Conversion and Times

Lk 13:1-9 (1-17)

Conversion refers to a process that shakes the soul, because of an Encounter. An encounter that opens up knowledge of ourselves.

A dialogue that projects mind and actions onto reality and Mystery, which incessantly refer back to a new Exodus.

Even today, the swampy counterpart to the life of Faith wedges in like a constant woodworm, and is symbolised by an arid confrontation, expressed in the absence of fruit on a fruitless tree.

The vineyard is an icon of the Chosen People and the fig tree of its central prosperity. Here it evokes the Temple, in particular its liturgical core: the Sanctuary.

According to religious prejudices - of class, purity, ministry, progressive skimming - within strictly demarcated perimeters, homage was paid to the God of Israel.

The worship that took place in the sacred zone of the vast area of Mount Zion was meant to express the praise of a people in constant listening, called to a life of sharing and fraternity.

The delicious fruits that the Lord expected should have been sweet and tender (like figs), instead they were hard and inedible. His call had been left to fall on deaf ears.

The many and conspicuous "leaves" of the devout ritual did not celebrate a life of acceptance and understanding, but rather tended precisely to hide the bitter berries of a style that did not conform to the divine plan at all.

We ask ourselves: how much time do we have to amend and not regress, living fully in the present? Is the Father's governing action punitive or only responsible and life-giving?

In the parable of the barren fig tree we learn: the only condition that can change a history of infertility and squalor - as well as the danger of formalism - is the time still needed to assimilate the Word.

Forward process, linked to the unpredictable manner in which the vital Call of the Seed and the particular outreach of its roots intertwines with the soil of the soul, then overflows in relation to events.

A call that does not cease; in whose reverberation is elaborated and strengthened the change of mentality that ushers in the reciprocal hospitable nature of conviviality and the design of liberation for an alternative world: the Kingdom of God.

Now in the hands of a useless and corrupt caste that had allowed the vital relationship to die out, the threads of the ignored design of Salvation and Justice (in the sense, first and foremost, of authentic God-man positions and just relationships) are re-knotted by the intensity of the Father-Son relationship.

After the three years of public life, there is a "fourth year" that extends to the history of the Church (vv.7-9).

It is not meant to conceal the blossoming of life, but to make it blossom, and it ceaselessly calls for a flourishing growth; for a feeling of Family with the sweetest fruit, which is not satisfied with external practices.

In order to overcome conditioning, suspicions, blockages, failures, there is a need to breathe: it is a matter of treading a long path of exploration.

There are no shortcuts, no useful U-turns according to the code of official authorities, perennially committed to attenuating and homologating charismatic peaks.

In fact, Jesus had invited the crowds to have independent thinking and judgement (Lk 12:57: "Now why do you not judge for yourselves what is right?").

Woe betide those who allow themselves to be subjugated, accepting omertà out of calculation or fear. What is at stake is our dignity and the missionary wealth to which God calls.

This is why the authorities considered Jesus as a Galilean: subversive and rebellious.

He is subjected to another intimidation by proxies of the religious leaders (Lk 13:1). We seem to be witnessing a rehearsal of prevarications with which we may be familiar.

As the encyclical Brothers All points out, the Lord still dreams of a project "with great goals, for the development of all mankind (No.16)".

For this purpose "we need to constitute ourselves into a 'we' that inhabits the Common House. Such care is of no interest to the economic powers that need quick revenues" (n.17).

The hasty logic - as well as the epidermic haste of the society of events - creates inequalities, not only in the mercantile field.

In short, everything becomes an opportunity for the Eternal to flourish and a field of action for the Eternal, a history that is truly ours: a magisterium of authentic theology and humanisation - if the story of the people unfolds on the way.

In the processes that trigger a history of redemption according to evangelical logic, the memory of the past does not alienate but interpellates: it does not banally provide inert, indefectible criteria for judging the present and obtaining repercussions or predictive capacity for the future.

The creed of philosophical-religious idealism may be a cocoon in which to lull oneself, but from the attentive and propulsive Faith springs a life of love that is also unpredictable, capable of inexplicable recoveries: it demands personal judgement and new determination in the situation.

It is harmful to dust off and readjust old things or one-sided dreams.

It is necessary to have open eyes and at the same time give time, so that we overcome the fatalisms of archaic monotheism, the sentiments that confuse intimist emotionalism with passion for the things of God, the reductionist and schematic fundamentalisms, the illusions of being already on the path of conversion.

The God of ancient religion has his demands and does not appear long-winded. The Father of Jesus knows how to wait. He tolerates both stubbornness and incautious acceleration.

He is not irritated, he does not give in to the frenzy of blow after blow. He is not disinterested, but he does not complain; nor does he take revenge.

It proposes solutions.

It reiterates occasions that would melt the hard temper of our idols - for an evolution towards a renewed masterpiece of celestial Patience.

It has the style of the mother or, at any rate, of the parent - close relative - who by dint of caresses and kisses convinces the wayward child to eat the food that will make him grow (calmly) and thus surpass himself.

In this way he does not cause irreparable trouble - on the contrary, he will astound us.

For a new Spring, in which the fig tree gives its unrepeatable sugary fruit [never already dry or dried] juicy and highly energetic - before the many leaves.

So that fraternity does not remain 'at best a romantic expression' (FT, 109).

To internalise and live the message:

How do you safeguard community life and your transpositions of Faith in Christ? What is the point of homologation in satisfaction, and where do you place your Preciousness?

Jesus and curved humanity

Theatrics and neutrality

(Lk 13:10-17)

The passion for full existence and things would like to lead us who knows where, but there is sometimes an external force that holds us back. A dark power that prevents us from even discovering our true nature.

The opinion of others, doctrines, customs or common ideas old and new stand in the way of the life that calls us.

And in the meantime, the perception that we are failing to walk the right path causes suffering, guilt and blockage.

Those who then accuse us... take advantage of the fear of having to pay the price of (character and vocational) freedom, for the eventual "errors" that one runs the risk of making by staying off the prescribed tracks.

All this - especially in religions without the leap of Faith - even should it seem that by walking the paths that belong to us, the risks could bring us joy, greater completeness, and fulfilment.

As always, Jesus makes Himself present in the "synagogue" not to make codified prayers: He is among His people to "instruct" (v.10).

In particular, he teaches that the Father is not in conflict with his subjects, rather he supports all his children, and gives a different posture from that of the 'animal world' (to which normal beliefs could perhaps reduce us).

At that time, no woman could participate directly in a liturgy, but in the Gospels the female figures are parable of the people themselves (in Hebrew, the term Israel is feminine).

Luke stages a woman to allude also to all the oppressed figures, to whom the praying community does not offer any comfort, nor does it grant any concrete emancipatory action.

People subjected to the 'cultural' paradigm of their particular environment and to the conditioning power of family tradition (which then transmitted a paradigmatic and conformist spirituality).

People subjected in everything to the head of the family, subservient to political power, subservient even to the fundamentalism of religious authorities. A humiliating, even atrocious panorama, bestial in fact.

In the place of worship, the Master (who in reality is forcefully educating his own) finds a humanity and a panorama of minima still harassed by religious obsession - therefore folded in on themselves, exhausted, unable to lift their heads.

The spirit of weakness that that very environment inoculated in the unwell made the faithful in the assembly (or the habituals in it) totally passive.

An existence - everyone's - hunched over, dragged along at the worst, without horizons.

Christ's action extracts from the habituated crowd, free from conformism and massification; it puts the faltering 'woman' back on her feet, who takes to praising God seriously, joyfully, immediately (vv.12-13).

She was a 'participant' in the ritual and always in the midst of the assembled people, but before personally meeting the Lord she did not glorify the Father in a real way - nor did she honour her own existence.

No joyful expressions of healing from the religious leaders - accustomed to inoculating a soporific atmosphere - only condemnation. Illustrious and distant.

Individualistic power-brokers, incapable of closeness. This was also due to various circle, doctrinal, supremacist and institutional interests.

Then - in the common idea - it seemed that in legalistic or rubric terms the sanctification of the day dedicated to the Lord excluded any involvement, and good works!

In addition to this unhealthy belief, even touching a wounded 'flesh' was imagined to make one impure!

In short, the spirit of the commandment imposing Sabbath rest (historically born to protect vast social, cultic, identity needs) had been completely manipulated and overturned.

The logic of the young Rabbi is opposed to protocol: only the neglect of the marginal and enslaved dishonours God.

The only non-negotiable principle is the good of the real woman and man: this is the only key to interpreting the Gospels.

And the rite must celebrate precisely the life of welcome and sharing, of happiness, personalisation, care, love.

The rest is for Jesus an unbearable comedy, from which his church leaders must keep away: 'Theatrics' (v.15) would call them even today - otherwise - our Lord.

We are worth far more than oxen and donkeys (vv.15-16). The relationship with God is celebration, healing, salvation: all concrete - the result of choice, even social.

And finally, even the new Magisterium breaks away from the previous, often diplomatic and neutral mentality:

"Jesus' conclusion is a request: Go and do likewise (Lk 10:37). That is to say, it challenges us to put aside all differences and, in the face of suffering, to be close to everyone. Therefore, I no longer say that I have 'neighbours' to help, but that I feel called to become a neighbour of others" (Fratelli Tutti, n.81).

Spirituality is not empty.