The Transfer of the Relics of the Holy Unmercenaries Cyrus and John (5th c.)
Apostles’ Fast. Abstinence from meat and foods that contain meat.
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Romans 9:6-19; Matthew 10:32-36; 11:1
This passage from Romans puts us at the heart of disbelief, a tendency quite obvious in contemporary culture. With apostasy en masse by politicians, celebrities, or even more intimately, our own family and friends, we are faced with the startling statement from St. Paul, that “So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens the heart of whomever he wills.” Paul seemingly puts it under God’s control the hardness of heart to accept the faith or not.
Most interpreters make a distinction between God’s “perfect will” and “permissive will.” God’s perfect will is announced at the beginning of every Baptism in the Greek Catholic Church: “Blessed is God who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (Cf. 1 Tim 2:4).
At Baptism, he bestows that grace equally upon all of us. Yet, look around at your pagan friends and siblings, many of whom are not practising, are fundamentally not interacting with that grace. The result of that is the hardening of the heart that we hear in St. Paul’s epistle. Because we are free, God doesn’t make it happen, but he allows it to happen, out of respect to our freedom. One commentator says that “he endures the hardening of our heart.” The gradual hardening of our heart pains our Lord, but he must respect our freedom. Faith and love coerced is not faith and love at all.
What this does not mean is that the hardness of our heart necessarily determines us. I have known many people, whose heart has been scarred and hardened by heart attacks, who are back to exercising and competitive racing. It’s a longer battle, but exhilarating to watch. In the depths of God’s wisdom, he works with the hardness of heart to bring about a greater good. In the example of Pharoah above, were it not for Pharoah’s recalcitrant heart, we wouldn’t have the beauty of God’s salvation in Exodus. In an age where we like underdog stories, the conversion of the hardened heart is probably the most glorious of them all.
Let’s keep our eyes open for those stories, and our hearts disposed of for our own conversion to God’s perfect will.