Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish

FR MICHAEL BIBLICAL IMAGERY

(Fr Michael Boakye Yeboah: Vice Rector of St Gregory Seminary, Kumasi-Ghana)

REVELATION TO MINORS

In Christian theology and spirituality, there is a special place reserved for minors, the “lowly”, and the unassuming. Jesus himself while on earth choose to live a “lowly” and humble lifestyle. His parents were humble people and he was born in the least “Benjamite” town of Bethlehem. He would later be raised and nurtured in the insignificant town of Nazareth, a town that attracted this comment from Nathanael: can anything good come from Nazareth (Cf. John 1:49)? Jesus would later in his ministry make the image of a “child” central in his teachings and makes it one of the criteria for reception of God’s revelation.

This teaching is in no way promoting mediocrity and inferiority but it goes a long way to educate people to discard pride and self-centeredness. People who have been privileged to be achievers and inventors should place God at the center of all their achievements. This background is given to help us understand what today’s Liturgy of the Word wants to draw home to us.

The Gospel contains three assertions: (1) The revelation of the Father is given to “minors”; (2) it takes place only through the Son, through Christ, who reveals it to whomever he wishes; (3) by pointing to his own meekness he addresses this revelation of the Father and Son to all who are burdened.

Revelation to minors is something that is central within formative circles. Minors here can be those who are humble and receptive. Normally children are meant to be humble and receptive to all the things that comes from their parents. Children are receptive to the teachings and instructions of their parents because they trust them and believe strongly that what their parents are teaching them are the right things.

Learning how to trust begins at birth: babies are born completely dependent on caregivers to fulfill their basic needs for food, shelter, comfort, and love. If caregivers react to babies’ cries and body language in an attentive, consistent, and nurturing manner, those babies will feel safe and learn to trust their world.

The imagery of child and parent is employed in formative beauty in today’s Gospel. I would like to think that God wants to relate with us as a parent would relate with his/her child. The Parent seeking the good of the child will impart the right teachings and instruction in order to aid in the child proper nurturing and because the child trust the parent, (s)he avails himself/herself to whatever the parent teaches him/her. God also knows what is good for us (his children), so if we place all our trust in him he will aid our proper formation.

In teenage years and adulthood some people turn to choose their own paths in life and abandon their childhood commitments. For some parents that is the time to sit and watch their children. For some parents in our modern times they grow quiet and silent to the life choices of their grown-up children. At times it is within this context and scenario that parents begin to clamor for grandchildren so that they will have the privilege of a child once again listening to what a parent says. Some parents begin to hide their personal opinions from their grown-up children and may only air their views on need-to-know basis. Considering this, was this similar to Jesus’ time?

Jesus may have been speaking in a parallel way. Here, Jesus is speaking out of experience, the experience that the Rabbis and the wise men rejected him while the simple people accepted him. The intellectuals had no use for him; but the humble welcomed him. We must be careful to see clearly what Jesus meant here. He is very far from condemning intellectual power; what he is condemning is intellectual pride. A Parent like Jesus is not afraid of his/her grown-up child’s independence and intellectual self-reliance but what parents dislike is when their children disrespect all that they were nurtured in and become prideful of their own chosen paths. We should note that ‘the heart, not the head, is the home of the Gospel’ and is no wonder that its secret keys are revealed to “child-like” people. It is not cleverness which shuts out; it is pride. It is not stupidity which admits; it is humility. People may be as wise as Solomon; but if they have not the simplicity, the trust, the innocence of the childlike heart, they shut themselves out.

The Rabbis themselves saw the danger of this intellectual pride; they recognized that often simple people were nearer God than the wisest Rabbi. If we are to know God and his ways we need to be humble and dependent as children are to their parents. In centuries past, people fought in battles and shared blood; today we are fighting the battles of “personal philosophies” and people seem not to listen to what God has for us. Unless we rediscover the ways of God in Jesus Christ, we will be far away from inner peace and harmony in society. We need to rediscover the place of Jesus in our lives and society.

Another element that is very important in today’s Gospel is the fact that Jesus alone can reveal God to men and women. John put this in a different way, when he tells us that Jesus said: ‘Whoever has seen me has seen the Father’ (John 14:9). What Jesus says is this: ‘If you want to see what God is like, if you want to see the mind of God, the heart of God, the nature of God, if you want to see God’s whole attitude to men and women – look at me!’ It is the Christian conviction that in Jesus Christ alone we see what God is like; and it is also the Christian conviction that Jesus can give that knowledge to anyone who is humble enough and trustful enough to receive it.

I will conclude with the last section of today’s Gospel: “Come to me, all you who are exhausted and weighed down beneath your burdens, and I will give you rest…” Pastors and all who play key roles in the Church should know and understand what the children of God are going through. Parents do not nurture and care for their children well by just buying them gifts and living in “mansions.” A good parent is the one who knows what his/her wards are going through and employ the appropriate parenting skills to care for them. Children in churches are going through a lot: from depression to addictions. I don’t know why the criteria of a good pastor has been fixed with those who build facilities. Today Covid-19 has shown us that building structures maybe important but the real “conditio sine qua non” in Christianity is the formation of the person. If as a pastor you do not pay attention to forming your flock, the buildings you are putting up will stand empty one day as is been the case in some parts of the world. Great attention should be place on “cura animarum” (the care of souls). Let us make churches “hospitals of souls” and not business centers where everything is about money. May our heavenly Father continue to care for us especially in this era of Covid-19 pandemic.