After a lengthy absence away from the blog I'm back, and I'm ready for what the summer may bring me. Hopefully, this will mean that I will have a daily opportunity to update with new material--perhaps several times a day--ranging from blogging the news, the daily readings, and my homilies and reflections in general.
What I do usually during the summer is to stay home with my children while both they and I take a break from school. This summer may be a little different in that in addition to my break from work I am also seeking a new job for next year, perhaps even discerning a different type of work. My philosophy has always been to pray for God's will to be done. This is a prayer that I have found to be highly effective. The secret is learning to trust.
Something that I noticed in today's readings from the Mass has to do with offering the sacrifice of praise. More than one time in my life I have had it suggested to me that a secret in our prayer life is to praise the Lord. I have learned that it isn't so much that our praising God is some kind of secret formula for getting what we want; rather, praising God in every imaginable situation shows our willingness to accept that God's justice is being carried out in our daily lives. Moreover, offering praise to God has more to do with what we are doing in our lives than anything that we might think to say.
Sirach 35:2 shows us the truest meaning of the sacrifice of praise. It is a meaning that we may not have yet considered. Actually, having come from a Pentecostal background I felt strongly that offering praise only meant lifting my voice to God and literally singing praises to the eternal and blessed One. Certainly, this is also part of our Catholic experience in liturgy and worship. However, the deeper meaning of things is something that we always should seek, and praise has a deeper meaning than its surface context.
Clearly the praise that God desires from us is that we seek and do justice. The work of justice is something that I have given a lot of time, energy, and thought to in the past. Justice is what God desires from us as an everyday way of relating to one another and living, but it doesn't have to be that we consider the work of justice to be anything extra to our daily life in Christ. We are called to offer justice as the sacrifice of praise in every moment of our living whether it is during our summer vacation or in the midst of our busy daily existence.
Justice speaks clearest to us that God repays us fairly, and that we offer fairness and right judgment in our daily affairs with others. Truly God knows the depths of our hearts and sees our innermost place. Truly God rewards us justly. With this knowledge even more do we have reason to seek God's will and to be willing to carry it out as our life's work and calling.
dd, I was reading the Sirach link, and was wondering if you could tell me what you think it means when he says, "to avoid injustice is an atonement". I don't understand what he's getting at. Thanks!
Posted by: Gabrielle | June 03, 2007 at 12:36 AM
What you think it means when he says, "to avoid injustice is an atonement".
The word atonement means the same as sacrifice, in the same way that Christ was the atonement for our sins. Keep in mind here the custom or religious practice of sacrificial sin offering.
Compare the Sirach passage to Isaiah 1: 11, 16-17, especially verse 16.
Keeping the commandments, doing good deeds and avoiding injustice are the true sacrifice and worship.
In his use of "avoid" I doubt that he means refraining occasionally or sometimes like when I avoid sweets. Rather, to avoid injustice is to do something to make it different. Often I avoid something by planning ahead and using preventative measures.
Finally, there's another comparison in Isaiah--33:14-15. Here we can apply what Isaiah says and ascertain that avoiding injustice can also mean to have nothing to do with it.
By living a life that seeks justice we live a life of holiness and we become collaborative partners with God in our atonement or salvation: through the works of justice we cover or blot out a multitude of sins.
Posted by: Deacon DW | June 03, 2007 at 09:46 AM
I've thought that whatever occasion of injustice we opt to not commit in honor of God or Love, even if it's small, even if it seems richly deserved or that we can justify it to the nth degree.. He of the freely given manna and of freely rejected earthly loaves in a hungry desert of tempation, Who was, is, and to the end of the age will be our very Bread of Life..is able to take that bit of goodwill and "feed" 5000 with that better choice. (Well, this sort of thinking keeps me from trying to give people directions to Boston.)
But Sirach is saying it can also be a personal atonement. I'd never thought of it that way, but of course, I rarely think that seriously about my own sin. Good heavens, I need to re-read Sirach. I forget how good is God.
Posted by: Gypsy | June 03, 2007 at 08:07 PM
Thank you Deacon Dan, and hello gypsy!
I will need to ponder this, and read Sirach and the Isaiah references you mentioned, dd. I must admit, I am a little confused about the "praise as sacrifice" also. I can't recall ever hearing anyone speak of it that way before. I need quiet time. (Like that's gonna happen...) :)
Posted by: Gabrielle | June 04, 2007 at 12:52 AM