When the Homily is about Immunology

Care

I believe his reclamation and revalidation is very much a return to an Orthodox understanding.

from Wendell Berry…

Once we have understood that we cannot exempt from our care anything at all that we have the power to damage – which now means everything in the world – then we face yet another startling realization: we have reclaimed and revalidated the ground of our moral and religious tradition. We now can see that what we have traditionally called “sins” are wrong not because they are forbidden but because they divide us from our neighbors, from the world, and ultimately from God. They deny care and are dangerous to creatures.

As an example, I would offer Phillip Sherrard’s definition of avarice in his invaluable book ‘Human Image: World Image.’ Avarice, he says,

‘is a disposition of our soul which refuses to acknowledge and share in the destiny common to all things and which desires to possess and use all things for itself…Through this seeming act of self-aggrandizement we actually debase the whole of our existence, perverting and even destroying the natural harmony of our being as well as that of everything with which we come into contact.’

Avarice, then, is a sin for very practical reasons: it makes division within unity, disorder within order, and discord within harmony.

I suspect that all sin has as its foundation avarice, and its primary symptom or manifestation is not caring. I pray God break my stubborn heart every time that I say: “I don’t care.”