I know a young man who did not spend his Christmas break from middle school the way that he had expected. He got some nice presents for Christmas, but, except for the clothes, he hasn’t used them yet. You see, he made a bad choice a few days before Christmas and then he didn’t tell the truth when asked about it. That did not set well with his father.
“I figured I needed a tough lesson around honesty when I was about that age, and he needed one, too,” his father told me. So this young man spent his break cleaning out cattle guards, digging up fence posts by hand, and generally doing unpleasant winter farm chores out in the cold and the wet.
His dad did not just send him out to do these things. He did them with him—or stayed nearby doing another chore. He didn’t give him a chance to get into more trouble by slacking off or pretending to do what was asked of him—another form of lying. He didn’t let dishonesty grow. He gave him the monitoring, companionship, and encouragement that helped him redeem himself by replacing his poor choices with good ones that could be affirmed. As he did that he also recovered his self-perception as a good, contributing, responsible member of the family.
That young man experienced a LOT of love this Christmas break. Surprisingly, after a few days even he realized the presence of that love in his time of hard labor.
In today’s readings we have two scriptural glimpses of the value of honesty (and Truth) in the Christian life. Sometimes it can seem that Truth and Love, core characteristics of God, can be at odds with each other. What is more accurate is that there is an inherent tension between the soft and tough aspects of love that can keep each in balance. We human beings need truth and “tough love” to face difficult realities. We need compassion (or mercy) to pull us out of difficult realities back into goodness.
St. Thomas Aquinas defined love as “willing the good of the other.” When we love someone, we want, seek, and do our best to choose what is good for that person. The Father in this story willed the good of his son. He confronted both his son’s bad choice and his lie. He then chose what seemed to him a good way to help his son learn from his mistake. Then he implemented that in a way that communicated caring by his presence out in the cold, too, and confidence in his son’s ability to now do right by setting things up for him to succeed.
Nathanael in the Gospel today and John in the epistle would have approved of how the whole situation was handled.
We do not know what happened under the fig tree just before Jesus called Nathanael to follow him as a disciple, but it impressed Jesus. He introduced himself to Nathanael by speaking a Truth with a capital T, that is, by naming something that Nathanael recognized as true about himself, but that was deeper than mere fact. It was something at his core.
Jesus said of Nathanael as he came toward him, “Here is a true child of Israel. There is no duplicity in him.” Nathanael recognized the Truth—but was curious: How could Jesus know? As is common for people who tend to be straight-forward with Truth and honesty, Nathanael asked Jesus, “How do you know me?” Jesus replied, “Before Phillip called you I saw you under the fig tree.”
We don’t know what happened under the fig tree, but Nathanael did. He recognized that Jesus understood him in a deep way. Jesus spoke truth. His response of trust was immediate. He said, “You are the Son of God, the King of Israel.”
Deep Truth has that effect on people. I have seen it in therapy sessions again and again. Whether the Truth spoken is something explanatory or something hidden that is devastating or something not yet said that is good—when the Truth is spoken there is a deep stillness in the room. There is a spontaneous reverence for the Presence of God in Truth. If that Truth has been long unspoken in a family, its expression makes an immediate, radical, profound, healing difference.
There is great power in Truth.
My observation is that people don’t speak deep Truth unless they are in the habit of being honest with ordinary matters: “Yes, I left the mess in the kitchen.” “No, I didn’t mail the letters.” “I need to tell you what happened yesterday….”
Honesty creates humility. It fosters problem solving. You can’t fix what you don’t face. I have known more than one drug addict or alcoholic who died of lying.
In the first reading John looks at honesty from a different angle. He faces the problem of pretending to love. Pretending is by definition dishonest. Whether I say to someone who asks, “How are you today?” “I’m fine” when I’m not, or whether I act loving to a person’s face and gossip about or devalue that same person an hour later, or whether I say I love but do not act in a loving way—John is talking to me today.
John contrasts Christian love with the “love” of the world. “We know that we have passed from death to life because we love our brothers.” He defines love then in concrete terms. To him it’s simple: follow Jesus example “The way we came to know love was that he laid down his life for us; we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If someone has worldly means sees a brother in need and refuses him compassion, how can the love of God remain in him? Children, let us love not in word or speech but in deed and truth.”
To love is to will the good of the other “in deed and truth.” That willing the good may be sharing some food with someone who is hungry. It could also be sending a child out to work in cold, wet mud.
In the Gospel Jesus “knew” Nathanael’s heart. In the epistle John notes that God reads hearts. “Now this is how we shall know that we belong to the truth and reassure our hearts before him in whatever our hearts condemn, for is greater than our hearts and knows everything.”
It takes courage to face some truths about ourselves. More than once I have cringed at naming a sin in confession—or simply admitting my wrong to family, co-worker, or friend. But there is a goodness at speaking truth. There is an integrity to it. Sometimes afterwards there are some tough consequences, but God loves us as the father loved the son in today’s story. He will be with us in the cold and wet to guide us and help us learn from mistakes and recover our integrity. Such lessons are just part of how we learn to love as God Loves.
Prayer:
Lord, help me be honest today. Preserve me from pretending to love. Preserve me from fooling myself into believing what is not true is the truth. If I lie, even to myself, point it out to me. Help me learn to walk as Jesus walked. Jesus, say of me as you said of Nathanael, “There is no duplicity in her.” Today help me love in deed and in truth. Amen.
