The Radical Freedom of Empty Hands
Michiel Peeters - Friends, let us begin with the second reading, the first lines the already old Paul writes to the Christians of Ephesus. In this city, he had lived for more than two years: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him.”
The Mystery has chosen us before the foundation of the world to be holy and without blemish before him, which means to be totally His and totally ourselves.
The Mystery has chosen us from all eternity to be totally his and totally ourselves.
“I was no prophet, nor have I belonged to a company of prophets; I was a shepherd and a dresser of sycamores. The Lord took me from following the flock and said to me, Go, prophesy to my people Israel,” says Amos, chronologically the first of the Old Testament prophets. I was minding my business, a shepherd, and the Lord chose me for his plan.
What plan? That we would be holy and without blemish before Him, totally His, dependent on Him alone, and totally flourishing in our humanity, as a sign for the others (which is what the concept of prophecy means), even if power is against us, as in the case of Amos.
Jesus obeys this election dynamic, through which God “accomplishes all things according to the intention of his will,” according to his plan: “In Him, we were also chosen, destined in accord with the purpose of the One who accomplishes all things according to the intention of his will so that we might exist for the praise of his glory [to make Him known], we who first hoped in Christ. In him you also, who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised holy Spirit…, to the praise of his glory.”
In the Gospel, we see how Christ chooses and educates his disciples to this dependence and becoming themselves before the Mystery: “Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two and … instructed them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick—no food, no sack, no money in their belts.
They were, however, to wear sandals but not a second tunic.” (Sandals are not only more comfortable to walk in, but it is also what the free man—unlike the slave—wears in his own home.) Jesus invites the disciples to depend on God alone in all circumstances. All circumstances are theirs; they are free in the circumstances, like owners in their property, like free men in their own house, provided that they receive everything from the Mystery, including themselves.
“Do you know what you are proposing to me? To give my life away, to be empty-handed, and to receive every moment” (A. Mascagni, Amica del Mistero - Adriana Mascagni, Friend of the Mystery).
This is how the Lord lived. This was his freedom, that made him so attractive to the pure of heart, the children and those on whom life had made an impact. This is the freedom he wants to raise us up to: to be empty-handed and receive every moment. To experience the unparalleled freedom promised to those who depend on the Mystery alone: “Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave. Whatever place does not welcome you or listen to you, leave there and shake the dust off your feet.”
We are on the island of St Brendan; from every page of his fantastic biography, it is clear why he became a Saint, a rock in the surf for his traveling companions, like the Brandaris (the lighthouse named after him) in a stormy sea: in everything, he depended consciously and freely on the Mystery, in everything he built and relied solely on the Mystery: “to be empty-handed and to receive every moment.”
We have been chosen to verify the same in our lifetime and circumstances.
The author's unrevised notes on the 15th Sunday in Ordinary Time B (Am 7:12-15; Eph 1:3-14; Mk 6:7-13) (Homily by Fr Michael Peeters in St Brendan’s Parish on Terschellingisland). Download.
