Most often when a person embarks on a project that has great meaning and value for him, and when he foresees that he will need others to help him complete the project, he will attempt to persuade them by making promises of what rewards and benefits will be in it for them. If the people see sufficient returns for themselves, they may go along with it and join the undertaking, and if they don’t deem it sufficiently rewarding, they will refuse. The point is that the one whose project it is often must prove to others the advantages that will accrue to them if they join up. Certainly, this makes sense. Most people would consider it unrealistic simply to throw in with somebody if they didn’t know a thing about the person or they had no real idea of what he had in mind or what he intended to do. If they knew nothing about his life and background, they would likely refuse. They want to enter the endeavor with “their eyes open.” In this way, they would minimize any risk or loss to themselves.
In the Gospel, we see none of this attempt by Christ to prove to or demonstrate to his first followers return that they might gain by following him. The two disciples asked him, “Rabbi, where are you staying?” Our Lord simply said, “Come and see.” The response of Christ to the disciples is a simple invitation to join him. It is as though if it were necessary for Christ to give an explanation about himself, it would be a kind of sellout or betrayal of what he stood for and what his mission was. And so, he simply invites them to come after him. The final choice about whether they stay or not is surely theirs. We see, then, that the response of the two disciples is one of simple and complete faith. “They came and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day.”
This idea of freedom on the one side and trust on the other seems to be at the very essence of the Christian vocation. Obviously, one’s vocation in life cannot be forced on him, or if it is, it often has negative results. If a person does not truly invest in or even care about what he is doing, and it is simply a matter of “going along” with it, then at the end, he can turn out to be bitter and disillusioned. His commitment must be freely given and given on faith, rather than on proof.
There is a tendency in all of us before we jump into any new venture, or enter a different way of life, to weigh the pros and cons carefully. We like to know, with as much certainty as we can, “what is in it” for us, and what will be the outcome.
This Gospel lesson is so appropriate considering the violence that occurred at our Nation’s Capitol Building on Jan. 6. As I previously stated, when a person embarks on a project that has great meaning and value for him, and when he foresees that he will need others to help him complete the project, he will attempt to persuade them by making promises of what rewards and benefits will be in it for them. It seems that this has been the erroneous choice of our former president and many of his political allies. Their attempt to persuade people to see sufficient returns for themselves and to join the undertaking erupted into an act of sedition, violence and a blatant disrespect for human life.
On that day and those that followed I could only offer prayers for the people of our nation who were shaken by the siege on our Congress and to pray for the five people who lost their lives when protesters stormed the Capitol. It would do us well to remember the words of Pope Francis in this regard. Remarking on the events, our pope insisted that “violence is always self-destructive. Nothing is gained by violence and so much is lost. Violence must always be condemned.”
He then went on to urge government leaders and the entire population to maintain a high sense of responsibility in order to soothe tempers, promote national reconciliation and protect the democratic values rooted in American society.
In addition to the comments of Pope Francis, I was also intrigued by the commentary made by Arnold Schwarzenegger, who likened the attempt by Donald Trump’s supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol to Kristallnacht when more than 100 Jews were killed as Nazis rampaged through Germany and Austria.
In a seven-minute address on Twitter, the Austrian-born film star and former Republican Governor of California gave a withering and emotional condemnation of the rampage on the Capitol building. He said, “I grew up in Austria. I’m very aware of Kristallnacht, or the Night of Broken Glass. It was a night of rampage against the Jews carried out in 1938 by the Nazi equivalent of the Proud Boys. Wednesday was the Day of Broken Glass right here in the United States.”
Kristallnacht was fueled by lies and deceptions. It appears that our former president and his allies followed a similar pattern in a bizarre attempt to overturn the results of a fair and just election, misleading people with deception. It was this deception, — claiming that the election had been “stolen” by Joe Biden — which triggered the events of Jan. 6.
Arnold stated, “The broken glass was in the windows of the United States Capitol, but the mob did not just shatter the windows of the Capitol, they shattered the ideas we took for granted. They did not just break down the doors of the building of American democracy. They trampled the very principles on which our country was founded.”
Fears of neo-Nazi involvement in last week’s rampage in Washington, D.C., were heightened by a photograph of one of the rioters wearing a “Camp Auschwitz” sweatshirt. If you have ever been to Auschwitz or Dachau, all you need to do is walk the grounds and you can feel the presence of evil that permeates the area.
As Christians, we are to follow the example of Jesus Christ. When Jesus came, he called his followers to embark on a way of life that would provide great meaning and value for his followers. He knew that he would need our help to complete the project, namely, building the Kingdom of God. As such, he called us to live a life that stands in contradiction to the standards of society. As disciples of Christ we are called to love one another, not hate our brothers and sisters because of differences; we are called to extend mercy and forgiveness to change the hearts of people, and not guns and weapons that destroy human life; we are called to be agents of peace and not vehicles of violence; we are called to work for peace and justice, and never violence and hatred. This is how we continue to build the Kingdom of God, and the reward given to us is never this worldly, but the promise of eternal life.
Therefore, in light of the violence that occurred last week, let us turn to our Blessed Mother, the patroness of the United States of America, to seek her intervention. As we intercede through her to Jesus, let us pray that we might keep alive the culture of life, the culture of caring, the culture of justice, and the culture of peace as the way to build together the common good and the Kingdom of God.
Msgr. Louis Marucci is pastor of Saint Andrew the Apostle Parish, Gibbsboro.
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