neat, little category.  All we can do is encounter Jesus – the one who once was dead but who now lives – and in this is found life.

The Possibility of Holiness

18 Sunday Jan 2015

Posted by mcummins2172 in Catholic Church, Christian living, Church, discipleship, faith, following Jesus, God, gospel, holiness, Jesus, joy

≈ Leave a comment

I am not holy.  My sins, failures and weaknesses are before me every day, but I believe in the possibility of holiness and it is this belief that keeps me in the Church. 

I am not naïve to the sins and failures of the institution of the Church nor its representatives – past and present, universal and local – but neither am I naïve to the sins and failures of those outside the Church and those who deride “church”.  I have also witnessed their sins and their hidden despair and I want none of it.  The louder and more forced the laugh; the deeper the despair, I believe.  
I do not want nor need a “Church” made in my image.  I know my sins.  Holiness is challenge – lived daily and without fanfare.  I am a creature and I need my Creator to heal what is broken within me.  To pretend that there is no brokenness is, in fact, to deny my Creator. 
Holiness is simple.  I am tired of a presentation of faith that needs to be hyper-stimulated.  I feel sorry for our young people who are growing up in such a world.  I am sorry for the times the Church buys into this.  Holiness cannot be manufactured.  Holiness grows simply and quietly.  What is manufactured quickly fades and leaves a void.  Maybe holiness can begin to grow in this void maybe it cannot.  I know that God can work as God so chooses and I have to trust in this.  
Holiness is not argument and it is not philosophy.  Debate does not lead to conversion, the witness of holiness does.  Philosophy and its structure is a good tool but it is not salvific faith.  The wise steward, we are told, is the one who can go to the storeroom and pull out both the old and the new as needed.  Maybe there are other tools available?
Holiness does not isolate.  Christ, the All Holy One, came into our very midst.  He called us brothers and sisters and taught us to love one another.  Holiness is found in my encounter with the other although it may not be immediately apparent.  The holiness uniquely found in community forces me out of myself and I need this.  If anything, the direction of holiness is from the mountain back down into the valley of the everyday. 
Holiness is not on a mountaintop somewhere but in the Gospel, the sacraments and community.  I need these every day.
Many people like to point to the sins of the Church.  It is nice to have an excuse isn’t it?  Pointing out the perceived sins of others does not grow holiness in my own life; it just gives me a way out.  I need to stand before my Creator on my own and not in contrast to what I perceive as the sins of others. 
Holiness is beautiful and I need beauty – a child playing peek-a-boo, friends laughing, feet being washed.  
I feel sorrow for those who have left the Church.  Christ loves the Church … how can you love Christ and not love what he loves?  Maybe Christ’s love should be bigger than my own resentments and excuses?
Holiness is living in friendship with God.            

Thoughts on the Sunday readings: God’s mercy. (25th Sunday in Ordinary Time – A)

21 Sunday Sep 2014

Posted by mcummins2172 in goats, homily; mercy, Jesus, justice, parable

≈ Leave a comment

When you get a chance and if you are interested I invite you to google “tree climbing goats of Morocco”.  I once stumbled across this and was really kind of mesmerized.  At first you might think that the pictures of these goats perched on extremely small branches of trees are doctored, I know I did, but they are not.  If you go to YouTube you will see videos of these goats climbing up into the trees, moving around and balancing on the branches and then scampering down.  The story is that there is a berry that these trees produce that the goats crave and over time they have adapted and developed the ability to climb the trees in order to get at the berries.  That being understood, the image of all these goats standing on branches in a tree is surreal – two very ordinary things (goats and trees) brought together in a totally unexpected way.  It makes you do a double-take when you see it and even question your perception. 
The parables of our Lord operate in a similar way I believe.  Our Lord takes common, everyday realities that we are all familiar with (maybe even take for granted) and then puts a spin on them that leaves the listener doing a mental double-take and re-evaluating ones perception of things.  Similar to seeing goats perched in a tree.  Take for example this Sunday’s parable (Mt. 20:1-16).  We can easily imagine the landowner and the laborers.  We understand what work is and what it means to give someone a fair wage for a fair day’s work.  But then there is this “spin” at the end.  Those laborers who worked only one hour get paid the same amount as those who put in a full day’s work.  And we are left with the response of the landowner, “Are you envious because I am generous?”
What is helpful to realize is that this parable is not about us.  It is about God.  God’s justice is his mercy.  In Isaiah we hear God proclaim, “…my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways … As high as the heavens are above the earth, so high are my ways above your ways and my thoughts above your thoughts.” (Is. 55:6-9).  
In this parable our Lord is not giving us a lesson on social justice nor is he presenting us with an image of the just boss.  Rather, he presents us with an absolutely exceptional person, who treats those under him beyond the bounds of any legalistic rules. The parable shows us how the Father acts – his kindness, his magnanimousness, and his mercy, which are as far from the human way of thinking as heaven is from earth. 
It is very easy to be cynical about all this, to roll one’s eyes at the Christian talk of mercy.  The cynic easily says, “Let’s get real; enough of this fairy-tale talk!”  Cynicism is indeed one of the besetting sins of our age which often dismissively equates mercy with naivety but cynicism is often really just a cover for fear.  The Christian mystery is not a puzzle to be solved and then set aside, allowing a sense of accomplishment and superiority for the cynic, rationalist and materialist.  The Christian mystery is a mystery to be lived and as we live it we are then brought to greater understanding and greater hope and joy.  And it takes courage and trust to live the mystery.  
So Isaiah doesn’t say “Figure it out!” rather he says, “Seek the Lord while he may be found, call him while he is near.”  Then he gets really personal, “…scoundrel, wicked … you forsake your way, your thoughts … turn to the Lord for mercy…”  God owes us nothing except by his choice which is his mercy.  Rather than trying to fit God into our sense of fairness it would be better for us to wonder on God’s mercy.  
The parable is about God and how his justice is his mercy and it teaches us that when we labor for him, as we are each called to do in our own way and according to our current season in life, then we will know the great reward of his mercy.  It is a great reward.  God is unjust with no one and neither is he senseless.  God does not give according to some abstract notion of equity, rather he gives to each of his children according to his or her need.  God’s justice is his mercy. 
“Seek the Lord while he may be found…”  Encounter God and his mercy.  Live the mystery and know the life and the generous mercy that overcomes all the cynicism and sad logic of our world.
“…am I not free to do as I wish … Are you envious because I am generous?” 
Follow The Alternate Path on WordPress.com

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Previous Posts

  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • April 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • December 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • April 2008
  • March 2008
  • February 2008
  • January 2008
  • December 2007
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • September 2007

Popular Posts

  • mcummins2172.files.wordpr…
  • mcummins2172.files.wordpr…

Blog at WordPress.com.

  • Follow Following
    • The Alternate Path
    • Join 146 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • The Alternate Path
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...