My Aunt Mary – she was really just a family friend, but out of respect for her 86 years on earth we always called her Aunt Mary. She was the only person I ever met who used an ear trumpet – a tubular or funnel-shaped device which collects sound waves and leads them into the ear. It was an aid for hearing before there were hearing aids. It was necessary to speak directly into the trumpet if you wanted to carry on conversation. My dad discovered that a simple surgical procedure could restore a great deal of her hearing, but Aunt Mary was not interested. It wasn’t that she was afraid, she simply stated: “I’m 86 years old and I have heard it all – and I don’t want to hear it again.” She did want to be disturbed.

As I accumulate years on this planet I find an increasing kinship with Aunt Mary. I probably have a lowering tolerance for being disturbed. For example, my attitude towards the news. Right, left, middle it all just seems to drone on. It’s disturbing. It seems we have heard it all before and I am not sure I want to hear it again. I am sure of one thing: I long for the days of Walter Cronkite.

I think every generation, at some level, disturbs the next. My parents were disturbed by the 1960s and early 70s. Apparently my generation has its own ways of disturbing others as witnessed by the catchphrase “OK, boomer” meant to disparage and discredit whatever it is that disturbs later generations.

We are people disturbed by many things. By the Washington Football Team – remember the early 80s when “Dallas Week” actually meant something? We are disturbed because someone sits in our regular pew, the place we have occupied since Jesus was on the Galilee. We are disturbed by today’s readings.

Today’s first reading is from the prophet Ezekiel who is speaking to the Jewish people deported into the Babylonian Exile. People described as “Hard of face and obstinate of heart,” Trust me, Ezekiel’s role as prophet is to disturb them. The first readings at this week’s daily Masses were taken from the Prophet Amos. It was a week of oracles and speeches against a different group of hard-hearted Jews who were greatly disturbed by his prophetic denunciation for the way the poor, widows, orphans and aliens were treated. King Ahaz gave Jeremiah a nickname: the disturber of the peace. 

In our second reading today, St. Paul is disturbed: “a thorn in the flesh was given to me, an angel of Satan, to beat me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I begged the Lord about this, that it might leave me” (2 Cor 12:7-8)

In the gospel, Jesus disturbed the town folk: “Where did this man get all this? What kind of wisdom has been given him?…Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary…and they took offense at him.” (Mark 6:2-3)

What is common in all this is not the personality of the messenger, but the message. Scripture is replete with the Word of God coming to a comfortable people, disturbing their peace, and leaving them very much uncomfortable. It is a divine disturbance.

Disturbances that come when a reading from Scripture or a point in the homily grates your conscience. Or maybe when you feel like the homily was written specifically and exactly for you. When you hear of a ministry and you think “maybe….” and then begin to recount all the reasons why you can’t. It can all come in waves like the prophet Amos who just won’t let up.

Sometimes I feel that God asks too many questions, offers too many challenges – poking, prodding, and pushing at a call to love more, do more, serve more, …. And, sad to say, I want to be left alone to just do my thing, to do me. I was comfortable. I like my routine – and if not routine, I want to be in control.

All sound familiar? We want calm seas, blue skies, and fair winds. Steady on course, right?

The problem is the compass we are using to set our course. You think you are doing fine until Ezekiel, Amos or Jeremiah shows up. That’s when you know you are hard of heart and have probably been ignoring a whole litany of divine disturbances offered in readings, homilies and the challenges of friends and confidants. The irony is that without that periodic disruption from time to time, we’ll never grow spiritually.

When we get too comfortable, when we are like the people of Nazareth and we are just so sure we know Jesus. It is then we need a good push from the outside to mobilize us to greatness, beyond what we might even think we are capable of. The legendary explorer and sea captain of the British empire, Sir Francis Drake, understood this and offers this prayer for disturbance:

“Disturb us Lord, when We are too well pleased with ourselves. When our dreams have come true Because we have dreamed too little. When we arrived safely Because we sailed too close to the shore… Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly, To venture on wider seas Where storms will show your mastery; Where losing sight of land, We shall find the stars.”

The Word of God may bring a disturbance into your life, but it never comes alone. It is as the Lord told St. Paul. “My grace is sufficient for you.” The grace ever available in the Word of God, in prayer and in the Eucharist. Go ahead be disturbed, then give thanks to God – and then find the stars of divine light.

Domenico Ghirlandaio | Calling the Apostles | 1481 | Sistine Chapel, Vatican | PD-US