CONTRAST IS
A GREAT TEACHER
A GREAT TEACHER
OPENING IMAGE
Everything always went right for Bob; everything always came easy. That is, till he had a stroke. And the stroke hit him and hit him hard. It was the first time he was ever in a hospital, that is, since his birth. His health was another one of those things he always bragged about, something he always prided himself in.
Well now, here he was in a hospital. Here he was in a room with someone else—someone “lower” than himself. Obviously, Joan, Bob’s wife, wanted him in a private room. They had the money. They had the insurance for the best health care in the world. However, the doctors stressed the value of sharing a room with someone else, “He’ll learn so much more by recovering with someone else.”
For the first few days Bob was hardly able to speak and hardly able to cope. His brain, his whole body, all was numb—dumb. All was moving in slow motion. He had lost control: he leaked; he drooled; he cried. His systems had let go. And as he lay there, he slowly began to realize that he too was going to have to learn to let go. That’s difficult when everything always worked the way they’re supposed to work.
Growing up, school came easy to him. Without cracking the books, without his parents or teachers having to crack the whip, he was always at the top of his class in grammar school, high school, and college.
Life came easy to him: a good job, a good family, a good neighborhood. Bob had the American Dream. Everything he did was a piece of cake and he got to eat it as well.
Contrast is a great teacher.
In the bed next to him was Jose. What a contrast! Jose: short, squat, bus driver, as well as a taxi cab driver on the side. Bob: tall, thin, business executive and Mercedes driver, golf and bridge player on the side.
Contrast is a great teacher.
Then there were their wives: Lourdes and Joan. Every afternoon around 2:00 o’clock in came Jose’s wife, Lourdes. She always wore her blue bloated down jacket and a beautiful smile. She waddled in with her shopping bags of stuff: everything from soup to rice and beans. Next came Joan, usually around 3:00. It’s a longer trip from suburbia. Sometimes, depending on where she was coming from, she would be wearing her soft white coat or her green suede jacket or her long tan overcoat.
Contrast is a great teacher.
Classes began. School started.
Two weeks later things had changed. Bob and Jose got to know each other—first by looks, then by waves, then by words. Both had major strokes, but luckily for both, the stroke was on their left side, so both were able to speak. In time all four—husbands and wives—talked—moving from small talk to healing talk. A stoke is a handicap and as in golf a handicap can be a great equalizer.
Physical therapy was aggressive. This was the doctors' and therapists' big stress: “We’re going to push and push hard. We have discovered that aggressive physical therapy as soon as possible after a stroke is the most important thing we can do for a stroke patient. The sooner the better. And we think our PT, Physical Therapy Department, and our OT, Occupational Therapy Department, are the best in the state.”
However, it was their kids who were the greatest teachers. Bob and Joan had 2 kids: both married, neither of whom had kids. Jose and Lourdes had their 8 kids and those 8 kids each seemed to have 6, 7 or 8 kids each. Sunday afternoons, when all showed up, chairs were out of the question. Bob and Jose’s room was as crowded as a tenement apartment. They had to move to the lounge—which both families soon took over. It was Bob and Joan’s first introduction to real Spanish food and Spanish culture and Spanish family life. “Mi casa, su casa” was the menu of the day. Soon all were laughing as they were eating Spanish food on paper plates with plastic knives and plastic forks that had come out of stained brown paper bags.
Contrast is a great teacher.
Then came the homework. As the weeks rolled on, it was at night that Bob began to do his homework. He gave himself poor grades as he compared his life to Jose’s.
Both men talked. Bob told Jose how lucky he was to have such beautiful children and grandchildren. He said how much he liked Miguel, Jose’s little 2 year old grandson. Jose added, “Isn’t he such a funny character?” Bob added, “Watching your family, I see how wrong I’ve been about people who live in the city and in apartment houses. I now see how important the things in life you can’t buy are: kisses, hugs, humor, laughter, children and grandchildren. Wow! When I walk out of this hospital, I’m going to be walking out a new person, Jose. Thanks. Oops. Muchas gracias.”
HOMILETIC REFLECTIONS
In today’s gospel we listened to one of Jesus’ great parables: the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. “Two men went up to the temple to pray: one was a Pharisee, the other a tax collector.”
In today’s gospel Jesus uses contrast. Contrast is a great teacher. And Jesus, the great teacher, is constantly trying to reach us and teach us by the use of contrasts, by the use of comparisons.
If contrasts and comparisons can get us to buy athletic shoes or diet food, why not use it to get us to change our attitudes?
Jesus aimed his parable at the Pharisee within each of us. Jesus throws this parable to us today to get us to think about how we view each other.
The Pharisee came into the temple not to praise God but to praise himself. The Pharisee came into the temple not only to put himself on a pedestal, but to put others in the basement. “I give you thanks, O God, that I am not like the rest of the people around here—grasping, crooked, adulterous—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I pay tithes on all I possess.”
The Tax Collector, the “sinner”, went to the temple to pray. When he walked into the presence of God, he realized by contrast his sinfulness. Contrast is a great teacher. He felt the vast difference between himself and God. He kept his distance and prayed, “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.”
Then Jesus hits us with the message. Then Jesus gives us his teaching, once more by using contrast. The Tax Collector, the sinner, the other man, Jesus says, went home from the temple justified, but the other man did not. “For all those who exalt themselves shall be humbled, while they who humble themselves shall be exalted.”
PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS
When are we going to learn this great lesson from life?
For most people, it’s probably one of those things we learn in the second half of life.
As St. Paul puts it in today’s second reading to Timothy, “It’s going to be after the fight is over and after the race is run.”
Isn’t that when most people really learn about life: after the race; after the fight; event; after the mistake; after the fall; in the winter of life?
Isn’t it when we are young and strong, rich and self-righteous, that we don’t listen and don’t learn? Aren’t those our Pharisee years?
And isn’t it when we are older and weaker, when we start to experience our body falling apart, that we begin to see what life is all about?
For Bob in today’s opening story, wasn’t it the time in his life when he was humbled by a stroke that his mind began to get exalted thoughts? Wasn’t the hospital his greatest classroom? Wasn’t Jose and his family his greatest teachers?
Doesn’t everyone say, “I never appreciated my health till I lost it.” Don’t we all hear people say, “I never appreciated my wife or husband till I lost her or him” Sickness gets us to sort out who and what’s really important in life.
Conclusion: As we heard in today’s first reading, isn’t it when we are weak and feel like an orphan or a widow that we finally begin to realize that God is listening to us and we ought to be listening to God? Isn’t the purpose of coming into this church, this temple, this hospital, to learn, to pray, to listen, to be emptied of ourselves and to walk out filled with a greater awareness of God and exalted thoughts about our neighbor?
“For all those who exalt themselves shall be humbled, while they who humble themselves shall be exalted.”
Two weeks later things had changed. Bob and Jose got to know each other—first by looks, then by waves, then by words. Both had major strokes, but luckily for both, the stroke was on their left side, so both were able to speak. In time all four—husbands and wives—talked—moving from small talk to healing talk. A stoke is a handicap and as in golf a handicap can be a great equalizer.
Physical therapy was aggressive. This was the doctors' and therapists' big stress: “We’re going to push and push hard. We have discovered that aggressive physical therapy as soon as possible after a stroke is the most important thing we can do for a stroke patient. The sooner the better. And we think our PT, Physical Therapy Department, and our OT, Occupational Therapy Department, are the best in the state.”
However, it was their kids who were the greatest teachers. Bob and Joan had 2 kids: both married, neither of whom had kids. Jose and Lourdes had their 8 kids and those 8 kids each seemed to have 6, 7 or 8 kids each. Sunday afternoons, when all showed up, chairs were out of the question. Bob and Jose’s room was as crowded as a tenement apartment. They had to move to the lounge—which both families soon took over. It was Bob and Joan’s first introduction to real Spanish food and Spanish culture and Spanish family life. “Mi casa, su casa” was the menu of the day. Soon all were laughing as they were eating Spanish food on paper plates with plastic knives and plastic forks that had come out of stained brown paper bags.
Contrast is a great teacher.
Then came the homework. As the weeks rolled on, it was at night that Bob began to do his homework. He gave himself poor grades as he compared his life to Jose’s.
Both men talked. Bob told Jose how lucky he was to have such beautiful children and grandchildren. He said how much he liked Miguel, Jose’s little 2 year old grandson. Jose added, “Isn’t he such a funny character?” Bob added, “Watching your family, I see how wrong I’ve been about people who live in the city and in apartment houses. I now see how important the things in life you can’t buy are: kisses, hugs, humor, laughter, children and grandchildren. Wow! When I walk out of this hospital, I’m going to be walking out a new person, Jose. Thanks. Oops. Muchas gracias.”
HOMILETIC REFLECTIONS
In today’s gospel we listened to one of Jesus’ great parables: the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. “Two men went up to the temple to pray: one was a Pharisee, the other a tax collector.”
In today’s gospel Jesus uses contrast. Contrast is a great teacher. And Jesus, the great teacher, is constantly trying to reach us and teach us by the use of contrasts, by the use of comparisons.
If contrasts and comparisons can get us to buy athletic shoes or diet food, why not use it to get us to change our attitudes?
Jesus aimed his parable at the Pharisee within each of us. Jesus throws this parable to us today to get us to think about how we view each other.
The Pharisee came into the temple not to praise God but to praise himself. The Pharisee came into the temple not only to put himself on a pedestal, but to put others in the basement. “I give you thanks, O God, that I am not like the rest of the people around here—grasping, crooked, adulterous—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I pay tithes on all I possess.”
The Tax Collector, the “sinner”, went to the temple to pray. When he walked into the presence of God, he realized by contrast his sinfulness. Contrast is a great teacher. He felt the vast difference between himself and God. He kept his distance and prayed, “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.”
Then Jesus hits us with the message. Then Jesus gives us his teaching, once more by using contrast. The Tax Collector, the sinner, the other man, Jesus says, went home from the temple justified, but the other man did not. “For all those who exalt themselves shall be humbled, while they who humble themselves shall be exalted.”
PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS
When are we going to learn this great lesson from life?
For most people, it’s probably one of those things we learn in the second half of life.
As St. Paul puts it in today’s second reading to Timothy, “It’s going to be after the fight is over and after the race is run.”
Isn’t that when most people really learn about life: after the race; after the fight; event; after the mistake; after the fall; in the winter of life?
Isn’t it when we are young and strong, rich and self-righteous, that we don’t listen and don’t learn? Aren’t those our Pharisee years?
And isn’t it when we are older and weaker, when we start to experience our body falling apart, that we begin to see what life is all about?
For Bob in today’s opening story, wasn’t it the time in his life when he was humbled by a stroke that his mind began to get exalted thoughts? Wasn’t the hospital his greatest classroom? Wasn’t Jose and his family his greatest teachers?
Doesn’t everyone say, “I never appreciated my health till I lost it.” Don’t we all hear people say, “I never appreciated my wife or husband till I lost her or him” Sickness gets us to sort out who and what’s really important in life.
Conclusion: As we heard in today’s first reading, isn’t it when we are weak and feel like an orphan or a widow that we finally begin to realize that God is listening to us and we ought to be listening to God? Isn’t the purpose of coming into this church, this temple, this hospital, to learn, to pray, to listen, to be emptied of ourselves and to walk out filled with a greater awareness of God and exalted thoughts about our neighbor?
“For all those who exalt themselves shall be humbled, while they who humble themselves shall be exalted.”
© Markings
Homiletic Reflections
30 Sunday OT C
Oct. 29, 1995
Andy Costello, CSSR
1 comment:
Thanks again Father Andy for the delicious food for healthy thought.
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