"How many idols that am unable to rid myself of, which enslave me? That idolatry that we have inside ... And God weeps for me. " "Today we should think about this disappointment, of God who made us for love and we go to look for love, health, wellbeing in other places and do not love Him. We move away from this God who raised us. And this is a thought for Lent. "
Vatican City (AsiaNews) - " Today we should think about this disappointment, of God who made us for love", while instead we chase idols, fantasies, worldliness. A path to infidelity, noted Pope Francis at Mass this morning in Santa Marta, commenting on the passing of Exodus (32.7 to 14) in which God tells Moses to come down from the mountain, "because your people, whom you brought out the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. "
Francis focused on 'dreams and disappointments of God ". The people are "God's dream. He dreamed he loved." Nonetheless, that people betray the dreams of the Father, and so God "begins to feel disappointment" and asks Moses to come down from the mountain where he had gone to receive the Law. The people "did not have the patience to wait for God" for 40 days. They made a golden calf. A god "for fun" and "forgot the God who saved them."
The prophet Baruc, Pope Francis said, “had a good expression for this people: ‘You have forgotten the One who reared you’”. “To forget God who made us, who raised us, and who accompanies us in our lives: this is the disappointment of God. And many times in the Gospel Jesus speaks in parables about that man who builds a vineyard, which then fails, because the workers want to take it for themselves. In the human heart there is always this restlessness! It is not satisfied with God, with faithful love. The human heart always tends towards infidelity. This is a temptation.” God, therefore, “through the prophet rebukes this people”, which “is inconstant and does not know how to wait”. They go astray from God to seek another god. “The disappointment of God is the infidelity of the people… And we are God’s people. We know well how [the dispositions] of our heart, and every day we must take up again the path so as not to slide slowly towards idols, fantasies, worldliness, and infidelity. I think it would do us good today to reflect on the disappointed Lord: ‘Tell me, Lord, are you disappointed in me?’ In something, yes, surely. But reflect, and ask yourself this question.”
God, Pope Francis affirmed, “has a tender heart, the heart of a father”. He recalled that Jesus wept “over Jerusalem”. Let us ask ourselves, he said, if “God weeps for me”, if “He is disappointed in me”, and if “I have distanced myself from the Lord”. He asked aloud, “How many idols do I have, which I am unable to remove, which make me a slave? The idolatry that we have within us… And God weeps for me.”
“Let us reflect today on this disappointment of God, who created us for love, whilst we go in search of love, of wellbeing elsewhere and not in His love. We distance ourselves from this God who raised us. This is a thought for Lent. It will do us good. Do this small examination of conscience daily: ‘Lord, you who have so many dreams for me, I know that I have gone away from you, but tell me where and how to return…’ The surprise will be that He ever awaits us, like the father of the prodigal son who saw him from afar, because he was waiting for him.”