Father Tim Lemlin
"Thanks anyway Father," says the Mom, "but it's you who's bothering him!"
I sometimes enjoy watching animal shows on public television or The Discovery Channel. It seems that many of the shows include an animal giving birth. It always strikes me that almost immediately after the birth the mother smells her newborn and the newborn smells his or her mother. They bond with each other through knowing each other's smell.
This happens among humans as well. It seems that the part of the brain that controls our ability to smell is located in the same part of our brain that stores memories. Adults don't seem to depend upon this method of knowing as much as adult animals, but infants certainly seem to use smell to know who Mom and Dad are before their ability to visually differentiate develops. Instinctively a newborn seeks to bond with his or her mother. The newborn seems to know that without this bond he or she will die.
Our gospel reading from John speaks of the shepherd knowing his sheep and the sheep knowing the shepherd. Bonding - knowing - seems to be part of who we are. The difficulty is we often bond with someone or something less than the One who gives us true life. We try to come to know ourselves by what we do. Our identity is generated by our jobs, our children, our religion, our possessions, our prestige, and our power over others. This is not entirely bad if we continue to seek our true mother. These can act as surrogate mothers giving us a positive sense of self, but they can also act as deterrents when we mistake them as our true source of life.
In a church a bible was being presented to third-grade children. It was the custom of that parish that when the child received the bible the child would recite a passage of scripture that they had learned for this occasion. Everything was going well until the parish priest came to one little boy who was so frightened that he couldn't remember his name, much less a bible verse. The little boy's eyes frantically searched for his mother, who was seated very near the front. When he finally spotted her, he was greatly relieved when she whispered, "I am the light of the world," to which he immediately bellowed, "My mother is the light of the world."
Fear can greatly help us misunderstand. It is fear that keeps us from knowing our true selves by leading us to believe that what we do and what we possess are who we truly are. In our anxiety to be right we bellow, "My job, my children, my possessions, my power, my religion… is the light of the world."
We are, in truth, more than what we do and what we possess. We are children of God. It is from this reality that we need to receive our identity. God bonds with each of us before our conception. God knows that God's identity is intimately connected with us. We need to seek out God for us to know that we are bonded with God - that we are God's children. The paths to this knowing vary but they all seem to lead to seeking the truth about ourselves. When we are true with ourselves (and oftentimes we need the help of another or others to be truthful with ourselves), we become aware that nothing and no one can make us feel complete. People, in particular, can offer us a momentary sense of our being complete. This moment can point us to God, or mislead us to believe that this person, or this success, or this power can fulfill us. But the truth is we are children of God. Only in this reality can we find fulfillment. Only in this reality can we experience the smell of God.
