1st Sunday Lent, A February 26, 2023
Fr. Alexander Albert St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette
Why does eating a piece of fruit condemn all of humanity to death and destruction? Why does it matter so much what we eat? Well, if someone is hanging from a cliff by a rope, ask them why it would matter if you cut that rope.
The poetic language of the creation story talks about fruit and trees, but it’s really conveying to us our place in the universe. Adam and Eve had no say in how gravity works, how the chemical bonds of water interact with temperature, or what allows trees to turn CO2 into Oxygen. They also didn’t get to custom build their own bodies or map out the plan for human psychological development. They simply received it.
In biblical language, “knowledge” of something is more than just the ability to recall an idea and spit out the words connected to that idea. It implies a kind of intimacy or mastery. In this case, “knowledge” of good and evil is not the ability to tell right from wrong, but access to the interior logic and laws that make something right or wrong.
Adam and Eve tried to gain the mystical power to rewrite the laws of morality. That’s why the serpent said it would make them like gods. The fruit was “desirable for gaining wisdom,” the wisdom of how to bypass the natural consequences of good and evil. Obviously, it failed. The devil is a liar. Even worse, eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil not only failed to give them power over good and evil, it left them with the delusion of having that power. The only thing worse than being wrong is being wrong while still thinking you’re right.
And this is why eating that fruit was like reaching up and cutting the rope holding us up: human nature is dependent on the nature of morality. Being human means you make choice that are either right or wrong. But if you scramble what makes things right and wrong, you scramble your own ability to be human. It’s like trying to play soccer without gravity. Mess up the laws of physics and you mess up everything else. Mess up the moral law and you mess up human beings.
We receive our existence from God. Adam and Eve, led astray by the devil, tried to take that away from God and define existence for themselves. They also broke his trust because they disobeyed him. When your child uses a toy bat to beat up their sibling, you take it away from them. God had not only given us existence, but also a special spiritual power, the grace of harmony and immortality. When they sinned, Adam and Eve not only lost sight of their own humanity, they lost those gifts. Every sin is both a violation of God’s trust and the attempt to redefine our own existence.
Yet human beings couldn’t stop trying to do just that. With our scrambled minds and weakened wills, it became impossible for us to re-establish that initial design of God’s creation. Once you cut the rope you’re hanging from, there’s nothing you can do to reconnect it. But Jesus Christ can and did. As St. Paul puts is “just as through one transgression condemnation came upon all, so, through one righteous act, acquittal and life came to all.” That’s the inner logic of the temptation of Jesus that we see here.
On one level, all of these temptations seem reasonable. Do X to get Y. In each case, the outcome is good, so why quibble about how you get there? On another level, however, all three of them involve a violation of God’s design. Man isn’t meant to use his power for selfish gain. Man isn’t meant to gamble with his life or take advantage of the protection God offers him. Most of all, Man is not meant to worship anything or anyone other than God.
Besides, the whole point of the problem is that God didn’t just design human beings for the outcome… the final product. The goal wasn’t just to pop out a bunch of perfect worshippers already in heaven. He designed us to be on a journey. The journey itself is part of his design. Don’t mistake me, the destination definitely matters, but so does the whole route we take to get there. Eternal life is not a sudden change, but the product of an integrated and interconnected growth in love. Every step towards eternal love needs to come from love. There are sacrifices involved in this – choosing one good thing over another – but this is never the same thing as choosing evil in order to get to good.
Understanding this is key to overcoming temptation. The devil is real, he is intelligent, and he is strong. But he does have one major limitation: he can’t rewrite the laws of good and evil any more than we can. Our human nature, despite it’s brokenness, still wants what is good. The devil doesn’t just say “hey, join me in eternal damnation,” because no one wants that. They can’t want it. So he offers something that looks good but isn’t, either because it’s an illusion – a fake good – or because the way he wants us to get to it is evil.
How do we overcome this? First, we need to admit reality is real and not ours to design. People who question whether or not all of life is an illusion or a simulation should have rocks thrown at their heads and asked why they duck. Reality is real and we didn’t make it real. And the moral law is a part of reality just as much as physics. Moreso actually. We can’t rewrite it and trying always leads to disaster eventually.
Second, we must be convinced that God’s design is good. The devil’s deceptive question about God forbidding all the fruit trees starts that doubt in Eve’s mind. Beware anyone who tells you God is stingy. We must daily remind ourselves “God’s design is good, even when I can’t see how.” Continue to learn what that design is, trusting in the Church as the authentic teacher of God’s revelation.
Finally, we must choose the whole good rather than just part of it. And the whole good is found only in Jesus Christ. St. Paul writes that “through the obedience of the one, the many will be made righteous.” Our salvation doesn’t come from us figuring out all the right moral choices to make. It comes from being made part of the one person who perfectly chooses what is good because he is goodness itself. Salvation is not a test or a reward for good behavior, it is the byproduct of being united to Jesus Christ. The way to do that is simple: turn away from sin and seek forgiveness in confession, actually engage with the Mass and the worship of God, and receive communion. We were condemned by eating the wrong food, so doesn’t it make sense that eating the right food is what will save us?
So yes, what we eat really does matter that much. Take and eat not according to your own design, but according to His… and live not on bread alone, but on the Word that comes forth from God… the Word made flesh and given up for you.