CLARITY AND CHARITY
INTRODUCTION
The title of my homily is, “Clarity and Charity!”
As I thought about today’s readings, I could hear Jesus’ clarity – but I wasn’t hearing Jesus’ charity. When that thought hit me, I said, “Uh oh! No! I can’t say that. Jesus is all about love!”
In the bottom half of today’s gospel, you just heard about these three someone’s who come up to Jesus and tell him they will follow him, but …
But I don’t know if I can live a life on the road with no place to call my home. But I have to bury my father. But I got to settle some stuff at home.
TODAY’S GOSPEL
Today’s gospel begins with Jesus beginning an earlier Ascension – his going up to Jerusalem – his journey to Jerusalem. Notice Luke’s words, “resolutely determined to journey to Jerusalem.”
Scripture scholars point out that this text in Luke 9: 51 indicates a turning point in Jesus’ life. Jesus starts to announce the so called, “Hard Sayings of Jesus”.
If you caught that harshness, that hardness, in today’s gospel, you caught it correctly.
Clarity – the theme of clarity – determination – goal – purpose – where have no and’s, if’s and but’s are allowed.
Notice the last saying of Jesus in today’s gospel, “No one who sets a hand to the plow and looks to what was left behind is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Now that’s clarity. Now that’s a straight line. Have you ever been in an airplane and you looked down on a farm with clear, straight, neat, exact row after row after row of corn or soy bean? That’s a farm that means business.
CLARITY AND CHARITY
The title of my homily is, “Clarity and Charity.”
There are four types of people: (1) those who are strong in clarity – but not in charity; (2) those who are strong in charity – but not in clarity; (3) those who are strong in neither; and (4) those who are strong in both clarity and charity.
I came up with that last night as I was working on this homily. Of course, you don’t have to agree with it. My strength is not clarity. I’ve always been more heart than head – better in history and literature, than math or logic. I would never make it as an engineer or computer programmer. My goal in preaching is to try to figure out stuff – to keep on figuring out life. I’m not interested in giving old homilies. And by preaching I figure out new stuff for myself – sometimes by discovering I don’t agree with what I said – but I have to say it – to figure out whether I’m wrong or not clear.
Huh?
Let me try to clarify my 4 types of people:
(1) Haven’t we met people who are very clear – very bull headed – very determined – very exact. They say what they say – and they say it concisely and sometimes bluntly. They know what they want – when they want it – and they are going to try to get it as soon as possible. They go crazy with people who get in their way. They go ballistic with stupid drivers, people on cell phones driving 59 miles an hour in the left lane of a 65 mile per hour road, people who don’t use their signal or what have you when switching lanes. They run a tight ship. They run a clear meeting. They go into the store – get what they want to get – and get out of there as fast as possible – and go bonkers with inefficiency at the check out counter.
(2) Or haven’t we met people who are all heart – all kindness – all chatty –all loving – but they don’t seem to be getting the job done. If they are at the front desk or the front window – the customer or questioner at the desk or the window – is getting heard and getting a smile – and is also being asked about their kids – but those on the line behind – might be inwardly screaming – watch watching – especially if they are off on efficiency and no nonsense clarity much more than charity and chit chat.
(3) Then there are those who are lazy lumps – and don’t seem to jump at anything.
(4) Then there are those who have clear goals – get things done – but are also very kind and loving – a very difficult way to live – but they are doing it. They seem to have balance – are great bosses – but they seem to be rather rare.
NATURE VS. NURTURE
William James [1842-1910], an early American philosopher and psychologist, talked about two types of people: the tough minded and the tender minded.
Are we born either way – or is it a question of how we are brought up and then how we discover and work and develop our qualities, gifts, weaknesses, quirks and personalities?
We’ve all lived and worked with and met – and interacted with – all kinds of people.
Haven’t we all scratched our heads when we have had to deal with people who seem selfish – self centered – self lost – self depressed – self assured – or with a self that seems so different from our self?
Haven’t we all been frustrated with people who seem to want to be difficult?
Years ago I wrote a whole book on this, How To Deal With Difficult People [Liguori 1980]. It’s out of print – but looking back – a few things I came up with helped me back then – but I still don’t get people – especially people I label as different – as difficult – people whom I describe as, “They just don’t get it.”
Some of us go crazy with the first three types of people. Some prefer the lump to the person who is all smiles – or the person who is all talk – all stories - but gives you no action. Some of us go crazy with those who are all clarity – no charity – all truth – their truth – the truth they are very sure of – black and white truth – and they seem to crush and crumble everyone who differs with them. They don’t seem to have ever heard the old Pennsylvania Dutch saying, “You catch more flies with a spoonful of honey than a barrel full of vinegar.” Their bumper sticker reads: “I swat flies with sledge hammers.
TODAY’S OTHER READINGS
I assume that today’s first reading [1 Kings 19: 16b, 19-21] was chosen because it’s has a similar scene to one of the scenes in today’s gospel: someone is called to follow a great prophet. It’s Elisha being called to follow Elijah. Yet the scene is different than the gospel scene because Elisha is allowed first to go home and kiss his mother and father goodbye. It doesn’t have the hard edge of Jesus’ saying to someone whose father had died, “Let the dead bury the dead.”
In today’s second reading [Galatians 5:1, 13-18] – Paul has great clarity and charity when he says, “For the whole law is fulfilled in one statement, namely, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”
Then Paul clearly adds, “But if you go on biting and devouring one another, beware that you are not consumed by one another.”
Haven’t we all seen that happen a dozen times in our life: someone makes their point – and in doing so it stabs the other person?
If I read Paul correctly, I think this is one of his big learnings in life. When he was Saul he was a relentless crusader for the truth – his truth about what God wanted – crushing people like Stephen in the process. When he fell on his face on the way to Damascus in continuing his pursuit of crushing Christians, he came face to face with his blindness and in his blindness he heard a voice other than his own. It was Christ. When Paul rose up, when his sight returned, he slowly got the insight that charity needs to come with clarity.
Paul said, “Speak the truth with love.” [Cf. Ephesians 4:15.] If your motive is not love, don’t tell the other they have bad breath – or stinking thinking. And everyone knows from attending weddings Paul’s great text on love: it’s the greatest virtue. Love is being kind, patient…. Love is not jealous. Love is not rude. In today’s gospel he says there are two kinds of people: those who live by the Spirit and those who live by the flesh. Obviously, the call is to live and be guided by the Spirit.
CONCLUSION
It’s a hard challenge to put into practice: when we speak, speak with both clarity and charity.
It takes work and effort to know our motives – what’s really behind both our words and behind our behavior.
Its hard work to get our motives clear – and to make sure what we’re doing, we’re doing out of love – and not to prove ourselves. Love challenges us to put ourselves into the other’s shoes. It’s the Golden Rule that Paul proclaimed in today’s second reading. Would you want what you’re saying to or about another be said to or about you?
It takes time to have clarity and charity of motive.
It takes time to make sure we’re following the hard sayings of Jesus as well as Paul.
In the meanwhile, life can be messy. It’s difficult to plow straight rows.
Hopefully, we are not like James and John in today’s gospel who want to have lighting strike those whom they disagree with.
Jesus, simply says with great clarity as well as obvious charity, “No, let’s move on to the next village – all the way to Jerusalem.”
