Whole/Some

A Homily for the 13th Sunday of Ordinary Time

“And the creatures of the world are wholesome.” First, I would like to draw your attention to the beauty and the truth of that simple phrase which we just heard in our first reading from the Book of Wisdom. We can too easily forget, especially in a world racked by polarization and wrecked by climate change, the fundamental wholesomeness of the divine creative impulse. Second, I would like to draw your attention to that wonderful little word: wholesome. It is a word that contains within it a beneficial tension and struggle.

If we split that word in two it appears to be a word at odds with itself. Either it’s whole or it’s some? How can it be wholesome? But this word really provides a means for us to reflect on how we live our lives and from where we live our lives and out of where we choose to act each day of our lives.

We can probably each identify the movements within ourselves when we are living more out of the some and less out of the whole. And we can probably identify the tension that arises in us when we catch ourselves living more out of the some rather than the whole. And we might just be tempted to resolve that tension prematurely, yet it is the very tension between whole and some that spurs our own on-going growth and maturation.

Thomas Merton once wrote about, what he called, the “Hidden Wholeness.” He wrote that there is the surface of life (in our context this morning we might call that the some) and, because we all share in the human condition, that surface is broken, frail, limited, and weak. But underneath that broken surface or our lives lies the “Hidden Wholeness” which has always already been ours in Christ. I think perhaps this is what the author of Wisdom means when he writes, “all creatures are wholesome.” So at the end of the day the entire spiritual journey of our lives is to learn to live more out of that wholeness and less off the surface.

I’m sure we can see the difference in our own lives and in the world in which we live. When we live from the surface of our lives, we live mired in the brokenness, the frailty, the weakness, and the sin. So then all we see in ourselves, in our brothers and sisters, and in the world is that same frailty, weakness, limitation and sin. Therefore, we act out of fear and our hearts and our minds become more rigid toward ourselves, toward others, and toward our world.

But when we live more fully out of the “Hidden Wholeness,” the broken surface reality of our lives remains, but we learn to relate to it very differently. We learn to cultivate, patience, understanding, compassion and care for ourselves and for others, and for our world.

Jesus, in our gospel today, tells Jairus: “Do not be afraid; just have faith.” When we act in fear we are acting from the broken surface of our lives. When we act in faith, we are living, choosing, and acting out of the “Hidden Wholeness” that is ours.

But, because we are human beings, day in and day out, we find ourselves always somewhere in-between fear & faith, between broken surface & Hidden Wholeness, between the whole & the some. And in that place of tension the call is not to rush to resolution but rather to trust into transformation that the experience of the tension itself is teaching us how to root ourselves deeper in the “Hidden Wholeness” so that over time becomes the primary place out of which we live, choose, and act every day.

A wonderful medieval definition of the word, wholesome, is “that which is of benefit to the soul.” So, I would suggest that it is when we commit ourselves to stay in the tension between the whole and the some that we benefit our own souls and that of our brothers and sisters.

So, as we receive anew the Eucharist this morning, the body of Christ broken but never divided, let us pray for the grace we need to stay on the journey from the some to the whole to the benefit of all the souls we encounter.