Words of the Word

Monday of the Twenty-fifth Week in Ordinary Time

“No one who lights a lamp conceals it with a vessel or sets it under a bed; rather, he places it on a lampstand so that those who enter may see the light...” (Luke 8:16.)

Origen of Alexandria (part 2 of Pope Benedict’s reflections on Origen) comments on this verse from the Gospel proclaimed at Mass today:

“Scripture does not say this about a tangible lamp but about a comprehensible one. One does not “light” the lamp and conceal it “with a vessel” or put it “under a bed, but on the lamp stand” within himself. The vessels of the house are the powers of the soul. The bed is the body. “Those who go in” are those who hear the teacher.

He calls the holy church a “lamp stand.” By its proclamation, the Word of God gives light to all who are in this world and illuminates those in the house with the rays of the truth, filling the minds of all with divine knowledge.” (Fragments on Luke, 120, 122.)

Collect

O God,
Who founded all the commands
of your sacred Law
upon love of you and of our neighbor,
grant that, by keeping your precepts,
we may merit to attain eternal life.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.

Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen

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Welcome or unwelcome, insist upon the message

Saint Augustine of Hippo

Bishop and Great Western Father of the Church

An excerpt from a sermon On Pastors (Sermon 46)

Monday of the Twenty-fifth Week in Ordinary Time

The straying sheep you have not recalled; the lost sheep you have not sought. In one way or another, we go on living between the hands of robbers and the teeth of raging wolves, and in light of these present dangers we ask your prayers. The sheep moreover are insolent. The shepherd seeks out the straying sheep, but because they have wandered away and are lost they say that they are not ours. “Why do you want us? Why do you seek us?” they ask, as if their straying and being lost were not the very reason for our wanting them and seeking them out. “If I am straying,” he says, “if I am lost, why do you want me?” You are straying, that is why I wish to recall you. You have been lost, I wish to find you. “But I wish to stray,” he says: “I wish to be lost.”

So you wish to stray and be lost? How much better that I do not also wish this. Certainly, I dare say, I am unwelcome. But I listen to the Apostle who says: Preach the word; insist upon it, welcome and unwelcome. Welcome to whom? Unwelcome to whom? By all means welcome to those who desire it; unwelcome to those who do not. However unwelcome, I dare to say: “You wish to stray, you wish to be lost; but I do not want this.” For the one whom I fear does not wish this. And should I wish it, consider his words of reproach: The straying sheep you have not recalled; the lost sheep you have not sought. Shall I fear you rather than him? Remember, we must all present ourselves before the judgment seat of Christ.

I shall recall the straying; I shall seek the lost. Whether they wish it or not, I shall do it. And should the brambles of the forests tear at me when I seek them, I shall force myself through all straits; I shall put down all hedges. So far as the God whom I fear grants me the strength, I shall search everywhere. I shall recall the straying; I shall seek after those on the verge of being lost. If you do not want me to suffer, do not stray, do not become lost. It is enough that I lament your straying and loss. No, I fear that in neglecting you, I shall also kill what is strong. Consider the passage that follows: And what was strong you have destroyed. Should I neglect the straying and lost, the strong one will also take delight in straying and in being lost.

Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen

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Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

“Let us condemn him to a shameful death; for according to his own words, God will take care of him.” (Wisdom 2:20.)

Origen of Alexandria (part 2 of Pope Benedict’s reflections on Origen) comments on this verse from the First Reading proclaimed at Mass today:

“My Lord Jesus Christ, when he assumed the flesh of the Virgin for our salvation, was surely glorified, because “he came to seek what was lost,” though he was not “glorified gloriously.” In fact, it is said precisely of him, “We saw him, and he had neither beauty nor splendor, and his face was more to be despised than all the sons of mortals.” He was glorified also when he went to the cross and suffered death. Do you know why he was glorified? He said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son, so that your Son may glorify you.” For him, therefore, even the passion of the cross was glory. This glory was not glorious, however, but humble. Finally, it is said of him, “He humbled himself even to death, death on a cross,” and of this also the prophet had foretold, “Let us condemn him to a shameful death.” But Isaiah also says of him, “He bore his judgment in humiliation.” Thus in all these events the Lord was glorified, but humbly, so to speak. He was not “glorified gloriously.” (Homilies on Exodus, 6.)

Collect

O God,
Who founded all the commands
of Your sacred Law
upon love of You and of our neighbor,
grant that, by keeping Your precepts,
we may merit to attain eternal life.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen

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Wednesday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time

“t bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” (1 Corinthians 13:7)

Saint Augustine of Hippo comments on this verse from the Frist Reading proclaimed during today’s Mass:

“For what is it to hear about oneself from you but to know oneself? Who, then, can know himself and say “It is false,” unless he himself lies? But because “charity believes all things,” certainly among those whom it makes one, in intimate union with each other, I, also, O Lord, do even confess to you in such a way that men may hear, though I cannot prove to them the things I confess are true. But those whose ears charity opens to me, they believe.” (Confessions,, 10.)

Collect

Look upon us, O God,
Creator and ruler of all things,
and, that we may feel the working of Your mercy,
grant that we may serve You with all our heart.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen

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Monday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time

“A centurion there had a slave who was ill and about to die, and he was valuable to him.” (Luke 7:2.)

Saint Ambrose of Milan offers the following insight on this verse from today’s Gospel proclamation:

“The servant of a Gentile centurion is immediately brought to the Lord for healing; this represented the people of the nations who were held in the bonds of worldly slavery, sick with deadly passions, to be cleansed by the Lord’s blessing. The Evangelist did not err in saying that he was at the point of death, for he would have died if Christ would not have healed him. He fulfilled the rule with heavenly love, he who so loved his enemies that he snatched them from death and admitted them to the hope of eternal salvation.” (Exposition on the Gospel of Luke, 5.)

Collect

Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen

The shepherds who feed themselves

Saint Augustine of Hippo

Bishop and Great Western Father of the Church

An excerpt from his sermon On Pastors

Monday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Let us consider the unflattering words of God which Scripture addresses to shepherds who feed themselves and not the sheep. You consume their milk and cover yourselves with their wool; you kill the fatlings, but my sheep you do not pasture. You have failed to strengthen what was weak, to heal what was sick, and to bind up what was injured. You did not call back what went astray, nor seek out what was lost. What was strong you have destroyed, and my sheep have been scattered because there is no shepherd.

This is spoken to the shepherds who feed themselves and not the sheep; it speaks of their concern and their neglect. What is their concern? You consume their milk and cover yourselves with their wool. And so the Apostle asks: Who plants a vineyard and does not eat from its fruit? Who pastures a flock and does not drink from the milk of the flock? Thus we learn that the milk of the flock is whatever temporal support and sustenance God's people give to those who are placed over them. It is of this that the Apostle was speaking in the passage just quoted.

Although he chose to support himself by the labor of his own hands and not to ask for milk from the sheep, the Apostle did say that he had the right to receive the milk, for the Lord had established that they who preach the Gospel should live from the Gospel. Paul also says that other of his fellow apostles made use of this right, a right granted them, and not unlawfully usurped. But Paul went further by not taking what was rightfully his. He forgave the debt, whereas the others did not demand what was not due them. Therefore Paul went further. Perhaps his action was foreshadowed by the Good Samaritan who, when he brought the sick man to the inn, said: If you spend any more, I will repay you on my way back.

What more can I say concerning those shepherds who do not need the milk of the flock? They are more merciful; or rather, they carry out a more abundant ministry of mercy. They are able to do so, and they do it. Let them receive praise, but do not condemn the others. The Apostle himself did not seek what was given. However, he wanted the sheep to be fruitful, not sterile and unable to give milk.

Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen

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A question from Jesus that wrenches the disciple from complacency

εὐαγγελίζω (euaggelizo)
“to announce the Good News of victory in battle”

“... Jesus and his disciples set out
for the villages of Caesarea Philippi.
Along the way he asked his disciples,
“Who do people say that I am?”
They said in reply,
“John the Baptist, others Elijah,
still others one of the prophets.”
And he asked them,
“But who do you say that I am?””

(Mark 8:27-29.)

θεωρέω (theoreo)
(“to perceive, discover, ponder a deeper meaning”)

From a seemingly innocuous question, to an announcement of death and the command to take up one’s Cross each day: this episode in The Gospel according to Saint Mark opens what many scholars term the core of the Marcan proclamation of Good News. Mark 8:22 through 10:52 is unit within this Gospel. It opens at 8:22 with the healing of a blind man and closes at 10:52 with sight restored to another blind man, suggesting a lesson on the necessity of seeing clearly and properly as a disciple of Jesus, living always in the mode of His Father’s Kingdom. Many key and challenging teachings of Jesus regarding the Kingdom of God are sounded in this part of the Gospel, not the least of which are three specific announcement on Jesus’ impending passion, death and resurrection that elicits various responses from disciples; disciples at this point in their lives who are apparently blind to the understanding and demands Kingdom living.

One might wonder what was in the minds of the disciples as they traveled to Caesarea Phillipi. Situated in the northern part of Israel, it is the place of Hermon Springs, the major source of water that, as it collects southward, empties into and forms the Sea of Galilee. It was and still is a place of rest and refreshment, with many people kneeling down and bringing a handful of cool spring water to their lips. Thus when Jesus asks, “Who do people say that I AM?” – perhaps the disciples thought this might be the introduction to some friendly chit-chat around the springs. They (and we) learned quickly that this was neither meaningless question nor a casual discussion. When Jesus posed the question even more seriously, “but who do you say that I am?” Jesus got to the very heart of the Gospel. This was a question the disciples began to wrestle with early in the Public Ministry (cf Mark 4:35-41): just who is this Person in the boat with us?

The question Jesus poses about His identity is essential for the disciple. Jesus certainly is not looking for a mindless, glib catechism answer that is belted out without any significance. The question is meant to shake the disciples (and us) from a self-creation or self-projection of Jesus, a Jesus that is warm, fuzzy, comfortable; in other words — ‘god’ on my terms. The various ‘images’ or ‘conceptions’ we have of Jesus, His Father and the Holy Spirit are images that must be continuously held up to the light of the Gospel and critiqued. Many involved in pastoral ministry and many believers will attest that the ‘faith question’ among many is not so much the existence of God but just exactly who (or [sadly] what,) is God.

Is God the ‘divine police officer’ looking to nail you every time you sin?
Is God the ‘sugar daddy’ who is able to leap tall buildings in a single bounce to give the pray-er whatever she or he wants whenever she or he calls out?
Is God the ‘divine watchmaker’ who has constructed a complex creation, started the pendulum swinging then leaves us to our own devices to figure things out?
Is God the ‘the force’ of goodness that pervades the universe as some etherial goo?
Is God the ‘guarantor’ who grants me an exemption from suffering, pain and death because I try to be a nice person?
Is God the ‘fixer’ who must suspend all the consequences (and responsibility) of mine and other’s wrongs with the wave of a wand?
Is God the ‘manager’ of the divine credit rewards program who hands out bonuses because I ‘rack up points’ by doing good things?
Do I approach God with a sense of entitlement that God must do x, y, and z for me because I am me?

These and many other images have been formed in our lives over the years in response to a plethora of circumstances and experience beyond counting. J. B. Phililips in Your God is Too Small, put it this way, “Many men and women today are living, often with inner dissatisfaction, without any faith in God at all. This is not because they are particularly wicked or selfish or, as the old-fashioned would say, “godless,” but because they have not found with their adult minds a God big enough to “account for” life, big enough to “fit in with” the new scientific age, big enough to command their highest admiration and respect, and consequently their willing co-operation.”

The grappling with Jesus identity is essential if we are to be true disciples as the original ones eventually came to be. Jesus’ identity must be accepted on His terms, not the individual’s because Jesus is clear as to Who He is: Son of God the Father Who is Love. As Son of the One-Who-Is-Love, Jesus knows acutely the result of selfishness and self-centeredness when it comes to Love: destruction. The only antidote to love in the way of the One-Who-Is-Love is the Cross. Jesus’ Cross is the singular way for authentic Love to blossom and for humanity to be remade in the image of the Son of God. This is why Jesus insists on denying oneself. It is not to make for misery, but to move us from the addiction to self and turn – in service – to the One Who Is Love, God our Father.

In this vein, the 6th century Bishop, Caesarius of Arles, counseled his flock in one of his Sermons: “When the Lord tells us in the Gospel that anyone who wants to be his follower must renounce himself, the injunction seems harsh; we think he is imposing a burden on us. But an order is no burden when it is given by one who helps in carrying it out. To what place are we to follow Christ if not where he has already gone? We know that he has risen and ascended into heaven; there, then, we must follow him. There is no cause for despair—by ourselves we can do nothing, but we have Christ’s promise. One who claims to abide in Christ ought to walk as he walked. Would you follow Christ? Then be humble as he was humble. Do not scorn his lowliness if you want to reach his exaltation. Human sin made the road rough. Christ’s resurrection leveled it. By passing over it himself, he transformed the narrowest of tracks into a royal highway. Two feet are needed to run along this highway; they are humility and charity. Everyone wants to get to the top — well, the first step to take is humility. Why take strides that are too big for you — do you want to fall instead of going up? Begin with the first step, humility, and you will already be climbing.”

Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time

“The Lord GOD is my help, therefore I am not disgraced; Therefore I have set my face like flint, knowing that I shall not be put to shame.” (Isaiah 50:7.)

In commenting on these verses from today’s First Reading, Saint John Chrysostom writes:

“For the railings, and insults, and reproaches and gibes inflicted by enemies and their plots are compared with a worn-out garment and moth-eaten wool when God says, “Do not fear the reproach of people, neither be afraid of their revilings, for they shall grow old as does a garment, and like moth eaten wool so shall they be consumed.” Therefore, let none of these things that are happening trouble [you], but stop asking for the aid of this or that person and running after shadows (for such are human alliances); persistently call on Jesus, whom [you serve] . . . and in a moment of time all these evils will be dissolved.” (Letters to Olympias, 7.)

A reflection on this Sunday’s Gospel.

Collect

Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen

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Prayers on 9/11

Psalm 23

“The LORD is my shepherd;
there is nothing I shall want.
Fresh and green are the pastures
where he gives me repose.
Near restful waters he leads me;
he revives my soul...”

More

Almighty ever-living God,
in Whose hand lies every human heart
and the rights of peoples,
look with favor, we pray,
on those who govern with authority over us,
that throughout the whole world
the prosperity of peoples,
the assurance of peace,
and freedom of religion
may through Your gift be made secure.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.

Roman Missal,

For those in Public Office, 22.

O God, who have revealed
that peacemakers are to be called Your children,
grant, we pray,
that we may work without ceasing
to establish that justice
which alone ensures true and lasting peace.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.

Roman Missal,

For the Preservation of Peace and Justice, 30.

The groan that heals, frees and opens

εὐαγγελίζω (euaggelizo)
“to announce the Good News of victory in battle”

“... then He looked up to heaven
and groaned (ἐστέναξεν, estenazen),
and said to him, “Ephphatha!”
that is, “Be opened!””

(Mark 7:34.)

θεωρέω (theoreo)
(“to perceive, discover, ponder a deeper meaning”)

This Sunday’s proclamation from the Gospel according to Saint Mark opens with Jesus traveling an impressible distance: from Tyre to the district of the Decapolis and once there, an event with meticulous and vivid detail unfolds. When Jesus got to the district of the Decapolis (an alliance of 10 Greek cities, south of the Sea of Galilee, formed to help preserve and advance their culture and commercial interests), nameless “people” brought to Jesus a “deaf man who had a speech impediment.” Reminiscent of an episode earlier in Mark’s Gospel, the paralyzed man being brought to Jesus by 4 people [chapter 2], once again ‘others’ are instrumental in bringing people to an encounter with the Person, Jesus.

The people who bring the deaf man to Jesus want Him “to lay his hand on him,” a gesture certainly familiar to many people who witnessed various healings by Jesus. Yet this time, Jesus follows a different course of action by removing Himself and the deaf man from the crowd and using His fingers and spittle. Some scholars suggest that the Greek people of the Decapolis would have recognized these gestures as inherently healing, even though Jesus and the deaf man are off by themselves. The healing gesture is followed by a Jesus emitting a mystifying “groan.”

στενάζω (stenázo) is the Greek verb translated “to groan” (and it can also be translated “to sigh”). There are certainly situations and circumstances that occur in day-to-day living that cause one to groan or to sigh, many of them involving disappointment that a particular course of action did not result the way one had planned. In the biblical world of the Gospels, though, στενάζω is often used as a response to oppression. Someone or something is actively preventing a person or people from living fully and another is needed in order to remove the oppression (for example, the Hebrew people caught in the slavery bondage of Egypt). στενάζω also signals to the people of the Decapolis that Jesus’ work is in no way associated with variants of Greek magical rites but a recognition of the reality of oppression that must be conquered. Jesus conquers the oppression here and, as the Cross looms ever present in His Public Ministry, He will definitely conquer all oppression and then command His disciples to freely and boldly speak of Him and His power to liberate humanity.