Who were the
two travelers on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-35)– Cleopas and that other
unidentified person? Were they friends,
or brothers, or husband and wife? We
don’t know. I like to think the reason
one of them remains unnamed is to allow us to insert our own name into the
story. It was Cleopas and Steve, or Cleopas
and Bob, or Cleopas and you on the road to Emmaus. And why not?
They were just like us. They had
the same concerns we do – in the midst of everyday life, keeping body and soul
together, keeping out of trouble, trying but failing to stay strong in the face
of shattered hopes and broken dreams.
Bible
scholars tell us that this episode, this theological masterpiece, with its
liturgical language – “He took; He broke; He gave”– is a description of the
Eucharist. It’s in the Liturgy of the
Word that the hearts of the two travelers were set on fire with understanding
of Jesus; that in the breaking of the bread, they saw Jesus; that having been
fed on the Word and the Bread they were sent on mission to proclaim the Good
News of the Lord’s resurrection. This,
in a nutshell, describes the Mass.
And yet,
perhaps the Good News embraces another, more commonplace, truth. The truth is that, like the two travelers, we
often walk in the wrong direction. We
walk away from Jerusalem, away from Calvary.
We walk in the direction of Emmaus, wherever that mysterious city may
be, seven miles distant and straight into darkness. We’re deliberately going the wrong way. It’s a bad habit we inherited from our first
parents who, in their sin of disobedience, went the wrong way, into the hiding
place of darkness.
Perhaps the
Good News, the central truth of all Scripture, beginning with Moses and the
prophets, as Jesus taught the two travelers, is that God always takes the
initiative in seeking us out – even when we insist on walking in the wrong
direction. He walks with us, yet never
forcing himself on us. He simply waits
patiently for me or Bob or you to say the words: "It’s
getting dark. Stay with us."
No comments:
Post a Comment