OT XXV [C] Readings:  Am 8:4-7; I Tm 2:1-8; Lk 16:1-1

 A few years ago, a priest was giving a retreat to inmates in a federal prison in the South. One of the talks dealt with Jesus’ teaching on revenge. Jesus said: “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. When someone strikes you on [your] right cheek, turn the other one to him as well.” To illustrate Jesus’ point, the priest told the story of Jackie Robinson, the first black athlete to play in the major leagues. When Branch Rickey signed Jackie to a Dodger contract in 1945, he told him, “You will have to take everything they dish out to you and never strike back.” Rickey was right. On the field, pitchers brushed Jackie back with blazing fastballs, and opposing fans and teams taunted him. Off the field, he was thrown out of hotels and restaurants where the rest of the team stayed and ate. Through it all, Jackie kept his cool. He turned the other cheek. And so did Dodgers’ General Manager Rickey, who was abused by people for signing Jackie. The priest ended the story by asking the prisoners this question: “Where do you think black athletes would be today had Jackie Robinson and Branch Rickey not turned the other cheek?” After the talk, a prisoner said to the priest: “That’s a nice story, Father. But why didn’t you tell the whole story? Why didn’t you tell why Rickey and Robinson turned the other cheek? It wasn’t for love of God. It was for love of money. Rickey turned the other cheek because if he succeeded, he would make a fortune too.” The priest thought to himself for a minute: “If the prisoner’s right, then he’s just shot my nice little story right out of the water.” — But then the priest thought: “Hey! Wait a minute! If the prisoner’s right, then my story makes an even more important point!” It’s the same point Jesus makes in today’s Gospel. Jesus says: “The children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light.” 

‘The children of this world’ are the children of darkness who see and value only the things of this world.  They live for this world, concentrate their attention on it, invest everything in it, give the energies of mind and body fully to it, and find in it their entire purpose for living. 

 Christian believers, however, are ‘the children of light’ who see real, eternal, spiritual values as primary and regard temporal values as secondary. The children of this world regard themselves as owners, while true Christians regard themselves as mere stewards of God who view their resources as simply loaned to them by God. 

It sounds strange to hear Jesus praising the steward of this parable for being so sly. In saving our souls and spreading the Good News, our Lord wants us to apply the same ingenuity and effort that other people put into their worldly affairs or into their attempts to attain some human ideal.

Many of the great men and women of the world - the CEOs, the athletes, the movie stars, the political leaders - are exemplary in their tenacity, their determination, and their astuteness.  They set a goal and let nothing stop them from achieving it. They turn everything into an opportunity to advance their cause. Imagine how different the Church (and the world) would be if every Catholic pursued holiness that energetically.

The steward knew that his time of employment was coming to an end. Before his last day arrives, he uses his connections and position to prepare for the future. Jesus reprimands his followers for not applying that same astuteness to the more important project of preparing for eternity.

We are all like that steward. We know that our lives will come to an end, sooner or later. We know it for a fact. And yet, are we effectively utilizing our resources and opportunities to prepare for what will come next? This is the question he wants us to ask ourselves. Are we energetically building Christ's Kingdom now, so as to be able to enjoy it forever later?

Sometimes we are irresponsible stewards because we forget what's really at stake. We become seduced by day-to-day problems and pleasures and forget that this life is passing. It is only a warm-up for eternal life.

In the parable, the steward was in charge of his master's account books, so he exercised his smartness by rearranging the debts people owed. We don't have control over Christ's account books.  Instead, we have three commodities to be managed astutely.

The three commodities are time, talent, and treasure.

How much time do we give to Christ and his Kingdom?  We all give him some time - that's why we're here. But can we give more? Should we? It may be a matter of dedicating larger chunks of time to serving Christ and the Church, or it may be a matter of simply adding some prayers to our drive to work. We are called to be wise stewards of our time.

Second, talent. 

Our talents too are resources given by God. We are called to invest them in loving God and loving our neighbor. Maybe this area is where we can be better stewards.

Finally, treasure. 

It is a law of the Church that every Catholic should give financial support to the works of the Church, each one in accordance with their means. There is a longstanding tradition in Christianity of tithing. If we don't do that, we should ask ourselves why not.

The manager in Jesus’ story used all his resources to secure his future. We must be no less resourceful. We have the Holy Mass and the Seven Sacraments as sources of Divine grace, the Holy Bible as the word of God for daily meditation and practice, and the Spirit-guided Church to direct us. These are the best possible resources; we need to use them in such a way that it will be said of us, “And the master commended them because they acted so wisely.”

 

Today, in Holy Communion, Christ will give himself entirely to each one of us, holding nothing back.   When he does, let's ask him to teach us to use our resources for his glory and the propagation of his kingdom.

 

 

 

 

OT XXIV [C] Ex 32:7-11, 13-14; I Tm 1:12-17; Lk 15:1-32

Everyone has lost something at one time or another.  There is even a website complete with mobile app, http://www.lostandfound.com, that acts as a global ‘lost and found’ box. Users can report items missing and users can report items found. It is a good example of how technology can help people connect in a useful way. This is a gateway site for all of the physical things that can be retrieved and returned to their rightful owners. According to their statistics, about twice as many objects have been reported lost as have been reported found in the U.S. So, the site’s users are losing things at twice the rate they are finding them. — Haven’t we all had the experience of losing things that we know deep down we will never recover? Depending on the situation, we can feel disappointed, heartbroken, hopeless, or simply discouraged by our own inability to keep up with things. Some Catholics invoke St. Antony who is the patron for the lost things. Isn’t it a wonderful relief to know that we will never fall into the ‘Lost Forever’ category? Isn’t it reassuring to know that God will never give up on us?

All the 3 parables in Luke 15 show us vividly that God cares about each one of us: he will not rest if only one sheep is missing, or one coin is lost. They show us that He cares deeply enough to go out of His way to save us when we are lost: it was certainly an inconvenience to go bushwhacking after the foolish stray sheep, and to light the lamp and sweep the dirt-floored house trying to find the lost coin.

Finding of the lost objects in the parable shows that God rejoices when we return to him, as the shepherd rejoices upon retrieving his sheep, and as the woman rejoices upon recovering her coin - every sinner who returns to God causes a joyful celebration to break out in the halls of heaven and the heart of the Father.

The self-righteous and judgmental comments of the Pharisees, provided the occasion for these parables to be told by Jesus. If the Pharisees had possessed Christ's power and authority, they would have destroyed all "sinners." But Christ uses all his power and authority to bring sinners back into communion with God.

The Pharisees can't understand this, because they have painted their image of God in their own likeness. They enjoy condemning others for being less perfect than themselves, because it feeds their vanity, making them feel superior. God’s limitless and entirely selfless desire to save sinners was revealed most fully by Christ on the cross, but it is also the main theme behind every other episode in salvation history.

We just listened to one of those episodes from the OT.  While Moses had been up on the mountain in prayer, receiving the Law from God's own hands, the Israelites down in the valley had lost hope and abandoned their faith. Instead of continuing to trust in the God who had already done so many miracles to save them from slavery and lead them to safety, they gave up on God. They rebelled against him, turned their backs on him, and built an idol out of gold. From the Pharisees' perspective, God should have simply destroyed them. That's the natural view of things, which God seems to adopt in his conversation with Moses, when he says he is going to destroy these faithless, stiff-necked people. But God doesn't mean it. He is only testing Moses. And Moses passes the test.

It is sometimes hard for our fallen human nature to see God's mercy clearly. We tend to be judgmental, so we also tend to project that - wrongly - onto God. This wrong conception can be detrimental to our maturity and peace of mind. It puts a wall around our own hearts, so that God's love can't reach in and transform us.

Let us realize the truth that our brothers and sisters deserve and expect from us the same compassion, kindness and forgiveness which we receive from our merciful God. As forgiven prodigals, we must become forgiving people, for Jesus taught us to pray, “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” 

Jesus is not asking us to be like either of the two brothers in the parable, because both were far from perfect.  Let us try and be like the father in the story. “Be made perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Be compassionate as the heavenly Father is.”

It is important to find out our own faults and sins and become aware of them so that we can humble ourselves before God and ask forgiveness. Before we go to bed at night, make it a habit to examine our conscience and confess to God our sins and failures of the day, asking His pardon and forgiveness. As the prodigal son came to his senses we also need to come to our senses and realize where we stand before God each day.

As we continue with the celebration of the Holy Mass, let us pray also for God’s Divine mercy on all of us who have fallen away from God’s grace.  Let us open our eyes to see and ears to hear that Jesus is welcoming us back home! And there will be a great rejoicing in heaven over our returning home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 OT XXIII- Wis 9:13-18b; Phlm 9-10, 12-17; Lk 14:25–33

 In his world-conquering march, Alexander the Great approached a highly fortified city and through a messenger demanded to see the king and set out his terms of surrender. The king laughed at him and said, “Why should I surrender to your emperor Alexander? You can’t do us any harm! We can endure any siege.” As the messenger returned Alexander ordered his men to line up in single file and to march towards the cliff within sight of the city walls. The city’s citizens watched with horrified fascination as one by one Alexander’s officers marched over the edge of that cliff and plunged to their death. After several men had obeyed his orders, he commanded them to halt. He then called his troops back to his side and stood silently facing the city. The effect on the citizens and the king was stunning. From spellbound silence they moved to absolute terror. They realized they had no walls thick enough and no defense strong enough to protect themselves against that kind of commitment and that kind of devotion. Spontaneously they rushed through the gates to surrender themselves to Alexander the Great. — That is the kind of surrender and sacrifice that Jesus is asking for. One thing you have to say about today’s terrorists is that they are willing to die for what they believe. The tragedy is that terrorists are more willing to pay a price and are more willing to die for a lie than Christians are to live for the truth.

Jesus said to the great crowds, “If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Is Christ telling us to hate the very people we should love the most? No.  In ancient Palestine, figures of speech were often vivid. The more important the point, the more vivid the image. For example when Christ says: “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off,” he’s not saying that every person who’s ever stolen a cookie from the cookie jar should start amputating body parts. He is saying that we need to be radical in our fight against sin. If a certain situation or place or person is always leading us away from God, he wants us to have the courage to renounce that situation or place, and put healthy boundaries with that person.

Unless we love Jesus more than we love our families, we can’t really follow him. And if we value our own life and our own comfort more than we love Him, we’re not going to be able to experience the joy of a deep friendship with him. Christ gives us to key to loving him above all else: it means letting go of our possessive love.

 

Just as a tower builder needs to have enough in the budget for materials and as a general to win a war needs to have enough well-trained troops to defeat his opponents, so we, to be followers of Christ need to know the sufferings that keeping this commitment will demand.  Perhaps these parables also illustrate that discipleship is not a one-time decision and that the commitment involved needs to be an ongoing decision to persevere in the ministries that are integral to following Jesus.  When we first decide to follow Christ, we know simply that there will be a price to pay.  Only as life unfolds can we begin to assess the full cost. 

 

When Jesus says: “Anyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions cannot be my disciple”, he’s not saying that everyone should run off and sell their homes and cars right after Mass. We have a responsibility to others, and we need to use the gifts of God wisely. He is, however, calling us to give up our possessive, hoarding attitude towards material possessions and towards others. He’s inviting us to carry our crosses by renouncing our possessions for the infinite gain of loving him above all things

 

Jesus asserted in the Sermon on the Mount: “No one can serve two masters; for he will either hate the one and love the other or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon” (Mt 6:24).  He cannot stand halfway between both sides. He has to decide and show his commitment.

The four conditions of discipleship as outlined by Jesus in this gospel indicate a kind of total commitment that every follower of Christ should be prepared to live. The radical demands of Jesus call us to center our lives on the suffering and risen Christ.

Taking up our own cross does not mean seeking out suffering. Jesus did not seek out his cross; he took on himself, in obedience to the Father, what men put on his shoulders, and with his obedient love, he transformed it from an instrument of torture into a sign of redemption and glory. Jesus did not come to make human crosses heavier, but rather to give them meaning. It has been rightly said that “whoever looks for Jesus without the cross will find the cross without Jesus,” that is, he will certainly find the cross but not the strength to carry it. Though “bearing a cross” is often equated with welcoming chronic illness, painful physical conditions, or trying family relationships, it also includes what we do voluntarily, as a consequence of our commitment to Jesus Christ.  Further, it is the spirit in which we freely and deliberately accept and endure the pain, the difficulties, and even the ridicule involved with these choices, that transforms them into real cross-bearing. We need to be prepared to suffer out of love for Jesus.

 

Real discipleship demands true commitment to the duties entrusted to us by life, circumstances, the community, or directly by God Himself, and by loving acts of selfless, humble, sacrificial love offered to all God’s children around us.  Let us remember that all this is possible only if we rely on the power of prayer and the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Today Christ will come in Holy Communion to strengthen us once again, so that we can continue bearing our crosses with faith and hope. This week, let's share that strength with someone who needs it. Let's take a share of a neighbor's cross, just as Christ has taken a share of ours.

 

 

 

 

 

OT 22 [C]: Sir 3:17-18, 20, 28-29; Heb 12:18-19, 22-24a; Lk 14:1, 7-14

An old story is told about someone searching for the meaning of life who wanders into the hut of a holy hermit in a forest. The hermit offers his guest tea and keeps pouring tea into the cup until it is overflowing. The guest watched the overflow until he could no longer restrain himself. “Stop! The cup is full. No more will go in.” And then the hermit replied, “Like this cup, you are full of your own opinions, preconceptions, and ideas. How can I teach you unless you first empty your cup?” — That is a wonderful story about humility, which is esteemed by many religious traditions. Dante in ‘The Divine Comedy’ thought of humility as the most important virtue. Humility is radical dependence upon and trust in God. 

One of the most important laws in Christ's Kingdom is the law of humility. This law says that "everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and everyone who humbles himself will be exalted". In other words, greatness in his Kingdom comes not from outdoing other people, outperforming them, and out-distancing them. Greatness in Christ's eyes comes from serving other people, from elevating them, helping them advance, and keeping oneself in the background.

In his very first sermon, Jesus had taught the same law with different words: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven." It's the same law stated so directly in today's First Reading: "conduct your affairs with humility, and you will be loved.. Humble yourself... and you will find favor with God." This law goes directly against everything this fallen world teaches us. It's extremely hard for us to swallow, which is why Jesus explained it by using this unambiguous parable.

This law is so fundamental, that Jesus also taught it to us by living it out in an extreme way: through his passion and death. Jesus, the Lord of heaven, came to earth and purposefully took the lowest place possible - that of a condemned criminal. He freely took on the most humiliating form of death - crucifixion. He allowed himself to be stripped of every honor.

In the parable, we heard Jesus talking about where the guests should sit at the table when invited somewhere. As a general rule in a fixed system, the most distinguished guest sits at the right hand of the host where he receives the highest honour. The second most important guest sits at the left side of the host, and so on. He used this example of good manners at the table to draw attention to how honour is accredited in the Kingdom of God.

The Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector is a great example that Jesus has given. This parable explains the power of humility as seen in our prayers. In the parable, Jesus talks about two men who went up to the temple to pray. One was a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 

The Pharisee began thanking God for “not being like other people”. He thanked God for not being one of the sinners and even added that he fasts twice a week and gave tenths of everything he receives. Now, the tax collector stood far away. He could not even look to heaven as he beat his breast and asked the Lord to have mercy on him, a sinner. The parable then ends with Jesus saying that those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.

It is important to stay humble because having humility not only helps us develop a more kind approach to interacting with others but it also influences how we perceive ourselves and the world around us. Humility helps one extend more compassion and empathy to others.  Humility offers the opportunity to become less self-involved and more attuned with the feelings of others.

It is relatively easy to be humble when we are at the bottom of the tree, as it were: new in a job, or very junior. The more senior we get, the more likely that we become proud. 

A key quality of humility is to value others and enable them to be heard. Spending time listening to others, and drawing out their feelings and values, enabling them to express themselves, is a very powerful way to start to understand this.

Secondly, be grateful for what we have. In other words, take the time to ‘count your blessings’, and be thankful for them. It is easy to get sucked into a negative spiral of wanting more. Taking time to stop, and remember what we have to be grateful for, is a good way to cultivate a more humble and positive frame of mind.

The Proverb says that the Lord detests everyone with a proud heart and that they will be punished. Pride is very offensive in the Eyes of God. With humility, we learn that this is the truth and that we should put ourselves before Him. Not being humble is basically like declaring that we are no longer in need of God’s guidance, and that is offensive to the Lord.

In washing the feet of His disciples Jesus set the greatest example of humility. Jesus set the bar for being humble. Our aim is to be like Jesus. So, if Jesus set the standard for humility, we should lower our level of pride to attain this. The Grace of God is like a waterfall; the water never flows upward to the skies. Instead, it flows and hits the ground in a downward motion. Therefore, those who are blessed are those who are humble.

As we prepare to receive the gift of gifts, the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, we ask him to give us the joy seeing ourselves as he sees us, and to make us truly humble of heart. Jesus meek and humble of heart make my heart like yours.

 XXI-O.T. Is. 66:18-21; Heb. 12:5-7, 11-13; Lk. 13:22-30

As he continues his fateful journey to Jerusalem, Jesus answers the question as to how many will be saved by answering how to enter into salvation and how urgent it is to strive now, before the Master closes the door. Jesus also admonishes his followers to concentrate on their own salvation instead of worrying about the salvation of others.

We don't know who the questioner was. It was someone who believed in eternal life. He was wondering if it was as hard to attain it as the prevailing view was. In our culture, the prevailing view is just the opposite.  It says that most people are nice guys, so most people will get to heaven. But what does Jesus say? He doesn't give a direct answer. He doesn't say, "Only a few will be saved," as the Pharisees taught. Neither does he say, "Many will be saved," as today's popular culture teaches. Instead, he changes the focus from general statistics to the individual. He looks at his questioner and says, "Strive to enter by the narrow gate." Then he tells a parable that reinforces this emphasis on individual responsibility (as opposed to general appearances) by showing that on Judgment Day there will be a lot of surprises - the first will be last, and the last will be first. We cannot take our friendship with Christ for granted. We have to consciously and continually strive to enter by the narrow gate.

Jesus is inviting us to break out of our comfort zones and start striving to follow him more closely. It's a real relationship that needs attention and effort. He invites us to strive more intelligently or energetically. Daily prayer and frequent confession are essential aspects of striving to enter through the narrow gate.

We cannot strive with all our strength to follow Christ if we do not know Christ.  It is not enough to have a superficial knowledge of Christ - like the people who said, "We ate and drank in your company and you taught in our streets." Rather, we have to have a living, lasting, growing friendship with Christ. That is what we were created for, and that is what will lead us to true life.

And since friendship always involves effort, self-sacrifice, and the investment of time and energy, the same thing goes for our friendship with Christ. Salvation comes from actually following him, from striving to know him better and live out his teaching. This is what Jesus means by "the narrow gate" that leads to salvation. To get through a narrow gate you have to leave behind all your excess baggage - you have to go through it on purpose.

It is possible to be labeled a Christian on the outside without really making an effort to follow the Christian way in our hearts. It is possible to come to Mass, to be involved with parish activities, and still never really enter into a committed, life-changing, personal relationship with Christ. Jesus knows that going through the motions isn't enough; we need to let his grace change our lives.

 

A few ways to start striving to know Christ better are: weekly Eucharistic adoration, joining Bible studies, renewing your prayer life, reading a good book on Christ, meditating on the mysteries of the rosaries etc... Jesus is eager to help us through the narrow gate, but he can't do his part unless we also strive to do our part.

The Letter to the Hebrews reminds us: "do not disdain the discipline of the Lord or lose heart when reproved by him; for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines..." In other words, every trial and tribulation that comes our way in life is either sent or permitted by God for our benefit. Nothing is outside of his wise and loving plan. And the main focus of that plan is to restore us to the fullness of life that sin has disrupted.

 

When God sends or permits trials, we often react by rebelling. In the spiritual life, we are like children who don't appreciate the value of discipline. So when following Christ's path becomes uncomfortable, when his gate becomes too narrow, we start looking around for shortcuts. We think to ourselves, “Jesus promises lasting happiness, but it seems so far away!" And then we think about the people around us, and the people on television and in the movies. They seem to be enjoying themselves so much. They don't follow Christ's teaching, but they seem to be doing just fine. And that's when we start to compromise in our moral lives. We cut corners on Church teaching in little ways that no one will notice. We make little exceptions. After all, we tell ourselves, everyone else is doing it. And so we step off the straight path traced out by the Ten Commandments and the Catechism - that sure and dependable path that our conscience always points too. We prefer the winding "shortcut".

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Until it suddenly stopped making any progress and looked like it was stuck.

So the man decided to help the butterfly. He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon. The butterfly then emerged easily, although it had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings.

The man didn’t think anything of it and sat there waiting for the wings to enlarge to support the butterfly. But that didn’t happen. The butterfly spent the rest of its life unable to fly, crawling around with tiny wings and a swollen body.

Our struggles in life develop our strengths. Without struggles, we never grow and never get stronger, so it’s important for us to tackle challenges on our own, and not be relying on help from others. When we accept these challenges and grow we will be able to say with Robert Frost,

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by

And that has made all the difference.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

OT XX [C] Jer 38:4-6, 8-10; Heb 12:1-4; Lk 12: 49-53 

Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.

There is a story that took place in Russia in 1905 and the plot centers around a man named Tevye, the father of a poor Jewish family. He has five daughters but no son. His eldest daughter marries a tailor who was not chosen for her by the traditional matchmaker. After a struggle with his conscience Teyve accepts the marriage. His next daughter marries a college student who has broken with many Jewish traditions. After another struggle with his conscience, Teyve accepts this marriage too. Finally, his third daughter, Chava, marries a non-Jew, a young Russian soldier. When Golde, Teyve’s wife breaks the news to him, Teyve, says, “Chava is dead to us! We must forget her.” Alone, Teyve, sings a beautiful song called “Chavalah”. In it he pours out his heart to God. He can’t understand why Chava did what she did. At that moment Chava appears and pleads with Teyve to accept her and her husband. Teyve looks up to heaven and says: “How can I accept them? Can I deny everything I believe in? On the other hand, can I deny my own child? (But if I deny everything I believe in, if I try to bend that far, I will break). No Chava!”  — When Jesus invited people to follow him, he realized what he was asking.

At least 75% of the Christian families, I believe, going through this kind of situations, torn between love and faith. What will you choose? Can you strike a balance without losing both? Both the first reading and the gospel speak with such situations.

Jeremiah in the first reading lived at a tumultuous time in Israel's history, right around 600 BC. The northern half of Israel had recently been conquered by Assyria, but the small, southern part of the country, Judah, where Jerusalem was located and where Jeremiah lived, was still free when Jeremiah was born. But it was located right between two powerful empires that were trying to conquer the whole area: Egypt in the south and Babylon in the north. Jeremiah's mission in life was to be a prophet, to constantly remind the people and rulers of Judah to trust in God.

If they obeyed God's commandments and instructions, God would protect them. Unfortunately, neither the leaders nor the people wanted to hear that. Instead, they wanted to take matters into their own hands, fight their own battles, and arrange their own peace treaties. The one thing they didn't want to do was to depend on and obey God.

Every time the King of Judah asked Jeremiah for guidance, Jeremiah would pray, receive instructions, and inform the King - and then the King would do the exact opposite. And then God would ask Jeremiah to issue warnings, calling the people to repentance. But they wouldn't repent. So, eventually Judah was conquered by Babylon, Jerusalem was obliterated, and the Jews were taken into exile. Through it all, Jeremiah was the despised scapegoat. They spread lies about him, mocked him, burned his writings, and finally put him in prison. When even that didn't silence him, they threw him down a well so he would starve to death. Why? Simply because he was being faithful to what God was asking of him.

Yes, choosing to follow Christ in a fallen world has consequences, and God wants us to be ready for them. Being a Christ's friend means more than simply praying and receiving the sacraments - although those are essential. It also means FOLLOWING him. It means daily listening for his call and obeying it when it comes. That's the tough part. Because, obeying Christ means, going against the grain of this fallen world. It brings us into conflict with social trends, other people's desires, and even of our own sin-struck nature. Even though Christ did come to establish peace between God and man, that peace causes a division between those who accept it and those who reject it. In this way he becomes a sign of contradiction.

The division which Jesus speaks of here has several features. History has borne testimony to the fact that the gospel divides men and women, husbands and wives, parents and children, for faith in Christ requires ultimate allegiance to Him. Not even family ties should hold us back from following him.

The loyalty to Christ has to take precedence over the dearest loyalties of this earth. Belief in Jesus and commitment to him cause fires of arguments to erupt between believers and non-believers in the same family or community, resulting in the division of families and conflict in society.  Standing up for what is right and working for justice and truth are higher aims than unity, and working for those aims will sometimes cause division.  Hence, Christians today may cause division and rouse opposition because they share, through their Baptism, the prophetic charism of speaking God’s word, no matter how unpopular, and of giving a voice to those who have no one to speak for them.  C.S. Lewis once said that the Gospel was concerned to create “new people” not just “nice people.” If our individual and communal living of the Good News casts no fire and causes no division, then perhaps we are practicing “inoffensive Christianity.”

The polarization that began from the time of Jesus has been continued throughout the centuries. It will never end. Jesus’ words speak of the inevitable consequence of his message. Divisions are foreseen, and divisions and conflicts have been a constant reality because the Christian gospel makes great demands. The challenge is to continue to speak the truth with love in spite of opposition.

Jesus has come to “bring fire to the earth” because some things that exist in our world have to be destroyed in order for something new, beautiful, and life-giving to emerge. And that is the mission of the church and each one of us, to keep the fire of Christ burning alive to burn down the sin of the world and in ourselves and create a new world loyal to Christ, the truth.  

 

 

 

 

OT XIX [C] Wis 18:6-9; Heb 11:1-2, 8-19; Lk 12: 32-48

The Gospel today invites us to trust God and cast out all fear. Jesus said to his disciples, Provide money bags for yourselves that do not wear out, an inexhaustible treasure in heaven that no thief can reach nor moth destroy. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.

A person’s heart is tied to what he values most in life. People will inevitably reveal what they value most by their actions. Some people may value money more than anything and will go to great lengths to secure and gain more riches. For many people, their success or family is the most valued treasure of their lives, which is revealed in how they spend their time and energy. Therefore, Jesus’ statement that “where your treasure is there your heart is also” means that what a person values and loves the most in life will influence how they live.

Someone said, if I looked at your spending for five minutes, I could tell where your priorities lie because people go to where their time and money go. For example, health-conscious people spend time and money on being healthy. Fashionable people spend time and money researching the latest fashion trends and shopping. The most fascinating thing is that many of us are misaligned in our priorities and where we allocate our money.

A person with a heart set on worldly pleasures and riches will live in pursuit of earthly treasure while the person who values Christ above all else will stay focused on eternity and store up treasures in Heaven.

COVID has taught us that life can change within the blink of an eye. Those things that we have devoted endless hours into building and attaining can be stripped away from us within an instant. We can do everything we can to create a type of security in life, but the truth is, everything in this life is temporary. 

We work endless hours in an attempt to build financial security. We expect our relationships to fulfill our deepest longings for love and adoration. These things are certainly not wrong in themselves. But it’s healthy, every now and then, to stop and reflect on our motives. 

Our outlook on life changes when we realize the true mission in life and, that will determine how we use our time. In the business world, people say "time is money", because they know that time is a limited resource. We don't have an unlimited amount of time in which we can fulfill the mission God has given us.

For us, then, "time is Kingdom". One thing that will help us to use our time well, to be responsible and not lazy servants of our King, is budgeting the amount of time we spend entertaining ourselves. We need a certain amount of relaxation and recreation in order to keep balance in life. They are a means to an end. But our society tends to treat pleasure, fun, and entertainment not as means, but as the goal of life. That attitude opens the door to over-indulgence in entertainment - to wasting this precious resource of time. Since we live in this society, we are vulnerable to that temptation. We can keep the proper balance by having  enough self-discipline to budget how much time we spend on entertainment. Whether it's TV, cell phones, music, video games, movies, web surfing, jogging, or whatever - we all need to find a healthy way to relax. But as Christians, our mission comes first. It's up to us to be responsible stewards of our time, and plan ahead.

Living our mission and being responsible stewards of the many gifts we have received from God has  practical repercussions. It means that being a Christian affects our life decisions. Knowing that we are members of Christ's household, and that our first priority in life is to follow him, sheds light on every significant decision we have to make.

For example, when young Catholics are deciding where to go to college, the Catholic presence on campus should be a factor - not the only factor, but if our primary mission in life is to be faithful followers of Christ, it should at least be a factor. This is also why the Church constantly encourages her children to marry someone who shares the same faith. 

Marriage is a sacrament. It is meant to bring the spouses and children closer to Christ as it brings them closer to each other. When the husband and wife don't share the same faith, it makes that mission much harder to fulfill.

Career decisions can also be enlightened by this criterion. If we know that in God's eyes what matters most is that we are faithful to him and to our mission in the Church, our criteria for career success will be different than society's generic criteria.

Staying aware of our identity and mission even helps us decide where to go on vacation: we will do our best to choose a place where we can at least get to Sunday Mass.

As we continue with this Mass, let's ask ourselves what decisions we are facing or will be facing this week. And as Christ comes to us once again in Holy Communion, let's speak with him about them, and ask him to give us the light and strength we need to be faithful and prudent stewards of his gifts.

 

 

 

 

OT XVIII [C] Eccl 1:2; 2:21-23; Col 3:1-5, 9-11; Lk 12:13-21

Charles Dickens in his play “The Christmas Carol” gives the picture of a selfish man, Mr Scrooge, whose sole aim in life was acquiring as much wealth as possible at any cost. He considered Christmas celebrations as humbug, and hated charity. He weighed human relationship against material wealth.  He never bothered to care for his nephew or his employees. 

One night, he saw an unusual figure in his bed room. It was a ghost in chains. The ghost introduced himself as the ghost of his deceased partner Marley. He came to warn Mr Scrooge about the futility of the life that he was leading. He told him that some spirits would come to him and he should listen to their message, to avoid the fate that Marley was suffering. 

First came the ghost of the past. He took Mr Scrooge to his past. He was presented as a young man who did not heed to the voice of his parents; who abandoned the love of a beautiful maiden to amass wealth. The second ghost, the ghost of the present, took him to the church where Christmas celebrations were being held; and to the house of one of his employees. There he witnessed what others thought of him. Everyone hated him due to his over attachment to wealth. The third ghost took him to the future. He was taken to a house where a dead body lay unattended and unlamented by any one. He was curious to see the dead man. The ghost allowed him to see the corpse. Mr Scrooge was shocked, it was his own death scene. 

 Mr Scrooge learned a great lesson that his frantic chase for wealth was meaningless. It would only lead him to eternal misery.  This is the message of today’s readings. 

The author of the book of Ecclesiastes, from which the first reading is taken, was evidently a man of wealth and education. Like every Hebrew of his time he too shared the view that material prosperity was one of the chief signs of God’s blessing and approval. Yet he questioned the assumptions of his society. He declares the truth that “a man who labors wisely, skillfully and successfully, must leave what is his own to someone who has not toiled for it at all. So he asks himself, “What profit comes to a man from all the toil and anxiety of heart with which he has labored under the sun?”

 The man in the story of Jesus too is like this. He exhorted himself, “eat heartily, drink well, and enjoy yourself.” He gave no consideration to his end. But God said to him: “fool! This very night the demand will be made for your soul; and this hoard of yours, whose will it be then?  

We are all familiar with the famous eruption of Mt Vesuvius in ancient times, which buried the city of Pompeii in lava in a matter of minutes. The lava and ash came quickly and in huge quantities, preserving a snapshot of life in that ancient city, as if freezing a moment from the past. When archeologists uncovered the lava-caked city, they found entire families gathered around a meal - buried in lava before they even knew the volcano had erupted; they found beasts of burden standing in their stables; they also found some people who had seen or heard the eruption and were trying, in vain, to run away when the eruption caught up with them.

But according to some records, the very first human remains that the archeologists found were the skeletons of a man and a woman, preserved in their lava shell. When they broke through that shell, they found the skeletons' bony fingers clutching handfuls of gold coins.

The temptation to trust too much in money is an old one - as old as money itself. Today Jesus is encouraging us once again not to fall into it.

St Paul advises us, “Let your thoughts be on heavenly things, not on the things that are on the earth.” 

One very practical way to keep our thoughts on heavenly things and keep money in its place is to sponsor an evangelization project as a family. If the whole family is involved in saving and sacrificing in order to reach a goal of this kind, it constantly reminds everyone in the family that money is meant to be a means to a higher end, not an end itself. For example, a family could commit to save enough money each year to sponsor a missionary priest, or a child in an orphanage run by missionaries, or feeding orphans in an orphanage for one week. Find out early how much it would cost and collect that amount; or sponsor a seminarian during his years of formation, or a certain number of Masses for the souls in purgatory. Or anything like that you can do it directly that your incentive to help the disadvantaged or the church will keep growing.  Together, as a family, you decide your goal, and then make a plan on how you will be able to meet it. You make a poster with a chart on it, so you can track your progress during the year.

And at the end of the year, when you make your goal, you celebrate with a ceremony in which the money is given to its destination.

Another way to do it is to set a more challenging goal and join forces with another family or two in order to achieve it. It also contributes to family unity and growth in faith.

Jesus doesn't want us to spend our lives building barns that we will never use. He wants us to spend our lives building his everlasting kingdom in our hearts and in the world.

There is a wise saying in India: 

Rivers do not drink their water. Trees do not consume their fruits themselves. Clouds do not rain for them. Thus, the wealth of the noble men is to be used for others. 

May the Lord open our ears and minds to understand his words: What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul.

 XVII-OT-C:Gen. 18:20-32; Col. 2:12-14; Lk. 11:1-13

Today's Reading from the Gospel of Luke reminds us of the necessity to persevere in our prayer. When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them how to pray, Jesus taught them the Lord's Prayer, the Our Father. The prayer our Father is not just a personal prayer. It is also a community prayer. We do not pray in the Lord’s Prayer, “give ME this day what I want.” We pray, “Give US this day our daily bread.” We are created for community. Our prayer-focus should not be just God and me, but God and US.

 To emphasize the importance of persevering in prayer, Jesus gave the story of a friend who arrived at midnight and the necessity to go next door to one's neighbour to borrow three loaves of bread. Under normal circumstances, it is expected that the neighbour will complain because of the hour during which the request is made. It must be realized that in those days, to open the door meant to remove a very large wooden or iron bar from the door that was shut. To do so was tiresome and noisy. Furthermore, the entire family slept on a mat in the peasant house that was single-roomed. To open the door meant to disturb the entire family from its sleep. However, because of the visitor’s persistent knocking or importuning he would get up because his family would be woken up by that any way. Jesus concluded His teaching by saying that if you ask, it will be given to you; if you search, you will find; and if you knock, the door will be opened to you.

God honors persistence throughout the bible. Abraham in the first reading was persistently praying for the good people of Sodom. He was concerned that God would destroy Sodom if fifty righteous souls were not found within the city. On behalf of a lesser number of righteous soul, even ten, Abraham obtained God's unconditional promise that He would not destroy the city. Even Jesus was persistent in prayer. At the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus left his disciples and prayed three times. Sometimes we feel like our prayers are never answered. We wonder if God actually hears our prayers.  

The parable of the persistent widow offers us some answers. The judge in the parable was a man who didn’t fear God or respect anyone. He was in it himself, for the money and the power. So when the widow asked for a judgment, there was nothing in it for him. So, he was unwilling to help. The widow, however, was persistent, approaching him multiple times until he finally gave in and rendered a just judgment. Unlike the judge, God wants to intervene on our behalf. We are His chosen people, His beloved children. He wants to answer our prayers. What God simply need from us is our faith.

There is a story of the Sea Captain, who in a terrible storm feared the loss of all lives.  He asked if anyone knew how to pray.  No one volunteered.  So the captain, prepared to do a captain’s duty, agreed to pray.  His opening words were, “God, I’ve never bothered you before, and if you help us through this storm, I’ll never bother you again.”  That is hardly what God desires from any of us. Even persistent prayer is not bothering God, but manifesting our trust in him.

When we come to God with our request we often come very casually.  We ask and then leave.  When we do not get an immediate answer we return with the request but more urgently.  The longer we do without what we need, the more we are aware of its importance to us, until like ancient Jacob we say “I will not let you go until you bless me.”  If we really need something from God, we will find ourselves returning again and again.

St Augustine understood Christian prayer better than almost anyone. He had learned all about it from his mother, St Monica, who spent almost twenty years begging God with daily tears to convert her heretical and pleasure-loving son. This experience helped him understand why God doesn't always give us what we ask for right away. It's because he wants to give us more than what we ask for. By inviting us to be persistent, God is stretching our hearts, making them able to receive more grace, the way you stretch out a burlap sack so you can fill it to the brim.

Here's how Augustine explained it: "Suppose you want to fill some sort of bag, and you know the bulk of what you will be given, you stretch the bag or the sack or the skin or whatever it is.  You know how big the object that you want to put in and you see that the bag is narrow so you increase its capacity by stretching it.  In the same way by delaying the fulfillment of desire God stretches it, by making us expand the soul, and by this expansion he increases its capacity."

God never ignores our prayers.  If we keep on asking with sincerity and confidence in God's goodness, we are guaranteed to receive, and it will probably be much more than we could have imagined. When we do not understand why answers to our prayers are delayed, put our hand into God’s hand.  And continue to pray for those things we know to be his will.

Today, in response to Christ's reminder about the nature of Christian prayer, let's renew our commitment to taking time every day to be alone with God, to reboot our souls every morning and evening; so that our lives can run more smoothly, the way God designed them to run.

 

 

 

 OT XVI [C] Gn 18:1-10a; Col 1:24-28; Lk 10:38-42

Today’s reading from the Gospel reminds us of keeping priorities. Jesus visited the house of Martha and Mary.  Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to Jesus and asked, 'Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.' But the Lord answered her, 'Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.' " [Lk. 10:38-42]

There was once a master lion tamer in a famous circus who was a couple of years from retirement. So the circus management and the master lion tamer decided to start training his successor as it would take a lot of hard work and focus for the young tamer to be able to control the lion. From hundreds of candidates, a young student was chosen and the training began.

As the first lesson, the master explained to the student that most courageous lion tamers use only two tools to control the fierce beasts prowling around the cage. A whip and a chair. The young student, surprised, looked at his mentor. The mentor noticed the surprised look of his young apprentice and asked him “Which of the two is the most valuable to the tamer?” The student answered, “Surely the whip.” To which, the master replied, “No. The most important tool is the chair, and more specifically, the four legs of the stool!”

The student just stood there baffled. “A chair,” said the student “that’s odd! But why a chair? And why the four legs?” The master lion tamer replied “A lion can easily overpower, maul and kill a person. However, it’s only easy for the lion to do so if it can focus on a singular object or one person. The lion tamer uses the stool as a method of distraction. The lion, when faced with the legs of the stool, tries to focus on all four at once. Confused, and unable to focus, it stands there, frozen!  The lion tamer remains relatively safe behind the stool.”

When we miss our priorities in life we get distracted. When we get distracted from Him, we are likely to miss His guidance.

If Jesus Christ truly is the one Lord of life and history, the one Savior, the one Way, Truth, and Life (which he is), then, it is certain that "only one" thing is needed for a fulfilling, meaningful, and fruitful life: to stay as close to him as possible at all times. Much more important than what we can do for Christ is what we can be for him, and what he can be for us.

Martha was doing all kinds of tasks, and that was good. But Mary was listening to him, letting him serve her, being his close, intimate friend, and that was even better, "the better part". Friendship with Christ is the one thing needed. Therefore, our task here on earth is to make a conscious choice to shape our lives accordingly, to keep Christ first, to live from his love and for his love. 

Jesus doesn't congratulate Mary because she won the spiritual lottery or had received a particularly beautiful soul from God. He praises her because she has "chosen the better part." She chooses it. She chooses to submit to the Lord, to let him be for her what he in truth already is for everyone - the one needed thing.

Martha, on the other hand, has a divided heart. She loves Christ, but she still depends on her own strength to earn his love in return. She hasn't learned that what matters is not so much what we can do for Christ as what he has done and wants to do for us.

Jesus kindly teaches her in this encounter that the greatest thing she can do for him, the "one needed thing", is to let him rule completely over her heart, to take her place at his feet and listen to his words. 

Every day we are faced with the choice to be more like Martha or more like Mary. This is one of the most amazing things about Christianity. God respects our freedom so much that, in a sense, he leaves our destiny in our own hands. We can freely choose our priorities in life. We can make our own achievements our highest priority, like Martha, or we can make knowing, loving, and imitating Christ our highest priority. Every single time we choose to give Christ and his will priority in our lives, we allow his sanctifying, healing grace to seep deeper into our lives.

Keeping Christ first, keeping his friendship as our highest priority and his will as our greatest desire - that's "the better part". But it is not always easy to do. After sitting at the Lord's feet and listening to his words, we have to go off and live them out. This means living by his standards, standards very different than those of the world around us. It means being honest when everybody else is cheating or cooking the books. It means speaking well of others when everybody around us is gossiping and criticizing. It means staying faithful to our duties and relationships, always giving our best at home, at school, and at the office, even when we get tired, even when no one notices. But above all, it means doing all things because we love Christ and want to follow him.

 

During this Mass, Christ has something to say to each one of us. That's why he comes to us individually in Holy Communion. Spend some time each time you receive Jesus. Like Mary, let's choose the better part and listen carefully.

And let's promise that we will live accordingly during the coming week, having confidence not in our own strength, as Martha did, but in the power of God's grace at work within us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

OT XV [C] Dt 30:10-14; Col 1:15-20; Lk 10:25-37

When the Communists came to power in China, not a few Christians were arrested and tried for their faith. One person was given the opportunity to reveal why he chose Christianity instead of the religion of his ancestors. I was in a deep pit, he said, sinking in the mire, and helpless to deliver myself. Looking up I saw a shadow at the top, and soon a venerable face looked over the brink and said, “My son, I am Confucius, the father of your country. If you had obeyed my teachings, you would never have been here.” And then he passed on with a significant movement of his finger and a cheerless farewell, adding, “If you ever get out of this, remember to obey my teachings.” But alas! That did not save me. Then Buddha came along, and, looking over the edge of the pit he cried, “My son, just count it all as nothing. Enter into rest. Fold your arms and retire within yourself, and you will find Nirvana, the peace to which we all are tending.” I cried, “Father Buddha, if you will only help me to get out, I will be glad to do so. I could follow your instructions easily if I were where you are, but how can I rest in this awful place?” But Buddha passed on and left me to my despair.

Then another face appeared. It was the face of a man beaming with kindness and bearing marks of sorrow. He did not linger a moment, but leaped down to my side, threw his arms around me, lifted me out of the mire, brought me to the solid ground above, then he did not even bid me farewell, but took off my filthy garments, put new robes upon me, and bade me follow him, saying, “I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.” That is why I became a Christian.

As followers of Christ, we can very easily see ourselves in that injured man because we were once dead, badly beaten up by our sins. But we have been spotted by – ‘The Good Samaritan par excellence and our ultimate neighbor, beyond all comparison,’ who healed and delivered us from our sins out of his loving mercy and compassion for us. After he healed us, he entrusted us to his inn, which is his Church, for further spiritual caring and nourishment. And, our Samaritan who saved us is none other than Jesus himself, who said that he will be back someday in the future to take us with him to his Kingdom. Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem when he told this parable. It is on Calvary, near Jerusalem, that he was going to take the wounded half dead man on his donkey, ie. the cross, and clean and bandage the wounds and pour wine on the wounds to heal them. This story is Jesus’ own story and he is the Good Samaritan, whom the Jewish leaders despised.

In this story, the Samaritan provides an example of risk-taking love, and those who love Jesus are to follow that example. The Samaritan treated the stranger’s wounds. He poured out expensive oil and the wine that would have quenched his thirst. He tore his clean and costly cloth to bind the bleeding man. Then he hoisted this dirty, bloodied stranger onto his donkey. He did not think of his position or the responsibilities he had. The Samaritan likely had things to do and places to be. He had a life and obligations. He might have been inconvenienced to help the hurt man, but he wasn’t deterred. He put his life aside for the moment and did what was required to make sure the man got the help he needed. He did not preach compassion to the innkeeper or expected any return for payment from the beaten man. The Samaritan took responsibility financially and personally and lived out a belief.

Pope Benedict XVI said. “The relevance of the parable today is evident. Aren’t we surrounded by people who have been robbed and battered? The victims of drugs, of human trafficking, inwardly devastated people who sit empty in the midst of material abundance. All this is of concern to us; it calls us to have the eye and the heart of a neighbor, and to have the courage to love our neighbor.” 

There is a growing number of elders who are experiencing loneliness in their community.  Some have been abandoned by their children who have moved to other cities. Others are unable to reach out and socialize because of their old age or their ill health. Trapped in solitude, they pray that someone would show care towards them, that someone would maybe take them out once in a while to the park for some fresh air. They are waiting for the help of good Samaritans to provide an opportunity for them to receive the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist.

This parable asks us to help without expecting anything in return. There was no obvious benefit for the Samaritan to help the fallen man. The Samaritan knew that the wounded man might never see him again. Yet, he pressed on because he knew it’s the right thing to do. Being a Good Samaritan in the modern-day context is hard. Most of the time, we are so wrapped up in our own lives that we forget about our less fortunate brethren. But you can still fix that when we start with little acts of kindness. Think less about what others can do for us and more on what we can do for them. That, in itself, is already being a good Samaritan.

The parable makes us realize that every human person is our neighbor. Our neighbor is the living image of God the Father, redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, and placed under the permanent action of the Holy Spirit. Our neighbor must therefore be loved, even if he or she is an enemy, with the same love with which the Lord loves him or her.” Let us pray that the Spirit of the living God may melt us, mold us and use us so that there will no longer be even one person who is untouchable or outside the boundaries of our compassion. May the Lord help all of us to prove to be good neighbors to others.

 

 

 

OT XIV [C] : Is 66:10-14c; Gal 6:14-18; Lk 10:1-12, 17-20

Today’s Scriptures remind us that announcing the Good News of the Kingdom by words, deeds, and life is not the task of only a few. Rather, it is a task of all baptized Christians. The 2.38 billion Christians (31%) in the world today have the same mission of the 72, to proclaim the Gospel of Christ to the other 5 billion non-Christians. While all the synoptic Gospels mention a mission of the Twelve, only Luke adds a second mission of the 72. 

Christ's appointing seventy-two disciples (some Greek manuscripts identify seventy) to collaborate in his mission is an action with deep Biblical significance. When Moses was leading the people of Israel into the Promised Land, God had him appoint seventy elders to receive Moses' same spirit and become his assistants. Later, the Sanhedrin, the ruling body of Israel after their return from the Babylonian exile, was made up of 71 elders.

The number 72 may even have yet another level of meaning. The Book of Genesis described the division of the non-Jewish world into 70 nations. So Jesus' choice of 72 disciples may reflect the universality of his saving mission. It includes those 70 Gentile nations, plus the nation of Israel, and, perhaps, his Church, the new People of God. A total of 72.

By following this pattern, Christ, the new Moses, shows that he is bringing the Old Covenant to its fulfillment. This Old and New Testament insistence on God's choosing coworkers to help build his Kingdom shows us something essential about our Lord: he is a team player. Jesus is saving the world, but not all by himself. He wants to do it with our help. From the pope down to the most recently baptized believer, we all share the same mission: to help Christ build up his Kingdom. This should be our greatest joy. Unlike the Twelve, called by the Lord to remain with Him, the seventy-two then returned to their families and their work. They lived there with what they had found with Jesus: to bear witness, each in its place, just helping those to come closer to Christ.

As Pope Benedict once wrote: "I am convinced that there is a great need for the whole Church to rediscover the joy of evangelization, to become a community inspired with missionary zeal to make Jesus better known and loved."

Sometimes we think of the Church as kind of a gas station - somewhere we go to fill up our spiritual tanks. That's part of the story, but not the whole story. We are his coworkers, his fellow laborers. We are players on his team. And on his team there are no bench-warmers. Announcing the Good News of the kingdom is not something optional for a Christian. The disciples received instructions as to how they were to carry out their mission. For example, “Do not carry a walking staff or traveling bag; wear no sandals.” The disciples were only armed with their Faith and the name of Jesus. They needed nothing more. Their detachment from material goods would enable them to uphold the absolute priority of preaching the Good News. They did not need a staff or provisions because God would take care of them through the people to whom they were to preach. The spirit of detachment would also help them to trust more deeply in Divine Providence and would oblige them to rely humbly on the hospitality of those who were receptive to the Gospel. Their life-style should help proclaim their message.

 “Greet no one along the way.” (See also 2 Kings 4:29). This instruction implies that the mission was so urgent that nothing should divert the disciples from it.  Likewise, the disciples were told to travel in pairs (perhaps for mutual support), suggesting that the work of evangelization should be a collective one. And if you have a companion you can encourage each other when you face rejection.

Why most people don’t talk about their faith to others any longer is due to fear of being rejected. Very often this fear is unfounded. However, if we never got rejected for the sake of faith we never did any mission work either.

A recent survey asked the question, “Why do adults join the Catholic Church in spite of the scandals publicized in the media?”  Seventy-five percent of the new adult converts to the Catholic Church reported that they were attracted by a personal invitation from a Catholic who had a lively relationship with Christ and his Church.  As faithful Catholics, we will attract others to the Catholic Church—just as a rose attracts people by its beauty and fragrance. It’s our job.  It’s our responsibility. We must not miss the current opportunities to be apostles in everyday life by our words and deeds.

Sr. Lynn will be starting the OCIA sessions soon. It used to be called RCIA, Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults. Now it is called Order of Christian Initiation of Adults. The RCIA participants were usually referred to as a “candidate.” OCIA will be split depending on where the candidate is in the initiation process. Terms used will be “inquirer,” “catechumen” and “elect.” During the COVID season we did not have anybody joining during Easter season. Now we should think about inviting someone to be a Catholic. As said, do not bother about the fear of being rejected. Rejection adds to the merit of the work.

 When Jesus tells his listeners to "ask the master of the harvest", he is telling us to pray for vocations. This is something concrete that every Catholic can do to further the Church's mission. Asking God to send the Church, vocations to the priesthood, consecrated life, and missionary life shows that we care about what Christ cares about, that we really care about being on his team. On this Sunday let’s recognize our call to be missionaries, to be Christ’s face, tongue, hands and feet, for without us Christ does not preach Gospel any more.

 

 

 

 

 

OT XIII [C]: I Kgs 19:16b, 19-21; Gal 5:1, 13-18; Lk 9:51-62

Jesus is traveling to Jerusalem for the last time.  Along the way, he meets three men who have heard his call in their hearts. These encounters teach us three tough lessons about what it means to follow Christ. To follow Christ, we have to transfer our sense of security.  We have to relocate it from ourselves to God. We have to unlearn the lesson we have been taught our whole life long, to rely only on ourselves for success and happiness. We have to learn to rely wholly upon God, plugging all our efforts in life into his grace. This is what Jesus means when he says that "foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of man has nowhere to rest his head."

Christ is trustworthy, but he is not predictable. When we follow him, we have to agree to go one step and one day at a time - he refuses to give us a full-life outline in advance. When we follow him, we have to stop pretending that we can keep our lives under control by our own efforts. By accepting Christ's friendship, we agree to follow him, to put our lives under his leadership.

The prophet Elisha gives us an eloquent example of this transferal of our security in the First Reading. When Elijah comes and calls him [Elisha] to become his successor as Israel's prophet, Elisha goes back home to tie up loose ends. And he really ties them up.

He was a farmer. His whole livelihood, his whole way of life, was linked to his farm. This was how he made his way in the world. Up until the time of his calling, this was the source of his security. But when God makes his will known, Elisha doesn't hesitate to break completely with that former way of life. He doesn't just leave the farm behind. He actually slaughters his most important farm animals and burns his most precious tools - offering them all to the Lord as a sign that from now on he will depend on God for his livelihood and his happiness. Not everyone is called to serve God in this way, by consecrating their lives completely to the Church. But all Christians are called to make a spiritual offering to God of our oxen and our plows, of those things, talents, or activities that we tend to depend on instead of God.

God can only fill our lives with the meaning and fruitfulness we long for if we put him first, trusting that he will lead us better than we can lead ourselves.

 

We live in a fallen world. When we declare ourselves to be citizens of Christ's Kingdom, in a sense, we lose our citizenship in this world; we become aliens, refugees waiting to return home to heaven, or, as sacred Scripture often affirms, pilgrims. This earth is no longer our home, and the closer we get to Christ, the more we realize it, the more we feel its sufferings and imperfections. Christ only reached Easter Sunday by passing through Good Friday, and Christians can expect nothing less.

Two young martyrs names are mentioned in the First Eucharistic prayer: Saints Perpetua and Felicity. Their lives are so challenging to any Christian of all times. Perpetua, a young noblewoman and her slave Felicity, were martyred for their faith in A.D. 203, under emperor Severus. At the time of their arrest, Perpetua had an infant son, and Felicity was pregnant and a couple of days before their martyrdom she also gave birth.

Prior to their arrest, the women had been studying the Scriptures and were preparing for baptism. They were baptized in prison by their teacher, who was imprisoned with them. Their prison warden was so inspired by their faith that he converted.

While she was in prison, Perpetua wrote about the circumstances leading up to their death in a diary that was later published as The Passion of Saints Perpetua and Felicity – one of the earliest writings by a Christian woman. Perpetua’s mother was a Christian but her father was a Pagan.

In that diary she described: While we were still under arrest, my father out of love for me was trying to persuade me and shake my resolution.

“Father,” said I, “do you see this vase here, for example?”

“Yes, I do,” said he.

And I told him: “Could it be called by any other name than what it is?”

And he said: “No.”

“Well, so too I cannot be called anything other than what I am, a Christian.”

Despite threats of persecution and death, Perpetua, Felicity refused to renounce their Christian faith.

In her diary, Perpetua describes her period of captivity: “What a day of horror! Terrible heat, owing to the crowds! Rough treatment by the soldiers! To crown all, I was tormented with anxiety for my baby…. Such anxieties I suffered for many days, but I obtained leave for my baby to remain in the prison with me, and being relieved of my trouble and anxiety for him, I at once recovered my health, and my prison became a palace to me and I would rather have been there than anywhere else.”

Perpetua and Felicity were thrown into an arena of wild animals, but they were not killed. Tragically, the emperor Severus then commanded that they be put to death by the sword.

Persecution for religious beliefs is not confined to Christians in ancient times. Consider Anne Frank, the Jewish girl who with her family, was forced into hiding and later died in Bergen-Belsen, one of Hitler’s death camps during World War II. Anne, like Perpetua and Felicity, endured hardship and suffering and finally death because she committed herself to God. In her diary, Anne writes, “It’s twice as hard for us young ones to hold our ground, and maintain our opinions, in a time when all ideals are being shattered and destroyed, when people are showing their worst side, and do not know whether to believe in truth and right and God.” Perptual and Felicity did not have a long history of the Church before them only a little over a hundred years. How could two young mothers with babies not older than a couple of weeks say I love Christ more than my own life and my babies? Can you and I do that? Let’s think over it and check how strong our faith in Christ is.