Called to be gifted

In the readings today, Isaiah tells King Ahaz what should be joyous tidings: that the Lord bids him to ask for a sign. Why does the king refuse? His words, 'I will not put the Lord to the test,' are humble enough on the face of it, but Isaiah instead conveys vexation? How should the king have responded? I guess he should have responded graciously. God is a magnanimous giver of gifts. Whether by insincerity, or by false humility, or even by pride, the king's refusal seems not to be the right answer.

In the Gospel reading from Luke, the angel Gabriel announces to Mary that she is to be the blessed mother of the Son of God, the Word of God, Christ and king. To these tidings, our Lady responds with perplexity and some anxiety, and the angel is not offended. This was, after all, a girl of fourteen years or so, and so her response was understandable, and really quite sincere. And her ultimate response caps it off: 'I am the handmaid of the Lord, let what you have said be done to me,' or, as the more romantic translations say, 'let it be done to me according to thy word.' I like this version because that word is the Word of God, himself.

This, I think, is how we should respond when faced with God's gifts. We are called to be gifted (not just called and gifted), for the Lord delights in his creation, and his love is everlasting. To his graciousness, and it is really proper and courteous -- we should say "Thank you!" and accept the gift.

Called

One of the things that seem etched into Man's heart is a sense of calling, something that pulls beyond what is immediately obvious, that there should be something more to life than whatever there seems to be. I grew up on stories with heroes in them, from the fictional to the historical, from the Old Testament heroes like Samson and David, to brief stories of the saints like Christopher and Francis of Assisi. And the mythical Norse heroes to the Greek, Arthur and his knights, Charlemagne, Roland and the paladins. Lapu-lapu, Rizal, Bonifacio and the heroes of more than a century ago. They all had callings of significance, and I could feel it in my bones that I had mine. Probably not the same that they had, probably not as big, but just as exciting and full of adventure and surprises.

It is probably just as well that I encountered St Josemaria Escriva at some point, and I learned the most amazing thing that makes incredible sense: the call to do ordinary things extraordinarily well -- supernaturally well, in fact. This Lent calls me to an opportunity to be returned to myself (not for me to return to myself, as I'd misstated below). To what do I return? For one, that I am called, to sanctify what is ordinary, by turning it into prayer, asking the Holy Spirit to therefore infuse the mundane activities of everyday with supernatural grace. Father and husband. Teacher, thinker, tinker. In today's readings, Isaiah proclaims God's call to holy ordinariness in acting with justice and compassion, reverence and faith (Is 58:9-14), and Jesus calls sinners to repentance, but also, as with Levi, to be his disciple (Lk 5:27-32). And this Levi is renamed Matthew, and goes from tax collector to apostle, doing ordinary things, really. Yet how many authors have had their book copied, reprinted, cited, read aloud, translated into dozens of languages, over a period of about 2000 years? Quite a boast, and it started one ordinary day at the customs house, with one extraordinary call!