Trust in God or Trust in Humanity: Homily for Thursday, February 29, 2024

Readings for Today. Listen to our other podcasts.

The brother in torment was not without a heart. He cared enough to ask God to help his brothers. But he could not see that Lazarus was his brother, too.

Table of Contents

Trust in God or Trust in Humanity

Jeremiah was a man of tremendous emotion. He was known as the weeping prophet because he was so saddened by the rejection of the people to whom he was speaking, the rejection of God. And what’s interesting is that this rejection of God did kind of run counter to a life that seemed practical.

But there were things that were quite honestly about trusting in God that were of particular importance to Jeremiah that he simply couldn’t convince people to believe. They opted for political solutions despite God’s warning that such would lead them worse off than they were at present.

In fact, they were exiled again and again. It seemed that a treaty, a political treaty with someone that was powerful was a good thing to do. But it wasn’t what God told them to do and they wound up in exile. And the one that was strong didn’t really have any benefit from their strength.

We can be tempted in our own life to rely solely on the gift of what seems reasonable to us. It can be very easy to look at our world and opt for what appear to be reasonable solutions. In the gospel, we see that this rich man is not a man without a heart. He’s concerned about his family. We can only wonder what types of conversations occurred in his house about Lazarus outside the door.

Was he written off as someone who was lazy and didn’t want to work? Was he simply seen as someone who was getting in the way of their lifestyle? Whatever it was, he could have compassion for his brothers, but not compassion for someone who was obviously in need.

And when we think about it from a reasonable point of view, trusting in human beings, which is precisely what Jeremiah warns against in the first reading, cursed is the one who trusts in human beings, they trusted in their wealth. They trusted in life, in their resources. They enjoyed the good things that have been part of their life. Now there’s nothing wrong with looking at good things, but today I think it poses for us a question.

Do we trust in God or in our own efforts? Do we trust in politics or the solution of God? Do we trust in our life, in what we are hearing from God, or do we seek to try to find our own answers to every problem? Lent really is a time, it seems to me, to recognize that our life of faith is what we are called to invest deeply in. It’s not at the expense of reason, it’s not at the expense of pragmatism, but faith always has pride of place. And so let us ask the Lord today that we might be inspired by one who is risen from the dead.

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