In yesterday’s second reading, we encountered Onesimus who has clearly become Paul’s right-hand man. But Onesimus is a different companion to Paul than the co-preachers Barnabas or Silas. We learn that he is an escaped slave. His master, Philemon, Paul had also evangelized and baptized in a very different context.
Paul issues a beautiful appeal on behalf of Onesimus that illustrates a powerful tool Christians have—a powerfully disruptive or, equally, constructive tool. It is the power to see as God sees. Philemon might otherwise consider slavery a social structure that is a given--there is no other way relationships can be in his society at that time. Paul offers a deceptively simple (but not easy) corrective: Look at Onesimus not as your property. Now that he has been baptized, see him as your brother. What a challenge for a slaveowner to accept! Once Paul lays bare the implications for their relationship that baptism manifests, neither man can unsee this vision.
Our baptism too affords us a new pair of eyes to see as God sees. What does our divine vision show us as the possibilities for our post-pandemic lives? What has the pandemic laid bare that allows us to see new ways of constructing our reality? What do we perceive must be disrupted.? What constructive visions of living God’s Reign now appear to us with renewed clarity?
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