Sunday, June 24, 2012

6/28/2012 – 12th Thursday of ordinary time - St Irenaeus of Lyons – Psalm 79 –


         Today, we hear a psalm that is a lament about the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in 586 BCE.  We hear the psalmist asking the Lord not to remember the iniquities of the past, but to have his compassion come quickly for his people.  In addition, the psalmist asks the Lord to deliver his people and to pardon their sins for the sake of his name.   We think of our past sins and transgressions, we think of the Lord of compassion and love, and we place our hope in the Lord for our future.  When I was hiking up the largest peak on the pilgrimage route to Spain on my way to Santiago this past April, one young man from New York told me that he saw this trek as penance for all of his past sins, and also penance for any sins he might commit in the future.  Many of us probably feel the same way. 
Today, we also celebrate St Irenaeus, the second bishop of Lyons, France.  Irenaeus is considered to be one of the most important theologians of the 2nd century, a time before our faith was a recognized religion in the Roman empire, a time when the theologians were still debating and hammering out a lot of the basics about what we believe about Jesus and about our faith. Much of what Irenaeus wrote was against Gnosticism, a popular philosophy in the ancient world that saw different levels of divinity as being present instead of one, unified God, a philosophy that separated the created world into the superior spirit and the inferior material objects.  Irenaeus of Lyons did a great deal to develop orthodox teachings within our faith, to develop those fundamental beliefs that we so often take for granted today. As we ponder the transgressions of the past and how we and the community of faith may have strayed from God’s will and God’s purpose for us in life, may we think about the mercy and compassion of God, just as the psalmist called upon that same divine love and compassion.  May God’s  love and compassion give us strength and encouragement as we travel along our own journeys.  

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