DEATH IS A RESULT OF EACH PERSON'S CHOICES

SATURDAY, NINETEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

Ezek 18:1-10,13,30-32; Ps 5112-15,18-19; Mt 19:13-15

The Man who has sinned shall die

This famous passage from the prophet Ezekiel about fathers eating unripe grapes and the teeth of the children set on edge, or the effects of the father's sins on his children, is about the misinterpretation of divine justice in Israel. The people misrepresented the justice of God. They wrongly understood the consequences of a man’s sins on his progenies as something unjust. Thus, they conceived God to be acting unjustly by punishing the sins of a man on his children. But in fact, God is most just in all his dealings with men and gives to each person according to his motives and works. God corrected the people's impression of his dealings with them. God’s determination to make the saying extinct in Israel does not imply he was acting unjustly and has now resolved to follow the cause of justice. “See now: all life belongs to me; the father’s life and the son’s life, both alike belong to me. The man who has sinned, he is the one who shall die.” The sense the word ‘die’ is used in the passage implies spiritual death. Death follows the cessation of upright living in a soul. For uprightness in a soul is a state of awareness of God in a soul, which makes the soul will and carry out every action in the fear of God or to please God.

This understanding of uprightness implies that God, through his words or commandments, is the life and light of such a soul. When a soul living in God and walking in this divine light given by his word ceases to live in it and begins to look to the idols, the life and light of God cease in such a soul. The cessation brings about the death of the soul. “The upright man is law-abiding and honest; he does not eat on the mountains or raise his eyes to the idols of the House of Israel.” He does none of the evils of enemies of God. He lives a godly life and is blessed forever. It is a consequence of his life. But if such a man has a son who does not follow his father’s good example and follows the damnable life of the enemies of God, he has no life at all; he is a living dead. Thus, spiritual living or dying has nothing to do with another person’s life; it follows solely on each person’s loves, desires, and choices. A father cannot choose life for his children; they must choose life themselves. Likewise, children cannot choose life for their father or mother; they must choose God and live.

The only way the parents can help their children to choose life for themselves is by introducing them to the word of God, both by their way of life and by their words of advice and teaching. The parents in the Gospel passage were doing this, and the disciples were obstructing them. The disciples’ obstruction of the parents from bringing their children to Jesus Christ attracted a rebuke from our Lord. “People brought little children to Jesus, for him to lay his hands on them and say a prayer. The disciples turned them away; but Jesus said, ‘Let the little children alone, and do not stop them coming to me; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.’” It is only in this related sense that the sins of the parents can result in the death of their children. When the parents fail to bring or introduce their children to the word of God by their way of life and teaching, then both the parents and their children will die by not living the life of God. The cause of the death of the children would be their parents’ negligence of their God-given duty to repeat the commandments to their children by living and teaching the commandments to them. In this case, it is not the Lord who caused the death of the parents and the children. Each died because of his choices. The parents for the sins they committed, and the children for following their parents to commit the same sin which caused their death. Let us strive to eat the bread of heaven and make it available to our children so that neither our teeth nor those of our children will be set on edge by eating sour grapes.

Let us pray: Grant us, Lord, the gift of purity of heart, put a steadfast spirit within each of us. Do not cast us away from your presence, nor deprive us of your Holy Spirit, so that we may continually eat the bread that comes from heaven and break it also for our children to possess eternal life.