26. Sunday in Ordinary Time A, MT 21,28-32

The time we live in is a time full of contradictions. Many people have placed injustice, deception, envy, hatred, and vainglory on the highest pedestal. Today we symbolize protest everything, the authorities’ crisis, the struggle of brother against brother. Have you noticed that it is in this spirit that the apostle Paul instructs and encourages the ecclesial community in Philippi? He writes this: Complete my joy: think the same, love the same, be one soul, and one mind! Do nothing out of hate, not even in vain glory: but in humility do ye regard one another. Why is Paul outlining such an ideological program for his beloved Filipinos? Why does such a program sketch for us through them?

To better understand the answer, let’s look at the spiritual life of the chosen nation. His spiritual leaders, the high priests, the scribes, and the Pharisees, professed God, Moses, and the Law, but were so rigid and hardened in their religious beliefs that they were not willing to change their minds even after the disciplines of John the Baptist and later Jesus Christ. They treated God and his message as things that were already “discarded” and did not know the humility that comes from being aware of their nothingness before God. Their religion was only a rigid ideology and an inanimate system. And although they were admonished and warned, they could not be softened. That is why Jesus told them hardly that the toll booths, the prostitutes, and the sinners would precede them into the kingdom of heaven. For the blackmailers, the nation’s traitors, and the prostitutes were aware that they were living in sins through their fault. Still, when they were willing to accept the call to conversion in a spirit of humility, they had the opportunity to save themselves. Remember Zacchaeus, Matthew, Mary Magdalene…

When we ask what program the religion of Jesus offers us, we can summarize it in two points: – it is an education for proper godly thinking, – it is a path of action to reveal a testimony to God’s message. From this, we see that pious utterances or learned theological theories are not enough here. God demands works of faith, that is, the godliness of life. Of course, God could carry out his plans with the world himself, but in his saving action in the world, God wanted to put the affairs of the kingdom of God in human hands. Although these hands are often unworthy, God can still use evil to transform into good. God does not want evil as such; he only admits it.

Today’s epoch of the Church needs much prayer and concrete deeds of courageous and self-sacrificing Christian witnesses. Theological reflections, liturgical renewal, and all ecclesiastical debates in assemblies, synods, and other meetings will remain only learned games in the sand, or they will be maneuvers with blind bullets if we lack the courage to act unselfishly. It is not enough to explain the living conditions in the world with witty words about Christianity. Still, it is necessary to try to transform oneself and the world in the spirit of the Lord in a spirit of humility and humility. When Cardinal Pacelli, later Pope Pius XII, was at the International Eucharistic Congress as a papal legate in 1934, he retreated to his cabin on the way back to rest.
Meanwhile, a telegram arrived from the Vatican. The legacy’s secretary knocked on the door several times, and when no one reported, he went downstairs and found the future pope lying on the ground. To the great amazement of why he was doing this, the cardinal said: Today, I have received too much honor, so I must, at least when I am alone, acknowledge my misery…

The apostle James writes: God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. And the apostle Paul saith unto the Philippians, Do ye not for enmity, neither for vainglory, but consider one another in humility. In the spirit of these words, Cardinal Pacelli demonstrated a beautiful pattern of humiliation, following the example of Jesus Christ himself. The latter left us the most admirable example of humility when he knelt before Judas at the Last Supper and washed his feet. And we could continue the example of the humility shown to us by the Virgin Mary, St. Joseph, and all the saints in general who lived their earthly lives in modesty and humility before God. Let us also strive to create a unity of spirit and faith through the virtue of humiliation and humility, so that today the Christian may be the light of the world and the salt of the earth.