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When we read today that "the Israelites offended the Lord by serving the Baals" and the goddess, Ashtaroth, we may feel that these names are so exotic and so removed from our own experience that we are not moved by any reflection or inspired to look at our own lives. Yet the situation described in the Book of Judges is not very different from ours. It was a time of chaotic religious conditions, just as in our own world. Pope John Paul II has described our world as one "marked by serious signs of violence and decadence". The end of today's first reading shows us the recurrent struggle between God's mercy and human recalcitrance. The world of the judges depicted here bears none of the signs of that "culture of life", that "civilization of love" which our Holy Father so incessantly speaks of. We ordinary Catholics know little about the Baals or Ashtaroth, but we can see what they stand for by looking at our own world. The last century was a century "marked by serious signs of violence" as we endured so many wars. Will this century, still so young and yet already so decadent, be marked by even more "serious signs of decadence"? Lord, remember us, Your people. In a world marked by violence and decadence, let us be messengers of peace and holiness. |
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P R A Y I N G W I T H T H E C H U R C H
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The awareness that only God is the master of human life may orientate the decisions of the legislators and leaders of nations
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Evidence shows with increasing clarity how policies and laws opposed to life are causing societies to decline morally, demographically and economically. The encyclical Evangelium Vitae makes the urgent appeal "that we offer this world of ours new signs of hope, and work to ensure that justice and solidarity will increase and that a new culture of human life will be affirmed, for the building of an authentic civilisation of truth and love". Thus there is no reason for a defeatist mentality which claims that laws opposed to the right of life are inevitable. On the contrary, they are a seed of corruption for society and its foundations. The civil and moral conscience cannot accept this false inevitability. The relationship between the civil and moral law deserves great attention because of the growing importance they are destined to have in the restoration of social life. Lawmakers are asked to renew their commitment to change unjust laws that legitimise or tolerate such violence. The changing of laws must be preceded and accompanied by the changing of mentalities and morals on a vast scale. The Church cannot spare any effort nor can she accept negligence or guilty silence. | |
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