Scripture for Your Inner Outcasts

Transcript

"The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Upon those who dwelt in the land of gloom a light has shown. You have brought them abundant joy and great rejoicing, as they rejoice before you, as at the harvest, as people make merry when dividing spoils. For the yoke that burden them, the pole on their shoulder, and the rod of their taskmaster, you have smashed, as on the day of Midian."

Welcome back to Scripture for Your Inner Outcasts. Today is January 25th, 2026, the third Sunday in Ordinary Time. Today is a special Sunday episode of Scripture for your Inner Outcasts, as we are joined by both Dr. Gerry Crete and Dr. Peter Malinoski, the co-founders of Souls and Hearts. They will be offering a joint reflection on today's readings.

So we are on the third Sunday in Ordinary Time, and it is great to be back in our virtual studio together. Dr. Gerry, so good to be with you.

Hey, it's always good to be with you.

And we have today the passage that actually launched this podcast, Scripture for Your Inner Outcasts. It was this first reading from Isaiah chapter 9 that actually provided the impetus to launch this podcast. And so if it's okay with you, I just want to jump right into it. Verses two and three. All right. So here we have where it says, "The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Upon those who dwelt in the land of gloom a light has shown. You have brought them abundant joy and great rejoicing, as they rejoice before you as at the harvest, as people make merry when dividing spoils. For the yoke that burdened them, the pole on their shoulder, and the rod of their taskmaster, you have smashed as on the day of Midian. And so what I'm going to just invite all of our listeners, all your parts to tune into, is if I change that first line from, the people who walked in darkness to the parts who walked in darkness have seen a great light, and upon those who dwelt in the land of gloom a light has shown, because these particular verses in Isaiah really spoke to me about the experience of you exiles living in exile, in gloom, in darkness, you know, yoked, the pole on their shoulders, the rod of taskmasters, which is often the way that exiles, that you experience managers who are working to keep you so hard in line, and that there could be an entirely different way of living, of being, you know, the sense of great hope, these tidings of joy. And so this is really the passage in all of Scripture that just so moved me to consider, how can we do this? How can we bring this to exiles? How can we bring light to the light of the gospel, the light of Scripture, to these parts? So I'm just curious, like what you think about that Dr. Gerry, how that lands with you? I don't know that. You know that, actually.

No, actually, I didn't know that that this was an inspiring passage in particular for this podcast. It makes sense to me. You know, when I was looking at this passage beforehand, you know, of course, it spoke to me in parts and and everything and burdens, knowing just a little bit of the historical context, like just a little in Isaiah and the fact that the people were being tempted to make an alliance with like Syria or, you know, their threat of Assyria. All these forces were at play. And I feel like that's the case for some of our parts, especially our exiles. They feel like they have to make some kind of compromise to survive, or they have to cope a certain way to survive. And I feel like this is so powerful because it's saying, no, you don't. You know, I mean, Isaiah warns Israelites, no, because something better is coming, right? You know, and of course, we know, looking at it from the Christian perspective, that something better is Christ himself, right? And that we don't need to live in fear. There's this great hope, and there's this whole new path that he will prepare for us and this great light, and we won't have to walk in darkness. So, you know, this is an invitation for our parts, I think, to connect with the innermost self, to connect with Christ ultimately.

Something better. Right. I think our exiles believe they're stuck with whatever they have. They have to stay where they are. And that's just not true.

Well, then we have it laid out for us in our responsorial psalm for today, too. You know, Psalm 27, verse 1 is the response, the Lord is my light and my salvation. So we see this pattern, right? What is this light you know, shines on the gloom? And I would say that that is the light of authentic love. That is the light of grace, that is the light. Who is Jesus Christ now incarnate? As we've come through the Christmas season, we're in the end of the Christmas season up till February 2nd.

So but look at this powerful part in that second verse is one thing I ask of the Lord. This I seek to dwell in the house of the Lord. So our exiles are being invited to dwell in a house. You know, they're not left somewhere to suffer. They're actually this light. This path is bringing them to the house of the Lord. Beautiful.

Well. And we have this refrain. Our Lord, you know, who is our light and our salvation. He's bringing this back up in Matthew chapter four. You know, he quotes this passage from Isaiah. You know, the people who sit in darkness have seen a great light. And on those dwelling in a land overshadowed with death, light has risen, you know. And from that time on, Jesus began to preach and to say, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And that's just like tying it all together right here. You see the same thing in the New Testament. But now, coming from the mouth of our Lord Jesus Christ, the mouth of the word, you know, if you will just, you know, sharing this with us. And again, I keep going back to what you've taught me about macrocosm, microcosm, you know, the all the Saint Maximus the Confessor and others too, that, you know, Evagrius and, you know, that have captured this. And I'm like, this is it. We're seeing it here again. You know, that we're encapsulating this. We're seeing it writ large in the external systems. You know, in Scripture back in Isaiah with the Israelites struggling with, you know, these questions about the alliances with Assyria and so forth. And we see it in the New Testament, you know, as Jesus is offering this message of repentance to open up ourselves to the light. But it's also going on within our own systems, in this microcosm inside.

Yeah. Well, I love that. What happens after Jesus, you know, cites Isaiah, is that he calls Andrew and Simon to go be fishers of men.

So then what happens after that. You know they're going to catch fish. Really there's just this huge, you know, metaphor for seeking out the lost, seeking out other exiles and bringing them home, bringing them out, of bringing them home ultimately.

Yeah. Yeah.

And so you see that even in the second reading to where Saint Paul is, you know, saying, "Let there not be divisions among you." You know, he's talking about the conflict that had broken out between Chloe and I can't remember who she was in the rivalry with, but you know, I belong to Paul, I began to Apollos, I belong to Cephas, I belong to Christ. Is Christ divided? No. There's this call for this interior integration, this unity inside. And he's talking about it within the Christian community. But we're also talking about it at the level of our parts. You know, that there be this unity inside, you know, because as Saint James says, where does the striving, you know, and the strife happen among you? Does it begin in your own heart, you know, and so we're getting to the root of that with this. And so it's just a blessing to be able to reach out to exiles with this message of hope that is so strongly expressed in the Scripture readings for today's Mass.

Absolutely.

Well, any final thoughts before we draw this to a close? Anything else that you wanted to share about this?

You know, just what a beautiful passage. What a beautiful invitation, really, for our hearts and our exile parts to come forward to the light. And and I think that the message I would just say is, you know, like, be not afraid, right? Like you're not alone. And there is a path and it is a path where, you know, Christ has prepared and Christ is excited and inviting. So that would be all that I have left to say.

Well, beautiful.

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