Seventeenth Week

17th Week in Ordinary Time, Saturday

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Our conscience is a voice inside of us, counselling us on what to do and what to avoid doing. There are those in our lives who try to help us to second that voice, helping us to see what is good, and what is true. There are also those who don’t really help us in the spiritual or moral life, and they try to drown out that voice, probably because they stopped listening to it in their own souls a long time ago, or are trying to drown it out themselves and want company. When stories of Our Lord in today’s Gospel begin to spread, Herod thinks it’s John the Baptist, back from the dead. Was he haunted by what he did to him? God knows.

John tried to second the voice inside of Herod urging him to do the right thing: to not treat his brother’s wife as his own, to be courageous when tough truths had to be acknowledged. Herod, despite all his power, was enslaved by an unhealthy relationship, by public opinion, and by a desire for Herodias’ daughter. Herodias knew how to manipulate him for her own ends: she hated John for testifying to the truth, and little by little Herod gave in to her desire to punish John. When Herod drew the line at killing John, due to his fear of public opinion, Herodias engineered a situation where another public would respond badly if he didn’t kill John, a situation in which he let himself get entangled due to his desire for Herodias’ daughter. In having John beheaded he was also drowning out the voice of the true and the good in his soul, aided by Herodias, who wanted to silence that same voice as well.

Circumstances and bad influences can hinder us from following that good voice of conscience in our soul, but that same voice reminds us that, in the end, our decisions are our own, and we must take responsibility for them. Let’s ask Our Lord today to help us hear his voice in our souls, to listen to it always, to second it in the lives of others, and to avoid those things, people, and places that try to drown it out.

Readings: Leviticus 25:1, 8–17; Psalm 67:2–3, 5, 7–8; Matthew 14:1–12.

17th Week in Ordinary Time, Friday

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Having a life-changing experience of faith is much like taking a journey: you learn so much, but those who haven’t made the journey and haven’t had the same experience don’t share the same enthusiasm. With our family and friends we’ve journeyed together for years; for some it’s been a journey of faith, for others just lives shared along the way. So when we make this sudden “journey” and experience of faith and conversion it’s understandable that they may be skeptical, even incredulous, when we change our life and suggest they change theirs. We should all be headed in the same direction–Heaven–and we need to help each other get there on the best path possible. If we think we know a shortcut, of course we’re going to try to share it. In the case of sharing the faith, it’s not just a question of faith in God, but our friends and loved ones having faith in us as well: a lack of faith in either will be an obstacle for them.

In today’s Gospel Jesus, who’s not only been to Heaven and back, but started there before he came here, is trying to share the faith with those he’s known and loved the most in his earthly life. They didn’t believe he was any more than the carpenter’s son they’d known for years. They’d heard he’d done amazing things, but they didn’t believe. His message was to repent and believe in the Gospel, and they were offended that someone they thought they knew since he was little should suggest something like that to them, independently of whether his words were true or not.

If this happened to Our Lord we shouldn’t be discouraged if we received the same skepticism from our family and friends when we try to share our faith with them. They may see us as arrogant, judgmental, even weird, but we must continue with patient endurance to help them see how much God means to us and wants to mean to them. Let’s ask Our Lord to open the hearts of those we love who are not living the Gospel so that they can make the journey of conversion and faith as well.

Readings: Leviticus 23:1, 4–11, 15–16, 27, 34b–37; Psalm 81:3–6, 10–11b; Matthew 13:54–58. See also 14th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B.

17th Week in Ordinary Time, Thursday

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In today’s Gospel Our Lord describes the “Kingdom of heaven” with regard to the end game. If we understand the Kingdom as not only the work of salvation, but all the other natural goods that in some way result from that work–a healthy society, solid families, true concern for the spiritual and material needs of others, etc.–we can understand how it is not just identified with the people who are actively working to be a part of it and to extend it. All kinds of “fish” end up in the “net.” Like any society there are good members and bad members, and part of society’s duty is to help all its members be good members of society, even, when necessary, through penal measures applied to those who are bad with the hope of helping them to reform themselves and to not present a danger to themselves or to society.

At the end of history, when the work of the Kingdom has definitively run its course and reached everywhere Our Lord wants it to be (and that, in the end, is everywhere and everyone), no one will remain unaffected or beyond its reach. That could be a chilling thought if we didn’t remember that the Kingdom equates to salvation and a good and just order of things that spreads and takes hold forever. Each person in the end chooses how they’ll end up in the Kingdom, in that “net”: the bad will have squandered all their opportunities to be good and will be cut off from the goods of the Kingdom forever. The good, through their efforts and God’s aid and mercy, will enjoy a beatific life: they will possess God and receive all the promises Our Lord made on the Sermon on the Mount (cf. Matthew 5:1–12) in full. We must work for the good of others, not just our own good, but in the end each person will stand or fall on his or her own merits and no one will be able to ride on another’s coat tails at the moment of Judgement.

Let’s thank Our Lord for all those opportunities he gives us daily to be good, and let’s pray and work for the conversion of sinners so that we may all one day be found worthy to be a part of the the Kingdom forever.

Readings: Exodus 40:16–21, 34–38; Psalm 84:3–6a, 8a, 11; Matthew 13:47–53.

fishing_net

17th Week in Ordinary Time, Tuesday

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In order to understand the parable being explained in today’s Gospel (the parable is presented in Matthew 13:24–30, just after the parable of the sower), of weeds being sown by an enemy among someone’s wheat crop, it’s important to understand that a certain kind of weed, the bearded darnel, looked very similar to the wheat sown in the time of Our Lord in Palestine and could be mistaken for wheat. Therefore the man in the parable decides to wait until harvest time to separate them when it’s more easy to distinguish them.

With the parable of the sower that we considered a few days ago we saw some potential obstacles to God’s word bearing fruit in our lives. If we let his word take root in us, we become those wheat stalks in today’s parable that grow and bear fruit. Sadly the Devil, the fallen angels who rebelled with him, and sinful people tempt and corrupt others, and those who succumb to it are like the weeds explained in today’s parable: they grow by feeding off of others and choking those trying to grow around them, and, in the end, their lives are fruitless. Perhaps some of them don’t even realize until the end that they’ve lived their lives as weeds, not as wheat, and some evils can appear to be good. Our Lord teaches us today that evil is present and active in the world, sometimes not easily detected, and it will not be definitively overcome until he returns in glory. In the meanwhile, we must persevere in hope and virtue and not become discouraged when it seems evil is widespread and winning.

Let’s pray today for the conversion of all those “weeds” in the world today, for the courage to persevere in the face of evil, and for the wisdom to tell between the weeds and the wheat in our world.

Readings: Exodus 33:7–11, 34:5b–9, 28; Psalm 103:6–13; Matthew 13:36–43.

17th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

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In today’s readings Our Lord reminds us that disciples know they always have something to learn and to pass along the people that they help. Christians never stop being disciples; Our Lord always has something to teach us. In the First Reading Elisha (who was the disciple of the prophet Elijah) learned from his master in the miracle of the multiplication: Elijah once asked a widow for the last bread she had to feed herself and her son (1 Kings 17:8–16), and when she explained her situation Elijah told her the Lord had promised to provide for them all, and so it came to be. Elisha in today’s Gospel was doing something similar, but because the Lord promised to help him, just as the Lord had helped Elijah and the widow, he knew to encourage his servant to begin handing out the bread, and the miracle happened.

The disciples in today’s Gospel are a little more proactive: they know from Our Lord’s question that he wants to feed the people who came to see him and it seems he’s asking them to make it happen. Phillip sees it as impossible even if they had enough money to feed them, due to the size of the crowd. Andrew at least starts asking around, but the resources come up short. They lost sight of the fact that Jesus said “we”: when we feel Our Lord is asking something difficult or impossible, we have to remember that, like in today’s Gospel, he will be with us and help us. We just have to take it one step at a time, even when sometimes it seems difficult or impossible. In the end, through taking things step by step, they helped Our Lord to make the miracle happen.

Have you felt in your heart that Our Lord has been asking you to try to do something difficult or impossible? Don’t think of the end game; ask him to teach you what first step he wants you to take, and then keep taking things one step at a time. You’ll be surprised how much you accomplish working with him.

Readings: 2 Kings 4:42–44; Psalm 145:10–11, 15–18; Ephesians 4:1–6; John 6:1–15.