31st Sunday - God Does Not Make Junk!

 

Does God make junk? In the first reading today, from the book of Wisdom it states, “For you love all things that are and loathe nothing that you have made; for what you hated, you would not have fashioned.”

So the answer to the question, “Does God make junk?” is, “No, God does not make junk.” In fact, in the book of Genesis, whenever God created something, He said, “It was good.” For example, when God created creatures, cattle and living things and beasts of the earth, etc… and God saw that it was good.

But, after God created man in His own image and likeness, and said, “It was very good.” Only, after creating human beings, did God say, “very good.”

All people are created very good including those of us who are short, or skinny or tall, or heavy. God creates each and every person in a unique way. If you take twins for example, one may be shy and the other outgoing. One may be very talented and the other is not.

Some children make fun of other children, who are short or skinny or tall, or heavy. But it causes emotional pain to be made fun of especially with regard to appearance.

Because of being made fun of, some people can develop a negative view of themselves and may even call themselves names such as: “I’m ugly” or “I’m stupid”, or “I’m dumb”. They can do this especially when they make a mistake or when they sin. And most of the time, people view themselves the way their parents view them or the way others who made fun of them view them.

It is extremely important that a parent not degrade their children. For example, to say to a child, “You are dumber than a box of rocks.” or to stay, “You will never amount to anything.” A parent should not even joke using negative phrases toward their children. When I was young, I heard a father, say to one of his children, “I buy you books and buy you books, and all you do is eat the covers.” While it sounds funny, the truth is, the child can develop a strong negative view of him or herself and truly believe he or she is stupid.

When I did hospital ministry in Tulsa at St. Francis Xavier Hospital, the general hospital, also had a heart hospital, a children’s hospital, a mental hospital and it had a hospital for people who suffer from bulimia and anorexia. I quickly learned, often times, their condition was caused by a parent or relative who made fun of their child’s weight. In one case, the staff was very attentive and noticed how a parent, even at the hospital, was abusive. The child ended up being taken away from her parents and given to a relative.

For example, a father used to regularly call his daughter, “fatso”. But the emotional damage caused by the parent’s verbal abuse lead to a life of misery for the girl. As the girl grew older, she wanted to do everything she could to please her father. Rather than her father affirming her as his little princess and apple of his eye, he ended up causing great emotional harm to his daughter, who would later constantly seek affection from men in all the wrong ways. And so, she began to hardly eat any food to such a degree, that the girl would be literally dying from starvation. She even needed to have a nasal feeding tube to prevent her from being malnourished. No matter how skinny she was, she truly believed she was fat.  She erroneously thought all men only like slim girls.

Just for the record, any joke that puts down another person is a bad joke and should never be said.  We all like jokes and there is nothing wrong with joking around. But, if the joke puts down a person or a group of people, its not a good joke and could be sinful.

For those of us, who in the past, led terribly sinful lives, we can mistakenly view ourselves as not worthy of God’s love or we think God will never forgive us, because we committed many grievous sins. We can believe, we are junk and that we are too stupid to do anything right. But all of this is false. In fact, I believe the devil puts these kinds of thoughts into our mind, to keep us from going to Confession and prevents us from experiencing God’s mercy.

God wants us to confess our sins and often times is very gentle in helping us to obtain forgiveness.

The book of Wisdom said, “O Lord and lover of souls, for your imperishable spirit is in all things! Therefore you rebuke offenders little by little, warn them and remind them of the sins they are committing, that they may abandon their wickedness and believe in you, O Lord.”

God does not hate any of us, nor does He hate any of His creation. God cannot but love, for God is love. But God hates sin. He loves the sinner, but hates sin.

No matter how many sins, nor how big your sins, you may have committed, God loves you and will always love you. And God will always forgive you, as long you are truly sorry and want to do better. So how does God treat the sinner?

St. Faustina said, “The greater the sinner, the greater right one has to God’s mercy.” The psalm for today speaks about God’s compassion and mercy for each person. It said, “The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and of great kindness. The Lord is good to all and compassionate toward all His works. The Lord lifts up all who are falling and raises up all who are bowed down.”

So, if you are person who keeps calling yourself, stupid, or if think you will never amount to anything, or if you think God will never forgive you, stop playing your broken record, and begin to live in reality. You may have made a mistake, you may even have committed grievous sins, you may not be the smartest person in the world, but you are created in the image and likeness of God and God will always forgive you, because He loves you. God’s mercy is infinite.

Look at Zacchaeus in the Gospel today. He was a short man, but a big sinner. Perhaps, when he was a child or even as an adult, people made fun of him for being short.  He was a tax collector. Tax collectors were known for cheating people out of taxes and pocketing the money in order to become rich. The Gospel even says, he was wealthy. However, deep in his heart, he wanted to be a better person, but he was caught up in stealing money, for the sake of becoming rich. He probably thought he was not worthy to be in the presence of Jesus. He most likely thought, himself as worthless and a nobody because of his sinful behavior.

But when Jesus saw him in the tree, he did not condemn him. Our Lord did not even point out his sinful behavior. Rather he said, “Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house.” We have to remember the Pharisees would never go to a public sinners home. And here, Jesus invites Himself to the home of Zacchaeus, a tax collector, who everyone despised. Surely, Zacchaeus was overwhelmed by God’s mercy and would have invited his tax collector friends, who were also thieves too, so they too could experience the mercy of Jesus. How many people, who came to the dinner at the house of Zacchaeus also gave up their sinful behavior?

The Lord was kind and compassionate towards Zacchaeus. He was merciful to him. Zacchaeus was so moved by Our Lord’s willingness to go to his home and to eat with a sinner, that he said, “Behold, half of my possessions, Lord, I shall give to the poor, and if I have exhorted anything from anyone I shall repay it four times over.” As Jesus was merciful to Zacchaeus, so the heart of Zacchaeus burst open with mercy towards others.

Just think about how his conversion was so sincere, that he wanted to even pay back four times the amount of money he cheated from people. He didn’t just want to pay back what he had stolen, but to pay back four times the amount.

He must have thought, “I’m not junk. I am worth something. I can actually become a kind and generous person.” Oh, how wonderful and blessed is God’s mercy. May, the Virgin Mary, Mother of Mercy, help us to treat others with love, never condescending, never harsh or cruel, and may we see that every person is created very good and is truly loved by God, who is slow to anger, rich in compassion and infinite in His mercy.