Please read this passage before reading the homily.
“The days are coming,” says the Lord, “when I raise up a righteous shoot to David.” Constantly throughout the pages of the Bible God keeps the promise God made to keep a king of David’s line on the throne of David. Constantly God refuses to destroy the heritage 0f David.
There were, however, evil kings who at times sat on the throne of David their ancestor. One of them was named Zedekiah, which means “the Lord-our-Justice. Since this king was anything but God’s justice, Jeremiah saw that God would replace him with a king , however, who would truly be “God’s Justice.” Zedekiah would be the last king of Israel and the people would go into exile.
The words of Jeremiah continued to provide hope for the people. There would be a return from exile, which happened, and there would be a righteous king eventually. In the Christian tradition, the birth of Jesus Christ is seen as a fulfilment of the rest of Jeremiah’s words.
We make puns on our leaders, either to humiliate them or to praise them. I remember a yard sign in the 2020 election, which proclaimed “Bye Don”, an attempt to deelect Trump and elect Joe Biden. It would like campaigning against President Lincoln by holding signs for Edsel, a model designed by Ford that failed financially.
We are called to make God our righteousness by the honest and graceful way we relate to others in this world.