Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXI per Annum C
21 August 2022

For the past few weeks, and for one more still, we are hearing in the second reading from the Letter to the Hebrews.  Two weekends ago Hebrews chapter 11 provided us with a litany of heroes of the faith, passing through Old Testament figures like Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses.  That litany concludes however, not with an Old Testament figure but with the hero who is Jesus Christ, the “leader and perfecter of faith” (Heb. 12:2), the faithful son of the Father and the only perfect model to imitate.  And more than only a model to imitate, the Lord Jesus is God, the source of our faith, and the Savior whose self-gift on the Cross and whose resurrection gives us hope of a glorious reward.

Hebrews chapter 12, from which we hear these few weeks provides three images for our understanding of what the Christian life is like.  Last week’s image is that surrounded then by so great a cloud of witnesses – the Old Testament heroes of faith – we should have the perspective that Christian life is an endurance race.  And so, we strive and persevere in running the race, cheered on by the heroes who have gone before us, their support and encouragement being like fans in a stadium surrounding us and urging us on to the finish line.  This image and lesson of the endurance race gives us focus and hope.  Motivated by a generalized protestant influence and, in some cases, even an anti-catholic bigotry, some will challenge and question and even reject our catholic appreciation of the communion of saints and the power and appropriateness of intercessory prayer – that we ask the saints to pray for us and we ourselves pray for one another.  In the race of faith we have hope because we are not alone.  How could one reject the communion of saints and the support of intercessory prayer when the Bible gives us such an image from Hebrews of being surrounded by a great multitude?  We Christians run a race of faith in a stadium surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses – Old and New Covenant saints alike – and we’re supposed to believe that appeal to the saints and intercession diminishes the role of Jesus?  Not at all.  The finish line is Jesus himself and his kingdom.  He is the one mediator who can bring salvation, yes.  But, he accepts the involvement of others in this race.  Our life with him is that of runners surrounded in a stadium, or that of a family, not just a “me and Jesus relationship”.  The focus this image of the endurance race provides us is critical too.  Often in life’s struggles and in our weakness and exhaustion we grow frustrated.  The struggles and weaknesses are our own, they are the failures of people around us, they are the sins of our secular world, and the scandals and sins even within the flock from others in the Church.  Our reaction to such disappointments and our exasperation reveals we are approaching Christian life as merely a sprint.  Can’t the race be over, Lord?  No, there are still some laps to go.  And so strive and focus on your running.  Remove the things that cling to you and weigh you down and slow down your pace.  Most especially strive in the endurance race by being healed of sin.

The second image from Hebrews chapter 12 gives us the perspective that Christian life is a process of growth toward maturity, a growth and process of maturity that is guided through the discipline, administered lovingly, from our heavenly Father.  Our sufferings and difficulties are valuable for training in holiness and so we should accept them for the good God can accomplish in us through them.  Hebrews gives us this lesson centuries before the modern age and its tendency to award everyone a blue ribbon for participation, centuries before the chronic allergy to discipline.  Perhaps our experience of discipline growing up can complicate our acceptance of this lesson.  Hebrews is not condoning discipline poorly administered.  But it is possible and valuable to have discipline administered not out of exasperation and annoyance but out of love.  Such discipline well-administered is an act of love.  It helps the one disciplined not give in to lesser things.  It helps us become the best we can be and avoids settling for urges and lower motivations.  The common phrase used in reference to physical activity that we accept so readily is true here in the spiritual marathon of discipleship too: “No pain, no gain.”

The third image from Hebrews chapter 12 about Christian life is that it is a joyous liturgical assembly raised aloft on God’s holy mountain where we are in the midst of angels and saints in worship of God.  Given this joyful gathering after passing through life’s hardships, we are encouraged to strive and not to forfeit our heavenly reward.  While we have much to endure in a long race and much suffering to accept as a sign of God’s love for us, we are not engaging and striving for something that is impossible or too far off for us.  God Himself has brought the finish line, the reward, close to us.  We are not going after something too far.  It has been brought near.  That is one incredible consequence of the Incarnation.  God has come near to us!  He has taken on our flesh.  And thus, Jesus is near and remains so.  He beckons us to him.  The witnesses surrounding us cheer us on.  Don’t we recognize that?  We barely stretch upward to reach our goal before we discover that here is the liturgical participation in the far greater and generous movement God makes toward us.  We must strive, yes, and use our freedom to cooperate with God’s discipline and grace, but the gulf between us and God has already been bridged in His generous movement to us in Christ Jesus.  It is he – the Lord Jesus – who is our focus, our finish line, our reward.  The stadium in this endurance race is filled with the cheers and prayers of saints who have endured, who know how to endure, and who know that with God’s grace  and the support of their prayers we too can endure!