Today’s Gospel (of John) continues the Bread of Life discourse for the third week and it will continue into next weekend also. This gospel deals with the true identity of Christ: He was the Word (thus the Wisdom) of God Incarnate and was with God from the beginning of time (John 1:1).

We hear of concerns by John for the Jew’s “disbelief” of Christ’s divinity and equality to God. John speaks of the Jews as not believing in this key element of Christianity but we must be careful not to condemn “all Jews in all times.” After all, many knew Jesus and His parents…wasn’t He just another ordinary Jew? The homilist needs to make sure that we understand that this is about the Jews of this specific time—who in all fairness were struggling with reconciling their new Christian faith with mainstream Judaism. Today we deal with “unbelief” in our secular culture right now.

Unbelief, not disbelief, is a result of the power of secularism—disbelief says I hear you and choose not to believe where unbelief is about confusion and misinformation, not simply “negative
certainty”. Since the beginning of humanity nearly all cultures have allowed unbelief to happen when they offer as equal alternatives to the truth the idea that whatever I believe is “ok” no matter whether or not it is based on” reality”. This allows for the idea that if it works for me (or it is convenience), it must be ok?! Rather, Truth calls us to look at “Heavenly Wisdom, Godly grace, and human character.” Heavenly wisdom comes from the Lord and is channeled through His Church and her teachings; Godly grace comes to us from reception of the Sacraments regularly, faith in God’s power and care for us, and in living as virtuous a life as one can; human character is formed by Truth and faith in our cooperation with God. Today’s culture replaces Wisdom, Grace and Character with “beauty, brains and brawn”— cultural powers of society. These revered secular attributes call us to look at the world differently and to follow the secularly-declared sources of “authority.” Those with brains give us the intelligence of the world telling us all that we need to know and do. Beauty oracles, the movie stars or rock stars of the world, tell us who we must listen to, whether they are espousing truth or convenience. From brawn, athletes can sell us
anything—from products to cultural norms and mores.

John’s Gospel wants to inform us to know that God’s Word Incarnate is another word for Godly Wisdom given to us in the Words of Christ. Christ empowered those wise words of our Creator with earthly action, giving us not only the Truth by which to live a virtuous life but also the ultimate example as to how we as mere human beings may carry it forward into our own time and place.