This reflection explores the apparent contradiction between God's unconditional love (Psalm 139) and Jesus's harsh judgment of hypocrites--those whose actions do not align with what they say. Rice notes that God's judgment targets those who hide behind masks, trying to earn love through performance rather than accepting they are already beloved. Using Byron Katie's insights, the piece suggests we often act from fear to manipulate others' affection, but God's love is unconditional and unearnable—we simply need to remove our masks and accept this truth.
Today’s readings can almost seem to give us whiplash. Just before this gospel of woe and judgment, the responsorial psalm is number 139, a great hymn to the Lord of love who has searched us, knows us, and names us the beloved. We have been loved into being by the one “who knit us in our mother’s womb,” knows every word before it reaches our lips, and from whom even the deepest darkness and the depths of Sheol cannot separate us. How do we reconcile the One who is Love with the One who speaks judgment?
If God is the great knower, the judgment Jesus renders today is to the hypocrites, those who would not be known. This title, hypocrite, evokes that of a stage actor who speaks from behind a mask. And it is common for us humans to don masks. We yearn for connection, acceptance and belonging, and this yearning can lead us to embrace a duality, who we present to the outside world, the mask, and who we really are in our essence. In her book, I Need Your Love, Is that True? Byron Katie writes, “When you say or do anything to please, get, keep, influence or control anyone or anything, fear is the cause and pain is the result. Manipulation is separation, and separation is painful” (45). In these instances Katie shares, even if we are in the presence of another person who is loving us totally in that moment, “[we’d] have no way of realizing it … [for] if you act from fear, there’s no way you can receive love, because you are trapped in a thought about what you have to do for love” (45). One of the exercises she recommends in the book is making a list of the mundane things we might do to curry favor with others, pretending we like the same music or are interested in the same hobbies, or even share the same political views. And then to imagine presenting this list to the one we have been trying to connect with, and say “Has it worked? Is this what you love?”
What an interesting exercise to consider in our relationship with God. For the fact of the matter is there is nothing we can do to make God love us, and yet how often do we act as if there is: I’ve fasted on the days that you have asked me to fast, I have gone to church on the days you’ve asked me to go to church, I’ve given part of my worldly treasure to those who have less … Has it worked, God? Is this what you love?
And we realize it is futile. For it is impossible for God not to love us. Can we believe that? That we are loved without expectation, simply because we are? And then, can we ascribe that same knowledge to others?
The very thing that we are seeking, love, connection, acceptance, is here all along. We never had to earn it, and neither do the ones we share this world with. For even when we forget who we truly are and don the masks that we think will bring us love, approval and esteem, we are still the beloved, and when we remember that we can let the masks go along with the painful separation from the One who knows and loves and calls us into being. Then, with the psalmist, we can say, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me.”
(Photo credit: Salib Saddaf)
