The World

On this 7th Sunday of Easter we read: Jesus raised his eyes to heaven and said, “Father, the hour has come. Give glory to your son, so that your son may glorify you, just as you gave him authority over all people, so that your son may give eternal life to all you gave him. 

Now this is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ. I glorified you on earth by accomplishing the work that you gave me to do. Now glorify me, Father, with you, with the glory that I had with you before the world began. “I revealed your name to those whom you gave me out of the world. They belonged to you, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.

Now they know that everything you gave me is from you, because the words you gave to me I have given to them, and they accepted them and truly understood that I came from you, and they have believed that you sent me. I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me, because they are yours, and everything of mine is yours and everything of yours is mine, and I have been glorified in them. And now I will no longer be in the world, but they are in the world, while I am coming to you.” (John 17:1-11A)

John’s rendition of Jesus’ words spoken to the Father has him call himself “Jesus Christ” – the one sent by God.  Strange he would refer to himself that way, that is, as Jesus Christ.      Nevertheless, in this reading we hear Jesus’ innermost thoughts and his conversation with God.

John many years after Jesus’ death and resurrection pieced together this wonderful soliloquy in which Jesus speaks of eternal life that has been given to us.  We hear Jesus telling God that he will pray for us, but not for the world.  One wonders, why not for the world, because as he says, we are in the world.  What’s wrong with the world?

Father Richard Rohr gives us his view in his 2019 book “What Do We Do With Evil?  The World, the Flesh, and the Devil.”  He said: “If evil depends on a good disguise, the cover of cultural virtue and religion is the very best of all.  Remember the full conspiracy between the Roman Empire’s representative (Pilate) and the Jewish High Priest (Caiaphas) in the killing of Jesus?  

Through this conspiracy Christians were forewarned that even the highest levels of power (Rome and Jerusalem) can and probably will be coopted by evil – and most will not see it, precisely because of this common entrapment in personal importance, our idolization of power, and inflated self images…Is there a culture in this world that does not operate out of this recipe for delusion?  No wonder history books are largely the history of wars.  This is what Paul means when he names ‘the world.’ Or what I call the system as one of the sources of evil…”

Rohr also is quite frank and candid in his characterization of the evils of the world perpetrated by the Catholic Church and the United States government especially “political dysfunction and foundational immorality.”  His accounts are sobering.

Yes, Jesus recognized the world for what it was and understood why he needed to pray for us and not the world.  However, we need to pray for both.

Deacon David Pierce