A Catholic woman I knew in Bombay once had an embarrassing experience
during Holy Mass. I will let her tell the story in her own words.
Many people were going to communion. As I was moving forward in the line, I noticed that Father Fernandez, our parish priest, was sweating a little. He may have been tired. Anyway, when my turn came, I stuck out my tongue as usual. He put the host on, but not properly, so that it fell off... and dropped on my breast. I froze in horror. He picked it up from my breast and put it back on my tongue. But while he did so, he sort of grunted at me and gave me an ugly stare.
I can’t tell you how upset I was about it. I knew it hadn’t been my fault. I didn’t mind so much the dropping of the host itself. I realize that such things can happen, and surely God understands human failings. But what hurt me was the way Father had kind of blamed me for it. Surely he must have known that I was as sorry about the incident as he was. Did he think I had no feelings at all? For many Sundays after that I went to Mass in another church.
Father Fernandez is quite a good priest. I like him really. But why does he always have to be so brusque with women?
I knew the parish priest in question, and I felt she was right. He is a very committed pastor, with a large heart. But his manner of speaking and acting is often stiff and harsh. He obviously feels awkward when dealing with women, and that makes him abrasive and rough. He lacks refinement and tenderness.
What exactly is tenderness and how important is it? Strangely enough, for a good description, and for providing material for prayer, the Old Testament is a much better starting point than the New. The Old Testament, for all its violence and cruder sections, offers deep insights into the more delicate aspects of human relationships.
When a man and a woman fall in love, their lives change. Their mutual attraction and admiration overshadow everything else. It is as if the whole world is filled with new colors. The ecstasy of such early romance, if it develops properly, will mature into a deep mutual sharing, the stable and close affection between husband and wife. There is something extremely beautiful in this. It is one of the heights of human relationship. It cannot exist without real tenderness.
In the Song of Songs the woman says of her partner:
“Like an apple tree among the trees of the forest,
so is my dearest compared to other men.
I love to sit in its shadow
and its fruit is sweet to my taste....
I am weak from passion.
His left hand is under my head
and his right hand caresses me” (Sg 2:3,5-6).
And the man says:
“How beautiful you are, my love; how your eyes shine with love!” (Sg 1:15).
Tenderness means respecting the delicate feelings of another person. There is tenderness in the way the man and woman address each other. There is tenderness in the way she simply wants to sit in his presence. There is tenderness in his embrace, cradling her head in the fold of his left arm, caressing her skin with his right hand. The touch is soft, the language poetry. Each has a heightened awareness of the other’s presence.
Are we not in the realm of sexuality? someone might ask. Yes, we are. Sexuality plays a part in this communication of love between a man and a woman. It means that our bodies too become means of receiving and giving feelings of love. Sex is an important and beautiful component of married love. But tenderness is something that goes beyond sexuality. It affects the way in which we receive and give. Misdirected sexuality can be very selfish and hurtful to the partner. On the other hand, there may be relationships in which the sexual component has been reduced through circumstances without a loss of tenderness. Tenderness is the quality of sensitivity in love. It is to love what flowers are to a plant.
It is worthwhile to read and savor the Song of Songs. For a human being remains stunted in growth as long as he or she is not capable of giving and receiving such love. Note well - I say we should be capable of it. Through the condition of our life it may well be that we will never have an actual partner with whom we can have such a relationship. We may, through a vow of celibacy or virginity, freely decide to abstain from marriage - to be freer to belong to God and serve our neighbor. But we should be the kind of person who can, or could, maintain such a relationship of tender love. Those who are not married, for whatever reason this may be, should at least value married love and appreciate the tenderness it requires. The Song of Songs was not inspired for nothing. It is not a secular book, but God’s Word. It shows that God delights in the tender love a husband and wife feel for each other.
In fact, God likes it so much that he made this kind of love an example of his own feelings for his chosen people. It is in this context that we should read what the prophet Hosea has to say. It makes remarkable reading. The prophet’s own experiences of love are used to illustrate the relationship between God and his people. If we piece the evidence together, this is what happened. One day Hosea saw an attractive girl called Gomer. He fell in love with her. However, when he inquired about her family and her past, things did not look promising. Diblaim, her father, had made her undergo an initiation rite in a fertility festival in honor of Baal What was worse, he had given her for prostitution to a number of men. Hosea considered all this and talked it over with Gomer. He felt he loved her in spite of her past. He “bought” her from her father for 15 pieces of silver and seven bushels of barley. Then he married her.
In the first few months everything went well. They loved one another deeply and shared their intimate thoughts and feelings. Then Gomer fell back into her past habits. She kept up relationships with some of her former lovers, perhaps to obtain extra clothes or ornaments. She also continued to take part in some of the midnight festivals for Baal. Hosea was sad and upset about it, but he still loved her. He could not bring himself to reject her altogether or have her stoned for adultery. While this experience was affecting him personally, it suddenly dawned on him that his unreasonable and illogical love for Gomer was precisely like God's love for his people. And, in prophetic inspiration, he understood that God was making use of his own experience to make Israel reflect and return to Yahweh. It was the start of Hosea’s prophetic involvement.
When the LORD first spoke to Israel through Hosea, he said to Hosea, “Go and get married; your wife will be unfaithful, and your children will be just like her. In the same way my people have left me and become unfaithful”(Hos 1:2).
Hosea used every means of kindness and persuasion to bring Gomer back. God, he knew, was trying to do the same with Israel.
“My children,plead with your mother....Plead with her to stop her adultery and prostitution....I am going to take her into the desert again; there I will win her back with words of love. I will give back to her the vineyards she had and will make Trouble Valley a door of hope. She will respond to me there as she did when she was young, when she came from Egypt. Then, once again she will call me her husband” (Hos 2:2,14-16).
Observe the tenderness of Hosea’s approach. Even when he threatens punishment, he is speaking to her heart. He wants to create a situation in which he can win her back with words of love. This is the way God works: He is a loving God.
Hosea could be called the prophet of God’s tenderness. God is not only a faithful husband-he is also a tenderly loving father. God loved Israel so much that he almost became its nurse.
“When Israel was a child I loved him
and called him out of Egypt as my son.
But the more I called to him,
the more he turned away from me....
Yet I was the one who taught Israel to walk.
I took my people up in my arms,
but they did not acknowledge that I took care of them.
I drew them to me with affection and love.
picked them up and held them to my cheek;
I bent down to them and fed them” (Hos 11:1-4).
Who could have described better the tenderness with which a big man handles his tiny son! Tenderness goes very well with strength.
Yet, there are people who think differently. Or at least, they behave as if they think so. The essence of religion lies in keeping the commandments, they say. Faithfulness to God and the service of people is shown in deeds, not in words or in other niceties. “Cut out the softness! Why all this wishy-washy diplomacy and trying to be nice? What God expects is for us to do his will. The person who practices religion does what is right. The smile, the handshake, the exchange of pleasantries are extras. Love God and your neighbor by doing your duty! That is what matters.”
Does it, I wonder? Jesus certainly did not think so. He gave a lot of time to tax collectors and sinners. He stayed at their homes and ate with them. The law-abiding scribes objected, “Why does your teacher eat with such people?” And when the disciples were picking grains of corn while walking through the fields on a Sabbath the scribes exclaimed, “Look, it is against our Law for your disciples to do this on the Sabbath!” In both cases Jesus referred to Hosea 6:6.
“Go and find out what is meant by the scripture that says: ‘It is kindness that I want, not animal sacrifices’ ” (Mt 9:13).
“The scripture says, ‘It is kindness that I want, not animal sacrifices.’ If you really knew what this means, you would not condemn people who are not guilty” (Mt 12:7).
I must confess that the way Jesus interprets Hosea 6:6 is revealing to me. The very quotation itself shows that Hosea’s teaching had made an impression on Jesus. He understood that the prophet is speaking about inner attitudes-that these are of greater value than external religious practice. With their stress on faithfulness to the Law, the scribes had lost sight of love. When they met so-called sinful people all they could think of is how not to be soiled by contact with them. They did not see that kindness and consideration rank much higher in God’s scale of values. When they saw someone “transgressing the Law,” as when Jesus’ disciples picked ears of corn, they judged by the norms found in judicial schools; they did not respect the motivation and feeling of the persons involved. “It is kindness that I want, not sacrifice,” thus expresses a principle. Respecting people’s feelings scores higher with him than being legally or ritually correct. God values kindness and tenderness.
When Jesus went to the house of Simon the Pharisee, a prostitute came into the dining hall. She took up her position behind Jesus, at his feet. Then she knelt down and wept. Her tears fell on Jesus’ feet; she dried them with her hair. Then she kissed them and poured ointment on them. Jesus allowed her to do this. He did not pull his feet back and look indignant as the Pharisees would have done. No, he gracefully accepted the expression of love she gave to him. When Simon criticized Jesus in his own mind, Jesus told him the parable of the two creditors and ended up saying:
“Do you see this woman? I came into your home, and you gave me no water for my feet, but she has washed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. You did not welcome me with a kiss, but she has not stopped kissing my feet since I came. You provided no olive oil for my head, but she has covered my feet with perfume” (Lk 7:44-46).
Simon, we should note, had not fallen short in his duties as a host. A host did not need to kiss his guest or to provide water and oil. What Jesus contrasts is the approach, the attitude to him, shown by both persons. Simon might have been correct according to the letter of the law but he had not shown kindness and love. The “sinful” woman, however, was a person who was capable of real love. That is why Jesus went on to say:
“I tell you, then, the great love she has shown proves that her many sins have been forgiven. But whoever has been forgiven little shows only a little love” (Lk 7:47).
Jesus, in my opinion, was not only referring to the love she had shown to him after entering the hall. No, she was the kind of person who could love. It was this capacity to love that she had now also shown to Jesus in her search for forgiveness. On account of this love he found it easy to forgive her sins. What a beautiful consolation to give to the woman! It was the nicest thing Jesus could have said. It was his tender way of accepting her repentance and giving her new self-respect. “Your faith has saved you; go in Peace” (Lk 7:50).
In the rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar it is assumed that Jesus and Mary Magdalene had fallen in love. At first I was scandalized by the idea. Later I began to realize that it contains a grain of truth. Jesus was a loving and lovable person. He would have made an ideal husband. In his dealing with persons like Mary Magdalene he shows a tenderness that borders on being in love. What is overlooked in the musical is that Jesus did not restrict this love to one or other person and that he did not bind himself to anyone exclusively in marriage. But he was not hard and awkward toward women. He loved them and showed them kindness and tenderness. Lord, save your church from priests who dislike women and from nuns who cannot show affection!