Dominica 4 post Epiphaniam / Evening, 28 January 2017 / Church of St John
Then rising up
he commanded the winds, and the sea, and there came a great calm (Mt 8:26).
We read in the opening verses of Genesis:
In the beginning God created heaven, and earth. And
the earth was void and empty and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And
the spirit of God moved over the waters. . . . God also said: Let the waters
that are under the heaven be gathered together into one place, and let the dry
land appear. And it was done.[1]
If there were a primordial peace and
order upon the waters as God created them, then this was not to last, once sin
had entered the world. Today’s Gospel proves it: “behold a great tempest arose in
the sea.” As such, there are all manner of storm that we encounter today.
There are cultural storms. Just
yesterday the March for Life occurred. It is fearful to observe how the most
basic matters of human life can also be the most hotly contested. This being
the case, it is probably not too much to say that the life issues are the cultural battle of our place and
time.
There are ecclesial storms, upheavals
within the fold of the Church that are also the source of division and
conflict. The confusion over Sacraments for the divorced and civilly remarried
is one such example; matters affecting the sacred liturgy are equally urgent
and embattled. These disturb the Catholic people, and are, in many ways, worse
than the cultural storms that rage about us.
Then there are personal storms, our
sufferings and hardships; the testings we undergo, the moral purification we
are about; there is the good we know must be done through arduous
circumstances—what have you. The storm as it beset some of the Apostles on the
sea in today’s Gospel is most certainly an analogy for our own lives; we were
on the boat with them that evening.
Imagine what that must have been. St
Matthew does not have to give us much detail because it is easy for us to
picture: the violent, swirling murk of the winds and clouds had blotted out the
evening stars; the pitch of the boat made each stomach sick and each heart race;
the vessel, no matter how well or poorly made, was taking on water; each swell
perhaps seemed more threatening than the last; all this in the midst of a
terrible wind that made the disciples blind and deaf. There is nothing like the
helplessness of man in the grip of a storm at sea, and it was not hyperbole for
the disciples—some of them likely experienced fishermen—to cry, Dómine, salva nos, perímus.[2]
Who knew such great storms could
arise in so little a place as the human heart and mind?
And then Christ rose.—He rose with
all the triumph and strength of the Creator, for in his Divine Nature he was
there when first these same waters were separated from the firmament.[3] He rose, no doubt, with
all the gravity and meekness and manliness that exuded from his human nature—and
we do not know here what words and gestures he used to rebuke the storm, but it
obeyed: et facta est tranquilitas magna.[4]
Beloved friends, if that evening
there arose great tempest—motus magnus in
mari factus est—it was only so that a great peace could follow—et facta est tranquilitas magna. St
Matthew does not say simply that things calmed a little, that is, just enough
for the men to safely continue their journey. No, it was a great peace, perhaps a peace the likes of which none of those
disciples would ever know again on this earth. But the point is for us, who
were in that boat in Christ’s Heart, when
they are pacified by Christ, great storms become great peace.
Stay faithful, dear friends, and
never be afraid of present storms or any that may come. We hear somewhere else
in the Scriptures: “Dearly beloved, we are now the sons of God; and it hath not
yet appeared what we shall be. We know that, when he shall appear, we shall be
like to him: because we shall see him as he is.”[5]
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