Year II

26th Week in Ordinary Time, Friday, Year II

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In today’s First Reading the Lord responds to Job’s multiple chapters of lament and disputation with his friends over why such suffering befell him. Wisdom encompasses a great deal of knowledge, and one of the characteristics of ancient wisdom literature in general are great lists surveying the immensity of the natural world. The Lord is now questioning Job about how much he really knows, as opposed to how much he thinks he knows. Job, again showing his humility and respect for the Lord, knows he won’t win any debates with God.

In the face of suffering our distress is compounded by how little we ever truly know about the why. When our suffering is due to evil we’re reminded that iniquity is a mystery; sometimes we ask why and there is no answer. When faced with any mystery we’re dismayed by how little we truly know, and suffering is one of the greatest mysteries of all, but it is nothing compared to the mystery of God.

Our Lord knows the answer to all of life’s mysteries and has experienced suffering in a way most of us cannot even imagine. In difficult moments let’s turn to him for consolation and strength. He may not give us all the answers we want, but he will accompany us in every leg of our journey.

Readings: Job 38:1, 12–21, 40:3–5; Psalm 139:1–3, 7–10, 13–14b; Luke 10:13–16. See also 15th Week in Ordinary Time, Tuesday.

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26th Week in Ordinary Time, Wednesday, Year II

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In today’s First Reading Job shows the humility of acknowledging that the Lord is the judge of everything in matters of justice. This is wisdom, the fear of the Lord, understood to be respect, something Job has been showing him despite the tragedy he has suffered, recalled last Monday, along with health problems in the chapters that followed.

In the chapters leading up to today’s excerpt from Job his friends have been trying to convince him that his children (or he himself) must be guilty if Job has been punished in this way by the Lord. He’s still struggling with why his misfortune has happened when, in his eyes, he has done nothing wrong. He knows he cannot declare that the Lord is unjust, because it is impossible for the Lord to be unjust.

The Lord is often accused of injustice by those who are suffering, but that goes against who and what the he is. He always has the best of intentions and always has a perfect and accurate knowledge of the “facts” in the case. Job knows this, and sometimes we have to remind ourselves of it too. Let’s ask Our Lord for the grace to help us in our trials, not put him on trial when things don’t go our way.

Readings: Job 9:1–12, 14–16; Psalm 88:10bc–15; Luke 9:57–62. See also 13th Week in Ordinary Time, Monday, Year II, 13th Week in Ordinary Time, Sunday, Cycle C, 10th Week of Ordinary Time, Saturday, Year II, and 26th Week in Ordinary Time, Wednesday.

 

26th Week in Ordinary Time, Tuesday, Year II

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In today’s Gospel Our Lord has to remind James and John, after a Samaritan village disrespected Our Lord and his disciples, that he wants salvation, not fulmination. The Old Testament has some rousing accounts of fulmination; Elijah called down fire on soldiers who’d come to him with attitude (see 2 Kings 1:10-12). James and John obviously wanted to relive the “glory days” of prophetism where the wicked were blown away, but that’s just a remnant of a mentality of the Messiah as someone who is coming to “clean house.”

It’s the Old Testament for a reason. You don’t bring Good News by calling down divine wrath. You bring Good News by announcing that liberation from sin is at hand for those who want it. The Samaritans today didn’t need further punishment; turning their back on the Gospel was worse than fulmination. They didn’t turn their back on Our Lord because he was the Messiah, but because they were at enmity with Jews in general. The results are the same: the grace of God passed them by.

Our charity, even when it is slighted, can open the door to grace for a soul. Let’s take Our Lord’s lesson to heart today and focus more on sharing the Good News and less on fulmination. Little by little that charity can win over even the most hardened soul.

Readings: Job 3:1–3, 11–17, 20–23; Psalm 88:2–8; Luke 9:51–56.

25th Week in Ordinary Time, Saturday, Year II

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In today’s First Reading Qoheleth encourages the young to enjoy their youth, but to not be deluded into thinking it is eternal or that they are immortal. He makes a stark contrast between the young person, enjoying life and unconcerned about the future, and the person aware of his mortality and how brief and fragile life can be.

When we’re young we often can’t wait to grow up, and once we get there, we lament our lost youth and how we squandered it. Both the young and the old striving to be the other only manage a caricature of what they once were, or what they will grow up to be. The lesson Qoheleth wants to impart today for young and old is that our actions and decisions always have consequences. Our Lord in today’s Gospel knows his actions and decisions will lead to the Cross; he warns his disciples, but they are too immature to face the facts.

We may not have so dire a cross facing us, but young and old must now that there are moments of difficulty and decision in life that either help us to mature or show us how immature we really are. Let’s examine our life today and see how we can grow in maturity at the right pace, never coming up short.

Readings: Ecclesiastes 11:9–12:8; Psalm 90:3–6, 12–14, 17; Luke 9:43b–45. See also 25th Week in Ordinary Time, Saturday and 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B.

25th Week in Ordinary Time, Friday, Year II

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In today’s First Reading Qoheleth invites us to consider the meaning of all the moments in our life: our birth and death, our up moments and our down moments, times of change, times of adversity, times of joy, and times of sadness. There is a time for everything, and the Lord has established that, not only so that there may be some order in life, but also to make our thoughts turn to whether anything is timeless, anything is eternal.

Eternity is not just a mental construction that we extrapolate from contemplating finite, temporal situations. Eternity is where we find God, at least until he became man, and even then he bridges the gap for us between time and eternity and consoles us with the certainty that one day all our toil will end, having achieved its purpose.

Many people today “live for the weekend”; let’s ask Our Lord to help us live for eternity.

Readings: Ecclesiastes 3:1–11; Psalm 144:1b, 2a–c, 3–4; Luke 9:18–22. See also 12th Week of Ordinary Time, Sunday, Cycle C, Feast of the Chair of St. Peter, Thursday after Ash Wednesday, 25th Week in Ordinary Time, Friday, and 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B.