August
2006
(From the seventeenth Sunday B to the
twenty first week II)
Pope Benedict
XVI's
general prayer intention
for August is:
"That orphans not be lacking in due care
for their human and Christian formation."
His mission intention
for the month of August is: "That Christian faithful be
conscious of their missionary vocation in all environments and
circumstances."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Seventeenth
Sunday of Ordinary Time B
(July 30) Saint
Peter Chrysologus, bishop and doctor of the Church. Born about
the year 380 at Imola in Emilia, he entered the clerical state and in
the year 424 was chosen to be Bishop of Ravenna (Italy). He looked
after his flock with meticulous care and taught the people with his
sermons and writings. He died about the year 450. (Saints)
Scripture
today: 2 Kings
4:42-44; Psalm 145: 10-11,
15-18;
Ephesians 4:1-6; John 6:1-15
"Then Jesus took the loaves, gave
thanks,
and gave them out to all who were sitting ready; he then did the same
with the fish, giving out as much as they wanted." (John 6:1-15)
Our Gospel today places before us the scene of our Lord feeding
the large crowds with the five loaves and the two fish. He provided
them with food out of nowhere, as it were. It was a gift from heaven in
which he took a little food made from the earth and human labour and by
his divine power gave
nourishment, health and life to the vast
numbers
gathered before him (John 6:1-15).
It was a harbinger of the heavenly
Bread which he would give to his Apostles at the Last Supper and
through them to the Church, and through the Church to mankind. By means
of the heavenly Food which was his body and his blood he would draw us
into his life with the Father. Let us then consider the Holy Eucharist,
and in particular Holy Communion when we partake of this divine
nourishment. By means of it we enter into union with Jesus and during
the
moments of Holy Communion we unite ourselves with him in his prayer to
the Father.
With our Gospel text today pointing to the heavenly Bread that
is
Holy Communion, let us remember another occasion in the
Gospel, when our Lord is portrayed in prayer (Luke
11:1-13). One of his
disciples asked him to teach
them to pray, and he did so. At various times in the Gospel our Lord is
shown at prayer, but the greatest moments of our Lord's prayer here on
earth were those he prayed while hanging on the Cross. It was during
his passion up to the point of his death on the Cross that our Lord was
offering the greatest prayer of his life, and that prayer was his
prayer of self-offering to the Father on behalf of all mankind. He was
bearing the sins of the entire world and expiating for them by his act
of total obedience to the Father. Those few who followed our Lord on
his way to Calvary were observing our Saviour in agony, but it was an
agony that expressed his prayer, the greatest prayer ever offered to
the
Father. He was also teaching mankind that very prayer by his own
example. If we want to know what it is to pray, we ought contemplate
Christ on the Cross.
Where does all this happen in our daily life? Where is it more
than anywhere else that we are with Christ as he prays and as he unites
us
to himself in his prayer? Most of all and more than anywhere else this
happens whenever we
take part in holy Mass. At Mass we are in the presence of our Lord as
he is praying and instructing us. He gathers us around him when we come
to Mass and we ought be alive to his invisible presence as we
gather in the Church. We ought never be late for Mass, keeping the
Master waiting, as it were. Nor ought we ignore his presence by
engaging in conversation with family and friends in the Church as we
wait for Mass to begin. We are in the presence of Jesus who wishes us
to listen to him and to enter into his prayer to the Father. During the
first half of the Mass, in the readings and the homily, he is
instructing us in his teaching which includes his teaching about prayer
in union with him. So we ought be full of prayerful attention.
But then most of all, in the Eucharistic Prayer our Lord
prays to his heavenly Father on our behalf. At Mass we are in the
presence of Christ during the greatest moment of his life of prayer,
the prayer he offered during his sacrifice on the Cross at Calvary.
That prayer is his prayer of obedience and loving abandonment to the
Father on our behalf, making up for our lack of obedience and lack of
abandonment to the will of the Father. At Mass the sacrifice of Christ
to his heavenly Father at Calvary is made present. That is what is
happening at Mass, and we are not just observers which some of his
disciples were during the actual event. Rather, we are active
participants in Christ’s prayer of self-offering. We are in active
union with him as he prays on our behalf, or at least we ought be.
We participate in Christ’s prayer of self-offering at Mass
not only by our personal attention and prayerfulness during the
Eucharistic Prayer and the Communion Rite, but above all by our
reception of Holy Communion. Holy Communion is the divine Bread from
heaven
to which our Lord pointed when he fed the vast crowds with the few
loaves.
That divine Food is literally himself. It
is an extraordinary thing that the living Jesus in all his human and
divine reality gives himself to us in Holy Communion. It is so easy to
approach Holy Communion viewing simply the appearances rather than,
with a lively faith, the reality. When we receive Holy Communion our
Lord gives himself in his total reality to us, even though all we see
are the appearances of bread and wine. He then unites us to himself in
what he is doing, and what he is doing above all is praying to the
heavenly Father for us and for the whole world in an act of loving
surrender. It is therefore the
privileged moment of prayer in our life. In practice, though, do we
regard it as such?
There is no other moment of prayer equal to the moment of
Holy Communion because we are united with Christ in his prayer. It is
the moment above all when we ought place before our Lord all that we
need, all that we want to say to God, and our whole selves in prayer.
It is
a wonderful practice to remain in prayer for at least ten minutes after
having received holy Communion because during that time our Lord
remains within us in all his Eucharistic presence. If this is
impossible then we ought return home after Mass in genuine prayer with
the Eucharistic Jesus who is still with us. Christ is praying as our
Intercessor before the Father and he takes us into his prayer and all
our intentions. We certainly ought not hurry out before Mass
finishes or during the last hymn. If we do, are we not ignoring that
precious moment of his presence within us when we are able to pray in
union with him? Let us then resolve to treasure the precious moments of
Holy Communion. It is the greatest time for personal prayer because we
are in communion with Christ in his prayer to the Father, just as he
was on the Cross for our sake. Let us not allow it to pass us
by.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: The Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no.1382-1390
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Jesus took the bread, said the
blessing, and gave it to them” (John 6:1-15)
Commentary by John Paul II
in his Apostolic Letter “Mane Nobiscum Domine”§
15-16
There is no doubt that the most evident dimension of the Eucharist is
that it is a meal. The Eucharist was born, on the evening of Holy
Thursday, in the setting of the Passover meal. Being a meal is part of
its very structure. “Take, eat... Then he took a cup and... gave it to
them, saying: Drink from it, all of you” (Mt 26:26, 27). As such, it
expresses the fellowship which God wishes to establish with us and
which we ourselves must build with one another.
Yet it must not be forgotten that the Eucharistic meal also has a
profoundly and primarily sacrificial meaning. In the Eucharist, Christ
makes present to us anew the sacrifice offered once for all on
Golgotha. Present in the Eucharist as the Risen Lord, he nonetheless
bears the marks of his passion, of which every Mass is a “memorial”, as
the Liturgy reminds us in the acclamation following the consecration:
“We announce your death, Lord, we proclaim your resurrection...”. At
the same time, while the Eucharist makes present what occurred in the
past, it also impels us towards the future, when Christ will come again
at the end of history. This “eschatological” aspect makes the Sacrament
of the Eucharist an event that draws us into itself and fills our
Christian journey with hope.
All these dimensions of the Eucharist come together in one aspect which
more than any other makes a demand on our faith: the mystery of the
“real” presence. With the entire tradition of the Church, we believe
that Jesus is truly present under the Eucharistic species... It is
precisely his presence which gives the other aspects of the Eucharist —
as meal, as memorial of the Paschal Mystery, as eschatological
anticipation — a significance which goes far beyond mere symbol- ism.
The Eucharist is a mystery of presence, the perfect fulfilment of
Jesus' promise to remain with us until the end of the world.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You told me, in confidence, that in your prayer you would open your
heart to God with these words: “I think of my wretchedness, which seems
to be on the increase despite the graces you give me. It must be due to
my failure to correspond. I know that I am completely unprepared for
the enterprise you are asking of me. And when I read in the newspapers
of so very many highly qualified and respected men, with formidable
talents, and no lack of financial resources, speaking, writing,
organizing in defence of your kingdom ... I look at myself, and see
that I’m a nobody: ignorant, poor: so little, in a word. This would
fill me with shame if I did not know that you want me to be so. But
Lord Jesus, you know how gladly I have put my ambition at your feet ...
To have Faith and Love, to be loving, believing, suffering. In these
things I do want to be rich and learned: but no more rich and learned
than you, in your limitless Mercy, have wanted me to be. I desire to
put all my prestige and honour into fulfilling your most just and most
loveable Will.” I then said to you: don’t
leave this merely as a good desire.
(The Forge,
no.822)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Did Jesus
contradict Israel’s faith in the one God and saviour?
Jesus never contradicted faith in the one God, not even when he
performed the stupendous divine work which fulfilled gteh messianic
promises and revealed himself as equal to God, namely the pardoning of
sins. However, the call of Jesus to believe in him and to be converted
makes it possible to understand the tragic misunderstanding of the
Sanhedrin which judged Jesus to be worthy of death as a blasphemer.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.116)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday
of the seventeenth week of Ordinary Time II
(July 31) Saint
Ignatius of Loyola, priest and founder (1491-1556). Born at
Loyola in northern Spain, his early life was led at court and in the
army, and later he was converted to a life of holiness. He studied
theology at Paris and gathered companions around him, and afterwards at
Rome he formed the Society of Jesus. He exercised a very fruitful
apostolate by his written work and by the formation of his disciples
who were outstanding in the reforms of the Church. One of his greatest
legacies was his manual of the Spiritual Exercises. His spirit,
transmitted to the Society he founded, was of dedication to the greater
glory of God in the service of the Church, in total obedience to the
Pope. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Jeremiah
13:1-11; Deuteronomy 32:18-19, 20, 21;
Matthew
13:31-35
He proposed another parable to them. "The
kingdom of heaven is like a
mustard seed that a person took and sowed in a field.
It is the smallest of all the seeds, yet when full-grown it is the
largest of plants. It becomes a large bush, and the birds of the sky
come and dwell in its branches."
He spoke to them another parable. "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast
that a woman took and mixed with three measures of wheat flour until
the whole batch was leavened."
All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables. He spoke to
them only in parables,
to fulfill what had been said through the prophet: "I will open my
mouth in parables, I will announce what has lain hidden from the
foundation (of the world)."
(Matthew
13:31-35)
I have often thought that the
best way to enter into an understanding
of the Catholic doctrine of divine grace is to look at what grace does.
Having seen that, one then can consider its nature. The grace of God
produces saints and through those saints produces more saints or at
least people on the way to sanctity.
Prior to his conversion, who would
have expected the mighty
river of grace that came to flow from the life and person of Ignatius
of Loyola! He was a court gad-about concerned with
making a name for himself, and determined to do illustriously in
battle. That is
to say, he was on the way to the oblivion that has engulfed countless
persons who followed the path of vanity he was following. But what
happened to
change everything? He was hit by a cannon ball and gradually started
doing a little serious reading and thinking. The story of his
being converted to a passionate following of Christ and his setting in
motion a tremendous religious Society in the Church is testimony to the
power of the grace of God. St Thomas Aquinas points out that God’s
almighty power is manifested in his mercy, and the life of St Ignatius
Loyola is an instance of God’s power. He looked with mercy on
Ignatius and abundant fruit sprung forth. The pattern is evident in
many other saints. Consider the conversion of St Paul, consider that of
St Augustine, that of St
Patrick, that of St Francis of Assisi, consider the second conversion
of St Teresa of Avila, consider the teenage conversion of John Henry
Newman. The call of Christ was heard in these cases and the effect was
dramatic.
On one occasion our Lord said that the kingdom of God is within you. In
our Gospel passage today our Lord speaks of the kingdom of heaven,
which is nothing other than the rule of God. He likens it to “a mustard
seed which a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all
the seeds, but when it has grown it is the biggest shrub of all and
becomes a tree so that the birds of the air come and shelter in its
branches.” (Matthew
13:31-35) That
seed is the grace of God implanted in our souls at Baptism, nourished
by the other Sacraments and the word of God, and producing its harvest
in personal holiness and in the apostolate each is called to exercise
in daily life. The story of the saints shows us that God’s providence
and plan varies for each person but each is called to holiness of life
and to a share in the mission of our Lord. The manner, the degree, and
the circumstances of each person’s vocation will vary, but the history
of sanctity in the Church ought show to each of Christ’s faithful that
God’s grace is very powerful. Our task is not to create our vocation
for ourselves, but to discern the vocation that God has granted us, and
with faith in his powerful grace to endeavour to live up to it with
all its responsibilities. God has his plan, his providence, and he
gives his grace to us who are called to participate in it. On our part,
the saints teach us how important conversion is, how important
fidelity, how important using the means that the Church recommends, how
important is growing in the virtues.
So then, now I begin! Personal holiness and apostolate! Every day I
must begin anew, knowing that the
grace of God in me can do it.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Love for God invites us to shoulder the Cross squarely: to feel on our
back the weight of the whole human race, and to fulfil, in the
circumstances of our own situation in life and the job we have, the
clear and at the same time loving designs of the Will of the Father.
(The
Forge, no.823)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Who is responsible for the death of Jesus?
The passion of Jesus cannot be imputed indiscriminately either to all
the Jews who were living at that time or to their descendants. Every
single sinner, that is, every human being is really the cause and the
instrument of the sufferings of the Redeemer; and the greater blame in
this respect falls on those above all who are Christians and who the
more often fall into sin or delight in their vices.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.117)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday
of the seventeenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 1) Saint
Alphonsus Mary de Ligouri, bishop and doctor of the Church. Born
at Naples in the year 1696, he studied law and took his doctor’s degree
in both civil and canon law. He became a priest and later founded the
Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer (Redemptorists). In order to
promote among the faithful a truly Christian life he spent his time
preaching and in writing, especially about moral theology of which
discipline he is looked upon as a master. He was chosen to be Bishop of
Sant’ Agata dei Goti, but soon gave up the post and returned to his own
Congregation where he died at Nocera dei Pagani in Campagna in the year
1787. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Jeremiah
14:17-22; Psalm 79:
8,9,11,13;
Matthew 13:36-43
"The sower of the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the
world; the good seed is the subjects of the kingdom; the darnel, the
subjects of the evil oe; the enemy who sowed them, the devil; the
harvest is the end of the world; the reapers are the angels."
Matthew
13:36-43
ardinal Newman
(1801-1890)
wrote that the first principle of religion is the thought of a judgment
as contained in the feeling of conscience. Whether that statement can
be taken as applicable to any and all religions is a moot point, but at
least it offers to the Christian an identifiable means of nourishing
his own religious life and also of recalling others to the importance
of religion. St Ignatius
Loyola is said to have often put to
Francis
Xavier the question, what does it profit a man to gain the whole world
and lose his own soul? He was
reminding Xavier of God’s judgment. It
converted Xavier to an ardent religious faith. At the end of one of his
most famous books (The
Development of Christian Doctrine, 1845) Newman appeals to the
reader to remember that life is short and eternity long. He is
reminding the reader of God’s judgment. Like the exams a student has to
prepare for if he is to graduate, the judgment of God is inevitable.
Just as the thought of those exams affects behaviour, so too the
thought of a coming judgment - if it truly exercises the mind - will
have its effect on our behaviour. For that reason the spiritual masters
recommend to the Christian that he think much of the last things: death
and God’s judgment, for following on the judgment of God there will be
either heaven or hell, salvation or damnation. It is an awful prospect
and one that ought transform life into a serious matter.
Very many religions have not had a clear thought of a divine judgment
on the life of each person. The ancient classical religions of Greece
and Rome in general did not. Classical Buddhism does not. Many
indigenous
religions do not, such as Australian aboriginal religion. Well, it has
been revealed by Christ our Lord that there is this judgment, and our
Gospel scene today (Matthew
13:36-43) is
an instance of this revelation. Our Lord is asked for an explanation of
the parable he has told, the parable of the darnel in the field. It is
all about the judgment of God. In the final analysis, our Lord informs
us, there will be those who have chosen to be good and those who have
chosen to be evil: those who
are subjects of God’s kingdom and those who are subjects of the devil.
At the end of time those who are evil will be gathered together by God
and sent to hell “where there will be weeping and grinding of teeth.”
In fact, this fate of the evil ones seems to be the main teaching of
the parable. It is a reminder by Christ our Lord that the wages of sin
are death. The pressing requirement, then, is repentance. For that
reason repentance was the first note of our Lord’s public preaching,
and it was the most prominent feature of St John the Baptist’s
preaching. We must repent of our sins because God’s judgment is coming.
In view of the fact that, as St Paul points out, all men of themselves
are under the power of sin, all men must repent.
Repentance is the path to the life of virtue and grace. The prospects
of the virtuous are bright, for, as our Lord teaches in our Gospel
passage
today “the virtuous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their
Father.” Let us renounce death and choose life. Let us put away sin and
choose
virtue. Let us bear constantly in mind the thought of God’s judgment
for it is one of the starting points of religion.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The good
seed are the
children of the Kingdom" (Matthew 13:36-43)
Commentary by Blessed
Teresa of
Calcutta (1910-1997),
Foundress of the Missionaries of Charity:
A
Simple Path by Mother Teresa
1995
They aren't two worlds - the
physical and the spiritual - there's only one: 'God's Kingdom on Earth
as it is in Heaven' (Mt 6:10). Many of us pray,'Our Father, who art
in Heaven,' thinking that God is up there, which creates the duality of
two worlds. A lot of people in the west like to keep matter and the
spirit very comfortably and conveniently apart. All truth is one, all
reality is one. As soon as we take the enfleshment of God, the
incarnation which, for Christians, is represented by the person of
Jesus Christ, then we start taking things seriously.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He was the greatest madman of all times. What greater madness
could
there be than to give oneself as he did, and for such people? It would
have been mad enough to have chosen to become a helpless Child. But
even then, many wicked men might have been softened, and would not have
dared to harm him. So this was not enough for him. He wanted to make
himself even less, to give himself more lavishly. He made himself food,
he became Bread. Divine Madman! How do men treat you? How do I treat
you?
(The Forge,
no.824)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why was the death of Jesus part of God’s
plan?
To reconcile to himself all who were destined to die because of sin God
took the loving initiative of sending his Son that he might give
himself up for sinners. Proclaimed in the Old Testament, especially as
the sacrifice of the Suffering Servant, the death of Jesus came about
“in accordance with the Scriptures.”
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.118)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday
of the seventeenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 2) Saint
Eusebius of Vercelli, bishop. Born in Sardinia at the beginning
of the fourth century, he became a cleric at Rome in the year 345. He
was chosen to be the first bishop of Vercelli. He spread the true faith
by his preaching and he set up the monastic life in his diocese. He was
sent into exile by the emperor Constantius and suffered much for the
same of the faith. When he returned to his own country he worked
unceasingly for the restoration of religion against the Arian heresy.
He died at Vercelli in the year 371. (Saints)
Scripure today:
Jeremiah
15:10.16-21; Psalm 59: 2-4,
10-11, 17-18;
Matthew 13:44-46
"Woe to me, mother, that you gave me
birth! a man of strife and contention to all the land! I neither borrow
nor lend, yet all curse me. When I found your words, I devoured them;
they became my joy and the happiness of my heart, Because I bore your
name, O LORD, God of hosts. I did not sit celebrating in the circle of
merrymakers; Under the weight of your hand I sat alone because you
filled me with indignation. Why is my pain continuous, my wound
incurable, refusing to be healed? You have indeed become for me a
treacherous brook, whose waters do not abide! Thus the LORD answered
me: If you repent, so that I restore you, in my presence you shall
stand; If you bring forth the precious without the vile, you shall be
my mouthpiece. Then it shall be they who turn to you, and you shall not
turn to them; And I will make you toward this people a solid wall of
brass. Though they fight against you, they shall not prevail, For I am
with you, to deliver and rescue you, says the LORD. I will free you
from the hand of the wicked, and rescue you from the grasp of the
violent." (Jeremiah
15:10.16-21)
Our first reading
today (Jeremiah
15:10.16-21) presents us with
a precious dialogue between the prophet Jeremiah and God who called him
to the prophetic service. It would be interesting to know how such a
dialogue came to be recorded for our benefit. The prophet groans under
the burden of his separation from his people which he feels and the
rejection he suffered from their hands. He protests
in the presence of
God his innocence and his refusal to join in the sinful attitudes of
the
people, but it has involved a great and continual cost. “I never took
pleasure in sitting in scoffers’ company”. His
suffering is “continual” and God
seems to be offering him no consolation. He asks of the Lord: “Why is
my suffering continual, my wound incurable, refusing to be healed? Do
you mean to be for me a deceptive stream with inconstant waters?” (Jeremiah
15:10.16-21) The
prophet’s predicament may be taken as exemplifying that of so many
whose God-given work in life involves little consolation and much
difficulty. The prophet’s prayer is an appeal for assistance in this
work and for deliverance from the suffering. What is God’s answer to
this prayer? We are fortunate to have it for it reminds us of the grace
of God.
God replies to the prophet that despite all the difficulty he is to
renew his commitment to his mission. If he does so, “you shall be as my
own mouth.” God will fortify Jeremiah, making him “a bronze wall
fortified
against this people. They will fight against you but they will not
overcome you, because I am with you to deliver you from the hands of
the wicked and redeem you from the clutches of the violent.” That is to
say, the grace of God will suffice. We are reminded of St Paul’s appeal
three times to God that he would take from him the “sting of the flesh”
but God replied that divine grace was all he needed, and that the power
of God is made manifest in human weakness. So our passage from the
prophet Jeremiah speaks especially of the power of God’s grace in the
life of the one dedicated to the work that has been given to him from
on high. In
this grace lie our hopes. Our Lord in today’s Gospel (Matthew
13:44-46) tells the crowds what the kingdom of heaven is like.
It is like a hidden treasure for which someone sells everything in
order to buy it. That selling of everything for the sake of the
treasure denotes the total dedication which God expects of the one who
suffers in doing his will and his work. We ought aspire to have this
dedication, and we can hope to have it provided we seek out, ask for,
and depend on the grace of God. Everything depends on living by God's
grace.
One of the very magnificent prayers bequeathed to the Church’s children
is that of St Ignatius of Loyola, called the colloquy asking for for
divine love.
In this prayer we ask God to take all, only to give us his love and his
grace. The one thing necessary for us is the love and the grace of God.
With that we can fulfil the mission God has given us, no matter what be
the difficulty. O God, take all but give me your love and your grace.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“When he finds a pearl of great
price, he
goes
and sells all he has” (Matthew 13:44-46)
Commentary by St John
Chrysostom (345-407), Bishop and Doctor of the Church
(Homily 18 on the Letter to the Hebrews)
“Poverty makes a person humble,” says Scripture (cf. Prov 10:4), and
Christ began his Beatitudes by saying: “How blest are the poor in
spirit” (Mt 5:2)… Do you want to hear the praise of poverty? Jesus
Christ himself embraced it, he who had “nowhere to lay his head.” (Mt
8:20)… His apostle Paul said: “We seem to have nothing, yet everything
is ours.” (2 Cor 6:10); and Peter said: “I have neither silver nor
gold.” (Acts 3:6) So let us not look upon poverty as a dishonour, for
alongside virtue, all the goods of this world are nothing but straw and
mud. Therefore, let us love poverty, if we want to possess the Kingdom
of heaven. “Go, sell your possessions, and give to the poor. You will
than have treasure in heaven.” (Mt 19:21)…
No one is richer than those who freely embrace poverty and who live it
with joy. They are richer than an emperor. Kings fear that they will be
lacking in what they need, whereas the poor of whom we are speaking
lack nothing; they fear nothing. For I ask you, who of the two is
richer, the one who is always afraid or the one who enjoys a little as
if he were living in abundance?
Money turns us into slaves; as Scripture says, it “blinds the eyes of
the wise.” (cf. Sir 20:29)… So share your possessions with the poor,
and one day you will hear this blessed word: “Come. You have my
Father’s blessing! Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the
creation of the world.” (Mt 25:34)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jesus, the madness of your Love has stolen my heart. You are small and
helpless, so that those who eat you can become great.
(The Forge,
no.825)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In what way did Christ offer himself to
the Father?
The entire life of Christ was a free offering to the Father to carry
out his plan of salvation. He gave “his life as a ransom for many”
(Mark 10:45) and in this way reconciled all of humanity with God. His
suffering and death showed how his humanity was the free and perfect
instrument of that divine love which desires the salvation of all
people.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.119)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the seventeenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 3) Today
let us think of Venerable
Anthony Margil
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Jeremiah
18:1-6; Psalm
146: 1-6;
Matthew 13:47-53
This word came to Jeremiah from
the LORD: Rise up, be off to the potter's house; there I will give you
my message. I went down to the potter's house and there he was, working
at the wheel. Whenever the object of clay which he was making turned
out badly in his hand, he tried again, making of the clay another
object of whatever sort he pleased. Then the word of the Lord came to
me: Can I not do to you, house of Israel, as this potter has done? says
the LORD. Indeed, like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my
hand, house of Israel.
(Jeremiah
18:1-6)
The experience of
failure is a universal
human experience. The question is, what is to be man’s response to it?
The most profound failure of man is in relation to his response to God,
the failure that is called sin.
The issue is, what is to be his response to this failure. Martin Luther
was an earnest Augustinian priest in the early sixteenth century and he
experienced failure in his attempts to overcome sin
and attain
holiness. His response to this personal failure was, as the Catholic
Church judges it, tragically mistaken and led to the doctrines that
inspired the Protestant Reformation. Setting aside his particular
case, one of the most common causes of mediocrity among those who at
one point or other have begun living a more spiritual life is simply
discouragement. They give up because they experience so much failure
and, quietly settling for spiritual mediocrity, turn to other pursuits.
Their hope has largely gone. They have unconsciously assumed that
the quest for holiness is futile. What all this means is that if we are
to have
great desires of serving and loving God with all our soul (which is
God’s commandment), we must be people of great hope and our hope has to
be well founded if it is to last. The true response to failure is
enduring hope, a hope that is undying.
Images can help us to grasp great ideas and unseen realities. In the
first reading today from the prophet Jeremiah God directs the prophet
to go to the potter’s house and observe. The potter was there “working
at the wheel. And whenever the vessel he was making came out wrong, as
happens with the clay handled by potters he would start afresh and work
it into another vessel, as potters do.” (Jeremiah 18:1-6)
It was an image that encapsulates the
work of God in the life of sinful man. God is always starting again,
always ready by his grace to rebuild our life in him, whatever be our
past, whatever be our thoughts, words and deeds. What he asks for is
that we repent of our sins and return to him as did the Prodigal Son.
The power of God is immense and epoch after epoch show evidence of the
renewal of the Church which God effects. “House of Israel, can I not do
to you what this potter does? Yes, as the clay is in the potter’s hand,
so you are in mine.”(Jeremiah 18:1-6)
Every one of us ought hear those words
addressed to us for by our baptism we are members of God’s House and
family. God addresses those words to us individually and to the entire
Church, giving us undying hope whatever be our failures. At every point
we are able to start again, returning to our heavenly Father repentant
and hopeful. Our hope is in the grace and power of God who raises from
the dead.
It is by this same power that Jesus our saviour rose from the
dead, and in him we are able to begin again constantly. So then, now I
begin! My hope lies in the power and the grace of God,
not in my own very limited and few successes. Whatever be my failures,
God is powerful. Therein lies my hope. So I resolve never to give up
and sink
into a quiet and hopeless mediocrity, for I am in God’s hands.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Again, the
kingdom of heaven is
like a net thrown into the sea, which collects fish of every kind. When
it is full they haul it ashore and sit down to put what is good into
buckets. What is bad they throw away. Thus it will be at the end of the
age."
(Matthew
13:47-53)
Commentary by St
Augustine (354-430), Bishop and Doctor of the Church
(Discourse on Psalm 95 (96):14-15)
“He shall rule the world with justice and the peoples with his truth.”
(Ps 96:13) Which justice and which truth? He will gather to him his
chosen ones (Mk 13:27); the others he will separate, for he will place
the former at his right and the latter at his left (Mt 25:33). What
will be more just, more true than that? Those who did not want to
practice mercy before the judge came, will not expect mercy from the
judge. Those who wanted to practice mercy, will be judged with mercy
(Lk 6:37). For he will say to those whom he has placed at his right:
“Come. You have my Father’s blessing! Inherit the kingdom prepared for
you from the creation of the world.” And he will attribute acts of
mercy to them: “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty
and you gave me drink” and all that follows (Mt 25:31ff.)…
Because you are unjust, will the judge not be just? Because you
sometimes lie, will truth not be truthful? If you want to meet a
merciful judge, be merciful before he comes. Forgive if someone has
offended you; give away the possessions of which you have an abundance…
Give what you have received from him: “Name something you have that you
have not received.” (1 Cor 4:7) These are the sacrifices that are very
pleasing to God: mercy, humility, gratitude, peace, charity. If that is
what we bring in sacrifice, we will await with assurance the coming of
the judge, of him who “shall rule the world with justice and the
peoples with his truth.”
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You have to make your life essentially, totally eucharistic.
(The Forge,
no.826)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How is Jesus’ offering expressed at the
Last Supper?
At the Last Supper with his apostles on the eve of his passion Jesus
anticipated, that is, both symbolized his free self-offering and made
it really present. “This is my Body which is given for you” (Luke
22:19), “This is my Blood which is poured out ...” (Matthew 26:28).
Thus he both instituted the Eucharist as the “memorial” (1 Corinthians
11:25) of his sacrifice and instituted his apostles as priests of the
new covenant.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.120)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday
of the seventeenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 4) Saint
John Mary Vianney, priest. Born at Lyons in the year
1786. After overcoming tremendous difficulties he was finally
ordained priest. He was given charge of the parish of Ars in the
diocese of Belley, and by his forthright preaching, personal
mortification, prayer and charity renewed it and increased it in a
wonderful way. His help to those who came to the sacrament of
Reconciliation was renowned and people flocked to him from all sides to
gain his advice. He died in the year 1859.
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Jeremiah
26:1-9; Psalm 69: 5,
8-10, 14;
Matthew 13:54-58
He came to his native place and
taught the people in their synagogue. They were astonished and said,
"Where did this man get such wisdom and mighty deeds? Is he not the
carpenter's son? Is not his mother named Mary and his brothers James,
Joseph, Simon, and Judas? Are not his sisters all with us? Where did
this man get all this?" And they took offense at him. But Jesus said to
them, "A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and in
his own house." And he did not work many mighty deeds there because of
their lack of faith.
(Matthew 13:54-58)
One of the tragedies
of human life is
that opportunities come and go unrecognized, and are lost perhaps
forever. It could be a courtship that has gone on and the young man
suddenly breaks it off telling the girl that he does not love her. The
girl is devastated and the young man goes on his way not realizing the
treasure he has failed to recognize and which he has lost. That fine
girl goes on to meet and marry someone else and has a beautiful family
in the course of time. Or again, on one occasion a rich
young man came
to our
Lord and asked what more he needed to do to gain eternal life, for he
had kept God’s commandments since his youth. Our Lord looked on him
with love and told him there was one thing he lacked, to leave his
riches to the poor and to return and follow him. The young man went
away sad, and a unique opportunity was lost to follow the King of kings
and Lord of lords. He did not recognize the opportunity that had come
his way. Probably every person can look back on opportunities
lost, and in particular opportunities in
the life of faith that have come and that were not
recognized. If this past failure is recognized, then that very
recognition itself becomes an opportunity, the opportunity to learn
from the past and to be alert to the opportunities of
the future. Those opportunities come especially when Christ enters our
life by
grace, inviting us to give him our faith and to respond in obedience to
his will.
In our Gospel passage today our
Lord returns to his home town and teaches in their synagogue. His
townspeople were astonished and asked where he gained the wisdom and
powers that he was now displaying. (Matthew
13:54-58) They
had known him all along and now
they refused to allow that he was more than what they had all along
taken
him to be. They would not accept him for what he now presented
himself
to be, and this constituted a signal opportunity lost to them. The
entire Old Testament pointed to the coming of the Messiah and the
Messiah had grown up in their midst and was now being presented before
them
for their acceptance, and they refused the opportunity. Later in our
Lord’s public ministry our Lord preached in the synagogue of Capernaum
his great doctrine of the Eucharist. The Eucharist would be the source
of eternal life for all the faithful and the means of constant union
between them and him. But they did not recognize their opportunity when
it came, and most of his disciples left him saying that what he
preached to them was beyond acceptance. Let us learn from these
examples in the Gospel that the greatest opportunity that God gives to
us is the opportunity of hearing the call of Christ and responding with
all our heart. That opportunity comes at great moments and in small
moments. It comes each day in the little calls of
grace present in our times of prayer, in our numerous duties and
services to others, and in so many other occasions in life. Christ is
passing by.
Every day Christ our Lord comes to us in various ways and
circumstances inviting us with his grace. Let us by our prayerfulness
and spiritual
attention recognize Christ's presence and by our response to him in
grace
gradually build the edifice of personal sanctity. These moments of
grace can be taken up
or, as in the case of the townspeople of Nazareth in our Gospel of
today, be lost forever. Let our attitude not be such that Christ calls
to us, and sadly because of our attitude has to pass us by.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Is he not the carpenter's son?
Is not his mother named Mary..."
(Matthew
13:54-58)
Commentary by Pope John Paul
II (Redemptoris custos,
27)
The communion of life between Joseph and Jesus leads us to consider
once again the mystery of the Incarnation, precisely in reference to
the humanity of Jesus as the efficacious instrument of his divinity for
the purpose of sanctifying man: "By virtue of his divinity, Christ's
human actions were salvific for us, causing grace within us, either by
merit or by a certain efficacy."(St. Thomas Aquinas)
Among those actions, the gospel writers highlight those which have to
do with the Paschal Mystery, but they also underscore the importance of
physical contact with Jesus…The apostolic witness did not neglect the
story of Jesus' birth, his circumcision, his presentation in the
Temple, his flight into Egypt and his hidden life in Nazareth. It
recognized the "mystery" of grace present in each of these saving
"acts," in as much as they all share the same source of love: the
divinity of Christ. If through Christ's humanity this love shone on all
mankind, the first beneficiaries were undoubtedly those whom the divine
will had most intimately associated with itself: Mary, the Mother of
Jesus, and Joseph, his presumed father.
Why should the "fatherly" love of Joseph not have had an influence upon
the "filial" love of Jesus? And vice versa why should the "filial" love
of Jesus not have had an influence upon the "fatherly" love of Joseph,
thus leading to a further deepening of their unique relationship? Those
souls most sensitive to the impulses of divine love have rightly seen
in Joseph a brilliant example of the interior life.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I like to call the Tabernacle a prison - a prison of Love. For twenty
centuries He has been waiting there, willingly locked up, for me and
for everyone.
(The Forge,
no.827)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What happened in the Agony in the Garden
of Gethsemane?
Despite the horror which death represented for the sacred humanity of
Jesus “who is the author of Life” (Acts 3:15), the human will fo the
Son of God remained faithful to the will of the Father for our
salvation. Jesus accepted the duty to carry our sins in his Body
“becoming obedient unto death” (Philippians 2:8).
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.121)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the seventeenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 5) Saint
Dominic (celebrated today in Australia). Born at Calaruega in
Spain about the year 1170, he studied theology at Palencia and became a
canon of the Cathedral of Osma. He preached against the Albigensian
heresy and because of the example of his own life this bore great
fruit. In order to carry on and increase this work he gathered around
him a group of companions and formed the Order of Preachers
(Dominicans). He died on August 6 in the year 1221 at Bologna. He was a
friend of St Francis of Assisi.
The Dedication
of the Basilica of St Mary Major. After the declaration of the
dogma of the divine maternity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Council
of Ephesus (year 431), Pope Sixtus III dedicated this Basilica in Rome
in honour of the Mother of God. It was called “St Mary Major” later on.
It is considered the oldest church in the West dedicated to the Virgin
Mary.
(Saints)
Scripture
today: Jeremiah
26:11-16.24; Psalm 69:
15-16,30-31,33-34 ;
Matthew 14:1-12
At that time Herod the tetrarch
heard of the reputation of Jesus and said to his servants, "This man is
John the Baptist. He has been raised from the dead; that is why mighty
powers are at work in him." Now Herod had arrested John, bound (him),
and put him in prison on account of Herodias, the wife of his brother
Philip, for John had said to him, "It is not lawful for you to have
her." Although he wanted to kill him, he feared the people, for they
regarded him as a prophet. But at a birthday celebration for Herod, the
daughter of Herodias performed a dance before the guests and delighted
Herod so much that he swore to give her whatever she might ask for.
Prompted by her mother, she said, "Give me here on a platter the head
of John the Baptist." The king was distressed, but because of his oaths
and the guests who were present, he ordered that it be given, and he
had John beheaded in the prison. His head was brought in on a platter
and given to the girl, who took it to her mother. His disciples came
and took away the corpse and buried him; and they went and told
Jesus.
(Matthew 14:1-12)
It is often pointed out that
inasmuch as
our age is blind not to crime and wrongdoing but to
sin, the impact of sin on the world is not noticed. We do not hear of
"sin" in public discourse and ordinary
conversation, and inasmuch as the
majority of Christians in Australia
(including the majority of Catholics) do not attend church with any
regularity where they would hear of "sin", the likelihood is that the
majority of Christians in our
country pick up this attitude to sin that is prevalent in our culture.
Well then, what is it that
can counter this view that sin is not real,
that it is a non-event? Apart from the obvious and constant
testimony and teaching of the
Church as to the fact of sin and its impact, an assiduous
reading of Scripture will bring this home to us. Scripture speaks at
length of sin, particularly the New
Testament because the Son of God became man to take away the sin of the
world. So then, if we want to be reminded of sin, let us take up the
Sacred Scriptures and read the story of sin in fallen man and in fallen
human society. Our Gospel
passage today offers an instance of sin and its destructive effect. It
tells us the story of the arrest and the martyrdom of John the Baptist.
John was a great saint of the Old Testament who bore witness to the
truth of God's Law, and in Herod and his
family sin did away with him. (Matthew 14:1-12)
Herod had arrested John for accusing him of sin in taking his brother
Philip’s wife as his own, an act prohibited by the Jewish Law: “It is
against the Law for you to have her.” Herod was so mortified by this
holy rebuke and resistance that he wanted to kill him, but he was
afraid of the people. We are told in another of the Gospels that he
also feared John for the holiness of his life, and he actually liked to
listen to him - so there was something of a superstitious religiosity
about Herod. It seems that he was a bad man, and a weak one as well,
with a few remotely redeeming qualities. His weakness became manifest
at his birthday celebrations when after promising the daughter of his
wife anything she wanted she demanded John the Baptist’s head. We have
then the picture of sin at work in the life of Herod and in
the life of Herodias and her daughter. Sin wreaks death, and we
see this
played out in the final hours of John the Baptist’s life. The pattern
was repeated in the life of our Lord. Sin would bring about his death
because of his testimony to the truth. The fundamental source of evil
and suffering in the world is sin. The ultimate choice in life is
betgween good and evil, holiness and sin, life and death.
In his Spiritual
Exercises, St Ignatius of Loyola has a famous Mediation which he
asks that the retreatant make. In it he presents the picture of the Two
Standards, one being the Standard of Christ, the other the Standard of
Satan. In our Gospel scene today these two Standards were present and
one of them was chosen by the protagonists. It was the Standard of
Satan and sin. As disciples of Jesus let us renounce that Standard and
choose
instead the Standard of Christ and his truth and his way. Let us make
that choice and then live it out as have such a great cloud of
witnesses before
us.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
John the Baptist, Martyr for the truth
(Matthew
14:1-12)
Comment by John Paul II
(Apostolic Letter Tertio
Millenio adveniente, 37)
The Church of the first millennium was born of the blood of the
martyrs: "Sanguis martyrum—semen christianorum."(21) The historical
events…could never have ensured the development of the Church as it
occurred during the first millennium if it had not been for the seeds
sown by the martyrs and the heritage of sanctity which marked the first
Christian generations. At the end of the second millennium, the Church
has once again become a Church of martyrs. The persecutions of
believers—priests, religious and laity—has caused a great sowing of
martyrdom in different parts of the world. The witness to Christ borne
even to the shedding of blood has become a common inheritance of
Catholics, Orthodox, Anglicans and Protestants, as Pope Paul VI pointed
out…
This witness must not be forgotten…
In our own century the martyrs have returned, many of them nameless,
"unknown soldiers" as it were of God's great cause. As far as possible,
their witness should not be lost to the Church… The local Churches
should do everything possible to ensure that the memory of those who
have suffered martyrdom should be safeguarded, gathering the necessary
documentation. This gesture cannot fail to have an ecumenical character
and _expression. Perhaps the most convincing form of ecumenism is the
ecumenism of the saints and of the martyrs. The communio sanctorum
speaks louder than the things which divide us… The greatest homage
which all the Churches can give to Christ on the threshold of the third
millennium will be to manifest the Redeemer's all-powerful presence
through the fruits of faith, hope and charity present in men and women
of many different tongues and races who have followed Christ in the
various forms of the Christian vocation.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Have you ever thought how you would prepare yourself to receive Our
Lord if you could go to Communion only once in your life? We must be
thankful to God that he makes it so easy for us to come to him: but we
should show our gratitude by preparing ourselves to receive him very
well.
(The Forge,
no.828)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What are the results of the sacrifice of Christ on the cross?
Jesus freely offered his life as an expiatory sacrifice, that is, he
made reparation for our sins with the full obedience of his love unto
death. This love “to the end” (John 13:1) of the Son of God reconciled
all of humanity with the Father. The paschal sacrifice of Christ,
therefore, redeems humanity in a way that is unique, perfect, and
definitive, and it opens up for them communion with God.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.122)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The
Transfiguration
of the Lord B
(August 6) The
feast of the Transfiguration became widespread in the West in
the 11th century
and was introduced tinto the Roman Calendar in 1457 to commemorate the
victory over Islam in Belgrade. Before that, the Transfiguration of the
Lord was celebrated in the Syrian, Byzantine and Coptic rites. The
Transfiguration foretells the glory of the Lord as God, and his
ascension into heaven. It is an anticipation of the glory in heaven,
where we shall see God face to face. We already share in this life,
through grace, in the divine promise of eternal life. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Daniel
7:9-10.13-14; Psalm 97: 1-2,
5-6, 9;
2 Peter 1:16-19; Mark 9:2-10
After
six days Jesus took
Peter, James, and John and led them up a high mountain apart by
themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became
dazzling white, such as no fuller on earth could bleach them. Then
Elijah appeared to them along with Moses, and they were conversing with
Jesus. Then Peter said to Jesus in reply, "Rabbi, it is good that we
are here! Let us make three tents: one for you, one for Moses, and one
for Elijah." He hardly knew what to say, they were so terrified. Then a
cloud came, casting a shadow over them; then from the cloud came a
voice, "This is my beloved Son. Listen to him." Suddenly, looking
around, they no longer saw anyone but Jesus alone with them. As they
were coming down from the mountain, he charged them not to relate what
they had seen to anyone, except when the Son of Man had risen from the
dead. So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what rising
from the dead meant. (Mark 9:2-10)
The basic issue for every living person is life - how to live, how
to live fully, correctly and happily. Life is what we seek and the
greatest disaster possible is when life is lost or taken away. Our
Lord
said once that he had come that we might have life and have it
to the full. This life to the full is a share in his own divine life
which was manifested in glory in the event that we celebrate today, the
Transfiguration. The apostles gazed in wonder at the spectacle of our
Lord transfigured in glory, with Moses and Elijah conversing with him,
and the Father pointing to him as his beloved Son (Mark 9:2-10).
It revealed Our Lord’s divine life and
the glory that he plans to give us.
In respect to glory, the practical question is, when
can we gain a foretaste of this glory and actually share in it? When
are we so united with Jesus
that we can share his life and ask for and gain the graces necessary to
advance on the path to the glory he revealed at the Transfiguration?
The greatest moment is when the Eucharistic Jesus comes to us in Holy
Communion. It is our pledge of glory.
We remember how some time before the Transfiguration our
Lord pointed to himself as the food of life. “I am the bread of life.
He who comes to me will never be hungry; he who believes in me will
never thirst.” He was referring to himself as the source of true life
as given to us in the Eucharist. The holy Eucharist
is the gift by Jesus of himself. In receiving him we receive a share in
his own
divine life, his life of glory. Just as the ordinary food we eat keeps
us physically alive, enables us to grow stronger, preserves our
strength against illnesses, and has an all-pervasive effect on every
other dimension of our natural life, so receiving the holy Eucharist
has a similar effect in the realm of our union with God and our share
in his life of glory.
The moment in our own life when we most approach that in which
the Apostles were
with our Lord at the Transiguration is the moment when we receive Holy
Communion. In Holy Communion we receive into our hearts the living
Jesus in all his risen reality, human and divine, body, blood, soul and
divinity. The problem is that all too often we receive Holy Communion
in an unthinking fashion with very little preparation before and during
Mass. How often have we come up the aisle with others to receive Holy
Communion without a lively faith in who it is who is coming to us at
that moment. During the minutes following our Lord’s coming, how often
have we spent the time thinking of other things and only half-heartedly
giving our divine guest the attention we should. So very often Holy
Communion has not been a time of real communion with
Jesus.
If we give our Lord our attention in prayer during
the precious moments of Holy Communion, it will unite us to him in a
wonderful way. Our union with Jesus will increase. If our ambition in
life is to be united to Jesus and to grow in this union with Jesus -
and this should be the supreme ambition of each one of us - then the
moment of Holy Communion is the supreme opportunity for this to
happen. That is the time to ask him to increase his union with us and
to pour out on us his help to enable it to grow.
Furthermore, inasmuch as Jesus came to take away the sin of the
world, our Lord’s coming in Holy Communion will contribute to the
cleansing from our souls of venial sin and its bad effects. Of course
the principal moment when our Lord takes away sin in our life,
including venial sin, is during the Sacrament of Penance, and it is
only in Confession that mortal sin is cleansed from our soul.
Nevertheless whenever he comes in Holy Communion he wishes by his grace
to further cleanse us of the various stains and effects of sin. So
when we receive Holy Communion we ought ask our Lord to cleanse us
of the vast effects of sin still present in our life. We cannot imagine
the
degree to which our many sins have affected our souls. Holy Communion
is the time to ask our Lord to mend what has been damaged and to
reconcile every aspect of our being to God. Moreover, we ought during
Holy Communion ask our Lord to preserve us from sin in the future,
especially mortal sin but also deliberate venial sin. It ought be our
life’s ambition to avoid all deliberate sin, including deliberate
venial sin. It is during Holy Communion that we ought repeatedly seek
the grace for this. If we do this we shall be advancing towards glory.
Holy Communion is the moment of great grace, for it is the
moment of greatest union with Jesus, if we take advantage of it with a
lively faith. It is our pledge of future glory. Whenever we receive
Holy Communion let us imagine ourselves with the Apostles at the
Transfiguration, and the Father telling us to listen to his beloved
Son. Let us never take Holy Communion for granted, but regard it as the
great moment of life, so full of opportunities for our sanctification
and for our future with Jesus in glory.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Contemplate the Face of Christ and
follow Christ transfigured
Commentary by Pope John-Paul
II (Vita
consecrata, 75)
He continually calls new disciples to himself, both men and women, to
communicate to them, by an outpouring of the Spirit (cf. Rom 5:5), the
divine agape, his way of loving, and to urge them thus to serve others
in the humble gift of themselves, far from all self-interest. Peter,
overcome by the light of the Transfiguration, exclaims: "Lord, it is
well that we are here" (Mt 17:4), but he is invited to return to the
byways of the world in order to continue serving the Kingdom of God:
"Come down, Peter! You wanted to rest up on the mountain: come down.
Preach the word of God, be insistent both when it is timely and when it
is not; reprove, exhort, give encouragement using all your forbearance
and ability to teach. Work, spend yourself, accept even sufferings and
torments, in order that, through the brightness and beauty of good
works, you may possess in charity what is symbolized in the Lord's
white garments".
The fact that consecrated persons fix their gaze on the Lord's
countenance does not diminish their commitment on behalf of humanity;
on the contrary, it strengthens this commitment, enabling it to have an
impact on history, in order to free history from all that disfigures it.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tell Our Lord that from now on, every time you celebrate Mass or attend
it, and every time you administer or receive the Sacrament of the
Eucharist you will do so with great faith, with a burning love, just as
if it were to be the last time in your life. And be sorry for the
carelessness of your past life.
(The Forge,
no.829)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why does Jesus call upon his disciples to
take up their cross?
By calling his disciples to take up their cross and follow him Jesus
desires to associate wit his redeeming sacrifice those who are to be
its first beneficiaries.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.123)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday
of the eighteenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 7)
Saints Sixtus II, pope and martyr and his companion martyrs.
(Died about 258).
Sixtus was ordained Bishop of Rome in about the year 257. In the
following
year while celebrating the Eucharist in the cemetery of Saint Calixtus,
he was he was taken prisoner by order of the Emperor Valerian and put
to death together with four of his deacons. He was buried in the same
cemetery. His name is included in the Roman Canon. (Saints)
Saint Cajetan,
priest. Born at Vicenza in the year 1480 he studied law at Padua
and after being ordained priest, founded at Rome a Congregation of
Clerks Regular (Theatines) in order to help in the work of the
apostolate. He worked to make his congregation spread throughout the
regions of Venice and Naples. He was outstanding for his personal
prayer and for his love of neighbour. He died at Naples in 1547. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Jeremiah
28:1-17; Psalm 119:29, 43, 79, 80, 95,
102; Matthew 14:13-21
When
Jesus heard of it, he withdrew in a boat to a deserted place by
himself. The crowds heard of this and followed him on foot from their
towns. When he disembarked and saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved
with pity for them, and he cured their sick. When it was evening, the
disciples approached him and said, "This is a deserted place and it is
already late; dismiss the crowds so that they can go to the villages
and buy food for themselves." (Jesus) said to them, "There is no need
for them to go away; give them some food yourselves." But they said to
him, "Five loaves and two fish are all we have here." Then he said,
"Bring them here to me," and he ordered the crowds to sit down on the
grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to
heaven, he said the blessing, broke the loaves, and gave them to the
disciples, who in turn gave them to the crowds. They all ate and were
satisfied, and they picked up the fragments left over --twelve wicker
baskets full. Those who ate were about five thousand men, not counting
women and children. (Matthew 14:13-21)
In his
famous little book of the Spiritual Exercises
St Ignatius of Loyola invites us in the First Contemplation of the
Second Week to place ourselves in the presence of the Three Divine
Persons as
“they look down upon the whole surface of
the earth, and
behold all nations in great blindness, going down to death and
descending into hell.” St Ignatius invites us to consider also the
goings on
of the peoples of the
earth, and the Divine Persons saying “Let us
work the redemption of the human race.” Dear visitor, when we think of
the vastness of sin, the vastness of the task of redemption ought be
obvious. But nothing is too much for God. As St Thomas Aquinas
points out, God's almighty power is made manifest in his mercy. He
became man and accepted the condition of human nature in working for
the
redemption of the world. An essential feature of that condition is
that man and his world is limited - which is to say that God submitted
himself to working for the redemption of the world through limited
human means. Those limited human means included the limitations of his
own human nature, and the limitations of those he would draw into
association with himself. That includes each one of us. God becoming
man meant that God submitted himself to working within limitations.
Grace would build on and through nature.
Our beautiful Gospel scene today (Matthew
14:13-21) is
an instance and a symbol of this. When Christ disembarked he “saw the
vast crowd,” and “his heart was moved with pity for them, and he cured
their sick.” Christ viewing the huge crowd reminds us of the triune God
viewing all humanity with infinite compassion and taking the momentous
step to heal humanity of its sin. God was now among men as one of them
and his method of feeding them is very instructive for each of us, and
very encouraging. Our Lord asked his disciples to feed the crowds, and
they replied that all that was available was “five loaves and two
fish.” How instructive! How representative of our situation within the
mission of Christ and his Church! Christ asks us to work to love him
with all our heart and to make disciples of all the nations, and all we
can bring to the task is our five loaves and two fish. That is to say,
all we can offer Christ for the work is our very limited and sinful
humanity not yet fully under the dominion of grace. Our Lord took the
few loaves and the fish and pronounced his blessing
over them - which he does continually over us - and orders his
disciples to proceed to feed the crowds. Every day our Lord directs us
to proceed with our daily effort to love him more and to bring the love
of him to others around us. Yes, our means are very limited indeed, but
so were the loaves and the fishes, but with that little material and
the all-powerful blessing of the Lord, the vast crowds were fed.
It is an instance and a symbol of almighty God working through limited
human nature to effect his redemptive work of mercy. Let us always
remember that whatever be the appearances, our hopes do not lie just in
the appearances. Our earnest efforts at the sanctification of ourselves
and of the world around us may be very limited both as to our
personal resources and as to the apparent results, but God is
all-powerful and in that reality lie our hopes. We are the few loaves,
but with
Christ’s blessing we ought never be discouraged. Our faith and
our hope lie in the loving power of God.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“There is
no need for them to go away; give them something to
eat yourselves.” Mt 14:13-21
Commentary by Pope John
Paul
II (Mane
Nobiscum Domine, 27-28)
The Christian who takes part in the
Eucharist learns to become a promoter of communion, peace and
solidarity in every situation. More than ever, our troubled world,
which began the new Millennium with the spectre of terrorism and the
tragedy of war, demands that Christians learn to experience the
Eucharist as a great school of peace, forming men and women who, at
various levels of responsibility in social, cultural and political
life, can become promoters of dialogue and communion.
There is one other point which I
would like to emphasize, since it significantly affects the
authenticity of our communal sharing in the Eucharist. It is the
impulse which the Eucharist gives to the community for a practical
commitment to building a more just and fraternal society. In the
Eucharist our God has shown love in the extreme, overturning all those
criteria of power which too often govern human relations and radically
affirming the criterion of service: “If anyone would be first, he must
be last of all and servant of all” (Mc 9:35). It is not by chance that
the Gospel of John contains no account of the institution of the
Eucharist, but instead relates the “washing of feet” (cf. Jn 13:1-20):
by bending down to wash the feet of his disciples, Jesus explains the
meaning of the Eucharist unequivocally. Saint Paul vigorously reaffirms
the impropriety of a Eucharistic celebration lacking charity expressed
by practical sharing with the poor (cf. 1 Cor 11:17-22, 27-34).
Can we not make this Year of the
Eucharist an occasion for diocesan and parish communities to commit
themselves in a particular way to responding with fraternal solicitude
to one of the many forms of poverty present in our world? I think for
example of the tragedy of hunger which plagues hundreds of millions of
human beings, the diseases which afflict developing countries, the
loneliness of the elderly, the hardships faced by the unemployed, the
struggles of immigrants… We cannot delude ourselves: by our mutual love
and, in particular, by our concern for those in need we will be
recognized as true followers of Christ (cf. Jn 13:35; Mt 25:31-46).
This will be the criterion by which the authenticity of our Eucharistic
celebrations is judged.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I can understand your keenness to receive the Holy Eucharist
each day.
Those who feel they are children of God have an overpowering need of
Christ.
(The Forge,
no.830)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In
what condition was the body of Christ while it lay in the tomb?
Christ underwent a real death and a true burial. However, the power of
God preserved his body from corruption.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.124)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday
of the eighteenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 8 in Australia:) Feast of Blessed
Mary MacKillop, religious and founder (1842-1909).
On January 15, 1842 Mary MacKillop
was born of Scottish parents, Alexander MacKillop and Flora MacDonald
in Fitzroy, Victoria. This was less than seven years after Faulkner
sailed up the Yarra, when Elizabeth Street was a deep gully and
Lonsdale Street was still virgin bush. A plaque in the footpath now
marks the place of her birth in Brunswick Street, Fitzroy. Mary, the
eldest of eight children, was well educated by her father who spent
some years studying for the priesthood in Rome but through ill health
had returned to his native Scotland until 1835 when he migrated to
Australia with his parents. Unfortunately, he lacked financial
awareness, so the family was often without a home of their own,
depending on friends and relatives and frequently separated from one
another.
From the age of sixteen, Mary earned her living and greatly supported
her family, as a governess, as a clerk for Sands and Kenny (now Sands
and MacDougall), and as a teacher at the Portland school. While acting
as a governess to her uncle's children at Penola, Mary met Father
Julian Tenison Woods who, with a parish of 22,000 square miles/56,000
square kilometres, needed help in the religious education of children
in the outback. At the time Mary's family depended on her income so she
was not free to follow her dream. However, in 1866, greatly inspired
and encouraged by Father Woods, Mary opened the first Saint Joseph's
School in a disused stable in Penola. Young women came to join Mary,
and so the Congregation of the Sisters of St Joseph was begun. In 1867,
Mary was asked by Bishop Shiel to come to Adelaide to start a school.
From there, the Sisters spread, in groups to small outback settlements
and large cities around Australia, New Zealand. Mary and these early
Sisters, together with other Religious Orders and Lay Teachers of the
time, had a profound influence on the forming of Catholic Education as
we have come to know and experience it today. She also opened
Orphanages, Providences to care for the homeless and destitute both
young and old, and Refuges for ex-prisoners and ex-prostitutes who
wished to make a fresh start in life.
Throughout her life, Mary met with opposition from people outside the
Church and even from some of those within it. In the most difficult of
times she consistently refused to attack those who wrongly accused her
and undermined her work, but continued in the way she believed God was
calling her and was always ready to forgive those who wronged her.
Throughout her life Mary suffered ill health. She died on August 8,
1909 in the convent in Mount Street, North Sydney where her tomb is now
enshrined. This great Australian woman inspired great dedication to
God's work in the then new colonies. In today's world, she stands as an
example of great courage and trust in her living out of God's loving
and compassionate care of those in need. (More on Blessed Mary MacKillop)
Scripture: Jeremiah 30:1-2,
12-15, 18-22; Ps 102:16-18, 19-21, 29 and 22-23; Matthew
14:22-36
Meanwhile the boat, already a few
miles offshore, was being tossed about by the waves, for the wind was
against it. During the fourth watch of the night, he came toward them,
walking on the sea. When the disciples saw him walking on the sea they
were terrified. "It is a ghost," they said, and they cried out in fear.
At once (Jesus) spoke to them, "Take courage, it is I; do not be
afraid." Peter said to him in reply, "Lord, if it is you, command me to
come to you on the water." He said, "Come." Peter got out of the boat
and began to walk on the water toward Jesus. But when he saw how
(strong) the wind was he became frightened; and, beginning to sink, he
cried out, "Lord, save me!" Immediately Jesus stretched out his hand
and caught him, and said to him, "O you of little faith, why did you
doubt?" After they got into the boat, the wind died down. Those who
were in the boat did him homage, saying, "Truly, you are the Son of
God." After making the crossing, they came to land at Gennesaret. (Matthew14:22-36)
The study of religions
is a widespread
modern study, and a most interesting question for this study is the
very purpose of the different religions of man. What need does this or
that religion profess to meet, and does it in fact meet it? A way of
answering this question is to consider the figure of the religion’s
founder and then to ask those questions of him and his life.
Christianity is an immense fact
in the life and history of the world,
and its meaning is clear. It is to overcome sin and bring the holiness
of Christ to broken man, and thus to glorify God. As John the Baptist
stated to his disciples as
he and they gazed upon Jesus, 'There is the Lamb of God who takes away
the sin of the world'. The disciple of Jesus knows that by his death,
resurrection and ascension he broke the power of the world’s sin
and gave to man the gift of the Spirit of holiness. Each of
Christ’s faithful are now called to share in the holiness of Christ.
This is an immense undertaking and there is no greater that life could
offer. Every person now has a beautiful and difficult work ahead of
him, one of joy and one that is truly attainable. Our Gospel passage
today is a symbol of that search for holiness. We are out in the boat
in
a heavy sea and there is a headwind which comes from sin both within us
and from without. But Christ is ahead of us in the middle of all the
trouble, saying to us “Courage! It is I! Do not be afraid.” (Matthew
14:22-36) In
our Gospel he invites Peter to come to him amid the turmoil of the
storm, and Peter begins to come but falters through lack of faith. He
failed to trust in the power of Christ.
On the tomb of Blessed Mary MacKillop in her chapel in North Sydney are
written the stirring words, Trust in God. Perhaps the most serious
challenge facing the ordinary disciple of Christ is discouragement at
the abundant evidence of sin in his life. He fails daily and he never -
in his own eyes - seems to make much progress. Perhaps he is even doing
what Peter did, failing in trust. He is always starting out across the
waves at Christ’s command to come, and constantly faltering and
beginning to sink with Christ’s hand ever reaching to him to hold him
up. This hand comes to him in his regular and frequent Confession and
in his Sunday or weekday Mass and Holy Communion. Yes, he may be
failing repeatedly, but at least he is beginning again and again and in
that constant new start he is not failing. He is doing the best he can
and that constant
new beginning is itself a sign of the power of Christ at work in his
life. Indeed, that is one thing that all the saints were ever doing,
beginning again and again. Another word for this pattern is constant
conversion from deliberate venial sin. The truly dangerous attitude
lies not in failing, but in failing to repent and especially failing to
repent of deliberate venial sin. It is the reason why St Ignatius of
Loyola recommended not only a daily general examination of conscience
but a daily particular examination of conscience. In this practice the
fervent disciple of Christ perseveringly attacks a particular
deliberate fault to which he is prone, ever beginning again in the
battle. Once that struggle has been won, the next is attempted. It is a
matter of daily new beginnings on the basis of trust in the power of
Christ.
We can only hope to do this if we trust in the power of Christ who is
present and before us in the midst of our daily difficulties and
spiritual headwinds. He says to us every day, Courage, it is I! So
Come! So then let us say in response, now I begin! It is what Blessed
Mary
MacKillop did every day, going from strength to strength trusting in
the ever-present grace of God.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Jesus went up on the mountain by himself
to pray.” Matthew
14:22-36
Comment from Saint Bruno(
? – 1101), Founder of the Carthusians(Letter to Raoul le Verd, 4, 15-16)
Dear Brother, I live in a desert in Calabria that is to all sides quite
far from any human habitation. I am here with my religious brothers,
some of whom are scholars. They keep a holy and persevering watch,
awaiting the return of their Master so as to open to him when he knocks
(Lk 12:36)…
Only those who have experienced the solitude and silence of the desert
know how useful these are and what divine enjoyment they bring to those
who love them. For there, strong people can be as recollected as they
wish; they can remain within themselves, zealously cultivate the
virtues and be nourished with the happiness of the fruits of paradise.
There, people try to acquire the eye, from which the clear gaze wounds
the divine Spouse with love and whose purity enables them to see God.
There, people give themselves up to a rest that is very filled, and
they come to peace in quiet activity. There, God gives his athletes the
reward they desire for the labor of combat: a peace, which the world
does not know and joy in the Holy Spirit…
For what is more contrary to reason, to justice, to nature itself than
to prefer the creature to the Creator, to pursue perishable goods more
than eternal goods, those of the earth more than those of heaven? …
Truth in person gives this advice to everyone: “Come to me, all you who
are weary and find life burdensome, and I will refresh you.” (Mt 11:28)
Is it not a thankless and sterile effort to be tormented by the desire
to own, worries, anxiety, fear? … Flee all these concerns, my brother,
pass from the storm of this world to the quiet and safe rest of the
harbor.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
While you are at Mass, think
that you are sharing in a divine
Sacrifice. For that is how it is: on the altar, Christ is offering
himself again for you.
(The Forge,
no.831)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is the “hell” into which Jesus
descended?
This “hell” was different from the hell of the damned. It was the state
of all those, righteous and evil, who died before Christ. With his soul
united to his divine Person Jesus went down to the just in hell who
were awaiting their Redeemer so they could enter at last into the
vision of God. When he had conquered by his death both death and the
devil “who has the power of death” (Hebrews 2:14), he freed the just
who looked forward to the Redeemer and opened for them the gates of
heaven.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.125)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday
of the eighteenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 9) Today
let us think of St Teresa
Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Jeremiah
31:1-7; Jeremiah
31: 1-13;
Matthew 15:21-28
Then Jesus went from that place
and withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. And behold, a Canaanite
woman of that district came and called out, "Have pity on me, Lord, Son
of David! My daughter is tormented by a demon." But he did not say a
word in answer to her. His disciples came and asked him, "Send her
away, for she keeps calling out after us." He said in reply, "I was
sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." But the woman came
and did him homage, saying, "Lord, help me." He said in reply, "It is
not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs."
She said, "Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps that fall
from the table of their masters." Then Jesus said to her in reply, "O
woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish." And
her daughter was healed from that hour. (Matthew 15:21-28)
In ordinary life most
people notice to
their chagrin that often important people favour others and do not
favour them. They also observe that other people have greater gifts
than themselves and so gain more attention and favour and advantage
than
they do. They see too that other people are blessed in life in so many
ways more than they are. Why has God disposed things in
this way, in a way
that favours others more? When they are
suffering
greatly, they look around on the many who do not appear to suffer in
similar fashion. Terrible catastrophes occur brought on by nature or
man and God appears to be silent while blessing others and allowing
them to prosper when they seem undeserving. They pray earnestly and
persistently to God for relief and deliverance from some trouble and
God appears to be silent and perhaps they give up on prayer because it
seems futile. God seems not to be listening. He does not answer nor
does he appear to show in any concrete way that he is a loving God and
a powerful one too. What is the answer to this spiritual impasse? The
only way out would seem to be to embrace very firm starting points,
clear first principles. Our starting point has to be one of assent to
the
revelation that the one almighty God is a God of love, and on the basis
of this firm assent then to go on to deal with the mysteries of life.
But if on the other hand our first
principle or starting point is one of doubt or suspicion as to God, a
doubt
which then expects evidence and confirmation of the hypothesis that he
is a God of love, the impasse will remain.
Our Gospel scene of today (Matthew
15:21-28) is
very revealing as to the manner in which the all-powerful and loving
God may choose to deal with us. Our Lord had withdrawn to the region of
Tyre and Sidon and out came a Canaanite woman who would not let him
alone. She had a terrible burden which was that her daughter was
tormented by a devil. How like the plight of mankind her case
was! But the likeness did not end there. Despite her persistence
our Lord “answered her not a word.” That this apparent refusal did not
discourage her is shown by the fact that “his disciples went and
pleaded with him. ‘Give her what she wants,’ they said ‘because she is
shouting after us’.” But our Lord was firm: “He said in reply, ‘I was
sent only to the lost sheep of the House of Israel’.” This was true -
our Lord’s mission was not to the pagan lands. This would be left to
the time of the Church. The point here, though, is that our Lord was
silent in response to persistent and clamorous prayer. He appeared to
rebuff it and refuse. It was an instance of the silence of God. But
that did not stop the woman for she believed
that our Lord had the power and that if she kept at him he would grant
her worthy request. After all, she was
pleading for the welfare of her daughter and behind the persistent
pleas must have been not only faith in our Lord’s power but faith in
his goodness in the face of human need. That is to say, despite the
silence and the apparent rebuff her faith would not allow our Lord to
pass her by without granting her worthy request. The result? She was
granted her prayer and greatly praised by our Lord for her faith.
Of course, our Gospel scene today does not provide us with a complete
doctrine on the prayer of faith. After
all,
we remember how on one occasion a person in the crowd asked our Lord to
do something for him and our Lord refused. The man requested that our
Lord tell
another person to return what was owing to him. Our Lord told him that
in this particular case that
was not his role, and he proceeded to give an instruction on avarice.
On
another occasion the mother of James and John together with her two
sons came to our Lord with the request that he give to them places at
his right and his left in his kingdom. Our Lord refused, saying that
was up to the Father. However, our Gospel scene today does teach us
that God’s silence in the face of genuine human need and tragedy is not
at all impenetrable. The answer to it is to pray with faith and
persistence as did the Canaanite woman, remembering our Lord’s
directive that we are to pray unceasingly and never lose heart. The
foundation of our prayer must be firm faith and not doubt or suspicion.
Let us ask
for this faith, remembering what that other man elsewhere in the Gospel
said:
"Lord, I do believe. Help my unbelief!"
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Woman, you have great faith!
Let
it be done for you as you wish.”
(Matthew
15:21-28)
Commentary by John Tauler
(around 1300 – 1361), Dominican (Sermon 9)
“Lord, Son of David, have pity on me!” That call is one of tremendous
strength… It is a groaning that comes from an infinite depth. It goes
way beyond nature, and it is the Holy Spirit himself who has to utter
this groaning in us (Rom 8:26)… But Jesus told her: “My mission is only
to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” and “It is not right to take
the food of sons and daughters and throw it to the dogs.” … How could
he have tried her and chased her away, pressed her even more?
So what did she do, she who was so chased? She let herself be hunted
down and she chased herself even deeper down than he could chased her.
She took the chase to its furthest. She penetrated more deeply into the
abyss. Even while lowering and humbling herself, she kept her trust and
said: “It is true, Lord; but even the dogs eat the leavings that fall
from their masters’ tables.”
Ah! If you could also succeed in penetrating thus truly to the deepest
truth, not by wise commentaries, big words, or even with your senses,
but to the true depth of yourself! Neither God nor any creature would
be able to trample you, to annihilate you, if you remained in the
truth, in trusting humility. People could submit you to insult, scorn
and rebuff, you would remain firm in perseverance, you would go still
deeper, animated by total trust, and you would constantly increase your
zeal even more. Everything depends on that, and the person who reaches
this point succeeds. These paths, and only they, truly lead to God
without any intermediary station. But few come to the point of
remaining thus in such great humility, with perseverance, with total
and true assurance, like that poor woman did.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When you receive him, tell him: Lord, I hope in you: I adore you, I
love you, increase my faith. Be the support of my weakness: You , who
have remained defenceless in the Eucharist so as to be the remedy for
the weakness of your creatures.
(The Forge,
no.832)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What
place does the Resurrection of Christ occupy in our faith?
The Resurrection of Jesus is the crowning truth of our faith in Christ
and represents along with his cross an essential part of the Paschal
Mystery.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.126)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the eighteenth week of Ordinary Time II
Scripture today:
Jeremiah
31:31-34; Psalm 50; Matthew
16:13-23
"Then Simon Peter spoke up. 'You are the Christ,' he said 'the Son of
the Living God.' Jesus replied, 'Simon son of Jonah, you are a happy
man! Because it was not flesh and blood that revealed this to you but
my Father in heaven. So I now say to you: You are Peter and on this
rock I will build my Church.' " (Matthew
16:13-23)
There are many things in life
that man
legitimately regards as
wonderful blessings. Normally his family is among the greatest of
life’s blessings. There is also health, normal material prosperity,
education, and especially the opportunity to do a work in life. All
these benefits come from God and man ought be very grateful for being
able to enjoy them. But let us consider our Gospel scene today and the
conversation between our Lord and his
disciples. Our Lord asks his
disciples who people say he is, and he receives various answers from
them. It is agreed that he is a prophet, indeed a great one. But then
our Lord asks them who they themselves think he is and immediately
Simon Peter spoke up “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” (Matthew
16:13-23) It
was a splendid and amazing answer and it drew from our Lord the highest
praise. Simon was a happy man! He had been granted the knowledge of
Jesus that opened up eternal life and prepared for his appointment as
the rock on which our Lord would build his Church. At the Last Supper
our Lord in his prayer to the Father said that eternal life is this, to
know you Father, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. This knowledge of
Jesus Simon had and it was an inestimable blessing not only for Simon
but for the entire Church which would share in that knowledge granted
by the Father. Simon was a happy man, he was fortunate, blessed, and
worthy of Christ’s praise.
It reminds us that there is no greater blessing than to recognise the
light that has come into the world and to accept it as coming from God.
That light is the person and the teaching of Christ. Every baptized
person has been granted a share in that light from on high. It came as
a gift, the gift of faith inclining the person by a divine impulse to
be open to the person of Jesus and to recognize the truth of what he
reveals about himself, about God and about God’s plan for us. We the
baptized have this divinely implanted inclination to believe, to assent
to Jesus, and on the basis of this and accompanying it, we have been
granted the inclination to hope in Jesus and to love him. We are happy,
blessed, fortunate. But these divine gifts are a responsibility. We
must cultivate them and exercise them so that they grow beyond
being a
divine spark to becoming a great flame, the flame of the Spirit of God
who is within. Our faith in Jesus and our assent to his teaching is the
foundation of our entire life in God’s plan, and if we have been
granted that faith and perception we are indeed fortunate. Let us then
every day work on our union with Jesus and our knowledge of him. Let us
put time into being with Jesus in prayer, contemplating him as he is
portrayed in the Gospels, endeavouring to know him more and more deeply
and lovingly so that from our heart we too will give the answer that
Simon Peter gave. Let us place ourselves in the company of Jesus and
hear him asking us the same question, who do you say I am? Then let us
from the heart tell him in prayer who we know him to be.
On this basis our life is to be one of bearing witness to this truth
about Jesus. Some time back I heard that a young person in the United
States (she was not a Catholic) was suddenly confronted by a crazed and
unbalanced person who happened to hate Christians. He aimed a revolver
at the young person and told her that if she stated in response to his
question that she believed in Jesus he would shoot her. He asked the
question, she answered in the affirmative, and he shot her dead. She
died bearing witness to Jesus. Our Lord would have said to her that she
was a happy person! Let us be prepared to bear witness to Jesus in our
everyday life.
(E.J.Tyler)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Feast of
Saint Lawrence, deacon and martyr (3rd century)
(August 10) Saint
Lawrence. Lawrence was a deacon of the Church
of Rome and died in the persecution of Valerian four days after Pope
Saint Sixtus II and his four fellow deacons. He was buried on the Via
Tiburtina at the Campo Verano near to where Constantine the Great built
a basilica. He has been venerated throughout the Church from the fourth
century. (Saints)
Scripture today:
2
Corinthians 9:6-10; Psalm 112: 1-2,
5-9;
John 12:24-26
Amen, amen, I say to you,
unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a
grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves
his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will
preserve it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and
where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honour
whoever serves me.
(John
12:24-26)
Saint John Vianney used
to read the
lives of the saints and derive great inspiration from them. Ignatius of
Loyola was hit by a cannon ball during a battle with the French and
during his convalescence he read a life of Christ and lives of the
saints. The thought began to occur to him that perhaps he could try to
be like them. His reading and the reflection that followed it led to a
tremendous
conversion which had an enormous impact
on the life of the
Church and on the course of history. The saints are meant by God to be
examples to us, and of course intercessors on our behalf in heaven.
Today we celebrate the life and especially the martyrdom of the deacon
Lawrence of the Church of Rome. Arrested by the prefect and called on
to deliver up the property of the Church, his answer was to point to a
crowd of poor people. “Here are the true treasures of the Church,” he
said. He was roasted to death on a gridiron. The question is, what gave
him the courage and fortitude to die in such an heroic way? It was
love, love for Jesus, love for the Church, love for truth. Behind every
martyr is a life of faith, hope and love and in this the martyrs and
the saints are our examples. If only we could gain their love for Jesus!
Well then, what must we do? Like Ignatius of Loyola, for instance, we
ought stop and begin to think of the ultimate things. Let us think of
the purpose and the foundation of life. We are created by God to know,
love and serve him above all things here on earth and in this way
to see and enjoy him forever in heaven. Accordingly we should aim at
being totally attached in love to God, and our relationship with all
other things ought be such as to assist in this all important aim of
life. Nothing else ought take God’s place in our heart. Let us make a
choice, then. There is before us Christ and his way, or the way of the
world, the flesh and the devil. Let us simplify it even more. There is
Christ on the one hand and his way of the cross, and there is
on the other hand the way of Satan and his way of honours and riches
for the sake of one’s own ego. Let us choose Christ and ask for the
grace to love him and his way, the way of the cross as presented in our
Gospel passage today (John 12:24-26) for the feast of Saint Lawrence. “If
anyone serves me, he must follow me, wherever I am, my servant will be
there too.” And were is our Lord? He is nailed to the cross, asking his
disciples from his cross to take up their cross every day and follow in
his footsteps. Saint Lawrence did this to the point of martyrdom.
So then, now I begin! Let us ask Christ our Lord for the grace to
follow him generously.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Lavishly he gives to the poor; his
generosity shall endure forever.” (Psalm 112: 9)
Commentary by St Augustine
(354-430), Bishop and Doctor of the Church
(Sermon 303, for the Feast of Saint Lawrence)
Saint Lawrence was a deacon in Rome. The persecutors of the Church
demanded that he hand over the Church’s treasures. In order to obtain a
real treasure in heaven, he suffered torments, the account of which you
can only listen to with horror: he was laid on a grill over a fire.
However, he triumphed over all the physical suffering by means of
extraordinary strength, which he drew from his charity and from the
help of Him who made him steadfast. For “(w)e are truly his handiwork,
created in Christ Jesus to lead the life of good deeds which God
prepared for us in advance.” (Ephesians 2:10)
This made the persecutors angry… Lawrence said: “Send some chariots
with me with which I can bring you the Church’s treasures.” They gave
him chariots. He filled them with poor people and sent them back
saying: “Here are the Church’s treasures.”
Nothing is truer, my brothers. The Christians’ great wealth is to be
found in the needs of the poor, if we really understand how to make
what we possess bear fruit. The poor are always with us. If we entrust
our treasures to them, we will not lose them.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We should dwell on those words of Jesus, and make them our own: I have
longed and longed to eat this Passover with you. There is no better way
to show how great is our concern and love for the Holy Sacrifice than
by taking great care with the last detail of the ceremonies the wisdom
of the Church has laid down. This is for Love: but we should also feel
the need to become like Christ, not only inside ourselves but also in
what is external. We should act on the wide spaciousness of the
Christian altar, with the rhythm and harmony which holy obedience
provides, the holy obedience that unites us to the will of the Spouse
of Christ, to the Will of Christ himself.
(The Forge,
no.833)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What
are the signs that bear witness to the Resurrection of Christ?
Along with the essential sign of the empty tomb, the Resurrection of
Jesus is witnessed to by the women who first encountered Christ and
proclaimed him to the apostles. Jesus then “appeared to Cephas (Peter)
and then to the Twelve. Following that he appeared to more than five
hundred of the brethren at one time (1 Corinthians 15:5-6) and to
others as well. The apostles could not have invented the story of the
resurrection since it seemed impossible to them. As a matter of fact,
Jesus himself upbraided them for their unbelief.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.127)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday
of the eighteenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 11) Saint
Clare, virgin. Born at Assisi in the year 1193, she followed her
fellow countryman Saint Francis in his life of poverty and was the
founder and ruler of an Order of nuns (Poor Clares). She led a very
austere life, abounding in works of piety and charity. She died 1253. (Saints)
Today let us also think
of Saint Philomena
(Saints)
Scripture: Nahum 2:1, 3;
3:1-3, 6-7; Deuteronomy 32:35cd-36ab, 39abcd, 41; Matthew 16:24-28
Then
Jesus said to his
disciples, "Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up
his cross, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose
it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. What profit
would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or
what can one give in exchange for his life? For the Son of Man will
come with his angels in his Father's glory, and then he will repay
everyone according to his conduct. Amen, I say to you, there are some
standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man
coming in his kingdom." (Matthew 16:24-28)
It has often been observed in the history
of human thought that life’s greatest mystery is presented by evil and
suffering. Every day on the news we see
graphic images and reports of evil and suffering. Man is constantly
endeavouring to do away with it. Its cause has been revealed to us:
suffering and evil flowed from the sin of man. As St Paul puts it,
through one man’s sin death entered the world
and death has spread
through the whole human race. This is mystery enough but there is
another mystery. It is that man was redeemed from the root cause of
suffering and evil in the world by the Son of God embracing suffering.
So while suffering and evil is the result of sinful disobedience,
obedience in suffering has become
the route to redemption from sin. Christ suffered and died on the Cross
because of sin, and his sufferings on the Cross redeemed man from sin.
Perhaps the biggest challenge for the Christian is that of learning the
lesson of the Cross. If one wishes to be a true disciple of Christ and
to follow him closely, one will have to follow in his footsteps. As our
Lord tells us in today’s Gospel, “If anyone wants to be a follower of
mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross and follow me.” (Matthew
16:24-28) If
this is ever to be done, the secret to it has to be found. The secret
is love. We are called to love Jesus to the extent of embracing the
cross just as he did out of love for us.
Today is the memorial of Saint Clare, the associate of Saint Francis of
Assisi and founder of the Poor Clares. Her life was distinguished by a
loving embrace of the cross, a life of freely chosen poverty and
penitence in imitation of Jesus the Master. She provides us with an
inspiring example, though of course in the particular form of her
embrace of the cross she was following her particular
vocation which is not the vocation of most of Christ’s faithful. But
the basic pattern is the same in the lives of all the saints. Consider
Saint Benedict, Saint John of the Cross, Saint John Vianney, or Saint
Josemaria Escriva in our own day. Their testimony is the same: the
cross is to be accepted lovingly as the great route to loving and
imitating Jesus the Master and to bearing much fruit, fruit that will
last. So then, the programme for the Christian is prayer, expiation
(the cross) and then our work, our God-given work. To gain a
Christ-like
love of the cross we must begin with prayer, contemplating in prayer
the person of Jesus and his way of obedient suffering, asking for the
grace to be able to follow him with love. Then when the grace to do so
comes, one
must act on it and proceed faithfully and generously along the way of
the cross, bearing willingly the sufferings God permits and which are
part and parcel of our God-given path.
Our daily work
ought be impregnated with prayer and the spirit of penance, accepting
obediently the inherent difficulties of our work and being ready to
embrace mortifications which in the providence of God present
themselves to us. Let us today, as we think of our Lord’s words in the
Gospel, and as we
think of the example of Saint Clare, ask for the grace to follow our
Lord as he carries his cross. This is the path to life.
(E.J.Tyler)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Seeing the Son of Man coming in his
Kingdom (Matt 16:28) Commentary
from Vatican Council II
Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the modern
world, Gaudium et
Spes, § 37-38
Sacred Scripture teaches the human family what the experience of
the ages confirms: that while human progress is a great advantage to
man, it brings with it a strong temptation. For when the order of
values is jumbled and bad is mixed with the good, individuals and
groups pay heed solely to their own interests, and not to those of
others. Thus it happens that the world ceases to be a place of true
brotherhood. In our own day, the magnified power of humanity threatens
to destroy the race itself…
Hence if anyone wants to know how this unhappy situation can be
overcome, Christians will tell him that all human activity…must be
purified and perfected by the power of Christ's cross and resurrection.
For redeemed by Christ and made a new creature in the Holy Spirit, man
is able to love the things themselves created by God, and ought to do
so. He can receive them from God… Thus He entered the world's history
as a perfect man, taking that history up into Himself and summarizing
it.(11) He Himself revealed to us that "God is love" (1 John 4:8) and
at the same time taught us that the new command of love was the basic
law of human perfection and hence of to worlds transformation. To
those, therefore, who believe in divine love, He gives assurance that
the way of love lies open to men and that the effort to establish a
universal brotherhood is not a hopeless one. He cautions them at the
same time that this charity is not something to be reserved for
important matters, but must be pursued chiefly in the ordinary
circumstances of life. Undergoing death itself for all of us
sinners,(12) He taught us by example that we too must shoulder that
cross which the world and the flesh inflict upon those who search after
peace and justice.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We should receive our Lord in the Eucharist as we would prepare to
receive the great ones of the earth, or even better: with decorations,
with lights, with new clothes... And if you ask me what sort of
cleanliness I mean, what decorations and what lights you should bring,
I will answer you: cleanliness in each one of your senses, decoration
in each of your powers, light in all your soul.
(The Forge,
no.834)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why is the Resurrection at the same time a
transcendent occurrence?
While being an historical event, verifiable and attested by signs and
testimonies, the Resurrection, insofar as it is the entrance of
Christ’s humanity into the glory of God, transcends and surpasses
history as a mystery of faith. For this reason the risen Christ did not
manifest himself to the world but to his disciples, making them his
witnesses to the people.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.128)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the eighteenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 12) Today
let us think of Saint Euplius
(Saints)
Scripture
today: Habakkuk
1:12-2:4; Psalm
9: 8-13;
Matthew 17:14-20
When
they came to the crowd a
man approached, knelt down before him, and said, "Lord, have pity on my
son, for he is a lunatic and suffers severely; often he falls into
fire, and often into water. I brought him to your disciples, but they
could not cure him." Jesus said in reply, "O faithless and perverse
generation, how long will I be with you? How long will I endure you?
Bring him here to me." Jesus rebuked him and the demon came out of him,
and from that hour the boy was cured. Then the disciples approached
Jesus in private and said, "Why could we not drive it out?" He said to
them, "Because of your little faith. Amen, I say to you, if you have
faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move
from here to there,' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for
you."(Matthew 17:14-20)
In our Gospel scene today we
witness a
man in great desperation kneeling before Jesus pleading
for his help. His son was “a lunatic and in a wretched state; he is
always falling into the fire or into the water.” It was due to the
activity of a demon and our Lord’s disciples were unable to cast it
out. Our Lord proceeded to expel the demon, but before doing so he gave
vent to his disappointment at the lack of faith he was encountering.
“Faithless and perverse generation! How much longer must I be with
you?
How much longer must I put up with you?” (Matthew
17:14-20) Our Lord’s words manifest how central to his
work of redemption it was to find faith among men. Time and time again
our Lord is portrayed as appealing for faith, right from the
commencement of his public ministry when he preached that people repent
and believe the good news of the Kingdom. Repent and believe! We
remember how out on the Sea of Galilee our Lord invited
Simon to come to him across the water, and Simon’s faith failed him as
he began to walk - and our Lord rebuked him for his little faith. Here
in out Gospel passage today, after the demon was cast out of the man’s
son
our Lord’s disciples came to him and asked why they were unable to
expel it. Our Lord said the reason was, “because of
your little faith."
We who are Christ’s faithful are not likely to be asked to cast out
demons, and in any case it is a work formally assigned to certain
individuals by the Church. But we are called to fight Satan and his
influence, and in the broader sense to contribute to casting him out of
the lives of men and the life of society. This will require persevering
faith and persevering work. Our daily work ought be undertaken in a
spirit of faith in the power of Christ to establish his
Kingdom in the hearts of men, and by our daily prayer and our daily
work we helps in the
establishment and building up of this Kingdom. Our Lord’s reaction in
our Gospel scene today shows how critical this faith is for the work of
God to be done: “Faithless and perverse generation! How much longer
must I be with you? How much longer must I put up with you?” So let us
ask for a greater and greater faith and ask for it perseveringly, for
it is the divine gift which is at the centre of the project of man’s
redemption and of Christ’s work in the world. We must ask for it and
cherish the life of faith that we have, never allowing it to decline
through neglect and unguarded exposure to temptation. Let us also try
to spread this spirit of faith among people, inviting them to place
their faith in Christ when they are assailed with difficulty as was the
man who appealed to our Lord on behalf of his son.
Let us encourage all fellow-workers in Christ’s vineyard to live with
true faith in Jesus. Let us bear in mind that other man in the Gospel
who appealed to our Lord for
help, and whom our Lord challenged in respect to his faith. He replied:
“Lord, I do
believe. Help my unbelief!” Let us make that prayer our own, repeatedly
and perseveringly.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Why could we not
drive it out?” He said to them, “Because of your little faith."(Mt 17:14-20)
Commentary by St.
Cyril of Jerusalem (313-350), Bishop of Jerusalem and Doctor of
the Church
(Catechetical Lecture 5, 10-11)
For the name of Faith is in the form of speech one, but has two
distinct senses. For there is one kind of faith, the dogmatic,
involving an assent of the soul on some particular point: and it is
profitable to the soul, as the Lord says: ‘Whoever hears my word and
believes in the one who sent me has eternal life’ (John 5:24)…
But there is a second kind of faith, which is bestowed by Christ as a
gift of grace. ‘For to one is given through the Spirit the word of
wisdom, and to another the word of knowledge according to the same
Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit, and to another gifts of
healing’ (1Co 12:2-9). This faith then which is given of grace from the
Spirit is not merely doctrinal, but also works things above man's
power. For whoever has this faith, shall say to this mountain, Remove
hence to yonder place, and it shall remove. For whenever any one shall
say this in faith, believing that it comes to pass, and shall not doubt
in his heart, then he receives the grace.
And of this faith it is said, ‘If you have faith as a grain of mustard
seed’. For just as the grain of mustard seed is small in size, but
fiery in its operation, and though sown in a small space has a circle
of great branches, and when grown up is able even to shelter the fowls;
so, likewise, faith in the swiftest moment works the greatest effects
in the soul. For, when enlightened by faith, the soul has visions of
God, and as far as is possible beholds God, and ranges round the bounds
of the universe, and before the end of this world already beholds the
Judgment, and the payment of the promised rewards.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Be a eucharistic soul! If the centre around which your thoughts and
hopes turn is the Tabernacle, then, my child, how abundant will the
fruits of your sanctity and apostolate will be!
(The Forge,
no.835)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is
the condition of the risen body of Jesus?
The Resurrection of Christ was not a return to earthly life. His risen
body is that which was crucified and bears the marks of his passion.
However it also participates in the divine life, with the
characteristics of a glorified body. Because of this the risen Jesus
was utterly free to appear to his disciples how and where he wished and
under various aspects.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.129)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nineteenth
Sunday of Ordinary Time B
(August 13) Saint
Pontianus pope, and Saint Hippolytus, priest, both martyrs.
Pontianus was ordained Bishop of Rome in the year 231,a nd in the year
235 was exiled by the Emperor Maximinus to Sardinia, together with the
priest Hippolytus. Here he abdicated the papacy. After his death in
Sardinia his body was buried in the cemetery of Callistus, while the
body of Hippolytus was taken to the cemetery on the Via Tiburtina. Both
of these martyrs have been venerated by the Church of Rome from the
beginning of the fourth century.
(Saints)
Scripture today:
1
Kings
19:4-8; Psalm 34: 2-9:
Ephesians 4:30-5:2; John 6:41-51
The
Jews murmured
about him
because he said, "I am the bread that came down from heaven," and they
said, "Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph? Do we not know his father
and mother? Then how can he say, 'I have come down from heaven'?" Jesus
answered and said to them, "Stop murmuring among yourselves. No one can
come to me unless the Father who sent me draw him, and I will raise him
on the last day. It is written in the prophets: 'They shall all be
taught by God.' Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him
comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is
from God; he has seen the Father. Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever
believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate
the manna in the desert, but they died; this is the bread that comes
down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die. I am the living
bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live
forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the
world."(John
6:41-51)
I have at various times met people who
think that at the end of life we die and that is the finish of all
personal existence. One elderly person I spoke to told me that he
believed that after he died his fate would be no different from that of
any dog or cat. He would be buried and his existence would end there.
Undoubtedly there are and have been plenty of people who think that
there is no life beyond the grave. But most people in our
Judaeo-Christian culture have been formed to
some extent by the great
world religions, and they consequently
accept
(at least notionally) that there is a judgment and a hereafter. They
might accept this, but
not a lot of people truly realize it. A great number live out their
daily lives thinking of this life only and rarely thinking of life
hereafter and how one should be preparing for the judgment of God that
precedes it. All their plans relate to this life, all their efforts,
all their hopes and regrets. They regret not having taken certain
opportunities that would have brought more money or more advantageous
work or greater fame. Very many would never think of regretting having
done
many things that have set them back in terms of an eternity with God.
Our Lord in today’s Gospel refers very explicitly to the
eternity that is coming. “No one can come to me unless he is drawn by
the Father who sent me, and I will raise him up at the last day.” He
will raise us up on the last day. He goes on to make an explicit
connection between his gift of the Eucharist and our eternity in
heaven. “I am the bread of life. ... I am the living bread which
has come down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live
forever; and the bread that I shall give is my flesh, for the life of
the world.” (John
6:41-51) Many people long for their retirement at
the end of years of work, but they never think of longing for heaven.
God means us to long for heaven and he provides for us a constant
pledge of it. That constant pledge, that promise and foretaste of what
is to come, is what our Lord refers to in today’s Gospel, Holy
Communion. Heaven is where we shall see God face to face and be in
union with him forever. Our foretaste of this is Holy Communion.
St Paul tells us that in Christ we receive every heavenly
blessing. In heaven we shall be granted every heavenly blessing because
we shall be with Christ face to face never to be separated from him.
Here when we receive Holy Communion we receive the same Jesus who is
now at the right hand of his Father in heaven. Therefore when we
receive Holy Communion we are receiving a foretaste of all the
blessings of heaven. So one of the things we ought pray to Jesus about
when we receive Holy Communion is heaven and our journey to heaven. At
the Last Supper our Lord himself directed us to think of heaven in
receiving the Holy Eucharist when he said, “I tell you I shall not
drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it
again with you in my Father’s kingdom.” So whenever Mass is celebrated
and whenever we receive our Lord in Holy Communion we ought remember
these words and think of our heavenly banquet with him that this points
to and reminds us of. We ought pray to our Lord about our homeland in
heaven when we receive Holy Communion and pray that we and the others
we care for will reach there. Our Lord’s presence in the Eucharist is
just as real as it is and will be in heaven, but in Holy Communion it
is veiled under other appearances. The same Jesus comes to help us on
our way.
Not only does the time we have with our Lord in Holy Communion
remind us of our personal eternity with him in heaven, it also
ought remind us of the new heavens and the new earth which eventually
we shall see and be part of. The same Jesus who comes in Holy Communion
will come again in glory at the end of time and all of us will be
gathered before him to be judged. No one will escape that day, just as
no one will escape the personal judgment immediately following
death. The same Jesus who comes to us in Holy Communion will be the
Judge of all and the centre and source of all heavenly blessings.
Following this final coming of Christ and his judgment there will be a
new heaven
and a new earth, and all will be new and glorious. This will happen by
the almighty power of God, and we shall be part of this if we are
judged
worthy. If we are not judged worthy, all will be lost. We ought
therefore joyfully
converse with our Lord about these final things and about our eternity
with him when we receive him in Holy
Communion. Holy Commuion is a pledge, a promise and a foretaste of our
eventual union with him both following our personal death, and also at
the end of
time when all will be restored, and death will be no more. Holy
Communion is our pledge of future glory.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: The Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no.1402-1405
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The bread that I will give is my
flesh for the life of the world." (John
6:41-51)
Commentary by Pope
John-Paul II (Encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia,
11)
The Church has received the Eucharist from Christ her Lord not
as one gift – however precious – among so many others, but as the gift
par excellence, for it is the gift of himself, of his person in his
sacred humanity, as well as the gift of his saving work. Nor does it
remain confined to the past, since “all that Christ is – all that he
did and suffered for all men – participates in the divine eternity, and
so transcends all times”(Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1085).
When the Church celebrates the Eucharist, the memorial of her
Lord's death and resurrection, this central event of salvation becomes
really present and “the work of our redemption is carried out” (Lumen
Gentium 3). This sacrifice is so decisive for the salvation of the
human race that Jesus Christ offered it and returned to the Father only
after he had left us a means of sharing in it as if we had been present
there. Each member of the faithful can thus take part in it and
inexhaustibly gain its fruits. This is the faith from which generations
of Christians down the ages have lived. The Church's Magisterium has
constantly reaffirmed this faith with joyful gratitude for its
inestimable gift. I wish once more to recall this truth and to join
you, my dear brothers and sisters, in adoration before this mystery: a
great mystery, a mystery of mercy. What more could Jesus have done for
us? Truly, in the Eucharist, he shows us a love which goes “to the end”
(cf. Jn 13:1), a love which knows no measure.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The objects used in divine worship should have artistic merit, but
bearing in mind that worship is not for the sake of art: art is for the
sake of worship.
(The
Forge, no.836)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How is the Resurrection the work of the
Most Holy Trinity?
The Resurrection of Christ is a transcendent work of God. The three
Persons act together according to what is proper to them: the Father
manifests his power, the Son “takes again” the life which he freely
offered (John 10:17), reuniting his soul and his body which the Spirit
brings to life and glorifies.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.130)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Prayers
today: Lord, be true to your covenant, forget
not the life of your poor ones for ever.
Rise up, O God, and defend your cause; do not ignore the shouts of your
enemies.
Almighty and ever-living God, your
Spirit made us your children, confident to call you Father.
Increase your Spirit within us and bring us to our promised
inheritance.
We
ask this through our Lord Jesus
Christ
your Son,
in the unity
of the Holy Spirit, one God forever.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday
of the nineteenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 14) Saint
Maximilian Mary Kolbe, priest and martyr (1894-1941). Maximilian
Kolbe was born in Poland. He consecrated himself to the Lord in the
Franciscan Order. Filled with love for the Virgin Mary, he founded the
Militia of the Immaculate Mary and, with preaching and writing,
undertook an intense apostolic mission in Europe and Asia. Interned in
Auschwitz during the Second World War, he offered himself in exchange
for the father of a large family who was to be executed. He died of
hunger in the concentration camp prison, and Pope John Paul II
proclaimed him Patron of Our Suffering Century. His life reminds us of
the many problems of our time: hunger, peace and reconciliation among
men, and the need to give meaning to life and death. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Ezechiel
1:2-5, 24-28c; Psalm 148:1-2, 11-12, 13,
14; Matthew
17:22-27
“When they reached Capernaum, the
collectors of the halfshekel came to Peter and said, ‘Does your master
not pay the halfshekel?’ ‘Oh yes’ he replied.” (Matthew 17:22-27)
We see from the
interchange in the
Gospel of today between the collectors of the halfshekel (the temple
tax) and Simon
Peter that our Lord paid his dues and taxes (Matthew 17:22-27).
Perhaps out of respect and recognition
of our Lord’s personal eminence the collector did not approach our Lord
directly about this but instead the one who appeared to be the chief of
his disciples, Simon
Peter. There are other indications in the
Gospels
that our Lord fully respected the laws of the land and the obligations
of citizenship. When challenged by
the scribes and Pharisees as to whether it was lawful to pay taxes to
Caesar or not, he replied that citizens were to render to Caesar what
belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God. There have been many
excellent embodiments of this general directive, and one who
immediately comes
to mind is the great English patron saint of politicians Saint Thomas
More, whose statue now stands in the New South Wales Parliamentary
precincts. Our Lord wants his disciples to be good citizens.
Citizenship is part and parcel of living as a true child of God for
society comes from God, though like every human being it suffers from a
fallen and sinful human condition requiring the grace of God. That is
to say, human society requires the redeeming grace and presence of
Christ and that presence is brought to it by Christ’s faithful, members
of the Church of which he is the living head.
We ought all examine ourselves as to the quality of our citizenship,
because just as being a good citizen was part and parcel of the
Incarnation of the Son of God, so too it is part and parcel of our life
in Christ. Loving and serving Christ involves loving and serving the
men and women of our everyday working life. It means loving and serving
the culture and society and country God has placed us in, while
endeavouring to bring the redeeming presence of Christ into its midst.
It means respecting the laws of our society and cooperating in the
development of its social, economic and political life, except when its
laws and expectations go against the will of God - such as in many
matters of bioethics. In fact, for the lay member of Christ’s faithful
this involvement in the secular life of society is the principal way in
which he exercises his share in the redeeming mission of Christ and the
Church. The lay person must compete for positions in his
workplace if he is to make his way in life and then he is called to
sanctify them. He is called to be involved in
political life at least by his informed vote at elections, but if it is
possible by taking part also in the activities and policy formation of
political parties. It is an excellent thing and a worthy exercise of
the Christian life to be writing letters to the Editors of various
newspapers and thus contributing to the evangelization of our culture.
It is a good thing to enter into talk-back radio programmes when
something important has to be said.
Let us reflect on Christ as citizen, setting us an example of good
citizenship. Let us endeavour by our daily life and work to sanctify
the society and culture around us.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"As they were gathering in Galilee,
Jesus said to them, 'The Son of Man is to be handed over to men, and
they will kill him, and he will be raised on the third day'." (Matthew
17:22-27)
Commentary by St Ambrose (340-397),
Bishop and Doctor of the Church
(Commentary on Psalm 48:14-15)
Which person is so powerful as to offer some atonement for himself in
addition to that which Christ offered when he alone reconciled the
world with God through his own blood? Is there a greater victim, a more
generous sacrifice, a better advocate than Jesus, who interceded for
the sins of all and who gave his life for our redemption?
Thus, no other atonement or ransom is demanded of any of us, since the
ransom for everyone is the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, who alone
reconciled us with the Father. He fulfilled his task to the end, for he
took upon himself our suffering, and he said: “Come to me, all you who…
find life burdensome, and I will refresh you.” (Mt 11:28)… Thus, the
human person will give nothing in atonement for his redemption, for he
has been washed of sin once and for all by the blood of Christ. But
that is not to say that he is freed from making an effort to observe
the precepts of life and not to wander away from the Lord’s
commandments. So long as he is alive, he will labor, and he will
persevere in that so as to live eternally, for fear lest he die the
death although he has already been redeemed from death.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Go perseveringly to the Tabernacle, either bodily or in your heart, so
as to feel safe and calm: but also in order to feel loved ... and to
love.
(The Forge,
no.837)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is the saving meaning of the
Resurrection?
The Resurrection is the climax of the Incarnation. It confirms the
divinity of Christ and all the things which he did and taught. It
fulfills all the divine promises made for us. Furthermore the risen
Christ, the conqueror of sin and death, is the principle of our
justification and our Resurrection. It procures for us now the grace of
filial adoption which is a real share in the life of the only begotten
Son. At the end of time he will raise up our bodies.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.131)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The
solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
(August 15) The
Assumption was celebrated in the liturgy of the East from the
sixth century and in Rome from the seventh century. On November 1,
1950, Pope Pius XII defined the dogma of the Assumption. He solemnly
proclaimed that the belief whereby the Blessed Virgin Mary at the close
of her earthly career was taken up body and soul into the glory of
heaven, really forms part of the deposit of faith received from the
Apostles. It is a dogma of faith and must be believed as revealed by
God. This feast confirms us in the theological virtue of hope whereby
we seek our sanctification and that of others in the midst of ordinary
duties, while at the same time looking to our heavenly goal. (Saints)
Revelation
11:19a;12:1-6a, 10ab; Psalm
45:10, 11, 12, 16; 1
Corinthians 15:20-27;
Luke 1:39-56
“And Mary said: "My
soul
proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my
savior. For he has looked upon his handmaid's lowliness; behold, from
now on will all ages call me blessed. The Mighty One has done great
things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is from age to age to
those who fear him.”
(Luke 1:39-56)
The world
characteristically goes simply
by what it sees, and it counts itself fortunate in the material and
temporal advantages it enjoys. Of course, material and temporal
blessings are indeed blessings and they are gifts from God. We ought
pray for those material benefits we need and be very grateful for those
we have. But it is quite possible to have many material
and temporal benefits and yet to
be absolutely impoverished in what is
more important, such as one’s union with God. A person can enjoy an
excellent and faithful spouse and children, with material prosperity
and success in his profession, and yet be an atheist or an agnostic and
so bereft of a living and conscious union with God.
For the person who knows that the principal purpose of life is to know
and love God, such a life is ultimately lacking in what is absolutely
essential. Mary the mother
of Christ was little known, and apart from her connection with Jesus as
his mother, her life was no different in its circumstances from that of
countless others. She had very few material blessings and like some
others in the ancient world lived to see her Son crucified. There would
have been many who would scarcely have counted her fortunate. But that
is
nothing like an adequate account of the matter. In fact, Mary the
mother of Jesus was the greatest human person who ever lived, greatest
according to the true criterion of greatness which is
Christian
holiness and one’s degree of participation in the redemptive work of
Christ. Thus in her prayer she proclaims the greatness of the Lord for
having done such great things in her. (Luke 1:39-56)
Mary is all-holy. Sin never touched her in any sense whatever, neither
the original sin of our first parents as transmitted to us in our
fallen human nature, nor the personal sin of each human being as his
life proceeds. Mary was by the power of that grace won for us by her
divine Son preserved from original sin and empowered to resist all
temptation to sin be it venial or mortal. She responded fully to all
God’s grace granted to her and for this reason was saluted by the
archangel Gabriel as full of grace and the object of God’s favour. No
creature of God possessed her beauty and greatness of soul and the
secret to her greatness was her total submission to the will and plan
of God. On one occasion when our Lord was speaking a woman from the
crowd raised her voice to praise the mother of such a Son as he. He
replied, better rather to say that blessed is the one who hears the
word of
God and puts it into practice. Undoubtedly he was above all thinking of
his own mother whom the woman in the crowd had just been praising. But
consider this. It was
within the context of a very ordinary and hidden life that this
greatness was achieved and played out. Mary was an ordinary person in
terms of her circumstances and temporal achievements, but great beyond
compare
in the sight of God in terms of her sinlessness and her holiness and
association with Christ in the work of the redemption. It is
because of all this that she was assumed body and soul into
heaven at the end of her mortal life, which is what we celebrate today.
She reigns in heaven as queen mother, glorious in body and soul, with
her Divine Son.
It is the testimony and teaching of the Church which has brought
this
before the attention of the world and it is faith which
wholeheartedly accepts this testimony and teaching. Christ wishes his
disciples to love his mother and to accept her as their own. From the
cross he entrusted her to John to be his mother and from the cross he
entrusted John to her to be her son. The Church has always seen each of
Christ’s disciples involved in that gift. Let us then understand that
the glorious Mary is our mother and our model, just as she was for
Christ himself.
As he was growing up, she was his mother and his model, and he was her
Son and her model. Let us love her and strive to be like her, taking to
heart what she said to the servants at the wedding feast of Cana: “Do
whatever he tells
you”. Let us cultivate a fervent devotion to our Lady, with devotions
such as the daily
Rosary and Angelus which the Church recommends, praying to her each
day, entrusting our Christian life to her care, meditating on her
example and asking constantly for her intercession.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"... heaven was opened, and the ark of
his covenant could be seen in the temple."(Rev
11:19)
Commentary by St John of
Damascus (675-749), Monk, Theologian, Doctor of the Church
(2nd Homily on the Dormition, 2,3)
Today, the holy and living ark of the living God, the one whose womb
carried her own Creator, rests in the Lord’s temple, a temple not built
by human hands. David, her ancestor and God’s relative, dances for joy
(2 Sam 7:14); the angels dance in unison, the archangels applaud, and
the powers of the heavens sing her glory…
She who enabled true life to spring forth for everyone, how could she
fall into the power of death? Certainly, as a daughter of the old Adam,
she submitted to the sentence that was pronounced against him, for her
Son, who is Life itself, did not shy away from it. But as the mother of
the living God, it is just that she be raised up to him… How could she
who received in her womb Life itself, without beginning or end, not be
alive for all eternity? In times past, the first parents of our mortal
race, drunk with the wine of disobedience…, with a heavy spirit because
of the intemperance of sin, fell asleep in the sleep of death. The Lord
had chased and exiled them from the paradise of Eden. Now she who did
not commit any sin and who bore the child of obedience to God and to
the Father, how could paradise not welcome her, not joyfully open its
doors to her? … Since Christ, who is Life and Truth, said: “Where I am,
there will my servant be” (Jn 12:26), how could his mother, all the
more so, not share in his dwelling place? …
So now “that the heavens are rejoicing”, may all the angels acclaim
her. “Let the earth rejoice,” (Ps 96:11), let human beings leap for
joy. Let the air resound with songs of joy; let the night reject its
darkness and its cloak of mourning… For the living city of the Lord,
the God of powers is exalted. From the sanctuary of Zion, kings bring
invaluable gifts (Ps 68:30). Those whom Christ established as princes
over all the earth, the apostles, escort the Mother of God, ever a
virgin, into the Jerusalem on high, which is free and our mother (Gal
4:26).
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I copy some words which a priest wrote for those who followed him in an
apostolic enterprise: “When you contemplate the Sacred Host exposed on
the altar in the monstrance, think how great is the love, the
tenderness of Christ. My way to understand it is by thinking of the
love I have for you: if I could be far away, working, and at the same
time at the side of each one of you, how gladly I would do it! But
Christ really can do it! He loves us with a love that is infinitely
greater than the love that all the hearts of the world could hold; and
he has stayed with us so that we can join ourselves at any time to his
most Sacred Humanity, and so that he can help us, console us,
strengthen us, so that we may be faithful.”
(The Forge,
no.838)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What does the Ascension mean?
After forty days during which Jesus showed himself to the apostles with
ordinary human features which veiled his glory as the Risen One, Christ
ascended into heaven and was seated at the right hand of the Father. He
is the Lord who now in his humanity reigns in the everlasting glory of
the Son of God and constantly intercedes for us before the Father. He
sends us his Spirit and he gives us the hope of one day reaching the
place he has prepared for us.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.132)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday
of the Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time
(August 16) Saint Stephen of
Hungary. Born in Hungary about the year 969, he received baptism
and in the year 1000 was crowned King of Hungary. He was a just,
peaceful and religious king, keeping strictly to the laws of the Church
and always seeking the good of his subjects. He established many
dioceses and did much to strengthen the life of the Church. He died at
Szekesfehervar in the ear 1038. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Ezechiel
9:1-7; 10:18-22; Psalm 113:1-2, 3-4, 5-6;
Matthew 18:15-20
Then the glory of
the LORD left the threshold of the temple and
rested upon the cherubim. These lifted their wings, and I saw them rise
from the earth, the wheels rising along with them. They stood at the
entrance of the eastern gate of the LORD'S house, and the glory of the
God of Israel was up above them. these were the living creatures I had
seen beneath the God of Israel by the river Chebar, whom I now
recognized to be cherubim. Each ohad four faces and four wings;
something like human hands were under their wings. Their faces looked
just like those I had seen by the river Chebar; each one went straight
forward. (Ezechiel
9:1-7; 10:18-22)
The Old Testament book of the prophet Ezechiel contains lofty
passages
speaking of Ezechiel’s experience of the glory of God, and our passage
today is one such. The prophet is granted a vision of the glory of the
Lord in the Temple. When the “scourges of the city” came in and halted
in front of the bronze altar, God gave to them his instructions to
punish evildoers and to spare the good. They were to begin at the
sanctuary. “Then the glory of the LORD left the threshold of the temple
and rested
upon the
cherubim.” The prophet repeats the point that above
the cherubim “was the glory of the God of Israel.” (Ezechiel 9:1-7;
10:18-22) As we meditate on these inspired lines, we
are led to appreciate anew the glory of the God who has revealed
himself to us. There are two notable features of God which the
Scriptures present very clearly. There is his utter transcendence, and
there is his ineffable nearness to us. In many respects it is his
transcendence which is especially (but not exclusively) portrayed in
the Old Testament, and it is especially his nearness as our Father
which is portrayed in the New Testament - although this division cannot
be pressed very far. For the Christian who is very used to the notion
of the nearness of God, there is the danger of his losing an
appropriate sense of his glory and transcendence. Passages such as that
of today can help to preserve in our hearts a sense of the glory of our
heavenly Father.
The fact that the prophet saw the glory of the Lord displayed precisely
in the Temple is also of relevance. We remember how in the
Gospel of St John our Lord entered the Temple and saw the buyers and
sellers with the animals and the birds and the money changers busy at
their work. Our Lord’s sense of the glory of his heavenly Father in the
Temple led
him to drive them all out, with the rebuke that they were turning his
“Father’s house” into a market place. Our Lord is our model of one who
was filled with a sense of the glory of God and his nearness. We in our
own lives are very prone to forget the glory of the Lord in his Temple
which is the local parish church. In our local parish church there
dwells in the Tabernacle the Lord of lords and the King of kings in
all his glory, but his glory is hidden. We do not see his glory as did
the prophet Ezechiel, but that same glory is there because it is the
risen and glorious Jesus who is present there in his entire reality.
Our danger is that, day after day and week after week as we visit the
church, or as we see it in the distance or as we pass by, or when we
come
to Sunday Mass, we will take no pains to acknowledge the glory of the
Lord there. Then when we receive our Lord in Holy Communion we ought be
especially alive to his glory. He comes to us in Holy Communion in his
glory but with this same glory veiled under other appearances. How much
time do we spend
with Christ in Holy Communion, how much attention do we give him? When
he is with us he is the Lord of glory.
May I suggest to you, dear visitor, a practical way to grow in a sense
and love for the glory of God? Say very often and with attention and
devotion the beautiful prayer we say at the end of every decade of the
Rosary, and often at the end of various prayers: “Glory be to the
Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the
beginning, is now and every shall be, world without end. Amen.”
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"For where two or three
are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”(Mt 18:15-20)
Commentary from Vatican
Council II (Sacrosanctum
Concilium,
Constitution on the Liturgy, § 7)
Christ is always present in His Church, especially in her
liturgical celebrations. He is present in the sacrifice of the Mass,
not only in the person of His minister, "the same now offering, through
the ministry of priests, who formerly offered himself on the cross"
(20), but especially under the eucharistic species. By His power He is
present in the sacraments, so that when a man baptizes it is really
Christ Himself who baptizes (21). He is present in His word, since it
is He Himself who speaks when the holy scriptures are read in the
Church. He is present, lastly, when the Church prays and sings, for He
promised: "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there
am I in the midst of them" (Matt. 18:20).
Christ indeed always associates the Church with Himself in this great
work wherein God is perfectly glorified and men are sanctified. The
Church is His beloved Bride who calls to her Lord, and through Him
offers worship to the Eternal Father. Rightly, then, the liturgy is
considered as an exercise of the priestly office of Jesus Christ. In
the liturgy…, the whole public worship is performed by the Mystical
Body of Jesus Christ, that is, by the Head and His members. From this
it follows that every liturgical celebration, because it is an action
of Christ the priest and of His Body which .s the Church, is a sacred
action surpassing all others; no other action of the Church can equal
its efficacy by the same title and to the same degree.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Don’t think that turning your life into service is easy. This good
desire needs to be translated into deeds, for “the kingdom of God does
not consist in talk, but in power”, as the Apostle teaches us.
Moreover, the practice of constantly helping other people is not
possible without sacrifice.
(The Forge,
no.839)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How does the Lord Jesus now reign?
As the Lord of the cosmos and of history, the Head of his Church, the
glorified Christ mysteriously remains on earth where his kingdom is
already present in seed and in its beginning in the Church. One day he
will return in glory but we do not know the time. Because of this we
live in watchful anticipation, praying “Come, Lord” (Revelation 22:20)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.133)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time II
(August 17) Today let us think of Saint Hyacinth (Saints)
Scripture today:
Ezechiel
12:1-12; Psalm 78:56-57, 58-59, 61-62;
Matthew 18:21-19:1
Then Peter approaching
asked him, "Lord, if my brother sins
against me, how often must I forgive him? As many as seven times?"
Jesus answered, "I say to you, not seven times but seventy-seven times.
That is why the kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who decided
to settle accounts with his servants. When he began the accounting, a
debtor was brought before him who owed him a huge amount. Since he had
no way of paying it back, his master ordered him to be sold, along with
his wife, his children, and all his property, in payment of the debt.
At that, the servant fell down, did him homage, and said, 'Be patient
with me, and I will pay you back in full.' Moved with compassion the
master of that servant let him go and forgave him the loan. When that
servant had left, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a
much smaller amount. He seized him and started to choke him, demanding,
'Pay back what you owe.' Falling to his knees, his fellow servant
begged him, 'Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.' But he
refused. Instead, he had him put in prison until he paid back the debt.
Now when his fellow servants saw what had happened, they were deeply
disturbed, and went to their master and reported the whole affair. His
master summoned him and said to him, 'You wicked servant! I forgave you
your entire debt because you begged me to. Should you not have had pity
on your fellow servant, as I had pity on you?' Then in anger his master
handed him over to the torturers until he should pay back the whole
debt. So will my heavenly Father do to you, unless each of you forgives
his brother from his heart." When Jesus finished these words, he left
Galilee and went to the district of Judea across the Jordan. (Matthew
18:21-19:1)
The
problem of evil and suffering is proverbial and how it is to be
reconciled with the existence of a good and almighty God is a
long-standing philosophical problem. The Christian grants the problem
and points to the
person of Christ who in his life and death showed the way to complete
abandonment to God while at the same time accepting and indeed
embracing untold suffering. The endurance of suffering and evil while
maintaining one’s faith in God is one thing, but the further
challenge is to forgive the one who has caused the evil and suffering
that has been endured.
One of the most universal problems of man and one that is capable of
causing life-long complications and ultimately the loss
of eternal life, is related to forgiveness. The problem is caused when
forgiveness is refused. Once again, the Christian looks to
Christ as the exemplar of forgiveness. Christ prayed to the
Father that all who made him suffer would be forgiven. In our Gospel
passage today (Matthew
18:21-19:1) our Lord is asked by Peter -
perhaps representing the Twelve, and indirectly all of Christ’s future
disciples - how often “must I forgive my brother if he wrongs me?” Let
us note that Peter’s question assumes that I “must” forgive my brother,
indicating that the obligation to forgive was the teaching they had
received from our Lord. The further question asked here is “how often”
I am obliged
to do this. The questioner is implying that there ought be a limit to
forgiveness if the wrongs continue.
Our Lord’s answer is that forgiveness ought never be refused, no matter
how often one is wronged. Our Lord is not saying that wrongdoing ought
go unresisted and unpunished against what is required for public
order in society, but in his teaching he is surely addressing the human
tendency to resentment and hatred of heart for wrongs endured and
unrequited. It is impossible that all human rights be protected this
side of the grave for many are far beyond the reach of public and
private protection. Our Lord is teaching us that we must forgive from
the heart, and informs us that there is a sanction if we refuse this
forgiveness from the heart. In his parable in today’s Gospel (Matthew
18:21-19:1) our Lord
likens the one who refuses to forgive to the steward who is forgiven an
utterly impossible debt by his king. The steward then proceeds to
punish a fellow servant who owed him a debt which while being
substantial could never be remotely compared with the debt he had just
been forgiven. The king threw him into the hands of the torturers when
he heard of it. “And that is how my heavenly Father will deal with you
unless you each forgive your brother from your heart”, our Lord
concluded. We know, then, that there will be great penalties coming to
the one who deliberately refuses to forgive for God has forgiven each
person so much. In the Lord’s Prayer our
Lord instructs us to ask forgiveness from our heavenly Father for our
sins, but adds to this request our commitment to forgive those who have
wronged us. Our Lord goes on to warn that if we do
not forgive others, our heavenly Father will not forgive us either.
If we want to follow our Lord closely as his true disciples, we must
come to terms with our deep-seated tendency to resent and to hate and
to refuse to forgive the one who hurts us. There are many
examples in human history of people who forgave, but the greatest of
all is Christ, and his teaching on the matter is unambiguous and
uncompromising. We must forgive from the heart, and as often as we are
wronged. God has forgiven us, and he offers us the
grace to forgive our brother who has wronged us. Let us ask for the
grace to imitate Christ in this
fundamental virtue, as in everything.
(E.J.Tyler)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Should you not have dealt
mercifully with your fellow servant, as I dealt with you?”
(Matt
18:21-19:1)
Commentary by Saint
Faustina Kowalska (1905-1938), Religious [Small Diary, p. 163
(1937)]
Oh my God, most Holy Trinity, I want to adore your mercy through
each breath of my being, each beat of my heart, each beat of my pulse.
I want to be entirely transformed into your mercy and thus to be a
living reflection of you, Lord. May the greatest of your divine
attributes, your unfathomable mercy, be poured out onto my neighbour
through my soul and through my heart.
Help me, Lord, so that my eyes will be merciful, so that I never
suspect or judge according to appearances, but that I discern the
beauty in my neighbour’s soul and that I come to his help. Help me,
Lord, so that my ear will be merciful, so that I bend to the needs of
my neighbour and do not remain indifferent to his pain and groaning.
Help me, Lord, so that my tongue is merciful, so that I never say
anything bad about my neighbour, but that I have a word of consolation
and forgiveness for each person. Help me, Lord, so that my hands are
merciful and filled with good works, so that I know how to do good to
my neighbour and to take upon myself the heaviest and most displeasing
tasks. Help me, Lord, so that my feet are merciful, so that I hasten to
help my neighbour while overcoming my own fatigue and weariness. My
true rest is to serve my neighbour.
Help me, Lord, so that my heart is merciful, so that I feel all my
neighbour’s suffering. I will not refuse to give my heart to anyone. I
will sincerely frequent even those of whom I know that they will abuse
of my kindness. And as for me, I will lock myself into the most
merciful heart of Jesus. I will remain silent about my own suffering.
May your mercy rest in me, Lord.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You must always have, in everything, the same “instinct” as the Church.
For this, you must acquire the spiritual and doctrinal training that
you need, which will make you a person of sound judgment in temporal
matters, humble and quick to correct yourself when you realise you have
made a mistake. Correcting your own mistakes, nobly, is a very human
and very supernatural way of using your freedom.
(The Forge,
no.840)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How will the coming of the Lord in glory happen?
After the final cosmic upheaval of this passing world the glorious
coming of Christ will take place. Then will come the definitive triumph
of God in the parousia and the Last Judgment. Thus the Kingdom of God
will be realized.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.134)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday
of the Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time
(August 18) Today let us think of Saint
Jane Frances de Chantal (Saints)
Scripture today: Ezechiel 16:
59-63; Isaiah 12:2-3, 4bcd,
5-6; Matthew 19:3-12
Some Pharisees approached him, and tested him,
saying, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause
whatever?" He said in reply, "Have you not read that from the beginning
the Creator 'made them male and female' and said, 'For this reason a
man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and
the two shall become one flesh'? So they are no longer two, but one
flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must
separate." They said to him, "Then why did Moses command that the man
give the woman a bill of divorce and dismiss her?" He said to them,
"Because of the hardness of your hearts Moses allowed you to divorce
your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. I say to you, whoever
divorces his wife (unless the marriage is unlawful) and marries another
commits adultery."
(Matthew 19:3-12)
During
these days (mid-August '06) the media is giving plenty of space to the
Prime Minister’s
announcement that the Coalition Government members of Federal
Parliament will be given a conscience vote in relation to the issue of
the use for research of embryonic stem cells. The lines have
immediately been drawn and there are many in the Federal Parliament who
are determined that legislation will be passed legalizing these
procedures. The reason? The reason they give for their position is that
embryonic stem cells offer excellent material for therapeutic treatment
of diseases. Of little importance for them is the consideration that
all the evidence points to adult stem cells offering the best potential
for medical treatment. Furthermore, embryonic stem cells are taken from
the human embryo and this therfore involves to damaging and destroying
embryonic human beings for the benefit of medical research and human
therapy. Human beings at their
most defenceless and voiceless stage will be surgically attacked for a
supposed ultimate advantage. All this involves a philosophy of rank
utilitarianism and the disregard of the absolute value of each human
being. Already in Australia there are perhaps near to one hundred
thousand abortions performed annually, without considering the coming
use of what has been called the “abortion pill”. With this looming
legislation human embryos will
be artificially created in order to be manipulated and experimented on.
Think of how
the creative hand of God is being forced into such proximity with such
gross and objective evil!
In our Gospel today
(Matthew 19:3-12) our
Lord is asked if it is in accordance with the Law of God to divorce
one’s spouse for “any pretext whatever”. Our Lord unambiguously states
that this was never the plan of God, and that God intended man and wife
to be one and never to be divided. The Law of Moses in this matter did
not reflect the Law of God but Moses’ management of the people’s
hardness of heart. The point here, though, is that we are reminded of
the contrast between the mind of Christ and that of the world. The
Christian in secular society is called to bear witness to Christ’s
teaching in the matter of all that pertains to the sanctity of life,
and to do so in the midst of opposition, ridicule and much
incomprehension. A great outgrowth of the Enlightenment was the
utilitarian system developed and propagated by the likes of Bentham and
the two Mills in nineteenth century Britain. Our secular society has
been silently conquered by their utilitarian positivism, an outlook
which looks on things and persons in terms of their utility, accepting
as true and worthwhile only what can be empirically tested and
measured. So, such persons ask, by what empirical measure can the life
of a seriously handicapped infant be deemed to be useful or of value?
None, they say - so let it be discarded while still in the womb for the
sake of something more useful to man’s happiness. This point is
developed further and taken to include the minuscule embryo and its
stem cells. The “useful” thing to do for the happiness of man is to get
at and extract those stem cells that probably offer so many therapeutic
possibilities and put them to testable and empirical use. Research will
benefit and so will the health of very many sufferers, even though
those microscopic embryos are destroyed in the process.
The Christian has
the
benefit of the light of Christ as transmitted by
the Church, enabling him to know with certainty what is of absolute
value. One of the greatest needs of our culture is the appreciation of
what is of true absolute value. If this is not grasped, our culture
will be in serious decay and on the road to various forms of death. The
Christian in our secular and utilitarian society has a most important
battle ahead of him - the propagation of
Christ’s doctrine. He must choose between Christ and all that is
opposed to Christ and his teaching. Christ is
the Lord of life and Satan the father of death. Let us choose for
Christ and work heartily for the triumph of his kingdom.
(E.J.Tyler)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Some Pharisees approached him, and tested him,
saying, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause
whatever?" He said in reply, "Have you not read that from the beginning
the Creator 'made them male and female' and said, 'For this reason a
man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and
the two shall become one flesh'? So they are no longer two, but one
flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must
separate."
(Matthew 19:3-12)
Commentary by Pope John Paul II (Talk to the
Synod on Family Life (October 1980), §5)
Before his death, on the very threshold of the paschal mystery, Christ
prayed, saying: “Father most holy, protect them with your name which
you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.” (Jn
17:11) In so doing, he also asked, maybe in a very special way, for the
unity of spouses and of families. He prayed for the unity of his
disciples, for the unity of the Church. And Saint Paul compared the
mystery of the Church with marriage (Ephesians 5:32). Thus, the Church
not only gives the family a part in her care, but in a certain sense,
she also considers the family to be her model. In the love of Christ,
her Spouse, who loved us even unto death, the Church contemplates
husbands and wives who have promised to love one another throughout
their lives until death. And she considers it to be her singular
obligation to protect that love.
Marriage is a sacrament. Those who were baptized in the name of the
Lord are also married in his name. Their love is a participation in
God’s love. He is its source. The marriage of Christian couples is like
the image here on earth of the marvel of God’s life, a life, which is
the loving and fruitful communion of the three persons in one single
God, and of God’s covenant with the Church in Christ. Christian
marriage is a sacrament of salvation; for each member of the family, it
is the path to sanctity.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is an urgent need for spreading the doctrine of Christ. Store up
your training, fill yourself with clear ideas, with the fulness of the
Christian message, so that afterwards you can pass it on to others. Do
not expect God to illuminate you, for he has no reason to when you have
definite human means available to you: study and work.
(The Forge, no. 841)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How will Christ judge the living and the dead?
Christ will judge with the power he has gained as the Redeemer of the
world who came to bring salvation to all. The secrets of hearts will be
brought to light as well as the conduct of each one toward God and
toward his neighbour. Everyone, according to how he has lived, will
either be filled with life or damned for eternity. In this way, “the
fullness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:13) will come about in which “God will
be all in all” (1 Corinthians 15:28)
(Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church,
no.135)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the nineteenth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 9) Saint
John Eudes, priest.
Born in the diocese of
Seez in France in the year 1601, he was ordained priest and spent many
years preaching as a missioner. He founded congregations with the
object of educating priests in seminaries and of rescuing women who
were in moral danger. He strenuously promoted devotion to the Sacred
Heart of Jesus and Mary. He died in 1680. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Ezechiel
18:1-10.13.30-32; Psalm 51:12-13, 14-15,
18-19; Matthew 19:13-15
Then children were brought to
him that he
might lay his hands on
them and pray. The disciples rebuked them, but Jesus said, "Let the
children come to me, and do not prevent them; for the kingdom of heaven
belongs to such as these." After he placed his hands on them, he went
away. (Matthew
19:13-15)
Consider the
simple action portrayed in our Gospel today.
“People brought little children to Jesus, for him to lay his hands on
them and say a prayer.” After rebuking his disciples for attempting to
dissuade the people from doing this, “he laid his hands on them and
went on his way.” (Matthew
19:13-15) What
are we talking about here? It is God himself become man praying for a
child and imparting a blessing upon that child. What a wonderful thing
for this to have happened to any child! We cannot imagine what might
have been the effect on that child’s life of the prayer and the
blessing of the Son of God. The people who brought their children knew
that our Lord was a person of immense holiness and that his prayer for
the child would be of inestimable value. Consider the effect of other
prayers that Christ said. Just before he raised Lazarus from the dead
he prayed to the Father saying that he, the Father always heard his
prayer - and then he proceeded to raise Lazarus from four days in the
grave. When dying on the cross he prayed to the Father that those who
had rejected him would be forgiven as they did not know what they were
doing. The effect of this prayer? Well, we cannot help but recall that
three thousand embraced the Faith when Peter preached to them at
Pentecost. Peter told them that he knew that they had not known what
they were doing when they rejected the Messiah, and so we may presume
that many of these converts were among those who had indeed rejected
Christ. Such was the power of Christ’s prayer. It is this prayer of
Christ that we think of as we think of him blessing and praying for the
children who had been brought to him.
We are told
in the Letter to the Hebrews that Christ is continually at
the right hand of the Father now interceding for us his brothers. This
same Christ who intercedes with us makes himself present above all at
Mass when his sacrifice at Calvary on our behalf is made present
sacramentally. The Christ who interceded for all mankind and for each
of us on the Cross makes present that very intercession, so powerful
that it redeemed the world. Christ taught us that if we wish to enter
the kingdom of heaven we must become as little children. We could
perhaps start by identifying with the little children who were brought
to him by their parents in order to receive his blessing and his
prayer. We are children of Mary the mother of Christ, for Christ gave
her to us at Calvary when he told his beloved disciple to take her for
his mother. Mary is our mother and the mother and model of the entire
Church. Let us place ourselves in her keeping, in her maternal arms,
and ask her to take us into the presence of her Son as did the parents
of the children in our Gospel today. Let us ask Mary our mother to
present us to Jesus, that she ask him to give to us his special
blessing and
his prayer as we set out each day to live as his disciples. We need the
prayer and the blessing of Christ, and he will not withhold it if we
become like little children with Mary as our intercessor. We will be
like little children if we
entrust ourselves to the care of Christ’s mother, just as the Father
entrusted his Son to her keeping by the power of the Holy Spirit. In
fact, let this be our attitude all our life long, entrusting ourselves
to the care of Mary so that she can take us to her Son and keep us in
his presence receiving his blessings.
With Mary
let us ask Christ our Lord to pour out his blessings on us so
that we may be able to follow him closely, all the way to the cross
which is the hallmark of his true disciples.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Let
the
children come to me… The kingdom of God belongs to such as these.”
(Mat.
19:13-15)
Comment by Blessed
Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997), Foundress of the Missionary
Sisters of Charity
(No Greater Love)
This is the path of trusting love:
- to give oneself in a way that is absolute, unconditional and
unchanging to God our Father, even when everything seems doomed to
failure;
- to see only him as our rampart and help;
- to refuse doubt and discouragement, to abandon all our anxieties and
concerns to the Lord, and to continue to go forward in perfect freedom;
- to dare to be free of all fear of obstacles, knowing that “nothing is
impossible with God” (Lk 1:37);
- to count on our heavenly Father for everything in a spontaneous
movement of abandonment, like that of children, remaining convinced of
our radical nothingness, but nevertheless sure of his paternal
goodness, if necessary with boldness
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Error does not only darken the
understanding: it also sunders wills.
But the truth will set you free from the partisan spirit that dries up
charity.
(The Forge,
no.842)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What does the Church mean when she
confesses: “I believe in the Holy Spirit”?
To believe in the Holy Spirit is to profess faith in the Third Person
of the Most Holy Trinity who proceeds from the Father and the Son and
“is worshipped and glorified with the Father and the Son”.The Spirit is
“sent into our hearts” (Galatians 4:6) so that we might receive new
life as sons of God.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.136)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Twentieth
Sunday of Ordinary Time B
(August 20) Saint Bernard, abbot
and doctor of the Church (1090-1153). Born in France he became a
Cistercian abbot and great preacher. He fought for the peace and unity
of the Church against schism. He wrote many treatises on the Blessed
Virgin Mary and Jesus Christ, as well as many works of theology and
asceticism. Obedience and love for the Church was his concern.
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Proverbs
9:1-6; Psalm 34:2-3, 4-5,
6-7; Ephesians 5:15-20;
John 6:51-58
“I
am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats
this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my
flesh for the life of the world." The Jews quarreled among themselves,
saying, "How can this man give us (his) flesh to eat?" Jesus said to
them, "Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of
Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats
my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on
the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.
Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.
Just as the living Father sent me and I have life because of the
Father, so also the one who feeds on me will have life because of me.
This is the bread that came down from heaven. Unlike your ancestors who
ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live forever”.
(John
6:51-58)
God
became man to save the world from sin and death and to
give us life in abundance. The world and man came from the hand of God
alive and destined for life, but as St Paul tells us sin entered the
world
through one man and with sin came
death, and death has spread through the whole human race. Our Lord said
that he had come to bring life in abundance, and this comes through
union with him. How then would Christ bring the life of God to mankind
through union with him? It was primarily by means of the Holy Eucharist.
The constant problem is
that we tend to live in
the light of those things we see, feel, hear, taste and smell either on
the large or the small scale. The important things in life therefore
tend to be material possessions, the influence and control we
manage to acquire, or the pleasure that comes our way. These are
generally judged to be the real things, the things that count for all
practical purposes. Even if we are committed to our Catholic Faith, the
danger is that there will nevertheless be a large part of our heart
given to these more temporal and material things. For the natural
man life consists in what is tangible. To call a life which is not seen
and felt and enjoyed in a material sense an abundant life is viewed as
unreal. In sum, to the extent that we are like
this we tend not to be very interested in what our Lord promises. We
may have some surface interest in it, and if our Lord were to
appear among us we would be very excited, but in terms of having a
great love for the gift he offers we tend to be seriously lacking.
In our
Gospel today
(John
6:51-58) our
Lord pinpoints exactly what will bring us eternal life. Once begun,
natural life is sustained by nourishment, and the same applies to
eternal
life. Christ and he alone is the living food that gives to man life
for ever. When our Lord refers to himself as this food, he means this
literally. Our Lord said quite publicly that “my flesh is real food and
my blood is real drink. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives
in me and I live in him.” We may wonder why our Lord in that public
situation did not explain how he would do it, that he would give his
body and his blood as food in a sacramental way and not in a physical
way. After all, as Archbishop Fulton Sheen used to say, he lost the
masses when he taught this doctrine. My supposition is that our Lord
put his doctrine in all its starkness in order to drive home to his
hearers that he would literally be giving his flesh to be eaten and his
blood to be drunk. He wanted this extraordinary doctrine to be taken
very seriously, literally, and in all its newness, even if it meant the
loss of many of
his disciples. I suspect that if
he had explained that he would give them his body and his blood under
the appearances of bread and wine, the bread and wine would have been
widely understood to be symbols
only, and not as literally his body and blood. It was in the privacy of
his Last Supper with his apostles that he showed that he would give his
body and his blood in a sacramental way, under the appearances of bread
and wine.
Apart from the starkness of his doctrine about his being
real
food, Christ makes it clear that it is primarily through and in the
Eucharist that eternal life is given to us throughout our life. The
Eucharist is the source of and the
principal moment in the eternal life enjoyed by each baptised member of
the Church and by the whole Church itself. This is clear from our
Lord’s words in our Gospel today. “As I who am sent by the living
Father myself draw life from the Father, so whoever eats me will draw
life from me.” Our ongoing Christian life will come primarily from
consuming Christ worthily in the Eucharist. So there is a lot at stake
in participating in Mass and receiving our Lord in Holy Communion and
making the very most of it. Our tendency will be to regard it as
important, yes, but together with many other things. Whereas it is
obvious from our Lord’s words that the Eucharist is the most important
element in
our ongoing Christian life. Nothing compares with it. Mass and Holy
Communion is the most important reason for being a Catholic and indeed
for being a Christian, even though many Christians separated from the
Catholic
Church do not have access to the true Eucharist, and indeed do not
believe in it.
Let us pray for the
grace to appreciate how
central to the Christian life is the Holy Eucharist. The Eucharistic
Jesus is the summit and source of the life of the Church and of the
life of each and all of us. Let us strive to live this truth and to
make it central to our spiritual lives.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further Reading: Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no.1324-1327
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“My flesh is true food, and my blood
is true drink”(John 6:51-58)
Comment by Pope BenedictXVI
(Homily, Eucharistic celebration on World Youth
Day, Sunday, 21 August 2005)
"This is my Body, given in sacrifice for you. This cup is the New
Covenant in my Blood".What is happening? How can Jesus distribute his
Body and his Blood? By making the bread into his Body and the wine into
his Blood, he anticipates his death, he accepts it in his heart, and he
transforms it into an action of love. What on the outside is simply
brutal violence - the Crucifixion - from within becomes an act of total
self-giving love. This is the substantial transformation which was
accomplished at the Last Supper and was destined to set in motion a
series of transformations leading ultimately to the transformation of
the world when God will be all in all (cf. I Cor 15: 28).
In their hearts, people always and everywhere have somehow expected a
change, a transformation of the world. Here now is the central act of
transformation that alone can truly renew the world: violence is
transformed into love, and death into life. Since this act transmutes
death into love, death as such is already conquered from within, the
Resurrection is already present in it. Death is, so to speak, mortally
wounded, so that it can no longer have the last word.
This first fundamental transformation of violence into love, of death
into life, brings other changes in its wake. Bread and wine become his
Body and Blood. But it must not stop there; on the contrary, the
process of transformation must now gather momentum. The Body and Blood
of Christ are given to us so that we ourselves will be transformed in
our turn. We are to become the Body of Christ, his own Flesh and Blood.
We all eat the one bread, and this means that we ourselves become one.
In this way, adoration, as we said earlier, becomes union. God no
longer simply stands before us as the One who is totally Other. He is
within us, and we are in him. His dynamic enters into us and then seeks
to spread outwards to others until it fills the world, so that his love
can truly become the dominant measure of the world.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You spend your time with that companion of yours who is
scarcely
even civil to you: and it’s hard. Keep at it, and don’t judge him.
He’ll have his “reasons”, just as you have yours, which you strengthen
so as to pray for him more each day.
(The Forge,
no.843)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why are
the missions of the Son and the Holy Spirit inseparable?
In the indivisible Trinity, the Son and the Spirit are distinct
but inseparable. From the very beginning until the end of time, when
the Father sends his Son he also sends his Spirit who unites us to
Christ in faith so that as adopted sons we can call God “Father”
(Romans 8:15). The Spirit is invisible but we know him through his
actions, when he reveals the Word to us and when he acts in the Church.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.137)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday
of the twentieth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 21) Saint Pius X, Pope.
Born at Riese in the province of Venice in the year 1835, he became a
priest and excelled in the duties given to him. After being first
Bishop of Mantua and then Patrriarch of Venice, he was elected pope in
the year 1903, following Pope Leo XIII. He chose the name Pius because
of his high regard for Pope Pius IX, now Blessed. He made it his object
in his pontificate to restore all things in Christ, and he did this by
his simplicity, his poverty and his fortitude. He renewed the true
Christian life among the faithful and he fought strenuously against the
errors of Modernism which were sweeping through certain sectors of the
Church at the time. He died on 20 August in 1914. (Saints)
Scripture
today: Ezechiel
24:15-23; Deuteronomy 32:18-19, 20, 21;
Matthew 19:16-22
“Now
someone approached him and
said, "Teacher, what good must I do to gain eternal life?" He answered
him, "Why do you ask me about the good? There is only One who is good.
If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments." He asked him,
"Which ones?" And Jesus replied, " 'You shall not kill; you shall not
commit adultery; you shall not steal; you shall not bear false witness;
honour your father and your mother'; and 'you shall love your neighbour
as yourself.'" The young man said to him, "All of these I have
observed. What do I still lack?" Jesus said to him, "If you wish to be
perfect, go, sell what you have and give to (the) poor, and you will
have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me." When the young man
heard this statement, he went away sad, for he had many possessions.” (Matthew
19:16-22)
Vast
energies of
mankind have been directed in a plethora of different
directions. Some people have striven with all their might to make
money, to
achieve eminence in politics or literature. Others have given their
lives to sport and others to this or that profession. There are various
ways of looking at this human phenomenon, but one thing it
manifests is the natural and God-given desire for growth, development
and perfection. Man has a
natural desire to grow and flourish and to make the best of himself and
his possibilities. Very many do not bother to cultivate this desire but
others do and they achieve very good things in life. But there is this
question: in what most of all will man achieve his perfection as a man?
This is an important question because one can spend one’s life seeking
the best in very ephemeral things, things that simply do not matter
much and which certainly do not add to one's own growth and perfection
as
a human being. For instance, one can spend one’s life focussed on
horse racing and on the gambling associated with that. In the meantime
many far more fundamental aspects of one’s life can go without
receiving any attention or care. And so we have, say, a famous film
star committing suicide - he or she worked for perfection in one area
of life and totally neglected other more fundamental areas. In what,
then, does human perfection most of all consist for every man, and on
which he should be working all his life long?
Christ answers this
in today’s Gospel passage (Matthew
19:16-22). A young man came to
Jesus and asked him how he could get to heaven. Our Lord told him
simply and clearly: it is necessary to keep the commandments, and our
Lord specifically mentioned those commandments that related to the
treatment of one’s parents, spouse and neighbour. The young man
responded saying that he had kept all these, and that really he wanted
to know what more he needed to do. The young man was a good and
generous and religious man and he aspired to more, to a higher place in
heaven. He knew that the perfection he was seeking had to do with
his response to God. Our Lord responded by telling him that if he
wished to be perfect - implying that such an aspiration is legitimate
and most praiseworthy - then he ought go and divest himself of his many
possessions, give them to the poor and then come and follow him. It was
a wonderful invitation and it promised the heights of the perfection
man is called to by God and which God wishes to give him. The young man
went off sad - for his heart was divided. He did not really want
perfection as our Lord had laid out before him. How like so many
persons of such promise! But let us consider here the teaching of our
Lord on this point of how human perfection is to be acquired. Human
perfection will be found
in the following of Jesus Christ, and the more total and undivided is
the following of him the greater is the access to human perfection.
Other things
in life by all means may be sought and worked at, and indeed other
things should be worked at, but all within the framework of a total
following of Christ.
Let us resolve to
make the very best of the gift of life by seeking to
maximise our potential for growth and for the doing of good. But let us
be clear about the way to this perfection. Christ is the way to it, the
truth about it and the fullness of life. By being united to him and by
following closely in his footsteps in true poverty of spirit that true
perfection will be granted to us in the measure intended by God.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"If
you wish to be
perfect, go, sell what you have and give to (the) poor.."
(Matthew
19:16-22)
Commentary by St. Teresa of
Avila (1515-82), Spanish Carmelite nun, Doctor of the Church
Interior Castle,
Mansion 3, Chapter 1
O Jesus! can any one declare that he does not desire this
great
blessing, especially after he has passed through the chief
difficulties? No; no one can! We all say we desire it, but there is
need of more than that for the Lord to possess entire dominion over the
soul. It is not enough to say so, any more than it was enough for the
young man when our Lord told him what he must do if he desired to be
perfect…
Enter then, enter, my daughters, into your interior; pass
beyond the
thought of your own petty works, which are no more, nor even as much,
as Christians are bound to perform: let it suffice that you are God's
servants, do not pursue so much as to catch nothing. Think of the
saints, who have entered the Divine Presence, and you will see the
difference between them and ourselves. Do not ask for what you do not
deserve, nor should we ever think, however much we may have done for
God, that we merit the reward of the saints, for we have offended Him.
Oh, humility, humility! I know not why, but I am always tempted to
think that persons who complain so much of aridities must be a little
wanting in this virtue…Let us try ourselves, my sisters, or let our
Lord try us; He knows well how to do so (although we often pretend to
misunderstand Him)…
If we turn our backs on Him and go away sorrowfully like
the youth
in the Gospel when He tells us what to do to be perfect, what can God
do? for He must proportion the reward to our love for Him. This love,
my daughters, must not be the fabric of our imagination; we must prove
it by our works. Yet do not suppose that our Lord has need of any works
of ours; He only expects us to manifest our goodwill…if we continue in
it… doubtless, by persevering in this poverty and detachment of soul,
we shall obtain all for which we strive. But, mark this - it must be on
one condition - that we `hold ourselves for unprofitable servants.’
(Luke 12:48)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You make such a mess of your own life - how can you be surprised if
other people are not angels?
(The Forge,
no.844)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What are the names of the Holy Spirit?
“The Holy Spirit” is the proper name of the third Person of the Most
Holy Trinity. Jesus also called him the Paraclete (Consoler or
Advocate) and the Spirit of Truth. The New Testament also refers to him
as the Spirit of Christ, or the Lord, or God - the Spirit of Glory and
the Spirit of the Promise.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.138)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday
of the twentieth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 22) The Queenship of
Mary This celebration was instituted by
Pope Pius XII in 1954. Mary participates in the glorious and universal
kingship of Christ. The foundation of this privilege Mary is he
intimate association with the Redemption performed by her Son. She is
also the mediatrix of graces. Though not the source of grace, she is
the channel through which grace is distributed to everyone because of
her divine motherhood. Let us have recourse to her. (Saints)
Ezechiel
28:1-10; Deuteronomy 32:26-27ab, 27cd-28, 30,
35cd-36ab; Matthew 19:23-30
"Then
Jesus said to his
disciples, "Amen, I
say to you, it will be
hard for one who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I say to
you, it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than
for one who is rich to enter the kingdom of God." When the disciples
heard this, they were greatly astonished and said, "Who then can be
saved?" Jesus looked at them and said, "For human beings this is
impossible, but for God all things are possible." Then Peter said to
him in reply, "We have given up everything and followed you. What will
there be for us?" Jesus said to them, "Amen, I say to you that you who
have followed me, in the new age, when the Son of Man is seated on his
throne of glory, will yourselves sit on twelve thrones, judging the
twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has given up houses or
brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands for the
sake of my name will receive a hundred times more, and will inherit
eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be
first."(Matthew
19:23-30)
It is
noteworthy how our Lord speaks of the danger of riches and
the threat they pose to the attainment of heaven. In our Gospel passage
today, our Lord tells his disciples, “I tell you solemnly, it will be
hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.” At various times
in the
Gospels our Lord
uses graphic images to make his point. For instance, he tells his
disciples that unless a person hate his father and mother he will not
be worthy to be his disciple. The image he uses here in today's Gospel
is graphic
also: “Yes, I tell you again, it is easier for a camel to pass through
the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of
heaven.” What does all this mean in practice? To begin with, our Lord
is speaking here of riches (not mere possessions) and how we must be
alert to their danger if
we have them. As with
the entire teaching of Christ as presented in the Gospels, it must be
interpreted in the light of the Church’s life, Tradition and teaching.
There
have been saints with many possessions. For instance, St Thomas
More who was one of the most attractive of
saints and a great man by any standards, was a man of many possessions
including material ones. He had honours, education and learning,
accomplishments and a fine house and family, and even something of a
small private zoo. But as events were to show, he preserved poverty of
spirit and the readiness to give up everything for Christ. By means of
his asceticism, his life of prayer and spiritual regimen he maintained
the attachment of his heart to God and his holy will. Christ is
speaking
here not only of material riches, but of the things we cling on to at
the
level of the heart.
What are some of
the things we cling on to? For instance, a powerful element in a
person’s life is
his memory, and as a person gets older his memory can become more
dominant
still. He can become embittered as he thinks of the injustices and
rebuffs he has suffered, the opportunities that have not come his way
and that have come the way of others, the general course of his life
that has perhaps been very disappointing to him. Such can be the train
of memories that flood more and more into the unguarded imagination of
this or that person as the years advance. But what is happening here in
such a case? This person is unconsciously hanging on to things he
wished had come his way. There are possessions which he wants, be they
past honours or opportunities which would have made his present
situation so much more respectable or worthy of the esteem of others.
He is clinging on to riches of a more subtle kind, ephemeral ones and
ones that will never be his, but riches he desires nevertheless and
riches which in his imagination he is hoarding with sullen regrets and
bitterness. The result is that he is not free in his heart to love
Christ and his holy will. He cannot bring himself to cut away from all
he is hanging on to and accept the will of Christ as it has worked
itself out in his past and as it is manifesting itself in his present.
He is not free to leave everything, as Peter puts it in today’s Gospel,
and to follow the Lord. Happiness will never be his as long as he
clings on to his unseen and hoped-for riches. Whereas the man who
leaves all and
follows Christ “will be repaid a hundred times over, and also inherit
eternal life.” (Matt
19:23-30)
Let us pray for the
grace to follow Christ with all our heart, for the
wisdom and discernment to know the riches we are clinging on to, and
the grace to detach ourselves entirely from them.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"And everyone who has given up
houses or
brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands for the
sake of my name will receive a hundred times more, and will inherit
eternal life. "(Mt 19:23-30)
Commentary by St Irenaeus of Lyon (around
130 - around 208), Bishop, Theologian and Martyr
(Against the Heresies,
Book IV, 14,1)
Abraham became God’s friend because he followed the Word of God,
God’s call, spontaneously and freely in the generosity of his faith
(Jas 2:23). The Word of God, perfect since the beginning, did not
acquire Abraham’s friendship for himself because of a lack. “Before
Abraham came to be, I am.” (Jn 8:58) But it was so that he who is good
could give Abraham eternal life… In the beginning, it was also not
because he needed man that God formed Adam, but so as to have someone
to whom to give his blessings.
It was also not because he needed our service that he commanded us to
follow him, but in order to procure salvation for us. For to follow the
Lord means to participate in salvation, just as following the light is
to participate in the light. When people are in the light, it is not
they who illumine the light and make it shine, but they are illumined
and made to shine by it… God gives his blessings to those who serve him
because they serve him, and to those who follow him because they follow
him; but he does not receive any benefit from them, for he is perfect
and has no need.
If God seeks man’s service, it is so that he who is good and merciful
can give his blessings to those who persevere in his service. For even
though God needs nothing, the human person needs communion with God.
The glory of the human being is to persevere in God’s service. That is
why the Lord told his disciples: “It was not you who chose me, it was I
who chose you” (Jn 15:16), thus showing that … for having followed the
Son of God, they were glorified by him: “Father, all those you gave me
I would have in my company where I am, to see this glory of mine.” (Jn
17:24)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Be lovingly on your guard in order to live holy purity, because a spark
is more easily put out than a roaring blaze. But all human care, and
mortification, and the cilice, and fasting, which are essential
weapons, how little are all these without you, my God!
(The Forge,
no.845)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What symbols are used to
represent the Holy Spirit?
There are many symbols of the Holy Spirit: living water which springs
from the wounded Heart of Christ and which quenches the thirst of the
baptized; anointing with oil, which is the sacramental sign of
Confirmation; fire which transforms what it touches; the cloud, dark or
luminous, in which the divine glory is revealed; the imposition of
hands by which the Holy Spirit is given; the dove which descended on
Christ at his baptism and remained with him.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.139)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday
of the twentieth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 23) Saint
Rose of Lima, virgin (1586-1617). The first saint of the
American continent, she was a model of a penitent life, continuous
prayer and simplicity of life. She received the habit of the Third
Order of St Dominic when she was five years old. She lived at home and
made great progress mystical contemplation. Her contemporaries in the
city of Lima were St Toribio the archbishop, St Martin de Porres, and
St Francis Solano. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Ezechiel
34:1-11; Psalm 23:1-3a, 3b-4, 5,
6; Matthew 20:1-16
"The
kingdom of heaven
is like a landowner
who went out at dawn to
hire labourers for his vineyard. After agreeing with them for the usual
daily wage, he sent them into his vineyard. Going out about nine
o'clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and he said to
them, 'You too go into my vineyard, and I will give you what is just.'
So they went off. (And) he went out again around noon, and around three
o'clock, and did likewise. Going out about five o'clock, he found
others standing around, and said to them, 'Why do you stand here idle
all day?' They answered, 'Because no one has hired us.' He said to
them, 'You too go into my vineyard.' When it was evening the owner of
the vineyard said to his foreman, 'Summon the labourers and give them
their pay, beginning with the last and ending with the first.' When
those who had started about five o'clock came, each received the usual
daily wage. So when the first came, they thought that they would
receive more, but each of them also got the usual wage. And on
receiving it they grumbled against the landowner, saying, 'These last
ones worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us, who bore
the day's burden and the heat.' He said to one of them in reply, 'My
friend, I am not cheating you. Did you not agree with me for the usual
daily wage? Take what is yours and go. What if I wish to give this last
one the same as you? Am I not free to do as I wish with my own
money? Are you envious because I am generous?' Thus, the last will be
first, and the first will be last." (Mt
20:1-16)
There
are
surely a few very consoling things we learn as we ponder our Lord’s
parable in the Gospel of today (Matthew
20:1-16).
But before we consider what is consoling about it, let us consider what
is very obvious about it. It is that God wants us to be at our labour.
The landowner in the parable goes out at various times each day to look
for those who will work for him, and that is what God is on the
look-out for continually.
Like the landowner of the vineyard, he does not want to see us idle. It
is neither good for us nor is it good for his vineyard. His vineyard is
wherever he has placed us in the world and in his Church. In our
culture
there are various ambivalent attitudes to work, with many working to
such an extent that fundamental things in their life such as faith and
family are neglected. Others look on work as an unpleasant necessity,
with the stress being on its being unpleasant. But whatever be the
attitude, work is obviously central to human life and so it is
important to have an appropriate attitude to it recognizing how central
it is for a wholesome human life. For the Christian, it is fundamental
that he learn how to sanctify his daily work, perseveringly doing it
well and doing it for God. If this is to happen, the unpleasant aspects
of work have to be recognized and faced up to in God’s presence.
The tendency will be continually to shirk the work that is unpleasant.
It could be tedious, with little evidence of progress, and with the
knack of being successful at it ever beyond our grasp. Work that is
unpleasant has to be faced up to, with the thought of God’s presence
before us, and with the determination to do our work for him and for
his glory, no matter how unpleasant it may be. We must spend our
life working for
the greater glory of God.
So then, our
parable teaches us that God wants us to be at our labour
in his vineyard, the vineyard of our God-given responsibilities. But
there is a further lesson that is very consoling. Everyone would
recognize that there have been many inadequacies in the story of his
own work in life. Perhaps as a person looks back on life it seems to
him that he has been very much like the ones standing idle in the
market place when found by the landowner. Perhaps in life he has been
relatively idle. Perhaps the work he has done has been poor when viewed
by hindsight, and far from being a holy work. Whatever be the cause of
regret when thinking of one’s work in life, the invitation is now
extended: Come to the vineyard and begin your work! Not only is there
now a renewed invitation, but when pay-time arrives, the recompense may
be surprisingly generous if the work is done well (Matthew
20:1-16).
So then, whatever be the past, and whatever be our poor performance
when compared with others who have worked before us or even beside us,
one can trust in the goodness of the master. That, surely, is the
principal message of today’s Gospel parable. In the parable those who
had been working all along were astonished at the remuneration received
by those workers who arrived at the eleventh hour. Our Lord is teaching
that God will be generous to those who repent and accept the invitation
to work in his vineyard. Let us then put all behind us, all regrets,
all wishful thinking, all resentments at lost opportunities, all
jealousies at the apparent good luck of others in their work in life,
and simply begin again trusting in God. So now I begin!
Let us resolve to
spend our lives at the labour God has given us,
placing our faith in his marvellous generosity. He is our Father and
will reward our repentance and our fidelity.
(E.J.Tyler)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“You too go along to my
vineyard.” (Matthew
20:1-16)
Comment by St John Chrysostom
(345-407), Bishop and Doctor of the
Church
(Homilies on Saint
Matthew, no. 64)
It is obvious that this parable is addressed both to people who have
been virtuous since their youth and to people who become so only in
their old age: to the former, to preserve them from pride and to stop
them from reproaching the people of the eleventh hour; and to the
latter, to teach them that they can deserve the same salary in a short
time. The Saviour had just spoken about giving up wealth, about scorn
for all goods, about virtues, which require a big heart and courage.
For that, the zeal and energy of a youthful soul are necessary. So the
Lord rekindles in them the flame of charity, strengthens their
sentiments, and shows them that even those who came last receive the
whole day’s salary.
All of Jesus’ parables - those about the virgins, the fishing net, the
thorns, the barren tree – invite us to show our virtue in our actions.
He speaks little about dogmas because they don’t require much effort.
But he often speaks about life. Or rather, he talks about it all the
time because, since life is a constant combat, the effort is also
constant.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Constantly call to mind that at every moment you are cooperating in the
human and spiritual formation of those around you, and of all souls -
for the blessed Communion of Saints reaches as far as that. At every
moment: when you work and when you rest; when people see you happy or
when they see you worried; when at your job, or out in the street, you
pray as does a child of God and the peace of your soul shows through;
when people see that you have suffered, that you have wept, and you
smile.
(The Forge,
no.846)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What does it mean that the Spirit “has spoken through the prophets”?
The term “prophets” means those who were inspired by the Holy Spirit to
speak in the name of God. The Spirit brings the prophecies of the Old
Testament to their complete fulfilment in Christ whose mystery he
reveals in the New Testament.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no140)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the twentieth week of Ordinary Time II (Feast of Saint
Bartholomew, Apostle)
(August 24) Saint
Bartholomew, apostle. He was from Cana in Galilee. Mentioned in
the Gospel as one of the Twelve Apostles he is identified with
Nathanael who was brought to Jesus by his friend, the Apostle Philip.
According to tradition, St Bartholomew preached the Gospel in Arabia
and Armenia where he died a martyr. (Saints)
Scripture
today: Revelation
21:9b-14; Psalm 145:10-11, 12-13,
17-18; John 1:45-51
“Philip
found Nathanael and told him, 'We
have found the one about
whom Moses wrote in the law, and also the prophets, Jesus, son of
Joseph, from Nazareth.' But Nathanael said to him, 'Can anything good
come from Nazareth?' Philip said to him, 'Come and see.' Jesus saw
Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, 'Here is a true Israelite.
There is no duplicity in him.' Nathanael said to him, 'How do you know
me?' Jesus answered and said to him, 'Before Philip called you, I saw
you under the fig tree.' Nathanael answered him, 'Rabbi, you are the
Son of God; you are the King of Israel.' Jesus answered and said to
him, 'Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig
tree? You will see greater things than this.' And he said to him,
'Amen, amen, I say to you, you will see the sky opened and the angels
of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man'.” (John 1:45-51)
At this
point (August '06) there is discussion in educational circles in
Australia about the teaching of history. A striking feature of the
discussion is the lack of interest in religious history. Very many
books of history are written with little attention given to religion
and with much attention given to political and economic history. But so
profound is the religious instinct of man and so widespread the
phenomenon of religion that a case could be made for regarding man’s
religious life as the basic element in the history of man. Whatever of
that passing observation, when we do turn our thoughts to man’s search
for and worship of the unseen God we cannot but be struck by the
profound difference of conceptions that have characterised this search.
What
is to be made of this often contradictory testimony about God? As John
Henry Newman often observed,
contradictory views in religion cannot all be correct, and that
therefore in the nature of the case a great proportion of mankind must
be wrong in the matter of religion. This principle of contradiction
suggests that man’s sincere religious efforts do not result in the
light of truth. Well, into the midst of this fumbling human activity
which
gropes towards the unseen Lord comes a visible God. The unseen God
makes himself seen, heard and felt. God becomes man, a particular man
with our human nature while remaining God. Man is now able to go and
see God in the flesh and know him in truth. And this is what happens in
today’s Gospel on the
feast of Saint Bartholomew (or Nathanael) the Apostle. “Philip found
Nathanael and said to him, ‘We have found the one Moses wrote about in
the Law, the one about whom the prophets wrote: he is Jesus son of
Joseph from Nazareth’ ... 'Come and see'.” (John
1:45-51) Come
and see, Philip told him. That was the invitation, and Nathanael went
and saw God become man.
However, it is not
as simple as this. More is required of the mind and heart than simply
seeing. For instance, during our Lord’s
public ministry Herod began to hear about our Lord and expressed the
desire to see him. When he did see him (during Christ’s passion) our
Lord refused to
speak to him, for Herod was far from having the necessary dispositions.
By
contrast this is exactly what Nathanael did have. When Philip brought
Nathanael to Jesus, our Lord in seeing him said of him, “There is an
Israelite who deserves the name, incapable of deceit.” Nathanael, then,
was a man of the truth and fully open to and committed to the truth,
and therefore disposed to accept and love Christ who is the truth. He
immediately expressed an astonishing faith in our Lord: 'Rabbi, you are
the
Son of God; you are the King of Israel.'
Not
long before this meeting between Nathanael and Christ, our Lord had
been pointed out by John the Baptist to two of his own disciples as the
Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. On hearing this the
two disciples followed Jesus and when Jesus turned and asked them what
they wanted, they said to him, “Rabbi, where do you live?” - implying
the desire to go with him there. Our Lord replied, “Come and see”. They
were invited to see, to see him above all, and they received this
invitation because they had the right dispositions. John the Baptist’s
very mission was to “prepare for the Lord a people well disposed” (Luke
1:17). So then, if we aspire to see God, if we aspire to contemplate
Christ, if we desire to gaze on him in our hearts in this life and face
to face hereafter, our hearts must be properly disposed. “Blessed are
the pure
of heart, for they shall see God”, our Lord taught.
We who are Christ’s
faithful ought every day be setting our gaze
steadfastly on the person of Christ, every day watching him with the
eyes of our heart. God is now to be seen, and this we do by faithfully
praying with the Gospels, placing ourselves in its scenes and keeping
company with our Lord as we immerse ourselves in the work he has given
us to do. We do not see him with our eyes as did Nathanael when God
walked the earth because we live in time and that time has passed, but
we see him in our hearts by the gift of our
religious imagination which, as Cardinal Newman pointed out in The Grammar of Assent, is the normal medium of
our religious life. But, as Nathanael's case reminds us, this must be
accompanied by constant work on
our inner selves and the purity of our motives in life, for our Lord
asks for the right disposition if we are ever to be granted the gift of
knowing him. We must be properly disposed if God in Christ is to make
himself known to us. Let us then take Nathanael as our example today.
He was indeed properly disposed and of good heart. He came to see and
Christ welcomed him into his company, and there with Christ he stayed.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Philip said to him, 'Come
and see'.”
(John 1:45-51)
Commentary by Philoxenes of Mabbug (? – 523), Bishop in Syria
(Homilies, no. 4, 76-79)
Jesus renewed the call addressed to Abraham for the holy apostles. And
their faith resembled that of Abraham. For just as Abraham obeyed as
soon as he was called (Gen 12), so the apostles left to follow Jesus as
soon as he called them and they heard him… They didn’t become disciples
by means of long teaching, but simply by having heard the word of
faith. Because faith was alive, as soon as it heard the living voice,
it obeyed life. They immediately ran after him without delay. And we
see by this that they were disciples in their heart even before they
were called.
That is how faith acts when it has remained simple. It does not receive
teaching through arguments. But just as a healthy and pure eye receives
without reasoning or working the sun’s rays that are sent to it, and
that it perceives the light as soon as it is open… in the same way,
those who have natural faith recognize the voice of God as soon as they
hear it. The light of his word rises up in them; they joyfully run
towards it and receive it, as our Lord said in the Gospel: “My sheep
hear my voice… and they follow me.” (Jn 10:27)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Holy coercion is one thing; blind violence or revenge is
quite another.
(The Forge,
no.847)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What
did the Holy Spirit accomplish in John the Baptist?
The Spirit filled John the Baptist, who was the last prophet of the Old
Testament. Under his inspiration John was sent to “prepare for the Lord
a people well disposed” (Luke 1:17). He was to proclaim the coming of
Christ, the Son of God, upon whom he saw the Spirit descend and remain,
the one who “baptizes with the Holy Spirit” (John 1:33).
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.141)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday of
the twentieth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 25) St Louis, king of
France (1214-1270)
His mother, Blanche of Castille, brought him up in a Christian manner.
He became King of France, and father of eleven children whom he
educated in an exemplary manner. He lived a great spirit of penance and
prayer. He showed great love for peace and the temporal as well as the
spiritual common good of his countrymen. He died near Tunis during the
second crusade for the deliverance of the Holy Places. (Saints)
St Joseph of
Calasanz, priest (1557-1648)
Born in Aragon, Spain. Ordained priest, he went to Rome and founded the
Piarist Congregation dedicated to poor children. He suffered trials,
slander, and persecution silently and serenely. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Ezechiel
37:1-14; Psalm 107:2-3, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9;
Matthew 22:34-40
When
the Pharisees heard that he had
silenced the Sadducees, they
gathered together, and one of them (a scholar of the law) tested him by
asking, Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest? He said
to him, "You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with
all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the
first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbour
as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two
commandments."
(Matt
22:34-40)
Some
have
often remarked how difficult it is to make sense of the Old
Testament. For many people there appears to be no unifying element in
it, however edifying the individual books are. Such is the feeling of
many and it leads them to neglect a regular reading of the Old
Testament. This is a great pity because the books of the Old Testament
are inspired by God and intended by him to be read by those who
accept his revelation. Consider the outstanding quality of the volumes
of plain and parochial sermons of John Henry Newman while still an
Anglican. A great number of them are based on texts and figures of the
Old Testament. Well then, is there a key to enable us to penetrate and
unify our reading of this very large portion of the inspired writings?
Our Gospel today throws light on the question. The number of laws in
ancient Judaism was immense and our Lord’s conflict with the Pharisees
had much to do with his flouting of rules which they regarded as
important. The Pharisees heard that our Lord had silenced the
Sadducees, and so as a means of perplexing him with a tremendous
problem of interpretation which was beyond their own consensus, they
asked him which was the greatest of the commandments of the Law. The
question of what was important in the Law of Israel was a very
significant issue, but our Lord’s answer goes beyond the particular
problem they posed to him. What our Lord said throws light on the
interpretation of the entire Old Testament.
Our Lord in his
answer said that the first and greatest commandment was
that “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all
your soul, and with all your mind.” He then added, “The second
resembles it: you must love your neighbour as yourself.” (Matthew
22:34-40) So
amid all the plethora of rules and
commandments which were meant to support and express God’s revelation
and his Law, God's command above all was to love him totally. We are
commanded to
love God with our whole being, and in like manner we are to love our
neighbour as ourself. But our Lord then adds that the entire Law and
the prophets hang on these two commandments of love. These commandments
then constitute the
key to the numerous books of the Old Testament. That is what unifies
such a varied collection of books written by different authors at
different times under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Moreover,
when we read the Old Testament not only ought we read in view of this
key given to us by Christ, but we ought read it with the one who gave
the
key very much in mind. What does it mean to love God with all our
being, and our
neighbour as ourself? Look at the person of Christ and you will learn
what it means. The person of Christ as the embodiment of perfect love
for God and neighbour is the key to understanding the Old Testament.
Our Lord told his disciples both before and after his death that the
Scriptures taught that the
Messiah had to suffer, and that the Law, the Prophets and the Psalms
spoke of him.
Let us remember our
Lord’s words in today’s Gospel whenever we see,
hear or take up the Old Testament. Its teaching hangs on the
commandment to love God totally, and our neighbour as ourself. The
person and teaching of Christ is the key to
the Old Testament, and the Old Testament points to him.
(E.J.Tyler)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Happy the man..(who)
delights in the law of the Lord and
meditates on his law day and night.”
(Ps 1:1-2) Commentary by Saint
Teresia Benedicta of the Cross [Edith Stein] (1891-1942),
Carmelite,
Martyr, Co-patroness of Europe (The History and Spirit
of Carmel)
What does “the law of the Lord” mean? Psalm 118 [119] … is filled with
the desire to know the law of the Lord and to let oneself by guided by
it during one’s entire life. It is very possible that the psalmist was
thinking there of the law of the Old Covenant. Getting to know it
really did demand life-long study and fulfilling it demanded an effort
of the will that also lasted one’s whole life. But the Lord has freed
us from the yoke of this law. We can consider the law of the New
Covenant to be the great commandment of love, which includes all of the
law and the prophets, as he said. Perfect love of God and of one’s
neighbour would certainly be a worthy object to be studied over a whole
lifetime.
But better still, we understand the law of the New Covenant to be the
Lord Jesus himself, since his life is for us the model of the life we
have to live. Thus, we fulfill our rule if we constantly keep before
our eyes the image of the Lord Jesus so as to become like him. The
Gospel is the book, which we will never have finished studying. But we
don’t find the Lord only in the accounts of those who witnessed his
life. He is present to us in the most Blessed Sacrament, and the hours
of adoration before the supreme Good, attentive listening to the voice
of the God of the Eucharist are both “meditation of the law of the
Lord” and a “vigil in prayer”. However, the highest degree is reached
when “the law dwells in the midst of our heart” (Ps 40:11).
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Master has said it already: if only we children of the
light were
to put at least as much effort and obstinacy into doing good as the
children of darkness put into their activities! Don’t complain. Work
instead to drown evil in an abundance of good.
(The Forge,
no.848)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is the work of the Spirit in Mary?
The Holy Spirit brought to fulfilment in Mary all the waiting, and th
preparation of the Old Testament for the coming of Christ. In a
singular way he filled her with grace and made her virginity fruitful
so that she could give birth to the Son of God made flesh. He made her
the Mother of the “whole Christ”, that is, of Jesus the Head and of the
Church his body. Mary was present with the twelve on the day of
Pentecost when the Holy Spirit inaugurated the “last days” with the
manifestation of the Church.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.142)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the twentieth week of Ordinary Time II
(August 26) Today let us think of Saint Martha
(Saints)
Scripture
today: Ezechiel
43:1-7ab; Psalm 85:9ab and 10, 11-12, 13-14;
Matthew 23:1-12
Then
he led me to the
gate which faces the east, and there I saw
the glory of the God of Israel coming from the east. I heard a sound
like the roaring of many waters, and the earth shone with his glory.
The vision was like that which I had seen when he came to destroy the
city, and like that which I had seen by the river Chebar......And I saw
that the temple was filled with the glory of the LORD. (Ezechiel
43:1-7ab)
Then
Jesus spoke to the crowds and to
his disciples, saying, "The
scribes and the Pharisees have taken their seat on the chair of Moses.
Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you, but do
not follow their example. For they preach but they do not practice.
....... They love places of honour at banquets, seats of honour in
synagogues, greetings in marketplaces, and the salutation
'Rabbi.'.....The greatest among you must be your servant. Whoever
exalts
himself will be humbled; but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
(Mt
23:1-12)
In the
first reading of today from the book of the prophet Ezechiel the
prophet once again has a vision of God, or more accurately, a vision of
his glory (Ezechiel
43:1-7ab). It is very similar to the account at the beginning of
the book describing the prophet’s vision of the glory of the Lord. The
reference to “the glory of the Lord” is repeated in this passage, as it
is in the much earlier
one. God’s greatness and exalted splendour is emphasised by the
prophet, a splendour to be acknowledged by his people. But in the
fulness of time a greater marvel about the God of glory was revealed.
It was that God is humble and readily takes the lowly position. The Son
who had, as St Paul puts it, the “form” of God did not cling to
his equality with God but divested himself of that glory and became as
men are, and lowlier still even to death on a cross. God humbled
himself. Our Lord in speaking of his heart described himself as meek
and humble, and at the Last Supper told his disciples that "he who sees
me sees the Father." Christ readily went unacknowledged and lacking the
signs and trappings of honour and glory. St Paul tells us that because
he did this, God the Father raised him on high and gave to him the
glory that had been his from all eternity.
This is the lesson that our Lord teaches us in today’s Gospel
(Matthew
23:1-12).
“The greatest among you must be your servant. Whoever exalts himself
will be humbled; but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” All
through history we see evidence of man seeking glory for himself -
military generals, rulers, people of all walks of life. The Pharoahs of
Egypt, Alexander the Great, various Roman Emperors, they sought to be
acknowledged as divine. Satan's sin was to seek the glory that is due
to God, and as we read in the first pages of Genesis it was the
temptation he successfully insinuated to our first parents. Christ’s
lesson goes clean contrary to all this for though being divine he did
not cling to the glory that was his but chose to humble himself even to
death. The path, then, to glory is through the lowliness and humility
of Christ. Let
us through love for Jesus make this our chosen preference in life and
if honours come our way then let us strive to be detached from them and
attached to the humble Christ. We must work at freeing ourselves
from self-exaltation for as our Lord teaches us in today’s Gospel,
whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and the man who humbles himself
will be exalted.
(Matthew
23:1-12)
Saint Ignatius
Loyola in his famous Spiritual Exercises
invites us to contemplate two great standards. They are the standard of
Satan and the standard of Christ. The one involves the choice of
honours and riches. The other involves the choice of Christ with
humility of heart and poverty of spirit. Let us every day choose Christ
and his standard. It has been revealed to be the path to glory.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Whoever exalts
himself will be humbled; but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.(Mt 23:1-12)
Commentary by Saint Paschas Radbert (? –
around 849), Benedictine monk
(Commentary on the
Gospel according to Matthew, 10:23)
“Who humbles himself shall be exalted.” Christ not only told his
disciples not to let themselves be called masters and not to love the
places of honour at table or any other honour, but in his person, he
himself gave the example and model of humility. Whereas the name of
master is given him not through kindness but by his natural right, for
“in him everything continues in being” (Col 1:17), by taking on flesh,
he communicated a teaching to us, which leads us all to true life, and
because he is greater than we, he “reconciled us with God.” (Romans
5:10) As if he were telling us: Do not love the highest honours, do not
desire to be called masters, just as “I seek no glory for myself; there
is one who seeks it.” (Jn 8:50) Keep your eyes fixed on me, “for the
Son of Man has come, not to be served by others, but to serve, to give
his own life as a ransom for the many.” (Mt 20:28)
Most certainly, in this passage of the gospel, the Lord is not only
teaching his disciples, but also the heads of the Churches, commanding
everyone not to allow themselves to be driven by greed in seeking
honors. On the contrary, may “anyone who aspires to greatness” be the
first to become like him, “serving the needs of all.” (Mt 20:26-27)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The charity that harms the
supernatural effectiveness of the apostolate is a false charity.
(The Forge,
no.849)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is the
relationship between the Spirit and Christ Jesus in his earthly mission?
Beginning with his Incarnation, the Son of God was consecrated in his
humanity as the Messiah by means of the anointing of the Spirit. He
revealed the Spirit in his teaching, fulfilled the promises made to the
Fathers, and bestowed him upon the Church at its birth when he breathed
on the apostles after the Resurrection.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.143)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Twenty-first
Sunday in Ordinary Time B
(August 27) St
Monica (331-387) Born in Tagaste (Africa) of a Christian
family, while still young she married Patricius and had children, one
of whom was Augustine for whose conversion she prayed and suffered
unceasingly. She is the example of a mother of outstanding virtue,
great faith and efficacy in prayer. She died at Ostia (Italy). (Saints)
Scripture today:
Joshua
24:1-2a, 15-17, 18b; Psalm 34:2-3,
16-17, 18-19, 20-21;
Ephesians 5:21-32 or 5:2a, 25-32, or
Ephesians 5:2a, 25-32;
John 6:60-69
Then many of his
disciples who were listening said, "This saying
is hard; who can accept it?" Since Jesus knew that his disciples were
murmuring about this, he said to them, "Does this shock you? What if
you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is
the spirit that gives life, while the flesh is of no avail. The words I
have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who
do not believe." Jesus knew from the beginning the ones who would not
believe and the one who would betray him. And he said, "For this reason
I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by
my Father." As a result of this, many (of) his disciples returned to
their former way of life and no longer accompanied him. Jesus then said
to the Twelve, "Do you also want to leave?" Simon Peter answered him,
"Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We
have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of
God." (John 6:60-69)
Our Gospel today
tells of how our Lord lost many of his disciples. They
left him after hearing him say that to follow him, indeed in order to
have eternal life, they would have to eat his flesh and drink his
blood. They went off saying that this was too much, even coming from
him. We can just imagine them going back to their families and telling
them what our Lord had said, with a shake of the head and saying that
their following of him was now over. Perhaps as a result of what they
said to others, others too left our Lord. At the end of his lengthy
announcement our Lord turned to the Twelve and asked if they were going
too, because there was to be no changing of what he had said. Simon
Peter answered, “Lord, who shall we go to? You have the words of
eternal life, and we believe; we know that you are the holy one of
God.” (John
6:60-69) That expressed great faith in our Lord
because
Simon Peter had no idea how our Lord was going to make his doctrine
possible - it was only at the Last Supper that he showed them that they
would eat his body and drink his blood truly but sacramentally. The
Eucharist would be the greatest exercise of our Lord’s power and would
make possible a marvellous transformation into him.
Yes, the
loving power of Christ is exercised in a stupendous though hidden way
in
the Eucharist. Ordinary bread and ordinary wine are transformed by the
power of God into the living risen Christ, body and blood, soul and
divinity. There is a compete change of the bread and wine into Christ’s
person. The fact that God has planned to do things this way is worthy
of much reflection. Our Lord could have entered into union with us in
all his risen reality other than by having us consume his body and his
blood, and doing it in this sacramental way. Why take bread and
wine,
why transform it into himself for us to eat? To begin with, bread and
wine symbolize and well represent the entire fruit of the earth which
God has given to man to be his home and his means of livelihood. When
we see the bread and wine, when we take it to present and offer it to
God for his transforming action at Mass, we present the earth and the
world which he has given to us. The change that comes upon that bread
and wine is an omen and a pledge of the redeeming transformation which
God plans for the world. The Eucharist points to the world to come.
While
in the bread and the wine we think of the world that
God has
given to be our home, we also think of all that God has done for us in
the story of our redemption. For instance, we think of Melchisedech
offering bread and wine on behalf of Abraham our father in faith. We
think of the unleavened bread of the Jewish Passover, reminding
us of
the exodus of God’s people out of the land of slavery into the promised
land. We think of the manna from heaven God gave to his people on their
journey through the wilderness. We think of the multiplication of the
loaves by Christ pointing to the heavenly bread which is the Eucharist.
All of this was a prelude to the crowning work of God in the death and
resurrection of Christ. The bread and the wine represent all that God
has bestowed upon us in creation and redemption and it points to its
fulfilment. Furthermore, the bread and wine while representing God’s
work, represent our work too - the work of our own hands, our hopes and
dreams in life, our efforts, our disappointments and our achievements.
All this we bring before the Lord at Mass and by the power of the Holy
Spirit the bread and wine are transformed into God the Son made man.
The
transformation of the bread and the wine into the body and
the
blood of Christ makes present the sacrifice of our Lord at Calvary.
That sacrifice of Christ at Calvary involved a passing by him from this
present life to his risen life, a transformation into glory. God
intends each of us to follow this very path of transformation into the
likeness of Christ, living in him and living by his life. That
redeeming
transformation is begun at our baptism and is nourished by the
Eucharist, by a devout participation in Mass and by a worthy reception
of Holy Communion. By consuming worthily the body and the blood of
Christ we live more fully in him. The Eucharist is God’s principal
means of
transforming us and the world into something divine, and of making
Christ all in all.
Every time
we come to Mass let us entrust ourselves to the grace
of
the Holy Spirit who transforms the bread and wine into the person of
the living Jesus, asking that he will transform us into the likeness of
Christ, together with all our daily work and the world in which we live.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further Reading: Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no. 1333-1336
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Simon Peter answered him, “Master, to whom
shall we go? You have the
words of eternal life”
Pope Benedict XVI (Homily,
celebration of Eucharist at the World Youth Day, 21 August 2005)
Let us return once more to the Last Supper. The new
element to emerge here was the deeper meaning given to Israel's ancient
prayer of blessing, which from that point on became the word of
transformation, enabling us to participate in the "hour" of Christ.
Jesus did not instruct us to repeat the Passover meal, which in any
event, given that it is an anniversary, is not repeatable at will. He
instructed us to enter into his "hour".
We enter into it through the sacred power of the words of
consecration - a transformation brought about through the prayer of
praise which places us in continuity with Israel and the whole of
salvation history, and at the same time ushers in the new, to which the
older prayer at its deepest level was pointing. The new prayer - which
the Church calls the "Eucharistic Prayer" - brings the Eucharist into
being. It is the word of power which transforms the gifts of the earth
in an entirely new way into God's gift of himself, and it draws us into
this process of transformation. That is why we call this action
"Eucharist", which is a translation of the Hebrew word beracha -
thanksgiving, praise, blessing, and a transformation worked by the
Lord: the presence of his "hour". Jesus' hour is the hour in
which love triumphs. In other words: it is God who has triumphed,
because he is Love.
Jesus' hour seeks to become our own hour and will indeed
become so if we allow ourselves, through the celebration of the
Eucharist, to be drawn into that process of transformation that the
Lord intends to bring about. The Eucharist must become the centre of
our lives.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
God needs men and women who are sure and strong, on whom he can lean.
(The Forge,
no.850)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What happened at Pentecost?
Fifty days after the Resurrection at Pentecost the glorified Jesus
Christ poured out the Spirit in abundance and revealed him as a divine
Person so that the Holy Trinity was fully manifest. The mission of
Christ and of the Spirit became the mission of the Church which is sent
to proclaim and spread the mystery of the communion of the Holy Trinity.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.144)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday
of the twenty first week of Ordinary Time II
(August 28) St Augustine, bishop
and doctor of the Church (354-430). Born in Tagaste (Africa). At
first he followed his mother’s example but later fell into a licentious
way of life. “My sins increase like a rolling snow ball,” he wrote in
his Confessions. His mother, St Monica, constantly prayed for his
conversion. He was converted at the age of thirty-three in Milan, where
he was influenced and baptized by the Bishop, St Ambrose. He went to
Africa and was elected Bishop of Hippo. There, he undertook an enormous
activity of preaching and writing in defence of the Faith. He is one of
the greatest doctors of the Church, with numerous devotees in our
day. (Saints)
Scripture today: 2
Thessalonians 1:1-5, 11-12; Psalm 96:1-2a, 2b-3,
4-5; Matthew 23:13-22
Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy to
the church of the Thessalonians ........ We ought to thank God always
for you, brothers, as is fitting, because your faith flourishes ever
more, and the love of every one of you for one another grows ever
greater. Accordingly, we ourselves boast of you in the churches of God
regarding your endurance and faith in all your persecutions and the
afflictions you endure. This is evidence of the just judgment of God,
so that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God for which
you are suffering. To this end, we always pray for you, that our God
may make you worthy of his calling and powerfully bring to fulfilment
every good purpose and every effort of faith, that the name of our Lord
Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, in accord with the grace
of our God and Lord Jesus Christ. (2
Thessalonians 1:1-5, 11-12)
The example of saints
and holy persons has always been regarded by the Church as a most
important stimulus to a fervent Christian life. St John Vianney spent
much time reading the lives of the saints, and Ignatius Loyola’s
conversion to a holy and extraordinarily fruitful life could be
attributed in considerable measure to his reading of the lives of the
saints during his convalescence after being shot down by a French
cannon ball. Well then, let us take our first reading of today in which
St Paul describes the Christians of Thessalonika (Matthew 23:13-22). Their example too
offers much to inspire us. St Paul found himself continually “thanking
God” for the Thessalonians because of the wonderful growth of their
faith and love. He writes that it “never stops increasing.” That is the
first point that we can take note of because if we are to attain the
goal of holiness to which we are called by our baptism our faith and
hope and love must never stop increasing. We must be ever pressing on
to attain the goal of the fulness of our life in Christ in which Christ
reigns in our hearts by faith and in love. The key to this constant
quest is to adhere to a well-advised plan for the spiritual life
involving the sacraments, a schedule of prayer and spiritual reading, a
sanctification of our daily work, adequate spiritual direction and
doctrinal formation, and the other usual elements of such a plan. But
then too, we must be constantly beginning again, ever repenting,
resisting mediocrity and half-measures, ever starting afresh with our
goals lustrously ahead.
There is more,
though, to the Christian life of the Thessalonians as St Paul describes
it. They were constant and faithful under persecution and various
troubles (Matthew 23:13-22). Now, there are so many
troubles and even persecutions an earnest Christian will have to bear
in a secular-minded world. Consider the Catholic and Christian
politician who knows that the Church is the pillar of the truth and her
teaching is that of the living Christ. There are many controverted
issues that come forward in the parliaments of our day which if allowed
would bring untold harm. I refer to matters concerning life and
bioethics, and many other matters besides. If the Catholic politician
is constant and faithful in his witness to the evil of various forms of
genetic engineering that bring harm to the microscopic embryo, he will
experience “persecutions and troubles” of various kinds. The same
applies to the Catholic in many situations in the world of work and
among secular-minded acquaintances. Bearing witness to what God has
revealed as it comes through his oracle the Church will bring troubles.
Our passage today presents us with the example of the church of
Thessalonika which was faithful and constant under persecution and
troubles. St Paul goes on to set forth “the purpose of it”, and why God
allows it. It is that “you may be found worthy of the kingdom of God;
it is for the sake of this that you are suffering now” And so St Paul
prays that “by his power” - which is his grace - God will fulfil all
their “desires for goodness” and complete all that they “have been
doing
through faith”, in order “that the
name of
our Lord
Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him”.
Let us every day
begin again in our quest for an unceasing growth in our life in Christ.
Let us be ready to bear with faith and constancy any troubles that come
our way in bearing witness to Christ and his teaching, while praying
all the time that God by his grace will bring to fruition both our
desires for goodness and the work he has given us to do.
(E.J.Tyler)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Choose the road that leads to the
Kingdom "
Commentary from
the Epistle of Barnabas
(about 130) (§ 18 &19 Translated by J.B. Lightfoot)
There are two ways of teaching and of power, the one of
light and the other of darkness; and there is a great difference
between the two ways. For on the one are stationed the light giving
angels of God, on the other the angels of Satan…
This then is the way of light, if anyone desiring to
travel on the way to his appointed place would be zealous in his works.
The knowledge then which is given to us whereby we may walk therein is
as follows. You shall love Him that made you; you shall fear Him that
created you, you shall glorify Him that redeemed you from death; you
shall be simple in heart and rich in spirit; you shall not cleave to
those who walk the way of death…You shall not exalt yourself, but shall
be lowly minded in all things. You shall not assume glory to yourself.
You shall not entertain a wicked design against your neighbour…You
shall not make a difference in a person to reprove him for a
transgression. You shall be meek, you shall be quiet, you shall be
fearing the words which you hast heard. You shall not bear a grudge
against your brother.
You shall not doubt whether a thing shall be or not be.
You shall not take the name of the Lord in vain. You shall love your
neighbour more than your own soul. You shall not murder a child by
abortion, nor again shall you kill it when it is born…The accidents
that befall you, you shall receive as good, knowing that nothing is
done without God.
You shall make thy neighbour partake in all things, and
shall not say that anything is your own. For if you are fellow
partakers in that which is imperishable, how much rather shall ye be in
the things which are perishable… You shall utterly hate the Evil One.
You shall judge righteously. You shall not make a schism, but you shall
pacify them that contend by bringing them together. You shall confess
your sins. You shall not betake yourself to prayer with an evil
conscience.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We do not live for the world, or for our own honour, but for the honour
of God, for the glory of God, for the service of God. It is this that
should be our motive.
(The Forge,
no.851)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What does the Spirit do in the Church?
The Spirit builds, animates and sanctifies the Church. As the Spirit of
Love, he restores to the baptized the divine likeness that was lost
through sin and causes them to live in Christ the very life of the Holy
Trinity. He sends them forth to bear witness to the Truth of Christ and
he organizes them in their respective functions so that all might bear
“the fruit of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:22).
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.145)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday
of the twenty first week of Ordinary Time II
(August 29) The
Martyrdom of Saint John the Baptist St John’s fearless
condemnation of Herod’s unlawful marriage incurred the hatred of the
king’s bride, Herodias. She had him imprisoned and finally killed. St
John the Baptist teaches us to be strong in carrying out the work God
has given us. (Saints)
Scripture
today: 2 Thessalonians
2:1-3a, 14-17; Psalm 96:10, 11-12,
13; Mark 6:17-29
Herod was the one who
had John
arrested and bound in prison on account of Herodias, the wife of his
brother Philip, whom he had married. John had said to Herod, "It is not
lawful for you to have your brother's wife." Herodias harbored a grudge
against him and wanted to kill him but was unable to do so. Herod
feared John, knowing him to be a righteous and holy man, and kept him
in custody. ......... The girl hurried back to the king's presence and
made
her request, "I want you to give me at once on a platter the head of
John the Baptist." The king was deeply distressed, but because of his
oaths and the guests he did not wish to break his word to her. So he
promptly dispatched an executioner with orders to bring back his head.
He went off and beheaded him in the prison. He brought in the head on a
platter and gave it to the girl. The girl in turn gave it to her
mother. When his disciples heard about it, they came and took his body
and laid it in a tomb. (Mark
6:17-29)
On August 28, 2006 The
Sydney Morning Herald published its own
survey of the intentions of various federal politicians in respect to
the mooted laws allowing so-called therapeutic cloning. The survey
indicated that parliamentarians were swinging towards allowing the
extraction from embryos of stem cells which, of course, will result in
their destruction. It is clear that the power of utilitarianism in our
culture is very great and when absolutes are placed next to what is
useful, it is the useful that is strongly preferred. In the front-page
article reporting the survey, those who declared themselves to be in
favour of a change in the legislation place the priority on allowing a
procedure that is deemed useful for medical research. The absolute
value of an incipient human being is set aside. Even if the human
status of the microscopic embryo were not admitted to be certain beyond
doubt, at least its possibility has to be admitted. If it is
possible that the tiny foetus is human even at that microscopic stage,
the embryo ought still be absolutely respected. If one is out shooting
rabbits, and one sees a movement that just could be a rabbit but at the
same time could be a human being, one may not shoot at the object in
case it is a human being. This latest bioethical issue has manifested
the power of utilitarian values in the shaping of consciences in our
secular culture, including the consciences of many Catholics, and some
Catholic parliamentarians. Some Catholics in federal parliament are
expected to vote for the new legislation, others at this point are
silent. It calls for great strength of character and clarity of mind to
be a public witness to absolute truths such as the sanctity of human
life from its beginnings to its very end. This strength of character
can be lacking in Catholics at all levels of society, including at the
level of federal parliament.
Today is the
memorial of the martyrdom of St John the Baptist. He was martyred
because he publicly confronted his own ruler for immorality of life and
for violation of the law of God. How relevant is his example in our
day! He spoke up on behalf of the truth revealed by God. The story was
that “Herod had sent to have John
arrested, and had him chained up in prison because of Herodias, his
brother Philip’s wife whom he had married. For John has told Herod, ‘It
is against the law for you to have your brother Philip’s wife.’ As for
Herodias, she was furious with him and wanted to kill him”. John the
Baptist’s case and the case of many others in history show that it can
cost greatly to speak up and to keep speaking up in witness to the law
of God, but that is the only way the truth will be made manifest. If
the truth is not manifested, it will not be known and it will have no
chance of being victorious over the consciences of men. The truth may
not win out for a long time and perhaps not ever in certain
environments and contexts, but those who know the truth and have had
the good fortune to have received it - that is, the members of Christ’s
faithful - have the obligation nevertheless to bear witness to it
despite the cost. Take another example from the very issue referred to
above of The
Sydney Morning Herald - tucked away on page
8. It reports of two abducted journalists who were freed in Gaza after
being forced by members of a group called the Holy Jihad Brigades
“at gunpoint to say in a videotape that they had converted to Islam.”
The average reader of that news item would think that conceding to that
terrorist demand to convert to Islam was perfectly in order - it was
the “useful” thing to
do as it resulted in their release. But for the true Christian, there
is the absolute value of bearing witness to the truth of Christ even at
great personal cost, even death.
Years ago I heard
of a non-Catholic girl in the United States who was suddenly confronted
by a possibly semi-crazed individual who threatened her at gunpoint
with death if she did not renounce her faith in Christ. She refused and
was shot dead. By her death she bore witness to the truth revealed by
God. She was in the line of John the Baptist. Let us today think of the
lesson of John the Baptist’s martyrdom, recalling us to our duty to
bear witness to the truth of Christ and his teaching especially in our
culture deeply shaped by relativism. Let us pray for the grace to do
this with fortitude as did John the Baptist, for as Christ’s faithful
we are called to speak up. Our Lord once said that if a man is ashamed
of me and my words before men, I will be ashamed of him before my
Father in heaven.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Witnesses of truth in front of the
power of evil
Commentary by Pope John Paul II
Homily for the Commemoration of the witnesses
to the faith in the XXth century, 7th May 2000
“Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter all
kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad,
for your reward is great in heaven” (Mt 5:11-12). How well these words
of Christ fit the countless witnesses to the faith in the last century,
insulted and persecuted, but never broken by the power of evil! Where
hatred seemed to corrupt the whole of life leaving no escape from its
logic, they proved that “love is stronger than death” (Sg 8,6). Within
terrible systems of oppression which disfigured man, in places of pain,
amid the hardest of privations, through senseless marches, exposed to
cold and hunger, tortured, suffering in so many ways, they loudly
proclaimed their loyalty to Christ crucified and risen...
Countless numbers refused to yield to the cult of the false gods of the
twentieth century and were sacrificed by Communism, Nazism, by the
idolatry of State or race. Many others fell in the course of ethnic or
tribal wars, because they had rejected a way of thinking foreign to the
Gospel of Christ. Some went to their death because, like the Good
Shepherd, they decided to remain with their people, despite
intimidation. On every continent and throughout the entire twentieth
century, there have been those who preferred to die rather than betray
the mission, which was theirs. Men and women Religious lived their
consecration to the shedding of blood. Men and women believers died
offering their lives for love of their brothers and sisters, especially
the poorest and the weakest. Many women lost their lives in order to
defend their dignity and purity. “Whoever loves his life loses it and
whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life” (Jn
12:25).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ever since Jesus Christ Our Lord founded the Church, this Mother of
ours has suffered continual persecution. Perhaps in other times
persecution was carried out openly, while nowadays it is often done
surreptitiously: but today as yesterday the Church continues to be
attacked. How great is our obligation to live every day as responsible
Catholics!
(The Forge,
no.852)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How do
Christ and his Spirit act in the hearts of the faithful?
Christ communicates his Spirit and the grace of God through the
sacraments to all the members of the Church, who thus bear the fruits
of the new life of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is also the Master of
prayer.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.146)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday
of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time II
(August 30) Today let us think of Saint Jeanne Jugan and Saint Fiacre
(Saints)
Scripture today:
2
Thessalonians 3:6-10, 16-18; Psalm 128:1-2, 4-5;
Matthew 23:27-32
“We
instruct you, brothers, in the name of (our) Lord Jesus Christ,to shun
any brother who conducts himself in a disorderly way and not according
to the tradition they received from us. For you know how one must
imitate us. For we did not act in a disorderly way among you, nor did
we eat food received free from anyone. On the contrary, in toil and
drudgery, night and day we worked, so as not to burden any of you. Not
that we do not have the right. Rather, we wanted to present ourselves
as a model for you, so that you might imitate us. In fact, when we were
with you, we instructed you that if anyone was unwilling to work,
neither should that one eat. May the Lord of peace himself give you
peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you. This
greeting is in my own hand, Paul's. This is the sign in every letter;
this is how I write. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.”(2
Thessalonians 3:6-10, 16-18)
In
our first reading
today from St Paul’s second Letter to the Thessalonians a
stern command is given. “In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we urge
you, brothers, to keep away from any of the brothers who refuses to
work or to live according to the tradition we passed on to you.” (Matthew
23:27-32) The
emphasis in this passage is on the very serious obligation to work, and
so serious is this duty that St Paul reminds his readers that “we gave
you a
rule when we were with you: not to let anyone have any food if he
refused to do any work.” St Paul writes these words “in the name of the
Lord Jesus Christ”. So he is speaking with the mind of Christ. To be at
our work, therefore, is very much part and parcel of the Christian life
and to refuse to work is not to live according to the Christian
"tradition". The refusal to work includes, of course, the refusal to
work
well. Working well, then, is part and parcel of following in the
footsteps of the Lord and imitating his way of life. We think of the
years at Nazareth during which our Lord worked at his profession with
Joseph, and helped lovingly and assiduously at home with his mother
Mary and his foster-father. I once read that much of the building in
the city of Caesarea would have been going on during our Lord’s years
at Nazareth, and that Joseph and our Lord may well have regularly
travelled together for work at Caesarea. Whatever of that possibility,
our Lord’s work with Joseph and Mary is a beautiful thought Then once
his public ministry had commenced, our Lord’s life’s work continued in
earnest with tremendous energy being expended in proclaiming the Good
News of the Kingdom. Christ was a man of great and holy work.
We are called to be
like him in his work and every day to be busy about our work in life.
St Paul’s words make it clear that we cannot be united to our Lord if
we refuse to work. Of course, “work” has a broad meaning and the sick
person in his bed has a very important “work” to do, namely of
suffering in union with the suffering Christ whose supreme work was to
suffer and to die on the cross. I once saw a documentary on a woman
whose whole life had been spent in an iron lung. She was attended to
by others all her days. The cameraman interviewed her at one point when
she was
being taken out for a drive in a specially designed vehicle for the
purpose. He asked her whether she ever felt sorry about her condition
and depressed with herself. She said no, never. Her philosophy, she
explained, was that whatever one’s circumstances, one had to make the
best and most of it. That is all that one can do and that is all that
one is expected to do, and that is what she always tried to do. So that
was her work in life, and she was making a very good job of it and
inspiring many people who were helping her. Let us think of the
enthusiasm and dedication of Christ for the work his Father had given
him to do. We ought try to acquire that Christ-like dedication and
enthusiasm for our work, striving to do it with excellence and
perseveringly and in union with him who sustains us. That is to say, we
must strive to sanctify our work in
life, and our work of each day. We must strive to work in union with
Jesus the Worker, who himself worked constantly in union with his
heavenly Father who was
always at work. We work in collaboration with Jesus, in union with him,
doing our work in such a way that it will be something holy and worthy
of being offered to the Father.
If we
sanctify our work, we will be sanctified in the process, and others too
will be sanctified. Work is a key element in the life,
development and redemption of man. Let us resolve to make a good job of
it with Christ before us as our model and Love.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Turn away
from hypocrisy and evildoing
Commentary from the Epistle of Barnabas (about
130) (§ 18, 20 & 21, translated by J.B. Lightfoot)
There are two ways of
teaching and of power, the one of light and the other of darkness; and
there is a great difference between the two ways… But the way of the
Black One is crooked and full of a curse. For it is a way of eternal
death with punishment wherein are the things that destroy men's
souls--idolatry, boldness, exhalation of power, hypocrisy, doubleness
of heart, adultery, murder, plundering, pride, transgression,
treachery, malice…, covetousness, absence of the fear of God;
persecutors of good men, hating the truth…, paying no heed to the widow
and the orphan…, not pitying the poor man…, oppressing him that is
afflicted…
It is good therefore to
learn the ordinances of the Lord, as many as have been written above,
and to walk in them. For he that does these things shall be glorified
in the kingdom of God; whereas he that chooses their opposites shall
perish together with his works. For this cause is the resurrection, for
this the recompense. I entreat you: keep amongst you those to whom you
may do good. Fail not.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Use this prescription for your life: “I don’t remember my own
existence. I don’t think of my own affairs, because I haven’t the time.
Work and service!
(The Forge,
no.853)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What does the word Church mean?
The word Church
refers to the people whom God calls and gathers together from every
part of the earth. They form the assembly of those who through faith
and baptism have become children of God, members of Christ, and temples
of the Holy Spirit.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.147
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time
(August 31) Today let us think of Saint Raymond Nonnatus
(Saints)
Scripture today:
1
Corinthians 1:1-9; Psalm 145:2-3, 4-5, 6-7;
Matthew 24:42-51
Paul, called to be an
apostle of
Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother, to the
church of God that is in Corinth, to you who have been sanctified in
Christ Jesus, called to be holy, with all those everywhere who call
upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours. Grace to
you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I give
thanks to my God always on your account for the grace of God bestowed
on you in Christ Jesus, that in him you were enriched in every way,
with all discourse and all knowledge, as the testimony to Christ was
confirmed among you, so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift
as you wait for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will keep
you firm to the end, irreproachable on the day of our Lord Jesus
Christ. God is faithful, and by him you were called to fellowship
with his Son, Jesus Christ our
Lord.
(1
Corinthians 1:1-9)
In
a column of Companions
(Winter 2006, p.2) the Provincial Superior of the Australian
Jesuits wrote that “Ignatius tells us how important are
memory and gratitude”. Clearly, Saint Ignatius is referring to
gratitude for blessings
remembered. There is no doubt that gratitude is most important in the
spiritual life of the Christian - and to appreciate this we just have
to advert to the fact that the Mass is called the “Eucharist” which
means a
thanksgiving. The Letters of St Paul are full of prayers of
thanksgiving, and our first reading today from the first Letter to
the Corinthians is an instance. He writes that “I never stop thanking
God for all the graces you have received through Jesus Christ.” (1 Corinthians
1:1-9) In
his opening
sentence Paul sends “greetings to the church of God in Corinth, to the
holy people of Jesus Christ, who are called to take their place among
all the saints everywhere who pray to our Lord Jesus Christ; for he is
their Lord no less than ours.” The Holy Spirit is
reminding us who read St Paul’s words that by our baptism and
membership
in the Church we share in the holiness of Christ. In being made members of
Christ, in
belonging now to the Lord, we share already in his holiness and for
this reason St Paul refers to “the holy people” of Corinth and to “the
saints everywhere”. That is our situation unless we forego it by
serious sin. We are in Jesus Christ, we are in the state of grace, and
so St Paul refers to us as “the saints”. There is nothing more
important for the human condition than this. Whatever may happen to us
in life if we are in the state of grace, if we are in Christ Jesus, if
we are “among the saints everywhere who pray to our Lord Jesus Christ”,
all will be well. As St Thomas More put it, though I lose my head I
shall come to no harm.
The critical
question is, how to advance in this state of grace? St Paul in our
passage today
trusts that Christ will keep his readers “steady and without blame
until the last day”. His confidence lies in the fact that “God by
calling you has joined you to his Son, Jesus Christ, and God is
faithful.” God is faithful, but
what must we on our part do? Our Lord in today's tells us that we must
“stay awake” and be alert to his coming “because you do not know
the day when your master is coming.” (Matthew
24:42-51) Our Lord tells the
parable of the servant whom the master placed over his household to
look after everyone and everything while he is away. There two kinds of
servants. There is the one whom the master finds diligently at his work
when he returns, and there is the other servant, the dishonest one, who
neglects his charge
and spends his time enjoying himself in a cruel ruination of his
responsibilities. He is caught guilty and unprepared when the master
suddenly returns. His punishment will be severe and final. So then we
must be vigilant and constantly at our God-given responsibilities, ever
ready should the master come - at our death or whenever. But of course
the master comes with his grace numerous times each day, let alone at
our death which for each individual is the definitive coming which
seals everything at the personal level. Let us resolve to respond to
the comings of the Lord in grace each day
such that were that day to be our last and our Judgment immediately to
follow, we would be prepared. And why could it not be our last
day?
Let us each day
remember our calling to be holy in Christ Jesus, with a share in the
holiness of God. We are called to be counted among the saints.
Therefore we must persevere and grow in the life of Christ with
perfection in the life of grace as our goal. If this is to be achieved
we must resolve to be constantly faithful to the grace given to us each
day. Let us put it to good use by the assiduous fulfilment of our work
in life
- understood in the broadest terms. As John Henry Newman put it in one
of his sermons, if we are faithful to the light given us, more will be
given.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Therefore,
stay awake! For you do not know on which day your Lord will come.”(Mt 24,42-51)
Commentary by Pope John Paul
II (Testament)
“Keep your eyes open, for you know not the day when your Lord will
come.” These words remind me of the last call that will come when the
Lord desires. I want to respond to it, and I want everything that makes
up my life on earth to prepare me for this moment. I don’t know when it
will come, but like everything, I also place that moment into the hands
of my Master’s Mother: Totus Tuus. I leave everything and everyone with
whom my life and my vocation have associated me in these same maternal
hands. Above all, I leave the Church in her hands, as well as my nation
and the whole of humanity. I thank each one. I ask each one for
forgiveness. I also ask that people pray so that God’s mercy will prove
to be greater than my weakness and my unworthiness (March 6, 1979)…
Each person must always count on the possibility of death. And he must
be ready to present himself before the Lord and Judge – who is at the
same time the Redeemer and Father. So I too constantly take this into
consideration, entrusting this decisive moment to the Mother of Christ
and of the Church – to the Mother of my hope…
Once again, I want to entrust myself totally to the Lord’s will. He
will decide when and how my earthly life and my pastoral ministry are
to come to an end. In my life and in my death, Totus Tuus, through the
Immaculate. I accept this death already today, and I hope that Christ
will give me grace for the last passage, that is to say, my Passover. I
also hope that he will make it useful to the supreme cause that I try
to serve: the salvation of humankind, the protection of the human
family and in it, of all nations and peoples (among them, I turn in a
particular way towards my earthly homeland); useful to the people whom
he has particularly entrusted to me, to the life of the Church, to the
glory of God himself (March 1, 1980).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
These are the characteristics that define the incomparable goodness of
our holy Mother, Mary: a love taken to the extreme, fulfilling the Will
of God with tender care; a complete forgetfulness of herself, for she
is happy to be where God wants her to be. For this reason, not even the
slightest gesture of hers is trivial. Learn from her.
(The Forge,
no.854)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Are there any other names
and images with which the Bible speaks about the Church?
In Sacred Scripture we find many images which bring out various
complementary aspects of the mystery of the Church. The Old Testament
favours those images that are bound to the people of God. The New
Testament offers images that are linked to Christ as the Head of this
people which is his Body. Other images are drawn from pastoral life
(sheepfold, flock, sheep), from agriculture (field, olive grove,
vineyard), from construction (dwelling place, stone, temple), and from
family life (spouse, mother, family).
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.148)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday
of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time II
(September 1) Today let us think of Saint Giles of Castaneda
(Saints)
Scripture today:
1 Corinthians
1:17-25; Psalm 33:1-2, 4-5, 10-11;
Matthew 25:1-13
For
Christ did not send me
to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with the wisdom of human
eloquence, so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied of its
meaning. The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are
perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it
is written: "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the learning of
the learned I will set aside." Where is the wise one? Where is the
scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made the wisdom
of the world foolish? For since in the wisdom of God the world did not
come to know God through wisdom, it was the will of God through the
foolishness of the proclamation to save those who have faith. For Jews
demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ
crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but
to those who are called, Jews and Greeks alike, Christ the power of God
and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human
wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
1
Corinthians
1:17-25
Then
the kingdom of heaven
will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the
bridegroom. Five of them were foolish and five were wise. The foolish
ones, when taking their lamps, brought no oil with them, but the wise
brought flasks of oil with their lamps. Since the bridegroom was long
delayed, they all became drowsy and fell asleep. At midnight, there was
a cry, 'Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!' Then all those
virgins got up and trimmed their lamps. The foolish ones said to the
wise, 'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.' But the
wise ones replied, 'No, for there may not be enough for us and you. Go
instead to the merchants and buy some for yourselves.' While they went
off to buy it, the bridegroom came and those who were ready went into
the wedding feast with him. Then the door was locked. Afterwards the
other virgins came and said, 'Lord, Lord, open the door for us!' But he
said in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, I do not know you.' Therefore, stay
awake, for you know neither the day nor the hour. (Matthew
25:1-13)
By
any standards, the
ancients produced examples of outstanding philosophical reflection that
presumably till the end of time will be a principal resource for human
thought. Consider especially Socrates, or Plato, or Aristotle. The
works of Plato were of great assistance to Christian thought for the
first thousand years of the Christian era. Consider the metaphysics of
Aristotle
and his considerations on human happiness and virtue. Those of his
works that survived had tremendous impact on Islamic thought in the
early and high middle ages, and subsequently on the thought of the
great scholastics especially St Thomas Aquinas, and through them on the
Church's thought during the second millenium. Yet for all its
capacity and achievements, how far short it fell of understanding man’s
ultimate situation and of the plan of God that would redeem him. Mere
human
philosophy did not understand how hopeless was the predicament of man.
It knew very little really of sin and of a personal God, let alone of
how the true
God who would redeem man from his sin, the wages of which were total
death. God’s revelation revealed, as St Paul tells us in today’s first
reading (1
Corinthians 1:17-25) the “foolishness of
human wisdom” and the need for a far greater light. So much, we might
say, for “the Greeks.” What of “the Jews”? The Jews looked not to human
wisdom but to the miraculous power of God to achieve the promised
kingdom. As far as it went, this was excellent. God’s saving power
would like the great Exodus where God slew
Israel’s enemies, or perhaps like the slaughter of the prophets of Baal
by Elijah after the failure of their sacrifice and the miraculous
acceptance of the sacrifice of Elijah. At the coming of the Messiah,
God would show himself victorious in great deeds. Even John the Baptist
had a touch of these expectations, and certainly our Lord’s own
disciples did. But no, in the event, God’s revelation and power was
revealed in “a
crucified Christ”, an obstacle to the Jews and to the Greeks
madness.
The light of the
world is the light of Christ. Our Lord told his disciples that the man
who follows him walks in the light and the one who does not walks in
the darkness. His claim is an absolute one applying to all humanity and
to the extent that human thought shares in Christ’s light (by the power
of the Holy Spirit working within the nations) it lives in the light.
So then, the lamp we must carry day by day and which we must keep
burning is that of Christ. Christ’s faithful have the mission to bring
this light to a secular-minded world. We who are Christ’s faithful must
keep that lamp lit, and this is one clear message from our Lord’s
parable in today’s Gospel.
There are two kinds of persons among the throng of Christ’s disciples.
They all profess to be Christian in a general sense and so can be
considered to be carrying the lamp while they go to meet the
bridegroom. But some are foolish, others are sensible. “The foolish
ones did take their lamps, but they brought no oil, whereas the
sensible ones took flasks of oil as well as their lamps.” And so, of
course, when the bridegroom suddenly arrived, the foolish ones were
found to be without lighted lamps because they had no oil. Our Lord’s
message is: “Stay awake, because you do not know either the day or the
hour.” (Matthew
25:1-13) To all practical
purposes this means that we must keep the flame
of faith alive in our hearts, as we are exhorted to do in the rite of
Baptism. We must take the means of living a constantly growing
spiritual life. The constant danger is that of mediocrity and gradual
neglect of “the oil” of the lamp. We must be careful about our daily
prayer, our spiritual reading, our participation in the Sacraments
which are our principal encounters with the person of Christ, our
awareness of the Church’s doctrine, the sanctification of our daily
work and all the other normal means of maintaining a lively faith.
Let us appreciate
that God’s revelation transcends human wisdom and the best of human
religiosity. Let us resolve to make it the light of every aspect of our
lives, ensuring by our own careful spiritual practice that it never
ceases to light up our way to our heavenly homeland.
(E.J.Tyler)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At midnight, there was a cry, 'Behold, the
bridegroom! Come out to meet him!' (Matt 25,1-13).
Commentary by St Augustine
(354-430), Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Sermon 93)
The ten virgins all wanted to go out to meet the
bridegroom. What
does going out to meet the bridegroom mean? It is to go out with their
heart, it is to live in expectation of his coming. But he delayed his
coming, and “they all fell asleep.” … What do those words mean: “they
all fell asleep”? There is a sleep that no one can escape. Remember the
words of the apostle Paul: “We would have you be clear about those who
sleep in death” (1 Thess 4:13), that is to say, those who have died…
Thus they have all fallen asleep. Do you think the sensible virgin can
escape death? No, whether they be sensible or foolish, they all have to
pass by way of the sleep of death…
“At midnight someone shouted.” What does that mean? It
happens at
the time when no one is thinking of it, when no one is expecting it… He
will come at the time when you are least thinking of it. Why will he
come like that? Because he says: “The exact time is not yours to know.
The Father has reserved that to himself.” (Acts 1:7) The apostle Paul
says: “The day of the Lord is coming like a thief in the night.” (1
Thess 5:2) So keep watch during the night so as not to be surprised by
the thief. For whether you want it or not, the sleep of death will
necessarily come.
However, it will only come when a cry is heard at
midnight. What is
that cry if not the one about which the apostle Paul said: “in an
instant, in the twinkling of an eye, at the sound of the last trumpet.
The trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and
we shall be changed.” (1 Cor 15:52) After the cry that will resound at
midnight: “The groom is here”, what will happen? “They all got up.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Committed. How much I like that word! We children of God
freely put
ourselves under an obligation to live a life of dedication to God,
striving that He may have complete and absolute sovereignty over our
lives.
(The Forge,
no.855)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What
is the origin and the fulfilment of the Church?
The Church finds her origin and fulfilment in the eternal plan of God.
She was prepared for in the Old Covenant with the election of Israel,
the sign of the future gathering of all the nations. Founded by the
words and actions of Jesus Christ, fulfilled by his redeeming death and
Resurrection, the Church has been manifested as the mystery of
salvation by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. She will
be perfected in the glory of heaven as the assembly of all the redeemed
of the earth.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.149)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time II
(September 2) Today let us think of the martyrs of September (Saints)
Scripture today:
1
Corinthians 1:26-31; Psalm 33:12-13, 18-19, 20-21;
Matthew 25:14-30
Consider your own calling,
brothers. Not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were
powerful, not many were of noble birth. Rather, God chose the foolish
of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to
shame the strong, and God chose the lowly and despised of the world,
those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are
something, so that no human being might boast before God. It is due to
him that you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, as
well as righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, so that, as it
is written, "Whoever boasts, should boast in the Lord."(1
Corinthians 1:26-31)
Then
the one who had received the one talent came forward and
said, 'Master, I knew you were a demanding person, harvesting where you
did not plant and gathering where you did not scatter; so out of fear I
went off and buried your talent in the ground. Here it is back.' His
master said to him in reply, 'You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew
that I harvest where I did not plant and gather where I did not
scatter? Should you not then have put my money in the bank so that I
could have got it back with interest on my return? Now then! Take the
talent from him and give it to the one with ten. For to everyone who
has, more will be given and he will grow rich; but from the one who has
not, even what he has will be taken away. And throw this useless
servant into the darkness outside, where there will be wailing and
grinding of teeth.'(Matthew
25:14-30)
Years ago
when I visited Jerusalem I was sitting in the area called the “Ecce
Homo” where Christ is traditionally considered to have been scourged.
It is now, if I remember correctly, a hostel and the area of the
scourging is within that hostel. I briefly began conversing with a
person who was not a Catholic and
was from Switzerland. I asked him what he did for a living, and he said
with a great gleam in his eyes, “Oh! I am only a tailor, but I am a
member of Jesus Christ!” It was a memorable answer and I am sure I
shall always remember it. He understood marvellously that his true
riches lay in
his
being incorporated into Christ Jesus, and that in belonging to Christ
he had been granted a status greater than anything he could aspire to
be. It is
this very point that St Paul stresses in our first reading from the
first Letter to the Corinthians today (1
Corinthians 1:26-31). He reminds his readers
that very few of them were regarded as eminent in society at the time
of their calling as Christians. They were not among those reputed to be
“wise”, “influential” or “noble”. But of course, what are all these
measures of importance in the sight of God? For “those whom the world
thinks common and contemptible are the ones that God has chosen”. The
boast of Christians is that of being made
“members of Christ Jesus” and that he, Christ, “has become our wisdom,
and our
virtue, and our holiness, and our freedom”. The riches and the hope of
the Christian lie in the person of Jesus in whom by baptism the
Christian lives.
That non-Catholic Swiss tailor seems to have understood this very well.
Let us pray for the grace to understand it well ourselves.
But it is not
enough simply to be in Christ by the gift and the power of God, for
that gift is a great responsibility. It is both a gift and a task, and
this is what the Lord himself is at pains to stress to his disciples in
our Gospel passage today. Our Lord’s parable tells of the master who in
setting out on his journey entrusts his property to his servants. That
"property" is, as we know, a share in the life of Christ and in the
heavenly blessings that come from being in Christ. “To one he gave five
talents, to another two, to a third one, each in proportion to his
ability. Then he set out.”
(Matthew 25:14-30) Immediately the one who
had been given the most set to work to extend his master’s property, as
did the next who had been given two talents. But the one who had been
given least did
nothing with it but hide it in the ground. The parable seems to be
mainly about that third servant, the little man, the ordinary person
with very little talent. It is the man who is “only a tailor”, the one
who cannot be
regarded as eminent in the sight of others, the one whom St Paul would
have counted among the Corinthians to whom he was writing. That is to
say, the parable is especially addressed to the everyman, to the common
people, to the nobodies who are members of Christ’s faithful. The
special danger that they must beware of is that of doing nothing with
the Faith they have been blessed with. Our Lord tells them that they
too will be held to account for the task they have been given of living
according to the Truth of Christ and of bearing witness to it in their
everyday life. The fact is that the evangelization of the world depends
enormously on the daily witness and Christian life of the ordinary
everyman,
because the world is made up largely of the everyman.
The Church Christ
founded would seem to include many who are ordinary but doing
very little with the grace and the talent they have been given by the
Holy Spirit. If all
of Christ’s faithful, no matter how limited be “the one talent”
given to them by the master, were to rise to a consistent witness to
the risen Christ and his message for man, how a sleeping giant would be
roused! Let us resolve to take up the work given to us each day. No
matter how small be the theatre of our daily life, its importance in
the
redemption of the world is very real. So, now I begin!
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Whenever sanctity is genuine it overflows from its vessel to fill other
hearts, other souls, with its superabundance. We, the children of God
sanctify ourselves by sanctifying others. Is Christianity spreading to
those around you? Consider this every day.
(The
Forge, no.856)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is the mission of the Church?
The mission of the Church is to proclaim and to establish the Kingdom
of God begun by Jesus Christ among all peoples. The Church constitutes
on earth the seed and beginning of this salvific Kingdom.
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.150)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Witnesses because of the gifts
they have received (Vatican Council II: Lumen gentium
31-33)
The laity, by their very vocation, seek the kingdom of God by engaging
in temporal affairs and by ordering them according to the plan of God.
They live in the world, that is, in each and in all of the secular
professions and occupations. They live in the ordinary circumstances of
family and social life, from which the very web of their existence is
woven. They are called there by God that by exercising their proper
function and led by the spirit of the Gospel, they may work for the
sanctification of the world from within as a leaven. In this way they
may make Christ known to others, especially by the testimony of a life
resplendent in faith, hope and charity. Therefore, since they are
tightly bound up in all types of temporal affairs it is their special
task to order and to throw light upon these affairs in such a way that
they may come into being and then continually increase according to
Christ to the praise of the Creator and the Redeemer…
The lay apostolate… is a participation in the salvific mission of the
Church itself. Through their baptism and confirmation all are
commissioned to that apostolate by the Lord himself. Moreover, by the
sacraments, especially the Holy Eucharist, that charity toward God and
man which is the soul of the apostolate is communicated and nourished.
Now the laity are called in a special way to make the Church present
and operative in those places and circumstances where only through them
can it become the salt of the earth. Thus every layman, in virtue of
the very gifts bestowed upon him, is at the same time a witness and a
living instrument of the mission of the Church itself, "according to
the measure of Christ's bestowal" (Eph 4:7)…
Upon all the laity, therefore, rests the noble duty of working to
extend the divine plan of salvation to all men of each epoch and in
every land. Consequently, may every opportunity be given them so that,
according to their abilities and the needs of the times, they may
zealously participate in the saving work of the Church.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------