“A reading from the first chapter of Malachi,” she intones. It’s the first reading of the thirty-first Sunday of Ordinary Time during the “A” cycle, lectionary 151. She pauses and begins.

“A great King am I, says the LORD of hosts, / and my name will be feared among the nations.” And in my own mind, that which I can never say to my wife — the question. Why?

Why would God declare that his name will be feared? Why should we fear it? What kind of father would want his son to fear him? It makes God seem terribly petty, terribly immature, almost like a bully.

“And now, O priests, this commandment is for you:” And why then apply it to us? I recall the notion that we are all priests in some sense or another — isn’t that in one of the epistles? It’s terribly popular in Protestantism: the priesthood of believers.

If you do not listen,
if you do not lay it to heart,
to give glory to my name, says the LORD of hosts,
I will send a curse upon you
and of your blessing I will make a curse.

Again, why? Why does God seek glory? Why does he demand praise? Why does he require subjugation?

You have turned aside from the way,
and have caused many to falter by your instruction;
you have made void the covenant of Levi,
says the LORD of hosts.

What exactly did they do? How did they void the covenant? Was it just that they didn’t praise him? Or did they eat ham?

I, therefore, have made you contemptible
and base before all the people,
since you do not keep my ways,
but show partiality in your decisions.

Does this mean that God somehow influenced the opinions of others to make the people — his people, his chosen people — seem base to others? Isn’t that kind of cheating? And if he would do that, why not influence people to do good rather than the opposite?

Have we not all the one father?
Has not the one God created us?
Why then do we break faith with one another,
violating the covenant of our fathers?

Is this how a father treats his children?

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I am falling away from the faith. I sit in Mass and think about it critically, as I’ve not done in years. I give myself licence to doubt.

It’s liberating.