You shall indeed hear but not understand you shall indeed look but never see.
Gross is the heart of this people,
Gross is the heart of this people,
No, he is not using gross in the current American sense of disgusting, or revolting. Here gross is used to mean fat, thick, or obese. It comes from the same verb used to describe pitching a tent. Yes, it is crass. But prophets often smack us in the face with reality we would just as soon not face.
In this country over half of adults are overweight. For guys my age more than 3/4 are overweight or obese. But that is merely one symptom of the problem. How many of are holding on to stuff that we do not need, stuff that we never use? I wonder if we don't like watching shows like Hoarders so we can reassure ourselves-"At least I'm not that bad."
There is a space in ever human being that can only be filled by God. But allowing God to fill the space is not as simple going to Church. There are people who go to church all the time and are still ravenously hungry. They have eyes but do not see,ears but do not hear.
Real faith is not simply believing in God. It requires trust of God. St. Paul gives us the measure in his letter to the Philippians.
For I have learned to be content in whatever circumstance
Part of the problem is that I don't think we really want to be content. I'm not sure we see content as a virtue. Even many ministers like to rail. Perhaps that's why we need an entire section of the liturgy dedicated to peace.
It is not easy for us to relax enough to trust God, open our hearts and let him be the one who fills it. But we should never cease try. And my guess is that if we were to only eat or buy when we were in that content space, we would consume less.
