WEDNESDAY MARCH 27, 2024
WEDNESDAY OF HOLY WEEK B
Isaiah 50:4-9
Matthew 26:14-25
DEALING WITH DISORDERED AFFECTIONS IN OUR CHRISTIAN JOURNEY
The appetite of man can be wild and wide. The hunger and lure for riches, and the pleasures of the eye and the desires of the heart can at times go uncontrolled to the extent that satisfying them results in injustice, trampling on the well-being of others and even inflicting injury and irreversible consequences on our souls.
These unnecessary and irrelevant desires of the heart, the unguarded appetite of man, the irresponsible lure for riches, the pleasure of the eye can all result and lead to or arise from disordered affections. They are affections that play most on our emotional state in life and tend to seek satisfaction for them.
One of such is what we read in today’s gospel. That Judas Iscariot experienced and allows himself be dragged into committing the horrendous sin of betraying his master. He listened, paid attention and was led away by his disordered affections of greed, love of money, and desire for material possession.
Judas Iscariot sold his master for thirty silver pieces and exchanged his master for this price.
In the temptation of Jesus before the beginning of his public ministry, we are tutored on the need to put these disordered affections which is so strong in our human nature to where they belongs. Every human being has the tendencies to be pulled by these affections. That is why they are temptations that man go through in life. Paying attention to them and being attracted and pulled by them and desiring to satisfy them can lead us into grave sin and turns us into enemies with God just as we see in Judas Iscariot.
The church continues to warn us against disordered affections. It could camouflage in different forms and styles. In our age people have taken to rationalize and worse still accept them as part of human nature or weaknesses that are unavoidable. Modern science are employed to play on man’s intelligence as if they are part and parcel of our lives which we cannot understand and which is beyond us and which we must accept.
We see such disordered affection which comes in form, for example of kleptomaniac, which is an urge to steal being rationalized as part of ones biological make up and so morally permissible. This is an insane interpretation. And if we admit such we must as well admit other forms of disordered affections which comes in form of sexual satisfactions, gay, lesbianism, transgender and all forms of disordered affection seen in the sexual angle. We could even admit sadistic tendencies which come as serial killers, and murderers who delight in inflicting injury and untold hardships on persons. But no!!! They are disordered affection resident in man and which must be controlled and fought against!!!
Again there is the second most serious tendency to relativize, minimize and even rename our disordered affections as if it does not matter much. We see in our culture today stealing, robbery and dwindling of people has been renamed with beautiful and less morally culpable titles. We may think of these horrendous crimes against human being arising from disordered affections, some of these names are 419, embezzlement, guys, and a host of other renamed crimes.
The church continue to state in unequivocal terms that disordered affections are serious sins against God and humanity and must never be condoned. There is no need to make a rationalization of it or renaming of it. It must be dealt with and fought against in our lives.
Jesus teaches us the way to fight against them wherever and whenever we observe them in us. It is the way of Isaiah in today’s first reading. It is by trusting in God, hoping upon his grace and striving daily to overcome in life. It has the attribute of humble acceptance of our limited ness and weaknesses, an acknowledgement of the fact that we need help and assistance of God to triumph in life. And we strive to hang on to God in Jesus and we humbly ask his help in our predicament. There are temptations we go through in life and we must never give in to them.
Judas Iscariot had a fair of his own temptations in the form of attraction to riches, greed and unguarded material possession and he fell for it by betraying Jesus. But the consequences of his actions were irreversible and brings untold guilt and punishment to him.
Guard yourselves always against disordered affections by trusting deeply in Jesus and being contented with values that gives life in God.
Heavenly Father, we are confronted and sometimes influenced by our unguarded appetite which goes against your will for us. Father, protect us from these temptations, teach us what is more valuable in life, help us never to be tempted beyond our capacity. May we never disappoint you or betray you in anyway in this life and call us back when we tend to stray away from the right way. Through Christ our Lord.
Fr Norbert Uchuno
