LIBERA NOS, DOMINE!

 

LIBERA NOS, DOMINE!

Early last year, a stunned world saw the conviction of Australian Cardinal Pell, former Archbishop of Melbourne, hounded, persecuted, and accused of what commentators say was basically a “crime” that was impossible to commit just by looking at the time, place, and surrounding circumstances described by the lone accuser. The same commentators say that Cardinal Pell, in effect, became the poster and whipping boy of a rabid anti-Catholic culture of both the Australian media and people.

It was, to say the least, possibly a most bitter bread to receive from a God who at times allows bad things to happen to good people. This reflection is not to exonerate the guy nor deny the many substantiated cases of crimes similar to what was imputed to him in many places all over the world.

Bread. This is what we pray for many times every day in the Our Father. We beg the Lord for daily bread—bread for the day and not for the morrow. But while what we mean and what the original prayer taught by the Lord refers to daily material and bodily sustenance, there is nothing that prevents us from inferring a spiritual meaning to what we pray for and what God, in His mercy, decides to give us besides.

The stories of the saints and our own experience show that sometimes, what we end up getting—for our own good—is not sweet bread but the bitter bread of trials and temptations. I can only speculate at the intense suffering (if innocent of the crime) undergone by the likes of Pell and the thousands of martyrs made to suffer unjustly for crimes they were not guilty of.

The Our Father today and every day has become more than just meaningful to me, for in truth, I have had my fair share of bitter bread both in the past and in the present. I, too, have suffered injustice, even as God knows I, too, have made others to suffer, knowingly and unknowingly. I still feel sore at the thought of the former—and sorry for the latter. Fr. Chito Dimaranan, SDB

---------- REFLECTION QUESTION ----------

At this point in your life, what kind of bread are you asking for from God when you pray, “Give us this day our daily bread”?

Dearest God, You know what’s best to give me when I ask You for “bread.” Amen.
Today, I pray for: ___________________________