By Colleen O’Sullivan
Some
who had come down from Judea were instructing the brothers, “Unless you are
circumcised according to the Mosaic practice, you cannot be saved.” (Acts 15:1)
(Jesus said:)
“Remain in me, as I remain in you.
Just as a branch cannot bear fruit on its own unless it remains on the
vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me. I am the vine, you are the branches.” (John 15:4-5a)
Piety
O Lord,
Life-giving Vine, may we ever be anchored in you.
Study
The other
afternoon, I was sitting on my patio, enjoying the deep blue sky, the puffy,
white clouds, the chance to just relax awhile.
My gaze wandered around the garden, taking in what needs to be done
after a long, cold winter. I smiled as I
admired the beautiful blooms already adorning the rose bush. My thoughts eventually turned to the vine and
the branches at the center of today’s Gospel reading. I tried to picture what they might look
like. What came to mind was a huge,
sturdy vine, bright green, impregnable, the source of never-ending life for
branches vibrant with a riot of flowers of every shape and hue in the spring
and weighed down with the abundant fruits of our labors in the autumn. The vine that is Christ supports and sustains
us in all our wonderful diversity.
But we
don’t always picture the vine and the branches in such a manner. In our reading from the Book of Acts, we find
the young church grappling with its first major crisis. Those who were Jews believed that every Christian
should have to observe the Jewish law and that all male followers of Christ
should be circumcised as they were. But
where did that leave the growing number of Gentile converts, who knew nothing
about the Jewish law? Did every believer
have to come to Christ in the same way? Do
all the blossoms and fruits on the branches have to be identical? After much discussion and consideration, the
early Church concluded that we are all saved through the same grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ. We are all firmly rooted
in the life-giving Vine. It is in that
rootedness and in our faith that we find unity.
Sometimes
I wonder if we ever learn anything from history, because we seem to fight the
same battles over and over again. We may
be reluctant to admit it, but often we think others ought to be living their
faith exactly the way we do. Whether
we’re conservative or liberal, we find fault with the other side. (The middle-of-the-roaders don’t stand a
chance.) We find ourselves intolerant of
types of spirituality and spiritual practices different from our own. We think everyone else should share our taste
in church décor or church music. The
list could go on and on.
It’s good
to remind ourselves that the Church, in its earliest days, already decided that
what makes us one is our rootedness in Christ, our faith in the one who died
and rose for us. Beyond that, there’s
room on the branches for a startlingly beautiful array of blooms and fruits, no
two alike but all relying on the same Source for life.
Action
In The Holy
Longing, Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI, says the foundation for our church
community is not found in like-mindedness or shared ethnicity or a whole host
of other things. We have community
because we gather round the same Lord and share in the same Spirit. (Ch. 6, “A Spirituality of Ecclesiology,” p.
118). What intolerances could you set aside in order
to focus more on the Christ who brings us together?
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