God gives us the burden of co-responsibility

33rd Sunday of Ordinary Time, Year A
First Reading: Prv 31:10-13, 16-18, 20, 26, 28-31
Second Reading: 1 Thes 5:1-6
Gospel Reading: Mt 25:14-30

St. Augustine described the three Persons of the Holy Trinity as Lover, Beloved, and Love. St. John says that God is love, quite apart from his creation.

Now “at the heart of the divine act of creation is the divine desire to make room for created persons in the communion of the uncreated Persons” of the Trinity.

Accordingly, God made human beings rational, giving us the dignity of persons who can “initiate and control” our own actions, says the Catechism of the Catholic Church. We shape our lives by our own free will: God gave us the power “to act or not to act, to do this or that, and so to perform deliberate actions” on our “own responsibility.”

“God is the sovereign Master of His plan,” the Catechism stresses, but “to carry it out, he also makes use of his creatures’ co-operation.” He grants us not only our existence, but also the dignity of acting on our own in the accomplishment of his plan.

This lays a burden of responsibility on us, a burden Jesus describes in the parable we hear this Sunday. A man who is going on a journey entrusts his property to his servants, without any instructions. The first two use their talents to create more wealth, but the third buries his in the ground. When the master returns, he commends the first two, but condemns the third.

Apparently, God’s “plan” for us is accomplished not just in what happens to us, but also in what we do. When we pray, in the Our Father, “Thy will be done,” we must realize that a great deal of God’s will must be done by us, on our own responsibility. We ask not just that we may meekly resign ourselves to God’s will, but also that we may vigorously do it.

God wants our deliberate, willing, and free co-operation, not just our meek resignation, in the accomplishment of his plan to adopt us into the Holy Trinity. The life of the Holy Trinity is a life of love. God is a Lover. He loves us. What lover is satisfied when the beloved, initiating nothing, responds “Whatever you like, dear” to all his proposals?

Of course, meek resignation is also necessary. If we are to live God’s life and live it to the full, our fallen human nature must be constantly corrected, and that is painful. We must endure the pain “as the discipline of God,” who treats us “as sons,” and respond whole-heartedly, “Thy will be done.”

Nevertheless, God expects us to co-operate with him in the world like sons and daughters, not like slaves.

Jesus made this distinction the night before he died. “I no longer speak of you as slaves, for a slave does not know what his master is about,” he told his apostles. “Instead I call you friends, since I have made known to you all that I heard from my Father.”

A slave is kept “in the dark,” so his master must continually give him detailed instructions. But we are not “in darkness,” St. Paul says in the Second Reading; we are “children of the day.” As children, we know, understand, and embrace our Father’s plan, so God can trust us to act on our own.

We are not slaves, to be surprised by our master’s return, St. Paul says. As children, we are always ready for our Father’s coming, for we are always at work on his plan. Like the “capable wife” of the First Reading, our “lamp does not go out at night.” We “consider” what is necessary and do it “with willing hands.”

“All who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God,” St. Paul said. We have not received “a spirit of slavery” leading us back into fear, but “a spirit of adoption” through which we cry out, “Abba!” (that is, “Father!”).

Father Hawkswell is again  teaching The Catholic Faith in Plain English, with new insights. The whole course is available in written form and, one session per week, in YouTube form at beholdvancouver.org/catholic-faith-course. Father is also  teaching the course in person: on Sundays at 2:00 pm in the John Paul II Pastoral Centre, 4885 St John Paul II Way, Vancouver (33rd and Willow); and on Mondays at 10:00 am in St. Anthony’s Church hall, 2347 Inglewood Avenue, West Vancouver. The title of next week’s talk is “Divine Revelation.” No pre-registration is necessary.