December 16/Second Monday of Advent
“By what authority are you doing these things? And who gave you this authority?” ~ Matt 21.22
Since about fourth grade, when I first encountered the challenge of word problems, math has not exactly been my strong suit. A geometry exercise I loved, however, was using the compass to draw a perfect circle. As I pressed the slender leg into the center of the paper and carefully inscribed an arc all the way around, I felt confident that the results would be error-free. That compass never failed me! It is hard, these days, to know in whom or what we may fix our own center. Institutions, traditions, long-held customs and norms all seem swallowed in the cacophony of opposing voices. Truth itself seems elusive. As the Irish poet W.B. Yeats wrote in The Second Coming, “The falcon cannot hear the falconer;/Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.” But in fact there is a fixed center that will hold. And it is God, who can lift us out of the turmoil and scrum of our daily lives and put us on the path to his truth. As the medieval German mystic and writer, Meister Eckhart, observed, “Whoever wants to start a good life should do so like someone setting out a circle. If he has fixed the center of the circle accurately, and it remains firm, then the line of the circle will be a good one. In other words, a person should first learn to set his heart firmly in God.” We are invited today to recognize the unchanging and eternal authority of the creating, redeeming, sanctifying God — the authority that Jesus so calmly claims in the face of a hostile establishment, as Matthew tells in today’s Gospel. In whom do we trust? Jesus knows: In God we trust.
Almighty God, Lord of heaven and earth, grant me the confidence and wisdom to place my trust completely in you. Amen.
For today’s readings, click here: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/121619.cfm
