Por Fr. Ed Liptak, SDB

The Old Testament of the Jewish people opens with an account of the Good and the Bad, the work of the Creator God, the marvels of this world, and the jealousy of the evil one who spoiled humanity and everything else in the world. There is God, the source of goodness and love. There is Satan, the source of evil and hatred. The scriptures of the 6th Sunday C in Ordinary Time further portray the battle between good and bad.

Jeremiah, God’s prophet, reflects for us a time when evil overcame God’s people for He had abandoned them to paganism. Jerusalem, City of God, had been ravaged. The glorious Temple of Solomon, God’s presence among them, had been destroyed. The ruling class, government, and religious, were being carried off into captivity. Well did Jeremiah lament, “Cursed is the one who trusts in human beings, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the LORD.” Well, could he remind them of better times when they were faithful to God, “Blessed is the one who trusts in the LORD, whose hope is the LORD,” when peace and the fullness of the earth were theirs.

Jeremiah lamented and so did St Paul, amazed that those whom he had taught that as Jesus rose, so they too, one with Christ, would also rise. “How can some among you say there is no resurrection of the dead?… If Christ has not been raised, your faith is vain; you are still in your sins. … Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished.” They are gone! The afterlife, eternal with Christ is gone! Paul concludes, “If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are the most pitiable people of all.” For those who trust, life goes on.

The Beatitudes cite pairs of opposites. Jesus who is Light names things of darkness. Accepting His teaching, we emerge from darkness, from poverty to riches of the Kingdom; hunger to satisfaction; weeping to laughter; being hated, excluded, called evil because of faith in Him—Rejoice! Happy are you! Yours is the Kingdom of Heaven. The ‘Woes’ added by St. Luke reinforce the ‘Beatitudes:’ The rich, for example, who neglect the way of Jesus, have their comfort now, not in the life to come. As for us, we hope and trust in the Lord, and the Kingdom of Heaven is ours!