God is Merciful

This week we will hear several passages from the prophet Hosea. Hosea describes Israel’s relationship with God using an example of his own life. He describes his marriage in three stages: first love, separation, and reunion. Hosea’s wife had run away with another man. In the Middle Eastern culture this would have brought great shame upon him in the eyes of his neighbors.

Hosea compares Israel’s relationship with God in the same three moments or stages. The initiation of the Covenant of Sinai was the moment of first love between Israel and God. Then Israel turned away from God and began to worship pagan idols. The third and final stage, eventual reunion, is pictured as taking place at some time in the future.

The verses we hear today depict that reunion using the place where they first fell in love, the desert. The Sinai desert is depicted as God’s trysting place. Speaking in the first person, God speaks of the time when Israel will return to him and will leave the false god Baal behind. God speaks of how Israel will return to a life of fidelity and the mercy and compassion with which their return will be greeted.

We are obviously being asked to examine our own relationship with God. I am sure that all of you can remember how you came to love God. Perhaps it was through your parents. Others may have come to that love relationship when they were adults and converted to the faith. No matter when it was, we all know that we, like the Israelites, have sometimes failed in our love for God. The words which God uses to describe the eventual reunion speaks to our own experience of forgiveness especially through the Sacrament of Penance.

Each time we celebrate the Eucharist, we begin with an expression of sorrow for our sins and an acclamation that speaks of God’s mercy. The expression “Lord have mercy” is not really a request so much as a statement of reality. God is merciful. In the Eucharist, we experience that mercy in God’s gift of self to us in communion.

Fr. Lawrence Jagdfeld, O.F.M., Administrator