The Words in Other Words by Fr Aris Martin SVD (USA)
Monday Week 6 Ordinary Time Year 2
James 1,1-11 Mark 8,11-13
We know that love grows in the fertile ground of trust. If trust is gone, love loses its excitement and joy.
This reminds me of a breathtaking scene in the movie The Great Wall where Lin tries to convince William to jump over the very high wall and fight against the enemy down. She said, Xin Ren (信任), a Chinese word for trust. “Trust is what keeps me alive.” To which William responded, “I am alive today because I do not trust anybody.”
They seem to be very different but at the end of the movie William’s only weapon in the greatest battle of his life was trust, and he finally said to Lin as if retracting his previous conviction, “We are more similar than we thought.”
Indeed, trust is what keeps us still alive. Trust respects differences and transcends them by focusing on the things that unite.
This is what the Letter of James points out that in trying times, we should hold on to God “in faith, not doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed about by the wind.”
In Mark 8, Jesus is disappointed with the Pharisees and leaves them. They are testing him, distrusting him, and thus, they do not love him.
Distrust is the “Great Wall” that divides us in our relationship with God and with one another. It has destroyed marriages or friendships. Whoever is faithful is trusting.
Our call is to be faithful. Without trust, we cannot be called the “lay faithful.” Let this be our prayer: Jesus, I trust in you. Jesus, I love you and we will live.
