{"id":2601,"date":"2017-10-21T10:00:44","date_gmt":"2017-10-21T14:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stpeterstoronto.ca\/main\/?p=2601"},"modified":"2017-10-18T14:53:43","modified_gmt":"2017-10-18T18:53:43","slug":"give-to-god-the-things-which-belong-to-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stpeterstoronto.ca\/main\/2017\/10\/21\/give-to-god-the-things-which-belong-to-god\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cGive to God the things which Belong to God.\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"love\"<\/a>I really like the way that people who are in love speak to one another. It can almost seem like there are never enough words to express their affection for one another. The first really big challenge in their communication usually comes when they desire to tell the other person that they are in love for the first time. Once the first person has mustered the courage to tell the other person \u201cI love you,\u201d it almost seems like they cannot say it enough. They start to say it to the other person all the time. Soon those words lose their force and they need to start adding adjectives, like \u201cI love you very much,\u201d or \u201cI love you very, very much.\u201d Usually, once people run out of words for how much they love one another, they usually start to add expressions of how long they wish to love one another to their words of affection. These expressions of love, which have to do with time, usually state something like \u201cI will love you to the end of time,\u201d or \u201cI will love you for all eternity.\u201d I do not think I have ever heard people who really deeply are in love say: \u201cI will love you until July 1, 2020; that is how much I will love you!\u201d Real and true love always wants to express that the beloved is everything to the one who loves and that the hope is that this love will last forever.<\/p>\n

It has always seemed to me that the way people talk when they are in love is one of the strongest arguments for the existence of God. Think about it for a moment. You and I are made to live only a finite amount of time; perhaps ninety to a hundred years if we are really blessed. Therefore, given that we know that we cannot live forever, why would we tell and promise the people that we care about the most that we will love them for all eternity. Surely, the person that I love the most is the last person in the world that I would want to make a false promise towards. The fact that we desire to love for all eternity, is for me a sign that we are created in the image and likeness of God. Because only God is eternal, it seems to me the desire to love for eternity is something that is put into our hearts by the God who has the power to allow us to love for all eternity. It is because God is eternal and has made us to love Him that he has also placed in our hearts the desire to love for all eternity.<\/p>\n

The Bible in fact tells us very explicitly that the human person is made in the image and likeness of God. We read this very explicitly in the Book of Genesis, where it states in the creation narrative: \u201cSo God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them\u201d (Genesis1:28). This is something that we refer to quite often, without ever thinking about what it can mean. What exactly can it mean to be made in the image and likeness of God? For me it means only one thing\u2014 that we are made for love. Our Christian tradition tells us that God has so much love within God\u2019s self that Gad cannot exist as one person. Jesus has revealed to us that God has so much love within God\u2019s self that He exists as a Trinity of persons made up of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. I like to think of creation as that Big Bang that burst forth from the love that exists within God to bring about all of created reality out of nothing. In fact many scientists still tell us that the universe is growing today. This proclaims the reality that God\u2019s love is infinite, always growing and unable to be contained. The fact that we then are made in the image and likeness of God, means that we are made for infinite and eternal love.<\/p>\n

Take a minute to think about the implications of that statement\u2014 \u201cYou and I are made for infinite and eternal love.\u201d How can you and I, who will only have a limited life span, be made for infinite and eternal love? What can possibly satisfy that thirst for infinite and eternal love?<\/p>\n

That in a nut shell is the dilemma of the human condition and our Christian journeys. We are made for eternal and infinite love, but we are finite beings living among other finite created realities. The struggle that we live for most of our lives is trying to satisfy our desire for the infinite and eternal with finite things that cannot satisfy our longings or hopes for the eternal. Throughout most of our lives, all of us attempt to satisfy our desire for love and the eternal by filling it with things and finite attachments that quench our thirst only momentarily. It is this desire for love and the eternal that feeds so many addictions and sends so many people on an endless quest for things and love. The real challenge of the Christian life is to give ourselves to those things and people that can lead us to God and the satisfaction that our hearts are longing for. All other things and people will leave us unsatisfied and searching for other things and people to quench our thirst. St. Augustine was really one of the first great Christian thinkers to recognize how powerful this desire for love in each of our hearts can be and how far off track our hearts can sometimes be led by this desire. In his great book, entitled The Confessions<\/em><\/strong>, St. Augustine recounted how in his own lifetime before finding Christ, he was led by so many false gods and destructive loves. His search took Augustine all across Europe and Africa. He searched for pleasure, knowledge and wealth.\u00a0 He was also left feeling empty because none of these finite realities could satisfy the longing of his heart. Finally, when he had come to accept Jesus and His love for him, Augustine was able to make that great proclamation: \u201cYou have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like St. Augustine, because we all so often fail to recognize God\u2019s presence in our lives, or that what we are really seeking is God and His love, there are so many ways in which we try to satisfy our deepest longing by filling in our thirst with false gods and passing pleasures from the world. This is exactly what we see happening in today\u2019s Gospel story. The Pharisees and the Herodians are standing face to face with Jesus, the Son of God, the one person who could actually satisfy all of their longings and desires. Instead of listening to Him and letting Him fill them with His love, they desire to try and trick Him and see what He has to say about money and taxes. As we so often do, they are looking for a worldly excuse to dismiss Him. How many are the human excuses for which people attempt to dismiss Jesus and Christianity. Jesus is trying to offer them eternal life and infinite love and all they can ask about is to whom they should give a silly coin. For this small amount of money, they are willing to risk their salvation. Jesus\u2019 answer is brilliant. He asks: \u201cWhose image is on the coin?\u201d His response, if Caesar\u2019s image and name are on the coin, give it to him\u2014 it belongs to him. But, He goes on to say, \u201cGive to God that which belongs to God.\u201d<\/p>\n

Without intending it, the Pharisees and Herodians have received from Jesus what is perhaps the simplest and most perfect summary of both Jewish and Christian spirituality. What does God invite us to do in response to all of the blessings that He has showered upon us in creation? The answer Jesus gives is: \u201cGive to God the things that belong to God.\u201d In his homily on this passage of scripture, St. Augustine wrote:<\/p>\n

In the same way as Caesar looks for his image on a coin, God looks for His in your soul. \u201cGive back to Caesar what is Caesar\u2019s,\u201d the Savior says. What does Caesar demand from you? His image. But Caesar\u2019s image is on a coin, whereas\u00a0 God\u2019s is in you. If the loss of a coin causes you to weep because you have lost Caesar\u2019s image, would not any damage brought to God\u2019s image be for you a cause for tears? (St. Augustine\u2019s 24th Sermon)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So often in our lives, we can find ourselves attached to things and people that do not lead us to God or respect who we are as men and women made in the image and likeness of God. Whenever we find ourselves really anxious, struggling with unhappiness or consumed with unhealthy behaviors or feelings, I think if we ask ourselves how is this thing or person leading me to God, or respecting who I am as someone made in His image and likeness, we will discover the source of our unhappiness. So often we know innately that a relationship is wrong or our attachment to something is unhealthy because it leaves us feeling incomplete or unable to see how it can lead us to our true end, which is with God. I might truly value something very much, or love a person very much, but if that person or thing is not on the path that leads to my true fulfilment in God, I will know in my heart it is not intended to bring me the fulfilment I was created for and it will leave me uneasy and longing for peace. True Christian peace and fulfillment requires that I give to God what belongs to God.<\/p>\n

In our Christian tradition, one of the ways that we speak about how we give to God what is owed to God is through our vocational response. The word \u201cvocation\u201d comes from the Latin verb \u201cvocare,\u201d which means to call. God has called each one of us into existence by creating us. He has created us with a desire for relationship with Him as expressed in our desire for infinite love and the eternal, which He alone can satisfy. We are each of us called to try and respond to this call and His love. There are many different ways in which each of us can do this. It is done through marriage, the single life, the life of religious women and men and the priesthood and the diaconate. Even once we have discerned our vocation, there will be many finite loves and attachments which threaten to take us off course. These can come in the way of sexual temptations, desire for new love, money, fame, and career. They can often come in many disguises. A good parent may be tempted into thinking that she or he is doing their family a favor by working extra hours to provide more money; instead they come home constantly grouchy and tired and deny the children the love of a parent which is all they really need. Like the Pharisees and Herodians in today\u2019s Gospel, each one of us can miss Jesus as he stands in front of us and invites us to experience His fulfillment. We can do so by worrying about so many things, which are nothing more than nonsense about trivial matters, like to whom do I give this coin. Our true happiness will always depend upon our being orientated to the love and eternity for which we have been created.<\/p>\n

The words which Jesus speaks in today\u2019s Gospel provide words from which all of us can find true peace: \u201cGive to God the things which belong to God.\u201d If there are things that are exercising an unhealthy power over you and taking your freedom, ask yourself if that thing is of God? Is it helping you to find the fulfillment and peace that God created you to know? Like the Pharisees and the Herodians, so often the things that trouble us and take up our attention are simply obstacles that we have created and they prevent us from seeing God as He stands right before our eyes. God created us for happiness; He created us to find that happiness in Him and the things which lead to Him. Where we find ourselves most troubled and stressed is most likely to be in those areas in our lives in which we are moving away from Him or failing to respect His image within ourselves. If we really want to worry about what is important in life, we are called to see the image of God that is within us, and our brothers and sisters, and to render to God the things that belong to God. As costly as it might seem to let go of those attachments that prevent us from rendering to God what belongs to God, only by letting Go of them can we experience the true peace and fulfilment which God has created us to enjoy. This is what the People of Israel learned when they were finally able to let go of the false gods they had created as they wandered the desert seeking God. When they let go of their golden calf, they entered the Promised Land and experienced that happiness that God had created them for when He made them in His image and likeness. Jesus invites us to this same happiness as He invites us, His brothers and sisters, made in the image and likeness of God, to render unto God the things of God.<\/p>\n

May we all come to the happiness that God has created us for by rendering unto God the things that belong to God.<\/p>\n

Father Michael McGourty
\nPastor\u2014 St. Peter\u2019s Church\u2014 Toronto.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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