“So the last shall be first, and the first last.”-Matt 20:16
In our society, we are obsessed with winning. We race each other to the bathroom, to the top of the slide, even to the ocean as if there isn’t enough for all of us. “Last one to the picnic table is a rotten egg!” So we imagine that the one who trips on his laces, skins his knee, and tags the table last has rotten yoke on his head. Weird.
When the Creator of the universe scandalously hung on a tree, Nietzsche got it right when he said: “God is dead”. He was no modalist. As Catholics, the words should give us chill bumps; the scene should take our breath away. Yet, somehow it doesn’t have that effect. Somehow we stand at the foot of the cross with the Roman soldier–indifferent. Blood staining our clothes, the dream of our life, angry birds, or something else has us so preoccupied we don’t have time to get small. Small enough to see who it is that hangs just above our head. Are we callous? Distracted? What is it that inhibits our perception, and where is it that we make this encounter?
First, I blame winning. The world is enamored with the winner. “Best in…”, “Greatest ever…”, we laude those whom appear, even just momentarily, successful. Sure history is full of failures, but we don’t fête those people. Sunday afternoon is about the “big play”, the moment when an übermensch, on the ground, makes a play and the crowd goes wild. We worship in awe at the ground.
Yet just above the clouds, where our eyes...
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