Who
are We Going to Trust?
Thursday March 20, 2003 (Audio) Homily by Fr. Robert Altier Second
Week of Lent
Reading (Jeremiah 17:5-10) Gospel (St. Luke 16:19-31)
In the first
reading today, we hear one of the most unfortunate statements in all of
Scripture – unfortunate in the fact that it is absolutely true, but something
that none of us like to hear – More tortuous
than all else is the human heart, beyond remedy; who can understand it?
The Lord is pointing to the fact that what happens is we do not trust. What
happens with most of us is we get caught up in ourselves and we do not trust
God. In fact, I think if we are honest with ourselves, we would probably admit
that we trust human beings far more than we trust God. Now none of us really
wants to admit to that, but the reality, if we look rather deeply at it, I
think is there. We can see human beings; we can listen to them; we can touch
them; they are flesh and blood; they are right in front of us or we can get
them on the other end of a telephone or with a letter or whatever it might be.
But with God, we cannot see Him, we cannot hear Him, we cannot touch Him, and
so it requires far more to be able to put our trust fully in God. It is a lot
easier to trust in other people.
Of course, the one
that it is most easy to trust – and the one who should be least trusted – is
the self! We put all kinds of trust in ourselves even though, if we look
historically at our own lives, we will have to admit there are probably
thousands of times that we have failed. Not only have we failed in our word to
other people and what they were trusting in us to do, but I suspect we have all
probably failed ourselves plenty of times, as well as failing the Lord. And so
it really makes one wonder what is wrong with us that we would put such trust
in ourselves and such trust in other people, but yet we do not really put the
trust in the Lord. It is not so much a matter that we are even really trying to
trust; the problem is that most of us are so caught up in our own selves that
trusting God does not even enter into our minds because we never look beyond
ourselves, or very rarely anyway.
Look, for instance,
at the Gospel reading, and you see Dives, the rich man, dining sumptuously
while there is a beggar sitting at his gate, not all that unlike many of us
because Dives probably never thought twice about it. It was his money, after
all, and he can do with it what he wants; he was caught up in himself. As long
as he had what he wanted, that was all that really mattered. And, after all, it
was a matter of justice: “If I made the money, I can spend it on myself if I
want to.” And so from the torments of hell, he cries out for help – and there
is none. Then he begs that Lazarus would at least go and warn his brothers. And
the Lord says in a totally prophetic manner, “If they do not listen to Moses
and the prophets, neither will they believe if someone rises from the dead.”
Well, we have
Someone Who has risen from the dead, and most people do not believe Him either.
We are held to an even greater responsibility than Dives and those of his time
because we not only have what Moses and the prophets have written, we have God
made man, Who suffered and died and rose from the dead for us. Still, we refuse
to listen. Still, we refuse to trust. We trust ourselves far more than we trust
Him, which is really sad because we have no reason to trust in ourselves and
every reason to trust in Him. But the reality is we do not and that is
something we need to look at. We need to pray about that because that trust is
absolutely essential for where we are headed. Now that things have begun, it is
time that we look at where we trust. Do we trust in airplanes and bombs and TV
sets and whatever else? Or do we trust in God? More
tortuous than all else is the human heart, beyond remedy; who can endure it?
* This text was
transcribed from the audio recording of a homily by Father Robert Altier with minimal editing.