Twenty-Third Sunday Sept 4, 2011

Ezekiel 33: 7-9 Ps 95 Romans 13:8-10 Matthew 18:15-20

Recently the National Geographic had a documentary on animals called Meerkats.

They are the size of  small weasels or racoons with watchful eyes. The meerkats survive as a colony or community. As the rest of the family or group eat, play and hunt one meerkat will stand on its hind legs for a long time. Then another will take its place, its head up like a submarine periscope looking in all directions. At the sign of danger, it will give a signal and the whole group will go underground into their tunnels. If it fails to do its job, the whole group could be destroyed.

The story of the meerkat could be the model or pattern behind our first reading from Ezekiel. The Israelites were taken captive and into exile for failing to keep the Law of God. Now they had come back from exile and the main task of the prophet was to preserve their identity as the People of God. The prophet was suppose to keep watch. He had to keep the Israelites from sinning. His job was

• to remind them of the covenant
• to admonish them when they broke the law
• to warn them on upcoming temptations to stray.

• The exiles had not formed a cohesive body. They were not yet united on their return. The prophet could not warn the group, and so he had to work on one individual at a time. If he did his job and the person was stubborn, refusing to change, the prophet would not be held responsible. His duty was not to change people,  but simply to remind, to admonish, to warn.

The reading from Romans is taken as it was last week, from chapters 12 -15 of the letter. These chapters deal with ethical behaviour and the reason and method of acting in a right and just manner. Today’s pericope or segment of the letter describes ethical behaviour in broad terms and does not get down to particulars.

• Paul speaks of the command to Love
• Paul gives us the reason for this command
• Paul shows us how we can deduce a set of ways of behaviour.
• Paul shows how these flow from the Command to love.

In doing this Paul is teaching or catechizing the Community at Rome.  He shows a single principle, a single reason for behaviour: Love. From there he draws different ethical ways of behaving. This makes it easier for his hearers to both

• understand “why”
• remember “how”

The single command to Love shows us

• how we should personally behave
• how we should relate to others
• how we should be stewards of creation
• how we should relate to God.

The Gospel then take us back to the picture of the Meerkat Colony. This particular Gospel teaching appears in all four Gospels and Scripture Scholars tell us that it is the only time “Church” appears in all four Gospels. The concern for the well being, is not the well being of a Colony of Meerkats, but rather for the members of the Church Community.

 The cohesion, vitality and growth of the Church depends on the vitality and development of each individual. The Church as a community must be concerned that its members “walk in the path of the Lord.” At times, as in the case of the prophet Ezekiel, the reminder, the admonition and warning must be given on a “one to one” basis. If this fails, a core group of church members must step in. If that fails the whole church should come to the support and keep in line the weaker member of the church.

In Civil Society, the wrong doer, the law-breaker is simply taken away and thrown in jail. Many take the “ostrich mentality” – if he is put away, we will all be safe. However invariably the law-breaker meets with others of the same ilk and they learn new and ingenious ways of breaking the law and avoiding arrest.

 The ideal way would be the way of he Gospel. We work one on one with the weaker member. The Alcoholic Anonymous group has shown us how well it works. If the one on one does not work, the group of believers come together and give a living example to the one who errs.

 But reaching out to an individual has not worked in many cases, because we have not tried it. It has not worked because

• it requires patience,
• it requires care,
• it requires trust both in the method and in the person.

We do not have enough of these because we live in a world that wants immediate solutions and instant results like instant coffee.

We live in a society where if a gadget does not work, we throw it out and replace it with a new one. John Paul II has said that each individual is a unique, irreplaceable, unrepeatable image of God. As a result we have to take the time and effort to dead with each member of our church in a unique and original and loving manner.

Meerkats

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpFkBt_AgTM