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Live
Letters Thirty-second
Sunday in Ordinary Time |
The Catholic Telegraph
November 9, 2001Last Sunday’s reading consisted of the end of the beginning and the beginning of the middle of II Thessalonians. This Sunday’s reading is composed of the ending of the central portion of the letter (in which the author set out his teaching about the signs of the coming of the parousia) and the beginning of its conclusion (in which the author presents practical exhortations).
He has been describing the trials that are to come before the final return of Christ and reassuring the Thessalonians of their calling to glory.
As this Sunday’s reading begins, Paul is summing up his reassurance of the Thessalonians. He prays that the Lord who has already given them His love and encouragement and hope will continue to give them ongoing fortitude and stamina in doing good. (This call for persistence and stability in living out their Christian life is one of the recurrent themes of II Thessalonians.)
Next our reading offers us the opening of the concluding section of the letter in which the author deals with practical applications of the teaching he has offered them. This Sunday’s reading offers us two of these exhortations. A third one will constitute next Sunday’s live letter.
The author asks his hearers first of all to pray for him. He reminds them how productive God’s work had been in their midst and invites them to ask God to make it equally productive elsewhere. He also asks them to pray for God’s protection for him from evil and faithless people.
The mention of people without faith triggers the next item the author wants to talk about: the faithfulness of God. "Not all people have faith, but God is faithful." He invites them to be reassured of God’s protection of them. Then he has still more to say about perseverance. He is confident that they are already carrying out his instructions, and that they will continue to do so. He hopes that their hearts will be directed toward the love of God and toward the steadfast faithfulness of Christ.
Encouragement, hope, strength, continuing in faithfulness, endurance in responding to the demands of faith: these are the things to which II Thessalonians calls its addressees. This is a letter about perseverance and steadfastness, and therein lies its significance for us.
These readings serve to remind us that having faith is not a matter of a one-time burst of enthusiasm, but of ongoing dedication.
Of course it is true that God’s relationship with us rests on what we might call "surprise interventions," on one-time, non-repeatable events that change the whole direction of reality. Such "surprise interventions" include creation, the incarnation of the divine Son of God in human nature, Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, and (still to occur) the final coming of Christ to judge the living and the dead at the end of time. These are all unique events that depend entirely on God’s initiative. They are unpredictable and we can’t make them happen. They take place in ways and times that God has chosen. They constitute the foundations of our faith and hope, the rationale for our love of God and neighbor.
Most of our life of faith, however, is spent in responding to and assimilating these cosmic surprises. God calls us not just to waiting for the next surprise to occur but to be active in carrying out the implications of what God has already done, in digesting the gifts that have already been given us. To be sure, nothing can happen without the breathtaking energy and creativity of God. But God’s undertakings will not reach their fulfillment unless we do our part in making them our own. The Thessalonians’ mistake did not consist in their looking forward to the second coming of Christ, but in their putting everything else on hold while they waited.
In this interim time between the basic acts of salvation that took place in the context of Jesus’ life and the final completion of redemption in Christ’s parousia we are called to be Church. We are called to ongoing and patient incorporation of ourselves in the life of the risen Christ that we began to live in baptism. We are also called to making this life of Christ appealing and accessible to others. All this takes place not in intermittent and random spurts of fervor, but in days and years of steady responsiveness, in days and years of ongoing encouragement of others to share what we ourselves have been given. Of course waiting for the end is part of our Christian faith, but we are called to be busy while we wait.
It’s all God’s doing. It’s all God’s initiative. It all happens on God’s schedule, and it’s not over yet. The Thessalonians thought they had God’s schedule all figured out and that they could just sit back and wait. They were wrong. We don’t have God’s schedule figured out any more than they did, but at least we know that, while everything isn’t over yet, there is plenty for us to do in the meantime.
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Conversation Questions.
Does waiting for the parousia play any part in my spirituality?
What contributions do I make to the Church’s ongoing mission?
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