Homilies

26th SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: BE TOLERANT WITH OTHERS

ONCE, a devout Catholic woman came to me crying. She shared with me her problem with her son, who planned to get married to a lady who was a "born-again" Christian.The woman requested me to talk to her son and convince him not to marry the Christian  lady. It appeared that she could not accept a "born-again" Christian to become part of their family.

In a majority Catholic country, like the Philippines, there is a tendency for Catholics to look at other Christian religions as something alien or a completely different religion from Catholicism itself. Therefore, for most of us, our attitude toward them has not been that healthy.

The gospel today is an eye-opener for us, and it offers us a proper attitude toward other Christian churches.

First, we need to realize that the Catholic Church is not the only Church that believes  in and professes Jesus as Lord. There are Anglicans, the Lutherans, to name a few, who confess the same faith with us. With this realization, we can broaden our  horizon, and we can think of better approaches in dealing with them, we being the majority in the country in terms of adherents.

Second, the first attitude that comes to the fore is that of tolerance. In the gospel, Jesus told his disciples not to prevent the "other" disciples, who did not belong to their inner circle, from exorcising demons in his name. The reason of Jesus: "If they are for us, they are not against us." Indeed, these Christian churches or Ecclesial communities profess Jesus as their Lord, and they have been called by God to become instruments of salvation. Vatican II talks about them as channels of grace.

Third, although the Catholic Church and other Christian churches believe in one Lord, we have to see the fact that there are differences in other matters that we believe in and what we practice. There is division in this respect. This division, according to John Paul II, is a "scandal." It is so because the will of God for all of us is unity. In fact, this was the prayer of Jesus to his Father: "Father, may they be one as you and I are one." Therefore this demands us to develop an attitude of unity. We all must work for further ecumenical dialogue with each other with the hope that we would understand each other, and perhaps, correct the differences. In the end, we can work and worship together in the one Lord, and perhaps, celebrate one Eucharist together, and profess the same doctrine.

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