Eleventh Week

11th Week in Ordinary Time, Wednesday

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In today’s First Reading St. Paul encourages us to give bountifully and cheerfully, without sadness or compulsion. Our Lord in today’s Gospel describes the three classic dimensions of Christian life, and the attitude we should have while living them: doing it for God, not for self-promotion. Prayer, fasting, and alms giving can be miserable if we do them in a calculating way, grudgingly, or just to fulfill some social obligation out of peer pressure. When we’re miserly in these things, making sure everyone knows we’re not happy about something we feel forced to do is natural, our glum attitude is simply venting in the face of an unpleasant situation. On the flip side, when we do these things in a flashy way, out of a desire for esteem or self-promotion, the boost to our ego is all we should expect, and that is not much: we’re just turning Christian living into another way to get ahead in a competitive world.

It’s not a question of not doing what we don’t want to do; rather, it is reminding ourselves, as St. Paul does in the First Reading, that a generous and cheerful heart is not only a blessing for those to whom it is giving–God and others–but a source of joy and peace to the giver as well. Instead of a vicious circle it becomes a virtuous cycle: it gives us a sort of spiritual second wind that helps us maintain our effort. We’ll feel the weight of sacrificing something for others, of giving precious time to God, of denying ourselves some comforts in order to win spiritual benefits for others and to grow in self-mastery, but we won’t let that stop us from giving from the heart. Virtue goes deeper than feelings. We experience that on those days when we pray, fast, and give alms even when we are having, by other standards, a rotten day and seemingly no recognition. When we joyfully give, quietly pray, and quietly fast we also ensure that what we are doing is for God, not just for ourselves. Our Lord may not reward us with a lot of public recognition, as we reminds us in today’s Gospel, but he will bless us.

Let’s examine today any glumness in our Christian living and ask Our Lord for the grace to give bountifully, cheerfully, and for his glory and not our own, knowing that he will bless us and others.

Readings: 2 Corinthians 9:6–11; Psalm 112:1b–4, 9; Matthew 6:1–6, 16–18.

11th Week in Ordinary Time, Tuesday

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In today’s First Reading Paul gives the Corinthians a way to measure whether their love is genuine: by their concern for others. As Our Lord reminds us in today’s Gospel good people and evil people receive gifts from God so that they can live a good life: the sun warms them, the refreshes them, together they provide the conditions for the food we need, etc. God’s concern is not conditioned by whether someone is a saint or a sinner: he provides for them and gives them the means to be holy. Droughts, natural disasters, and other calamities don’t just target the good or just the wicked. God really doesn’t need to intervene in that way: a sinner’s punishment is largely self-inflicted, and if a sinner doesn’t use God’s blessings wisely, it’ll only get worse, even eternally worse.

When evil stares us in the face, not some nebulous force or Hollywood B movie caricature, but real evil done by real people and to real people, we must combat it for the sake of others, but we must not lose our concern for the people who are on that path to misery and failure by their misdeeds. That is the sign of genuine love, a perfect love, like our Heavenly Father’s love. It’s not a love conditioned by the love we expect in return or have received; otherwise we’d only care about those who care for us. That is the secret to overcoming the damage any lack of love on the part of others may have caused in our lives. Love can triumph if we let it. Society, a difficult family situation, an evil done to us can only conquer our love if we let it.

Let’s ask Our Lord today to strengthen our love by growing in our concern for others and praying for sinners to take up the path of life again.

Readings: 2 Corinthians 8:1–9; Psalm 146:2, 5–9a; Matthew 5:43–48.

11th Week in Ordinary Time, Monday

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In a world that’s often focused on vendettas, avenging wrongs, trampled rights, and payback, Our Lord reminds us today of what has been a trademark of Christianity throughout the centuries: turning the other cheek. Meekness is often considered weakness, but it actually involves a very virtuous effort to not strike, or even dislike, the one who’s struck you, to give your time and possessions when someone doesn’t have a right to them, or to go out of your way beyond what any reasonable person would expect.

Our Lord has set the standard. How many blows did he receive? Being God, he didn’t have to become flesh and sacrifice himself for our salvation. When Adam and Eve sinnedGod could have left us to the mess they’d made of our lives, just as he could every time we sin and continue to sin. With all that baggage anything we ask, or sometimes demand, of Our Lord is something he is under no obligation whatsoever to to fulfill. And yet he does and continues to do so.

We often focus on the receiving end of the slights and offenses that he describes in today’s Gospel, but what he also teaches, through example, is how we should not be on the giving end of them either. Even today we have an eloquent testimony in so many Christians suffering persecution and death. Let’s ask Our Lord today for the meekness and humility of heart that enables us to turn the other cheek and to go out of our way for others.

Readings: 2 Corinthians 6:1–10; Psalm 98:1, 2b–4; Matthew 5:38–42.

11th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

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Salvadora persica

When Our Lord begins his public ministry the core of his message is that the Kingdom of God is at hand, and conversion and faith in the Gospel are needed. In today’s Gospel he gives us two parables to understand what the Kingdom of God is: the sowing and reaping of grain and the growth of a mustard seed. By teaching in parables he is trying to explain deeper spiritual realities using the every day realities that his listeners understand. The Gospel reminds us that he also gave more explanations in private to the disciples: deeper spiritual realities are understood more fully through parables and explanations, but since they ultimately refer back to the deepest mystery–God–they’re never completely fathomable.

The Kingdom of God reflects this profundity: it is reflected in the Church and her work, but it also the whole work of salvation, of God conquering hearts, one by one, throughout the centuries, until his reign of love endures forever in the hearts of those who welcomed it. The example of the grain shows us that this requires cultivation, waiting for the right time to reap the spiritual harvest of our labors, but also that God does the heavy lifting: the growth that is quiet, slow, and unseen, at times even when we’re not doing anything, comes from him and from his grace working in our souls and in the souls of others. The example of the mustard see shows that it starts small: in Jesus’ earthly ministry it went from him, to twelve disciples, then to thousands by the time narrated in the Acts of the Apostles, and to the whole world and throughout history. The Kingdom doesn’t just represent something small that has an incredible capacity for growth and expansion; like the cool shade of the mustard plant it makes room for everyone to find rest and consolation, because God wants everyone to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.

Let’s pray today for the grace to cultivate the Kingdom of God in our hearts and for the insight to find our place in it. It’s not just something in the future: it is growing here and now.

Readings: Ezekiel 17:22–24; Psalm 92:2–3, 13–16; 2 Corinthians 5:6–10; Mark 4:26–34.