Homily, 5-22-23; Monday of the 7th Week of Easter:
In the Book of Ecclesiastes we hear: “There is an appointed time for everything, A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather them” (Ec. 3:1,5). Scatter, I did a word search on the word and found that this word is used 130 times in the Bible. We hear how the people were scattered to the different nations after the Tower of Babel incident. We hear many stories of the Israelites being scattered in exile after they were disobedient and worshipped false gods. We hear Jesus tells how the people were scattered like sheep because they had false shepherds. And we hear about scattering in two of our readings this morning; once in our responsorial psalm and once in our gospel passage.
In our psalm we heard: “God arises; his enemies are scattered, and those who hate him flee before him.” It is a reassurance that, if we put our faith and trust in God, He will drive enemies away. But we need more than just faith. In a recent presentation by Fr. Carlos Martins, he mentioned that he often has discussions with Protestants who argue that faith alone is needed for salvation. He replies to them that the Devil has great faith, that he believes in God more than any human, but he doesn’t have obedience to Him. Our faith in God must be strong and our obedience to His will must be strong and then God will scatter our enemies.
In our gospel passage, we hear not about enemies being scattered, but about how we are scattered out of fear when we lose sight of our true goal. The disciples declare their faith in Jesus saying: “Now we realize that you know everything and that you do not need to have anyone question you. Because of this we believe that you came from God.” But, in reply, Jesus informs them: “Behold, the hour is coming and has arrived when each of you will be scattered to his own home and you will leave me alone.” And this is what happened when Jesus was arrested and all his disciples abandoned Him. It was not with accusation or condemnation that Jesus told the disciples that they would scatter and abandon Him. It was out of mercy that He understood their weakness and offered them His peace, even though they would scatter from His side.
Jesus offers that same gift of peace when we scatter from His side though our sinfulness, when we experience troubles in the world, when we go our own way like sheep without a shepherd. He has conquered the world. Let us always repent of our sinfulness and strive to be obedient, to draw close to God safe from the world around us. Let us put our faith and trust in God and not in the things of this world. And God will gather His own to Himself and scatter His enemies. There is a time to scatter stones, and a time to gather them together, a time for every affair under the heavens.