13th Sunday of Ordinary Time
A deep, profound theological question
If God was in MMA what would his fighting style be?
Would it be Tae Kwon Do? Karate? Jujitsu?
No - it would be Judo.
Judo
A Judo move is where you use the power of your opponent against him. Today the readings speak to us about how God is the ultimate judoka - he takes the power of the enemy and transforms it into the source of our salvation.
Baptism and Death - The first God Judo Move
Baptism is prefigured in the old testament by the flood
The flood destroys the world - yet out of the flood the world is saved.
The red sea saves the Israelites from the Egyptians - yet in the Red Sea the Egyptians are destroyed.
We are buried with Christ in the waters of Baptism so that we can be raised to new life through the waters of Baptism.
This is God Judo - He uses the weapons of the enemy - terror, death, destruction and turns it into the source of Salvation - through the Waters of Baptism we are saved for eternal life.
God used Augustine’s desire to learn debate to save him.
Augustine the Hedonist
St. Augustine grew up a pagan and a hedonist - he started his life focused on himself. He had a long-term relationship with a concubine with whom had had a son. Augustine was a professor of debate (rhetoric), and as he was growing up heard that the governor of Milan was the best in the empire at debate - so Augustine went to study him there.
St. Ambrose the Brilliant
The Governor of Milan at the time was also the Bishop. He was St. Ambrose. To study Ambrose, Augustine would attend Mass. He tuned out most of the liturgy but was most attentive when Ambrose would preach. St. Ambrose befriended Augustine, as they were both experts at debate and a beautiful friendship sprung up.
In his book Confessions Augustine speaks about their friendship - “[Ambrose] received me as a father, and showed me kindness on my coming. Thenceforth I listened diligently to him preaching to the people, not with that intent I ought, but, as it were, trying his eloquence, whether it answered the fame thereof, or flowed fuller or lower than was reported; and I hung on his words attentively; but of the matter I was as a careless and scornful looker-on…. And while I opened my heart to admit “how eloquently he spake,” there also entered “how truly he spake”; but this by degrees. For first, these things also had now begun to appear to me capable of defense; and the Catholic faith””
Augustine is Baptized
In the spring of 387 St. Augustine, 33 years old at the time, was Baptized by St. Ambrose during the Easter vigil and entered the church. It was in His Baptism that Augustine realized that his life was not about him, or his family, but was all about encountering Christ.
The life of St. Augustine serves as a lens for us to reflect on the readings today through. Prior to his Baptism Augustine was a hedonist - he lived a life that was firmly and fully rooted in the world. After his baptism he had a profound conversion. He came into relationship with God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit and realized what it cost God to save him from sin and welcome him into the Church.
God Judo with St. Ambrose and St. Augustine
God used Augustine’s love for debate, and his pride to draw him to Ambrose to learn how to be better at debate and ended up surrendering everything about his life that was self-centered in order to follow Christ.
The Cross - The God-Judo Super Move!
Here Paul invites us to see that our Baptism is into the death of Christ on the Cross. This is the God Judo super-move. Christ embraces the cross - an instrument of torture and death and through it destroys death and opens our way to eternal life. Christ then has blood and water flow from his side on the Cross so that we can benefit from his work of salvation by being baptized - which conquers all sin in our life.
God Judo and You - the Gospel
What is greater? My love for Sin or my love for God?
When I am tempted to Sin I need to recognize that my love for God is greater than my love for sin. In a similar way I need God more than I need sin. When you are next tempted to enter into Sin, God is inviting you to the Judo matt to see if you can allow him to practice some “God Judo” in your heart - to surrender to Him, and to choose Him over sin.
What are the reasons to allow God to Judo in my life?
Think about what is coming up that you would miss because of Sin - “I have Mass on Sunday” or “I am going to pray tonight” or “I asked God for my sick aunt Kathy” etc. Let God wrestle with you and for you.
How do we allow God to practice His judo in our lives?
First - recognize that you are a member of God’s Judo Dojo - we call it the Church. Here we train to allow Christ to conquer sin and death in our lives. Here we are strengthened by grace and invited to choose life with Christ over death to sin.
Is my love for God primary in my life?
I need to recognize that the love that God has for me should be primary in my life. If I can’t do that then I am going to suck at spiritual judo - because I am trying to use my own power rather than allow the grace of God to flow through me.
This is why in the Gospel Jesus says, “whoever loves Father or Mother or Son or Daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”
It is not that loving Father or Mother or Son or Daughter is bad - but that love is nothing compared to the Love fo God and yet how rarely do we truly understand that.
St. Augustine put it this way.
Augustine responded to this - “Isn’t what they are asking for just? Shouldn’t I give back what I have received? The father says “I fathered you”, the mother says “I bore you”. The Father says “I educated you”, the mother says “I fed you”... Let us answer our father and mother when they justly say “Love us”. Let us answer, I will love you in Christ not instead of Christ. You will be with me in him, but I will not be with you without him.“
Essentially what St. Augustine is saying to think about the nature of love and how we live it out. The love from God is like the light from the Sun. The love for our parents, or children or siblings is like a 120W bulb - bright, but nothing when compared to the love that we receive from God. Let us then allow our lives to be illuminated first and foremost by His love.
Right after this the Lord challenges us more profoundly - he challenges our love of self - and in doing so comes right back to the challenge of Sin, that Christ died to save us from. The Lord says “whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me.”
The cross is the place in our life where God invites us to learn to love Him as His Son loves Him. The cross is the school of love. The cross is a suffering in our life we would not wish on our worst enemy, and is not due to our own sinfulness or doing, yet it is unavoidable in our life. Christ invites us to take it up, to embrace it and in embracing the cross to learn to love as He loves.
In a way the ultimate love we often put before that of God is love for self. Christ invites us to even put love of self after love of God and he shows us that this is true when he embraces the cross to follow the will of the Father.
In a similar way he invites us to share in that grace, a grace that involves true suffering so we can learn to love as God loves.
Be a Judoka with God - the Prophet / Righteous / Disciple
Finally, Christ ends his preaching with what appears to be a set of moralisms - The Prophet, the Righteous and the Disciple. If we look at these in reverse we see that this part of his teaching is an invitation for us, his disciples to Grow in Holiness.
Disciple - St. Ambrose’s Friendship
Disciple - This is the simplest - a cold glass of water - one who desires to share the love of God with others. This is how St. Ambrose first befriended Augustine in Milan.
The reward of one who receives a disciple is to take on discipleship. This is what St. Augustine did when he encountered St. Ambrose.
Righteous - St. Ambrose’s actions
The righteous man - in order to be one that sees righteousness one needs to be righteous. We live in a world today where our leaders are seldom righteous. They seldom speak the truth and they rarely seek the good of others over themselves. We as Christians are called to be the counter-example to that.
The reward of one who receives righteousness is to become righteous. St. Augustine saw that St. Ambrose was first concerned about giving his fellow man his due, and began to appreciate and imitate him.
The Holy Spirit - St. Ambrose’s speech.
Finally, the Prophet is the one who speaks God’s truth. In order to be one that welcomes a prophet we need to recognize that the Holy Spirit is speaking through the heart of the one who is with us, and then we will receive our reward - that is the Holy Spirit will come to dwell in our hearts.
Golden Nugget: As Christians, we are called to be “little Christs” in the world. As we become more like him, we share in his sufferings, rejections, and humiliations, but also in his glories and his joys. May we be more conformed to him so that, when others see us, they encounter Jesus Christ.
Be a Judoka with God - the Prophet / Righteous / Disciple
I want to invite you to live your life this week as a Catholic Judoka. As the Lord used St. Ambrose as a Judoka to reach the heart of St. Augustine, through his friendship, treatment of others and life of prayer - How will you let the Lord use your life this week - to be a friend to others, to treat them with justice and to pray for your persecutors?
