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Tuesday of The Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 6, 7-8. 12. 14-20
King Darius issued an order to the officials of West-of-Euphrates: "Let the governor and the elders of the Jews continue the work on that house of God; they are to rebuild it on its former site. I also issue this decree concerning your dealing with these elders of the Jews in the rebuilding of that house of God: From the royal revenue, the taxes of West-of-Euphrates, let these men be repaid for their expenses, in full and without delay. I, Darius, have issued this decree; let it be carefully executed."
The elders of the Jews continued to make progress in the building, supported by the message of the prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, son of Iddo. They finished the building according to the command of the God of Israel and the decrees of Cyrus and Darius [and of Artaxerxes, king of Persia]. They completed this house on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius. The Israelites -- priests, Levites, and the other returned exiles -- celebrated the dedication of this house of God with joy. For the dedication of this house of God, they offered one hundred bulls, two hundred rams, and four hundred lambs, together with twelve he-goats as a sin-offering for all Israel, in keeping with the number of the tribes of Israel. Finally, they set up the priests in their classes and the Levites in their divisions for the service of God in Jerusalem, as is prescribed in the book of Moses.
The exiles kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month. The Levites, every one of whom had purified himself for the occasion, sacrificed the Passover for the rest of the exiles, for their brethren the priests, and for themselves.
Resp. Psalm Ps 122, 1-2. 3-4. 4-5
R.(1) I rejoiced when I heard them say: let us go to the house of the Lord.
I rejoiced because they said to me,
"We will go up to the house of the Lord."
And now we have set foot
within your gates, O Jerusalem --
Jerusalem, built as a city
with compact unity.
To it the tribes go up,
the tribes of the Lord,
According to the decree for Israel,
to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
In it are set up judgment seats,
seats for the house of David.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus came to be with him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd. He was informed, "Your mother and your brothers are standing outside and wish to see you." He told them in reply, "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and act upon it."
Commentary on Luke 8:19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus come looking for him but they cannot get to him because of the crush of people in the house where he is speaking. Jesus was in Capernaum at the time and Nazareth was about 50 km (30 miles) away. The mention of ‘brothers’ would commonly indicate cousins and not just siblings. When the message is passed in to Jesus, he says to all:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
The story is told in harsher terms in Mark. He has Jesus say, for instance:
Who are my mother and my brothers?” (Mark 3:33)
It is suggested there that their purpose was to take him away. On the one hand, they thought he was mad and an embarrassment to the family and, secondly, that he might get them into trouble with the authorities because of the provocative things he was saying and doing such as questioning traditional interpretations of the Law. We see a similar embarrassment on the part of the parents of the man born blind in John chapter 9. They refuse to speak to the authorities about their son:
Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself. (John 9:21)
Luke’s account is softer and just focuses on the saying of Jesus. In fact, Luke has taken this passage out of its context in Mark (3:31-35) and turns it into a conclusion to his short section on the parables. In doing so, he modifies Mark’s statement:
Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother. (Mark 3:35)
This is done to match the end of Luke’s parable of the sower:
…the ones who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart and bear fruit with endurance. (Luke 8:15)
Luke has Jesus say:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
To a society which regarded itself as God’s chosen people merely by birth and an external ritual like circumcision, Jesus asserts that belonging to God has little to do with blood or race, but only with the relationship one establishes with God.
There is a lot of meaning in the words of the message:
Your mother and your brothers are standing outside…
It was clear from their behaviour that they were not, like the seed falling on fertile soil, ‘hearing’ him and so they were outsiders. Those who really ‘hear’, no matter who they are or where they come from, are ‘insiders’ and belong to the family of Jesus.
Of course, we know from elsewhere, especially in Luke’s gospel, that Mary is not being condemned here. In fact, this is where her greatness really lies. Clearly it partly lies in her being chosen to be the mother of God’s Son. But perhaps it lies even more in her saying ‘Yes’ (“…let it be with me according to your word”), in her unswerving faithfulness to that ‘Yes’ and in her standing by her Son to the very end when all the rest had fled.
When, on another occasion, she was indirectly praised for being the mother of such a Son, Jesus had spoken in words very similar to today:
Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it! (Luke 11:28)
Our discipleship, too, is not determined by our being born into a Catholic family or just by being baptised or by observing the external requirements of our religion, but by our total commitment to the Gospel and to an unconditional following of Jesus. Only then can we truly be said to be his brother or sister.
Wednesday of The Twenty-fifth week
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 9, 5-9
At the time of the evening sacrifice, I Ezra rose in my wretchedness, and with cloak and mantle torn I fell on my knees, stretching out my hands to the Lord my God.
I said: "My God, I am too ashamed and confounded to raise my face to you, O my God, for our wicked deeds are heaped up above our heads and our guilt reaches up to heaven. From the time of our fathers even to this day great has been our guilt, and for our wicked deeds we have been delivered over, we and our kings and our priests, to the will of the kings of foreign lands, to the sword, to captivity, to pillage, and to disgrace, as is the case today.
"And now, but a short time ago, mercy came to us from the Lord our God, who left us a remnant and gave us a stake in his holy place; thus our God has brightened our eyes and given us relief in our servitude. For slaves we are, but in our servitude our God has not abandoned us; rather, he has turned the good will of the kings of Persia toward us. Thus he has given us new life to raise again the house of our God and restore its ruins, and has granted us a fence in Judah and Jerusalem."
Resp. Psalm Tb 13, 2. 3-4. 6. 7-8. 6
R.(1) Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
He scourges and then has mercy;
he casts down to the depths of the nether world,
and he brings up from the great abyss.
No one can escape his hand.
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
For though he has scattered you among the Gentiles,
he has shown you his greatness even there.
Exalt him before every living being,
because he is the Lord our God,
our Father and God foreveR.
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
So now consider what he has done for you,
and praise him with full voice.
Bless the Lord of righteousness,
and exalt the King of ages.
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
As for me, I exalt my God,
and my spirit rejoices in the King of heaven.
Let all men speak of his majesty,
and sing his praises in Jerusalem.
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
"Turn back, you sinners! do the right before him:
perhaps he may look with favor upon you
and show you mercy."
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
Year II Reading I Prv 30, 5-9
Every word of God is tested;
he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.
Add nothing to his words,
lest he reprove you, and you be exposed as a deceiver.
Two things I ask of you,
deny them not to me before I die:
Put falsehood and lying far from me,
give me neither poverty nor riches;
[provide me only with the food I need;]
Lest, being full, I deny you,
saying, "Who is the Lord?"
Or, being in want, I steal,
and profane the name of my God.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 119, 29. 72. 89. 101. 104. 163
R.(105) Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Remove from me the way of falsehood,
and favor me with your law.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
The law of your mouth is to me more precious
than thousands of gold and silver pieces.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Your word, O Lord, endures forever;
it is firm as the heavens.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
From every evil way I withhold my feet,
that I may keep your words.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Through your precepts I gain discernment;
therefore I hate every false way.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Falsehood I hate and abhor;
your law I love.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 1-6
Jesus called the Twelve together and gave them power and authority to overcome all demons and to cure diseases. He sent them forth to proclaim the reign of God and heal the afflicted. Jesus advised them: "Take nothing for the journey, neither walking staff nor traveling bag; no bread, no money. No one is to have two coats. Stay at whatever house you enter and proceed from there. When people will not receive you, leave that town and shake its dust from your feet as a testimony against them." So they set out and went from village to village, spreading the good news everywhere and curing diseases.
Commentary on Luke 9:1-6
As we move on to chapter 9, we have left out a number of stories in chapter 8 – the calming of a storm on the lake, the healing of a demoniac, the raising of Jairus’ daughter and the healing of a woman with a haemorrhage. However, they are dealt with elsewhere in our readings from the other Gospels. We are now moving into a turning point in the public life of Jesus and in his relationship with his disciples.
This is, in fact, the third tour of Galilee by Jesus. On the first tour he was accompanied just by the four fishermen he had called first – Peter, Andrew, James and John. On the second, all the Twelve were with him and on the third, he was alone after sending out the Twelve on their own mission.
We begin the reading today with Jesus sending his chosen Twelve on their mission. It is the first time he has sent them out on their own without his being with them. Basically, they are to do exactly as their Master does. They are given power over evil forces and to heal sicknesses. They are also to proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom.
They are to travel in total freedom and so are not to bring anything with them which would make traveling more difficult:
Take nothing for your journey: no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money—not even an extra tunic.
It is understood that the people will support them in return for the services they render. It is expected that hospitality will be extended to them in the traditional way of the Middle East.
And they are not to be choosy about where they are received:
Whatever house you enter, stay there, and leave from there.
And, in places where they and their message and their services are not welcome:
…as you are leaving that town shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.
This was a symbolic act which the Pharisees practised when they left an “unclean” Gentile area. In this case, the act signifies that people are not just rejecting the disciples but God himself, Whom they bring with their message and their healing.
So they departed and went through the villages, bringing the good news and curing diseases everywhere.
It really was the beginning of the Church. And it was the work of making the Kingdom a reality, God’s will being done on earth.
The same mission is entrusted to each one of us although it will obviously be adapted to our life situation. We are called, individually and in community, to proclaim the Gospel by word and lifestyle. We are called to help liberate people from the negative forces, addictions of all kinds that can enslave. We are called to be sources of healing and wholeness, and for this we do not need to be part of the medical profession. We are called to live lives of simplicity, using only those things which we need for life and work and rejecting all superfluity and luxury. As we have already noted: the really rich are those whose needs are the least. It is a message our consumer world needs to hear and see.
Thursday of the Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Hg 1, 1-8
The beginning of the book of the prophet Haggai
Build the temple and you will be acceptable to me.
In the second year of King Darius, the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai to the governor of Judah, Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, and to the high priest Joshua, son of Jehozadak:
Thus says the Lord of hosts: This people says: "Not now has the time come to rebuild the house of the Lord." (Then this word of the Lord came through Haggai, the prophet:) Is it time for you to dwell in your own paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?
Now thus says the Lord of hosts:
Consider your ways!
You have sown much, but have brought in little;
you have eaten, but have not been satisfied;
You have drunk, but have not been exhilarated;
have clothed yourselves, but not been warmed;
And he who earned wages
earned them for a bag with holes in it.
Thus says the Lord of hosts:
Consider your ways!
Go up into the hill country;
bring timber, and build the house
That I may take pleasure in it
and receive my glory, says the Lord.
Resp. Psalm Ps 149, 1-2. 3-4. 5-6. 9
R.(4) The Lord takes delight in his people.
Sing to the Lord a new song
of praise in the assembly of the faithful.
Let Israel be glad in their maker,
let the children of Zion rejoice in their king.
R. The Lord takes delight in his people.
Let them praise his name in the festive dance,
let them sing praise to him with timbrel and harp.
For the Lord loves his people,
and he adorns the lowly with victory.
R. The Lord takes delight in his people.
Let the faithful exult in glory;
let them sing for joy upon their couches;
let the high praises of God be in their throats.
This is the glory of all his faithful. Alleluia.
R. The Lord takes delight in his people.
Year II Reading I Eccl 1, 2-11
Vanity of vanities, says Qoheleth,
vanity of vanities! All things are vanity!
What profit has man from all the labor
which he toils at under the sun?
One generation passes and another comes,
but the world forever stays.
The sun rises and the sun goes down;
then it presses on to the place where it rises.
Blowing now toward the south, then toward the north,
the wind turns again and again, resuming its rounds.
All rivers go to the sea,
yet never does the sea become full.
To the place where they go,
the rivers keep on going.
All speech is labored;
there is nothing man can say.
The eye is not satisfied with seeing
nor is the ear filled with hearing.
What has been, that will be; what has been done, that will be done. Nothing is new under the sun. Even the thing of which we say, "See, this is new!" has already existed in the ages that preceded us. There is no remembrance of the men of old; nor of those to come will there be any remembrance among those who come after them.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 90, 3-4. 5-6. 12-13. 14. 17
R.(1) In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
You turn man back to dust,
saying, "Return, O children of men."
For a thousand years in your sight
are as yesterday, now that it is past,
or as a watch of the night.
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
You make an end of them in their sleep;
the next morning they are like the changing grass,
Which at dawn springs up anew,
but by evening wilts and fades.
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
Teach us to number our days aright,
that we may gain wisdom of heart.
Return, O Lord! How long?
Have pity on your servants!
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
Fill us at daybreak with your kindness,
that we may shout for joy and gladness all our days.
And may the gracious care of the Lord our God be ours;
prosper the work of our hands for us!
[Prosper the work of our hands!]
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 7-9
Herod the tetrarch heard of all that Jesus was doing and he was perplexed, for some were saying, "John has been raised from the dead"; others, "Elijah has appeared"; and still others, "One of the prophets of old has risen." But Herod said, "John I beheaded. Who is this man about whom I hear all these reports?" He was very curious to see him.
Commentary on Luke 9:7-9
Today we have a short interlude which is leading to some very special revelations. Herod the Tetrarch (his father Herod the Great’s kingdom had been divided among four sons) is hearing stories about what Jesus is doing. ‘Tetrarch’ means the ruler of the fourth part of a kingdom. This one, Herod Antipas, was one of several sons; the kingdom was divided among four of them. Herod Antipas ruled over Galilee and Perea from 4 BC to 39 AD. Although not strictly speaking a ‘king’ he is called that in Matthew and Mark following popular usage.
Herod is puzzled because he is being told that Jesus is John the Baptist risen from the dead. At the same time others are saying that Elijah, whose expected return would signal the arrival of the Messiah, or some of the former biblical prophets has reappeared. Herod has recently beheaded John the Baptist and the superstitious king is filled with a mixture of fear and curiosity. He kept trying to “see” Jesus.
Luke does not actually record the death of John and, in this short passage, he prepares the reader for the later meeting of Herod with Jesus (Luke 23:8-12). So Herod’s wish will be partially fulfilled at a later date, though under very unexpected circumstances and in a way that Herod will find very unsatisfactory. He is hoping that Jesus, like some circus dog, will do some ‘tricks’ or ‘miracles’ for him.
Herod’s desire was almost entirely one of curiosity. It was the desire of the hedonist and the seeker of novelty. To “see” Jesus, in the full Gospel sense, is something totally other. It can only happen to those who have the eyes of faith, and who can see in the person of Jesus the presence and power of God. We may recall the request of some “Greeks” who told Philip they wanted to see Jesus and the reply that Jesus gave about the grain of wheat falling into the ground and dying (John 12:20-26). We have not seen Jesus if we do not know him in his suffering and dying as his way to new life.
Let us ask to see Jesus today, a seeing that leads to a total acceptance of his way of life and following him all the way, through the cross and beyond to a life that never ends.
September 29 Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, archangels
Reading 1 Dn 7:9-10, 13-14
As I watched: Thrones were set up and the Ancient One took his throne. His clothing was bright as snow, and the hair on his head as white as wool; His throne was flames of fire, with wheels of burning fire. A surging stream of fire flowed out from where he sat; Thousands upon thousands were ministering to him, and myriads upon myriads attended him. The court was convened, and the books were opened. As the visions during the night continued, I saw One like a son of man coming, on the clouds of heaven; When he reached the Ancient One and was presented before him, He received dominion, glory, and kingship; nations and peoples of every language serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not be taken away, his kingship shall not be destroyed.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 138:1-2ab, 2cde-3, 4-5
R. (1) In the sight of the angels I will sing your praises, Lord.
I will give thanks to you, O LORD, with all my heart,
for you have heard the words of my mouth;
in the presence of the angels I will sing your praise;
I will worship at your holy temple
and give thanks to your name.
Because of your kindness and your truth;
for you have made great above all things
your name and your promise.
When I called, you answered me;
you built up strength within me.
All the kings of the earth shall give thanks to you, O LORD
when they hear the words of your mouth;
And they shall sing of the ways of the LORD
"Great is the glory of the LORD
Gospel Jn 1:47-51
Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, "Here is a true child of Israel. 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 heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."
Commentary
The Gospel reading from John is the scene in the beginning of the gospel where Jesus meets Nathanael, who has been introduced to him by Philip. Nathanael who had somewhat sneeringly asked if anything good could come from Nazareth must have been somewhat surprised to hear Jesus say to him:
Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!
Of how many people can that be said (including ourselves)?
Puzzled, Nathanael asks Jesus:
Where did you get to know me?
Rather enigmatically Jesus tells him:
I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you.
The fig tree was often seen as a symbol of messianic peace. They were words, then, of commendation. Nathanael, deeply impressed, tells Jesus:
Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!
This declaration is on a par with Peter’s confession of Jesus’ identity,and concludes the list of Jesus’ titles which are given in this first chapter of John.
And yet Jesus says he will see much more:
Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these…Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.
The allusion is clearly to the dream of Jacob who saw God’s angels-messengers going up and down on a ladder linking Heaven with Earth, God with his People. Jesus, as the Incarnate Son of God is the bridge which links God with his People. He is like a ladder by which God comes to his People and his People go to God.
In a sense Jesus is the Archangel of archangels, the Ultimate Messenger of God’s Truth and Love. Through Him God comes to us, and through Him we go to God.
There is a choice of two First Readings. The first is from the Book of Daniel and speaks of a vision that the prophet has of God on his Throne, which is described in graphic and apocalyptic language. Among other things we are told that:
A thousand thousands served him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood attending him.
These are the angels who serve at God’s throne.
The second part of this reading is taken from the New Testament to refer to the Christ, the Messiah, the Saviour King of Israel. He is said to be:
…one like a human being coming with the clouds of heaven.
Some translations have it as “one like the son of man”.
His dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not pass away, and his kingship is one that shall never be destroyed.
This is an image that the Gospel will use to describe the return of the Risen Jesus at the end of time as he calls his people to himself (see Matt 25).
The alternative First Reading is from the Book of Revelation and speaks of Michael defeating Satan and the powers of evil, which was mentioned above. With the defeat of Satan:
…come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Messiah…
These angels are symbols of God’s ever-loving relationship with us. It is a two-way communication. We listen to what God tells us and try to make it part of our lives. At the same time, we reach out to him in faith and trust and in a complete surrender of our being.
Friday of the Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Hg 1, 15--2, 9
In the second year of King Darius, on the twenty-first day of the seventh month, the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai: Tell this to the governor of Judah, Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, and to the high priest Joshua, son of Jehozadak, and to the remnant of the people:
Who is left among you
that saw this house in its former glory?
And how do you see it now?
Does it not seem like nothing in your eyes?
But now take courage, Zerubbabel, says the Lord,
and take courage, Joshua, high priest, son of Jehozadak,
And take courage, all you people of the land,
says the Lord, and work!
For I am with you, says the Lord of hosts.
This is the pact that I made with you
when you came out of Egypt,
And my spirit continues in your midst;
do not fear!
For thus says the Lord of hosts:
One moment yet, a little while,
and I will shake the heavens and the earth,
the sea and the dry land.
I will shake all the nations,
and the treasures of all the nations will come in,
And I will fill this house with glory,
says the Lord of hosts.
Mine is the silver and mine the gold
says the Lord of hosts.
Greater will be the future glory of this house
than the former, says the Lord of hosts;
And in this place I will give peace,
says the Lord of hosts!
Resp. Psalm Ps 43, 1. 2. 3. 4
R.(5) Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
Do me justice, O God, and fight my fight
against a faithless people;
from the deceitful and impious man rescue me.
R. Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
For you, O God, are my strength.
Why do you keep me so far away?
Why must I go about in mourning,
with the enemy oppressing me?
R. Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
Send forth your light and your fidelity;
they shall lead me on
And bring me to your holy mountain,
to your dwelling-place.
R. Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
Then will I go in to the altar of God,
the God of my gladness and joy;
Then will I give you thanks upon the harp,
O God, my God!
R. Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
Year II Reading I Eccl 3, 1-11
There is an appointed time for everything,
and a time for every affair under the heavens.
A time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to uproot the plant.
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to tear down, and a time to build.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance.
A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather them;
a time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces.
A time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away.
A time to rend, and a time to sew;
a time to be silent, and a time to speak.
A time to love, and a time to hate;
a time of war, and a time of peace.
What advantage has the worker from his toil? I have considered the task which God has appointed for men to be busied about. He has made everything appropriate to its time, and has put the timeless into their hearts, without men's ever discovering, from beginning to end, the work which God has done.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 144, 1-2. 3-4
R.(1) Blessed be the Lord, my Rock!
Blessed be the Lord, my rock,
my refuge and my fortress,
My stronghold, my deliverer,
my shield, in whom I trust.
R. Blessed be the Lord, my Rock!
Lord, what is man, that you notice him;
the son of man, that you take thought of him?
Man is like a breath;
his days, like a passing shadow.
R. Blessed be the Lord, my Rock!
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 18-22
One day when Jesus was praying in seclusion and his disciples were with him, he put the question to them, "Who do the crowds say that I am?" "John the Baptizer," they replied, "and some say Elijah, while others claim that one of the prophets of old has returned from the dead." "But you -- who do you say that I am?" he asked them. Peter said in reply, "The Messiah of God." He strictly forbade them to tell this to anyone. "The Son of Man," he said, "must first endure many sufferings, be rejected by the elders, the high priests and the scribes, and be put to death, and then be raised up on the third day."
*Monday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1ZEC 8:1-8
This word of the LORD of hosts came:
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
I am intensely jealous for Zion,
stirred to jealous wrath for her.
Thus says the LORD:
I will return to Zion,
and I will dwell within Jerusalem;
Jerusalem shall be called the faithful city,
and the mountain of the LORD of hosts,
the holy mountain.
Thus says the LORD of hosts: Old men and old women,
each with staff in hand because of old age,
shall again sit in the streets of Jerusalem.
The city shall be filled with boys and girls playing in its streets.
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
Even if this should seem impossible
in the eyes of the remnant of this people,
shall it in those days be impossible in my eyes also,
says the LORD of hosts?
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
Lo, I will rescue my people from the land of the rising sun,
and from the land of the setting sun.
I will bring them back to dwell within Jerusalem.
They shall be my people, and I will be their God,
with faithfulness and justice.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 46-50 A discussion arose among the disciples as to which of them was the greatest. Jesus, who knew their thoughts, took a little child and placed it beside him, after which he said to them, "Whoever welcomes this little child on my account welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes him who sent me; for the least one among you is the greatest." It was John who said, "Master, we saw a man using your name to expel demons, and we tried to stop him because he is not of our company." Jesus told him in reply, "Do not stop him, for any man who is not against you is on your side."
Commentary on Luke 9:46-50
Following on Jesus once again telling his disciples that he was going to be "handed over" to suffering and death, we were told in our previous reading that they did not understand what he meant. It did not make sense to them.
Now, almost as an indication of how far they were from Jesus’ thinking, they began arguing among themselves which one among them should be seen as the greatest. Why should they be arguing about this? Was it because, whatever difficulties they had in accepting what Jesus had said about his future, they were wondering what was going to happen after Jesus had been taken away from them? If they were to remain together as a group, which of them would be in charge?
Perhaps Peter was already beginning to think that he should be the one. Perhaps some of the others felt it should be one of them.
But Jesus, who, of course, was not present during these sensitive discussions, was well aware of what was going on. He took a child and put it in their midst. "Whoever receives a child like this in my name, receives me. And whoever receives me, receives him who sent me. For the one that is least among you all is the greatest."
It is interesting that the greatness is to be seen in the child rather than in the one who receives it. The child represents all who are vulnerable and weak and powerless. To "receive" such persons is to treat them with the utmost dignity and respect and to accept them and lift them up.
In Jesus’ eyes, such little people are truly great because, to those who have eyes to see, they are the ones in whom we can especially meet Jesus and love and serve him. St Francis of Assisi, who kissed the leper (a particularly daring thing to do in his time), or Mother Teresa, tenderly picking up a decaying, barely living body off the street knew this well. To find Jesus in such a person is to make direct contact with God himself.
Jesus himself will reach the peak of his own greatness when he hangs dying and helpless on the cross. This is the lesson the disciples will learn to see and accept in time. We have to keep working on it too because it does not come easily to any of us.
The second part of today’s gospel points to another area where the disciples have to change their outlook. John, the brother of James, who both come across in the Synoptics as somewhat hotheaded (they had the nickname "sons of thunder"), tells Jesus they saw someone driving out devils in Jesus’ name. They had told the man to stop because he was "not one of us". (Was there an element of jealousy also? In Mark 9:14ff, we are told that the disciples failed to drive out an evil spirit from a boy.)
Here we have something of the arrogance of the insider, of the elitist. John and his companions felt that the exorcism of evil spirits in the name of Jesus was something only they were allowed to do. Jesus did not agree. "Leave him alone," he told them. And he enunciates a principle for them to follow: "Whoever is not against us is for us."
It is a constant temptation among more devout religious people to set themselves apart from "the others". It can happen to bishops or priests or religious. It can happen in a parish to members of the parish council or some parish group – a prayer group, charismatics, the liturgy committee or whatever.
We can find ourselves developing a two-tier community of "us" and "them". We can find ourselves looking down on those who come in late for Mass and hang around the back door or who only come occasionally or maybe even only turn up at Christmas.
Even more, we can be tempted to set ourselves apart from non-Catholic and non-Christian groups. We can fail to see God working in all kinds of people, religious and non-religious, atheists, agnostics and people who apparently do not believe in anything.
Of course, as Christians, we do have a distinctive understanding of life and its meaning coming from the teaching and life of Jesus and it should not be compromised. But, at the same time, we do not have a monopoly of the truth. No one has. The full Truth is beyond all of us. We are all searching. Still less do we have a monopoly on good works. God can and does use any person to build the Kingdom. And it is our responsibility to work hand in hand with such people. Ultimately, our aim is not to promote our Church but God’s work and God’s plan for the whole world.
Tuesday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1ZEC 8:20-23
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
There shall yet come peoples,
the inhabitants of many cities;
and the inhabitants of one city shall approach those of another,
and say, "Come! let us go to implore the favor of the LORD";
and, "I too will go to seek the LORD."
Many peoples and strong nations shall come
to seek the LORD of hosts in Jerusalem
and to implore the favor of the LORD.
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
In those days ten men of every nationality,
speaking different tongues, shall take hold,
yes, take hold of every Jew by the edge of his garment and say,
"Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you."
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 51-56 As the time approached when Jesus was to be taken from this world, he firmly resolved to proceed toward Jerusalem, and sent messengers on ahead of him. These entered a Samaritan town to prepare for his passing through, but the Samaritans would not welcome him because he was on his way to Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw this, they said, "Lord, would you not have us call down fire from heaven to destroy them?" He turned toward them only to reprimand them. Then they set off for another town
Commentary on Luke 9:51-56
We come today to a distinct turning point in Luke’s gospel. It is marked by the opening words of today’s passage: "When the days for his being taken up were fulfilled, he resolutely determined to journey to Jerusalem." The ‘taking up’ or the ‘assumption’ of Jesus refers to his passion and death leading to resurrection and ascension. It corresponds to the ‘glory’ that John speaks of and for whom the crucifixion is a ‘lifting up’ into ‘glory’.
At this point we have now come to the end of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee and we move on to a new section – the journey to Jerusalem which ends at chap. 18:27 where we find Jesus in Jerusalem. The opening corresponds to Mark 10:1 where Jesus is seen entering Judea to preach there and which John more specifically describes as a journey to Jerusalem during the time of the Feast of Tabernacles (John 7:1-10)
But Luke diverges from Mark’s story with very different material. He now follows Matthew’s source as well as using material of his own. The section consists almost entirely of teachings of Jesus to his disciples. It is all loosely organised within the framework of Jesus making his way to Jerusalem. The section we are entering is a time of preparation for the disciples for their future role as Messengers of the Kingdom.
Jerusalem is the place where it is all going to happen – the ‘exodus’ of Jesus, including his suffering, death, resurrection, and ascension leading to the passing on of his mission to his disciples with the coming down of the Spirit of the Father and Jesus on the disciples. And it will be from Jerusalem that the new Church will be established and from Jerusalem it will spread gradually throughout the whole Mediterranean area until it reaches the empire’s capital in Rome and from there to the ends of the earth.
As he set out, Jesus sent some messengers ahead to announce his coming. In order to go directly from Galilee to Judea, where the city of Jerusalem was situated, they would have had to pass through Samaria. Samaritans were particularly hostile to Jews, especially when they were on their way to a Jewish festival in Jerusalem (as Jesus and his disciples seemed to be doing). It would take at least three days to cross Samaria and the Samaritans were refusing the disciples overnight shelter. Because of this situation, Jewish pilgrims and travellers often avoided confrontation by going down the east bank of the Jordan River. There is an irony here that, when the first Christians were persecuted in Jerusalem, they took refuge in Samaria which became one of the first places to accept the Gospel. (Very likely, the evangelist is aware of the irony when telling this story.)
Faced with this hostility, the brothers James and John, whom we described yesterday as hotheads, suggested that fire from heaven be called down to burn them up. Their threat is reminiscent of the fire that Elijah brought down on the emissaries of an idolatrous king. They were indignant that their Master, the Messiah, should be treated in this way. There is a parallel here between Jesus’ negative reception in his home town of Galilee with his rejection by the people of Samaria.
But Jesus distances himself from those disciples and gives them a scolding. This was not Jesus’ way. Instead, they went off to another village where they hoped to find a better welcome. As we see in other parts of the Gospel, Jesus does not normally go out of his way to court trouble. On the other hand, he will not hesitate to speak his mind or do what he believes is right, even if certain kinds of people take offence at it.
It is never Jesus’ way to destroy his enemies. We will see that clearly after he reaches Jerusalem where far worse things are done to him. Jesus’ purpose always is to change people who are against him, to defuse their hostility and help them to see things in a better way. It is something we could try to do more often. It is not at all the "softy’s" approach. On the contrary, it requires great inner strength and security.
Wednesday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1NEH 2:1-8
In the month Nisan of the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes,
when the wine was in my charge,
I took some and offered it to the king.
As I had never before been sad in his presence,
the king asked me, “Why do you look sad?
If you are not sick, you must be sad at heart.”
Though I was seized with great fear, I answered the king:
“May the king live forever!
How could I not look sad
when the city where my ancestors are buried lies in ruins,
and its gates have been eaten out by fire?”
The king asked me, “What is it, then, that you wish?”
I prayed to the God of heaven and then answered the king:
“If it please the king,
and if your servant is deserving of your favor,
send me to Judah, to the city of my ancestors’ graves,
to rebuild it.”
Then the king, and the queen seated beside him,
asked me how long my journey would take
and when I would return.
I set a date that was acceptable to him,
and the king agreed that I might go.
I asked the king further: “If it please the king,
let letters be given to me for the governors
of West-of-Euphrates,
that they may afford me safe-conduct until I arrive in Judah;
also a letter for Asaph, the keeper of the royal park,
that he may give me wood for timbering the gates
of the temple-citadel and for the city wall
and the house that I shall occupy.”
The king granted my requests,
for the favoring hand of my God was upon me.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 57-62 As Jesus and his disciples were making their way along, someone said to Jesus, "I will be your follower wherever you go." Jesus said to him, "The foxes have lairs, the birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head." To another he said, "Come after me." The man replied, "Let me bury my father first." Jesus said to him, "Let the dead bury their dead; come away and proclaim the kingdom of God." Yet another said to him, "I will be your follower, Lord, but first let me take leave of my people at home." Jesus answered him, "Whoever puts his hand to the plow but keeps looking back is unfit for the reign of God."
Commentary on Luke 9:57-62
Today’s passage has to be seen in the light of yesterday’s. Jesus has reached an important stage in his public life and mission. He is now irrevocably on his way to Jerusalem and all that that means for him – and us.
But he does not want to go alone. His whole purpose is to have people go with him. Already there are his disciples but there will be more. Today we see three "candidates" coming forward with a lot of good will but Jesus makes them aware of what following him really means. Their responses to Jesus’ remarks are not given so we do not know whether they became followers or not. The point Luke is making is to show what following entails.
a. The first says very generously that he will go wherever Jesus is going. Jesus answers: "Foxes have their lairs and the birds of the air their nests but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head."
These words of Jesus indicate not poverty or indigence but freedom. To follow Jesus fully one needs to be free, not to be tied down by anything and not to be anxious about having or not having things.
There is no evidence that Jesus was poor in the sense of being deprived of the necessities of life. He did not own a house but it is never even hinted that he had to sleep out in the open air. He belonged to a group of people who more than willingly shared what they had with him.
b. The second man was actually invited by Jesus to be a follower. But he asked first to be allowed to go and bury his father. This does not mean that his father had just died and he wanted to attend the funeral. It is more likely that he wanted, as a dutiful son, to wait for his father’s death before going off with Jesus.
But that is not good enough. The call of Jesus transcends needs of family, tradition and culture. The needs of the living outweigh those of the dead. His father might not die for years; what was the man supposed to do in the meantime?
Once we are aware of Jesus’ call the only time to answer is now. In spite of that, we should not read these lines too rigidly. Clearly, for example, there would be times when one would want to be present at the death of a parent, especially to provide support for the grieving spouse. That would be in total harmony with respect for parents and love for the neighbour. But the man in the example is in a totally different situation. He is talking about an event in the future whose time and place are not known.
c. Another would-be follower asked first for permission to go home and say goodbye to his family. It was similar to a request made by Elisha when he was called to succeed Elijah as prophet. Elijah’s answer was, "Go ahead." So what we have here
seems a very reasonable request but it is rejected by Jesus who says, "No man, having put his hand to the plough, looking back is fit for the kingdom of God."
Like Jesus himself turning his face towards Jerusalem and all that it means for him, once the decision has been made to serve God and his people, there can be no turning back. Again, the words of Jesus should not be taken literally.
Read in that way, they would be totally at variance with the loving and compassionate quality of Jesus’ character. The point that is being made in all three examples is the absoluteness, the unconditionally that is required in the following of Jesus. It is a theme which is emphasised more than once in Luke’s gospel. We cannot be fence-sitters, to have our cake and eat it. Being a follower of Jesus can never be a part-time affair. It is all or nothing. At the same time, the demands of agape-love are always there. It is a matter each time of discerning where the truly loving act lies.
If we are honest, a lot of us are like these men in our following of Christ and in the living out of our faith. We do have our material wants (distinct from needs), we feel we cannot live without "our little comforts in life".
Let us pray today for a high degree of freedom in being able to accept unconditionally God’s will for us. To have that freedom is one of the greatest blessings and graces of our life.
Thursday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1NEH 8:1-4A, 5-6, 7B-12
The whole people gathered as one in the open space before the Water Gate,
and they called upon Ezra the scribe
to bring forth the book of the law of Moses
which the LORD prescribed for Israel.
On the first day of the seventh month, therefore,
Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly,
which consisted of men, women,
and those children old enough to understand.
Standing at one end of the open place that was before the Water Gate,
he read out of the book from daybreak until midday,
in the presence of the men, the women,
and those children old enough to understand;
and all the people listened attentively to the book of the law.
Ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform
that had been made for the occasion.
He opened the scroll
so that all the people might see it
(for he was standing higher up than any of the people);
and, as he opened it, all the people rose.
Ezra blessed the LORD, the great God,
and all the people, their hands raised high, answered,
"Amen, amen!"
Then they bowed down and prostrated themselves before the LORD,
their faces to the ground.
As the people remained in their places,
Ezra read plainly from the book of the law of God,
interpreting it so that all could understand what was read.
Then Nehemiah, that is, His Excellency, and Ezra the priest-scribe
and the Levites who were instructing the people
said to all the people:
"Today is holy to the LORD your God.
Do not be sad, and do not weep"–
for all the people were weeping as they heard the words of the law.
He said further: "Go, eat rich foods and drink sweet drinks,
and allot portions to those who had nothing prepared;
for today is holy to our LORD.
Do not be saddened this day,
for rejoicing in the LORD must be your strength!"
And the Levites quieted all the people, saying,
"Hush, for today is holy, and you must not be saddened."
Then all the people went to eat and drink,
to distribute portions, and to celebrate with great joy,
for they understood the words that had been expounded to them.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 10, 1-12 Jesus appointed a further seventy-two and sent them in pairs before him to every town and place he intended to visit. He said to them: "The harvest is rich but the workers are few; therefore ask the harvest-master to send workers to his harvest. Be on your way, and remember: I am sending you as lambs in the midst of wolves. Do not carry a walking staff or traveling bag; wear no sandals and greet no one along the way. On entering any house, first say, 'Peace to this house.' If there is a peaceable man there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will come back to you. Stay in the one house eating and drinking what they have, for the laborer is worth his wage. Do not move from house to house. "Into whatever city you go, after they welcome you, eat what they set before you, and cure the sick there. Say to them, 'The reign of God is at hand.' If the people of any town you enter do not welcome you, go into its streets and say, 'We shake the dust of this town from our feet as testimony against you. But know that the reign of God is near.' I assure you, on that day the fate of Sodom will be less severe than that of such a town."
Commentary on Luke 10:1-12
Two days ago we saw Jesus firmly setting out for Jerusalem and the accomplishment of his mission. Yesterday we saw how he responded to people who wanted to or were being invited to join his mission. During the coming days we will see Jesus preparing his actual disciples for their work.
In addition to the inner circle of the Twelve, we are told today that he appointed another 72 (12×6) and sent them two by two to the places he himself would be visiting. (Only Luke mentions this group.) That is a good description of our Christian role. We are supposed to go first to prepare the ground but then it is Jesus himself who comes to plant the seed of faith.
Jesus then goes on to give an instruction to his disciples. We, too, should be listening to his words:
a. He first points out that the harvest is great and there are very few labourers, few who are willing to do the harvesting work with Jesus.
This is a text which is often thrown at us during "vocation" campaigns. We tend to hear it as a call for more priests, brothers and nuns. It is that, of course, but when Jesus spoke there were no priests, brothers or nuns. The challenge was being thrown out to all his followers to find more people to join in the harvesting work.
We have to be careful as we listen to these words not to exclude ourselves because we are middle-aged, or married, or already have a career. The words are addressed to all of us and call for some kind of response from every one of us. It is never too late to respond to the call.
b. Second, Jesus warns his followers that it may not be easy. "I am sending you out as lambs among wolves." In spite of the message of truth, love, compassion and justice that we bring, it does not mean that we will be received with open arms. On the contrary, we may meet with strong opposition and even persecution. Our message will be seen as threatening. It will be distorted and misunderstood.
c. The disciple is called on to travel light. Jesus himself "had nowhere to lay his head" and he only had the clothes he wore. So many of us are weighed down by the things we own. Some of us have to protect our property with the latest in security devices. In our search for prosperity and material security we have lost the more precious gift of freedom. They are not to stop to greet people in the sense of carrying on lengthy conversations. Their mission was urgent – there are few labourers for a potentially huge harvest.
d. They are to be bearers of peace. Peace, shalom, is much more than an absence of violence. It is a deep inner harmony with oneself, with others, with one’s environment, with God. "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God." We could hardly bring a more precious gift to others than this inner peace. It is, in fact, the heart of our Christian message. Faith, hope and love are the keys to peace.
e. The evangeliser is, first, to stay in the first house that accepts him. He should not be going around looking for better accommodation. At the same time, he is to be provided with shelter and hospitality for "the labourer is worthy of his hire".
This, it seems, was the way Jesus himself lived. And this was the overall ideal of the Christian community: a network of mutually supporting people sharing their resources with each other and with those in greater need than themselves.
f. Their work is primarily to heal the sick in the places they go to. ‘Healing’ should be taken in a wider sense of including body, feelings, mind and spirit. And ‘healing’ should also be seen not just as getting rid of a sickness but of making a person whole again. Bringing healing and wholeness into the lives of individuals and communities is of the essence of the Kingdom and at the heart of Jesus’ work and that of his followers. The sign of that wholeness is inner peace. Today it is no different.
And they are to say, "The kingdom of God has come near to you." This is not just a statement they are to throw out. It is the core of Jesus’ message and an explanation of why people are experiencing healing and wholeness coming into their lives. This is the effect of the coming of the kingdom; this is what the coming of the kingdom means. God’s power is penetrating their lives, transforming them and making them whole again.
Luke mentions the kingdom of God more than 30 times; Matthew more than 50 times. Matthew’s is truly a Gospel of the Kingdom.
The term can have a number of meanings:
- the eternal kingship (basileia) of God
- the presence of the kingdom in the person of Jesus; he is the embodiment, the incarnation of the rule of God in himself, an incarnation he wishes to be found in his disciples and the communities they establish
- the future kingdom in the life that is to come.
In short, the kingdom, the rule of God is intended to be both a present reality as well as a future hope.
g. Finally, if there is any place where they are not received, they are to leave it to its own fate. Even then those people are to know that the kingdom of God is near to them also. There is always the hope that the results of their very rejection of the kingdom will lead to a deeper awareness later on. But by rejecting the messengers of God they have opened themselves to a fate worse than that of Sodom, a city utterly destroyed because of its shameful lack of hospitality to divine visitors. But those hearing the message of Jesus are even more accountable for hearing the message of the Kingdom proclaimed to them and turning their back on it.
Clearly, we cannot literally apply all of these points to our own work on behalf of the Gospel but we need to make the underlying principles and values ours too. It will require some reflection on our part both as individuals and as communities on how we should effectively share the Gospel with those around us and be the harvesters that are so badly needed.
Indeed, let us pray for vocations but let us remember that every single one of us is being called to work in the harvest field and not just some chosen souls who are totally unknown to us.
Friday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1BAR 1:15-22
During the Babylonian captivity, the exiles prayed:
"Justice is with the Lord, our God;
and we today are flushed with shame,
we men of Judah and citizens of Jerusalem,
that we, with our kings and rulers
and priests and prophets, and with our ancestors,
have sinned in the Lord's sight and disobeyed him.
We have neither heeded the voice of the Lord, our God,
nor followed the precepts which the Lord set before us.
From the time the Lord led our ancestors out of the land of Egypt
until the present day,
we have been disobedient to the Lord, our God,
and only too ready to disregard his voice.
And the evils and the curse that the Lord enjoined upon Moses, his servant,
at the time he led our ancestors forth from the land of Egypt
to give us the land flowing with milk and honey,
cling to us even today.
For we did not heed the voice of the Lord, our God,
in all the words of the prophets whom he sent us,
but each one of us went off
after the devices of his own wicked heart,
served other gods,
and did evil in the sight of the Lord, our God."
Years I and II Gospel Lk 10, 13-16 Jesus said: "It will go ill with you, Chorazin! And just as ill with you, Bethsaida! If the miracles worked in your midst had occurred in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have reformed in sackcloth and ashes. It will go easier on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And as for you, Capernaum, 'Are you to be exalted to the skies? You shall be hurled down to the realm of death!' "He who hears you, hears me. He who rejects you, rejects me. And he who rejects me, rejects him who sent me."
Commentary on Luke 10:13-16
Strong words today from Jesus against towns where he had preached extensively – Chorazin, Bethsaida and especially Capernaum.
Chorazin is only mentioned twice in the Bible, here and in the parallel passage of Matt 11:21. It was near the Sea of Galilee and probably between 3 and 4 km north of Capernaum. Bethsaida, the home of some of Jesus’ disciples, was on the north-east shore of the Sea of Galilee. It had been built by Philip the Tetrarch, who called it ‘Julias’ after Julia, a daughter of the emperor Caesar Augustus. Capernaum, situated on the north shore of the lake, appears frequently in the Gospel narratives and was the centre from which Jesus did much of his missionary work. His work and preaching would have been most familiar to the people there.
Jesus says that if the Gentile cities of Tyre and Sidon had witnessed all that Jesus had said and done in those towns of Palestine they would have repented long ago, just as the pagan people of Niniveh had repented at the preaching of Jonah. Tyre and Sidon were towns on the Phoenician coast, north of Palestine (Lebanon today). Jesus was said to have visited the area just once and only very briefly so the people there did not have an opportunity to witness Jesus’ miracles or hear his preaching unlike the people in the towns mentioned above.
And Jesus goes further. Addressing his disciples he says, "He that hears you, hears me and he that despises you despises me" and the Father who sent him. In other words, to listen to the messengers of Jesus is equivalent to listening to him personally; to reject those messengers is to reject Jesus and to reject God.
And, in our own times, perhaps we should emphasise that those "messengers" are not just bishops, priests and religious. They include all those who sincerely proclaim the Gospel by their words and their lives.
It might be no harm then for each of us today to hear those warnings of Jesus addressed to ourselves. How well have we really responded to the call of Jesus in the Gospel? How open are we to hear that message coming to us from different kinds of people in our community? How committed are we to accepting, living and sharing that Gospel with others?
Might it be true to say that there are people in other parts of our world, our country, our society who, if they were given what we have been given, who heard what we hear, would respond much more generously than we have done?
There is never any room for complacency in our Christian life. Because we have been given so much so much more is expected of us. As Jesus says elsewhere we may be very surprised to see others, who never had an opportunity directly to hear the Gospel, go before us into God’s Kingdom.
Monday of The Twenty-second Week of The Year
Year 1 Reading 1 1 Thes 4, 13-18
We would have you be clear about those who sleep in death, brothers; otherwise you might yield to grief, like those who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose, God will bring forth with him from the dead those also who have fallen asleep believing in him. We say to you, as if the Lord himself had said it, that we who live, who survive until his coming, will in no way have an advantage over those who have fallen asleep. No, the Lord himself will come down from heaven at the word of command, at the sound of the archangel's voice and God's trumpet; and those who have died in Christ will rise first. Then we, the living, the survivors, will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the aiR. Thenceforth we shall be with the Lord unceasingly. Console one another with this message.
Resp. Psalm Ps 96, 1. 3. 4-5. 11-12. 13
R.(13) The Lord comes to judge the earth.
Sing to the Lord a new song;
sing to the Lord, all you lands.
Tell his glory among the nations;
among all peoples, his wondrous deeds.
For great is the Lord and highly to be praised;
awesome is he, beyond all gods.
For all the gods of the nations are things of nought,
but the Lord made the heavens.
Let the heavens be glad and the earth rejoice;
let the sea and what fills it resound;
let the plains be joyful and all that is in them!
Then shall all the trees of the forest exult.
Before the Lord, for he comes;
for he comes to rule the earth.
He shall rule the world with justice
and the peoples with his constancy.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 16-30
Jesus came to Nazareth where he had been reared, and entering the synagogue on the sabbath as he was in the habit of doing, he stood up to do the reading. When the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed him, he unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written: "The spirit of the Lord is upon me; therefore he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives, Recovery of sight to the blind and release to prisoners, To announce a year of favor from the Lord." Rolling up the scroll, he gave it back to the assistant and sat down. All in the synagogue had their eyes fixed on him. Then he began by saying to them, "Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing." All who were present spoke favorably of him; they marveled at the appealing discourse which came from his lips. They also asked, "Is not this Joseph's son?" He said to them, "You will doubtless quote me the proverb, 'Physician, heal yourself,' and say, 'Do here in your own country the things we have heard you have done in Capernaum.' But in fact," he went on, "no prophet gains acceptance in his native place. Indeed, let me remind you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the heavens remained closed for three and a half years and a great famine spread over the land. It was to none of these that Elijah was sent, but to a widow of Zarephath near Sidon. Recall, too, the many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; yet not one was cured except Naaman the Syrian." At these words the whole audience in the synagogue was filled with indignation. They rose up and expelled him from the town, leading him to the brow of the hill on which it was built and intending to hurl him over the edge. But he went straight through their midst and walked away.
Commentary on Luke 4:16-30
We begin today the reading of Luke’s gospel which will bring us up to the end of the Church year. We have already gone through Matthew and Mark and John’s gospel has been spread through various parts of the year, especially during the Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter seasons.
The gospel is a companion volume to the book of the Acts and the language and structure of these two books indicate that both were written by the same person. They are addressed to the same individual, Theophilus, and the second volume refers to the first.
Luke presents the works and teachings of Jesus that are especially important for understanding the way of salvation. Its scope is complete from the birth of Christ to his ascension. It appeals to both Jews and Gentiles.
However, we take up Luke’s gospel at the beginning of Jesus’ public life (chap. 4). After his baptism he had returned "in the power of the Spirit to Galilee", the northern province of Palestine and his home province. Already people were talking about him everywhere.
Now, as our reading opens, we find him in Nazareth, a small town in Galilee and the place where he grew up. From the verses immediately preceding, it does not seem that Jesus actually began his ministry in Nazareth. The event described here may not have taken place until a year later. One suggestion (NIV Bible) is that all that is described in John’s gospel between 1:19 to 4:42 took place between the temptation in the desert and the moving north to Galilee (vv.13 and 14).
But Luke has arranged the structure of his gospel so that Jesus will begin his public life in Nazareth and will gradually proceed southwards towards his goal, Jerusalem, without turning back. In the other Synoptics he moves around Galilee in all directions and John suggests that he made a number of visits to Jerusalem during his public life.
The Jerusalem Bible suggests that our passage today actually combines three distinct parts:
the first, vv.16-22 (Jesus is honoured), occurring at the time indicated by Matt 4:13;
the second, vv.23-24 (Jesus astonishing his audience), the visit of which Matthew and Mark speak;
the third, vv.25-30 (the life of Jesus threatened), not mentioned by Matthew or Mark and to be placed towards the end of the Galilean ministry.
In this way Luke presents an introductory tableau which is a summary and symbol of Christ’s great offer and of its contemptuous rejection by his own people.
As the reading opens we find Jesus in the town synagogue. It is a sabbath day. He gets up to read the scripture and comments on it. The ruler of the synagogue could authorise any adult Jew to read the scripture lesson. The passage he reads is full of significance. It comes from the prophet Isaiah and Jesus’ reading of it amounts to a manifesto or what we might call today a "mission statement". ‘Books’ in those days were in the form of scrolls and the Scriptures were kept in a special place in the synagogue and given to the reader by an attendant. Jesus may have chosen the passage himself or it may have been assigned for that day.
But it is more than just a mission statement. As he reads it becomes clear that the whole statement is about Jesus himself. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me." This has already been confirmed during his baptism in the river Jordan when "the Holy Spirit came down on him in the form of a dove" and a voice was heard to say, "You are my beloved Son; in you I am well pleased" (Luke 3:22).
"Because he has anointed me." In saying this Jesus is making an unequivocal claim to be the Messiah or the Christ, the long-awaited liberating King of Israel. The word "Messiah", translated into Greek as Christos (???????), means someone who is anointed with oil. (We call the oil in baptism and confirmation ‘chrism’.) And a person was made king by having oil poured over his head. (We remember how David was anointed king.) Jesus, of course, was not literally anointed but had been figuratively ‘anointed’ by the coming of the Spirit on him in his baptism. ‘Anointing’ is our equivalent of ‘coronation’, symbolised by the putting of a crown on the new king.
Then comes the mission of this King: To preach the gospel to the poor, to heal the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are hurt and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.
There is nothing here of restoring the glories of Israel, nothing about conquering enemies and laying waste their lands. No, it is about letting the poor of this world hear the Good News of God’s love for them. It is about healing and reconciliation. It is about liberating those who are tied down by any form of enslavement. It is about helping people to see clearly the true meaning of life. It is about restoring wholeness to people’s lives and to societies. It is about the inauguration of the Kingdom by its King.
It is, in short, the whole picture of Jesus that will unfold in the pages of Luke, a gospel which focuses on the poor and vulnerable, a gospel of tenderness and compassion, a gospel of the Spirit and of joy, a gospel of prayer and healing.
It is about "proclaiming a year acceptable to the Lord". This refers to the Messianic age when salvation would be proclaimed. Isaiah in the original text is alluding to the Year of Jubilee, when every 50 years slaves were set free, debts were cancelled and ancestral lands were returned to the original family. Isaiah was thinking mainly of freedom from Babylonian captivity but Jesus was speaking of liberation across the board of human living.
And, as he finished the reading, Jesus put down the scroll and said that these things were now being fulfilled as they were hearing them.
And the townspeople who thought they knew him so well were overawed by the wisdom with which he spoke. This positive reaction to Jesus is a favorite theme in Luke. "Is not this Joseph’s son?" they asked rhetorically. But they were wrong. He was not Joseph’s son; he was the son of Mary and of the Father, the divine Word sharing our ‘flesh’. (As suggested above, this event may have occurred on a second visit.)
And this in turn leads us to the third section of the reading which provides an unexpected turn of events and is more in harmony with the later part of Jesus’ public life. Jesus’ hearers were surprised at the way he spoke but they were not moved to change. After all, he was just the son of Joseph, and someone they knew so well could have nothing to say to them. At the same time Jesus says they, his own townspeople, must be wondering why he is not doing the things in Nazareth that he was doing in places like Capernaum.
Capernaum, apparently a sizeable town, was where Peter lived and Jesus made his house the centre out of which he did his missionary work in Galilee. A 5th century basilica now stands on the supposed site of the house and there is a 4th century synagogue quite near.
The reason for their non-acceptance is that they do not really accept him for what he is. He reminds them that prophets are seldom accepted in their own place. Familiarity blinds people to their message. "I know who he is and he has nothing to say to me." Jesus then gives two rather provocative examples:
During a great famine in the time of the prophet Elijah he was sent to help not his fellow Israelites but a poor widow in Sarepta, near Sidon in non-Jewish territory. Sidon was one of the oldest Phoenician cities on the Mediterranean coast and about 33 km north of Tyre. Later, Jesus would heal the daughter of a Gentile woman here.
And in the time of the prophet Elisha, there were many lepers in Israel but he was sent to cure Naaman, a Gentile general from Syria.
God reaching out to Gentiles through his prophets sets the stage for the Gentiles to receive the message of the Prophet Jesus, which is so much a theme of Luke’s writings. But these remarks so angered the people of Nazareth that they dragged Jesus to the brow of a hill with the intention of throwing him down but he just walked through them. Whether he did this miraculously or from the sheer power of his personality is not clear. In any case, his time had not yet come.
Prophetic voices being rejected by their own is a phenomenon only too common in our own day. And it was something Jesus foretold would happen to his followers, simply for being his followers and proclaiming his vision of life. In the meantime, let us make Jesus’ mission statement our own. It is what being a Christian means.
Monday of The Twenty-second Week of The Year
Year 1 Reading 1 1 Thes 4, 13-18
We would have you be clear about those who sleep in death, brothers; otherwise you might yield to grief, like those who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose, God will bring forth with him from the dead those also who have fallen asleep believing in him. We say to you, as if the Lord himself had said it, that we who live, who survive until his coming, will in no way have an advantage over those who have fallen asleep. No, the Lord himself will come down from heaven at the word of command, at the sound of the archangel's voice and God's trumpet; and those who have died in Christ will rise first. Then we, the living, the survivors, will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the aiR. Thenceforth we shall be with the Lord unceasingly. Console one another with this message.
Resp. Psalm Ps 96, 1. 3. 4-5. 11-12. 13
R.(13) The Lord comes to judge the earth.
Sing to the Lord a new song;
sing to the Lord, all you lands.
Tell his glory among the nations;
among all peoples, his wondrous deeds.
For great is the Lord and highly to be praised;
awesome is he, beyond all gods.
For all the gods of the nations are things of nought,
but the Lord made the heavens.
Let the heavens be glad and the earth rejoice;
let the sea and what fills it resound;
let the plains be joyful and all that is in them!
Then shall all the trees of the forest exult.
Before the Lord, for he comes;
for he comes to rule the earth.
He shall rule the world with justice
and the peoples with his constancy.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 16-30
Jesus came to Nazareth where he had been reared, and entering the synagogue on the sabbath as he was in the habit of doing, he stood up to do the reading. When the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed him, he unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written: "The spirit of the Lord is upon me; therefore he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives, Recovery of sight to the blind and release to prisoners, To announce a year of favor from the Lord." Rolling up the scroll, he gave it back to the assistant and sat down. All in the synagogue had their eyes fixed on him. Then he began by saying to them, "Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing." All who were present spoke favorably of him; they marveled at the appealing discourse which came from his lips. They also asked, "Is not this Joseph's son?" He said to them, "You will doubtless quote me the proverb, 'Physician, heal yourself,' and say, 'Do here in your own country the things we have heard you have done in Capernaum.' But in fact," he went on, "no prophet gains acceptance in his native place. Indeed, let me remind you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the heavens remained closed for three and a half years and a great famine spread over the land. It was to none of these that Elijah was sent, but to a widow of Zarephath near Sidon. Recall, too, the many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; yet not one was cured except Naaman the Syrian." At these words the whole audience in the synagogue was filled with indignation. They rose up and expelled him from the town, leading him to the brow of the hill on which it was built and intending to hurl him over the edge. But he went straight through their midst and walked away.
Commentary on Luke 4:16-30
We begin today the reading of Luke’s gospel which will bring us up to the end of the Church year. We have already gone through Matthew and Mark and John’s gospel has been spread through various parts of the year, especially during the Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter seasons.
The gospel is a companion volume to the book of the Acts and the language and structure of these two books indicate that both were written by the same person. They are addressed to the same individual, Theophilus, and the second volume refers to the first.
Luke presents the works and teachings of Jesus that are especially important for understanding the way of salvation. Its scope is complete from the birth of Christ to his ascension. It appeals to both Jews and Gentiles.
However, we take up Luke’s gospel at the beginning of Jesus’ public life (chap. 4). After his baptism he had returned "in the power of the Spirit to Galilee", the northern province of Palestine and his home province. Already people were talking about him everywhere.
Now, as our reading opens, we find him in Nazareth, a small town in Galilee and the place where he grew up. From the verses immediately preceding, it does not seem that Jesus actually began his ministry in Nazareth. The event described here may not have taken place until a year later. One suggestion (NIV Bible) is that all that is described in John’s gospel between 1:19 to 4:42 took place between the temptation in the desert and the moving north to Galilee (vv.13 and 14).
But Luke has arranged the structure of his gospel so that Jesus will begin his public life in Nazareth and will gradually proceed southwards towards his goal, Jerusalem, without turning back. In the other Synoptics he moves around Galilee in all directions and John suggests that he made a number of visits to Jerusalem during his public life.
The Jerusalem Bible suggests that our passage today actually combines three distinct parts:
the first, vv.16-22 (Jesus is honoured), occurring at the time indicated by Matt 4:13;
the second, vv.23-24 (Jesus astonishing his audience), the visit of which Matthew and Mark speak;
the third, vv.25-30 (the life of Jesus threatened), not mentioned by Matthew or Mark and to be placed towards the end of the Galilean ministry.
In this way Luke presents an introductory tableau which is a summary and symbol of Christ’s great offer and of its contemptuous rejection by his own people.
As the reading opens we find Jesus in the town synagogue. It is a sabbath day. He gets up to read the scripture and comments on it. The ruler of the synagogue could authorise any adult Jew to read the scripture lesson. The passage he reads is full of significance. It comes from the prophet Isaiah and Jesus’ reading of it amounts to a manifesto or what we might call today a "mission statement". ‘Books’ in those days were in the form of scrolls and the Scriptures were kept in a special place in the synagogue and given to the reader by an attendant. Jesus may have chosen the passage himself or it may have been assigned for that day.
But it is more than just a mission statement. As he reads it becomes clear that the whole statement is about Jesus himself. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me." This has already been confirmed during his baptism in the river Jordan when "the Holy Spirit came down on him in the form of a dove" and a voice was heard to say, "You are my beloved Son; in you I am well pleased" (Luke 3:22).
"Because he has anointed me." In saying this Jesus is making an unequivocal claim to be the Messiah or the Christ, the long-awaited liberating King of Israel. The word "Messiah", translated into Greek as Christos (???????), means someone who is anointed with oil. (We call the oil in baptism and confirmation ‘chrism’.) And a person was made king by having oil poured over his head. (We remember how David was anointed king.) Jesus, of course, was not literally anointed but had been figuratively ‘anointed’ by the coming of the Spirit on him in his baptism. ‘Anointing’ is our equivalent of ‘coronation’, symbolised by the putting of a crown on the new king.
Then comes the mission of this King: To preach the gospel to the poor, to heal the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are hurt and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.
There is nothing here of restoring the glories of Israel, nothing about conquering enemies and laying waste their lands. No, it is about letting the poor of this world hear the Good News of God’s love for them. It is about healing and reconciliation. It is about liberating those who are tied down by any form of enslavement. It is about helping people to see clearly the true meaning of life. It is about restoring wholeness to people’s lives and to societies. It is about the inauguration of the Kingdom by its King.
It is, in short, the whole picture of Jesus that will unfold in the pages of Luke, a gospel which focuses on the poor and vulnerable, a gospel of tenderness and compassion, a gospel of the Spirit and of joy, a gospel of prayer and healing.
It is about "proclaiming a year acceptable to the Lord". This refers to the Messianic age when salvation would be proclaimed. Isaiah in the original text is alluding to the Year of Jubilee, when every 50 years slaves were set free, debts were cancelled and ancestral lands were returned to the original family. Isaiah was thinking mainly of freedom from Babylonian captivity but Jesus was speaking of liberation across the board of human living.
And, as he finished the reading, Jesus put down the scroll and said that these things were now being fulfilled as they were hearing them.
And the townspeople who thought they knew him so well were overawed by the wisdom with which he spoke. This positive reaction to Jesus is a favorite theme in Luke. "Is not this Joseph’s son?" they asked rhetorically. But they were wrong. He was not Joseph’s son; he was the son of Mary and of the Father, the divine Word sharing our ‘flesh’. (As suggested above, this event may have occurred on a second visit.)
And this in turn leads us to the third section of the reading which provides an unexpected turn of events and is more in harmony with the later part of Jesus’ public life. Jesus’ hearers were surprised at the way he spoke but they were not moved to change. After all, he was just the son of Joseph, and someone they knew so well could have nothing to say to them. At the same time Jesus says they, his own townspeople, must be wondering why he is not doing the things in Nazareth that he was doing in places like Capernaum.
Capernaum, apparently a sizeable town, was where Peter lived and Jesus made his house the centre out of which he did his missionary work in Galilee. A 5th century basilica now stands on the supposed site of the house and there is a 4th century synagogue quite near.
The reason for their non-acceptance is that they do not really accept him for what he is. He reminds them that prophets are seldom accepted in their own place. Familiarity blinds people to their message. "I know who he is and he has nothing to say to me." Jesus then gives two rather provocative examples:
During a great famine in the time of the prophet Elijah he was sent to help not his fellow Israelites but a poor widow in Sarepta, near Sidon in non-Jewish territory. Sidon was one of the oldest Phoenician cities on the Mediterranean coast and about 33 km north of Tyre. Later, Jesus would heal the daughter of a Gentile woman here.
And in the time of the prophet Elisha, there were many lepers in Israel but he was sent to cure Naaman, a Gentile general from Syria.
God reaching out to Gentiles through his prophets sets the stage for the Gentiles to receive the message of the Prophet Jesus, which is so much a theme of Luke’s writings. But these remarks so angered the people of Nazareth that they dragged Jesus to the brow of a hill with the intention of throwing him down but he just walked through them. Whether he did this miraculously or from the sheer power of his personality is not clear. In any case, his time had not yet come.
Prophetic voices being rejected by their own is a phenomenon only too common in our own day. And it was something Jesus foretold would happen to his followers, simply for being his followers and proclaiming his vision of life. In the meantime, let us make Jesus’ mission statement our own. It is what being a Christian means.
Tuesday of The Twenty-second Week of The Year
Year 1 Reading 1 1 Thes 5, 1-6. 9-11
As regards specific times and moments, brothers, we do not need to write you; you know very well that the day of the Lord is coming like a thief in the night. Just when people are saying, "Peace and security," ruin will fall on them with the suddenness of pains overtaking a woman in labor, and there will be no escape. You are not in the dark, brothers, so that the day might catch you off guard, like a thief. No, all of you are children of light and of the day. We belong neither to darkness nor to night; therefore let us not be asleep like the rest, but awake and sober!
God has not destined us for wrath but for acquiring salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He died for us that all of us, whether awake or asleep, together might live with him. Therefore, comfort and upbuild one another, as indeed you are doing.
Resp. Psalm Ps 27, 1. 4. 13-14
R.(13) I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.
The Lord is my light and my salvation;
whom should I fear?
The Lord is my lifés refuge;
of whom should I be afraid?
One thing I ask of the Lord;
this l seek:
To dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
That I may gaze on the loveliness of the Lord
and contemplate his temple.
I believe that I shall see the bounty of the Lord
in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord with courage;
be stouthearted, and wait for the Lord.
Year II Reading I 1 Cor 2, 10-16
The Spirit scrutinizes all matters, even the deep things of God. Who, for example, knows a man's innermost self but the man's own spirit within him? Similarly, no one knows what lies at the depths of God but the Spirit of God. The Spirit we have received is not the world's spirit but God's Spirit, helping us to recognize the gifts he has given us. We speak of these gifts, not in words of human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, thus interpreting spiritual things in spiritual terms. The natural man does not accept what is taught by the Spirit of God. For him, that is absurdity. He cannot come to know such teaching because it must be appraised in a spiritual way. The spiritual man, on the other hand, can appraise everything, though he himself can be appraised by no one. For "Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 145, 8-9. 10-11. 12-13. 13-14
R.(17) The Lord is just in all his ways.
The Lord is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and of great kindness.
The Lord is good to all
and compassionate toward all his works.
Let all your works give you thanks, O Lord,
and let your faithful ones bless you.
Let them discourse of the glory of your kingdom
and speak of your might,
Making known to men your might
and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
Your kingdom is a kingdom for all ages,
and your dominion endures through all generations.
The Lord is faithful in all his words
and holy in all his works.
The Lord lifts up all who are falling
and raises up all who are bowed down.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 31-37
Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town of Galilee, where he began instructing the people on the sabbath day. They were spellbound by his teaching, for his words had authority. In the synagogue there was a man with an unclean spirit, who shrieked in a loud voice: "Leave us alone! What do you want of us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the Holy One of God." Jesus said to him sharply, "Be quiet! Come out of him." At that, the demon threw him to the ground before everyonés eyes and came out of him without doing him any harm. All were struck with astonishment, and they began saying to one another: "What is there about his speech? He commands the unclean spirits with authority and power, and they leave." His renown kept spreading through the surrounding country.
Commentary on Luke 4:31-37
Immediately after his mixed reception in Nazareth, Jesus moves on to Capernaum, a town on the north shore of Galilee, which was to be the base from which Jesus did much of his missionary work. As in Nazareth, he taught the people in the synagogue on the sabbath. Unlike in Nazareth, "his teaching made a deep impression" on the people because he spoke "with authority". He did not quote other authorities, like the teachers of the law, because his authority was directly from God, it was his own.
At the same time, it was not the authority of domination. It was the authority of someone who has access to special knowledge, the authority of someone who speaks in his own name and not just on behalf of others, the authority of one who empowers others and makes them grow.
And Jesus’ authority is not only in word and teaching. Right there in the synagogue as he speaks is a man possessed by an "unclean spirit". The spirit speaks through the man. It speaks in fear of the power of Jesus. "Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." This title seems to indicate that the spirit recognizes Jesus’ divine origin but not his Messiahship. There was a belief in those times that knowing the exact name of one’s opponent gave one power over him.
Jesus ordered the evil spirit of the man who was thrown to the ground but not hurt. The people are amazed. Exorcism was not new to them but they had never seen it done with such speed and effectiveness. They are astounded again at the power and authority of Jesus. They realize they are in the presence of someone very special, in fact, the "Holy One of God".
Each one of us is given authority of some kind – as a parent, a teacher, our job responsibility… Let us make sure that we use it in such a way as to enhance the abilities of others rather than diminish them.
Tuesday of The Twenty-second Week of The Year
Year 1 Reading 1 1 Thes 5, 1-6. 9-11
As regards specific times and moments, brothers, we do not need to write you; you know very well that the day of the Lord is coming like a thief in the night. Just when people are saying, "Peace and security," ruin will fall on them with the suddenness of pains overtaking a woman in labor, and there will be no escape. You are not in the dark, brothers, so that the day might catch you off guard, like a thief. No, all of you are children of light and of the day. We belong neither to darkness nor to night; therefore let us not be asleep like the rest, but awake and sober!
God has not destined us for wrath but for acquiring salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He died for us that all of us, whether awake or asleep, together might live with him. Therefore, comfort and upbuild one another, as indeed you are doing.
Resp. Psalm Ps 27, 1. 4. 13-14
R.(13) I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.
The Lord is my light and my salvation;
whom should I fear?
The Lord is my lifés refuge;
of whom should I be afraid?
One thing I ask of the Lord;
this l seek:
To dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
That I may gaze on the loveliness of the Lord
and contemplate his temple.
I believe that I shall see the bounty of the Lord
in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord with courage;
be stouthearted, and wait for the Lord.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 31-37
Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town of Galilee, where he began instructing the people on the sabbath day. They were spellbound by his teaching, for his words had authority. In the synagogue there was a man with an unclean spirit, who shrieked in a loud voice: "Leave us alone! What do you want of us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the Holy One of God." Jesus said to him sharply, "Be quiet! Come out of him." At that, the demon threw him to the ground before everyonés eyes and came out of him without doing him any harm. All were struck with astonishment, and they began saying to one another: "What is there about his speech? He commands the unclean spirits with authority and power, and they leave." His renown kept spreading through the surrounding country.
Commentary on Luke 4:31-37
Immediately after his mixed reception in Nazareth, Jesus moves on to Capernaum, a town on the north shore of Galilee, which was to be the base from which Jesus did much of his missionary work. As in Nazareth, he taught the people in the synagogue on the sabbath. Unlike in Nazareth, "his teaching made a deep impression" on the people because he spoke "with authority". He did not quote other authorities, like the teachers of the law, because his authority was directly from God, it was his own.
At the same time, it was not the authority of domination. It was the authority of someone who has access to special knowledge, the authority of someone who speaks in his own name and not just on behalf of others, the authority of one who empowers others and makes them grow.
And Jesus’ authority is not only in word and teaching. Right there in the synagogue as he speaks is a man possessed by an "unclean spirit". The spirit speaks through the man. It speaks in fear of the power of Jesus. "Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." This title seems to indicate that the spirit recognizes Jesus’ divine origin but not his Messiahship. There was a belief in those times that knowing the exact name of one’s opponent gave one power over him.
Jesus ordered the evil spirit of the man who was thrown to the ground but not hurt. The people are amazed. Exorcism was not new to them but they had never seen it done with such speed and effectiveness. They are astounded again at the power and authority of Jesus. They realize they are in the presence of someone very special, in fact, the "Holy One of God".
Each one of us is given authority of some kind – as a parent, a teacher, our job responsibility… Let us make sure that we use it in such a way as to enhance the abilities of others rather than diminish them.
Wednesday of the Twenty-second Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Col 1, 1-8
The Good News which has reached you is spreading all over the world.
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, to the holy ones at Colossae, faithful brothers in Christ. May God our Father give you grace and peace.
We always give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in our prayers for you because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love you bear toward all the saints -- moved as you are by the hope held in store for you in heaven. You heard of this hope through the message of truth, the gospel, which has come to you, has borne fruit, and has continued to grow in your midst as it has everywhere in the world. This has been the case from the day you first heard it and comprehended God's gracious intention through the instructions of Epaphras, our dear fellow slave, who represents us as a faithful minister of Christ. He it was who told us of your love in the Spirit.
Resp. Psalm Ps 52, 10. 11
R.(10) I trust in the kndness of God for eveR.
I, like a green olive tree
in the house of God,
Trust in the kindness of God
forever and eveR.
R. I trust in the kindness of God for eveR.
I will thank you always for what you have done,
and proclaim the goodness of your name
before your faithful ones.
R. I trust in the kindness of God for eveR.
Year II Reading I 1 Cor 3, 1-9
Brothers, I could not talk to you as spiritual men but only as men of flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, and did not give you solid food because you were not ready for it. You are not ready for it even now, being still very much in a natural condition. For as long as there are jealousy and quarrels among you, are you not of the flesh? And is not your behavior that of ordinary men? When someone says, "I belong to Paul," and another, "I belong to Apollos," is it not clear that you are still at the human level?
After all, who is Apollos? And who is Paul? Simply ministers through whom you became believers, each of them doing only what the Lord assigned him. I planted the seed and Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. This means that neither he who plants nor he who waters is of any special account, only God, who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters work to the same end. Each will receive his wages in proportion to his toil. We are God's co-workers, while you are his cultivation, his building.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 33, 12-13. 14-15. 20-21
R.(12) Happy the peple the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Happy the nation whose God is the Lord,
the people he has chosen for his own inheritance.
From heaven the Lord looks down;
he sees all mankind.
R. Happy the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
From his fixed throne he beholds
all who dwell on the earth,
He who fashioned the heart of each,
he who knows all their works.
R. Happy the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Our soul waits for the Lord,
who is our help and our shield,
For in him our hearts rejoice;
in his holy name we trust.
R. Happy the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 38-44 On leaving the synagogue, Jesus entered the house of Simon. Simon's mother-in-law was in the grip of a severe fever, and they interceded with him for her. He stood over her and addressed himself to the fever, and it left her. She got up immediately and waited on them. At sunset, all who had people sick with a variety of diseases took them to him, and he laid hands on each of them and cured them. Demons departed from many, crying out as they did so, "You are the son of God!" He rebuked them and did not allow them to speak because they knew that he was the Messiah. The next morning he left the town and set out into the open country. The crowds went in search of him, and when they found him they tried to keep him from leaving them. But he said to them, "To other towns I must announce the good news of the reign of God, because that is why I was sent." And he continued to preach in the synagogues of Judea.
Commentary on Luke 4:38-44
After the scene in the synagogue where Jesus healed a man possessed by an evil spirit, he goes straight to Peter’s house. It was a sabbath day so Jesus could not move around or do any major activity. He seems to have used this house as his base when in Capernaum and that part of Galilee. (Jesus had "nowhere to lay his head", no dwelling of his own, but it seems clear that he was not a streetsleeper. There were always people ready to offer him hospitality – a custom of the Middle East and a model for Christians of every age and place.)
Peter’s mother-in-law was in the grip of a fever and the disciples begged Jesus to do something for her. (We might remember that the first pope was married.) Jesus stood over her and, with a word, cured her. Immediately she got up and began to serve Jesus and his group.
There is a lesson here. Health and healing are not just for the individual. Her healing immediately restored her to the community and the duty of serving that community. (And not just because she was a woman! If it had been the father-in-law, the same would apply.) As long as we are in health our energies are meant to be directed to the building up of the community and not simply for our personal enjoyment.
"Now when the sun was setting" – we need to remember it was a sabbath. The sabbath went from sunset on Friday to sunset on Saturday (so Jesus could not be properly buried on the Friday evening when he died). According to the traditions, Jews could not travel more than two-thirds of a mile or carry any load. Only after sunset could the sick be brought to Jesus.
As soon as the sabbath was over, large numbers brought their sick to him. He "laid his hands on every one of them" and healed them all. As Jesus had announced in the synagogue at Nazareth, the Kingdom of God had arrived and was entering the lives of people, bringing them health and wholeness.
Many were also liberated from the power of evil spirits. These spirits shouted at Jesus "You are the Son of God". As we mentioned earlier, by using Jesus’ title they hoped to exert control over him. It did not work, of course. Whether these were actual cases of possession or were psychological or moral disorders which made people behave in abnormal ways and perhaps ways harmful to themselves and others is not clear. But clearly the presence of the Kingdom is being felt.
At daybreak – Jesus had been working the whole night for the people – he went off into a quiet place. The desert is the place where God is to be found and very likely, as Mark tells us, Jesus went there to pray and to be alone. The people, who had seen what he did for them, wanted him to stay with them. Their attitude is in marked contrast to the people of Nazareth.
But he could and would not. "I must preach the kingdom of God to other cities also; that is why I have been sent." And so we are told that he was now preaching in the synagogues of Judea – in the south of the country, although the term may simply refer to the whole of Jewish territory.
No place could have a monopoly on his attentions. We need to attach ourselves to Jesus and keep close to him but we cannot cling to him in a way that prevents others from experiencing his healing touch.
On the contrary, it is our task as his disciples to see that as many as possible come to know and experience his love, his compassion and his healing.
Thursday of the Twenty-second Week of the Year
Year II Reading I 1 Cor 3, 18-23
Let no one delude himself. If any one of you thinks he is wise in a worldly way, he had better become a fool. In that way he will really be wise, for the wisdom of this world is absurdity with God. Scripture says, "He catches the wise in their craftiness"; and again, "The Lord knows how empty are the thoughts of the wise." Let there be no boasting about men. All things are yours, whether it be Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or the present, or the future: all these are yours, and you are Christ's and Christ is God's.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 24, 1-2. 3-4. 5-6
R.(1) To the Lord belongs the earth and all that fills it.
The Lord's are the earth and its fullness;
the world and those who dwell in it.
For he founded it upon the seas
and established it upon the rivers.
Who can ascend the mountain of the Lord?
or who may stand in his holy place?
He whose hands are sinless, whose heart is clean,
who desires not what is vain.
He shall receive a blessing from the Lord,
a reward from God his savior.
Such is the race that seeks for him,
that seeks the face of the God of Jacob.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 5, 1-11
As the crowd pressed in on Jesus to hear the word of God, he saw two boats moored by the side of the lake; the fishermen had disembarked and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to pull out a short distance from the shore; then, remaining seated, he continued to teach the crowds from the boat. When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, "Put out into deep water and lower your nets for a catch." Simon answered, "Master, we have been hard at it all night long and have caught nothing; but if you say so, I will lower the nets." Upon doing this they caught such a great number of fish that their nets were at the breaking point. They signaled to their mates in the other boat to come and help them. These came, and together they filled the two boats until they nearly sank. At the sight of this, Simon Peter fell at the knees of Jesus saying, "Leave me, Lord. I am a sinful man." For indeed, amazement at the catch they had made seized him and all his shipmates, as well as James and John, Zebedeés sons, who were partners with Simon. Jesus said to Simon, "Do not be afraid. From now on you will be catching men." With that they brought their boats to land, left everything, and became his followers.
Commentary on Luke 5:1-11
This is Luke’s version of the first call of Jesus’ disciples. It differs significantly from the parallel versions in Mark and Matthew and is a combination of passages from Mark and John.
We are told that Jesus was standing by the shore of Lake Gennesaret. The other gospel writers call it the Sea of Galilee and John twice refers to it as the Sea of Tiberias.
Because of the large crowds pressing in on him to hear the word of God, Jesus was forced to borrow one of two boats moored near the shore where their owners were washing their nets. "He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon" and "remaining seated, he continued to teach the crowds from the boat". As we saw in the synagogue at Nazareth (and also in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew), sitting was the usual teaching position. From a practical point of view, by preaching from the boat Jesus could avoid the pressure of the crowd and yet be close enough to speak to them.
It is a simple, straightforward statement and yet there is a symbolism here. Jesus gets into Simon’s boat and teaches from it. The boat, in the Gospel, is frequently a symbol of the church community. It is very meaningful to say that Jesus stepped into that boat, that it was Peter’s boat, and that he taught from there. It is a symbol of what is to come in the near future.
Now comes the lesson and the revelation. At the end of the teaching, Simon is told to go out into the deep water and start fishing. (He will not be called Peter until the next chapter.) "Master, we have been hard at it all night long and have caught nothing; but if you say so, I will lower the nets." There is here something of the condescension of the expert towards the amateur. "We know there are no fish there but, just to make you happy, we’ll let down the nets."
But their nets were hardly in the water when they were so full of fish that they were on the point of breaking. They (Peter and those others with him in the boat) had to call their companions in the other boat to come to their help (they do not seem to have caught any fish; only Simon’s boat does). But the two boats together were now so full of fish that they were on the point of sinking.
Peter, just now so arrogant and all-knowing, is totally overcome. He knew there were no fish there. So there was only one explanation. The man standing before him was Someone very special: "Go away from me, Lord, I am a sinful man." It is the reaction of a person in the awful presence of God’s overwhelming power and goodness. We see similar reactions by Abraham (Gen 18:27), Job (42:6) and Isaiah (6:5).
Peter did not belong there; the expert realises he is nothing in the presence of this man. Instead, he becomes so aware of his shortcomings. Paradoxically, it is the saints who are most ready to acknowledge their sinfulness. And his companions, James and John, were equally amazed. There is no mention of Andrew in this version of the story because he would have been in his brother Peter’s boat. And the passage indicates that Peter was not alone in the boat ("We have worked hard all night…")
Some commentators feel that Luke may have borrowed this story from John’s account of the disciples going fishing at the end of that gospel. It has been noted that Simon calls Jesus ‘Lord’, a post-resurrection title and refers to his sinfulness, which makes more sense after his triple denial during the Passion. It also looks forward to Peter’s leadership which is confirmed in the same chapter of John.
Jesus then reassures Simon and his companions: "Do not be afraid." They are words they will hear again. Because he is calling them to be his partners in the work of building his Kingdom. The huge catch of fish made by the boat in which Jesus and Peter were is a sign of a much greater catch of people to be made by the new community led by the Spirit of Jesus and under the leadership of Peter.
Unlike the other gospels, Luke has a period of teaching and miracles precede the call of the disciples. This makes their unhesitating response less surprising and more plausible.
They heard the message, they accepted the call and "with that they brought their boats to land, left everything, and become his followers". In Mark and Matthew they left their nets and boats. In Luke’s gospel especially, the following of Jesus is understood as absolute – one must leave everything and throw in one’s lot totally with Jesus wherever that will lead. Those boats and nets were the security on which the lives of Peter, his companions and their families depended. But they left them and everything else. This is faith, this is trust. Without it, the mission cannot succeed.
Friday of the Twenty-second Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Col 1, 15-20
Christ is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creatures. In him everything in heaven and on earth was created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominations, principalities or powers; all were created through him and for him. He is before all else that is. In him everything continues in being. It is he who is head of the body, the church; he who is the beginning, the first-born of the dead, so that primacy may be his in everything. It pleased God to make absolute fullness reside in him and, by means of him, to reconcile everything in his person, everything, I say, both on earth and in the heavens, making peace through the blood of his cross.
Resp. Psalm Ps 100, 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
R.(2) Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Sing joyfully to the Lord, all you lands;
serve the Lord with gladness;
come before him with joyful song.
Know that the Lord is God;
he made us, his we are;
his people, the flock he tends.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
his courts with praise;
Give thanks to him; bless his name.
The Lord is good,
the Lord, whose kindness endures forever,
and his faithfulness, to all generations.
Year II Reading I 1 Cor 4, 1-5
Men should regard us as servants of Christ and administrators of the mysteries of God. The first requirement of an administrator is that he prove trustworthy. It matters little to me whether you or any human court pass judgment on me. I do not even pass judgment on myself. Mind you, I have nothing on my conscience. But that does not mean that I am declaring myself innocent. The Lord is the one to judge me, so stop passing judgment before the time of his return. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and manifest the intentions of hearts. At that time, everyone will receive his praise from God.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 37, 3-4. 5-6. 27-28. 39-40
R.(39) The salvation of the just comes from the Lord.
Trust in the Lord and do good,
that you may dwell in the land and enjoy security.
Take delight in the Lord,
and he will grant you your heart's requests.
Commit to the Lord your way;
trust in him, and he will act.
He will make justice dawn for you like the light;
bright as the noonday shall be your vindication.
Turn from evil and do good,
that you may abide forever;
For the Lord loves what is right,
and forsakes not his faithful ones.
Criminals are destroyed
and the posterity of the wicked is cut off.
.
The salvation of the just is from the Lord;
he is their refuge in time of distress.
And the Lord helps them and delivers them;
he delivers them from the wicked and saves them,
because they take refuge in him.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 5, 33-39
The scribes and Pharisees said to Jesus: "John's disciples fast frequently and offer prayers; the disciples of the Pharisees do the same. Yours, on the contrary, eat and drink freely." Jesus replied: "Can you make guests of the groom fast while the groom is still with them? But when the days come that the groom is removed from their midst, they will surely fast in those days." He then proposed to them this figure: "No one tears a piece from a new coat to patch an old one. If he does he will only tear the new coat, and the piece taken from it will not match the old. Moreover, no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Should he do so, the new wine will burst the old skins, the wine will spill out, and the skins will be lost. New wine should be poured into fresh skins. No one, after drinking old wine, wants new. He says, 'I find the old wine better.'"
Commentary on Luke 5:33-39
The call of the first disciples is followed in Luke by the cure of a leper and then of a paralytic. Then there is the call of Levi (called Matthew in Matthew’s gospel) and the discussion with Jesus about his mixing with sinful and unclean people. It is the first of many confrontations between Jesus and the Jewish leaders.
We then come to today’s reading. Some scribes and Pharisees want to know why, when their disciples and those of John the Baptist regularly fast, Jesus’ disciples "eat and drink freely". We know that John grew up in the desert and lived on an austere diet of locusts and wild honey. He also preached an austere penitential message and lived a highly disciplined life. The Pharisees also led a highly regimented and strict lifestyle. Jesus, however, together with his disciples, is frequently seen eating at the tables of Pharisees and tax collectors and in the houses of friends.
But, while Jesus rejected ostentatious fasting, we know he fasted (once for 40 days) and praised it together with prayer and almsgiving, provided it was done discreetly and not for display.
Jesus gives two answers to the question. First, he says that it is not appropriate for guests to fast when the bridegroom is still around. A Jewish wedding was and is a specially joyous occasion (plenty of wine needed, as we see in Cana) and it could last for a week. It would be unthinkable to fast at such a time. Here Jesus is the bridegroom. There will come a time when he is not physically with his disciples and then they will fast.
The second reason goes deeper and is presented in the form of a parable. One does not use a new piece of cloth to patch an old garment. At the first sign of stress, the new cloth will be stronger and the old cloth will be torn. Nor does one put new wine into old wineskins. The new wine is still fermenting and expanding. The old wineskins, which are made of goatskins, are already stretched and no longer flexible. When the new wine expands, the old wineskins will not be able to stretch any more and will burst. The result is lost wine and ruined wineskins. So new wine has to be poured into new wineskins.
In this Jesus is clearly saying that his whole vision of religion is new and it can only be accepted and adopted by people who are prepared to see things in a new way. His teaching, his vision cannot be grafted on to the old religion. The old religion emphasised externals like observance of legal and ritual regulations and fasting; Jesus emphasises the interior spirit which is the real measure of a person’s value.
This parable may also be read in conjunction with John’s account of the wedding feast at Cana where Jesus produced new and better wine from the water in the ritual washing jars.
Jesus knows the difficulties his adversaries face. "No one, after drinking old wine, wants new. He says, ‘I find the old wine better’." Those who had grown up with the ‘old wine’ of the Mosaic Law would find it difficult to switch to the ‘new wine’ that Jesus was offering.
In our Church today there are many who still hanker for the ‘old wine’ of pre-Vatican II days. They have not made the inner shift which is necessary. They have not understood that Vatican II was much more than a change of external practices (such as have taken place in the liturgy). They nostalgically long for the Tridentine Mass in Latin and compare it favourably with the "new" liturgy which they find superficial and lacking in reverence. But they do not seem to have grasped the thinking which is behind the liturgical changes. The new patch does not fit their old cloth. "The old wine is better," they say.
The new wine will not be appreciated until the wineskins are also changed; otherwise we are in the same situation as the Pharisees were with Jesus.
*Monday of the Twenty-third Week of the Year
Reading 1Col1:24–2:3
Brothers and sisters: I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his Body, which is the Church, of which I am a minister in accordance with God's stewardship given to me to bring to completion for you the word of God, the mystery hidden from ages and from generations past. But now it has been manifested to his holy ones, to whom God chose to make known the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; it is Christ in you, the hope for glory. It is he whom we proclaim, admonishing everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. For this I labor and struggle, in accord with the exercise of his power working within me.
For I want you to know how great a struggle I am having for you and for those in Laodicea and all who have not seen me face to face, that their hearts may be encouraged as they are brought together in love, to have all the richness of assured understanding, for the knowledge of the mystery of God, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
Responsorial PsalmPs 62:6-7, 9R. (8)
In God is my safety and my glory.
Only in God be at rest, my soul,
for from him comes my hope.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
my stronghold; I shall not be disturbed.
Trust in him at all times, O my people!
Pour out your hearts before him;
God is our refuge!
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 6-11
On a sabbath Jesus came to teach in a synagogue where there was a man whose right hand was withered. The scribes and Pharisees were on the watch to see if he would perform a cure on the sabbath so that they could find a charge against him. He knew their thoughts, however, and said to the man whose hand was withered, "Get up and stand here in front." The man rose and remained standing. Jesus said to them, "I ask you, is it lawful to do good on the sabbath -- or evil? To preserve life -- or destroy it?" He looked around at them all and said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." The man did so and his hand was perfectly restored. At this they became frenzied and began asking one another what could be done to Jesus.
Commentary on Luke 6:6-11
Immediately following the incident of plucking the grains in the cornfield, we have another confrontation with religious leaders also on a Sabbath day. This one is even nastier as it involves what is called in American police movies a "set up" or "entrapment".
Jesus had gone into the local synagogue, as was his practice on the sabbath, and began to teach. Right in front of him was a man with a withered hand, no doubt something he was born with.
There were scribes and Pharisees in the congregation and, we are told, they "were watching him" to see whether he would heal the man on a Sabbath day so that they could accuse him of breaking the Law.
Medical work was forbidden on the Sabbath because it normally took time. Jesus, of course, healed with just a word but even if he did not, could one say that healing was against the spirit of the Sabbath? At the same time, it is also worth noting that the man was suffering from a chronic and probably non-painful disability. There was no need for him to be cured on the spot; it could easily have waited until the next day.
That gives further point to Jesus’ argument. The poor man had clearly been "planted". He was being used as bait for their sinister ends. For the Pharisees and their co-conspirators the man and his plight were secondary. They had to prove their point and he was seen as a useful tool.
Jesus, of course, is fully aware of what is going on. He speaks directly to the disabled man: "Rise up and stand out in the middle!" The command to "rise up" is already an indication of what is going to take place; the man is going to be given new life. Nor is there any secrecy. What Jesus is going to do is to be seen by all.
But first he puts a question to the whole congregation, scribes and Pharisees included: "Is it lawful on the sabbath day to do good, or to do evil? to save life or to destroy it?"
It is really an unanswerable question because the answer is so obvious. But it was not the way these Pharisees were thinking. Their question would be very different: "Is it right to obey the Law or to violate it?" For them the Law, even the letter of the Law, was paramount. There is an irony in Jesus’ question because Jesus is planning to bring healing into a man’s life while they were preparing to bring about his destruction. Who was really breaking the Sabbath?
Not so with Jesus. For him the Law was relative to the true and the good. No implementation of a law can offend the true and the good. And sometimes the following of the true and the good may have to go against the letter of the law. What is legal is not always moral. It can be immoral, that is, evil, to obey a law in certain circumstances. What is moral sometimes transcends the law and may even contradict the law.
Hearing no dissenting answer, Jesus says to the man, "Stretch out your hand." He did so. His arm was fully restored to normal.
The scribes and Pharisees were furious and began to plot against Jesus. Their plans had been brought to nought. They showed no pleasure that a crippled man had been made whole. Their interpretation of the law had been shown to be wanting and they had to get back at Jesus.
Such situations are by no means unknown in our Christian life and in our Church. We will run into situations where doing good may be in conflict with traditional regulations and legal formulae.
We will find ourselves in situations where contemporary Pharisees will try to put the Church into a straitjacket of narrow-mindedness and fundamentalism whether it involves our understanding of the Scripture or the liturgy or morality or something else. These are people who put the letter of the laws, regulations and rubrics before love. For them it is more important to observe the externals of rules than to be a loving person.
Tuesday of the Twenty-third Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Col 2, 6-15
Continue to live in Christ Jesus the Lord, in the spirit in which you received him. Be rooted in him and built up in him, growing ever stronger in faith as you were taught, and overflowing with gratitude. See to it that no one deceives you through any empty, seductive philosophy that follows mere human traditions, a philosophy based on cosmic powers rather than on Christ.
In Christ the fullness of deity resides in bodily form. Yours is a share of this fullness, in him who is the head of every principality and poweR. You were also circumcised in him, not with the circumcision administered by hand but with Christ's circumcision, which strips off the carnal body completely. In baptism you were not only buried with him but also raised to life with him because you believed in the power of God who raised him from the dead. Even when you were dead in sin and your flesh was uncircumcised, God gave you new life in company with Christ. He pardoned all our sins. He canceled the bond that stood against us with all its claims, snatching it up and nailing it to the cross. Thus did God disarm the principalities and powers. He made a public show of them and, leading them off captive, he triumphed in the person of Christ.
Resp. Psalm Ps 145, 1-2. 8-9. 10-11
R.(9) The Lord is compassionate to all his creatures.
I will extol you, O my God and King,
and I will bless your name forever and eveR.
Every day will I bless you,
and I will praise your name forever and eveR.
The Lord is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and of great kindness.
The Lord is good to all
and compassionate toward all his works.
Let all your works give you thanks, O Lord,
and let your faithful ones bless you.
Let them discourse of the glory of your kingdom
and speak of your might.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 12-19
Jesus went out to the mountain to pray, spending the night in communion with God. At daybreak he called his disciples and selected twelve of them to be his apostles: Simon, to whom he gave the name Peter, and Andrew his brother, James and John, Philip and Bartholomew, Matthew and Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, and Simon called the Zealot, Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who turned traitor. Coming down the mountain with them, he stopped at a level stretch where there were many of his disciples; a large crowd of people was with them from all Judea and Jerusalem and the coast of Tyre and Sidon, people who came to hear him and be healed of their diseases. Those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured; indeed, the whole crowd was trying to touch him because power went out from him which cured all.
Commentary on Luke 6:12-19
We move on now to a different phase in Luke’s story and some very crucial sayings of Jesus.
Jesus, we are told, went up into the mountains to pray and spent the whole night there in prayer to God. Some might wonder what Jesus would have to pray about. Such a question may reveal a limited concept of what prayer is. It is not just a question of asking for things. It is even less a question of fulfilling a religious duty, "saying our prayers".
Prayer is ultimately making contact with God, the beginning and end of all things. It makes a lot of sense that Jesus would have wanted to be in intimate contact with his Father and to have spent long periods with him. One of Jesus’ main concerns was that he do the will of his Father. Prayer was one way of making sure that there was completely harmony with that will.
Luke’s gospel shows Jesus at prayer more than any of the others. He also shows Jesus praying before all the important stages in his public life. As soon as this period of prayer was over, he called together his disciples and from them he chose twelve as apostles.
We know that among those who came to hear Jesus was a group, comprising both men and women, who regularly followed him and were committed to his teachings. Elsewhere we know of 72 such disciples who were sent out on a mission to do what Jesus was doing. After the ascension, we are told of 120 believers waiting for the coming of the Spirit. It is from these that Jesus chooses 12 to be Apostles, with a special mandate to continue his mission for the Kingdom. Although the order of names varies in the different gospels, the list is always headed by Peter while Judas is placed last.
We can sometimes be rather casual in our use of the terms ‘disciples’ and ‘apostles’ but they have very distinct meanings. The word ‘disciple’ is applied to any person who commits himself to be a follower of Jesus. The word ‘disciple’ comes from a word which means ‘to learn’. There is a passive element present, in the sense of the disciple sitting at the feet of the guru and learning from him. Jesus’ disciples regularly called him ‘Rabbi’ or teacher. ‘Apostle’ however has a much more active meaning. It refers to a person who goes out as an emissary, delegated to pass on information or commands or instructions to others on behalf of some authority.
In the Gospel, the word ‘apostle’ first applies to the twelve people who were especially chosen by Jesus to hand on his message. They would, after the departure of Jesus, become the foundation stones of the new community. In them would be invested the integrity of the original message and it would be up to them to interpret its acceptable developments. They were the beginnings of what we call today the "magisterium", the teaching body of the Church responsible for the maintenance of the integrity of the Gospel message.
In this, as in all the lists of the Apostles, the first person listed is Simon, whose name is now changed to Peter. (In Matthew, the change is made at Peter’s confession of Jesus as Messiah, Matt 16:18.) There are variations of the Apostles’ names in all the lists. Bartholomew here seems to be the same as Nathanael in John (cf. 1:45) and is associated with Philip. Matthew seems to correspond to Levi (cf. Mark 2:13ff.). James, son of Alphaeus, is probably the same as James the younger, not the brother of John (Mark 15:40). The other Simon is called a Zealot. This could be either to describe his religious zeal or indicate his membership in the party of the Zealots, a Jewish revolutionary group violently opposed to Roman rule. Judas, the son of James is another name for Thaddaeus (Matt 10:3; Mark 3:18). Also known as Jude to distinguish him from the other Judas, who always appears last in the lists. ‘Iscariot’ may mean that he comes from Kerioth. The town Kerioth Hezron was about 19 km south of Hebron and appears in the Old Testament (Joshua 15:25; Jeremiah 48:24).
We know, of course, that one of the chosen failed utterly and betrayed his Master. He was replaced by Matthias. Later, too, Paul – who never saw the pre-resurrection Jesus – would be called to be an Apostle. And the term would also be applied to a few others in the New Testament, e.g. Barnabas, a missionary colleague of Paul.
Secondly, however, the word ‘apostle’ applies to every baptised Christian. All of us, one way or another, are called to pass on the Gospel message so that others can hear and respond. There are many ways we can do this. One thing, though, is clear; it is not enough for us to be simply disciples, passive followers.
Immediately following the call of the Twelve comes what is really Luke’s version of the Sermon on the Mount. Significantly, for him it is going to take place in a plain, down on the ground in the midst of all the people. So his version is sometimes known as the "Sermon on the Plain". It somehow indicates the humility of Jesus and his closeness to the people while Matthew uses the more biblical concept of a mountain as the place where God reveals himself.
Jesus is surrounded by all his disciples, his newly chosen apostles, and a huge crowd from Judea and Jerusalem, from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, including both Jews and non-Jews. They all came to listen to Jesus and to be healed. And they were all eager to touch him physically because a certain power went out from Jesus and brought healing to all.
Let us then hear today the call of Jesus, first to be his disciples, totally committed to accepting and assimilating his message; second, to accepting the responsibility to spread the Gospel actively through the way we live our lives, through the way we speak, and through the relationships we establish with people; thirdly, let us reach out and touch Jesus so that we may experience his healing wherever we need it.
Wednesday of the Twenty-third Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Col 3, 1-11
Since you have been raised up in company with Christ, set your heart on what pertains to higher realms where Christ is seated at God's right hand. Be intent on things above rather than on things of earth. After all, you have died! Your life is hidden now with Christ in God. When Christ our life appears, then you shall appear with him in glory.
Put to death whatever in your nature is rooted in earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desires, and that lust which is idolatry. These are the sins which provoke God's wrath. Your own conduct was once of this sort, when these sins were your very life. You must put that aside now: all the anger and quick temper, the malice, the insults, the foul language. Stop lying to one anotheR. What you have done is put aside your old self with its past deeds and put on a new man, one who grows in knowledge as he is formed anew in the image of his CreatoR. There is no Greek or Jew here, circumcised or uncircumcised, foreigner, Scythian, slave, or freeman. Rather Christ is everything in all of you.
Resp. Psalm Ps 145, 2-3. 10-11. 12-13
R.(9) The Lord is compassionate to all his creatures.
Every day will I bless you,
and I will praise your name forever and eveR.
Great is the Lord and highly to be praised;
his greatness is unsearchable.
Let all your works give you thanks, O Lord,
and let your faithful ones bless you.
Let them discourse of the glory of your kingdom
and speak of your might.
Making known to men your might
and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
Your kingdom is a kingdom for all ages,
and your dominion endures through all generations.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 20-26
Jesus raised his eyes to his disciples and said: "Blest are you poor; the reign of God is yours. Blest are you who hunger; you shall be filled. Blest are you who are weeping; you shall laugh. Blest shall you be when men hate you, when they ostracize you and insult you and proscribe your name as evil because of the Son of Man. On the day they do so, rejoice and exult, for your reward shall be great in heaven. Thus it was that their fathers treated the prophets. "But woe to you rich, for your consolation is now. Woe to you who are full; you shall go hungry. Woe to you who laugh now; you shall weep in your grief. Woe to you when all speak well of you. Their fathers treated the false prophets in just this way."
Commentary on Luke 6:20-26
Today we begin what is known as Luke’s ‘Sermon on the Plain’ which more or less parallels Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount. Luke’s is much shorter but both begin with the Beatitudes and end with the parable of the house builders. Some of what is found in Matthew’s Sermon is found elsewhere in Luke as Matthew’s ‘Sermon’ it consists of disparate sayings of Jesus gathered into one place. Luke also omits Matthew’s specifically Jewish material which would not have been relevant to his Gentile readers.
The Sermon can be summarized as follows:
Similar to Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount, Luke begins the Sermon on the Plain with his version of the Beatitudes. But there are striking differences. Whereas Matthew has eight (some would say seven) Beatitudes, Luke has four "Blesseds" and four contrasting "Woes". As is typical of his uncompromising style when it comes to following Jesus, the language of Luke is much more direct and hard-hitting and it may well be closer to what Jesus actually said.
Matthew’s Beatitudes propose a set of attitudes which reflect the spirit of the Kingdom, qualities to be found in the truly Christian and human life. Luke, on the other hand, speaks of material conditions in this life which will be overturned. Later in this gospel, this is illustrated graphically in the story of the rich man and Lazarus (16:25).
Luke also has Jesus speak in the second person: "Blessed are you" and "Woe to you" rather than in the third person as Matthew does ("Blessed are those who…"). Nor does he speak of the "poor in spirit" but of "you who are poor" and he certainly means the materially poor.
He goes on to say how blessed too are "you who are hungry; you who weep; you who are hated and who are rejected and marginalised and whose name is regarded as evil" because of their connection with Jesus. Undoubtedly Matthew’s Beatitudes can be read to consider just ‘spiritual’ poverty and a hunger for ‘righteousness’, which in fact are also a form of real poverty and real hunger but Luke is a gospel for the materially poor and distressed and we must be careful not to turn our focus away from them. That is why he has Jesus born in poverty and dying naked and destitute (even of his ‘friends’).
Jesus tells those who are poor and hungry and abused to rejoice when that happens and "dance for joy". There are two reasons: because their reward will be "great in heaven" and because that is the way the prophets in the past were treated (and the way Jesus the Prophet will also be treated).
At a first reading, it seems like a classical example of religion as the ‘opium of the people’: Be happy that you are having such a hard time now because there is a wonderful future waiting for you in the next world. It was the message that Karl Marx mocked the capitalist-ruled churches of preaching to the exploited ‘proletariat’.
And the second part is not likely to go down well in our contemporary developed world. ""Woe to you who are rich [he can't be serious!], you have received your comfort already." "Woe to you who are full, because you will be hungry; woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep; woe to you who are spoken well of. That is how they treated the false prophets."
How are we to understand these sayings which turn our common worldview upside down? I think they have to be seen in the light of the Kingdom, in the kind of society that Jesus came to set up, a society based on mutual love and sharing and support. A Kingdom for this world and not just the next. The coming of such a society could only be good news for the poor and destitute (material and otherwise), for those suffering from hunger (physical and otherwise), for those depressed by deep sorrow and for those abused and rejected for their commitment to Jesus and his Way.
On the other hand it would not be good news for those self-focused people who amass material wealth at the expense of others, who indulge in excessive consumption of the world’s goods, who live lives centred on personal hedonism and pleasure, and who feed off the envy and adulation of those around them. There is really no place for such people in the Kingdom. To enter fully into the Kingdom they have to unload all these concerns and obsessions and let go. Instead of focusing on what they can get; they will focus on what they can share of what they have.
A clear example is of the rich young man in the Gospel. How rich he was – and yet how sad he was! Compare him with Zacchaeus, whom we will be meeting later on.
Thursday of The Twenty-third Week of The Year
Reading 1 COL 3:12-17
Brothers and sisters:
Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved,
heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience,
bearing with one another and forgiving one another,
if one has a grievance against another;
as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.
And over all these put on love,
that is, the bond of perfection.
And let the peace of Christ control your hearts,
the peace into which you were also called in one Body.
And be thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,
as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one another,
singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs
with gratitude in your hearts to God.
And whatever you do, in word or in deed,
do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 139, 1-3. 13-14. 23-24
R.(24) Guide me, Lord, along the everlasting way.
O Lord, you have probed me and you know me;
you know when I sit and when I stand;
you understand my thoughts from afar.
My journeys and my rest you scrutinize,
with all my ways you are familiar.
Truly you have formed my inmost being;
you knit me in my mother's womb.
I give you thanks that I am fearfully, wonderfully made;
wonderful are your works.
Probe me, O God, and know my heart;
try me, and know my thoughts;
See if my way is crooked,
and lead me in the way of old.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 27-38 Jesus said to his disciples: 'To you who hear me, I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you and pray for those who maltreat you. When someone slaps you on one cheek, turn and give him the other; when someone takes your coat, let him have your shirt as well. Give to all who beg from you. When a man takes what is yours, do not demand it back. Do to others what you would have them do to you. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, how can you claim any credit? Sinners do as much. If you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what merit is there in it for you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. "Love your enemy and do good; lend without expecting repayment. Then will your recompense be great. You will rightly be called sons of the Most High, since he himself is good to the ungrateful and the wicked. "Be compassionate, as your Father is compassionate. Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Pardon, and you shall be pardoned. Give, and it shall be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over, will they pour into the fold of your garment. For the measure you measure with will be measured back to you.
Commentary on Luke 6:27-38
For many people, even those who identify themselves as Christians, this may be one of the most difficult passages in the Gospel. It seems to express an idealism that is totally unrealistic and unattainable.
We live today in a world of great violence, of terrorism, of increasing litigation – suing and counter-suing, violence and murder, of vicious vendettas often stirred up in the tabloid press and other media, the horror of terrorist attacks on the innocent. Are these things not to be avenged?
Where do Jesus’ words fit in? It may be worth noting that the passage (in the original – not in today’s reading) begins: "I say this to you who are listening." In order to understand what Jesus is really saying to us, we have to put aside our prejudices and assumptions and really listen to what he is saying. This passage, in particular, is one where we are likely to react emotionally.
"Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who treat you badly." We may feel that to follow this teaching is to try something which is totally beyond our capacity, that it would require a tremendous amount of will-power and that it would only encourage those people to behave even worse. In the Old Testament hatred of evildoers is presumed to be the right attitude to have. But Jesus is extending love to the enemy and the persecutor.
This is the core of Jesus’ teaching, which he himself practised. The Golden Rule which is often expressed as "Do not do to others what you would not want them do to you" is expressed here in positive terms.
The first big hurdle is the word "love". For us it is a very emotional word, implying both affection and intimacy. For us to "love" is often to "be in love with", to "be attracted to". But Jesus is not telling us to be in love with our enemies. He is not even telling us to like them. The Greek verb which the gospel uses is agapao (‘agapaw) from which the noun agape (‘agaph) comes. Agape [pronounced ‘ah-gah-pay'] is a special kind of love. It is not the physically-expressed love of lovers nor is it the love of close friends. It is rather an attitude of positive regard towards other people by which I wish for their well-being.
This, in fact, is the love that God has for us. It is a one-sided love in the sense that a return is not expected. God reaches out in infinite love to every single person without exception. God wishes every person to experience that love; God wishes the fullest well-being of every single person. That love of his is often not returned; it is often rejected or ignored.
But it continues unabated, like the father in the story of the prodigal son waiting for his boy to come back. The father continued to love his son even in his lowest moments of debauchery and degradation. It was the same with the people who were nailing Jesus to the cross. He prayed for them, for their being forgiven and that they might come to a realisation of just what they were doing.
In this sense, loving our enemies seems altogether reasonable. And not only not impossible but really the only thing to do.
Who are our "enemies"? First of all, they are not our enemies in the sense that we hate them or want to harm them. In that sense, Christians should have no enemies. Rather, they are people who are hostile to us. They want to harm us, take revenge on us, even destroy us, or whatever.
There are two ways we can deal with such people. We can set out to do more harm to them, to take revenge on them, or try to wipe them out completely. Or we can try and work to turn them round.
Our problem is that we tend to focus too much on ourselves and our own immediate needs and overlook the needs of others. To love as God loves is to focus more on others. We can only do this if we have a strong inner sense of security and self-acceptance. Then we are not too worried about what people say about us or do to us.
And then, too, we can turn our attention much more to the one who is hating or harming. We will begin to ask why do they have to act in this way. What is hurting inside them that drives them to such behaviour? Already we are just by thinking in this way beginning to care for our enemy and beginning to love him or her.
And is not this a much better solution to the problem? To bring peace back into that person’s life and initiate a healing process in them and between them and me.
Jesus is not at all asking us to do something "unnatural". We do not naturally want to hate or be hated. We want to love and to be loved. We see many parts of the world where – for years – there has been a process of hatred and retaliation in a never-ending spiral of vengeance and loss of life.
The only way to break this cycle is to follow Jesus’ advice. It is not a lose-lose or lose-win situation; it is a win-win situation where everyone benefits.
Perhaps words of the late Mother Teresa are appropriate here:
"Love, to be true, has to hurt. I must be willing to give whatever it takes not to harm other people and, in fact, to do good to them. This requires that I be willing to give until it hurts. Otherwise, there is no love in me and I bring injustice, not peace, to those around me."
To put Jesus’ teaching into effect is not a matter of strengthening our will to do something very difficult but to change our conventional thinking at the deepest level, to see things his way. Once we do that, it becomes much easier.
Jesus’ application of this teaching also has been the subject of much mockery. "To the man who slaps you on one cheek, present the other cheek too." In a world where macho reigns, this is just too much. Only wimps would follow Jesus’ advice because they are afraid to do anything else.
Schwarzenegger and Stallone know what to do in such cases: mow them down with an automatic machine gun.
Again, it is a question of seeing things from Jesus’, that is, God’s viewpoint. Turning the other cheek, as it is presented here, is not at all an act of weakness. It requires great courage and great inner strength and an awareness that the one who strikes is the one who is really weak. It is easy to lash out at another person by word or act. It is easy to hit back; it is almost an instinctive reaction but it is not the truly human response.
To hit back is to reduce oneself to the same level as one’s attacker and it solves nothing in the long run. Deliberately and calmly not to hit back is to refuse, in Eric Berne’s words, "to play the other person’s game". It is to break the cycle and change the level of the playing field and move it to a higher level – the level of mutual respect and human dignity.
Jesus set the example when he was struck on the face during his trial. During the whole degradation of the Passion his dignity shines out in contrast to the pathetic posturings of his judges and tormentors. This was the spirit that guided Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King and which is behind all movements devoted to active non-violence.
Jesus sets the principle: "Treat others as you would like them to treat you." You do not want to be hated or struck so you refuse, no matter what happens, to hate or strike another person. "If you love those who love you, what thanks can you expect?" No, we will not react simply in the way others deal with us.
As followers of Christ, we see things in a completely different way and we want to behave differently. We believe that not only do we personally benefit from following Jesus’ way but that others too will benefit and may even come to our point of view.
Finally, Jesus calls us to follow the model of God himself: "Be compassionate as your Father is compassionate." In Matthew’s gospel it is, "Be perfect as…" The meaning is the same: our perfection consists in our empathetic reaching out in compassionate agape to every single person.
And, through us, the compassion of God can then be experienced by people.
We are not to judge or condemn persons (although we may be asked and required to give an objective and discerned evaluation of a person’s behaviour or fitness for some task or position). And we are to forgive. Then we will not be condemned and will in turn receive forgiveness.
The emphasis is on reaching out to others rather than gathering for ourselves, being turned in on our little, insecure selves. "Give, and there will be gifts for you." Jesus put this graphically when he told us to give not only our cloak to someone asking for it but our tunic as well. Given that the poor in those days only had two garments, that would leave the donor totally naked!
But that is the point: the one filled with the spirit of Christ has nothing to lose, nothing to be ashamed of. Life consists in what we are able to give and not what we can get. "The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given back."
And that, above all, applies to agape. Everyone can give an endless supply of that.
Friday of The Twenty-third Week of The Year
Reading 11 TM 1:1-2, 12-14
Paul, an Apostle of Christ Jesus by command of God our savior and of Christ Jesus our hope, to Timothy, my true child in faith: grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
I am grateful to him who has strengthened me, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he considered me trustworthy in appointing me to the ministry. I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and an arrogant man, but I have been mercifully treated
because I acted out of ignorance in my unbelief. Indeed, the grace of our Lord has been abundant, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.
Resp. Psalm Ps 16, 1-2. 5. 7-8. 11
R.(5) You are my inheritance, O Lord.
Keep me, O God, for in you I take refuge;
I say to the Lord, "My Lord are you."
O Lord, my allotted portion and my cup,
you it is who hold fast my lot.
I bless the Lord who counsels me;
even in the night my heart exhorts me.
I set the Lord ever before me;
with him at my right hand I shall not be disturbed.
You will show me the path to life,
fullness of joys in your presence,
the delights at your right hand foreveR.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 39-42
Jesus used images in speaking to his disciples: "Can a blind man act as guide to a blind man? Will they not both fall into a ditch? A student is not above his teacher; but every student when he has finished his studies will be on a par with his teacher. "Why look at the speck in your brother's eye when you miss the plank in your own? How can you say to your brother, 'Brother, let me remove the speck from your eye,' yet fail yourself to see the plank lodged in your own? Hypocrite, remove the plank from your own eye first; then you will see clearly enough to remove the speck from your brother's eye."
Commentary on Luke 6:39-42
In Matthew the parallel passage today is addressed to the Pharisees but in Luke it is addressed to the disciples.
Jesus makes two points:
a. The blind cannot lead the blind. The disciple, left to himself, does not know very much and depends on his teacher. But, once he is fully trained and has learnt everything he can from his teacher, then he becomes an extension of his teacher. He shares the knowledge and wisdom of his teacher and can, in turn, be a guide to others.
This is something we all have to do: to listen carefully to what Jesus tells us and make it part of our own lives. Only then can we effectively lead others to him.
b. We have to be very careful about sitting in judgement on others. Jesus uses a graphic image of someone trying to remove a speck of dust from another person’s eye while there is a large splinter of wood in their own. How can we see properly to correct the vision of our brother when our own vision is so distorted?
The faults we so easily see in others are often trivial in comparison with our own shortcomings. Of course, much of the energy we exert in putting down others (the main staple of our gossiping sessions!) is sub-consciously to compensate for the shortcomings we are all too aware of in ourselves. Instead of lifting ourselves up by changing our ways, we try to drag others down.
And, so often our judgements are based purely on external behaviour. We usually have no idea of the inner motives or intentions of other people or an awareness of their inability to behave otherwise than they do.
And, while we can be very ready with criticism behind people’s backs, we do not dare to say these things to their face. Yet, there may be times when we will be asked to give – as far as is possible – an objective evaluation of a person’s behaviour or their fitness for some responsibility. And, not infrequently, we will shy away from this responsibility.
Monday of The Twenty-fourth Week of The Year
Reading 11 TM 2:1-8
Beloved: First of all, I ask that supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings be offered for everyone, for kings and for all in authority, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity. This is good and pleasing to God our savior, who wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth.
For there is one God. There is also one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,
who gave himself as ransom for all.
This was the testimony at the proper time. For this I was appointed preacher and Apostle (I am speaking the truth, I am not lying), teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.
It is my wish, then, that in every place the men should pray, lifting up holy hands, without anger or argument.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 28:2, 7, 8-9R. (6)
Blessed be the Lord, for he has heard my prayer.
Hear the sound of my pleading, when I cry to you,
lifting up my hands toward your holy shrine.
The LORD is my strength and my shield.
In him my heart trusts, and I find help;
then my heart exults, and with my song I give him thanks.
The LORD is the strength of his people,
the saving refuge of his anointed.
Save your people, and bless your inheritance;
feed them, and carry them forever!
Years I and II Gospel Lk 7, 1-10
When Jesus had finished his discourse in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. A centurion had a servant he held in high regard, who was at that moment sick to the point of death. When he heard about Jesus he sent some Jewish elders to him, asking him to come and save the life of his servant. Upon approaching Jesus they petitioned him earnestly. "He deserves this favor from you," they said, "because he loves our people, and even built our synagogue for us." Jesus set out with them. When he was only a short distance from the house, the centurion sent friends to tell him: "Sir, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you enter my house. That is why I did not presume to come to you myself. Just give the order and my servant will be cured. I too am a man who knows the meaning of an order, having soldiers under my command. I say to one, 'On your way,' and off he goes; to another, 'Come here,' and he comes; to my slave, 'Do this,' and he does it." Jesus showed amazement on hearing this, and turned to the crowd which was following him to say, "I tell you, I have never found so much faith among the Israelites." When the deputation returned to the house, they found the servant in perfect health.
Commentary on Luke 7:1-10
After he had finished the Sermon on the Plain (although we do not necessarily have to think its represents teachings all given at one time) Jesus went into Capernaum, the base from which he operated when in Galilee. Almost immediately he is met with a request for healing but this one is somewhat different. It will set the stage for developments which will take place and be described later in the Acts of the Apostles (also by Luke).
The story concerns the slave of a centurion. A centurion was an army officer with – as his rank indicates – one hundred men under him. He was presumably attached to the Roman garrison in the town or one of Herod Antipas’ forces. The Roman military in general did not have a good reputation and Mel Gibson’s film ‘The Passion of the Christ’ does not altogether do them an injustice in portraying their cruelty and brutality. However, those in the Gospel do not appear in a bad light. This is a good example of the danger of stereotyping any group of people – something we are all very easily prone to do.
He was not necessarily a Roman but he was certainly not a Jew. He was a Gentile outsider. His slave, who was very dear to him, had fallen seriously ill. This, in turn, implies he treated his slave well. Undoubtedly, he had heard the stories of what Jesus had done by way of healing and wondered if his slave could also be helped.
However, as an outsider he did not dare to approach Jesus personally. He sent a delegation consisting of Jewish town elders. These are not the ‘elders’ mentioned during Jesus’ passion but simply respected members of the local Jewish community. In Matthew’s account, the centurion approaches Jesus himself. Luke having him go through influential Jewish friends sounds more plausible.
They apparently were only too willing to help because they said he was very friendly to the Jews and had even built a synagogue for them. The stage is being set for the story of Cornelius, also a soldier and the first Gentile Christian, in the Acts of the Apostles (cf. Acts 10:1ff.).
While Jesus was on his way to the house, the centurion immediately sent word that it was not necessary for Jesus to come personally. As a friend of Jews, he knew that a devout Jew, and especially a rabbi, could not enter the house of a Gentile. He did not want to be a source of embarrassment for Jesus.
"I am not worthy that you should come under my roof," he said – words which we now use every time we prepare to approach the table of the Eucharist. Just as he himself felt unworthy to be approached by Jesus. He knew that Jesus had only to say a word and his slave would be made whole again.
He recognised the very special authority that Jesus had, an authority, in some respects, not unlike his own as an army officer. He had only to say "Go" to a soldier and he went; he only had to say "Do this" and it was done. Jesus could do the same.
Jesus is amazed at the man’s faith. "I have never found such faith, even in Israel." Only twice in the Gospel is Jesus described as being amazed. This is caused by the faith of a Gentile; the other was caused by the unbelief of his townspeople in Nazareth (Mark 6:6).
When the delegation returned to the centurion’s house, they found that the slave was totally well again.
What strikes one so strongly in this story is the character of the centurion who contradicted every stereotype of the Roman soldier which the average person in Palestine would have had. He is kind and caring of his slave. He has contributed to the building of the local synagogue. He is extremely sensitive to Jewish customs and does not embarrass Jesus by approaching him directly. And, when Jesus offers to go to his house, he says that it is not necessary. He knows that Jesus, as a Jew, would become unclean by entering a Gentile house. He is a good example how wrong we can be in generalising about certain kinds or classes of people. He also clearly illustrates how a Gentile could be, as the early Church only gradually discovered, a worthy person to belong to the Christian community. In fact, this story prepares the way for Luke’s account later in the Acts of a centurion, Cornelius, being received as the first Gentile member of the Christian community (Acts chap. 10).
The key factor, of course, in this healing story is the faith of the Gentile, a faith which Jesus said he had never encountered even among many of his own people. Beginning with Cornelius, this experience will be repeated in the early Church as the first Christians, all Jews, begin to realise that the Gentiles too are being called to follow Christ and that their Spirit-filled faith can be as strong as that of any of them.
For us today it is a reminder that Jesus can reveal himself to the most unlikely persons and that we must never presume that a person is unfitted for the Christian life based on past behaviour or any other characteristics. God can call anyone and he does.
Let us, too, follow the example of the centurion in our confidence in God’s healing power in our lives.
Tuesday of the Twenty-fourth Week of the Year
Reading 11 TM 3:1-13
Beloved, this saying is trustworthy: whoever aspires to the office of bishop desires a noble task. Therefore, a bishop must be irreproachable, married only once, temperate, self-controlled, decent, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not aggressive, but gentle, not contentious, not a lover of money. He must manage his own household well, keeping his children under control with perfect dignity; for if a man does not know how to manage his own household, how can he take care of the Church of God? He should not be a recent convert, so that he may not become conceited nd thus incur the Devil's punishment. He must also have a good reputation among outsiders, so that he may not fall into disgrace, the Devil's trap.
Similarly, deacons must be dignified, not deceitful, not addicted to drink, not greedy for sordid gain, holding fast to the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. Moreover, they should be tested first; then, if there is nothing against them,
let them serve as deacons. Women, similarly, should be dignified, not slanderers, but temperate and faithful in everything.
Deacons may be married only once and must manage their children and their households well. Thus those who serve well as deacons gain good standing and much confidence in their faith in Christ Jesus.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 101:1b-2ab, 2cd-3ab, 5, 6R.(2) I will walk with blameless heart.
Of mercy and judgment I will sing;
to you, O LORD, I will sing praise.
I will persevere in the way of integrity;
when will you come to me?
I will walk with blameless heart,
within my house;
I will not set before my eyes
any base thing.
Whoever slanders his neighbor in secret,
him will I destroy.
The man of haughty eyes and puffed up heart
I will not endure.
My eyes are upon the faithful of the land,
that they may dwell with me.
He who walks in the way of integrity
shall be in my service.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 7, 11-17
Jesus went to a town called Naim, and his disciples and a large crowd accompanied him. As he approached the gate of the town a dead man was being carried out, the only son of a widowed mother. A considerable crowd of townsfolk were with her. The Lord was moved with pity upon seeing her and said to her, "Do not cry." Then he stepped forward and touched the litter; at this, the bearers halted. He said, "Young man, I bid you get up." The dead man sat up and began to speak. Then Jesus gave him back to his mother. Fear seized them all and they began to praise God. "A great prophet has risen among us," they said; and, "God has visited his people." This was the report that spread about him throughout Judea and the surrounding country.
Commentary on Luke 7:11-17
This story is only found in Luke. It is one of only three stories in the Gospel where Jesus is described as bringing a dead person to life. The most dramatic is the story of Lazarus told in John’s gospel. There is the also the story of the synagogue leader’s daughter although it is not categorically certain that she had actually died. She might have been in a coma or catatonic state.
In the thinking of the time, the scene is particularly sad. A woman, who has already lost her husband, has now lost her only son and the only means of her support. She is on the way to bury him.
The lot of the widow, in those days often a relatively young woman, was particularly difficult in a society where the married woman was no longer the responsibility of her own family and who, after the death of husband and children, was no longer the responsibility of her husband’s family either. She was largely left to her own devices in a society where social welfare of any kind was unknown.
Jesus himself is deeply moved at her plight. At this point, for the first time, Luke refers to Jesus as "Lord", a title reserved for God himself. He approaches the litter (not a coffin as we know it) carrying the dead man, tells the bearers to stop and then orders the young man to rise up. As in other similar stories, the word "rise up" is the same as that used to describe the resurrection of Jesus. "I have come that they may have life."
The reaction of the people around is one of awe and admiration. "A great prophet has risen among us and God has visited his people." They had no doubts about the origin of what they had seen taking place; it was the work of God. Not surprisingly, the story spread like wildfire all through Judea and beyond. The episode prepares the way for Jesus’ response to the disciples of John the Baptist a little later (but which is not included in our Mass readings at this time).
This story should help us to look at our own situation and see, first of all, how alive we really are.
Let us look around and see how many people need to be lifted up and helped to find new life. Maybe we can do something for them.
Wednesday of The Twenty-fourth Week of The Year
Reading 11 TM 3:14-16
Beloved: I am writing you, although I hope to visit you soon. But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth. Undeniably great is the mystery of devotion,
Who was manifested in the flesh, vindicated in the spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed to the Gentiles, believed in throughout the world, taken up in glory.
Responsorial PsalmPs 111:1-2, 3-4, 5-6
R. (2) How great are the works of the Lord!
I will give thanks to the LORD with all my heart
in the company and assembly of the just.
Great are the works of the LORD,
exquisite in all their delights.
Majesty and glory are his work,
and his justice endures forever.
He has won renown for his wondrous deeds;
gracious and merciful is the LORD.
He has given food to those who fear him;
he will forever be mindful of his covenant.
He has made known to his people the power of his works,
giving them the inheritance of the nations.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 7, 31-35
Jesus said: "What comparison can I use for the men of today? What are they like? They are like children squatting in the city squares and calling to their playmates, 'We piped you a tune but you did not dance, We sang you a dirge but you did not wail.' I mean that John the Baptizer came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, 'He is mad!' The Son of Man came and he both ate and drank, and you say, 'Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!' God's wisdom is vindicated by all who accept it."
Commentary on Luke 7:31-35
Today’s passage follows immediately after the scene (not in our Mass readings) where Jesus answers the query from John the Baptist languishing in prison about whether Jesus is truly the Messiah. Jesus uses the occasion to speak words of high praise for John, "Of all the children born of women, there is no one greater than John".
Jesus now criticises the cynicism and self-contradictory attitudes of those who reject both him and John. They have simply closed their ears and want to hear nothing and learn nothing. He compares them to children in a city square calling to their playmates. "When we played lively music for you, you would not dance; when we played funereal music, you would not mourn."
This comparison Jesus applies to John the Baptist and himself. John led an austere life in the desert eating, as we are told elsewhere, only locusts and wild honey. They said he was mad and rejected him. Jesus came leading a highly convivial life, mixing with all kinds of people. They called him a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and other sinful people. He even invited a tax collector to be one of his twelve Apostles!
It was a no-win situation. When people are like that there is really nothing that can be done. Jesus concludes with the enigmatic statement, "Wisdom has been proved right by all her children." Both John and Jesus could both be described as children of Wisdom, whose origin is God himself. Those who can see the hand of God in the lives of John and Jesus are also children of Wisdom. Those who adamantly refuse to see God are not.
It is important for us not to fall into such a trap. God speaks to us in so many ways and through so many people and situations. It is very easy to find ourselves excluding a priori the people or situations by which God is trying to reach us.
We cannot expect God to speak to us in ways which we find congenial. He may speak to us through a saint or a sinner. Through a conservative or a liberal. Through a man or a woman – or a young child. Through an old person or a young person. Through an educated or an illiterate person… Through a local person or a foreigner. Through a straight or gay person… Through a saint or a sinner. We have at all times to be ready to listen with an unprejudiced mind and heart.
Thursday of the Twenty-fourth Week of the Year
Reading 11 TM 4:12-16
Beloved: Let no one have contempt for your youth, but set an example for those who believe, in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity. Until I arrive, attend to the reading, exhortation, and teaching. Do not neglect the gift you have, which was conferred on you through the prophetic word with the imposition of hands by the presbyterate. Be diligent in these matters, be absorbed in them, so that your progress may be evident to everyone. Attend to yourself and to your teaching;
persevere in both tasks, for by doing so you will save both yourself and those who listen to you.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 7, 36-50
There was a certain Pharisee who invited Jesus to dine with him. Jesus went to the Phariseés home and reclined to eat. A woman known in the town to be a sinner learned that he was dining in the Phariseés home. She brought in a vase of perfumed oil and stood behind him at his feet, weeping so that her tears fell upon his feet. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissing them and perfuming them with the oil.
When his host, the Pharisee, saw this, he said to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would know who and what sort of woman this is that touches him -- that she is a sinner."
In answer to his thoughts, Jesus said to him, "Simon, I have something to propose to you." "Teacher," he said, "speak." "Two men owed money to a certain moneylender; one owed a total of five hundred coins, the other fifty. Since neither was able to repay, he wrote off both debts. Which of them was more grateful to him?"
Simon answered, "He, I presume, to whom he remitted the larger sum." Jesus said to him, "You are right."
Turning then to the woman, he said to Simon: "You see this woman? I came to your home and you provided me with no water for my feet. She has washed my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but she has not ceased kissing my feet since I entered. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with perfume. I tell you, that is why her many sins are forgiven -- because of her great love. Little is forgiven the one whose love is small."
He said to her then, "Your sins are forgiven," at which his fellow guests began to ask among themselves, "Who is this that he even forgives sin?" Meanwhile he said to the woman, "Your faith has been your salvation. Now go in peace."
Commentary on Luke 7:36-50
Today’s passage is one of the most striking scenes in the whole of the Gospel. It is a story only found in Luke and, in a way it is strange that it is not otherwise recorded. It is not the same as the anointing of Jesus at Bethany, described by Matthew (26:6-13). Perhaps to some, especially Jewish readers, it was a little too daring and close to the edge. Because it is a highly sexual story in which Jesus is deeply involved.
We are told that a Pharisee – his name is Simon – was keen to have Jesus eat at his house. The word ‘Pharisee’ means ‘separated one’ and they numbered about 6,000 throughout Palestine. They taught in synagogues and, as their name implies, they saw themselves on a higher level of religious observance. They believed that interpretations and rules handed down by tradition had virtually the same authority as Scripture (cf. Mark 7:8-13). As a result, they were constantly bothered by Jesus’ behaviour.
Jesus accepted the invitation and he joined Simon and others at the table. We should notice that Jesus accepted invitations from both Pharisees and tax collectors. Both were equally deserving of his love and service. The diners would be reclining on couches, rather than sitting, as was the fashion of the day. This helps to explain what is going to happen.
It is not clear whether what happened next was totally spontaneous or whether it was part of a conspiracy to put Jesus in a compromising position where he could be denounced (not unlike his being presented with an adulterous woman – John 8:1ff). In one sense it was strange that a woman such as this could burst into a Pharisee’s house unchallenged (there must have been servants); on the other hand, houses were not bolted and barred as they are in our more civilised(?) times.
What is clear is that the woman’s own intentions were sincere. We are told she was a sinner. "Sinner" here can only refer to some public immorality and very likely she was a "woman of the street", a prostitute or at least a woman known for her promiscuous behaviour.
She was eager to meet with Jesus and heard that he was dining at Simon’s house. So she burst in, bringing an alabaster box of ointment (probably quite expensive – the gift of an appreciative client?) and came up to Jesus from behind. She immediately began crying and her abundant tears bathed Jesus’ feet. She then began to dry his feet with her long hair. The fact that she wore her hair down or let it down in public itself indicates that she was a "loose" woman. She kissed the feet of Jesus and poured the ointment over them.
Simon, whether he had planned the intrusion or not, was deeply shocked at the extraordinary scene that was playing out before his eyes and in his house. If Jesus was really a prophet, he thought to himself, he would know what kind of a woman this was who was touching him. She was a sinner and no good person, least of all a rabbi, should allow anything remotely like that to take place.
Jesus, fully aware of what was going on in Simon’s mind, tells him a story about two debtors. One owed a large amount and other a smaller amount. However, the creditor wrote off both debts. Which of the two, Jesus asked, would be more grateful and appreciative? Obviously the one who had been remitted the larger debt, said Simon.
"Well said," replied Jesus and then went on to apply the parable to the present situation. In the process he indicates something that Simon had probably not thought of – that he, too, was a sinner, even though to a lesser degree. Because Simon had been guilty of not extending even the ordinary courtesies of hospitality to his guest.
Simon had not had Jesus’ feet washed when he came into the house but the woman had washed his feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. Simon had not given a kiss of greeting but the woman had not stopped kissing his feet since she came into the house. Simon had not put oil on his guest’s head but the woman had poured an expensive flask of ointment over his feet.
And therefore – now comes the point of the story: "Her many sins have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love." The one who has less forgiven loves less. And, turning to the woman at his feet, Jesus says, "Your sins are forgiven." And the guests at table begin to ask each other: "Who is this that he forgives sin?" Again Jesus says to the woman, "Your faith has made you whole again. Go in peace."
This is a really extraordinary story. To appreciate this one has to enter into it visually and be really present with all one’s senses active. What comes across is the amazing composure and inner security and freedom of Jesus during the whole episode. He shows absolutely no signs of being uncomfortable or embarrassed. He does not pull away or tell the woman to stop what she is doing.
Here is this woman, known to be a public sinner, who comes in and weeps over him, wipes his feet with her hair and keeps kissing them passionately. The guests are highly disturbed, shocked and probably embarrassed but Jesus remains perfectly at ease. The reason is that he knows what the woman is doing and is not worried about what others might think she is doing.
Let us admire his ability to focus totally on the woman and not be self-conscious about the other people around. Can one imagine what a tabloid publication might have made of this scene?! What if something like that were to happen today with a bishop or a priest? Or some other prominent person? How would most clergy – or other public people react in such a situation?
Jesus can see that the woman is expressing both sincere repentance and a great affection for Jesus. She is expressing her repentance in the only way that she knows. She is a highly tactile person; it is part of her way of life. To the sexually immature, what she is doing and Jesus’ acceptance of it seems at the very least unbecoming and at the worst bordering on the obscene.
But Jesus says her sins are now forgiven. It was really the passionate love she was showing which indicated that had won forgiveness. Love and sin are incompatible; they cannot co-exist in the same person. She was loving Jesus so much at that moment that she could not be a sinner. Simon could not see this. His concept of sin was purely legalistic. For Jesus it is relational.
At this point her immoral past was totally irrelevant. In our society wrongdoers can be stuck with labels often for the rest of their lives irrespective of how they have changed. God does not work that way. He deals with persons as they are here and now. What I did yesterday does not matter. All that matters is what I am doing now, how I am relating to God and those around me right now.
We remember the man who died beside Jesus on the cross. He had led a terrible life and was now being executed for his crimes. Yet he appeals to Jesus and is promised that he will go to God hand in hand with Jesus. Unfair? Fortunately God’s ideas of fairness are not ours. Otherwise we might be in trouble because of our past.
Once again we see how God, in Jesus, always tries to rehabilitate and not to punish. Punishment destroys. God’s desire is that we be all made whole and experience inner peace and harmony.
Friday of the Twenty-fourth Week of the Year
Reading 11 TM 6:2C-12
Beloved: Teach and urge these things. Whoever teaches something different and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the religious teaching is conceited, understanding nothing, and has a morbid disposition for arguments and verbal disputes. From these come envy, rivalry, insults, evil suspicions, and mutual friction among people with corrupted minds, who are deprived of the truth, supposing religion to be a means of gain. Indeed, religion with contentment is a great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, just as we shall not be able to take anything out of it.
If we have food and clothing, we shall be content with that. Those who want to be rich are falling into temptation and into a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires, which plunge them into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all evils, and some people in their desire for it have strayed from the faith and have pierced themselves with many pains.
But you, man of God, avoid all this. Instead, pursue righteousness, devotion, faith, love, patience, and gentleness. Compete well for the faith. Lay hold of eternal life, to which you were called when you made the noble confession in the presence of many witnesses.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 49:6-7, 8-10, 17-18, 19-20
R. Blessed the poor in spirit; the Kingdom of heaven is theirs!
Why should I fear in evil days
when my wicked ensnarers ring me round?
They trust in their wealth;
the abundance of their riches is their boast.
Yet in no way can a man redeem himself,
or pay his own ransom to God;
Too high is the price to redeem one's life; he would never have enough
to remain alive always and not see destruction.
Fear not when a man grows rich,
when the wealth of his house becomes great,
For when he dies, he shall take none of it;
his wealth shall not follow him down.
Though in his lifetime he counted himself blessed,
"They will praise you for doing well for yourself,"
He shall join the circle of his forebears
who shall never more see light.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 1-3
Jesus journeyed through towns and villages preaching and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God. The Twelve accompanied him, and also some women who had been cured of evil spirits and maladies: Mary called the Magdalene, from whom seven devils had gone out, Joanna, the wife of Herod's steward Chuza, Susanna, and many others who were assisting them out of their means.
Commentary on Luke 8:1-3
This passage follows immediately from yesterday’s about the sinful woman in the house of Simon the Pharisee. It is one of those summary passages describing in general terms the work of Jesus.
He is accompanied by the chosen Twelve, his co-operators in the preaching of the word and the establishing of the Kingdom. And it is precisely the Good News (the Gospel) about the Kingdom that they are preaching in word and demonstrating in practice.
What is noteworthy here – and it is unique to Luke – is the mention of many women also travelling in the company of Jesus. Some of them were women who had been healed of evil spirits. One is mentioned by name, Mary of Magdala, from whom seven evil spirits had been exorcised. The number seven is not to be taken literally but indicates the woman had formerly been in a seriously immoral state. She appears very prominently in John’s gospel as someone very close to Jesus and he describes her as the first witness of the Resurrection. It is possible, too, that the "sinful woman" in the house of Simon the Pharisee was also in the group.
Some of the other women seem to be of more ample means and higher social rank. One of them was Joanna, the wife of King Herod’s steward. They helped Jesus and his disciples with their material needs. Once again, Jesus is not embarrassed to travel in the company of these women; nor are they uncomfortable in his.
We see here two roles being played by followers of Jesus. On the one hand are the apostles whose function it is to proclaim the Gospel and establish the Kingdom by word and deed, by preaching and by the example of the communal and shared life they are leading.
The other role is that of disciples who are materially better off and who support the work of proclaiming the Gospel by providing for the material and other needs of the evangelisers.
Both roles are complementary and both, taken together, form the evangelising work of the Church.
A good example are the Sisters of Mother Teresa who would never be able to take care of the destitute dying without the generous help of many benefactors. And the same for many other voluntary groups involved in looking after the disadvantaged.
*Monday of the Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 1, 1-6
These are the people of the Lord who went to Jerusalem to build the temple of the Lord God.
In the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord inspired King Cyrus of Persia to issue this proclamation throughout his kingdom, both by word of mouth and in writing: "Thus says Cyrus, king of Persia: 'All the kingdoms of the earth the Lord, the God of heaven, has given to me, and he has also charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever, therefore, among you belongs to any part of his people, let him go up, and may his God be with him! Let everyone who has survived, in whatever place he may have dwelt, be assisted by the people of that place with silver, gold, goods, and cattle, together with free-will offerings for the house of God in Jerusalem.'" Then the family heads of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and Levites -- everyone, that is, whom God had inspired to do so -- prepared to go up to build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem. All their neighbors gave them help in every way, with silver, gold, goods, and cattle, and with many precious gifts besides all their free-will offerings.
Resp. Psalm Ps 126, 1-2. 2-3. 4-5. 6
R.(3) The Lord has done marvels for us.
When the Lord brought back the captives of Zion,
we were like men dreaming.
Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
and our tongue with rejoicing.
Then they said among the nations,
"The Lord has done great things for them."
The Lord has done great things for us;
we are glad indeed.
Restore our fortunes, O Lord,
like the torrents in the southern desert.
Those that sow in tears
shall reap rejoicing.
Although they go forth weeping,
carrying the seed to be sown,
They shall come back rejoicing,
carrying their sheaves.
Year II Reading I Prv 3, 27-34
Refuse no one the good on which he has a claim
when it is in your power to do it for him.
Say not to your neighbor, "Go, and come again,
tomorrow I will give," when you can give at once.
Plot no evil against your neighbor,
against him who lives at peace with you.
Quarrel not with a man without cause,
with one who has done you no harm.
Envy not the lawless man
and choose none of his ways:
To the Lord the perverse man is an abomination,
but with the upright is his friendship.
The curse of the Lord is on the house of the wicked,
but the dwelling of the just he blesses;
When he is dealing with the arrogant,
he is stern, but to the humble he shows kindness.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 15, 2-3. 3-4. 5
R.(1) He who does justice shall live on the Lord's holy mountain.
He who walks blamelessly and does justice;
who thinks the truth in his heart
and slanders not with his tongue;
Who harms not his fellow man,
nor takes up a reproach against his neighbor;
By whom the reprobate is despised,
while he honors those who fear the Lord;
Who lends not his money at usury
and accepts no bribe against the innocent.
He who does these things
shall never be disturbed.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 16-18
Jesus said to the crowd: No one who lights a lamp conceals it under a vessel, or sets it under a bed; rather he puts it on a lamp stand so that whoever comes in can see it. There is nothing hidden that will not be exposed, nothing concealed that will not be known and brought to light. Take heed, therefore, how you hear: to the man who has, more will be given; and he who has not, will lose even the little he thinks he has."
Commentary on Luke 8:16-18
The message today seems clear enough. The Gospel message is not meant to be kept hidden.
We are not a ‘mystery religion’ in the sense that the Gospel is only for initiates. It is a message that is to be proclaimed from the housetops. If what we believe and say is true it will prevail. We understand Jesus to be the Light of the world, and his followers are also to be like lamps shining out for all the world to see. An invisible Christian is a contradiction in terms, yet there are strong tendencies for us to keep our religion to ourselves and not foist it on others.
However, forcing others to believe is not the message given, even if it were possible. Inviting people to “come and see”, to hear the message and have a personal experience of living it is something else. We also believe that the Gospel message offers a way of life that brings great happiness into the lives of individuals and of whole societies if it is really followed. So, part of our communicating the message is as much through our lifestyle (“See…it works!”) as through what we say.
Jesus says today:
So pay attention to how you listen…
It is not just listening, but a hearing which understands, accepts, assimilates and puts into practice. What is heard and assimilated has to be passed on. Otherwise it dies, because:
…for to those who have, more will be given, and from those who do not have, even what they seem to have will be taken away.
To be a Christian is not to reach a certain level and stay there. It essentially means constant growth and development – to stay still or to stagnate is to go backwards.
*Monday of the Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 1, 1-6
These are the people of the Lord who went to Jerusalem to build the temple of the Lord God.
In the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord inspired King Cyrus of Persia to issue this proclamation throughout his kingdom, both by word of mouth and in writing: "Thus says Cyrus, king of Persia: 'All the kingdoms of the earth the Lord, the God of heaven, has given to me, and he has also charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever, therefore, among you belongs to any part of his people, let him go up, and may his God be with him! Let everyone who has survived, in whatever place he may have dwelt, be assisted by the people of that place with silver, gold, goods, and cattle, together with free-will offerings for the house of God in Jerusalem.'" Then the family heads of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and Levites -- everyone, that is, whom God had inspired to do so -- prepared to go up to build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem. All their neighbors gave them help in every way, with silver, gold, goods, and cattle, and with many precious gifts besides all their free-will offerings.
Resp. Psalm Ps 126, 1-2. 2-3. 4-5. 6
R.(3) The Lord has done marvels for us.
When the Lord brought back the captives of Zion,
we were like men dreaming.
Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
and our tongue with rejoicing.
Then they said among the nations,
"The Lord has done great things for them."
The Lord has done great things for us;
we are glad indeed.
Restore our fortunes, O Lord,
like the torrents in the southern desert.
Those that sow in tears
shall reap rejoicing.
Although they go forth weeping,
carrying the seed to be sown,
They shall come back rejoicing,
carrying their sheaves.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 16-18
Jesus said to the crowd: No one who lights a lamp conceals it under a vessel, or sets it under a bed; rather he puts it on a lamp stand so that whoever comes in can see it. There is nothing hidden that will not be exposed, nothing concealed that will not be known and brought to light. Take heed, therefore, how you hear: to the man who has, more will be given; and he who has not, will lose even the little he thinks he has."
Commentary on Luke 8:16-18
The message today seems clear enough. The Gospel message is not meant to be kept hidden.
We are not a ‘mystery religion’ in the sense that the Gospel is only for initiates. It is a message that is to be proclaimed from the housetops. If what we believe and say is true it will prevail. We understand Jesus to be the Light of the world, and his followers are also to be like lamps shining out for all the world to see. An invisible Christian is a contradiction in terms, yet there are strong tendencies for us to keep our religion to ourselves and not foist it on others.
However, forcing others to believe is not the message given, even if it were possible. Inviting people to “come and see”, to hear the message and have a personal experience of living it is something else. We also believe that the Gospel message offers a way of life that brings great happiness into the lives of individuals and of whole societies if it is really followed. So, part of our communicating the message is as much through our lifestyle (“See…it works!”) as through what we say.
Jesus says today:
So pay attention to how you listen…
It is not just listening, but a hearing which understands, accepts, assimilates and puts into practice. What is heard and assimilated has to be passed on. Otherwise it dies, because:
…for to those who have, more will be given, and from those who do not have, even what they seem to have will be taken away.
To be a Christian is not to reach a certain level and stay there. It essentially means constant growth and development – to stay still or to stagnate is to go backwards.
Tuesday of The Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 6, 7-8. 12. 14-20
King Darius issued an order to the officials of West-of-Euphrates: "Let the governor and the elders of the Jews continue the work on that house of God; they are to rebuild it on its former site. I also issue this decree concerning your dealing with these elders of the Jews in the rebuilding of that house of God: From the royal revenue, the taxes of West-of-Euphrates, let these men be repaid for their expenses, in full and without delay. I, Darius, have issued this decree; let it be carefully executed."
The elders of the Jews continued to make progress in the building, supported by the message of the prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, son of Iddo. They finished the building according to the command of the God of Israel and the decrees of Cyrus and Darius [and of Artaxerxes, king of Persia]. They completed this house on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius. The Israelites -- priests, Levites, and the other returned exiles -- celebrated the dedication of this house of God with joy. For the dedication of this house of God, they offered one hundred bulls, two hundred rams, and four hundred lambs, together with twelve he-goats as a sin-offering for all Israel, in keeping with the number of the tribes of Israel. Finally, they set up the priests in their classes and the Levites in their divisions for the service of God in Jerusalem, as is prescribed in the book of Moses.
The exiles kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month. The Levites, every one of whom had purified himself for the occasion, sacrificed the Passover for the rest of the exiles, for their brethren the priests, and for themselves.
Resp. Psalm Ps 122, 1-2. 3-4. 4-5
R.(1) I rejoiced when I heard them say:
let us go to the house of the Lord.
I rejoiced because they said to me,
"We will go up to the house of the Lord."
And now we have set foot
within your gates, O Jerusalem --
Jerusalem, built as a city
with compact unity.
To it the tribes go up,
the tribes of the Lord,
According to the decree for Israel,
to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
In it are set up judgment seats,
seats for the house of David.
II Reading I Prv 21, 1-6. 10-13
Like a stream is the king's heart in the hand of the Lord;
wherever it pleases him, he directs it.
All the ways of a man may be right in his own eyes,
but it is the Lord who proves hearts.
To do what is right and just
is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice.
Haughty eyes and a proud heart --
the tillage of the wicked is sin.
The plans of the diligent are sure of profit,
but all rash haste leads certainly to poverty.
He who makes a fortune by a lying tongue
is chasing a bubble over deadly snares.
The soul of the wicked man desires evil;
his neighbor finds no pity in his eyes.
When the arrogant man is punished, the simple are the wiser;
when the wise man is instructed, he gains knowledge.
The just man appraises the house of the wicked:
there is one who brings down the wicked to ruin.
He who shuts his ear to the cry of the poor
will himself also call and not be heard.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 119, 1. 27. 30. 34. 35. 44
R.(35) Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Happy are they whose way is blameless,
who walk in the law of the Lord.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Make me understand the way of your precepts,
and I will meditate on your wondrous deeds.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
The way of truth I have chosen; I have set your ordinances before me.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Give me discernment, that I may observe your law
and keep it with all my heart.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Lead me in the path of your commands, for in it I delight.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
And I will keep your law continually, forever and ever.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus came to be with him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd. He was informed, "Your mother and your brothers are standing outside and wish to see you." He told them in reply, "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and act upon it."
Commentary on Luke 8:19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus come looking for him but they cannot get to him because of the crush of people in the house where he is speaking. Jesus was in Capernaum at the time and Nazareth was about 50 km (30 miles) away. The mention of ‘brothers’ would commonly indicate cousins and not just siblings. When the message is passed in to Jesus, he says to all:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
The story is told in harsher terms in Mark. He has Jesus say, for instance:
Who are my mother and my brothers?” (Mark 3:33)
It is suggested there that their purpose was to take him away. On the one hand, they thought he was mad and an embarrassment to the family and, secondly, that he might get them into trouble with the authorities because of the provocative things he was saying and doing such as questioning traditional interpretations of the Law. We see a similar embarrassment on the part of the parents of the man born blind in John chapter 9. They refuse to speak to the authorities about their son:
Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself. (John 9:21)
Luke’s account is softer and just focuses on the saying of Jesus. In fact, Luke has taken this passage out of its context in Mark (3:31-35) and turns it into a conclusion to his short section on the parables. In doing so, he modifies Mark’s statement:
Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother. (Mark 3:35)
This is done to match the end of Luke’s parable of the sower:
…the ones who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart and bear fruit with endurance. (Luke 8:15)
Luke has Jesus say:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
To a society which regarded itself as God’s chosen people merely by birth and an external ritual like circumcision, Jesus asserts that belonging to God has little to do with blood or race, but only with the relationship one establishes with God.
There is a lot of meaning in the words of the message:
Your mother and your brothers are standing outside…
It was clear from their behaviour that they were not, like the seed falling on fertile soil, ‘hearing’ him and so they were outsiders. Those who really ‘hear’, no matter who they are or where they come from, are ‘insiders’ and belong to the family of Jesus.
Of course, we know from elsewhere, especially in Luke’s gospel, that Mary is not being condemned here. In fact, this is where her greatness really lies. Clearly it partly lies in her being chosen to be the mother of God’s Son. But perhaps it lies even more in her saying ‘Yes’ (“…let it be with me according to your word”), in her unswerving faithfulness to that ‘Yes’ and in her standing by her Son to the very end when all the rest had fled.
When, on another occasion, she was indirectly praised for being the mother of such a Son, Jesus had spoken in words very similar to today:
Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it! (Luke 11:28)
Our discipleship, too, is not determined by our being born into a Catholic family or just by being baptised or by observing the external requirements of our religion, but by our total commitment to the Gospel and to an unconditional following of Jesus. Only then can we truly be said to be his brother or sister.
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 6, 7-8. 12. 14-20
King Darius issued an order to the officials of West-of-Euphrates: "Let the governor and the elders of the Jews continue the work on that house of God; they are to rebuild it on its former site. I also issue this decree concerning your dealing with these elders of the Jews in the rebuilding of that house of God: From the royal revenue, the taxes of West-of-Euphrates, let these men be repaid for their expenses, in full and without delay. I, Darius, have issued this decree; let it be carefully executed."
The elders of the Jews continued to make progress in the building, supported by the message of the prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, son of Iddo. They finished the building according to the command of the God of Israel and the decrees of Cyrus and Darius [and of Artaxerxes, king of Persia]. They completed this house on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius. The Israelites -- priests, Levites, and the other returned exiles -- celebrated the dedication of this house of God with joy. For the dedication of this house of God, they offered one hundred bulls, two hundred rams, and four hundred lambs, together with twelve he-goats as a sin-offering for all Israel, in keeping with the number of the tribes of Israel. Finally, they set up the priests in their classes and the Levites in their divisions for the service of God in Jerusalem, as is prescribed in the book of Moses.
The exiles kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month. The Levites, every one of whom had purified himself for the occasion, sacrificed the Passover for the rest of the exiles, for their brethren the priests, and for themselves.
Resp. Psalm Ps 122, 1-2. 3-4. 4-5
R.(1) I rejoiced when I heard them say: let us go to the house of the Lord.
I rejoiced because they said to me,
"We will go up to the house of the Lord."
And now we have set foot
within your gates, O Jerusalem --
Jerusalem, built as a city
with compact unity.
To it the tribes go up,
the tribes of the Lord,
According to the decree for Israel,
to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
In it are set up judgment seats,
seats for the house of David.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus came to be with him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd. He was informed, "Your mother and your brothers are standing outside and wish to see you." He told them in reply, "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and act upon it."
Commentary on Luke 8:19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus come looking for him but they cannot get to him because of the crush of people in the house where he is speaking. Jesus was in Capernaum at the time and Nazareth was about 50 km (30 miles) away. The mention of ‘brothers’ would commonly indicate cousins and not just siblings. When the message is passed in to Jesus, he says to all:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
The story is told in harsher terms in Mark. He has Jesus say, for instance:
Who are my mother and my brothers?” (Mark 3:33)
It is suggested there that their purpose was to take him away. On the one hand, they thought he was mad and an embarrassment to the family and, secondly, that he might get them into trouble with the authorities because of the provocative things he was saying and doing such as questioning traditional interpretations of the Law. We see a similar embarrassment on the part of the parents of the man born blind in John chapter 9. They refuse to speak to the authorities about their son:
Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself. (John 9:21)
Luke’s account is softer and just focuses on the saying of Jesus. In fact, Luke has taken this passage out of its context in Mark (3:31-35) and turns it into a conclusion to his short section on the parables. In doing so, he modifies Mark’s statement:
Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother. (Mark 3:35)
This is done to match the end of Luke’s parable of the sower:
…the ones who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart and bear fruit with endurance. (Luke 8:15)
Luke has Jesus say:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
To a society which regarded itself as God’s chosen people merely by birth and an external ritual like circumcision, Jesus asserts that belonging to God has little to do with blood or race, but only with the relationship one establishes with God.
There is a lot of meaning in the words of the message:
Your mother and your brothers are standing outside…
It was clear from their behaviour that they were not, like the seed falling on fertile soil, ‘hearing’ him and so they were outsiders. Those who really ‘hear’, no matter who they are or where they come from, are ‘insiders’ and belong to the family of Jesus.
Of course, we know from elsewhere, especially in Luke’s gospel, that Mary is not being condemned here. In fact, this is where her greatness really lies. Clearly it partly lies in her being chosen to be the mother of God’s Son. But perhaps it lies even more in her saying ‘Yes’ (“…let it be with me according to your word”), in her unswerving faithfulness to that ‘Yes’ and in her standing by her Son to the very end when all the rest had fled.
When, on another occasion, she was indirectly praised for being the mother of such a Son, Jesus had spoken in words very similar to today:
Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it! (Luke 11:28)
Our discipleship, too, is not determined by our being born into a Catholic family or just by being baptised or by observing the external requirements of our religion, but by our total commitment to the Gospel and to an unconditional following of Jesus. Only then can we truly be said to be his brother or sister.
Wednesday of The Twenty-fifth week
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 9, 5-9
At the time of the evening sacrifice, I Ezra rose in my wretchedness, and with cloak and mantle torn I fell on my knees, stretching out my hands to the Lord my God.
I said: "My God, I am too ashamed and confounded to raise my face to you, O my God, for our wicked deeds are heaped up above our heads and our guilt reaches up to heaven. From the time of our fathers even to this day great has been our guilt, and for our wicked deeds we have been delivered over, we and our kings and our priests, to the will of the kings of foreign lands, to the sword, to captivity, to pillage, and to disgrace, as is the case today.
"And now, but a short time ago, mercy came to us from the Lord our God, who left us a remnant and gave us a stake in his holy place; thus our God has brightened our eyes and given us relief in our servitude. For slaves we are, but in our servitude our God has not abandoned us; rather, he has turned the good will of the kings of Persia toward us. Thus he has given us new life to raise again the house of our God and restore its ruins, and has granted us a fence in Judah and Jerusalem."
Resp. Psalm Tb 13, 2. 3-4. 6. 7-8. 6
R.(1) Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
He scourges and then has mercy;
he casts down to the depths of the nether world,
and he brings up from the great abyss.
No one can escape his hand.
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
For though he has scattered you among the Gentiles,
he has shown you his greatness even there.
Exalt him before every living being,
because he is the Lord our God,
our Father and God foreveR.
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
So now consider what he has done for you,
and praise him with full voice.
Bless the Lord of righteousness,
and exalt the King of ages.
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
As for me, I exalt my God,
and my spirit rejoices in the King of heaven.
Let all men speak of his majesty,
and sing his praises in Jerusalem.
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
"Turn back, you sinners! do the right before him:
perhaps he may look with favor upon you
and show you mercy."
R. Blessed be God, who lives for eveR.
Year II Reading I Prv 30, 5-9
Every word of God is tested;
he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.
Add nothing to his words,
lest he reprove you, and you be exposed as a deceiver.
Two things I ask of you,
deny them not to me before I die:
Put falsehood and lying far from me,
give me neither poverty nor riches;
[provide me only with the food I need;]
Lest, being full, I deny you,
saying, "Who is the Lord?"
Or, being in want, I steal,
and profane the name of my God.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 119, 29. 72. 89. 101. 104. 163
R.(105) Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Remove from me the way of falsehood,
and favor me with your law.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
The law of your mouth is to me more precious
than thousands of gold and silver pieces.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Your word, O Lord, endures forever;
it is firm as the heavens.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
From every evil way I withhold my feet,
that I may keep your words.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Through your precepts I gain discernment;
therefore I hate every false way.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Falsehood I hate and abhor;
your law I love.
R. Your word, O Lord, is a lamp for my feet.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 1-6
Jesus called the Twelve together and gave them power and authority to overcome all demons and to cure diseases. He sent them forth to proclaim the reign of God and heal the afflicted. Jesus advised them: "Take nothing for the journey, neither walking staff nor traveling bag; no bread, no money. No one is to have two coats. Stay at whatever house you enter and proceed from there. When people will not receive you, leave that town and shake its dust from your feet as a testimony against them." So they set out and went from village to village, spreading the good news everywhere and curing diseases.
Commentary on Luke 9:1-6
As we move on to chapter 9, we have left out a number of stories in chapter 8 – the calming of a storm on the lake, the healing of a demoniac, the raising of Jairus’ daughter and the healing of a woman with a haemorrhage. However, they are dealt with elsewhere in our readings from the other Gospels. We are now moving into a turning point in the public life of Jesus and in his relationship with his disciples.
This is, in fact, the third tour of Galilee by Jesus. On the first tour he was accompanied just by the four fishermen he had called first – Peter, Andrew, James and John. On the second, all the Twelve were with him and on the third, he was alone after sending out the Twelve on their own mission.
We begin the reading today with Jesus sending his chosen Twelve on their mission. It is the first time he has sent them out on their own without his being with them. Basically, they are to do exactly as their Master does. They are given power over evil forces and to heal sicknesses. They are also to proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom.
They are to travel in total freedom and so are not to bring anything with them which would make traveling more difficult:
Take nothing for your journey: no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money—not even an extra tunic.
It is understood that the people will support them in return for the services they render. It is expected that hospitality will be extended to them in the traditional way of the Middle East.
And they are not to be choosy about where they are received:
Whatever house you enter, stay there, and leave from there.
And, in places where they and their message and their services are not welcome:
…as you are leaving that town shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.
This was a symbolic act which the Pharisees practised when they left an “unclean” Gentile area. In this case, the act signifies that people are not just rejecting the disciples but God himself, Whom they bring with their message and their healing.
So they departed and went through the villages, bringing the good news and curing diseases everywhere.
It really was the beginning of the Church. And it was the work of making the Kingdom a reality, God’s will being done on earth.
The same mission is entrusted to each one of us although it will obviously be adapted to our life situation. We are called, individually and in community, to proclaim the Gospel by word and lifestyle. We are called to help liberate people from the negative forces, addictions of all kinds that can enslave. We are called to be sources of healing and wholeness, and for this we do not need to be part of the medical profession. We are called to live lives of simplicity, using only those things which we need for life and work and rejecting all superfluity and luxury. As we have already noted: the really rich are those whose needs are the least. It is a message our consumer world needs to hear and see.
Thursday of the Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Hg 1, 1-8
The beginning of the book of the prophet Haggai
Build the temple and you will be acceptable to me.
In the second year of King Darius, the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai to the governor of Judah, Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, and to the high priest Joshua, son of Jehozadak:
Thus says the Lord of hosts: This people says: "Not now has the time come to rebuild the house of the Lord." (Then this word of the Lord came through Haggai, the prophet:) Is it time for you to dwell in your own paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?
Now thus says the Lord of hosts:
Consider your ways!
You have sown much, but have brought in little;
you have eaten, but have not been satisfied;
You have drunk, but have not been exhilarated;
have clothed yourselves, but not been warmed;
And he who earned wages
earned them for a bag with holes in it.
Thus says the Lord of hosts:
Consider your ways!
Go up into the hill country;
bring timber, and build the house
That I may take pleasure in it
and receive my glory, says the Lord.
Resp. Psalm Ps 149, 1-2. 3-4. 5-6. 9
R.(4) The Lord takes delight in his people.
Sing to the Lord a new song
of praise in the assembly of the faithful.
Let Israel be glad in their maker,
let the children of Zion rejoice in their king.
R. The Lord takes delight in his people.
Let them praise his name in the festive dance,
let them sing praise to him with timbrel and harp.
For the Lord loves his people,
and he adorns the lowly with victory.
R. The Lord takes delight in his people.
Let the faithful exult in glory;
let them sing for joy upon their couches;
let the high praises of God be in their throats.
This is the glory of all his faithful. Alleluia.
R. The Lord takes delight in his people.
Year II Reading I Eccl 1, 2-11
Vanity of vanities, says Qoheleth,
vanity of vanities! All things are vanity!
What profit has man from all the labor
which he toils at under the sun?
One generation passes and another comes,
but the world forever stays.
The sun rises and the sun goes down;
then it presses on to the place where it rises.
Blowing now toward the south, then toward the north,
the wind turns again and again, resuming its rounds.
All rivers go to the sea,
yet never does the sea become full.
To the place where they go,
the rivers keep on going.
All speech is labored;
there is nothing man can say.
The eye is not satisfied with seeing
nor is the ear filled with hearing.
What has been, that will be; what has been done, that will be done. Nothing is new under the sun. Even the thing of which we say, "See, this is new!" has already existed in the ages that preceded us. There is no remembrance of the men of old; nor of those to come will there be any remembrance among those who come after them.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 90, 3-4. 5-6. 12-13. 14. 17
R.(1) In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
You turn man back to dust,
saying, "Return, O children of men."
For a thousand years in your sight
are as yesterday, now that it is past,
or as a watch of the night.
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
You make an end of them in their sleep;
the next morning they are like the changing grass,
Which at dawn springs up anew,
but by evening wilts and fades.
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
Teach us to number our days aright,
that we may gain wisdom of heart.
Return, O Lord! How long?
Have pity on your servants!
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
Fill us at daybreak with your kindness,
that we may shout for joy and gladness all our days.
And may the gracious care of the Lord our God be ours;
prosper the work of our hands for us!
[Prosper the work of our hands!]
R. In every age, O Lord, you have been our refuge.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 7-9
Herod the tetrarch heard of all that Jesus was doing and he was perplexed, for some were saying, "John has been raised from the dead"; others, "Elijah has appeared"; and still others, "One of the prophets of old has risen." But Herod said, "John I beheaded. Who is this man about whom I hear all these reports?" He was very curious to see him.
Commentary on Luke 9:7-9
Today we have a short interlude which is leading to some very special revelations. Herod the Tetrarch (his father Herod the Great’s kingdom had been divided among four sons) is hearing stories about what Jesus is doing. ‘Tetrarch’ means the ruler of the fourth part of a kingdom. This one, Herod Antipas, was one of several sons; the kingdom was divided among four of them. Herod Antipas ruled over Galilee and Perea from 4 BC to 39 AD. Although not strictly speaking a ‘king’ he is called that in Matthew and Mark following popular usage.
Herod is puzzled because he is being told that Jesus is John the Baptist risen from the dead. At the same time others are saying that Elijah, whose expected return would signal the arrival of the Messiah, or some of the former biblical prophets has reappeared. Herod has recently beheaded John the Baptist and the superstitious king is filled with a mixture of fear and curiosity. He kept trying to “see” Jesus.
Luke does not actually record the death of John and, in this short passage, he prepares the reader for the later meeting of Herod with Jesus (Luke 23:8-12). So Herod’s wish will be partially fulfilled at a later date, though under very unexpected circumstances and in a way that Herod will find very unsatisfactory. He is hoping that Jesus, like some circus dog, will do some ‘tricks’ or ‘miracles’ for him.
Herod’s desire was almost entirely one of curiosity. It was the desire of the hedonist and the seeker of novelty. To “see” Jesus, in the full Gospel sense, is something totally other. It can only happen to those who have the eyes of faith, and who can see in the person of Jesus the presence and power of God. We may recall the request of some “Greeks” who told Philip they wanted to see Jesus and the reply that Jesus gave about the grain of wheat falling into the ground and dying (John 12:20-26). We have not seen Jesus if we do not know him in his suffering and dying as his way to new life.
Let us ask to see Jesus today, a seeing that leads to a total acceptance of his way of life and following him all the way, through the cross and beyond to a life that never ends.
September 29 Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, archangels
Reading 1 Dn 7:9-10, 13-14
As I watched: Thrones were set up and the Ancient One took his throne. His clothing was bright as snow, and the hair on his head as white as wool; His throne was flames of fire, with wheels of burning fire. A surging stream of fire flowed out from where he sat; Thousands upon thousands were ministering to him, and myriads upon myriads attended him. The court was convened, and the books were opened. As the visions during the night continued, I saw One like a son of man coming, on the clouds of heaven; When he reached the Ancient One and was presented before him, He received dominion, glory, and kingship; nations and peoples of every language serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not be taken away, his kingship shall not be destroyed.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 138:1-2ab, 2cde-3, 4-5
R. (1) In the sight of the angels I will sing your praises, Lord.
I will give thanks to you, O LORD, with all my heart,
for you have heard the words of my mouth;
in the presence of the angels I will sing your praise;
I will worship at your holy temple
and give thanks to your name.
Because of your kindness and your truth;
for you have made great above all things
your name and your promise.
When I called, you answered me;
you built up strength within me.
All the kings of the earth shall give thanks to you, O LORD
when they hear the words of your mouth;
And they shall sing of the ways of the LORD
"Great is the glory of the LORD
Gospel Jn 1:47-51
Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, "Here is a true child of Israel. 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 heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."
Commentary
The Gospel reading from John is the scene in the beginning of the gospel where Jesus meets Nathanael, who has been introduced to him by Philip. Nathanael who had somewhat sneeringly asked if anything good could come from Nazareth must have been somewhat surprised to hear Jesus say to him:
Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!
Of how many people can that be said (including ourselves)?
Puzzled, Nathanael asks Jesus:
Where did you get to know me?
Rather enigmatically Jesus tells him:
I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you.
The fig tree was often seen as a symbol of messianic peace. They were words, then, of commendation. Nathanael, deeply impressed, tells Jesus:
Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!
This declaration is on a par with Peter’s confession of Jesus’ identity,and concludes the list of Jesus’ titles which are given in this first chapter of John.
And yet Jesus says he will see much more:
Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these…Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.
The allusion is clearly to the dream of Jacob who saw God’s angels-messengers going up and down on a ladder linking Heaven with Earth, God with his People. Jesus, as the Incarnate Son of God is the bridge which links God with his People. He is like a ladder by which God comes to his People and his People go to God.
In a sense Jesus is the Archangel of archangels, the Ultimate Messenger of God’s Truth and Love. Through Him God comes to us, and through Him we go to God.
There is a choice of two First Readings. The first is from the Book of Daniel and speaks of a vision that the prophet has of God on his Throne, which is described in graphic and apocalyptic language. Among other things we are told that:
A thousand thousands served him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood attending him.
These are the angels who serve at God’s throne.
The second part of this reading is taken from the New Testament to refer to the Christ, the Messiah, the Saviour King of Israel. He is said to be:
…one like a human being coming with the clouds of heaven.
Some translations have it as “one like the son of man”.
His dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not pass away, and his kingship is one that shall never be destroyed.
This is an image that the Gospel will use to describe the return of the Risen Jesus at the end of time as he calls his people to himself (see Matt 25).
The alternative First Reading is from the Book of Revelation and speaks of Michael defeating Satan and the powers of evil, which was mentioned above. With the defeat of Satan:
…come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Messiah…
These angels are symbols of God’s ever-loving relationship with us. It is a two-way communication. We listen to what God tells us and try to make it part of our lives. At the same time, we reach out to him in faith and trust and in a complete surrender of our being.
Friday of the Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Hg 1, 15--2, 9
In the second year of King Darius, on the twenty-first day of the seventh month, the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai: Tell this to the governor of Judah, Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, and to the high priest Joshua, son of Jehozadak, and to the remnant of the people:
Who is left among you
that saw this house in its former glory?
And how do you see it now?
Does it not seem like nothing in your eyes?
But now take courage, Zerubbabel, says the Lord,
and take courage, Joshua, high priest, son of Jehozadak,
And take courage, all you people of the land,
says the Lord, and work!
For I am with you, says the Lord of hosts.
This is the pact that I made with you
when you came out of Egypt,
And my spirit continues in your midst;
do not fear!
For thus says the Lord of hosts:
One moment yet, a little while,
and I will shake the heavens and the earth,
the sea and the dry land.
I will shake all the nations,
and the treasures of all the nations will come in,
And I will fill this house with glory,
says the Lord of hosts.
Mine is the silver and mine the gold
says the Lord of hosts.
Greater will be the future glory of this house
than the former, says the Lord of hosts;
And in this place I will give peace,
says the Lord of hosts!
Resp. Psalm Ps 43, 1. 2. 3. 4
R.(5) Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
Do me justice, O God, and fight my fight
against a faithless people;
from the deceitful and impious man rescue me.
R. Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
For you, O God, are my strength.
Why do you keep me so far away?
Why must I go about in mourning,
with the enemy oppressing me?
R. Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
Send forth your light and your fidelity;
they shall lead me on
And bring me to your holy mountain,
to your dwelling-place.
R. Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
Then will I go in to the altar of God,
the God of my gladness and joy;
Then will I give you thanks upon the harp,
O God, my God!
R. Hope in God; I will praise him, my savior and my God.
Year II Reading I Eccl 3, 1-11
There is an appointed time for everything,
and a time for every affair under the heavens.
A time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to uproot the plant.
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to tear down, and a time to build.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance.
A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather them;
a time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces.
A time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away.
A time to rend, and a time to sew;
a time to be silent, and a time to speak.
A time to love, and a time to hate;
a time of war, and a time of peace.
What advantage has the worker from his toil? I have considered the task which God has appointed for men to be busied about. He has made everything appropriate to its time, and has put the timeless into their hearts, without men's ever discovering, from beginning to end, the work which God has done.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 144, 1-2. 3-4
R.(1) Blessed be the Lord, my Rock!
Blessed be the Lord, my rock,
my refuge and my fortress,
My stronghold, my deliverer,
my shield, in whom I trust.
R. Blessed be the Lord, my Rock!
Lord, what is man, that you notice him;
the son of man, that you take thought of him?
Man is like a breath;
his days, like a passing shadow.
R. Blessed be the Lord, my Rock!
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 18-22
One day when Jesus was praying in seclusion and his disciples were with him, he put the question to them, "Who do the crowds say that I am?" "John the Baptizer," they replied, "and some say Elijah, while others claim that one of the prophets of old has returned from the dead." "But you -- who do you say that I am?" he asked them. Peter said in reply, "The Messiah of God." He strictly forbade them to tell this to anyone. "The Son of Man," he said, "must first endure many sufferings, be rejected by the elders, the high priests and the scribes, and be put to death, and then be raised up on the third day."
*Monday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1ZEC 8:1-8
This word of the LORD of hosts came:
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
I am intensely jealous for Zion,
stirred to jealous wrath for her.
Thus says the LORD:
I will return to Zion,
and I will dwell within Jerusalem;
Jerusalem shall be called the faithful city,
and the mountain of the LORD of hosts,
the holy mountain.
Thus says the LORD of hosts: Old men and old women,
each with staff in hand because of old age,
shall again sit in the streets of Jerusalem.
The city shall be filled with boys and girls playing in its streets.
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
Even if this should seem impossible
in the eyes of the remnant of this people,
shall it in those days be impossible in my eyes also,
says the LORD of hosts?
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
Lo, I will rescue my people from the land of the rising sun,
and from the land of the setting sun.
I will bring them back to dwell within Jerusalem.
They shall be my people, and I will be their God,
with faithfulness and justice.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 46-50 A discussion arose among the disciples as to which of them was the greatest. Jesus, who knew their thoughts, took a little child and placed it beside him, after which he said to them, "Whoever welcomes this little child on my account welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes him who sent me; for the least one among you is the greatest." It was John who said, "Master, we saw a man using your name to expel demons, and we tried to stop him because he is not of our company." Jesus told him in reply, "Do not stop him, for any man who is not against you is on your side."
Commentary on Luke 9:46-50
Following on Jesus once again telling his disciples that he was going to be "handed over" to suffering and death, we were told in our previous reading that they did not understand what he meant. It did not make sense to them.
Now, almost as an indication of how far they were from Jesus’ thinking, they began arguing among themselves which one among them should be seen as the greatest. Why should they be arguing about this? Was it because, whatever difficulties they had in accepting what Jesus had said about his future, they were wondering what was going to happen after Jesus had been taken away from them? If they were to remain together as a group, which of them would be in charge?
Perhaps Peter was already beginning to think that he should be the one. Perhaps some of the others felt it should be one of them.
But Jesus, who, of course, was not present during these sensitive discussions, was well aware of what was going on. He took a child and put it in their midst. "Whoever receives a child like this in my name, receives me. And whoever receives me, receives him who sent me. For the one that is least among you all is the greatest."
It is interesting that the greatness is to be seen in the child rather than in the one who receives it. The child represents all who are vulnerable and weak and powerless. To "receive" such persons is to treat them with the utmost dignity and respect and to accept them and lift them up.
In Jesus’ eyes, such little people are truly great because, to those who have eyes to see, they are the ones in whom we can especially meet Jesus and love and serve him. St Francis of Assisi, who kissed the leper (a particularly daring thing to do in his time), or Mother Teresa, tenderly picking up a decaying, barely living body off the street knew this well. To find Jesus in such a person is to make direct contact with God himself.
Jesus himself will reach the peak of his own greatness when he hangs dying and helpless on the cross. This is the lesson the disciples will learn to see and accept in time. We have to keep working on it too because it does not come easily to any of us.
The second part of today’s gospel points to another area where the disciples have to change their outlook. John, the brother of James, who both come across in the Synoptics as somewhat hotheaded (they had the nickname "sons of thunder"), tells Jesus they saw someone driving out devils in Jesus’ name. They had told the man to stop because he was "not one of us". (Was there an element of jealousy also? In Mark 9:14ff, we are told that the disciples failed to drive out an evil spirit from a boy.)
Here we have something of the arrogance of the insider, of the elitist. John and his companions felt that the exorcism of evil spirits in the name of Jesus was something only they were allowed to do. Jesus did not agree. "Leave him alone," he told them. And he enunciates a principle for them to follow: "Whoever is not against us is for us."
It is a constant temptation among more devout religious people to set themselves apart from "the others". It can happen to bishops or priests or religious. It can happen in a parish to members of the parish council or some parish group – a prayer group, charismatics, the liturgy committee or whatever.
We can find ourselves developing a two-tier community of "us" and "them". We can find ourselves looking down on those who come in late for Mass and hang around the back door or who only come occasionally or maybe even only turn up at Christmas.
Even more, we can be tempted to set ourselves apart from non-Catholic and non-Christian groups. We can fail to see God working in all kinds of people, religious and non-religious, atheists, agnostics and people who apparently do not believe in anything.
Of course, as Christians, we do have a distinctive understanding of life and its meaning coming from the teaching and life of Jesus and it should not be compromised. But, at the same time, we do not have a monopoly of the truth. No one has. The full Truth is beyond all of us. We are all searching. Still less do we have a monopoly on good works. God can and does use any person to build the Kingdom. And it is our responsibility to work hand in hand with such people. Ultimately, our aim is not to promote our Church but God’s work and God’s plan for the whole world.
Tuesday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1ZEC 8:20-23
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
There shall yet come peoples,
the inhabitants of many cities;
and the inhabitants of one city shall approach those of another,
and say, "Come! let us go to implore the favor of the LORD";
and, "I too will go to seek the LORD."
Many peoples and strong nations shall come
to seek the LORD of hosts in Jerusalem
and to implore the favor of the LORD.
Thus says the LORD of hosts:
In those days ten men of every nationality,
speaking different tongues, shall take hold,
yes, take hold of every Jew by the edge of his garment and say,
"Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you."
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 51-56 As the time approached when Jesus was to be taken from this world, he firmly resolved to proceed toward Jerusalem, and sent messengers on ahead of him. These entered a Samaritan town to prepare for his passing through, but the Samaritans would not welcome him because he was on his way to Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw this, they said, "Lord, would you not have us call down fire from heaven to destroy them?" He turned toward them only to reprimand them. Then they set off for another town
Commentary on Luke 9:51-56
We come today to a distinct turning point in Luke’s gospel. It is marked by the opening words of today’s passage: "When the days for his being taken up were fulfilled, he resolutely determined to journey to Jerusalem." The ‘taking up’ or the ‘assumption’ of Jesus refers to his passion and death leading to resurrection and ascension. It corresponds to the ‘glory’ that John speaks of and for whom the crucifixion is a ‘lifting up’ into ‘glory’.
At this point we have now come to the end of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee and we move on to a new section – the journey to Jerusalem which ends at chap. 18:27 where we find Jesus in Jerusalem. The opening corresponds to Mark 10:1 where Jesus is seen entering Judea to preach there and which John more specifically describes as a journey to Jerusalem during the time of the Feast of Tabernacles (John 7:1-10)
But Luke diverges from Mark’s story with very different material. He now follows Matthew’s source as well as using material of his own. The section consists almost entirely of teachings of Jesus to his disciples. It is all loosely organised within the framework of Jesus making his way to Jerusalem. The section we are entering is a time of preparation for the disciples for their future role as Messengers of the Kingdom.
Jerusalem is the place where it is all going to happen – the ‘exodus’ of Jesus, including his suffering, death, resurrection, and ascension leading to the passing on of his mission to his disciples with the coming down of the Spirit of the Father and Jesus on the disciples. And it will be from Jerusalem that the new Church will be established and from Jerusalem it will spread gradually throughout the whole Mediterranean area until it reaches the empire’s capital in Rome and from there to the ends of the earth.
As he set out, Jesus sent some messengers ahead to announce his coming. In order to go directly from Galilee to Judea, where the city of Jerusalem was situated, they would have had to pass through Samaria. Samaritans were particularly hostile to Jews, especially when they were on their way to a Jewish festival in Jerusalem (as Jesus and his disciples seemed to be doing). It would take at least three days to cross Samaria and the Samaritans were refusing the disciples overnight shelter. Because of this situation, Jewish pilgrims and travellers often avoided confrontation by going down the east bank of the Jordan River. There is an irony here that, when the first Christians were persecuted in Jerusalem, they took refuge in Samaria which became one of the first places to accept the Gospel. (Very likely, the evangelist is aware of the irony when telling this story.)
Faced with this hostility, the brothers James and John, whom we described yesterday as hotheads, suggested that fire from heaven be called down to burn them up. Their threat is reminiscent of the fire that Elijah brought down on the emissaries of an idolatrous king. They were indignant that their Master, the Messiah, should be treated in this way. There is a parallel here between Jesus’ negative reception in his home town of Galilee with his rejection by the people of Samaria.
But Jesus distances himself from those disciples and gives them a scolding. This was not Jesus’ way. Instead, they went off to another village where they hoped to find a better welcome. As we see in other parts of the Gospel, Jesus does not normally go out of his way to court trouble. On the other hand, he will not hesitate to speak his mind or do what he believes is right, even if certain kinds of people take offence at it.
It is never Jesus’ way to destroy his enemies. We will see that clearly after he reaches Jerusalem where far worse things are done to him. Jesus’ purpose always is to change people who are against him, to defuse their hostility and help them to see things in a better way. It is something we could try to do more often. It is not at all the "softy’s" approach. On the contrary, it requires great inner strength and security.
Wednesday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1NEH 2:1-8
In the month Nisan of the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes,
when the wine was in my charge,
I took some and offered it to the king.
As I had never before been sad in his presence,
the king asked me, “Why do you look sad?
If you are not sick, you must be sad at heart.”
Though I was seized with great fear, I answered the king:
“May the king live forever!
How could I not look sad
when the city where my ancestors are buried lies in ruins,
and its gates have been eaten out by fire?”
The king asked me, “What is it, then, that you wish?”
I prayed to the God of heaven and then answered the king:
“If it please the king,
and if your servant is deserving of your favor,
send me to Judah, to the city of my ancestors’ graves,
to rebuild it.”
Then the king, and the queen seated beside him,
asked me how long my journey would take
and when I would return.
I set a date that was acceptable to him,
and the king agreed that I might go.
I asked the king further: “If it please the king,
let letters be given to me for the governors
of West-of-Euphrates,
that they may afford me safe-conduct until I arrive in Judah;
also a letter for Asaph, the keeper of the royal park,
that he may give me wood for timbering the gates
of the temple-citadel and for the city wall
and the house that I shall occupy.”
The king granted my requests,
for the favoring hand of my God was upon me.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 9, 57-62 As Jesus and his disciples were making their way along, someone said to Jesus, "I will be your follower wherever you go." Jesus said to him, "The foxes have lairs, the birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head." To another he said, "Come after me." The man replied, "Let me bury my father first." Jesus said to him, "Let the dead bury their dead; come away and proclaim the kingdom of God." Yet another said to him, "I will be your follower, Lord, but first let me take leave of my people at home." Jesus answered him, "Whoever puts his hand to the plow but keeps looking back is unfit for the reign of God."
Commentary on Luke 9:57-62
Today’s passage has to be seen in the light of yesterday’s. Jesus has reached an important stage in his public life and mission. He is now irrevocably on his way to Jerusalem and all that that means for him – and us.
But he does not want to go alone. His whole purpose is to have people go with him. Already there are his disciples but there will be more. Today we see three "candidates" coming forward with a lot of good will but Jesus makes them aware of what following him really means. Their responses to Jesus’ remarks are not given so we do not know whether they became followers or not. The point Luke is making is to show what following entails.
a. The first says very generously that he will go wherever Jesus is going. Jesus answers: "Foxes have their lairs and the birds of the air their nests but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head."
These words of Jesus indicate not poverty or indigence but freedom. To follow Jesus fully one needs to be free, not to be tied down by anything and not to be anxious about having or not having things.
There is no evidence that Jesus was poor in the sense of being deprived of the necessities of life. He did not own a house but it is never even hinted that he had to sleep out in the open air. He belonged to a group of people who more than willingly shared what they had with him.
b. The second man was actually invited by Jesus to be a follower. But he asked first to be allowed to go and bury his father. This does not mean that his father had just died and he wanted to attend the funeral. It is more likely that he wanted, as a dutiful son, to wait for his father’s death before going off with Jesus.
But that is not good enough. The call of Jesus transcends needs of family, tradition and culture. The needs of the living outweigh those of the dead. His father might not die for years; what was the man supposed to do in the meantime?
Once we are aware of Jesus’ call the only time to answer is now. In spite of that, we should not read these lines too rigidly. Clearly, for example, there would be times when one would want to be present at the death of a parent, especially to provide support for the grieving spouse. That would be in total harmony with respect for parents and love for the neighbour. But the man in the example is in a totally different situation. He is talking about an event in the future whose time and place are not known.
c. Another would-be follower asked first for permission to go home and say goodbye to his family. It was similar to a request made by Elisha when he was called to succeed Elijah as prophet. Elijah’s answer was, "Go ahead." So what we have here
seems a very reasonable request but it is rejected by Jesus who says, "No man, having put his hand to the plough, looking back is fit for the kingdom of God."
Like Jesus himself turning his face towards Jerusalem and all that it means for him, once the decision has been made to serve God and his people, there can be no turning back. Again, the words of Jesus should not be taken literally.
Read in that way, they would be totally at variance with the loving and compassionate quality of Jesus’ character. The point that is being made in all three examples is the absoluteness, the unconditionally that is required in the following of Jesus. It is a theme which is emphasised more than once in Luke’s gospel. We cannot be fence-sitters, to have our cake and eat it. Being a follower of Jesus can never be a part-time affair. It is all or nothing. At the same time, the demands of agape-love are always there. It is a matter each time of discerning where the truly loving act lies.
If we are honest, a lot of us are like these men in our following of Christ and in the living out of our faith. We do have our material wants (distinct from needs), we feel we cannot live without "our little comforts in life".
Let us pray today for a high degree of freedom in being able to accept unconditionally God’s will for us. To have that freedom is one of the greatest blessings and graces of our life.
Thursday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1NEH 8:1-4A, 5-6, 7B-12
The whole people gathered as one in the open space before the Water Gate,
and they called upon Ezra the scribe
to bring forth the book of the law of Moses
which the LORD prescribed for Israel.
On the first day of the seventh month, therefore,
Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly,
which consisted of men, women,
and those children old enough to understand.
Standing at one end of the open place that was before the Water Gate,
he read out of the book from daybreak until midday,
in the presence of the men, the women,
and those children old enough to understand;
and all the people listened attentively to the book of the law.
Ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform
that had been made for the occasion.
He opened the scroll
so that all the people might see it
(for he was standing higher up than any of the people);
and, as he opened it, all the people rose.
Ezra blessed the LORD, the great God,
and all the people, their hands raised high, answered,
"Amen, amen!"
Then they bowed down and prostrated themselves before the LORD,
their faces to the ground.
As the people remained in their places,
Ezra read plainly from the book of the law of God,
interpreting it so that all could understand what was read.
Then Nehemiah, that is, His Excellency, and Ezra the priest-scribe
and the Levites who were instructing the people
said to all the people:
"Today is holy to the LORD your God.
Do not be sad, and do not weep"–
for all the people were weeping as they heard the words of the law.
He said further: "Go, eat rich foods and drink sweet drinks,
and allot portions to those who had nothing prepared;
for today is holy to our LORD.
Do not be saddened this day,
for rejoicing in the LORD must be your strength!"
And the Levites quieted all the people, saying,
"Hush, for today is holy, and you must not be saddened."
Then all the people went to eat and drink,
to distribute portions, and to celebrate with great joy,
for they understood the words that had been expounded to them.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 10, 1-12 Jesus appointed a further seventy-two and sent them in pairs before him to every town and place he intended to visit. He said to them: "The harvest is rich but the workers are few; therefore ask the harvest-master to send workers to his harvest. Be on your way, and remember: I am sending you as lambs in the midst of wolves. Do not carry a walking staff or traveling bag; wear no sandals and greet no one along the way. On entering any house, first say, 'Peace to this house.' If there is a peaceable man there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will come back to you. Stay in the one house eating and drinking what they have, for the laborer is worth his wage. Do not move from house to house. "Into whatever city you go, after they welcome you, eat what they set before you, and cure the sick there. Say to them, 'The reign of God is at hand.' If the people of any town you enter do not welcome you, go into its streets and say, 'We shake the dust of this town from our feet as testimony against you. But know that the reign of God is near.' I assure you, on that day the fate of Sodom will be less severe than that of such a town."
Commentary on Luke 10:1-12
Two days ago we saw Jesus firmly setting out for Jerusalem and the accomplishment of his mission. Yesterday we saw how he responded to people who wanted to or were being invited to join his mission. During the coming days we will see Jesus preparing his actual disciples for their work.
In addition to the inner circle of the Twelve, we are told today that he appointed another 72 (12×6) and sent them two by two to the places he himself would be visiting. (Only Luke mentions this group.) That is a good description of our Christian role. We are supposed to go first to prepare the ground but then it is Jesus himself who comes to plant the seed of faith.
Jesus then goes on to give an instruction to his disciples. We, too, should be listening to his words:
a. He first points out that the harvest is great and there are very few labourers, few who are willing to do the harvesting work with Jesus.
This is a text which is often thrown at us during "vocation" campaigns. We tend to hear it as a call for more priests, brothers and nuns. It is that, of course, but when Jesus spoke there were no priests, brothers or nuns. The challenge was being thrown out to all his followers to find more people to join in the harvesting work.
We have to be careful as we listen to these words not to exclude ourselves because we are middle-aged, or married, or already have a career. The words are addressed to all of us and call for some kind of response from every one of us. It is never too late to respond to the call.
b. Second, Jesus warns his followers that it may not be easy. "I am sending you out as lambs among wolves." In spite of the message of truth, love, compassion and justice that we bring, it does not mean that we will be received with open arms. On the contrary, we may meet with strong opposition and even persecution. Our message will be seen as threatening. It will be distorted and misunderstood.
c. The disciple is called on to travel light. Jesus himself "had nowhere to lay his head" and he only had the clothes he wore. So many of us are weighed down by the things we own. Some of us have to protect our property with the latest in security devices. In our search for prosperity and material security we have lost the more precious gift of freedom. They are not to stop to greet people in the sense of carrying on lengthy conversations. Their mission was urgent – there are few labourers for a potentially huge harvest.
d. They are to be bearers of peace. Peace, shalom, is much more than an absence of violence. It is a deep inner harmony with oneself, with others, with one’s environment, with God. "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God." We could hardly bring a more precious gift to others than this inner peace. It is, in fact, the heart of our Christian message. Faith, hope and love are the keys to peace.
e. The evangeliser is, first, to stay in the first house that accepts him. He should not be going around looking for better accommodation. At the same time, he is to be provided with shelter and hospitality for "the labourer is worthy of his hire".
This, it seems, was the way Jesus himself lived. And this was the overall ideal of the Christian community: a network of mutually supporting people sharing their resources with each other and with those in greater need than themselves.
f. Their work is primarily to heal the sick in the places they go to. ‘Healing’ should be taken in a wider sense of including body, feelings, mind and spirit. And ‘healing’ should also be seen not just as getting rid of a sickness but of making a person whole again. Bringing healing and wholeness into the lives of individuals and communities is of the essence of the Kingdom and at the heart of Jesus’ work and that of his followers. The sign of that wholeness is inner peace. Today it is no different.
And they are to say, "The kingdom of God has come near to you." This is not just a statement they are to throw out. It is the core of Jesus’ message and an explanation of why people are experiencing healing and wholeness coming into their lives. This is the effect of the coming of the kingdom; this is what the coming of the kingdom means. God’s power is penetrating their lives, transforming them and making them whole again.
Luke mentions the kingdom of God more than 30 times; Matthew more than 50 times. Matthew’s is truly a Gospel of the Kingdom.
The term can have a number of meanings:
- the eternal kingship (basileia) of God
- the presence of the kingdom in the person of Jesus; he is the embodiment, the incarnation of the rule of God in himself, an incarnation he wishes to be found in his disciples and the communities they establish
- the future kingdom in the life that is to come.
In short, the kingdom, the rule of God is intended to be both a present reality as well as a future hope.
g. Finally, if there is any place where they are not received, they are to leave it to its own fate. Even then those people are to know that the kingdom of God is near to them also. There is always the hope that the results of their very rejection of the kingdom will lead to a deeper awareness later on. But by rejecting the messengers of God they have opened themselves to a fate worse than that of Sodom, a city utterly destroyed because of its shameful lack of hospitality to divine visitors. But those hearing the message of Jesus are even more accountable for hearing the message of the Kingdom proclaimed to them and turning their back on it.
Clearly, we cannot literally apply all of these points to our own work on behalf of the Gospel but we need to make the underlying principles and values ours too. It will require some reflection on our part both as individuals and as communities on how we should effectively share the Gospel with those around us and be the harvesters that are so badly needed.
Indeed, let us pray for vocations but let us remember that every single one of us is being called to work in the harvest field and not just some chosen souls who are totally unknown to us.
Friday of the Twenty-sixth Week of the Year
Reading 1BAR 1:15-22
During the Babylonian captivity, the exiles prayed:
"Justice is with the Lord, our God;
and we today are flushed with shame,
we men of Judah and citizens of Jerusalem,
that we, with our kings and rulers
and priests and prophets, and with our ancestors,
have sinned in the Lord's sight and disobeyed him.
We have neither heeded the voice of the Lord, our God,
nor followed the precepts which the Lord set before us.
From the time the Lord led our ancestors out of the land of Egypt
until the present day,
we have been disobedient to the Lord, our God,
and only too ready to disregard his voice.
And the evils and the curse that the Lord enjoined upon Moses, his servant,
at the time he led our ancestors forth from the land of Egypt
to give us the land flowing with milk and honey,
cling to us even today.
For we did not heed the voice of the Lord, our God,
in all the words of the prophets whom he sent us,
but each one of us went off
after the devices of his own wicked heart,
served other gods,
and did evil in the sight of the Lord, our God."
Years I and II Gospel Lk 10, 13-16 Jesus said: "It will go ill with you, Chorazin! And just as ill with you, Bethsaida! If the miracles worked in your midst had occurred in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have reformed in sackcloth and ashes. It will go easier on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And as for you, Capernaum, 'Are you to be exalted to the skies? You shall be hurled down to the realm of death!' "He who hears you, hears me. He who rejects you, rejects me. And he who rejects me, rejects him who sent me."
Commentary on Luke 10:13-16
Strong words today from Jesus against towns where he had preached extensively – Chorazin, Bethsaida and especially Capernaum.
Chorazin is only mentioned twice in the Bible, here and in the parallel passage of Matt 11:21. It was near the Sea of Galilee and probably between 3 and 4 km north of Capernaum. Bethsaida, the home of some of Jesus’ disciples, was on the north-east shore of the Sea of Galilee. It had been built by Philip the Tetrarch, who called it ‘Julias’ after Julia, a daughter of the emperor Caesar Augustus. Capernaum, situated on the north shore of the lake, appears frequently in the Gospel narratives and was the centre from which Jesus did much of his missionary work. His work and preaching would have been most familiar to the people there.
Jesus says that if the Gentile cities of Tyre and Sidon had witnessed all that Jesus had said and done in those towns of Palestine they would have repented long ago, just as the pagan people of Niniveh had repented at the preaching of Jonah. Tyre and Sidon were towns on the Phoenician coast, north of Palestine (Lebanon today). Jesus was said to have visited the area just once and only very briefly so the people there did not have an opportunity to witness Jesus’ miracles or hear his preaching unlike the people in the towns mentioned above.
And Jesus goes further. Addressing his disciples he says, "He that hears you, hears me and he that despises you despises me" and the Father who sent him. In other words, to listen to the messengers of Jesus is equivalent to listening to him personally; to reject those messengers is to reject Jesus and to reject God.
And, in our own times, perhaps we should emphasise that those "messengers" are not just bishops, priests and religious. They include all those who sincerely proclaim the Gospel by their words and their lives.
It might be no harm then for each of us today to hear those warnings of Jesus addressed to ourselves. How well have we really responded to the call of Jesus in the Gospel? How open are we to hear that message coming to us from different kinds of people in our community? How committed are we to accepting, living and sharing that Gospel with others?
Might it be true to say that there are people in other parts of our world, our country, our society who, if they were given what we have been given, who heard what we hear, would respond much more generously than we have done?
There is never any room for complacency in our Christian life. Because we have been given so much so much more is expected of us. As Jesus says elsewhere we may be very surprised to see others, who never had an opportunity directly to hear the Gospel, go before us into God’s Kingdom.
Monday of The Twenty-second Week of The Year
Year 1 Reading 1 1 Thes 4, 13-18
We would have you be clear about those who sleep in death, brothers; otherwise you might yield to grief, like those who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose, God will bring forth with him from the dead those also who have fallen asleep believing in him. We say to you, as if the Lord himself had said it, that we who live, who survive until his coming, will in no way have an advantage over those who have fallen asleep. No, the Lord himself will come down from heaven at the word of command, at the sound of the archangel's voice and God's trumpet; and those who have died in Christ will rise first. Then we, the living, the survivors, will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the aiR. Thenceforth we shall be with the Lord unceasingly. Console one another with this message.
Resp. Psalm Ps 96, 1. 3. 4-5. 11-12. 13
R.(13) The Lord comes to judge the earth.
Sing to the Lord a new song;
sing to the Lord, all you lands.
Tell his glory among the nations;
among all peoples, his wondrous deeds.
For great is the Lord and highly to be praised;
awesome is he, beyond all gods.
For all the gods of the nations are things of nought,
but the Lord made the heavens.
Let the heavens be glad and the earth rejoice;
let the sea and what fills it resound;
let the plains be joyful and all that is in them!
Then shall all the trees of the forest exult.
Before the Lord, for he comes;
for he comes to rule the earth.
He shall rule the world with justice
and the peoples with his constancy.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 16-30
Jesus came to Nazareth where he had been reared, and entering the synagogue on the sabbath as he was in the habit of doing, he stood up to do the reading. When the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed him, he unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written: "The spirit of the Lord is upon me; therefore he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives, Recovery of sight to the blind and release to prisoners, To announce a year of favor from the Lord." Rolling up the scroll, he gave it back to the assistant and sat down. All in the synagogue had their eyes fixed on him. Then he began by saying to them, "Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing." All who were present spoke favorably of him; they marveled at the appealing discourse which came from his lips. They also asked, "Is not this Joseph's son?" He said to them, "You will doubtless quote me the proverb, 'Physician, heal yourself,' and say, 'Do here in your own country the things we have heard you have done in Capernaum.' But in fact," he went on, "no prophet gains acceptance in his native place. Indeed, let me remind you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the heavens remained closed for three and a half years and a great famine spread over the land. It was to none of these that Elijah was sent, but to a widow of Zarephath near Sidon. Recall, too, the many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; yet not one was cured except Naaman the Syrian." At these words the whole audience in the synagogue was filled with indignation. They rose up and expelled him from the town, leading him to the brow of the hill on which it was built and intending to hurl him over the edge. But he went straight through their midst and walked away.
Commentary on Luke 4:16-30
We begin today the reading of Luke’s gospel which will bring us up to the end of the Church year. We have already gone through Matthew and Mark and John’s gospel has been spread through various parts of the year, especially during the Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter seasons.
The gospel is a companion volume to the book of the Acts and the language and structure of these two books indicate that both were written by the same person. They are addressed to the same individual, Theophilus, and the second volume refers to the first.
Luke presents the works and teachings of Jesus that are especially important for understanding the way of salvation. Its scope is complete from the birth of Christ to his ascension. It appeals to both Jews and Gentiles.
However, we take up Luke’s gospel at the beginning of Jesus’ public life (chap. 4). After his baptism he had returned "in the power of the Spirit to Galilee", the northern province of Palestine and his home province. Already people were talking about him everywhere.
Now, as our reading opens, we find him in Nazareth, a small town in Galilee and the place where he grew up. From the verses immediately preceding, it does not seem that Jesus actually began his ministry in Nazareth. The event described here may not have taken place until a year later. One suggestion (NIV Bible) is that all that is described in John’s gospel between 1:19 to 4:42 took place between the temptation in the desert and the moving north to Galilee (vv.13 and 14).
But Luke has arranged the structure of his gospel so that Jesus will begin his public life in Nazareth and will gradually proceed southwards towards his goal, Jerusalem, without turning back. In the other Synoptics he moves around Galilee in all directions and John suggests that he made a number of visits to Jerusalem during his public life.
The Jerusalem Bible suggests that our passage today actually combines three distinct parts:
the first, vv.16-22 (Jesus is honoured), occurring at the time indicated by Matt 4:13;
the second, vv.23-24 (Jesus astonishing his audience), the visit of which Matthew and Mark speak;
the third, vv.25-30 (the life of Jesus threatened), not mentioned by Matthew or Mark and to be placed towards the end of the Galilean ministry.
In this way Luke presents an introductory tableau which is a summary and symbol of Christ’s great offer and of its contemptuous rejection by his own people.
As the reading opens we find Jesus in the town synagogue. It is a sabbath day. He gets up to read the scripture and comments on it. The ruler of the synagogue could authorise any adult Jew to read the scripture lesson. The passage he reads is full of significance. It comes from the prophet Isaiah and Jesus’ reading of it amounts to a manifesto or what we might call today a "mission statement". ‘Books’ in those days were in the form of scrolls and the Scriptures were kept in a special place in the synagogue and given to the reader by an attendant. Jesus may have chosen the passage himself or it may have been assigned for that day.
But it is more than just a mission statement. As he reads it becomes clear that the whole statement is about Jesus himself. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me." This has already been confirmed during his baptism in the river Jordan when "the Holy Spirit came down on him in the form of a dove" and a voice was heard to say, "You are my beloved Son; in you I am well pleased" (Luke 3:22).
"Because he has anointed me." In saying this Jesus is making an unequivocal claim to be the Messiah or the Christ, the long-awaited liberating King of Israel. The word "Messiah", translated into Greek as Christos (???????), means someone who is anointed with oil. (We call the oil in baptism and confirmation ‘chrism’.) And a person was made king by having oil poured over his head. (We remember how David was anointed king.) Jesus, of course, was not literally anointed but had been figuratively ‘anointed’ by the coming of the Spirit on him in his baptism. ‘Anointing’ is our equivalent of ‘coronation’, symbolised by the putting of a crown on the new king.
Then comes the mission of this King: To preach the gospel to the poor, to heal the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are hurt and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.
There is nothing here of restoring the glories of Israel, nothing about conquering enemies and laying waste their lands. No, it is about letting the poor of this world hear the Good News of God’s love for them. It is about healing and reconciliation. It is about liberating those who are tied down by any form of enslavement. It is about helping people to see clearly the true meaning of life. It is about restoring wholeness to people’s lives and to societies. It is about the inauguration of the Kingdom by its King.
It is, in short, the whole picture of Jesus that will unfold in the pages of Luke, a gospel which focuses on the poor and vulnerable, a gospel of tenderness and compassion, a gospel of the Spirit and of joy, a gospel of prayer and healing.
It is about "proclaiming a year acceptable to the Lord". This refers to the Messianic age when salvation would be proclaimed. Isaiah in the original text is alluding to the Year of Jubilee, when every 50 years slaves were set free, debts were cancelled and ancestral lands were returned to the original family. Isaiah was thinking mainly of freedom from Babylonian captivity but Jesus was speaking of liberation across the board of human living.
And, as he finished the reading, Jesus put down the scroll and said that these things were now being fulfilled as they were hearing them.
And the townspeople who thought they knew him so well were overawed by the wisdom with which he spoke. This positive reaction to Jesus is a favorite theme in Luke. "Is not this Joseph’s son?" they asked rhetorically. But they were wrong. He was not Joseph’s son; he was the son of Mary and of the Father, the divine Word sharing our ‘flesh’. (As suggested above, this event may have occurred on a second visit.)
And this in turn leads us to the third section of the reading which provides an unexpected turn of events and is more in harmony with the later part of Jesus’ public life. Jesus’ hearers were surprised at the way he spoke but they were not moved to change. After all, he was just the son of Joseph, and someone they knew so well could have nothing to say to them. At the same time Jesus says they, his own townspeople, must be wondering why he is not doing the things in Nazareth that he was doing in places like Capernaum.
Capernaum, apparently a sizeable town, was where Peter lived and Jesus made his house the centre out of which he did his missionary work in Galilee. A 5th century basilica now stands on the supposed site of the house and there is a 4th century synagogue quite near.
The reason for their non-acceptance is that they do not really accept him for what he is. He reminds them that prophets are seldom accepted in their own place. Familiarity blinds people to their message. "I know who he is and he has nothing to say to me." Jesus then gives two rather provocative examples:
During a great famine in the time of the prophet Elijah he was sent to help not his fellow Israelites but a poor widow in Sarepta, near Sidon in non-Jewish territory. Sidon was one of the oldest Phoenician cities on the Mediterranean coast and about 33 km north of Tyre. Later, Jesus would heal the daughter of a Gentile woman here.
And in the time of the prophet Elisha, there were many lepers in Israel but he was sent to cure Naaman, a Gentile general from Syria.
God reaching out to Gentiles through his prophets sets the stage for the Gentiles to receive the message of the Prophet Jesus, which is so much a theme of Luke’s writings. But these remarks so angered the people of Nazareth that they dragged Jesus to the brow of a hill with the intention of throwing him down but he just walked through them. Whether he did this miraculously or from the sheer power of his personality is not clear. In any case, his time had not yet come.
Prophetic voices being rejected by their own is a phenomenon only too common in our own day. And it was something Jesus foretold would happen to his followers, simply for being his followers and proclaiming his vision of life. In the meantime, let us make Jesus’ mission statement our own. It is what being a Christian means.
Monday of The Twenty-second Week of The Year
Year 1 Reading 1 1 Thes 4, 13-18
We would have you be clear about those who sleep in death, brothers; otherwise you might yield to grief, like those who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose, God will bring forth with him from the dead those also who have fallen asleep believing in him. We say to you, as if the Lord himself had said it, that we who live, who survive until his coming, will in no way have an advantage over those who have fallen asleep. No, the Lord himself will come down from heaven at the word of command, at the sound of the archangel's voice and God's trumpet; and those who have died in Christ will rise first. Then we, the living, the survivors, will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the aiR. Thenceforth we shall be with the Lord unceasingly. Console one another with this message.
Resp. Psalm Ps 96, 1. 3. 4-5. 11-12. 13
R.(13) The Lord comes to judge the earth.
Sing to the Lord a new song;
sing to the Lord, all you lands.
Tell his glory among the nations;
among all peoples, his wondrous deeds.
For great is the Lord and highly to be praised;
awesome is he, beyond all gods.
For all the gods of the nations are things of nought,
but the Lord made the heavens.
Let the heavens be glad and the earth rejoice;
let the sea and what fills it resound;
let the plains be joyful and all that is in them!
Then shall all the trees of the forest exult.
Before the Lord, for he comes;
for he comes to rule the earth.
He shall rule the world with justice
and the peoples with his constancy.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 16-30
Jesus came to Nazareth where he had been reared, and entering the synagogue on the sabbath as he was in the habit of doing, he stood up to do the reading. When the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed him, he unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written: "The spirit of the Lord is upon me; therefore he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives, Recovery of sight to the blind and release to prisoners, To announce a year of favor from the Lord." Rolling up the scroll, he gave it back to the assistant and sat down. All in the synagogue had their eyes fixed on him. Then he began by saying to them, "Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing." All who were present spoke favorably of him; they marveled at the appealing discourse which came from his lips. They also asked, "Is not this Joseph's son?" He said to them, "You will doubtless quote me the proverb, 'Physician, heal yourself,' and say, 'Do here in your own country the things we have heard you have done in Capernaum.' But in fact," he went on, "no prophet gains acceptance in his native place. Indeed, let me remind you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the heavens remained closed for three and a half years and a great famine spread over the land. It was to none of these that Elijah was sent, but to a widow of Zarephath near Sidon. Recall, too, the many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; yet not one was cured except Naaman the Syrian." At these words the whole audience in the synagogue was filled with indignation. They rose up and expelled him from the town, leading him to the brow of the hill on which it was built and intending to hurl him over the edge. But he went straight through their midst and walked away.
Commentary on Luke 4:16-30
We begin today the reading of Luke’s gospel which will bring us up to the end of the Church year. We have already gone through Matthew and Mark and John’s gospel has been spread through various parts of the year, especially during the Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter seasons.
The gospel is a companion volume to the book of the Acts and the language and structure of these two books indicate that both were written by the same person. They are addressed to the same individual, Theophilus, and the second volume refers to the first.
Luke presents the works and teachings of Jesus that are especially important for understanding the way of salvation. Its scope is complete from the birth of Christ to his ascension. It appeals to both Jews and Gentiles.
However, we take up Luke’s gospel at the beginning of Jesus’ public life (chap. 4). After his baptism he had returned "in the power of the Spirit to Galilee", the northern province of Palestine and his home province. Already people were talking about him everywhere.
Now, as our reading opens, we find him in Nazareth, a small town in Galilee and the place where he grew up. From the verses immediately preceding, it does not seem that Jesus actually began his ministry in Nazareth. The event described here may not have taken place until a year later. One suggestion (NIV Bible) is that all that is described in John’s gospel between 1:19 to 4:42 took place between the temptation in the desert and the moving north to Galilee (vv.13 and 14).
But Luke has arranged the structure of his gospel so that Jesus will begin his public life in Nazareth and will gradually proceed southwards towards his goal, Jerusalem, without turning back. In the other Synoptics he moves around Galilee in all directions and John suggests that he made a number of visits to Jerusalem during his public life.
The Jerusalem Bible suggests that our passage today actually combines three distinct parts:
the first, vv.16-22 (Jesus is honoured), occurring at the time indicated by Matt 4:13;
the second, vv.23-24 (Jesus astonishing his audience), the visit of which Matthew and Mark speak;
the third, vv.25-30 (the life of Jesus threatened), not mentioned by Matthew or Mark and to be placed towards the end of the Galilean ministry.
In this way Luke presents an introductory tableau which is a summary and symbol of Christ’s great offer and of its contemptuous rejection by his own people.
As the reading opens we find Jesus in the town synagogue. It is a sabbath day. He gets up to read the scripture and comments on it. The ruler of the synagogue could authorise any adult Jew to read the scripture lesson. The passage he reads is full of significance. It comes from the prophet Isaiah and Jesus’ reading of it amounts to a manifesto or what we might call today a "mission statement". ‘Books’ in those days were in the form of scrolls and the Scriptures were kept in a special place in the synagogue and given to the reader by an attendant. Jesus may have chosen the passage himself or it may have been assigned for that day.
But it is more than just a mission statement. As he reads it becomes clear that the whole statement is about Jesus himself. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me." This has already been confirmed during his baptism in the river Jordan when "the Holy Spirit came down on him in the form of a dove" and a voice was heard to say, "You are my beloved Son; in you I am well pleased" (Luke 3:22).
"Because he has anointed me." In saying this Jesus is making an unequivocal claim to be the Messiah or the Christ, the long-awaited liberating King of Israel. The word "Messiah", translated into Greek as Christos (???????), means someone who is anointed with oil. (We call the oil in baptism and confirmation ‘chrism’.) And a person was made king by having oil poured over his head. (We remember how David was anointed king.) Jesus, of course, was not literally anointed but had been figuratively ‘anointed’ by the coming of the Spirit on him in his baptism. ‘Anointing’ is our equivalent of ‘coronation’, symbolised by the putting of a crown on the new king.
Then comes the mission of this King: To preach the gospel to the poor, to heal the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are hurt and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.
There is nothing here of restoring the glories of Israel, nothing about conquering enemies and laying waste their lands. No, it is about letting the poor of this world hear the Good News of God’s love for them. It is about healing and reconciliation. It is about liberating those who are tied down by any form of enslavement. It is about helping people to see clearly the true meaning of life. It is about restoring wholeness to people’s lives and to societies. It is about the inauguration of the Kingdom by its King.
It is, in short, the whole picture of Jesus that will unfold in the pages of Luke, a gospel which focuses on the poor and vulnerable, a gospel of tenderness and compassion, a gospel of the Spirit and of joy, a gospel of prayer and healing.
It is about "proclaiming a year acceptable to the Lord". This refers to the Messianic age when salvation would be proclaimed. Isaiah in the original text is alluding to the Year of Jubilee, when every 50 years slaves were set free, debts were cancelled and ancestral lands were returned to the original family. Isaiah was thinking mainly of freedom from Babylonian captivity but Jesus was speaking of liberation across the board of human living.
And, as he finished the reading, Jesus put down the scroll and said that these things were now being fulfilled as they were hearing them.
And the townspeople who thought they knew him so well were overawed by the wisdom with which he spoke. This positive reaction to Jesus is a favorite theme in Luke. "Is not this Joseph’s son?" they asked rhetorically. But they were wrong. He was not Joseph’s son; he was the son of Mary and of the Father, the divine Word sharing our ‘flesh’. (As suggested above, this event may have occurred on a second visit.)
And this in turn leads us to the third section of the reading which provides an unexpected turn of events and is more in harmony with the later part of Jesus’ public life. Jesus’ hearers were surprised at the way he spoke but they were not moved to change. After all, he was just the son of Joseph, and someone they knew so well could have nothing to say to them. At the same time Jesus says they, his own townspeople, must be wondering why he is not doing the things in Nazareth that he was doing in places like Capernaum.
Capernaum, apparently a sizeable town, was where Peter lived and Jesus made his house the centre out of which he did his missionary work in Galilee. A 5th century basilica now stands on the supposed site of the house and there is a 4th century synagogue quite near.
The reason for their non-acceptance is that they do not really accept him for what he is. He reminds them that prophets are seldom accepted in their own place. Familiarity blinds people to their message. "I know who he is and he has nothing to say to me." Jesus then gives two rather provocative examples:
During a great famine in the time of the prophet Elijah he was sent to help not his fellow Israelites but a poor widow in Sarepta, near Sidon in non-Jewish territory. Sidon was one of the oldest Phoenician cities on the Mediterranean coast and about 33 km north of Tyre. Later, Jesus would heal the daughter of a Gentile woman here.
And in the time of the prophet Elisha, there were many lepers in Israel but he was sent to cure Naaman, a Gentile general from Syria.
God reaching out to Gentiles through his prophets sets the stage for the Gentiles to receive the message of the Prophet Jesus, which is so much a theme of Luke’s writings. But these remarks so angered the people of Nazareth that they dragged Jesus to the brow of a hill with the intention of throwing him down but he just walked through them. Whether he did this miraculously or from the sheer power of his personality is not clear. In any case, his time had not yet come.
Prophetic voices being rejected by their own is a phenomenon only too common in our own day. And it was something Jesus foretold would happen to his followers, simply for being his followers and proclaiming his vision of life. In the meantime, let us make Jesus’ mission statement our own. It is what being a Christian means.
Tuesday of The Twenty-second Week of The Year
Year 1 Reading 1 1 Thes 5, 1-6. 9-11
As regards specific times and moments, brothers, we do not need to write you; you know very well that the day of the Lord is coming like a thief in the night. Just when people are saying, "Peace and security," ruin will fall on them with the suddenness of pains overtaking a woman in labor, and there will be no escape. You are not in the dark, brothers, so that the day might catch you off guard, like a thief. No, all of you are children of light and of the day. We belong neither to darkness nor to night; therefore let us not be asleep like the rest, but awake and sober!
God has not destined us for wrath but for acquiring salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He died for us that all of us, whether awake or asleep, together might live with him. Therefore, comfort and upbuild one another, as indeed you are doing.
Resp. Psalm Ps 27, 1. 4. 13-14
R.(13) I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.
The Lord is my light and my salvation;
whom should I fear?
The Lord is my lifés refuge;
of whom should I be afraid?
One thing I ask of the Lord;
this l seek:
To dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
That I may gaze on the loveliness of the Lord
and contemplate his temple.
I believe that I shall see the bounty of the Lord
in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord with courage;
be stouthearted, and wait for the Lord.
Year II Reading I 1 Cor 2, 10-16
The Spirit scrutinizes all matters, even the deep things of God. Who, for example, knows a man's innermost self but the man's own spirit within him? Similarly, no one knows what lies at the depths of God but the Spirit of God. The Spirit we have received is not the world's spirit but God's Spirit, helping us to recognize the gifts he has given us. We speak of these gifts, not in words of human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, thus interpreting spiritual things in spiritual terms. The natural man does not accept what is taught by the Spirit of God. For him, that is absurdity. He cannot come to know such teaching because it must be appraised in a spiritual way. The spiritual man, on the other hand, can appraise everything, though he himself can be appraised by no one. For "Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 145, 8-9. 10-11. 12-13. 13-14
R.(17) The Lord is just in all his ways.
The Lord is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and of great kindness.
The Lord is good to all
and compassionate toward all his works.
Let all your works give you thanks, O Lord,
and let your faithful ones bless you.
Let them discourse of the glory of your kingdom
and speak of your might,
Making known to men your might
and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
Your kingdom is a kingdom for all ages,
and your dominion endures through all generations.
The Lord is faithful in all his words
and holy in all his works.
The Lord lifts up all who are falling
and raises up all who are bowed down.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 31-37
Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town of Galilee, where he began instructing the people on the sabbath day. They were spellbound by his teaching, for his words had authority. In the synagogue there was a man with an unclean spirit, who shrieked in a loud voice: "Leave us alone! What do you want of us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the Holy One of God." Jesus said to him sharply, "Be quiet! Come out of him." At that, the demon threw him to the ground before everyonés eyes and came out of him without doing him any harm. All were struck with astonishment, and they began saying to one another: "What is there about his speech? He commands the unclean spirits with authority and power, and they leave." His renown kept spreading through the surrounding country.
Commentary on Luke 4:31-37
Immediately after his mixed reception in Nazareth, Jesus moves on to Capernaum, a town on the north shore of Galilee, which was to be the base from which Jesus did much of his missionary work. As in Nazareth, he taught the people in the synagogue on the sabbath. Unlike in Nazareth, "his teaching made a deep impression" on the people because he spoke "with authority". He did not quote other authorities, like the teachers of the law, because his authority was directly from God, it was his own.
At the same time, it was not the authority of domination. It was the authority of someone who has access to special knowledge, the authority of someone who speaks in his own name and not just on behalf of others, the authority of one who empowers others and makes them grow.
And Jesus’ authority is not only in word and teaching. Right there in the synagogue as he speaks is a man possessed by an "unclean spirit". The spirit speaks through the man. It speaks in fear of the power of Jesus. "Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." This title seems to indicate that the spirit recognizes Jesus’ divine origin but not his Messiahship. There was a belief in those times that knowing the exact name of one’s opponent gave one power over him.
Jesus ordered the evil spirit of the man who was thrown to the ground but not hurt. The people are amazed. Exorcism was not new to them but they had never seen it done with such speed and effectiveness. They are astounded again at the power and authority of Jesus. They realize they are in the presence of someone very special, in fact, the "Holy One of God".
Each one of us is given authority of some kind – as a parent, a teacher, our job responsibility… Let us make sure that we use it in such a way as to enhance the abilities of others rather than diminish them.
Tuesday of The Twenty-second Week of The Year
Year 1 Reading 1 1 Thes 5, 1-6. 9-11
As regards specific times and moments, brothers, we do not need to write you; you know very well that the day of the Lord is coming like a thief in the night. Just when people are saying, "Peace and security," ruin will fall on them with the suddenness of pains overtaking a woman in labor, and there will be no escape. You are not in the dark, brothers, so that the day might catch you off guard, like a thief. No, all of you are children of light and of the day. We belong neither to darkness nor to night; therefore let us not be asleep like the rest, but awake and sober!
God has not destined us for wrath but for acquiring salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He died for us that all of us, whether awake or asleep, together might live with him. Therefore, comfort and upbuild one another, as indeed you are doing.
Resp. Psalm Ps 27, 1. 4. 13-14
R.(13) I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.
The Lord is my light and my salvation;
whom should I fear?
The Lord is my lifés refuge;
of whom should I be afraid?
One thing I ask of the Lord;
this l seek:
To dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
That I may gaze on the loveliness of the Lord
and contemplate his temple.
I believe that I shall see the bounty of the Lord
in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord with courage;
be stouthearted, and wait for the Lord.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 31-37
Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town of Galilee, where he began instructing the people on the sabbath day. They were spellbound by his teaching, for his words had authority. In the synagogue there was a man with an unclean spirit, who shrieked in a loud voice: "Leave us alone! What do you want of us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the Holy One of God." Jesus said to him sharply, "Be quiet! Come out of him." At that, the demon threw him to the ground before everyonés eyes and came out of him without doing him any harm. All were struck with astonishment, and they began saying to one another: "What is there about his speech? He commands the unclean spirits with authority and power, and they leave." His renown kept spreading through the surrounding country.
Commentary on Luke 4:31-37
Immediately after his mixed reception in Nazareth, Jesus moves on to Capernaum, a town on the north shore of Galilee, which was to be the base from which Jesus did much of his missionary work. As in Nazareth, he taught the people in the synagogue on the sabbath. Unlike in Nazareth, "his teaching made a deep impression" on the people because he spoke "with authority". He did not quote other authorities, like the teachers of the law, because his authority was directly from God, it was his own.
At the same time, it was not the authority of domination. It was the authority of someone who has access to special knowledge, the authority of someone who speaks in his own name and not just on behalf of others, the authority of one who empowers others and makes them grow.
And Jesus’ authority is not only in word and teaching. Right there in the synagogue as he speaks is a man possessed by an "unclean spirit". The spirit speaks through the man. It speaks in fear of the power of Jesus. "Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." This title seems to indicate that the spirit recognizes Jesus’ divine origin but not his Messiahship. There was a belief in those times that knowing the exact name of one’s opponent gave one power over him.
Jesus ordered the evil spirit of the man who was thrown to the ground but not hurt. The people are amazed. Exorcism was not new to them but they had never seen it done with such speed and effectiveness. They are astounded again at the power and authority of Jesus. They realize they are in the presence of someone very special, in fact, the "Holy One of God".
Each one of us is given authority of some kind – as a parent, a teacher, our job responsibility… Let us make sure that we use it in such a way as to enhance the abilities of others rather than diminish them.
Wednesday of the Twenty-second Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Col 1, 1-8
The Good News which has reached you is spreading all over the world.
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, to the holy ones at Colossae, faithful brothers in Christ. May God our Father give you grace and peace.
We always give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in our prayers for you because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love you bear toward all the saints -- moved as you are by the hope held in store for you in heaven. You heard of this hope through the message of truth, the gospel, which has come to you, has borne fruit, and has continued to grow in your midst as it has everywhere in the world. This has been the case from the day you first heard it and comprehended God's gracious intention through the instructions of Epaphras, our dear fellow slave, who represents us as a faithful minister of Christ. He it was who told us of your love in the Spirit.
Resp. Psalm Ps 52, 10. 11
R.(10) I trust in the kndness of God for eveR.
I, like a green olive tree
in the house of God,
Trust in the kindness of God
forever and eveR.
R. I trust in the kindness of God for eveR.
I will thank you always for what you have done,
and proclaim the goodness of your name
before your faithful ones.
R. I trust in the kindness of God for eveR.
Year II Reading I 1 Cor 3, 1-9
Brothers, I could not talk to you as spiritual men but only as men of flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, and did not give you solid food because you were not ready for it. You are not ready for it even now, being still very much in a natural condition. For as long as there are jealousy and quarrels among you, are you not of the flesh? And is not your behavior that of ordinary men? When someone says, "I belong to Paul," and another, "I belong to Apollos," is it not clear that you are still at the human level?
After all, who is Apollos? And who is Paul? Simply ministers through whom you became believers, each of them doing only what the Lord assigned him. I planted the seed and Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. This means that neither he who plants nor he who waters is of any special account, only God, who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters work to the same end. Each will receive his wages in proportion to his toil. We are God's co-workers, while you are his cultivation, his building.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 33, 12-13. 14-15. 20-21
R.(12) Happy the peple the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Happy the nation whose God is the Lord,
the people he has chosen for his own inheritance.
From heaven the Lord looks down;
he sees all mankind.
R. Happy the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
From his fixed throne he beholds
all who dwell on the earth,
He who fashioned the heart of each,
he who knows all their works.
R. Happy the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Our soul waits for the Lord,
who is our help and our shield,
For in him our hearts rejoice;
in his holy name we trust.
R. Happy the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 4, 38-44 On leaving the synagogue, Jesus entered the house of Simon. Simon's mother-in-law was in the grip of a severe fever, and they interceded with him for her. He stood over her and addressed himself to the fever, and it left her. She got up immediately and waited on them. At sunset, all who had people sick with a variety of diseases took them to him, and he laid hands on each of them and cured them. Demons departed from many, crying out as they did so, "You are the son of God!" He rebuked them and did not allow them to speak because they knew that he was the Messiah. The next morning he left the town and set out into the open country. The crowds went in search of him, and when they found him they tried to keep him from leaving them. But he said to them, "To other towns I must announce the good news of the reign of God, because that is why I was sent." And he continued to preach in the synagogues of Judea.
Commentary on Luke 4:38-44
After the scene in the synagogue where Jesus healed a man possessed by an evil spirit, he goes straight to Peter’s house. It was a sabbath day so Jesus could not move around or do any major activity. He seems to have used this house as his base when in Capernaum and that part of Galilee. (Jesus had "nowhere to lay his head", no dwelling of his own, but it seems clear that he was not a streetsleeper. There were always people ready to offer him hospitality – a custom of the Middle East and a model for Christians of every age and place.)
Peter’s mother-in-law was in the grip of a fever and the disciples begged Jesus to do something for her. (We might remember that the first pope was married.) Jesus stood over her and, with a word, cured her. Immediately she got up and began to serve Jesus and his group.
There is a lesson here. Health and healing are not just for the individual. Her healing immediately restored her to the community and the duty of serving that community. (And not just because she was a woman! If it had been the father-in-law, the same would apply.) As long as we are in health our energies are meant to be directed to the building up of the community and not simply for our personal enjoyment.
"Now when the sun was setting" – we need to remember it was a sabbath. The sabbath went from sunset on Friday to sunset on Saturday (so Jesus could not be properly buried on the Friday evening when he died). According to the traditions, Jews could not travel more than two-thirds of a mile or carry any load. Only after sunset could the sick be brought to Jesus.
As soon as the sabbath was over, large numbers brought their sick to him. He "laid his hands on every one of them" and healed them all. As Jesus had announced in the synagogue at Nazareth, the Kingdom of God had arrived and was entering the lives of people, bringing them health and wholeness.
Many were also liberated from the power of evil spirits. These spirits shouted at Jesus "You are the Son of God". As we mentioned earlier, by using Jesus’ title they hoped to exert control over him. It did not work, of course. Whether these were actual cases of possession or were psychological or moral disorders which made people behave in abnormal ways and perhaps ways harmful to themselves and others is not clear. But clearly the presence of the Kingdom is being felt.
At daybreak – Jesus had been working the whole night for the people – he went off into a quiet place. The desert is the place where God is to be found and very likely, as Mark tells us, Jesus went there to pray and to be alone. The people, who had seen what he did for them, wanted him to stay with them. Their attitude is in marked contrast to the people of Nazareth.
But he could and would not. "I must preach the kingdom of God to other cities also; that is why I have been sent." And so we are told that he was now preaching in the synagogues of Judea – in the south of the country, although the term may simply refer to the whole of Jewish territory.
No place could have a monopoly on his attentions. We need to attach ourselves to Jesus and keep close to him but we cannot cling to him in a way that prevents others from experiencing his healing touch.
On the contrary, it is our task as his disciples to see that as many as possible come to know and experience his love, his compassion and his healing.
Thursday of the Twenty-second Week of the Year
Year II Reading I 1 Cor 3, 18-23
Let no one delude himself. If any one of you thinks he is wise in a worldly way, he had better become a fool. In that way he will really be wise, for the wisdom of this world is absurdity with God. Scripture says, "He catches the wise in their craftiness"; and again, "The Lord knows how empty are the thoughts of the wise." Let there be no boasting about men. All things are yours, whether it be Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or the present, or the future: all these are yours, and you are Christ's and Christ is God's.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 24, 1-2. 3-4. 5-6
R.(1) To the Lord belongs the earth and all that fills it.
The Lord's are the earth and its fullness;
the world and those who dwell in it.
For he founded it upon the seas
and established it upon the rivers.
Who can ascend the mountain of the Lord?
or who may stand in his holy place?
He whose hands are sinless, whose heart is clean,
who desires not what is vain.
He shall receive a blessing from the Lord,
a reward from God his savior.
Such is the race that seeks for him,
that seeks the face of the God of Jacob.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 5, 1-11
As the crowd pressed in on Jesus to hear the word of God, he saw two boats moored by the side of the lake; the fishermen had disembarked and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to pull out a short distance from the shore; then, remaining seated, he continued to teach the crowds from the boat. When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, "Put out into deep water and lower your nets for a catch." Simon answered, "Master, we have been hard at it all night long and have caught nothing; but if you say so, I will lower the nets." Upon doing this they caught such a great number of fish that their nets were at the breaking point. They signaled to their mates in the other boat to come and help them. These came, and together they filled the two boats until they nearly sank. At the sight of this, Simon Peter fell at the knees of Jesus saying, "Leave me, Lord. I am a sinful man." For indeed, amazement at the catch they had made seized him and all his shipmates, as well as James and John, Zebedeés sons, who were partners with Simon. Jesus said to Simon, "Do not be afraid. From now on you will be catching men." With that they brought their boats to land, left everything, and became his followers.
Commentary on Luke 5:1-11
This is Luke’s version of the first call of Jesus’ disciples. It differs significantly from the parallel versions in Mark and Matthew and is a combination of passages from Mark and John.
We are told that Jesus was standing by the shore of Lake Gennesaret. The other gospel writers call it the Sea of Galilee and John twice refers to it as the Sea of Tiberias.
Because of the large crowds pressing in on him to hear the word of God, Jesus was forced to borrow one of two boats moored near the shore where their owners were washing their nets. "He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon" and "remaining seated, he continued to teach the crowds from the boat". As we saw in the synagogue at Nazareth (and also in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew), sitting was the usual teaching position. From a practical point of view, by preaching from the boat Jesus could avoid the pressure of the crowd and yet be close enough to speak to them.
It is a simple, straightforward statement and yet there is a symbolism here. Jesus gets into Simon’s boat and teaches from it. The boat, in the Gospel, is frequently a symbol of the church community. It is very meaningful to say that Jesus stepped into that boat, that it was Peter’s boat, and that he taught from there. It is a symbol of what is to come in the near future.
Now comes the lesson and the revelation. At the end of the teaching, Simon is told to go out into the deep water and start fishing. (He will not be called Peter until the next chapter.) "Master, we have been hard at it all night long and have caught nothing; but if you say so, I will lower the nets." There is here something of the condescension of the expert towards the amateur. "We know there are no fish there but, just to make you happy, we’ll let down the nets."
But their nets were hardly in the water when they were so full of fish that they were on the point of breaking. They (Peter and those others with him in the boat) had to call their companions in the other boat to come to their help (they do not seem to have caught any fish; only Simon’s boat does). But the two boats together were now so full of fish that they were on the point of sinking.
Peter, just now so arrogant and all-knowing, is totally overcome. He knew there were no fish there. So there was only one explanation. The man standing before him was Someone very special: "Go away from me, Lord, I am a sinful man." It is the reaction of a person in the awful presence of God’s overwhelming power and goodness. We see similar reactions by Abraham (Gen 18:27), Job (42:6) and Isaiah (6:5).
Peter did not belong there; the expert realises he is nothing in the presence of this man. Instead, he becomes so aware of his shortcomings. Paradoxically, it is the saints who are most ready to acknowledge their sinfulness. And his companions, James and John, were equally amazed. There is no mention of Andrew in this version of the story because he would have been in his brother Peter’s boat. And the passage indicates that Peter was not alone in the boat ("We have worked hard all night…")
Some commentators feel that Luke may have borrowed this story from John’s account of the disciples going fishing at the end of that gospel. It has been noted that Simon calls Jesus ‘Lord’, a post-resurrection title and refers to his sinfulness, which makes more sense after his triple denial during the Passion. It also looks forward to Peter’s leadership which is confirmed in the same chapter of John.
Jesus then reassures Simon and his companions: "Do not be afraid." They are words they will hear again. Because he is calling them to be his partners in the work of building his Kingdom. The huge catch of fish made by the boat in which Jesus and Peter were is a sign of a much greater catch of people to be made by the new community led by the Spirit of Jesus and under the leadership of Peter.
Unlike the other gospels, Luke has a period of teaching and miracles precede the call of the disciples. This makes their unhesitating response less surprising and more plausible.
They heard the message, they accepted the call and "with that they brought their boats to land, left everything, and become his followers". In Mark and Matthew they left their nets and boats. In Luke’s gospel especially, the following of Jesus is understood as absolute – one must leave everything and throw in one’s lot totally with Jesus wherever that will lead. Those boats and nets were the security on which the lives of Peter, his companions and their families depended. But they left them and everything else. This is faith, this is trust. Without it, the mission cannot succeed.
Friday of the Twenty-second Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Col 1, 15-20
Christ is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creatures. In him everything in heaven and on earth was created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominations, principalities or powers; all were created through him and for him. He is before all else that is. In him everything continues in being. It is he who is head of the body, the church; he who is the beginning, the first-born of the dead, so that primacy may be his in everything. It pleased God to make absolute fullness reside in him and, by means of him, to reconcile everything in his person, everything, I say, both on earth and in the heavens, making peace through the blood of his cross.
Resp. Psalm Ps 100, 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
R.(2) Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Sing joyfully to the Lord, all you lands;
serve the Lord with gladness;
come before him with joyful song.
Know that the Lord is God;
he made us, his we are;
his people, the flock he tends.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
his courts with praise;
Give thanks to him; bless his name.
The Lord is good,
the Lord, whose kindness endures forever,
and his faithfulness, to all generations.
Year II Reading I 1 Cor 4, 1-5
Men should regard us as servants of Christ and administrators of the mysteries of God. The first requirement of an administrator is that he prove trustworthy. It matters little to me whether you or any human court pass judgment on me. I do not even pass judgment on myself. Mind you, I have nothing on my conscience. But that does not mean that I am declaring myself innocent. The Lord is the one to judge me, so stop passing judgment before the time of his return. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and manifest the intentions of hearts. At that time, everyone will receive his praise from God.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 37, 3-4. 5-6. 27-28. 39-40
R.(39) The salvation of the just comes from the Lord.
Trust in the Lord and do good,
that you may dwell in the land and enjoy security.
Take delight in the Lord,
and he will grant you your heart's requests.
Commit to the Lord your way;
trust in him, and he will act.
He will make justice dawn for you like the light;
bright as the noonday shall be your vindication.
Turn from evil and do good,
that you may abide forever;
For the Lord loves what is right,
and forsakes not his faithful ones.
Criminals are destroyed
and the posterity of the wicked is cut off.
.
The salvation of the just is from the Lord;
he is their refuge in time of distress.
And the Lord helps them and delivers them;
he delivers them from the wicked and saves them,
because they take refuge in him.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 5, 33-39
The scribes and Pharisees said to Jesus: "John's disciples fast frequently and offer prayers; the disciples of the Pharisees do the same. Yours, on the contrary, eat and drink freely." Jesus replied: "Can you make guests of the groom fast while the groom is still with them? But when the days come that the groom is removed from their midst, they will surely fast in those days." He then proposed to them this figure: "No one tears a piece from a new coat to patch an old one. If he does he will only tear the new coat, and the piece taken from it will not match the old. Moreover, no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Should he do so, the new wine will burst the old skins, the wine will spill out, and the skins will be lost. New wine should be poured into fresh skins. No one, after drinking old wine, wants new. He says, 'I find the old wine better.'"
Commentary on Luke 5:33-39
The call of the first disciples is followed in Luke by the cure of a leper and then of a paralytic. Then there is the call of Levi (called Matthew in Matthew’s gospel) and the discussion with Jesus about his mixing with sinful and unclean people. It is the first of many confrontations between Jesus and the Jewish leaders.
We then come to today’s reading. Some scribes and Pharisees want to know why, when their disciples and those of John the Baptist regularly fast, Jesus’ disciples "eat and drink freely". We know that John grew up in the desert and lived on an austere diet of locusts and wild honey. He also preached an austere penitential message and lived a highly disciplined life. The Pharisees also led a highly regimented and strict lifestyle. Jesus, however, together with his disciples, is frequently seen eating at the tables of Pharisees and tax collectors and in the houses of friends.
But, while Jesus rejected ostentatious fasting, we know he fasted (once for 40 days) and praised it together with prayer and almsgiving, provided it was done discreetly and not for display.
Jesus gives two answers to the question. First, he says that it is not appropriate for guests to fast when the bridegroom is still around. A Jewish wedding was and is a specially joyous occasion (plenty of wine needed, as we see in Cana) and it could last for a week. It would be unthinkable to fast at such a time. Here Jesus is the bridegroom. There will come a time when he is not physically with his disciples and then they will fast.
The second reason goes deeper and is presented in the form of a parable. One does not use a new piece of cloth to patch an old garment. At the first sign of stress, the new cloth will be stronger and the old cloth will be torn. Nor does one put new wine into old wineskins. The new wine is still fermenting and expanding. The old wineskins, which are made of goatskins, are already stretched and no longer flexible. When the new wine expands, the old wineskins will not be able to stretch any more and will burst. The result is lost wine and ruined wineskins. So new wine has to be poured into new wineskins.
In this Jesus is clearly saying that his whole vision of religion is new and it can only be accepted and adopted by people who are prepared to see things in a new way. His teaching, his vision cannot be grafted on to the old religion. The old religion emphasised externals like observance of legal and ritual regulations and fasting; Jesus emphasises the interior spirit which is the real measure of a person’s value.
This parable may also be read in conjunction with John’s account of the wedding feast at Cana where Jesus produced new and better wine from the water in the ritual washing jars.
Jesus knows the difficulties his adversaries face. "No one, after drinking old wine, wants new. He says, ‘I find the old wine better’." Those who had grown up with the ‘old wine’ of the Mosaic Law would find it difficult to switch to the ‘new wine’ that Jesus was offering.
In our Church today there are many who still hanker for the ‘old wine’ of pre-Vatican II days. They have not made the inner shift which is necessary. They have not understood that Vatican II was much more than a change of external practices (such as have taken place in the liturgy). They nostalgically long for the Tridentine Mass in Latin and compare it favourably with the "new" liturgy which they find superficial and lacking in reverence. But they do not seem to have grasped the thinking which is behind the liturgical changes. The new patch does not fit their old cloth. "The old wine is better," they say.
The new wine will not be appreciated until the wineskins are also changed; otherwise we are in the same situation as the Pharisees were with Jesus.
*Monday of the Twenty-third Week of the Year
Reading 1Col1:24–2:3
Brothers and sisters: I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his Body, which is the Church, of which I am a minister in accordance with God's stewardship given to me to bring to completion for you the word of God, the mystery hidden from ages and from generations past. But now it has been manifested to his holy ones, to whom God chose to make known the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; it is Christ in you, the hope for glory. It is he whom we proclaim, admonishing everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. For this I labor and struggle, in accord with the exercise of his power working within me.
For I want you to know how great a struggle I am having for you and for those in Laodicea and all who have not seen me face to face, that their hearts may be encouraged as they are brought together in love, to have all the richness of assured understanding, for the knowledge of the mystery of God, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
Responsorial PsalmPs 62:6-7, 9R. (8)
In God is my safety and my glory.
Only in God be at rest, my soul,
for from him comes my hope.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
my stronghold; I shall not be disturbed.
Trust in him at all times, O my people!
Pour out your hearts before him;
God is our refuge!
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 6-11
On a sabbath Jesus came to teach in a synagogue where there was a man whose right hand was withered. The scribes and Pharisees were on the watch to see if he would perform a cure on the sabbath so that they could find a charge against him. He knew their thoughts, however, and said to the man whose hand was withered, "Get up and stand here in front." The man rose and remained standing. Jesus said to them, "I ask you, is it lawful to do good on the sabbath -- or evil? To preserve life -- or destroy it?" He looked around at them all and said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." The man did so and his hand was perfectly restored. At this they became frenzied and began asking one another what could be done to Jesus.
Commentary on Luke 6:6-11
Immediately following the incident of plucking the grains in the cornfield, we have another confrontation with religious leaders also on a Sabbath day. This one is even nastier as it involves what is called in American police movies a "set up" or "entrapment".
Jesus had gone into the local synagogue, as was his practice on the sabbath, and began to teach. Right in front of him was a man with a withered hand, no doubt something he was born with.
There were scribes and Pharisees in the congregation and, we are told, they "were watching him" to see whether he would heal the man on a Sabbath day so that they could accuse him of breaking the Law.
Medical work was forbidden on the Sabbath because it normally took time. Jesus, of course, healed with just a word but even if he did not, could one say that healing was against the spirit of the Sabbath? At the same time, it is also worth noting that the man was suffering from a chronic and probably non-painful disability. There was no need for him to be cured on the spot; it could easily have waited until the next day.
That gives further point to Jesus’ argument. The poor man had clearly been "planted". He was being used as bait for their sinister ends. For the Pharisees and their co-conspirators the man and his plight were secondary. They had to prove their point and he was seen as a useful tool.
Jesus, of course, is fully aware of what is going on. He speaks directly to the disabled man: "Rise up and stand out in the middle!" The command to "rise up" is already an indication of what is going to take place; the man is going to be given new life. Nor is there any secrecy. What Jesus is going to do is to be seen by all.
But first he puts a question to the whole congregation, scribes and Pharisees included: "Is it lawful on the sabbath day to do good, or to do evil? to save life or to destroy it?"
It is really an unanswerable question because the answer is so obvious. But it was not the way these Pharisees were thinking. Their question would be very different: "Is it right to obey the Law or to violate it?" For them the Law, even the letter of the Law, was paramount. There is an irony in Jesus’ question because Jesus is planning to bring healing into a man’s life while they were preparing to bring about his destruction. Who was really breaking the Sabbath?
Not so with Jesus. For him the Law was relative to the true and the good. No implementation of a law can offend the true and the good. And sometimes the following of the true and the good may have to go against the letter of the law. What is legal is not always moral. It can be immoral, that is, evil, to obey a law in certain circumstances. What is moral sometimes transcends the law and may even contradict the law.
Hearing no dissenting answer, Jesus says to the man, "Stretch out your hand." He did so. His arm was fully restored to normal.
The scribes and Pharisees were furious and began to plot against Jesus. Their plans had been brought to nought. They showed no pleasure that a crippled man had been made whole. Their interpretation of the law had been shown to be wanting and they had to get back at Jesus.
Such situations are by no means unknown in our Christian life and in our Church. We will run into situations where doing good may be in conflict with traditional regulations and legal formulae.
We will find ourselves in situations where contemporary Pharisees will try to put the Church into a straitjacket of narrow-mindedness and fundamentalism whether it involves our understanding of the Scripture or the liturgy or morality or something else. These are people who put the letter of the laws, regulations and rubrics before love. For them it is more important to observe the externals of rules than to be a loving person.
Tuesday of the Twenty-third Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Col 2, 6-15
Continue to live in Christ Jesus the Lord, in the spirit in which you received him. Be rooted in him and built up in him, growing ever stronger in faith as you were taught, and overflowing with gratitude. See to it that no one deceives you through any empty, seductive philosophy that follows mere human traditions, a philosophy based on cosmic powers rather than on Christ.
In Christ the fullness of deity resides in bodily form. Yours is a share of this fullness, in him who is the head of every principality and poweR. You were also circumcised in him, not with the circumcision administered by hand but with Christ's circumcision, which strips off the carnal body completely. In baptism you were not only buried with him but also raised to life with him because you believed in the power of God who raised him from the dead. Even when you were dead in sin and your flesh was uncircumcised, God gave you new life in company with Christ. He pardoned all our sins. He canceled the bond that stood against us with all its claims, snatching it up and nailing it to the cross. Thus did God disarm the principalities and powers. He made a public show of them and, leading them off captive, he triumphed in the person of Christ.
Resp. Psalm Ps 145, 1-2. 8-9. 10-11
R.(9) The Lord is compassionate to all his creatures.
I will extol you, O my God and King,
and I will bless your name forever and eveR.
Every day will I bless you,
and I will praise your name forever and eveR.
The Lord is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and of great kindness.
The Lord is good to all
and compassionate toward all his works.
Let all your works give you thanks, O Lord,
and let your faithful ones bless you.
Let them discourse of the glory of your kingdom
and speak of your might.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 12-19
Jesus went out to the mountain to pray, spending the night in communion with God. At daybreak he called his disciples and selected twelve of them to be his apostles: Simon, to whom he gave the name Peter, and Andrew his brother, James and John, Philip and Bartholomew, Matthew and Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, and Simon called the Zealot, Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who turned traitor. Coming down the mountain with them, he stopped at a level stretch where there were many of his disciples; a large crowd of people was with them from all Judea and Jerusalem and the coast of Tyre and Sidon, people who came to hear him and be healed of their diseases. Those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured; indeed, the whole crowd was trying to touch him because power went out from him which cured all.
Commentary on Luke 6:12-19
We move on now to a different phase in Luke’s story and some very crucial sayings of Jesus.
Jesus, we are told, went up into the mountains to pray and spent the whole night there in prayer to God. Some might wonder what Jesus would have to pray about. Such a question may reveal a limited concept of what prayer is. It is not just a question of asking for things. It is even less a question of fulfilling a religious duty, "saying our prayers".
Prayer is ultimately making contact with God, the beginning and end of all things. It makes a lot of sense that Jesus would have wanted to be in intimate contact with his Father and to have spent long periods with him. One of Jesus’ main concerns was that he do the will of his Father. Prayer was one way of making sure that there was completely harmony with that will.
Luke’s gospel shows Jesus at prayer more than any of the others. He also shows Jesus praying before all the important stages in his public life. As soon as this period of prayer was over, he called together his disciples and from them he chose twelve as apostles.
We know that among those who came to hear Jesus was a group, comprising both men and women, who regularly followed him and were committed to his teachings. Elsewhere we know of 72 such disciples who were sent out on a mission to do what Jesus was doing. After the ascension, we are told of 120 believers waiting for the coming of the Spirit. It is from these that Jesus chooses 12 to be Apostles, with a special mandate to continue his mission for the Kingdom. Although the order of names varies in the different gospels, the list is always headed by Peter while Judas is placed last.
We can sometimes be rather casual in our use of the terms ‘disciples’ and ‘apostles’ but they have very distinct meanings. The word ‘disciple’ is applied to any person who commits himself to be a follower of Jesus. The word ‘disciple’ comes from a word which means ‘to learn’. There is a passive element present, in the sense of the disciple sitting at the feet of the guru and learning from him. Jesus’ disciples regularly called him ‘Rabbi’ or teacher. ‘Apostle’ however has a much more active meaning. It refers to a person who goes out as an emissary, delegated to pass on information or commands or instructions to others on behalf of some authority.
In the Gospel, the word ‘apostle’ first applies to the twelve people who were especially chosen by Jesus to hand on his message. They would, after the departure of Jesus, become the foundation stones of the new community. In them would be invested the integrity of the original message and it would be up to them to interpret its acceptable developments. They were the beginnings of what we call today the "magisterium", the teaching body of the Church responsible for the maintenance of the integrity of the Gospel message.
In this, as in all the lists of the Apostles, the first person listed is Simon, whose name is now changed to Peter. (In Matthew, the change is made at Peter’s confession of Jesus as Messiah, Matt 16:18.) There are variations of the Apostles’ names in all the lists. Bartholomew here seems to be the same as Nathanael in John (cf. 1:45) and is associated with Philip. Matthew seems to correspond to Levi (cf. Mark 2:13ff.). James, son of Alphaeus, is probably the same as James the younger, not the brother of John (Mark 15:40). The other Simon is called a Zealot. This could be either to describe his religious zeal or indicate his membership in the party of the Zealots, a Jewish revolutionary group violently opposed to Roman rule. Judas, the son of James is another name for Thaddaeus (Matt 10:3; Mark 3:18). Also known as Jude to distinguish him from the other Judas, who always appears last in the lists. ‘Iscariot’ may mean that he comes from Kerioth. The town Kerioth Hezron was about 19 km south of Hebron and appears in the Old Testament (Joshua 15:25; Jeremiah 48:24).
We know, of course, that one of the chosen failed utterly and betrayed his Master. He was replaced by Matthias. Later, too, Paul – who never saw the pre-resurrection Jesus – would be called to be an Apostle. And the term would also be applied to a few others in the New Testament, e.g. Barnabas, a missionary colleague of Paul.
Secondly, however, the word ‘apostle’ applies to every baptised Christian. All of us, one way or another, are called to pass on the Gospel message so that others can hear and respond. There are many ways we can do this. One thing, though, is clear; it is not enough for us to be simply disciples, passive followers.
Immediately following the call of the Twelve comes what is really Luke’s version of the Sermon on the Mount. Significantly, for him it is going to take place in a plain, down on the ground in the midst of all the people. So his version is sometimes known as the "Sermon on the Plain". It somehow indicates the humility of Jesus and his closeness to the people while Matthew uses the more biblical concept of a mountain as the place where God reveals himself.
Jesus is surrounded by all his disciples, his newly chosen apostles, and a huge crowd from Judea and Jerusalem, from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, including both Jews and non-Jews. They all came to listen to Jesus and to be healed. And they were all eager to touch him physically because a certain power went out from Jesus and brought healing to all.
Let us then hear today the call of Jesus, first to be his disciples, totally committed to accepting and assimilating his message; second, to accepting the responsibility to spread the Gospel actively through the way we live our lives, through the way we speak, and through the relationships we establish with people; thirdly, let us reach out and touch Jesus so that we may experience his healing wherever we need it.
Wednesday of the Twenty-third Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Col 3, 1-11
Since you have been raised up in company with Christ, set your heart on what pertains to higher realms where Christ is seated at God's right hand. Be intent on things above rather than on things of earth. After all, you have died! Your life is hidden now with Christ in God. When Christ our life appears, then you shall appear with him in glory.
Put to death whatever in your nature is rooted in earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desires, and that lust which is idolatry. These are the sins which provoke God's wrath. Your own conduct was once of this sort, when these sins were your very life. You must put that aside now: all the anger and quick temper, the malice, the insults, the foul language. Stop lying to one anotheR. What you have done is put aside your old self with its past deeds and put on a new man, one who grows in knowledge as he is formed anew in the image of his CreatoR. There is no Greek or Jew here, circumcised or uncircumcised, foreigner, Scythian, slave, or freeman. Rather Christ is everything in all of you.
Resp. Psalm Ps 145, 2-3. 10-11. 12-13
R.(9) The Lord is compassionate to all his creatures.
Every day will I bless you,
and I will praise your name forever and eveR.
Great is the Lord and highly to be praised;
his greatness is unsearchable.
Let all your works give you thanks, O Lord,
and let your faithful ones bless you.
Let them discourse of the glory of your kingdom
and speak of your might.
Making known to men your might
and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
Your kingdom is a kingdom for all ages,
and your dominion endures through all generations.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 20-26
Jesus raised his eyes to his disciples and said: "Blest are you poor; the reign of God is yours. Blest are you who hunger; you shall be filled. Blest are you who are weeping; you shall laugh. Blest shall you be when men hate you, when they ostracize you and insult you and proscribe your name as evil because of the Son of Man. On the day they do so, rejoice and exult, for your reward shall be great in heaven. Thus it was that their fathers treated the prophets. "But woe to you rich, for your consolation is now. Woe to you who are full; you shall go hungry. Woe to you who laugh now; you shall weep in your grief. Woe to you when all speak well of you. Their fathers treated the false prophets in just this way."
Commentary on Luke 6:20-26
Today we begin what is known as Luke’s ‘Sermon on the Plain’ which more or less parallels Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount. Luke’s is much shorter but both begin with the Beatitudes and end with the parable of the house builders. Some of what is found in Matthew’s Sermon is found elsewhere in Luke as Matthew’s ‘Sermon’ it consists of disparate sayings of Jesus gathered into one place. Luke also omits Matthew’s specifically Jewish material which would not have been relevant to his Gentile readers.
The Sermon can be summarized as follows:
- An introduction of blessings and woes (20-26)
- The love of one’s enemies (27-36)
- The demands of loving one’s neighbour (37-42)
- Good deeds as proof of one’s goodness (43-45)
- A parable on listening to and acting on the words of Jesus (46-49).
Similar to Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount, Luke begins the Sermon on the Plain with his version of the Beatitudes. But there are striking differences. Whereas Matthew has eight (some would say seven) Beatitudes, Luke has four "Blesseds" and four contrasting "Woes". As is typical of his uncompromising style when it comes to following Jesus, the language of Luke is much more direct and hard-hitting and it may well be closer to what Jesus actually said.
Matthew’s Beatitudes propose a set of attitudes which reflect the spirit of the Kingdom, qualities to be found in the truly Christian and human life. Luke, on the other hand, speaks of material conditions in this life which will be overturned. Later in this gospel, this is illustrated graphically in the story of the rich man and Lazarus (16:25).
Luke also has Jesus speak in the second person: "Blessed are you" and "Woe to you" rather than in the third person as Matthew does ("Blessed are those who…"). Nor does he speak of the "poor in spirit" but of "you who are poor" and he certainly means the materially poor.
He goes on to say how blessed too are "you who are hungry; you who weep; you who are hated and who are rejected and marginalised and whose name is regarded as evil" because of their connection with Jesus. Undoubtedly Matthew’s Beatitudes can be read to consider just ‘spiritual’ poverty and a hunger for ‘righteousness’, which in fact are also a form of real poverty and real hunger but Luke is a gospel for the materially poor and distressed and we must be careful not to turn our focus away from them. That is why he has Jesus born in poverty and dying naked and destitute (even of his ‘friends’).
Jesus tells those who are poor and hungry and abused to rejoice when that happens and "dance for joy". There are two reasons: because their reward will be "great in heaven" and because that is the way the prophets in the past were treated (and the way Jesus the Prophet will also be treated).
At a first reading, it seems like a classical example of religion as the ‘opium of the people’: Be happy that you are having such a hard time now because there is a wonderful future waiting for you in the next world. It was the message that Karl Marx mocked the capitalist-ruled churches of preaching to the exploited ‘proletariat’.
And the second part is not likely to go down well in our contemporary developed world. ""Woe to you who are rich [he can't be serious!], you have received your comfort already." "Woe to you who are full, because you will be hungry; woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep; woe to you who are spoken well of. That is how they treated the false prophets."
How are we to understand these sayings which turn our common worldview upside down? I think they have to be seen in the light of the Kingdom, in the kind of society that Jesus came to set up, a society based on mutual love and sharing and support. A Kingdom for this world and not just the next. The coming of such a society could only be good news for the poor and destitute (material and otherwise), for those suffering from hunger (physical and otherwise), for those depressed by deep sorrow and for those abused and rejected for their commitment to Jesus and his Way.
On the other hand it would not be good news for those self-focused people who amass material wealth at the expense of others, who indulge in excessive consumption of the world’s goods, who live lives centred on personal hedonism and pleasure, and who feed off the envy and adulation of those around them. There is really no place for such people in the Kingdom. To enter fully into the Kingdom they have to unload all these concerns and obsessions and let go. Instead of focusing on what they can get; they will focus on what they can share of what they have.
A clear example is of the rich young man in the Gospel. How rich he was – and yet how sad he was! Compare him with Zacchaeus, whom we will be meeting later on.
Thursday of The Twenty-third Week of The Year
Reading 1 COL 3:12-17
Brothers and sisters:
Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved,
heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience,
bearing with one another and forgiving one another,
if one has a grievance against another;
as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.
And over all these put on love,
that is, the bond of perfection.
And let the peace of Christ control your hearts,
the peace into which you were also called in one Body.
And be thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,
as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one another,
singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs
with gratitude in your hearts to God.
And whatever you do, in word or in deed,
do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 139, 1-3. 13-14. 23-24
R.(24) Guide me, Lord, along the everlasting way.
O Lord, you have probed me and you know me;
you know when I sit and when I stand;
you understand my thoughts from afar.
My journeys and my rest you scrutinize,
with all my ways you are familiar.
Truly you have formed my inmost being;
you knit me in my mother's womb.
I give you thanks that I am fearfully, wonderfully made;
wonderful are your works.
Probe me, O God, and know my heart;
try me, and know my thoughts;
See if my way is crooked,
and lead me in the way of old.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 27-38 Jesus said to his disciples: 'To you who hear me, I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you and pray for those who maltreat you. When someone slaps you on one cheek, turn and give him the other; when someone takes your coat, let him have your shirt as well. Give to all who beg from you. When a man takes what is yours, do not demand it back. Do to others what you would have them do to you. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, how can you claim any credit? Sinners do as much. If you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what merit is there in it for you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. "Love your enemy and do good; lend without expecting repayment. Then will your recompense be great. You will rightly be called sons of the Most High, since he himself is good to the ungrateful and the wicked. "Be compassionate, as your Father is compassionate. Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Pardon, and you shall be pardoned. Give, and it shall be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over, will they pour into the fold of your garment. For the measure you measure with will be measured back to you.
Commentary on Luke 6:27-38
For many people, even those who identify themselves as Christians, this may be one of the most difficult passages in the Gospel. It seems to express an idealism that is totally unrealistic and unattainable.
We live today in a world of great violence, of terrorism, of increasing litigation – suing and counter-suing, violence and murder, of vicious vendettas often stirred up in the tabloid press and other media, the horror of terrorist attacks on the innocent. Are these things not to be avenged?
Where do Jesus’ words fit in? It may be worth noting that the passage (in the original – not in today’s reading) begins: "I say this to you who are listening." In order to understand what Jesus is really saying to us, we have to put aside our prejudices and assumptions and really listen to what he is saying. This passage, in particular, is one where we are likely to react emotionally.
"Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who treat you badly." We may feel that to follow this teaching is to try something which is totally beyond our capacity, that it would require a tremendous amount of will-power and that it would only encourage those people to behave even worse. In the Old Testament hatred of evildoers is presumed to be the right attitude to have. But Jesus is extending love to the enemy and the persecutor.
This is the core of Jesus’ teaching, which he himself practised. The Golden Rule which is often expressed as "Do not do to others what you would not want them do to you" is expressed here in positive terms.
The first big hurdle is the word "love". For us it is a very emotional word, implying both affection and intimacy. For us to "love" is often to "be in love with", to "be attracted to". But Jesus is not telling us to be in love with our enemies. He is not even telling us to like them. The Greek verb which the gospel uses is agapao (‘agapaw) from which the noun agape (‘agaph) comes. Agape [pronounced ‘ah-gah-pay'] is a special kind of love. It is not the physically-expressed love of lovers nor is it the love of close friends. It is rather an attitude of positive regard towards other people by which I wish for their well-being.
This, in fact, is the love that God has for us. It is a one-sided love in the sense that a return is not expected. God reaches out in infinite love to every single person without exception. God wishes every person to experience that love; God wishes the fullest well-being of every single person. That love of his is often not returned; it is often rejected or ignored.
But it continues unabated, like the father in the story of the prodigal son waiting for his boy to come back. The father continued to love his son even in his lowest moments of debauchery and degradation. It was the same with the people who were nailing Jesus to the cross. He prayed for them, for their being forgiven and that they might come to a realisation of just what they were doing.
In this sense, loving our enemies seems altogether reasonable. And not only not impossible but really the only thing to do.
Who are our "enemies"? First of all, they are not our enemies in the sense that we hate them or want to harm them. In that sense, Christians should have no enemies. Rather, they are people who are hostile to us. They want to harm us, take revenge on us, even destroy us, or whatever.
There are two ways we can deal with such people. We can set out to do more harm to them, to take revenge on them, or try to wipe them out completely. Or we can try and work to turn them round.
Our problem is that we tend to focus too much on ourselves and our own immediate needs and overlook the needs of others. To love as God loves is to focus more on others. We can only do this if we have a strong inner sense of security and self-acceptance. Then we are not too worried about what people say about us or do to us.
And then, too, we can turn our attention much more to the one who is hating or harming. We will begin to ask why do they have to act in this way. What is hurting inside them that drives them to such behaviour? Already we are just by thinking in this way beginning to care for our enemy and beginning to love him or her.
And is not this a much better solution to the problem? To bring peace back into that person’s life and initiate a healing process in them and between them and me.
Jesus is not at all asking us to do something "unnatural". We do not naturally want to hate or be hated. We want to love and to be loved. We see many parts of the world where – for years – there has been a process of hatred and retaliation in a never-ending spiral of vengeance and loss of life.
The only way to break this cycle is to follow Jesus’ advice. It is not a lose-lose or lose-win situation; it is a win-win situation where everyone benefits.
Perhaps words of the late Mother Teresa are appropriate here:
"Love, to be true, has to hurt. I must be willing to give whatever it takes not to harm other people and, in fact, to do good to them. This requires that I be willing to give until it hurts. Otherwise, there is no love in me and I bring injustice, not peace, to those around me."
To put Jesus’ teaching into effect is not a matter of strengthening our will to do something very difficult but to change our conventional thinking at the deepest level, to see things his way. Once we do that, it becomes much easier.
Jesus’ application of this teaching also has been the subject of much mockery. "To the man who slaps you on one cheek, present the other cheek too." In a world where macho reigns, this is just too much. Only wimps would follow Jesus’ advice because they are afraid to do anything else.
Schwarzenegger and Stallone know what to do in such cases: mow them down with an automatic machine gun.
Again, it is a question of seeing things from Jesus’, that is, God’s viewpoint. Turning the other cheek, as it is presented here, is not at all an act of weakness. It requires great courage and great inner strength and an awareness that the one who strikes is the one who is really weak. It is easy to lash out at another person by word or act. It is easy to hit back; it is almost an instinctive reaction but it is not the truly human response.
To hit back is to reduce oneself to the same level as one’s attacker and it solves nothing in the long run. Deliberately and calmly not to hit back is to refuse, in Eric Berne’s words, "to play the other person’s game". It is to break the cycle and change the level of the playing field and move it to a higher level – the level of mutual respect and human dignity.
Jesus set the example when he was struck on the face during his trial. During the whole degradation of the Passion his dignity shines out in contrast to the pathetic posturings of his judges and tormentors. This was the spirit that guided Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King and which is behind all movements devoted to active non-violence.
Jesus sets the principle: "Treat others as you would like them to treat you." You do not want to be hated or struck so you refuse, no matter what happens, to hate or strike another person. "If you love those who love you, what thanks can you expect?" No, we will not react simply in the way others deal with us.
As followers of Christ, we see things in a completely different way and we want to behave differently. We believe that not only do we personally benefit from following Jesus’ way but that others too will benefit and may even come to our point of view.
Finally, Jesus calls us to follow the model of God himself: "Be compassionate as your Father is compassionate." In Matthew’s gospel it is, "Be perfect as…" The meaning is the same: our perfection consists in our empathetic reaching out in compassionate agape to every single person.
And, through us, the compassion of God can then be experienced by people.
We are not to judge or condemn persons (although we may be asked and required to give an objective and discerned evaluation of a person’s behaviour or fitness for some task or position). And we are to forgive. Then we will not be condemned and will in turn receive forgiveness.
The emphasis is on reaching out to others rather than gathering for ourselves, being turned in on our little, insecure selves. "Give, and there will be gifts for you." Jesus put this graphically when he told us to give not only our cloak to someone asking for it but our tunic as well. Given that the poor in those days only had two garments, that would leave the donor totally naked!
But that is the point: the one filled with the spirit of Christ has nothing to lose, nothing to be ashamed of. Life consists in what we are able to give and not what we can get. "The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given back."
And that, above all, applies to agape. Everyone can give an endless supply of that.
Friday of The Twenty-third Week of The Year
Reading 11 TM 1:1-2, 12-14
Paul, an Apostle of Christ Jesus by command of God our savior and of Christ Jesus our hope, to Timothy, my true child in faith: grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
I am grateful to him who has strengthened me, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he considered me trustworthy in appointing me to the ministry. I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and an arrogant man, but I have been mercifully treated
because I acted out of ignorance in my unbelief. Indeed, the grace of our Lord has been abundant, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.
Resp. Psalm Ps 16, 1-2. 5. 7-8. 11
R.(5) You are my inheritance, O Lord.
Keep me, O God, for in you I take refuge;
I say to the Lord, "My Lord are you."
O Lord, my allotted portion and my cup,
you it is who hold fast my lot.
I bless the Lord who counsels me;
even in the night my heart exhorts me.
I set the Lord ever before me;
with him at my right hand I shall not be disturbed.
You will show me the path to life,
fullness of joys in your presence,
the delights at your right hand foreveR.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 6, 39-42
Jesus used images in speaking to his disciples: "Can a blind man act as guide to a blind man? Will they not both fall into a ditch? A student is not above his teacher; but every student when he has finished his studies will be on a par with his teacher. "Why look at the speck in your brother's eye when you miss the plank in your own? How can you say to your brother, 'Brother, let me remove the speck from your eye,' yet fail yourself to see the plank lodged in your own? Hypocrite, remove the plank from your own eye first; then you will see clearly enough to remove the speck from your brother's eye."
Commentary on Luke 6:39-42
In Matthew the parallel passage today is addressed to the Pharisees but in Luke it is addressed to the disciples.
Jesus makes two points:
a. The blind cannot lead the blind. The disciple, left to himself, does not know very much and depends on his teacher. But, once he is fully trained and has learnt everything he can from his teacher, then he becomes an extension of his teacher. He shares the knowledge and wisdom of his teacher and can, in turn, be a guide to others.
This is something we all have to do: to listen carefully to what Jesus tells us and make it part of our own lives. Only then can we effectively lead others to him.
b. We have to be very careful about sitting in judgement on others. Jesus uses a graphic image of someone trying to remove a speck of dust from another person’s eye while there is a large splinter of wood in their own. How can we see properly to correct the vision of our brother when our own vision is so distorted?
The faults we so easily see in others are often trivial in comparison with our own shortcomings. Of course, much of the energy we exert in putting down others (the main staple of our gossiping sessions!) is sub-consciously to compensate for the shortcomings we are all too aware of in ourselves. Instead of lifting ourselves up by changing our ways, we try to drag others down.
And, so often our judgements are based purely on external behaviour. We usually have no idea of the inner motives or intentions of other people or an awareness of their inability to behave otherwise than they do.
And, while we can be very ready with criticism behind people’s backs, we do not dare to say these things to their face. Yet, there may be times when we will be asked to give – as far as is possible – an objective evaluation of a person’s behaviour or their fitness for some responsibility. And, not infrequently, we will shy away from this responsibility.
Monday of The Twenty-fourth Week of The Year
Reading 11 TM 2:1-8
Beloved: First of all, I ask that supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings be offered for everyone, for kings and for all in authority, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity. This is good and pleasing to God our savior, who wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth.
For there is one God. There is also one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,
who gave himself as ransom for all.
This was the testimony at the proper time. For this I was appointed preacher and Apostle (I am speaking the truth, I am not lying), teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.
It is my wish, then, that in every place the men should pray, lifting up holy hands, without anger or argument.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 28:2, 7, 8-9R. (6)
Blessed be the Lord, for he has heard my prayer.
Hear the sound of my pleading, when I cry to you,
lifting up my hands toward your holy shrine.
The LORD is my strength and my shield.
In him my heart trusts, and I find help;
then my heart exults, and with my song I give him thanks.
The LORD is the strength of his people,
the saving refuge of his anointed.
Save your people, and bless your inheritance;
feed them, and carry them forever!
Years I and II Gospel Lk 7, 1-10
When Jesus had finished his discourse in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. A centurion had a servant he held in high regard, who was at that moment sick to the point of death. When he heard about Jesus he sent some Jewish elders to him, asking him to come and save the life of his servant. Upon approaching Jesus they petitioned him earnestly. "He deserves this favor from you," they said, "because he loves our people, and even built our synagogue for us." Jesus set out with them. When he was only a short distance from the house, the centurion sent friends to tell him: "Sir, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you enter my house. That is why I did not presume to come to you myself. Just give the order and my servant will be cured. I too am a man who knows the meaning of an order, having soldiers under my command. I say to one, 'On your way,' and off he goes; to another, 'Come here,' and he comes; to my slave, 'Do this,' and he does it." Jesus showed amazement on hearing this, and turned to the crowd which was following him to say, "I tell you, I have never found so much faith among the Israelites." When the deputation returned to the house, they found the servant in perfect health.
Commentary on Luke 7:1-10
After he had finished the Sermon on the Plain (although we do not necessarily have to think its represents teachings all given at one time) Jesus went into Capernaum, the base from which he operated when in Galilee. Almost immediately he is met with a request for healing but this one is somewhat different. It will set the stage for developments which will take place and be described later in the Acts of the Apostles (also by Luke).
The story concerns the slave of a centurion. A centurion was an army officer with – as his rank indicates – one hundred men under him. He was presumably attached to the Roman garrison in the town or one of Herod Antipas’ forces. The Roman military in general did not have a good reputation and Mel Gibson’s film ‘The Passion of the Christ’ does not altogether do them an injustice in portraying their cruelty and brutality. However, those in the Gospel do not appear in a bad light. This is a good example of the danger of stereotyping any group of people – something we are all very easily prone to do.
He was not necessarily a Roman but he was certainly not a Jew. He was a Gentile outsider. His slave, who was very dear to him, had fallen seriously ill. This, in turn, implies he treated his slave well. Undoubtedly, he had heard the stories of what Jesus had done by way of healing and wondered if his slave could also be helped.
However, as an outsider he did not dare to approach Jesus personally. He sent a delegation consisting of Jewish town elders. These are not the ‘elders’ mentioned during Jesus’ passion but simply respected members of the local Jewish community. In Matthew’s account, the centurion approaches Jesus himself. Luke having him go through influential Jewish friends sounds more plausible.
They apparently were only too willing to help because they said he was very friendly to the Jews and had even built a synagogue for them. The stage is being set for the story of Cornelius, also a soldier and the first Gentile Christian, in the Acts of the Apostles (cf. Acts 10:1ff.).
While Jesus was on his way to the house, the centurion immediately sent word that it was not necessary for Jesus to come personally. As a friend of Jews, he knew that a devout Jew, and especially a rabbi, could not enter the house of a Gentile. He did not want to be a source of embarrassment for Jesus.
"I am not worthy that you should come under my roof," he said – words which we now use every time we prepare to approach the table of the Eucharist. Just as he himself felt unworthy to be approached by Jesus. He knew that Jesus had only to say a word and his slave would be made whole again.
He recognised the very special authority that Jesus had, an authority, in some respects, not unlike his own as an army officer. He had only to say "Go" to a soldier and he went; he only had to say "Do this" and it was done. Jesus could do the same.
Jesus is amazed at the man’s faith. "I have never found such faith, even in Israel." Only twice in the Gospel is Jesus described as being amazed. This is caused by the faith of a Gentile; the other was caused by the unbelief of his townspeople in Nazareth (Mark 6:6).
When the delegation returned to the centurion’s house, they found that the slave was totally well again.
What strikes one so strongly in this story is the character of the centurion who contradicted every stereotype of the Roman soldier which the average person in Palestine would have had. He is kind and caring of his slave. He has contributed to the building of the local synagogue. He is extremely sensitive to Jewish customs and does not embarrass Jesus by approaching him directly. And, when Jesus offers to go to his house, he says that it is not necessary. He knows that Jesus, as a Jew, would become unclean by entering a Gentile house. He is a good example how wrong we can be in generalising about certain kinds or classes of people. He also clearly illustrates how a Gentile could be, as the early Church only gradually discovered, a worthy person to belong to the Christian community. In fact, this story prepares the way for Luke’s account later in the Acts of a centurion, Cornelius, being received as the first Gentile member of the Christian community (Acts chap. 10).
The key factor, of course, in this healing story is the faith of the Gentile, a faith which Jesus said he had never encountered even among many of his own people. Beginning with Cornelius, this experience will be repeated in the early Church as the first Christians, all Jews, begin to realise that the Gentiles too are being called to follow Christ and that their Spirit-filled faith can be as strong as that of any of them.
For us today it is a reminder that Jesus can reveal himself to the most unlikely persons and that we must never presume that a person is unfitted for the Christian life based on past behaviour or any other characteristics. God can call anyone and he does.
Let us, too, follow the example of the centurion in our confidence in God’s healing power in our lives.
Tuesday of the Twenty-fourth Week of the Year
Reading 11 TM 3:1-13
Beloved, this saying is trustworthy: whoever aspires to the office of bishop desires a noble task. Therefore, a bishop must be irreproachable, married only once, temperate, self-controlled, decent, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not aggressive, but gentle, not contentious, not a lover of money. He must manage his own household well, keeping his children under control with perfect dignity; for if a man does not know how to manage his own household, how can he take care of the Church of God? He should not be a recent convert, so that he may not become conceited nd thus incur the Devil's punishment. He must also have a good reputation among outsiders, so that he may not fall into disgrace, the Devil's trap.
Similarly, deacons must be dignified, not deceitful, not addicted to drink, not greedy for sordid gain, holding fast to the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. Moreover, they should be tested first; then, if there is nothing against them,
let them serve as deacons. Women, similarly, should be dignified, not slanderers, but temperate and faithful in everything.
Deacons may be married only once and must manage their children and their households well. Thus those who serve well as deacons gain good standing and much confidence in their faith in Christ Jesus.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 101:1b-2ab, 2cd-3ab, 5, 6R.(2) I will walk with blameless heart.
Of mercy and judgment I will sing;
to you, O LORD, I will sing praise.
I will persevere in the way of integrity;
when will you come to me?
I will walk with blameless heart,
within my house;
I will not set before my eyes
any base thing.
Whoever slanders his neighbor in secret,
him will I destroy.
The man of haughty eyes and puffed up heart
I will not endure.
My eyes are upon the faithful of the land,
that they may dwell with me.
He who walks in the way of integrity
shall be in my service.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 7, 11-17
Jesus went to a town called Naim, and his disciples and a large crowd accompanied him. As he approached the gate of the town a dead man was being carried out, the only son of a widowed mother. A considerable crowd of townsfolk were with her. The Lord was moved with pity upon seeing her and said to her, "Do not cry." Then he stepped forward and touched the litter; at this, the bearers halted. He said, "Young man, I bid you get up." The dead man sat up and began to speak. Then Jesus gave him back to his mother. Fear seized them all and they began to praise God. "A great prophet has risen among us," they said; and, "God has visited his people." This was the report that spread about him throughout Judea and the surrounding country.
Commentary on Luke 7:11-17
This story is only found in Luke. It is one of only three stories in the Gospel where Jesus is described as bringing a dead person to life. The most dramatic is the story of Lazarus told in John’s gospel. There is the also the story of the synagogue leader’s daughter although it is not categorically certain that she had actually died. She might have been in a coma or catatonic state.
In the thinking of the time, the scene is particularly sad. A woman, who has already lost her husband, has now lost her only son and the only means of her support. She is on the way to bury him.
The lot of the widow, in those days often a relatively young woman, was particularly difficult in a society where the married woman was no longer the responsibility of her own family and who, after the death of husband and children, was no longer the responsibility of her husband’s family either. She was largely left to her own devices in a society where social welfare of any kind was unknown.
Jesus himself is deeply moved at her plight. At this point, for the first time, Luke refers to Jesus as "Lord", a title reserved for God himself. He approaches the litter (not a coffin as we know it) carrying the dead man, tells the bearers to stop and then orders the young man to rise up. As in other similar stories, the word "rise up" is the same as that used to describe the resurrection of Jesus. "I have come that they may have life."
The reaction of the people around is one of awe and admiration. "A great prophet has risen among us and God has visited his people." They had no doubts about the origin of what they had seen taking place; it was the work of God. Not surprisingly, the story spread like wildfire all through Judea and beyond. The episode prepares the way for Jesus’ response to the disciples of John the Baptist a little later (but which is not included in our Mass readings at this time).
This story should help us to look at our own situation and see, first of all, how alive we really are.
Let us look around and see how many people need to be lifted up and helped to find new life. Maybe we can do something for them.
Wednesday of The Twenty-fourth Week of The Year
Reading 11 TM 3:14-16
Beloved: I am writing you, although I hope to visit you soon. But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth. Undeniably great is the mystery of devotion,
Who was manifested in the flesh, vindicated in the spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed to the Gentiles, believed in throughout the world, taken up in glory.
Responsorial PsalmPs 111:1-2, 3-4, 5-6
R. (2) How great are the works of the Lord!
I will give thanks to the LORD with all my heart
in the company and assembly of the just.
Great are the works of the LORD,
exquisite in all their delights.
Majesty and glory are his work,
and his justice endures forever.
He has won renown for his wondrous deeds;
gracious and merciful is the LORD.
He has given food to those who fear him;
he will forever be mindful of his covenant.
He has made known to his people the power of his works,
giving them the inheritance of the nations.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 7, 31-35
Jesus said: "What comparison can I use for the men of today? What are they like? They are like children squatting in the city squares and calling to their playmates, 'We piped you a tune but you did not dance, We sang you a dirge but you did not wail.' I mean that John the Baptizer came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, 'He is mad!' The Son of Man came and he both ate and drank, and you say, 'Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!' God's wisdom is vindicated by all who accept it."
Commentary on Luke 7:31-35
Today’s passage follows immediately after the scene (not in our Mass readings) where Jesus answers the query from John the Baptist languishing in prison about whether Jesus is truly the Messiah. Jesus uses the occasion to speak words of high praise for John, "Of all the children born of women, there is no one greater than John".
Jesus now criticises the cynicism and self-contradictory attitudes of those who reject both him and John. They have simply closed their ears and want to hear nothing and learn nothing. He compares them to children in a city square calling to their playmates. "When we played lively music for you, you would not dance; when we played funereal music, you would not mourn."
This comparison Jesus applies to John the Baptist and himself. John led an austere life in the desert eating, as we are told elsewhere, only locusts and wild honey. They said he was mad and rejected him. Jesus came leading a highly convivial life, mixing with all kinds of people. They called him a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and other sinful people. He even invited a tax collector to be one of his twelve Apostles!
It was a no-win situation. When people are like that there is really nothing that can be done. Jesus concludes with the enigmatic statement, "Wisdom has been proved right by all her children." Both John and Jesus could both be described as children of Wisdom, whose origin is God himself. Those who can see the hand of God in the lives of John and Jesus are also children of Wisdom. Those who adamantly refuse to see God are not.
It is important for us not to fall into such a trap. God speaks to us in so many ways and through so many people and situations. It is very easy to find ourselves excluding a priori the people or situations by which God is trying to reach us.
We cannot expect God to speak to us in ways which we find congenial. He may speak to us through a saint or a sinner. Through a conservative or a liberal. Through a man or a woman – or a young child. Through an old person or a young person. Through an educated or an illiterate person… Through a local person or a foreigner. Through a straight or gay person… Through a saint or a sinner. We have at all times to be ready to listen with an unprejudiced mind and heart.
Thursday of the Twenty-fourth Week of the Year
Reading 11 TM 4:12-16
Beloved: Let no one have contempt for your youth, but set an example for those who believe, in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity. Until I arrive, attend to the reading, exhortation, and teaching. Do not neglect the gift you have, which was conferred on you through the prophetic word with the imposition of hands by the presbyterate. Be diligent in these matters, be absorbed in them, so that your progress may be evident to everyone. Attend to yourself and to your teaching;
persevere in both tasks, for by doing so you will save both yourself and those who listen to you.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 7, 36-50
There was a certain Pharisee who invited Jesus to dine with him. Jesus went to the Phariseés home and reclined to eat. A woman known in the town to be a sinner learned that he was dining in the Phariseés home. She brought in a vase of perfumed oil and stood behind him at his feet, weeping so that her tears fell upon his feet. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissing them and perfuming them with the oil.
When his host, the Pharisee, saw this, he said to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would know who and what sort of woman this is that touches him -- that she is a sinner."
In answer to his thoughts, Jesus said to him, "Simon, I have something to propose to you." "Teacher," he said, "speak." "Two men owed money to a certain moneylender; one owed a total of five hundred coins, the other fifty. Since neither was able to repay, he wrote off both debts. Which of them was more grateful to him?"
Simon answered, "He, I presume, to whom he remitted the larger sum." Jesus said to him, "You are right."
Turning then to the woman, he said to Simon: "You see this woman? I came to your home and you provided me with no water for my feet. She has washed my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but she has not ceased kissing my feet since I entered. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with perfume. I tell you, that is why her many sins are forgiven -- because of her great love. Little is forgiven the one whose love is small."
He said to her then, "Your sins are forgiven," at which his fellow guests began to ask among themselves, "Who is this that he even forgives sin?" Meanwhile he said to the woman, "Your faith has been your salvation. Now go in peace."
Commentary on Luke 7:36-50
Today’s passage is one of the most striking scenes in the whole of the Gospel. It is a story only found in Luke and, in a way it is strange that it is not otherwise recorded. It is not the same as the anointing of Jesus at Bethany, described by Matthew (26:6-13). Perhaps to some, especially Jewish readers, it was a little too daring and close to the edge. Because it is a highly sexual story in which Jesus is deeply involved.
We are told that a Pharisee – his name is Simon – was keen to have Jesus eat at his house. The word ‘Pharisee’ means ‘separated one’ and they numbered about 6,000 throughout Palestine. They taught in synagogues and, as their name implies, they saw themselves on a higher level of religious observance. They believed that interpretations and rules handed down by tradition had virtually the same authority as Scripture (cf. Mark 7:8-13). As a result, they were constantly bothered by Jesus’ behaviour.
Jesus accepted the invitation and he joined Simon and others at the table. We should notice that Jesus accepted invitations from both Pharisees and tax collectors. Both were equally deserving of his love and service. The diners would be reclining on couches, rather than sitting, as was the fashion of the day. This helps to explain what is going to happen.
It is not clear whether what happened next was totally spontaneous or whether it was part of a conspiracy to put Jesus in a compromising position where he could be denounced (not unlike his being presented with an adulterous woman – John 8:1ff). In one sense it was strange that a woman such as this could burst into a Pharisee’s house unchallenged (there must have been servants); on the other hand, houses were not bolted and barred as they are in our more civilised(?) times.
What is clear is that the woman’s own intentions were sincere. We are told she was a sinner. "Sinner" here can only refer to some public immorality and very likely she was a "woman of the street", a prostitute or at least a woman known for her promiscuous behaviour.
She was eager to meet with Jesus and heard that he was dining at Simon’s house. So she burst in, bringing an alabaster box of ointment (probably quite expensive – the gift of an appreciative client?) and came up to Jesus from behind. She immediately began crying and her abundant tears bathed Jesus’ feet. She then began to dry his feet with her long hair. The fact that she wore her hair down or let it down in public itself indicates that she was a "loose" woman. She kissed the feet of Jesus and poured the ointment over them.
Simon, whether he had planned the intrusion or not, was deeply shocked at the extraordinary scene that was playing out before his eyes and in his house. If Jesus was really a prophet, he thought to himself, he would know what kind of a woman this was who was touching him. She was a sinner and no good person, least of all a rabbi, should allow anything remotely like that to take place.
Jesus, fully aware of what was going on in Simon’s mind, tells him a story about two debtors. One owed a large amount and other a smaller amount. However, the creditor wrote off both debts. Which of the two, Jesus asked, would be more grateful and appreciative? Obviously the one who had been remitted the larger debt, said Simon.
"Well said," replied Jesus and then went on to apply the parable to the present situation. In the process he indicates something that Simon had probably not thought of – that he, too, was a sinner, even though to a lesser degree. Because Simon had been guilty of not extending even the ordinary courtesies of hospitality to his guest.
Simon had not had Jesus’ feet washed when he came into the house but the woman had washed his feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. Simon had not given a kiss of greeting but the woman had not stopped kissing his feet since she came into the house. Simon had not put oil on his guest’s head but the woman had poured an expensive flask of ointment over his feet.
And therefore – now comes the point of the story: "Her many sins have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love." The one who has less forgiven loves less. And, turning to the woman at his feet, Jesus says, "Your sins are forgiven." And the guests at table begin to ask each other: "Who is this that he forgives sin?" Again Jesus says to the woman, "Your faith has made you whole again. Go in peace."
This is a really extraordinary story. To appreciate this one has to enter into it visually and be really present with all one’s senses active. What comes across is the amazing composure and inner security and freedom of Jesus during the whole episode. He shows absolutely no signs of being uncomfortable or embarrassed. He does not pull away or tell the woman to stop what she is doing.
Here is this woman, known to be a public sinner, who comes in and weeps over him, wipes his feet with her hair and keeps kissing them passionately. The guests are highly disturbed, shocked and probably embarrassed but Jesus remains perfectly at ease. The reason is that he knows what the woman is doing and is not worried about what others might think she is doing.
Let us admire his ability to focus totally on the woman and not be self-conscious about the other people around. Can one imagine what a tabloid publication might have made of this scene?! What if something like that were to happen today with a bishop or a priest? Or some other prominent person? How would most clergy – or other public people react in such a situation?
Jesus can see that the woman is expressing both sincere repentance and a great affection for Jesus. She is expressing her repentance in the only way that she knows. She is a highly tactile person; it is part of her way of life. To the sexually immature, what she is doing and Jesus’ acceptance of it seems at the very least unbecoming and at the worst bordering on the obscene.
But Jesus says her sins are now forgiven. It was really the passionate love she was showing which indicated that had won forgiveness. Love and sin are incompatible; they cannot co-exist in the same person. She was loving Jesus so much at that moment that she could not be a sinner. Simon could not see this. His concept of sin was purely legalistic. For Jesus it is relational.
At this point her immoral past was totally irrelevant. In our society wrongdoers can be stuck with labels often for the rest of their lives irrespective of how they have changed. God does not work that way. He deals with persons as they are here and now. What I did yesterday does not matter. All that matters is what I am doing now, how I am relating to God and those around me right now.
We remember the man who died beside Jesus on the cross. He had led a terrible life and was now being executed for his crimes. Yet he appeals to Jesus and is promised that he will go to God hand in hand with Jesus. Unfair? Fortunately God’s ideas of fairness are not ours. Otherwise we might be in trouble because of our past.
Once again we see how God, in Jesus, always tries to rehabilitate and not to punish. Punishment destroys. God’s desire is that we be all made whole and experience inner peace and harmony.
Friday of the Twenty-fourth Week of the Year
Reading 11 TM 6:2C-12
Beloved: Teach and urge these things. Whoever teaches something different and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the religious teaching is conceited, understanding nothing, and has a morbid disposition for arguments and verbal disputes. From these come envy, rivalry, insults, evil suspicions, and mutual friction among people with corrupted minds, who are deprived of the truth, supposing religion to be a means of gain. Indeed, religion with contentment is a great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, just as we shall not be able to take anything out of it.
If we have food and clothing, we shall be content with that. Those who want to be rich are falling into temptation and into a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires, which plunge them into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all evils, and some people in their desire for it have strayed from the faith and have pierced themselves with many pains.
But you, man of God, avoid all this. Instead, pursue righteousness, devotion, faith, love, patience, and gentleness. Compete well for the faith. Lay hold of eternal life, to which you were called when you made the noble confession in the presence of many witnesses.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 49:6-7, 8-10, 17-18, 19-20
R. Blessed the poor in spirit; the Kingdom of heaven is theirs!
Why should I fear in evil days
when my wicked ensnarers ring me round?
They trust in their wealth;
the abundance of their riches is their boast.
Yet in no way can a man redeem himself,
or pay his own ransom to God;
Too high is the price to redeem one's life; he would never have enough
to remain alive always and not see destruction.
Fear not when a man grows rich,
when the wealth of his house becomes great,
For when he dies, he shall take none of it;
his wealth shall not follow him down.
Though in his lifetime he counted himself blessed,
"They will praise you for doing well for yourself,"
He shall join the circle of his forebears
who shall never more see light.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 1-3
Jesus journeyed through towns and villages preaching and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God. The Twelve accompanied him, and also some women who had been cured of evil spirits and maladies: Mary called the Magdalene, from whom seven devils had gone out, Joanna, the wife of Herod's steward Chuza, Susanna, and many others who were assisting them out of their means.
Commentary on Luke 8:1-3
This passage follows immediately from yesterday’s about the sinful woman in the house of Simon the Pharisee. It is one of those summary passages describing in general terms the work of Jesus.
He is accompanied by the chosen Twelve, his co-operators in the preaching of the word and the establishing of the Kingdom. And it is precisely the Good News (the Gospel) about the Kingdom that they are preaching in word and demonstrating in practice.
What is noteworthy here – and it is unique to Luke – is the mention of many women also travelling in the company of Jesus. Some of them were women who had been healed of evil spirits. One is mentioned by name, Mary of Magdala, from whom seven evil spirits had been exorcised. The number seven is not to be taken literally but indicates the woman had formerly been in a seriously immoral state. She appears very prominently in John’s gospel as someone very close to Jesus and he describes her as the first witness of the Resurrection. It is possible, too, that the "sinful woman" in the house of Simon the Pharisee was also in the group.
Some of the other women seem to be of more ample means and higher social rank. One of them was Joanna, the wife of King Herod’s steward. They helped Jesus and his disciples with their material needs. Once again, Jesus is not embarrassed to travel in the company of these women; nor are they uncomfortable in his.
We see here two roles being played by followers of Jesus. On the one hand are the apostles whose function it is to proclaim the Gospel and establish the Kingdom by word and deed, by preaching and by the example of the communal and shared life they are leading.
The other role is that of disciples who are materially better off and who support the work of proclaiming the Gospel by providing for the material and other needs of the evangelisers.
Both roles are complementary and both, taken together, form the evangelising work of the Church.
A good example are the Sisters of Mother Teresa who would never be able to take care of the destitute dying without the generous help of many benefactors. And the same for many other voluntary groups involved in looking after the disadvantaged.
*Monday of the Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 1, 1-6
These are the people of the Lord who went to Jerusalem to build the temple of the Lord God.
In the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord inspired King Cyrus of Persia to issue this proclamation throughout his kingdom, both by word of mouth and in writing: "Thus says Cyrus, king of Persia: 'All the kingdoms of the earth the Lord, the God of heaven, has given to me, and he has also charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever, therefore, among you belongs to any part of his people, let him go up, and may his God be with him! Let everyone who has survived, in whatever place he may have dwelt, be assisted by the people of that place with silver, gold, goods, and cattle, together with free-will offerings for the house of God in Jerusalem.'" Then the family heads of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and Levites -- everyone, that is, whom God had inspired to do so -- prepared to go up to build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem. All their neighbors gave them help in every way, with silver, gold, goods, and cattle, and with many precious gifts besides all their free-will offerings.
Resp. Psalm Ps 126, 1-2. 2-3. 4-5. 6
R.(3) The Lord has done marvels for us.
When the Lord brought back the captives of Zion,
we were like men dreaming.
Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
and our tongue with rejoicing.
Then they said among the nations,
"The Lord has done great things for them."
The Lord has done great things for us;
we are glad indeed.
Restore our fortunes, O Lord,
like the torrents in the southern desert.
Those that sow in tears
shall reap rejoicing.
Although they go forth weeping,
carrying the seed to be sown,
They shall come back rejoicing,
carrying their sheaves.
Year II Reading I Prv 3, 27-34
Refuse no one the good on which he has a claim
when it is in your power to do it for him.
Say not to your neighbor, "Go, and come again,
tomorrow I will give," when you can give at once.
Plot no evil against your neighbor,
against him who lives at peace with you.
Quarrel not with a man without cause,
with one who has done you no harm.
Envy not the lawless man
and choose none of his ways:
To the Lord the perverse man is an abomination,
but with the upright is his friendship.
The curse of the Lord is on the house of the wicked,
but the dwelling of the just he blesses;
When he is dealing with the arrogant,
he is stern, but to the humble he shows kindness.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 15, 2-3. 3-4. 5
R.(1) He who does justice shall live on the Lord's holy mountain.
He who walks blamelessly and does justice;
who thinks the truth in his heart
and slanders not with his tongue;
Who harms not his fellow man,
nor takes up a reproach against his neighbor;
By whom the reprobate is despised,
while he honors those who fear the Lord;
Who lends not his money at usury
and accepts no bribe against the innocent.
He who does these things
shall never be disturbed.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 16-18
Jesus said to the crowd: No one who lights a lamp conceals it under a vessel, or sets it under a bed; rather he puts it on a lamp stand so that whoever comes in can see it. There is nothing hidden that will not be exposed, nothing concealed that will not be known and brought to light. Take heed, therefore, how you hear: to the man who has, more will be given; and he who has not, will lose even the little he thinks he has."
Commentary on Luke 8:16-18
The message today seems clear enough. The Gospel message is not meant to be kept hidden.
We are not a ‘mystery religion’ in the sense that the Gospel is only for initiates. It is a message that is to be proclaimed from the housetops. If what we believe and say is true it will prevail. We understand Jesus to be the Light of the world, and his followers are also to be like lamps shining out for all the world to see. An invisible Christian is a contradiction in terms, yet there are strong tendencies for us to keep our religion to ourselves and not foist it on others.
However, forcing others to believe is not the message given, even if it were possible. Inviting people to “come and see”, to hear the message and have a personal experience of living it is something else. We also believe that the Gospel message offers a way of life that brings great happiness into the lives of individuals and of whole societies if it is really followed. So, part of our communicating the message is as much through our lifestyle (“See…it works!”) as through what we say.
Jesus says today:
So pay attention to how you listen…
It is not just listening, but a hearing which understands, accepts, assimilates and puts into practice. What is heard and assimilated has to be passed on. Otherwise it dies, because:
…for to those who have, more will be given, and from those who do not have, even what they seem to have will be taken away.
To be a Christian is not to reach a certain level and stay there. It essentially means constant growth and development – to stay still or to stagnate is to go backwards.
*Monday of the Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 1, 1-6
These are the people of the Lord who went to Jerusalem to build the temple of the Lord God.
In the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord inspired King Cyrus of Persia to issue this proclamation throughout his kingdom, both by word of mouth and in writing: "Thus says Cyrus, king of Persia: 'All the kingdoms of the earth the Lord, the God of heaven, has given to me, and he has also charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever, therefore, among you belongs to any part of his people, let him go up, and may his God be with him! Let everyone who has survived, in whatever place he may have dwelt, be assisted by the people of that place with silver, gold, goods, and cattle, together with free-will offerings for the house of God in Jerusalem.'" Then the family heads of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and Levites -- everyone, that is, whom God had inspired to do so -- prepared to go up to build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem. All their neighbors gave them help in every way, with silver, gold, goods, and cattle, and with many precious gifts besides all their free-will offerings.
Resp. Psalm Ps 126, 1-2. 2-3. 4-5. 6
R.(3) The Lord has done marvels for us.
When the Lord brought back the captives of Zion,
we were like men dreaming.
Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
and our tongue with rejoicing.
Then they said among the nations,
"The Lord has done great things for them."
The Lord has done great things for us;
we are glad indeed.
Restore our fortunes, O Lord,
like the torrents in the southern desert.
Those that sow in tears
shall reap rejoicing.
Although they go forth weeping,
carrying the seed to be sown,
They shall come back rejoicing,
carrying their sheaves.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 16-18
Jesus said to the crowd: No one who lights a lamp conceals it under a vessel, or sets it under a bed; rather he puts it on a lamp stand so that whoever comes in can see it. There is nothing hidden that will not be exposed, nothing concealed that will not be known and brought to light. Take heed, therefore, how you hear: to the man who has, more will be given; and he who has not, will lose even the little he thinks he has."
Commentary on Luke 8:16-18
The message today seems clear enough. The Gospel message is not meant to be kept hidden.
We are not a ‘mystery religion’ in the sense that the Gospel is only for initiates. It is a message that is to be proclaimed from the housetops. If what we believe and say is true it will prevail. We understand Jesus to be the Light of the world, and his followers are also to be like lamps shining out for all the world to see. An invisible Christian is a contradiction in terms, yet there are strong tendencies for us to keep our religion to ourselves and not foist it on others.
However, forcing others to believe is not the message given, even if it were possible. Inviting people to “come and see”, to hear the message and have a personal experience of living it is something else. We also believe that the Gospel message offers a way of life that brings great happiness into the lives of individuals and of whole societies if it is really followed. So, part of our communicating the message is as much through our lifestyle (“See…it works!”) as through what we say.
Jesus says today:
So pay attention to how you listen…
It is not just listening, but a hearing which understands, accepts, assimilates and puts into practice. What is heard and assimilated has to be passed on. Otherwise it dies, because:
…for to those who have, more will be given, and from those who do not have, even what they seem to have will be taken away.
To be a Christian is not to reach a certain level and stay there. It essentially means constant growth and development – to stay still or to stagnate is to go backwards.
Tuesday of The Twenty-fifth Week of the Year
Year 1 Reading 1 Ezr 6, 7-8. 12. 14-20
King Darius issued an order to the officials of West-of-Euphrates: "Let the governor and the elders of the Jews continue the work on that house of God; they are to rebuild it on its former site. I also issue this decree concerning your dealing with these elders of the Jews in the rebuilding of that house of God: From the royal revenue, the taxes of West-of-Euphrates, let these men be repaid for their expenses, in full and without delay. I, Darius, have issued this decree; let it be carefully executed."
The elders of the Jews continued to make progress in the building, supported by the message of the prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, son of Iddo. They finished the building according to the command of the God of Israel and the decrees of Cyrus and Darius [and of Artaxerxes, king of Persia]. They completed this house on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius. The Israelites -- priests, Levites, and the other returned exiles -- celebrated the dedication of this house of God with joy. For the dedication of this house of God, they offered one hundred bulls, two hundred rams, and four hundred lambs, together with twelve he-goats as a sin-offering for all Israel, in keeping with the number of the tribes of Israel. Finally, they set up the priests in their classes and the Levites in their divisions for the service of God in Jerusalem, as is prescribed in the book of Moses.
The exiles kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the first month. The Levites, every one of whom had purified himself for the occasion, sacrificed the Passover for the rest of the exiles, for their brethren the priests, and for themselves.
Resp. Psalm Ps 122, 1-2. 3-4. 4-5
R.(1) I rejoiced when I heard them say:
let us go to the house of the Lord.
I rejoiced because they said to me,
"We will go up to the house of the Lord."
And now we have set foot
within your gates, O Jerusalem --
Jerusalem, built as a city
with compact unity.
To it the tribes go up,
the tribes of the Lord,
According to the decree for Israel,
to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
In it are set up judgment seats,
seats for the house of David.
II Reading I Prv 21, 1-6. 10-13
Like a stream is the king's heart in the hand of the Lord;
wherever it pleases him, he directs it.
All the ways of a man may be right in his own eyes,
but it is the Lord who proves hearts.
To do what is right and just
is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice.
Haughty eyes and a proud heart --
the tillage of the wicked is sin.
The plans of the diligent are sure of profit,
but all rash haste leads certainly to poverty.
He who makes a fortune by a lying tongue
is chasing a bubble over deadly snares.
The soul of the wicked man desires evil;
his neighbor finds no pity in his eyes.
When the arrogant man is punished, the simple are the wiser;
when the wise man is instructed, he gains knowledge.
The just man appraises the house of the wicked:
there is one who brings down the wicked to ruin.
He who shuts his ear to the cry of the poor
will himself also call and not be heard.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 119, 1. 27. 30. 34. 35. 44
R.(35) Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Happy are they whose way is blameless,
who walk in the law of the Lord.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Make me understand the way of your precepts,
and I will meditate on your wondrous deeds.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
The way of truth I have chosen; I have set your ordinances before me.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Give me discernment, that I may observe your law
and keep it with all my heart.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Lead me in the path of your commands, for in it I delight.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
And I will keep your law continually, forever and ever.
R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.
Years I and II Gospel Lk 8, 19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus came to be with him, but they could not reach him because of the crowd. He was informed, "Your mother and your brothers are standing outside and wish to see you." He told them in reply, "My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and act upon it."
Commentary on Luke 8:19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus come looking for him but they cannot get to him because of the crush of people in the house where he is speaking. Jesus was in Capernaum at the time and Nazareth was about 50 km (30 miles) away. The mention of ‘brothers’ would commonly indicate cousins and not just siblings. When the message is passed in to Jesus, he says to all:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
The story is told in harsher terms in Mark. He has Jesus say, for instance:
Who are my mother and my brothers?” (Mark 3:33)
It is suggested there that their purpose was to take him away. On the one hand, they thought he was mad and an embarrassment to the family and, secondly, that he might get them into trouble with the authorities because of the provocative things he was saying and doing such as questioning traditional interpretations of the Law. We see a similar embarrassment on the part of the parents of the man born blind in John chapter 9. They refuse to speak to the authorities about their son:
Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself. (John 9:21)
Luke’s account is softer and just focuses on the saying of Jesus. In fact, Luke has taken this passage out of its context in Mark (3:31-35) and turns it into a conclusion to his short section on the parables. In doing so, he modifies Mark’s statement:
Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother. (Mark 3:35)
This is done to match the end of Luke’s parable of the sower:
…the ones who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart and bear fruit with endurance. (Luke 8:15)
Luke has Jesus say:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
To a society which regarded itself as God’s chosen people merely by birth and an external ritual like circumcision, Jesus asserts that belonging to God has little to do with blood or race, but only with the relationship one establishes with God.
There is a lot of meaning in the words of the message:
Your mother and your brothers are standing outside…
It was clear from their behaviour that they were not, like the seed falling on fertile soil, ‘hearing’ him and so they were outsiders. Those who really ‘hear’, no matter who they are or where they come from, are ‘insiders’ and belong to the family of Jesus.
Of course, we know from elsewhere, especially in Luke’s gospel, that Mary is not being condemned here. In fact, this is where her greatness really lies. Clearly it partly lies in her being chosen to be the mother of God’s Son. But perhaps it lies even more in her saying ‘Yes’ (“…let it be with me according to your word”), in her unswerving faithfulness to that ‘Yes’ and in her standing by her Son to the very end when all the rest had fled.
When, on another occasion, she was indirectly praised for being the mother of such a Son, Jesus had spoken in words very similar to today:
Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it! (Luke 11:28)
Our discipleship, too, is not determined by our being born into a Catholic family or just by being baptised or by observing the external requirements of our religion, but by our total commitment to the Gospel and to an unconditional following of Jesus. Only then can we truly be said to be his brother or sister.
