A VERY POWERFUL IDEA

Rufus Griscom is a serial entrepreneur and founder of Heleo, an online publishing platform. He sees bad ideas as a sort of tool for eventually discovering big opportunities. He says, “A lot of bad ideas backed by a passionate entrepreneur can work on a small scale. Then, adjacent to those bad ideas, there may be some very powerful good ideas. If you really care about it, there’s a decent chance that other people care about it too and you can get it to critical mass. Then, if it does prove to, in fact, be a bad idea, you can find something adjacent to it that is a very powerful idea.”[1]

As typical of the Lord’s prophets, the Servant in today’s first reading protests and laments about having toiled in vain. Yet their gloom quickly turns to surety of success in the Lord’s mission. For God’s errands never end in failure.

The Servant’s vocation in Isaiah reflects that of Moses, Israel, and Jeremiah. None who planned to be a prophet and all express reluctance when called. Put another way, if someone said, “I have wanted to be a prophet from childhood,” this would be red flag indicating they may be a false prophet! The sense of unworthiness, we hear in the statement, “I thought I had toiled in vain,” (Is 49:4) characterizes the prophetic experience. Thus, the servant is “a light to the nations, reaching to the ends of the earth.” (Is 49:6) Despite the toils, the challenges, the public embarrassments they continue with their calling for the glory of God.

This theme of glory can be found running adjacent to the laments in today’s Gospel also. Amid betrayal at the Last Supper and then Peter’s denial soon after, the Father is at work through Jesus’ passion. “Now the Son of Man has been glorified” (Jn 13:31). Jesus is making visible God’s presence on earth.[2]

There was much talk and remembering, on Palm Sunday, of the laments and debates surrounding the decision to close the Church for Holy Week last year. Yet in the solitude and seeming darkness of the past year, we now can sense the dawning of a new hope, a light, a very real resurrection of sorts for the Church. We are being called to be the light now! To be the light that draws others back to worship, to community, to be Eucharist in the midst of laments.

Today’s readings bring together the images of lament, hope, and praise. Holy Week invites us to sit amid the moments of darkness, while never losing hope and trust. Because “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it” (Jn 1:5) Amid the tragic events of Holy Week, where the perceived bad idea, of Jesus’ passion, becomes a very powerful idea of Jesus entering into his glory

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[1] Harvard Business Review. “Embracing Bad Ideas to Get to Good Ideas” by John Geraci, December 27, 2016.

[2] Weekday HomilyHelps. Exegesis and Homily Suggestion by Edward Owens, OSST.