The Great Power of the Church
On board my first ship, we were in the South China Sea. Suddenly, I heard blasts on the ships horn and the ship started listing on one side as it turned intensely. I ran to the bow to see what was happening. The patter of the blasts indicated our ship was trying to avoid a collision.
There was a cargo ship a head of us quite a distance but clearly, we were on the way to cross paths. Now, you have to imagine the scene. The horizon at sea level is twelve miles away. So imagine you can see 12 miles in any direction and there is nothing but water except for these two ships that almost had a collision. It did not happen and the other ship was a distance away, however, remember that it takes time to slow a ship unlike vehicles on land.
The first thing that came to mind when you can see nothing but open ocean except where these two ships are on this sunny day, is how does this happen?
In another case, before I got on the same ship. The navigator, a junior officer who would remind you of Frank Burns was directing the ship to Taiwan, unfortunately, he was off course enough for the crew to see Chinese gun boats from the mainland coming towards them. They had to correct the course ASAP.
These two stories tell of what goes wrong when navigation is wrong.
When we navigate wrongly
In today’s Gospel, Jesus gives the Apostles the power to forgive sins. What does this power do? It helps the faithful correct the course they are on.
Jesus came to show us the way because we cannot figure it out on our own and the Holy Spirit guides us, but we can get off course and that is what the power of forgiveness means. When we are on the wrong track, we basically know it, but the Lord knows we need his assistance to remain on the right track. The right track is what leads us to the fulfullment of human enlightenment. So we ask forgiveness to get us back on track and seek to follow the Lord who is leading us to where he is calling us to be.
Forgiveness is the greatest gift
This is the important power of gift of forgiveness. We are human we make mistakes we think we know it all, we choose to follow our own way. Jesus is not only promising the mercy of God but also the wisdom. Forgiveness is to help us understand that we are not following the right track based on the wisdom of God and that we are following only human wisdom.
Human wisdom works well for a time but eventually there will be a point where it clashes with divine wisdom and we find ourselves off the track. We realize we need to get back to where the Lord is calling us.
It is not about being a better person, a richer person or a successful person, it is about growing in our ability to live as Christ calls us to live so that we can be Christ to others. We can channel his mercy and love to those who are most without both.
Often times these are the people the world looks upon as lost. Jesus calls us to lead the lost to salvation and we cannot understand this well if we too are lost.
So the mercy of God is huge as is the Church’s ability to bring forth the mercy of God.
Fr. Robert J Carr is pastor of St. Anthony Parish in Allston, MA
The parish podcast is at CatholicAudioMedia.com
The newest edition of Fr Robert J Carr's latest book is now available. Christ in Our Humanity. You can find it here.