In the 1^st reading we hear about how Elijah experienced God in a “tiny whispering sound.” The New American Bible, commenting on this scenes, says,  “Compare these divine manifestations to Elijah with those to Moses (Exodus 19:1-23; 33:21-23; 34:5) on the same Mount Horeb (Sinai) (Deut 4:10-15). Though various phenomena, such as wind, storms, earthquakes, fire (Exodus 19:18-19), herald the divine presence, they do not constitute the presence itself which, like the tiny whispering sound, is imperceptible and bespeaks the spirituality of God.”  

This is similar to how we use many things in our worship to remind us of God’s presence – incense, bells, candles, statues, stained glass windows, vestments, etc. These make us think about God’s presence among us – in the Holy Spirit speaking to us through the readings, in the Eucharist, where we encounter Christ’s own Body and Blood. The things we use for prayer are good, but they just lead us to God; they are not God.

The Bible commentary notices how Elijah is sent to the same mountain as Moses was sent, the mountain on which God revealed Himself to Moses not in a tiny whispering sound, but in a burning bush. On this mountain Moses asked God to tell him His name (since Moses would be reporting back to the people in Egypt, where people believed that there were many gods) and God told him, “I AM WHO AM,” or just “I AM.”

When Jesus spoke to the terrified apostles out on the lake, who thought that they were seeing a ghost walking on water, Jesus literally says (in the original Greek version of the Gospel), “I AM.” He identifies Himself with the Father and a few minutes later, after Jesus had saved him from sinking into the sea, Peter and all the guys in the boat exclaim, “truly you are the Son of God.”

POPE BENEDICT XVI  in 2005 compared the 2 big events on Mount Horeb, also known as Mount Sinai and saw a parallel between them and how God gave the Apostles the Holy Spirit twice: “the strong wind of [Pentecost] and the gentle breath of Jesus on the evening of Easter.”

The 1^st time, with Moses, God was beginning the Covenant with the Israelites. The 2^nd time, with Elijah, we are dealing with a situation where there had been great infidelity to the Covenant – Elijah was fleeing King Ahab and the even more infamous (maybe due to historical sexism) Queen Jezebel.

The pope notes, “In a certain way, Elijah must rekindle the flame of faith on God's mountain and bring it back to Israel. He experiences, in that place, wind, earthquake and fire. But God is not present in all of this. He then perceives a sweet soft murmur; and God speaks to him in this soft breath (cf. I Kings 19: 11-18).”

The Pope then continues, speaking about the gentleness of this revelation of God to Elijah, in contrast to the harsh revelation of God on Mount Carmel, where Elijah had a showdown with the pagan prophets whom Ahab and Jezebel had favored. God proved Himself real there, but that didn’t win people over to God. Pope Benedict notes, “On Mt Carmel, Elijah sought to overcome the distancing from God with fire and the sword, killing the prophets of Baal. In this way, though, he was unable to restore the faith.”

In encountering God in His gentleness on Mt Horeb, Elijah “in this way  [is made] to recognize in advance the One [Jesus] who overcame sin not with power but by his Passion; the One who, by his suffering, has given us the ability to forgive. This is how God wins.”

Pope Benedict was giving this sermon in part to priests who were about to be ordained, reminding them that it is the love of God which wins people over to the Truth, not the anger of God. Saint Paul in today’s 2^nd reading speaks of his anguish in not winning over more of his countrymen to Christ – he is not angry about it, but sad because he loves them.

We’re mindful of people in our lives who are distant from Christ. We might think it is hopeless that they’ll come back to Him, but He tells us along with the guys in the boat, “Take Courage, I AM, do not be afraid.”

He is not advocating an Alfred E. Newman, “What, me worry?” thoughtlessness, but the attitude of trust we see in the saints of the month of August – St. Edith Stein, today’s saint, who traveled from Judaism to Catholicism to death at Auschwitz, always trusting in God; Sunday’s Saint, St. Lawrence Martyr, who had the guts to present the poor to the Roman officials as the true riches of the Church; St. Monica later this month, who prayed for decades for her husband and sons to be converted. Some of these saints had to see from Heaven the fruit of their prayers, while Monica had the joy of seeing her family convert while she was still alive.

We ask our Lord, the master of the universe who comes to us in great gentleness, to help us find the gentle and loving ways to bring our world the message of the Truth, the message of Christ.