Moral Blindness

Gospel: Luke 12: 54-59

Jesus asks us the rhetorical question - why are we unable to judge what is right in the times in which we live?  We can forecast the weather and foresee all sorts of other things, but we cannot - or will not - rightly interpret the signs of our times.  We are blinded by our hypocrisy.  We have created one set of ethics for others while an entirely different set for ourselves and our tribe.  We are more than ready to hold others to account while exonerating ourselves and our tribe for the same moral crimes.  

The modern era thinks itself better and morally superior to past ages, though little empirical evidence can be brought forward to justify such a claim.  The same atrocities abound, the same hypocrisy, the same double standards.  We Christians make triumphalistic assertions on the moral superiority of the Christian system, but again finding little in the way of supporting data.  The mass graves of children at indigenous missions and Irish laundries, the sexual abuse crimes, the coddling of tyrants and a host of other evils suggest otherwise.

But what we do have is the example of Jesus against which our actions can be measured and judged.  Found wanting each day, we can and must strive to do better.  We can and must model our lives on the Lord Jesus alone, not on ideologues and religious charlatans.  Jesus reminds us in today's Gospel that it is within our power to judge what is right and wrong.  We have the capacity to discern the signs of our times. We have only to do so - to repent and to follow him in a life of mercy and loving kindness to others.