A Prophet who weeps<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
Jesus never hides his affection for the two sisters and their brother who live in Bethany.\u00a0 Surely, they are the ones who welcome him to their home whenever he goes up to Jerusalem.\u00a0 One day Jesus gets a message: \u00a0Our brother Lazarus, \u201cthe one you love,\u201d is sick<\/b>.\u00a0 Before long, Jesus is headed towards their small village.<\/p>\n
When he gets there, Lazarus is already died.\u00a0 When Mary, the younger sister, sees him arrive, she bursts into tears weeping.\u00a0 No one can console her.\u00a0 When Jesus sees his friend weeping and the Jews who are with her weeping as well, he cannot contain himself.\u00a0 He too starts \u201cweeping\u201d alongside them.\u00a0 The people remark: \u00a0\u201cSee how he loved him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jesus does not just weep because of the death of a very dear friend.\u00a0 It breaks his spirit when he feels everybody\u2019s powerlessness in the face of death<\/b>.\u00a0 All of us carry in the very depth of our being an insatiable desire to live.\u00a0 Why do we have to die?\u00a0 Why is life not happier, longer, more secure, more lively?<\/b><\/p>\n
People today, like those of every age, carry hearts that are pierced with the most unsettling question that is the hardest to answer:\u00a0 What\u2019s going to happen to each and every one of us?<\/b>\u00a0 It is no use to fool ourselves.\u00a0 What can we do?\u00a0 Rebel? \u00a0Be depressed?<\/p>\n
Without any doubt, the most usual reaction is to just forget it and \u201ckeep plugging away.\u201d\u00a0 But is the human being not called to live life and live it lucidly and responsibly?\u00a0 Is it only our end that we have to approach thoughtlessly, irresponsibly, without taking any stand?<\/b><\/p>\n
In the face of the ultimate mystery of our destiny it is not possible to appeal to either scientific or religious dogmas.\u00a0 They cannot guide us beyond this life.\u00a0 The more honest stand seems to be that of the sculpture Eduardo Chillida.\u00a0 I heard him say on one occasion: \u201cAbout death, reason tells me that it is final.\u00a0 About reason, reason tells me that it is limited.\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n
We Christians do not know any more about the next life than others do.\u00a0 We too need to approach humbly the dark fact of our death.\u00a0 But we do it with a radical trust in the Goodness of the Mystery of God that we catch a glimpse of in Jesus<\/b>, this Jesus whom we love, without having seen him, and in whom, without seeing still, we place our trust.<\/p>\n
This trust cannot be understood from outside.\u00a0 It can only be lived by the one who has responded with simple faith to what Jesus says: \u00a0\u201cI am the resurrection and the life.\u00a0 Do you believe this?\u201d\u00a0 Recently Hans K\u00fcng, the most critical theologians of the twentieth century, already close to his end, has said that for him, to die is \u201cto rest in the mystery of God\u2019s mercy.<\/b><\/p>\n
Jos\u00e9 Antonio Pagola<\/b><\/p>\n
April 6, 2014
\n5 Lent (A)
\nJohn 11, 1-45<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"