The Word Of Peace
Homiletic Reflections On Peacemaking

Deacon Robert M. Pallotti

20th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

" You may well ask: "Why direct action ? Why sit-ins, marches and so forth ?" Isn't negotiation a better path ?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has consistently refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue....I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth."

In April of 1963, one of the most famous and inspiring political and religious documents in human history was written. It was entitled: Letter from a Birmingham Jail. These words still present to us the urgent nature of our Lord's mission and ours as well. They point out that a choice for Jesus Christ means a choice that is to be made today ! Our Lord tells us that such a choice is usually in the context of a crisis ! That is, it is the result of a person being confronted with the "cost" of such a decision, generating a real tension with one's surrounding culture.

We know when we are being confronted with such a decision, because like our Lord, like Jeremiah--we fell the fire of God's Spirit in the encounter with this confrontation. It is a fire that wants to be blazing on the whole earth. It is a fire of God's unconditional, unmerited and unquechable love for all of us and all creation. To be a follower of Jesus Christ means to spread this fire--this blaze that the Lord wants ignited on earth. Now is the time ! This is the summons to us today !

Jesus' words touch off a real crisis in one's life. One comes to understand that a choice about the fundamental direction of one's life hangs on this decision. What's more, Jesus goes on to tell us that, at times, following Jesus means those we love, even our families, may come to reject our decision. Our neighbors, co-workers, and even members of the Catholic Church may reject someone for their decision to follow Jesus Christ, with the all the "costs" that come from such a decision.

This was the case with Dr. King when he took his nonviolent campaign for justice to Birmingham, Alabama in 1963. He and his co-workers were first met with rejection and hostility by the local officials. But they were also met with rejection by members of the local clergy who preferred "order" founded on oppressive violence, rather than the peace of justice.

Jesus tells us, " I have come for division; from now on a household of five will be divided three against two." This is so not because Jesus wants to make trouble. It is because Jesus wants to bring real peace; a peace grounded in the affirmation by individuals and structures of the dignity of every human person. That is the source of real peace, quite different from the false peace built on the illegitimate use of force and the tyranny that results.

This is how to understand Jeremiah the prophet as well. His words offended many because he came to bring the Peace of God, rather than the false peace of massed armies, alliances and chariots. Jeremiah called, as out Lord calls, for conversion of heart expressed in the concrete; both in individual and collective action directed towards manifesting God's blazing love. Nothing else can save Judah. And in the end, nothing else can save the human race and the planet.

In a age when almost every major decision is put to committee for study and consensus, Jesus forces the issue on each individual Christian. Each person must decide. Each person is confronted with a choice for Jesus Christ now ! The world cries out for those who would bring God's blazing love to the earth. It cries out for those who will accept the "cost", live in a tension with our surroundings, while at the same time, enduring the cross without retaliation or defensive. Now is the time to choose. Or, in the context of the Letter from Dr. King.

" We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time ....!!!

Deacon Robert M. Pallotti, D. Min.
Uploaded January 14, 2000