Mercy

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

Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry that God did not carry out the evil he threatened against Nineveh. (Jonah 4:1)

As I wrote on Monday, one of the things that distinguishes Jonah from all of the other prophets is the fact that Jonah was successful. After he preached God's Word to the people of Nineveh, they all repented of their sins and entered into a period of fasting and self-mortification. The king himself put on sackcloth and ordered that even the livestock were to share in the penitential observance. He must have been a very convincing preacher!

However, the opening verse of chapter four gives us a look into Jonah's attitude toward the Ninevites. He wasn't really interested in their conversion. They were foreigners, aliens, the "others." His bias against them is extreme. First he didn't want to preach to them in the first place. However, God pursued him until he accepted the call. Then when he did preach to them, he was secretly hoping that they would not heed his call for repentance. Of course, God had another plan.

Jonah even goes so far as to cite the "little creed" of Exodus as a reason for not wanting to preach to the Ninevites. He claims that he knew all along that God was simply bluffing.

Jonah stands as a witness to us today of extreme prejudice and bias. Lurking in the shadows of our consciousness, there is often a secret desire, a wish that God would "get those sinners." When some sort of natural disaster strikes, some are quick to blame it on "those sinners" who have angered God. Hurricane Katrina, according to these wags, was a punishment sent to New Orleans as punishment for this sinful city. They ignore the fact that natural disasters occur in every location of our imperfect earth.

Each of us eventually will stand before the mercy seat of God on the Day of Judgment. On that day, we will each hear the echo of Jesus proclaiming: Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. (Matthew 5:7)