THE WORD AND THE SAINT
August 14, 2025 - Remembering St. Maxmillian Kolbe
Joshua 3:7-11,13-17; Matthew 18:21 - 19:1
The presence of the Lord with the Israelites was a solid and concrete presence - the pillar of fire and the pillar of cloud that we have seen and today the splitting of Jordan when the bearers of the Ark step in. The presence made a great difference in the lives of the people and at times the Lord made it concrete because they were constantly forgetting the fact.
Today in the first reading, we have the Jordan splitting itself - the upper Jordan and the lower and they saw the dry ground. It is a repetition of the experience when they crossed the Red Sea with Moses, they walked on dry ground even then. In our life too, there are experiences of dry ground - we walk through them without our feet getting wet or dirty or stained or soiled, not by our own merit but by the grand mercy of God.
That is what Jesus is reminding us of - when you find fault with your neighbour, when you judge your brother or your sister, when you call them names, when you have your finger pointing at your fellow persons, remember the dry ground phenomenon. You are standing on a dry ground, your feet unsoiled because the Lord has had mercy on you. Remember, your dry ground is not your merit, it is God's mercy. When you are mindful of it, you will surely be a member of the Reign.
We remember today Maximlian Kolbe, a saint of our times whom we can look up to with awe! He lived with courage his call to be a Christian, that is his call to choose God above all else! He took seriously 1 John 3:16 - "... we ought to lay down our lives for our brethren." That is the sign given to us to testify for the absolute choice we have made for God. But how much we cry and complain when someone causes us trouble, or spoils our name, or ruins our prospects...that is a sign that we have other choices which matter to us more!
Right enough, at the canonisation ceremony, Pope John Paul II declared him as 'the Patron Saint of our Difficult Century'. A saint from the greatest of all tragedies of the just gone century in the concentration camp of Auschwitz, where Kolbe chose to die in place of another (that was Franciszek Gajowniczek, who was present at the canonisation of the saint). Kolbe was able to do it because he was mindful of his dry ground experience, the gratuitous gift that he had received from God, the life that he chose to give for the other!
Let our choice for God be absolute. If that is the case, nothing can ever overpower us, except loving gratitude to the one who gives us the dry ground experience in our daily lives!