Last time out I danced around the issue of divine chastisement. My conclusion was that we can't call the recent atrocity in Orlando an example of divine retribution, not that I've seen anyone overtly suggesting it. It seems like after tragedies of this nature someone comes out saying "this is God's wrath" against this group or another that's assumed to have run afoul of the moral law. So, I just wanted to head that one off at the pass.
I also affirmed that, contrary to common belief today, God does indeed chastise. It's that it's not for vigilantes, mobs or even governments to decide what needs to be punished and then take it upon themselves to exact the punishment.
Beyond that God is patient. He doesn't want to punish us if he can avoid it. The Prophet Jonah was one of those fire and brim stone types, as well as being more than a tad xenophobic, who reluctantly delivered the Lord's message of repentance to Nineveh (a gentile city). He was actually upset when the city repented, therefore avoiding destruction. God had to sit him down and explain that He created all humanity (along with everything in nature, actually), and didn't want to see any of them lost. And those poor gentiles, who didn't know their right hand from their left (in other words didn't have the benefit of Divine Revelation) needed even more patience than the Israelites did.
In Luke 9:51-56 we hear about a Samaritan village who wouldn't receive Jesus, then traveling on the way to Jerusalem. John and James asked if they should, "'call down fire from heaven to consume them?'" All it says is that "Jesus rebuked them," before moving on to another locale. While the description is rather curt - we don't know what form Jesus's rebuke took, the message is clear: a Sodom and Gomorrah redux wasn't a part of Jesus' mission. As with the example of Jonah, we have here a gentile community, and this time it's Jesus who has to correct His followers who thought their mission was about vengeance instead of mercy. Jesus came to gather in the lost sheep of the House of Israel first, and then make the invitation to the gentiles to repent and accept the Kingdom of God, not to destroy either one.
In all this, we need to follow a very important principle of how to read Scripture, namely to always interpret Scripture in light of Scripture. In other words, read everything in context. If we stop here we could get the impression that Jesus did away with the whole chastisement thing. But the New Testament does speak of the Lord disciplining His children (Jn. 15:2, Heb. 12:5, 1 Cor. 11:32, among other passages we could site). The Book of Revelation is filled with descriptions of how humanity is and will be chastised, including stern warnings to the churches who don't fulfill their mission (Revelation chapters 2-3). Jesus isn't saying that chastisements are out, just that it's not for us to assume the motives, times and methods of God's judgement. I would go further, that taken together, along with the Old Testament, it's unfaithful and slack believers who are more likely to encounter a harsh judgment than others are (Lk. 12:41-48).
Jesus also makes it clear that just because bad things happening to you doesn't automatically mean that God's punishing you (John 9:1-3).
We live in a fallen world. Earthquakes happen, madmen go on rampages (which doesn't mean we don't try to prevent such things, and yes that means looking at our gun laws). Suffering is a part of life on planet Earth, and there is no way we can be shielded completely from natural disasters or prevent every act of deliberate evil. And we can't judge people who die in disturbing ways, or somehow think we're favored by God because we didn't.
Jesus was once asked his opinion about Pilate slaughtering Galileans during their worship ceremony. He stated that it was a mistake to believe that they were greater sinners than anyone else - the same with 18 victims of a tower collapse. So, while he affirms that bad things happening to you isn't necessarily an indication of divine judgment, he also tells his questioners that, unless "you repent you will perish as they did!"
Sobering words. Bad things happen to good, bad and indifferent people, yet we must be on the watch that the end doesn't catch us unprepared, meaning unrepentant.
Jesus never offers us the simple answer. If we really read the Scriptures with clear eyes, specifically the Gospels, we will never confuse the Word with opium.
We see 49 people killed randomly in a night club and we are horrified. We should be. We are also outraged. Again, we should be. We think first of the temporal issues - gun control, bigotry, international and domestic terrorism. We need to. It's our world, and we will be held to account for our stewardship of it.
We usually end there, though. If we do think of the eternal implications, our assumption is probably that everyone was saved, whatever concept we have of that reality. My experience is that the assumption of salvation is the default position at funerals - if people believe in a life after death at all, which misses the point of why we have funerals. More and more people are forsaking the traditional obsequies and Requiem Masses for memorial services, if that. A memorial is a remembrance of the dearly departed, of his or her human life and times. The implication is that it's over - a memory is of something that is passed. We salute someone who lived a full length of years, or else rue that someone was taken too young, tragically. But either way, it's over, and all we are left with is a memory that will die with all the mourners who in turn go to that long cold sleep from which there is no awaking.
A Mass is a act of divine memory. We are asking God the Father to remember someone, in the context of His remembering the saving work of His Son on the Cross. When God remembers, the memory is real and eternal. He doesn't remember for a moment - but forever. The priest asks the Father to remember Jesus' dying and rising - to remember His sacrifice, and so, through the power of the Holy Spirit, the sacrifice becomes present to us in the form of the Eucharist. During the funeral Mass, when the priest asks the Father to remember the one we love, he or she becomes present to Him. God's memory is not of something that is passed - it is of something present, real, unfading, eternal.
The uncomfortable aspect of this is that all in the previous paragraph depends on that the person who passed on died in a state of grace. We really don't want to think about the alternative, or really don't believe that there is an alternative. Maybe more on the other possibility for another time.
I'll end here by saying that we don't judge because we don't know the heart. We pray though. We don't assume salvation or damnation. We pray though.
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