Decision, decisions, decisions—life is
full of them. Pancakes or waffles? Coke or Pepsi? Boxers or briefs? In a country
that’s blessed with many choices, scientists say that we make some 35,000
decisions a day. Occasionally, they’re monumental, some are important, but most
are trivial. Our faith life is full of decisions, too, but every one of them
has eternal consequences. Our readings this evening make that clear.
In our first reading, Joshua’s pretty
blunt when he calls for a take-it-or-leave-it commitment from the Israelites. “Choose
either the God who brought you through the desert or the attractive gods around
you.”
As the Israelites wandered through the desert and entered the Promised Land,
they interacted and sometimes even assimilated with the cultures they
encountered. As a result, their commitment to the God of Abraham waned over
time, and Joshua would have none of it. He “demanded that they pledge absolute
commitment to the God of the Exodus,”
and the Israelites faced a difficult decision. Likewise, in our Gospel, the disciples face a
difficult decision. Jesus just told them that they must eat his flesh and drink
his blood to have life within them, and they rightfully point out that “this
saying is hard; who can accept it?” Many decide to leave him, but the Twelve
choose wisely, acknowledging that only Jesus has the words of eternal life.
The Christian message challenges human existence on every
level. It demands “an act of surrender to Christ, an acceptance of him as the
final authority; and it demands a moral standard of the highest level.”
That’s a lot to ask, and Jesus knows it, but he also knows that the rewards are
out of this world. It’s up to us, then, to discern what the demands of
Christianity mean for us, especially the difficult parts, and make a decision.
Our second reading from Saint Paul’s Letter to the
Ephesians is a great example of a difficult teaching, at least for half of us, which
is probably why it’s the most avoided passage in the Lectionary. “Wives should be
subordinate to their husbands.” Many preachers choose the shorter option from
the Lectionary to avoid this language, but not your fearless preacher. It’s
part of Scripture, so I don’t think we should avoid it. So at the risk of being
run out of town on a rail, I’d like for us to consider the passage together.
Controversial Bible passages challenge
us to make difficult decisions. Will we accept them as containing revelatory truth
or dismiss them as patently wrong or anachronistic? Will we take them at face
value even if it produces an absurd result or delve deeper to find the true
meaning behind the text? Saint Paul’s statement about women being subordinate is
controversial for good reason—it’s been manipulated for millennia to subject
women to patriarchal structures, domination, and abuse. These injustices are
particularly poignant today as we watch the Taliban take control of Afghanistan,
threatening women’s rights and lives in their wake.
So how do we interpret a difficult passage like this? First,
we have to understand the text in its context. This passage reflects the patriarchal
structure of first-century society, norms that are no longer acceptable in many
societies today. Rather than getting all huffy with the text, we have to
appreciate that Paul’s using words that his culture would understand. Scripture
speaks to all times, though, so these first-century cultural influences aren’t
essential to finding the truth of God’s Revelation in the passage. We need to
look beyond them to find the meaning behind the text. We also have to remember
that it’s believed that Saint Paul wasn’t married, so he didn’t have a wife to
help him choose his words more carefully.
Second, we have to appreciate what this passage can’t
mean. We, as Catholics, accept the Bible as true,
but not always as literally true. For example, through scientific
discovery we know that the universe wasn’t created in seven days, as we hear in
Genesis, a fact that’s in no way inconsistent with the revealed truth that God
created everything in God’s time. Biblical passages must be understood, then, in
the light of faith and reason, “the two wings on which the human spirit rises
to the contemplation of truth.”
On the faith side, scriptural interpretations have to be consistent with Scripture
as a whole. As a result, any interpretation that contravenes the revealed truth
that God created each of us equally, regardless of gender, race, creed, and
color, or that denies the dignity that God bestowed on every human being can’t
be true. On the reason side, scriptural interpretations can’t produce absurd
results, so manipulating a passage to abuse or control another person can’t be true
either. The Christian message, and, therefore, this passage, isn’t about control
and abuse; it’s about love, so every Bible passage and every Church teaching must
be interpreted in the light of love.
Bearing in mind the cultural influences, faith, and
reason, we have to delve deeper into what the text really means. This passage
is part of Saint Paul’s Household Code, teachings intended to promote family harmony
with Jesus Christ as our model. You’ll note that the passage opens by saying, “Be
subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ.” That language sets the
standard for the whole passage. It’s calling each of us, female and
male, to be subordinate to each other, as Christ subordinated himself throughout
his life, passion, and death. Although the vocabulary differs, wives and
husbands are held to the same standard in our text—the standard of Jesus’
perfect example, the standard of humble, self-sacrificing love that never
imposes its will on another. Read in the light of love, then, our passage reveals
that women should offer humble, self-sacrificing love to their husbands, and
husbands should offer humble, self-sacrificing love to their wives. I don’t know
about you, but as the father of two young women, the meaning behind the text makes
my decision to accept it as the revealed Word of God much easier.
The Christian life is full of decisions. Today’s
readings alone challenge us to decide which God we’re going to follow, how we react
to difficult texts and teachings, and whether we’re going to follow Jesus or
leave him. Jesus asks us today and every day of our lives the same question he posed
to the Apostles: “Do you also want to leave?” Nothing less than eternal life
with God hinges on our response. Decisions, decisions, decisions.
Readings: Joshua 24:1-2a, 15-17,18b; Psalm 34; Ephesians 5:21-32; John 6:60-69
Mary
McGlone, “Scandalously Ordinary,” National Catholic Reporter 57, 22
(August 6, 2021), 19.
