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PAGE 5-May 20,1976
Jesus’ Manifestation
Of Power During Earthly Life
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BY STEVE LANDREGAN
The rupture between God and man that
Jesus reconciled had four dimensions described
by Father Walter J. Burghardt, S.J., in his
excellent little book “Towards Reconciliation.”
“In the first place there is disunity between
man and nature .. . This disunity between man
and nature is a symbol and to some extent an
effect, of the disunity that exists within man
himself . .. This disunity within man himself is
a symbol and to some extent a cause, of the
disunity that prevails between man and man . ..
All these disunities, man and nature, man
himself, man and man, are but a symptom, and
in great measure an effect, of the most tragic
disunity of all: the rupture between man and
God.”
We have mentioned earlier that to the Jew of
Jesus’ time the Kingdom of God was seen as a
period when man would once again live in
harmony with God, with his neighbor, with
himself and with the created world about him.
Man’s struggle with nature; his constant
battle against the elements; the terror of
drought, of flood; the ever-present threat of
blight or infestation; the scourage of wild
animals, poisonous reptiles, insects, were all
seen by biblical man as manifestations of divine
punishment.
Conversely the advent of Shalom, the
Messianic Kingdom, was to be marked by the
restoration of harmony. “Then the wolf shall
be a guest of the lamb and the leopard shall lie
down with the kid; The calf and the young lion
shall browse together, and a little child to guide
them. The cow and the bear shall be neighbors,
together their young shall rest; the lion shall eat
hay like the ox. The baby shall play by the
cobra’s den, and the child lay his hand on the
adder’s lair. There shall be no harm or ruin on
all my holy mountain” (Is 11:6-9).
St. Paul writes: “we know that all creation
groans in agony even until now.”
Thus it is that the nature miracles in the
Gospel signal the beginning of a restoration of
the harmony of nature, just as the exorcisms,
healings and raising of Jesus signalled the
inbreak of the time when every tear would be
wiped away.
The raging sea responds to Jesus’ rebuke
(Mark 4:37-41), in an incident that bears
striking similarity to Jesus rebuking sickness or
driving out demons. Jesus walks on water and is
recognized by the Apostles, he orders them out
to sea for a miraculous catch of fish, he feeds
crowds of 4,000 and 5,000 in the wilderness, in
miracles that the Gospels see as conveying the
full messianic significance of Christ and
challenging men to faith.
Another sign of a different sort was the
cleansing or purging of the Temple by Jesus.
This story as told by John (2:13-22) and the
other Evangelists has two dimensions. One is
the fulfillment of an Old Testament prophecy
(Zee 14:21) the other is that of a prophecy of
Christ concerning the new temple.
At passover time, Jesus, angered by the
presence of sacrificial animal booths, money
changers, and others in the Temple drove the
merchants out. Challenging Jesus, those in the
Temple asked him, “What sign can you show us
authorizing you to do these things?”
Jesus replied, “Destroy this Temple and in
three days I will build it up.” His reply referred
to the destruction of Herod’s Temple by the
Romans, but beyond that it referred, John tells
us, to the Temple of his Body. His prophecy
points to His death and His resurrection and the
ultimate signs to which all other miracles and
signs of Jesus are but a prelude, the empty
tomb and the Body of the Risen Christ.
One of the great symbols of John the
Evangelist is the Body of the Risen Christ. It is
to be the focus of worship in spirit and truth
(John 4:21f), the spiritual temple from which
flow living waters (7:37-39), and the only
temple in the New Jersualem (Rev. 21:22).
This ultimate sign, like the healings and
raisings of Jesus, like glorious manifestations of
Jesus during His earthly life, like His victory
over the forces of nature, points to the time
when man will be reconciled with God, with
Himself, with his neighbor and all creation and
Jesus, conqueror of all his enemies, will hand
over the Kingdom to the Father (1 Cor. 15:24)
and His disciples will share His glory (Rev.
3:21).
THE CALF AND THE YOUNG LION -- In this article
“Jesus’ Manifestations of Power During Earthly Life,’’ Steve
Landregan writes that to the Jew of Jesus’ time the Kingdom of
God was seen as a period when man would once again live in
harmony with God, with his neighbor, with himself and with
the created world around him. He quotes Isiah, “Then the wolf
shall be a guest of the lamb and the leopard shall lie down with
the kid; The calf and the young lion shall browse together with
a little child to guide them.’’ (NC Sketch by Eric Smith)
r
v.
Jesus’ Power In This World
BY MARY MAHER
Some time ago I stood with a dear friend for
a long time at an open incubator in a Chicago
technology museum and watched chickens
hatch. The first evidence of their desire to be
born in a new way was the eggs’ trembling
movements. The shells were being pecked from
within by the small beaks and being kicked at
by the fragile but lively little legs within. Then
a crack would appear, a beak would make the
crack into a jagged hole and the legs would kick
the hole into a wide passage for exiting. Soon a
wet ball of new life would flop out onto the
earth. It lay impotent for a few minutes. Then
other small chickens would come near to
examine it and would huddle around it,
touching it and drying its down. Gradually it
would get up on one wobbly foot, fall down
and then it would try again and again. Soon it
would be up fully on two feet. In about an
hour it could walk and later even run a wee bit.
Then it could begin to dry out the other
chickens who came as it had come into the
world; a wet, feeble ball of life.
That is what my experience of life tells me
that Jesus’ resurrection is like for me and for
many whom I know.
We have all seen powerful pictures of Jesus
moving through rock and we may tend to think
that this power of His is to be duplicated
likewise in our lives. For most of us, Jesus’
power is not so dramatic, not so spectacular.
It comes in life itself, in our small
movements to break shells of indifference
which surround us and keep us in old life. It
comes in the struggle we have to break through
shells on non-communications that we so desire
to break in order that we may experience
others’ love in more healing ways. It comes as
we help a lost visitor in a city find his bus or an
elcferly gentleman pick up oranges that fell
through his broken grocery sack onto the
sidewalk. It comes as we visit those sick in our
‘hospitals whom no one visits and who live the
loneliness of anonymity. It comes as we join to
celebrate with those who pass exams or find
jobs. Jesus’ power comes as our fragile legs
move to our neighborhood meetings to work
for better schooling or fairer wages or better
garbage collection. It comes as we often, like
newly hatched chicks, lie and wait, fresh with
new insights about ourselves but ones which we
need friends to help us live. We ourselves also
wait for Jesus’ power to move in close to us
with our brothers’ comfort, care and concern.
Jesus’ power waits to break through our
excuses for not reaching out to others who
suffer because we are already too busy doing
his work. Jesus’ power comes as we walk out of
fears which we have which both comfort us
with their familiarity and paralyze us with their
infantile possibilities. Jesus’ power comes as we
run to others in. our joy, in our love, in our
concern, in our pain, in our confusion, in our
woundedness. It was the original resurrection
that flooded a world with tenderness and not
rock-shattering magic.
Power is a funny, broken work in our
culture. It is often perceived to be that selfish
dynamic which exists when men will not share
and when thousands of their brothers live in
powerless conditions of poverty because wealth
speaks so strongly that it paralyzes the will of
others to create against its tyranny. Jesus’
power is very different than most power we see
around us today. It is so tender, so outreaching
and often so quiet. It makes no pretense, needs
neither filmstrip nor billboard to verify it; in
fact, it doesn’t even need a bumper sticker to
help us remember it. It blesses others in
beatitude that comes of giving hands and caring
eyes and careful listening. It is a strong power
because it comes from a strong Lord. It is
unlike that weak power which decays weak
men by their own deception of strength.
Jesus lives in this world in His power. The
tomb that He may ask us first to allow
shattered is our unbelief that indeed He is here
in every action where men love others with
Gospel delicacy.
Chickens or cross or crises — what power but
the power of Life itself allows the broken tomb
or shell or situation?
ST. PAUL, Father Alfred McBride
writes, spent part of his life in Corinth
which was the sex capital of the world.
To the sex minded commercial
Corinthians, Paul spoke not as a man
submerged in erotic passion, but one
on fire with moral passion. In a modern
day American “Corinth,” a man strolls
down a Washington street oblivious of
the adult book store close by. A trash
container makes an ironic silent plea.
(NC Photo by Bob Strawn)
* ' ^
Paul: Amazing Grace
i- ^
BY FATHER ALFRED MCBRIDE, O.PRAEM.
The second Vatican Council, unlike the 20
Councils that preceded it, did not concern itself
with heresies and false interpretations of the
teachings of Jesus. It undertook the joyful task
of making Easter real for the whole world. The
Council Fathers gathered to make the pastoral
ministry of the Church a reality for every
culture under heaven. It dedicated itself to
making the timeless message and presence of
Jesus a timely and true offering of forgiveness
and hope to every human being.
It was just such a colossal task that “one
Council Father” of apostolic day, St. Paul
dared to undertake and achieve. To him befell
the vocation to translate the singular, culture
bound understanding of Jesus into Greek and
Roman forms. He took the events of a small
Jewish colony in the world’s backwater and
translated them for continental Europe. He
spoke to the intellectuals of Athens, the sex
conscious and commercial Corinthians and the
legal minded Romans.
To the wise people of Athens, he spoke of
the wisdom of Christ. Taking time to appreciate
their poets, philosophers, playwrights and
architects, he built an argument from images
familiar to them to one that was unfamiliar,
namely, the wisdom of the living God that
found expression in the human humiliation of
Jesus and Christ’s victory over death. While he
was not overly successful with the reason
bound people of Athens, he did convert some,
and left us the legacy of remembering the care
he took to translate pastorally the Jewish
vocabulary and imagery of the Gospels into a
meaningful message for a new culture. (Read
Acts 17)
To the sex minded and commercial
Corinthians he spoke not as a man submerged
in erotic passion, but one on fire with moral
passion. What did he see in Corinth? As he
walked through their streets he brushed
shoulders with sailors, soldiers, merchants,
police and government officials from all over
the empire. He could attend the Isthmian
games, a kind of local Olympics, from which he
would draw images for his letters and sermons.
He also saw plenty of sexual freedom.
Corinth was the sex capital of the world.
Leering conversations the world over spoke of
“living like a Corinthian,” meaning “Anything
goes.” A “Corinthinan girl” meant a “call girl.”
The lusty sailors worshiped Aphrodite so they
would have good luck in their gamy adventures.
Paul could see her temple towering over the
city from a 1,700 foot cliff. He knew that
1,000 “priestesses” served her as well as local
members of the male population.
Paul did not flinch at condemning such self
indulgence, but he spoke more passionately
about the saving power of Jesus, alive and ready
to awaken them to the dignity of their
body-persons, vessels of the Holy Spirit and
destined to a freedom from all self defeating
obsession. It is to this flesh ridden population
that Paul confides the first text we have of the
Body of Christ in Eucharist and in Church. As
he went to the Athenians in lofty intellectual
terms, so he changed gears and spoke to the
Corinthians in down-to-earth human and
pastoral words.
To the legal minded, institutional and
organizational Romans, Paul spoke of faith and
grace. Just as reason alone would not save the
Athenians, nor money and sex the Corinthians,
neither would legal genius save the Romans. He
could speak from the long history of Hebrew
experience with law’s limitations. A real
Hebrew was the child of Abraham, the believer
who trusted in the grace of God.
Paul’s words rang with the prophetic
dissatisfaction with legalism that so obscured
the beauty of faith and grace. It’s not that Paul
saw no use for organization and law. Roman
organization had built the very roads that
helped Paul travel with directness and ease.
Roman law had imposed a necessary stability.
And Paul was not above giving rules and orders
himself, and organizing missions. No, Paul was
not against law, but he was opposed to seeing it
as the repository of salvation.
The organ like tones of his majestic Epistle
to the Romans is a hymn to the unbelievable
grace of having a living Christ present now to
offer a forgiveness no law could provide. Again
Paul’s genius translated the Gospel in terms of
the dominating image of a Roman culture. He
began with law and ended with grace. What a
pastor! What a model for the gift handed to us
by Vatican II!
It is an Amazing Grace with sound so sweet
that it could provide us yet with an astonishing
religious revival.
Know
Your Faith
(All Articles On This Page Copyrighted 1976 by N.C. News Service)