Reviewing the Genesis readings from this week’s Presanctified Liturgy, I’m struck by the recurring theme that we saw from the very start of the creation stories: We humans are in conversation with God and all is good; then, we humans mess up, so to speak. We engage in dishonesty, betrayal, jealousy, greed . . . We mess up the goodness and push God’s patience beyond the limit: hence, expulsion, flood, babel, Sodom & Gomorrah. It looks like we humans don’t learn from our mistakes! Nevertheless, astonishingly, God manifests unlimited patience, continuing to speak to us, telling us of our capacity for goodness and love. Throughout the ages, humanity has always been given another chance, despite our track record. I speak of a collective us and we, because through Christ we know that we are as interconnected as parts of a body or branches on a vine. Only together can we glimpse our wholeness and recognize divinity in our world. Through Christ we see God as human and we see how we can live to the fullness of our humanity. Yet, even with God as our brother, we humans rejected God’s incarnate goodness and, unleashing our worst traits, we tortured and sentenced goodness to death (all in the name of righteousness and law).

We really really messed up.

God: infinite patience. Infinite love. Year after year, we celebrate the Resurrection, not as an historical event—but as the miracle of miracles: we humans cannot kill love; we cannot destroy God. God gives us life, in all its wonder and joy. We humans bring the darkness to reign, but in recognizing the light of Christ we become the vessels of God—here and now.