Homily for the Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C, 2022

The One Thing Necessary

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

St. Alphonsus Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, MN

Sunday, July 17, 2022

If Jesus were to visit you and the rest of your family unannounced, what would you do? If the door bell rings, and upon opening the door, you realize it is Jesus, what would you do after welcoming him in and offering him a seat? As you think about that, let’s reflect on what the two sisters—Mary and Martha did when the Lord came to their house. Today’s Gospel (Luke 10:38-42) says that as Jesus enters a village, Martha invites and welcomes him to her home. After that, she hurries to the kitchen to prepare a meal for him. As she is slicing onions, tomatoes, bell peppers, other veggies, and getting every ingredients ready for the meal, her younger sister, Mary, is sitting at the feet of Jesus listening to him speak just like a true disciple would do. Martha is not pleased by her younger sister’s “idleness.” She comes to the sitting room and says, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving? Tell her to help me.” Instead of ordering Mary to join Martha in the kitchen, Jesus smiles and in a friendly way says, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.” 

Over the centuries, this story has been interpreted as an account of the play between the active life and the contemplative life, and as Jesus indicating his preference for the latter over the former. But I think that kind of interpretation does not get to the heart of the story. It is important to understand that none of the two sisters loved Jesus less. Each of their actions is their own way of demonstrating their love for the Lord. Martha wants to fix a meal for Jesus, and there is nothing wrong with it. Her sister Mary, like a first time lover, wants to spend every second with him. For Mary, sitting at the feet of Jesus, listening to him and forming relationship with him is more important. For Martha, satisfying the Lord’s hunger for food is more important. It is wrong and unfair to present Martha in a bad light. She loves Jesus as intensely as Mary. Both sisters are interested in him, and both wanted to please him. The difference is the manner in which they went about trying to please him. Martha thought Jesus was hungry and wanted to feed him. Mary thought Jesus needs company and stayed behind in the sitting room.  Martha thought Jesus came to be fed; Mary thought Jesus came to feed them with God’s word. Jesus came to their home needing relationship. Martha did not get it. Mary did! The practical bottomline is that Christianity is about forming relationship Jesus Christ. 

This Gospel is not an invitation to choose between Mary and Martha. A disciple of Jesus needs to be both. This Gospel is not an endorsement to doing nothing. Jesus is not promoting idleness and laziness. He too was a hard worker. In John 5:17, he says, “My Father is always working and I too, am working.” Jesus is not going to reject Martha’s meal. He is only calling her attention to the worry and anxiety her busy schedule is costing her— that it is distracting her from what really matters most. Martha’s problem is not that she is engaging in the “active” life; her problem is that she is uncentered. She is obviously divided, drifting from one concern to another, from one anxiety to another; there are many things that preoccupy her mind. Mary on her own part has chosen not so much the contemplative life, rather the focused life. She is rooted in the unum necessarium (one thing necessary). The implication here is that even if Mary were preoccupied with household chores, she would not be “worried and anxious” like Martha. She would not be distracted or divided by them because her life is rooted in the one thing necessary. As for Martha, even if she were to sit at the feet of Jesus, she would still be distracted with impatience, because her mind is divided. The issue here is not so much what they are doing, but how they are doing it. The clearest sign that something is not right in Martha’s soul is that she even tells God what to do. 

Sisters and brothers, there are many voices calling out to you and urging you in different directions. There are scores of influences pulling you from one pole to the other. Amidst all of these, what’s the unum necessarium? (the one thing necessary). I will tell you! It is to listen to the voice of Jesus as he tells you of his love and as he tells you who you are. Make God the absolute priority of your lives. The great St. Augustine said, “love God and do what you want.” Is that a license to do whatever you feel like? No! “Love God” means fix the attention of your soul on the unum necessarium. Fix the eyes of your soul on unum necessarium, which is God. When you do that, your life will be ordered in such a way that whatever you want will be good, will be in accord with God’s deepest purposes and God’s deepest designs. Take this as a test, whatever you are doing, your duties and responsibilities, cares and preoccupations, as you are doing them, can you honestly say this is in accord with what God wants. That’s a tough test, but it is the test that St. Augustine gives. Is what you are doing right now connected to the designs and purposes of God? You know, God is not one being among the many, just like you, me, the church, the sky, the trees and then God. No! God is not one being among the many. He is not one of the things we see and don’t see. God is the sheer act of being itself that gives rise to all that exists. God is not one interest among the many. We can be interested in going to school, in listening to music, in cooking, or watching soccer. We can have many interests and God is not and should not be listed as one interest like other interests. Rather, God is the great, single interest of my life in terms of which all the other interests hang together and make sense. This is why the Lord praises Mary. But how do we cultivate this attitude of Mary? Prayer! Prayer! Prayer! Which means attending to God. People become unfocused and confused when they stop praying because they lost touch with the unum necessarium. Prayer keeps you ground in God. Secondly, wear the sign of your faith on your clothes and on your person to remind yourself of God who orders your life. Lastly, keep the name of God often on your lips. How do you do it? Don’t use his name as an exclamation. Say, “I thank God” when someone asks you how life is going with you. Keep the name of God in your ordinary conversation. Giving God credit for your success, family, peace, health, job, education etc is a good reminder of our rootedness in God.