30th Sunday of OT | Jer 31:7-9; Mk 10:46-52
This Sunday I was going to preach a more general message about how the blind Bartimaeus in today’s Gospel is a model for each of us, teaching us how to cry out to Jesus at the hour of our need. When I woke up and read the news Saturday morning, however, I became convinced that there is some more specific need for which we need to cry out to God today.
Like many of you, I was horrified to read the news this Saturday morning about the mass shooting that occured at the Tree of Life Congregation synagogue in Pittsburgh. In this terrible act of anti-semitism, a gunman opened fire on a Jewish community gathered for prayer on the Shabbat, killing eleven people and wounding many others. As we condemn this evil action and offer our prayers and solidarity to the families affected and the larger Jewish community, we should recognize that this crime is part of an incredibly unsettling trend of increased anti-semitism in recent years. Recently, we have seen very public displays of anti-semitism, such as in Charlottesville last year. In Canada too anti-semitism has become more and more prevalent. For example, according to the Toronto Police Service, the Jewish population is the most common group targeted by hate-crimes. This should deeply trouble us as Catholics. It is something to which we must respond.
In response, we need to clearly denounce anti-semitism for the evil that it is. Nostra Aetate, the document from the Second Vatican Council on the relationship of the Church to non-Christian religions, clearly denounced anti-semitism and called us as Catholics to speak out against it. As recent Popes, especially St. John Paul II, have noted, tragically Catholics in the past did not always do enough to combat anti-semitism and at times even fueled it. John Paul II, for example, recognized the actions and often inactions of Catholics that contributed to the Shoah (in his preface to, We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah, 1998). Although Nostra Aetate clearly condemned the ideas that Jews are collectively guilty for the death of Jesus, this idea was permitted to exist among Catholics for too long, allowing anti-semitism to fester among Christians. This way of thinking was often the root of Jewish persecution in the past (for more, see here). Especially because anti-semitism has in the past found a place among Catholics, in light of recent events, we must clearly denounce it as evil. Anti-semitism is, as John Paul II said, an “offense against God” (here).
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| Michelangelo [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons |
In addition to condemning anti-semitism, we need to be aware that, because of God’s covenant with Israel, the Jewish people have a unique and special place in the heart and plans of God. God’s covenant with the Jewish people is still in effect and is in fact irrevocable. Nostra Aetate clearly teaches this. In the first reading from today (Jer 31:7-9), the prophet Jeremiah beautifully speaks about God’s covenant with Israel. Jeremiah lived at a time of great crisis for the people of Israel, namely, the destruction of Jerusalem at the hands of the Babylonians in the year 587 BC. This event and the later crisis of the deportation provoked Jeremiah’s outpouring of grief and mourning. The message of Jeremiah, however, was also one of hope. In the passage we heard today, the prophet envisages a new action of God. Jeremiah was convinced that God would restore Israel to well being. As the prophet explains, on account of the covenant, the Jewish people are in a permanent and unique relationship with God who loves and cares for them.
Hearing this message of Jeremiah today compels us to stand in close solidarity with our Jewish brothers and sisters at a time when this evil has been committed against them. We pray especially for those who have died and for their families. We pray for our Jewish brothers and sisters, whether they be in Pittsburgh or closer to home, that the words of the prophet Jeremiah may be realized in in their midst. With Jeremiah we pray that they may experience the restoration of God the father, that he might bind the lame among them and console them.
