Directing Our Gaze

The ancient Israelites apparently had only a short-term memory of their spiritual heritage, for not long after the people told Joshua “We will serve the Lord, for he is our God” (Joshua 24:18), “…a later generation arose that did not know the Lord, or what he had done for Israel; abandoning the Lord, the God of their fathers, they followed the other gods of the various nations around them” (Judges 2: 10, 12). This story illustrates well the following observation by Simone Weil: “Sin is not a distance, it is a turning of our gaze in the wrong direction.”

Like the Israelites we read about in Scripture, we too lose sight of what God has done for us and turn to idols that seem to offer cheap grace. All humans have a tendency to be blockheaded, and we all require a lot of repetition for a concept to travel from our heads to our hearts. Therefore, although I often tire of hearing the Exodus story over and over and over again in our psalmody and Scripture readings at liturgy of the hours and daily mass, the repetition is important. It serves the purpose of keeping our gaze turned in the right direction—the direction of God who has made a covenant with us, who leads us through trials (mostly of our own making), and who loves us despite our infidelity and pride.

One value of praying daily, even when it seems tedious, is that it keeps our gaze focused on God. When we remember God’s goodness, we are less likely to be distracted by that which does not give life—by idols who “have mouths but speak not, eyes but see not, ears but hear not…their makers shall be like them, everyone that trusts in them” (Ps 115). We imitate the characteristics of that which we worship. Let us worship God, who is compassionate, merciful, and faithful.