Ordinary Time

32nd Week in Ordinary Time, Tuesday

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Everyone likes recognition for the work they do; some people even crave it, but Our Lord in today’s Gospel encourages us to be content with the fact that we’ve been able to serve another and perform our duties. There are many people in the world who’ll never get Employee of the Month, but who have done their work well. If that moment of recognition comes, Our Lord tells us what our attitude should be: humility. If recognition is the motivation for our service, it’s no so much service as trying to climb the social or career ladder, and that can lead to a false sense of entitlement that makes us frustrated when we should just be focusing on doing our job.

Sometimes service without recognition is hard. In the First Reading Our Lord reminds us that the souls of the virtuous suffered trials, sometimes apparent disaster, but in the end they were in the hand of God and shined, full of grace and mercy. We shouldn’t worry so much about receiving recognition; in the end Our Lord will give us the recognition we deserve as the good and just God that he is.

Let’s focus today on being useful servants who do their duty and not so much on being Employee of the Month. If we do, maybe we’ll get both. It’s in the Lord’s hands.

Readings: Wisdom 2:23–3:9; Psalm 34:2–3, 16–19; Luke 17:7–10.

32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

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In today’s readings we see a parallel between the First Reading and the Gospel: the generosity of a widow who shows faith and hope. In the First Reading Elijah asks for a handout while Israel is suffering an extended drought. The widow doesn’t disagree, she simply thinks she’d have to choose between her, her son, or Elijah: one would starve to death for the sake of another, and ultimately as well. Elijah gives her an opportunity in faith to trust in the Lord’s Providence: she’ll be provided for until the drought ends for her generosity. She provides for her son and helps the Lord through helping Elijah and everything works out.

In the Gospel Our Lord is moved by the generosity of a poor widow who gives all she has to the Temple treasury. She sacrifices her livelihood for the sake of giving alms, and no one notices her, because the amount seems so insignificant. It’s not insignificant to her, which is why it is so generous. She’s not doing it for good public relations, as the rich men are doing out of their surplus. She’s not even negotiating like Elijah and the widow in the First Reading. Little does she know that God himself is looking upon her sacrifice with contentment through the eyes of the Son, and making it an example for the disciples to follow.

We all know the expression “give ’til it hurts”; if we put a little of our comfort and livelihood on the line in giving, whether time, talent, or treasure, Our Lord sees and will bless us, even if the world doesn’t. Let’s be generous today in sharing what we have with others, knowing if we take care of others Our Lord will take care of us abundantly.

Readings: 1 Kings 17:10–16; Psalm 146:7–10; Hebrews 9:24–28; Mark 12:38–44. See also 9th Week in Ordinary Time, Saturday.

31st Week in Ordinary Time, Saturday

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In yesterday‘s Gospel Our Lord gave the example of the dishonest and shrewd steward as an example not to follow. Today he explains why. As a strategy for gaining the things that really matter it is laughable, and it rarely stops at small infractions. When he challenges them to see if dishonest wealth will get them into Heaven (“eternal dwellings”), he in part is ridiculing the thought that that strategy would even work–God can’t be swindled. If you can’t be trusted in small matters, you can’t be trusted in larger ones either: it’s no coincidence that people who swindle others out of something are called confidence men (or con men): they prey on trust to get something to which they’re not entitled.

The bad example from yesterday was helping your boss defraud people (and then defrauding your boss), but there are many things we’d be dishonest in taking, because they don’t belong to us. Using the company car or phone for personal matters. Surfing the Internet or calling friends when we should be working. Goofing off when we should be studying. Giving the love we’ve promised unconditionally to our spouse to another, either in person or through the Internet. Turning the time you should be dedicating to your spouse and children into “me” time. Trust is a fragile thing, and, once lost, it is not easily restored: suspicion will cast a pall over everything we do after our dishonesty comes to light.

Our Lord warns today of the worst price of dishonesty: not just all the people we alienate, but preventing us from reaching those “eternal dwellings” where our true treasure lies. Let’s ask him today to always deal in the currency that will get us there: honesty, fidelity, and loyalty.

Readings: Romans 16:3–9, 16, 22–27; Psalm 145:2–5, 10–11; Luke 16:9–15.

31st Week in Ordinary Time, Friday

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In today’s Gospel we see the first part of Our Lord’s teaching on the need to be faithful and honest even in small things. He begins with the negative example of a steward squandering his employer’s property and being put on notice that he’s to be dismissed. The steward doesn’t want to abandon the good life he’s had, and he doesn’t want to become a beggar, so he starts making deals with the very people he and his former employer had been cheating in order to win their favor. When he adjusts the billing for each person it’s because he’s been helping his employer to deceive them all along. Now that the employer is firing him, he’s using that fact to his advantage: his former employer can’t do anything about it without revealing that he too was part of the deception, and by giving his employer’s clients these “discounts” he is winning favor for himself. The soon-to-be former employer can’t help but admire his cunning (probably because the steward learned it from him).

Perhaps a better translation for Jesus’ evaluation of this could be that the children of this world are cleverer in dealing with those of their own kind that those who are not of this kind. He’s not giving us an example to follow, but an example to be on guard against and avoid. The children of the light don’t act this way and shouldn’t.

We’ll consider how they should act in tomorrow’s reflection. For now, let’s examine our dealings with others and see whether we’re more a child of this age (bad) or a child of the light (good).

Readings: Romans 15:14–21; Psalm 98:1–4; Luke 16:1–8.

31st Week in Ordinary Time, Wednesday

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In today’s Gospel Our Lord presents the need to renounce the two most precious things in our life in order to be able to successfully follow him: our family and our life as it stands without him. If he calls us to follow him, it means putting other things on hold and embracing sacrifice and difficulty for something greater. When he teaches us today to hate our family and life as it stands he does not mean abandoning them or harming them; he means practicing a healthy detachment from them where God’s will comes first because God knows best and wants the best for everyone, including those we love.

If we don’t form this healthy detachment he warns us we may not have the spiritual resources to finish what we started or to succeed. He uses two images: a construction project discontinued for lack of funds, and a battle lost for not have sufficient forces to win or the foresight to seek a diplomatic solution instead. Everyone wants to build something with their life; Our Lord wants us to build a life with him, and he knows that requires the spiritual resources that only come from detachment, sacrifice, and discernment. Our life is a battle at times, a struggle to succeed, and detachment, sacrifice, and discernment are what enable us to succeed in what truly matters: love for God and love for others.

Let’s examine our lives today with the Lord’s help and see whether anything in our lives might be preventing us from being the success he wants us to be.

Readings: Romans 13:8–10; Psalm 112:1b–2, 4–5, 9; Luke 14:25–33. See also 15th Week in Ordinary Time, Monday.