Ken Levine wrote: “We all make choices, but in the end our choices make us.”
Is that what you are saying, O Lord? Is that what you are trying to inject into our hearts?
To follow your law and commandments, O Lord — or to put it another way, to walk hand in hand with you, to be in harmony with you, to sing your song together with you — will bring about the consequences and results of a life well-lived.
Normally — usually, most of the time — we will find ourselves living and being in love and in peace, and goodness, and balanced and thoughtful of I, me, we, and others.
It is similar to the “schema” Jews recite many times a day; it is the reiteration of the two great commandments of Jesus: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, and with all your strength”; and “You shall love your neighbor as you love yourself.”
+ In the Gospel, Jesus points to the crowd. They do not live in harmony with God, neighbor and self; and they oppose, contradict, condemn and live in dissonance and always “out of tune.”
The children in Jesus’ example get it: “We played a flute for you, but you did not dance. We played a dirge for you but you did not mourn.”
Even the children could see the obvious and what should and could be.
Jesus tells us again and again and again: “The time is here. The time is now. Open your ears. Open your eyes. Wake up. Stay alert!”
There are consequences to hearing or not hearing the voice and the message of Jesus the Christ. In life and in faith it remains the truth: “We all make choices, but in the end our choices make us.”
Father Perry D. Leiker is the 14th pastor of St. Bernard Catholic Church. Reach him at (323) 255-6142. Email Father Perry at perry.leiker@gmail.com. Follow Father Perry on Twitter: @MrDeano76.
