Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time, October 1, 2023 – Ezekiel 18:25-28; Philippians 2:1-11; Matthew 21:28-32

Micro-aggressions. We all are guilty of them. We all are the victims of them. 

During the Covid lockdown, I was one of the few cars on the road on a regular basis because I still went to dialysis three days a week. And the path I take to dialysis is always the same. Using the same roads. Very little traffic on them back then. But when we came back from the Covid lockdown, I noticed something. Drivers were much more aggressive. For example, there is a major intersection on the road that I use, with a traffic light. And usually, traffic piles up at the traffic light and I would be in a queue of, say, eight or nine cars waiting. And somebody behind me would pull out and pass all eight of us on the right - which is illegal - just so they could make a right-hand turn on red. Because “the law says I can do that, so it’s my right to do that.” On that same road, it winds its way through a number of bedroom communities. And people come out of the side roads there without even noticing there’s a stop sign. “It’s their right to come out of that road. Get out of their way.” Micro-aggressions.

Jesus, in today’s gospel, talks about a micro-aggression. We’ve all been there. When we were kids, our parents told us to do something. “I won’t. I won’t. You can’t make me.” That was usually followed by a macro-aggression on the part of our parents. Nonetheless, it’s a part of human experience.  And today’s second reading is meant to talk with us about our micro-aggressions.

Paul loved the people of Phillipi. HIs congregation there. They loved him back again. So, what he’s saying in today’s reading is meant as a gentle reminder. But the bulk of it is known as the Hymn to Christ. And Paul didn’t write it. As a matter of fact, it’s so ancient, that it’s very likely that Paul learned to sing it when he was a catechumen getting ready for his own baptism. Right after his conversion. Probably, if we never had another piece of Christian literature other than that brief poem, that’s all we would need to know about Christ.

But there’s a problem with it. It sounds like Paul is offering Jesus just as a model of good human behavior. That’s what is known as the heresy of Pelagianism. Pelagius, after whom it’s named, was a priest of the fourth century who went around saying that human beings didn’t really need to be redeemed from evil, they just needed a good example to follow. And so, Jesus came down from heaven to be a good example for us to follow.

But pressed into the hymn here and there are little additions that St. Paul made that tell us that’s not what it’s about. The first one is “even death on a cross.” The second one is “above the earth, on the earth and under the earth.” And the third one is “to the glory of God the Father. We’ll get to that later on. 

The first thing to talk about is what exactly is the image of Jesus being offered? The hymn starts out by saying “although he was in the form of God, Jesus did not think equality with God was something to be grasped.” Now, when we were little, we were taught that we were made in the image and likeness of God. The Latin word is imago. There’s a butterfly called the imago butterfly. Jesus is in the imago of God. But He doesn’t think that that’s something to clutch at. That word, in the original languages, has a very special meaning. The first time it appears in the scripture, it appears in the second chapter of the book of Genesis, right after the snake convinces Eve that she should eat the fruit from the tree. And the writer says, “At that moment the fruit looked good, and Eve jumped up to grasp it, to clutch at it.” We have all done that, right? Tried to grab the low fruit on a tree? That’s the image that’s there in the poem. Jesus did not think that being God Himself was something to grasp at, but rather He let it go. He emptied Himself. He let it go. Appearing as a human being.  And then the hymn says, “And in his humanness, He even accepted death.”

Death is the great leveler. As we grow older, we begin to realize that. That no matter what we’ve done, who we are, what we own, who loves us, there will come a time when we are no more. And St. Paul emphasizes that by saying, “Yeah, not only did He accept death - everybody has to accept that - He accepted death on a cross.” That’s the first proof that this is not a Pelasgian heresy. The one who is in the image of God accepted an absolutely horrible death. 

The next proof is that St. Paul says, “Every knee must bend, above the earth, on the earth and under the earth.” Only the Pagans would have been interested in that, because they were fascinated by the three-story universe. The heavens above, the flat earth where we live, and that dark place under the earth. And St. Paul emphasizes that “so much was this human being who accepted death truly God, that the whole universe bows before Him. And that’s the proof that He surrendered Himself for our sake.” St. Paul says, “to the glory of God the Father.” That’s what gives God glory. 

But when you realize that, then you realize that this really is a great pattern for us to follow. Emptying oneself. So easy to say and so hard to do. But it needs to come, for all of us, in very small stages. That letting go of ourselves in the center. You know, they say that growing up means moving from being self-centered and other-directed to being other-centered and self-directed. It takes a long time. The way that we train ourselves is in little bits and pieces. Offering someone else the place ahead of us in line. Holding the door for somebody. Saying thank you to someone who has held the door for us. Smiling and nodding at someone who is scowling at us. Just little things.

Little by little, we begin to let go of ourselves as micro-aggressors and become more like what the Catechism says we were made to be. In the image of God. In the image of Jesus.