Wednesday, September 28, 2016



Wednesday of the Twenty-sixth Week in Ordinary Time

(Job 9:1-12.14-16; Luke 9:57-62)

Scientist Richard Dawkins once stated in an interview that he would be interested in a supreme power that gives rise to the forces producing the universe.  The statement raised eyebrows because Dawkins is well known as a “new atheist.”  This kind of god is described by Job in today’s first reading. 

Job speaks of a god who moves mountains and creates stars.  But he believes that this god would not bother to care about him personally. “If I appealed to him…” he says, “I could not believe that he would hearken to my words.”  Whatever Job has in mind here, the god he describes is not the one Jesus proclaims in the gospel. For Jesus God is so good, so loving that one would rather tell others about Him than bury a dead mother or father.

We have come to know the gracious God that Jesus proclaimed.  It is not that there are any other gods, but there are many mistaken conceptions of God. However, through his death and resurrection Jesus has shown his Father to be both just and merciful, both firm and loving.