Been a long time since I posted in here. Something came up in a group I'm part of, and I wrote about today's sermon at the Mass I attended. I thought about it, and wanted to include it here:
Luke 9:51-56
Not long before it was time for Jesus to be taken up to heaven, he made up his mind to go to Jerusalem. He sent some messengers on ahead to a Samaritan village to get things ready for him. But he was on his way to Jerusalem, so the people there refused to welcome him. When the disciples James and John saw what was happening, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven to destroy these people?”
But Jesus turned and corrected them for what they had said. Then they all went on to another village.
^ A little known piece of information for you, the Vatican sends out what they want each church to focus on each year. Meaning this was planned LONG in advance to be the focus of the sermon for today. And it was so appropriate for this past week's SCOTUS decision. They could have released their decision much earlier, as we know over a month ago they were already working on the majority opinion. But it was released on Friday.
The Father's accompanying commentary was about how pride causes us to get angry, and then turn towards wrath. It's normal for us to do so, which is why we have to work on ourselves to overcome such things. As he put it "THESE ARE SUPPOSE TO BE THE GOOD GUYS!", but they let pride get into their hearts. He went on further to say that through other ancient writings the words of rebuke went something like (and I'm paraphrasing here, because I can't recall verbatim) "You know not the spirit you are asking from". He tied this further to the Cross when Christ cried out "Father forgive them for they know not what they do". I always loved that line, even wrote something about it into a stanza of a song I couldn't sing the Spanish portion for a many Passovers ago. A man being murdered and still crying out for the salvation of those who are pursuing his death.
Later, during the announcements, he delivered an address regarding the Roe v. Wade protests. He said that there have been threats of violence against Pro-Life churches. That if they come, no one in the congregation should lash out at them, but let them come in.
It coalesced with the pre-ordained reading and sermon so perfectly. Anyone listening and with keen understanding could make the connection of how perfectly everything aligned for this sermon to take place.
But how I saw it relating to the Jedi Path due to this conversation about Jedi and the Political Sphere was eye opening to a facet of who we are-
We are suppose to be Guardians of Peace. We can't lash out at each other because of the beliefs we hold. We can only encourage people to learn. Sure, sometimes in circles we are part of, we find we have to cut out people or groups just so both ourselves and them can find peace from the anger, pride and wrath we see in the opposing views which are present before us. But that's the goal of the Jedi - to be a peace, so we can help others find it.
Gather at the River,
Setanaoko Oceana
