for April 1
Wednesday in the Fifth Week in Lent

Today’s readings are full of high drama and raw emotions as well as some harsh words, all of which may make them hard to connect with on a personal level. Even the psalm focuses on God’s glory and majesty way up there in heaven. Our everyday experience here on earth seems on a different plane. But if we look beyond the external trappings, I think we’ll find some familiar experiences.

In the Gospel, Jesus is disputing with people who believe in him but are being challenged by where that faith is taking them. They are now faced with an image of him that is beyond their previous comfortable understanding. When Jesus tells them that if they continue to keep his word, they will be set free, they are offended. Their self-understanding is that they are already privileged to be free. The harshness of this exchange between Jesus and some of his Jewish followers is likely connected to the deteriorating relations between Christians and Jews at the time the Gospel of John was written around the end of the first century. Yet the misplaced self-assurance of the followers is perhaps not so foreign to us.

I learned this lesson early in life. One day when I was about five years old, I was using an old baby blanket as a cape for my princess persona. It made a gratifying train. However, when I paraded past my mother, she told me not to drag the blanket on the floor. My mother had many rules I didn’t understand the point of and so my compliance usually came down to whether I wanted to placate her or not. I still remember deciding in a surge of righteous self-discipline to forgo the sweep of the train that day and obey her. So I took out my scissors (luckily they were blunt) and started cutting off the offending end of the blanket. My mother was not placated! And I was highly offended because I truly believed I had listened to her. I had sacrificed my own gratification because she had told me to and instead of being praised, I was chastised. Like the followers, I heard the words but misunderstood what they meant and so I missed the point.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, in contrast, get the point. They understand their faith does not guarantee that God will save them from suffering at the hands of King Nebuchadnezzar. They know that their freedom to defy the king comes not from a privileged invulnerability conferred by God but from an unbreakable bond of mutual love that transcends whatever the forces of the world might do to them. And through their faithfulness, the truth breaks through to Nebuchadnezzar as well. He is not offended but is himself moved to bless the God who rules not through fear but through a love that inspires his followers to offer up their lives for his sake.

The men facing the furnace ask that their lives be saved if possible but are open to whatever happens for they trust in God. Jesus too speaks of his life being at risk and likewise refuses to be ruled by that fear. Later he will also ask that his life be spared if possible but will accept his death because he trusts in his Father. There are people in our midst today who are hoping to live but are risking their lives for the sake of others because their love is stronger than their fear. As we move toward Holy Week and Easter, may their witness light our way.
–Christine Sczcepanowski

Today’s readings can be found on the US Catholic Conference of Bishops website.