In the Gospel today (Luke 12:49-53) Jesus tells of his desire to set the earth ablaze with a fire. He says something else that seems contradictory to His person and message: “I have come for division.”
In reality, Jesus does not come to bring division, but His presence and message result in division until people humbly submit to His Gospel of Truth. The Fire that Jesus casts upon the earth is the Fire of Divine Love. This Divine Love; the Love that exists within (and is) the communion of Divine Persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, is the source of all creation. As such, this Divine Love is the unifying power of everything within creation. This Divine Love is the final destination to which all creation will return, when all creation will bend the knee at the name of Jesus (Philippians 2:10), ‘and God will be all in all.’ (1 Corinthians 15:28)
Where there is resistance to this Love, there can only be division and discord. Where there is harmony with this Love, there is communion – unity – peace – love.
This Fire of Divine Love is the culmination of God’s plan for all of creation – for every human person. St. Paul gives a marvelous ‘blueprint’ for the Divine Plan in his letter to the Ephesians. Today’s first reading (Ephesians 3: 14-21) speaks of the culmination of God’s plan:
Brothers and Sisters: I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that he may grant you in accord with the riches of his glory to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inner self, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the holy ones what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
God’s plan, through Christ, is to share His love with all of us; to fill us with the very Love of God! This is the Fire of Love that burns away selfish love, leaving only Authentic Love, which is the harmony of the soul with God and the peaceful abiding of one person with another.
My dear friends, let us live the Faith that is ours in Christ, that we may abide in the Love of God. May this Raging Fire of Divine Love sweep over us and all creation, that we may be cleansed of all selfishness and division, thus discovering communion with God and unity with our brothers and sisters.
+pde
0