Monday, January, 20, 2025

Monday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time

(Hebrews 5:1-10; Mark 2:18-22)

The Letter to the Hebrews recognizes Christ as both human and the Son of God.  But it realizes that this does not mean that the human Jesus always had consciousness of being Son of God.  Rather, as today’s reading from the letter shows, Jesus had to learn how to conform his will to God’s.  As for everyone else, it was not an easy lesson.

The passage speaks of Christ’s learning obedience, the conforming of one’s will to another’s, through suffering.  As the first three gospels testify, in the garden Jesus asked God to release him from the Passion he was about to endure.  Nevertheless, he submitted himself to God when he said, ”…not my will but yours be done.”  As might be expected, the result of trusting himself completely to God was his death blossoming into resurrection glory.

Today’s reading from Hebrews makes the point that the merit of Christ’s obedience accrues entirely to those who choose him as their priest.  Being sinless, he did not need redemption.  It is to our advantage, as well as to the addressees’ of this letter, that we continue to follow him.

 Monday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time

(Hebrews 5:1-10; Mark 2:18-22)

What does it mean to be a human being?  Without sounding silly or arrogant, we might answer it does mean something.  Contrary to what some are saying today, we are not individuals who we can define themselves in whatever way we like.  We have similar feelings, an intellect and a will, as well as bodily makeup.  In other words, we all have a human nature.

The Letter to the Hebrews identifies Jesus Christ as one of us.  It says that Jesus understood our feelings and needs.  He suffered in the same ways that we do and experienced our joys and satisfaction.  But one thing Jesus did not share with other human beings was the guilt of sin.  He never offended God, his Father.  For these reasons, the letter concludes, Jesus makes the perfect high priest.  He knows our human situation and gives himself to appealing to God for us.  He does not ask for himself because he is always one with the Father.

We can trust in Jesus with our needs.  He will not abandon us because he loves us.  He has won favor with God the Father and will beseech Him on our behalf.  But we must join his company and ask for his help.

Monday, January 21, 2013

Memorial of Saint Agnes, virgin and martyr

(Hebrews 5:1-10; Mark 2:18-22)

Writer Frank McCourt tells of a bus driver who was able to relate to an African-American high school student in a way that he never could. McCourt’s class was returning from a cultural activity when the student began talking with the bus driver who was also African-American. She asked the driver about his family. The driver said that he had children and was working hard to send them to school so they wouldn’t have to drive buses for a living. He said that Black people had to work hard in the United States if they were going to get by but in the end that was good because the struggle made them stronger.

Just like the bus driver could relate to the student in McCourt’s story, Jesus is able to relate to us. The writer of the Letter to the Hebrews emphasizes that Jesus knows human suffering and offers men and women a hand in overcoming the self-pity and resentment it tends to create. In fact, with the graces merited by Jesus’ own suffering, humans can turn those bitter reactions into the virtue of compassion. In other words, they can be made stronger.

Today the United States honors one of its greatest heroes. Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke up for struggling minorities who were being deprived of opportunity to show their ability. He preached to the well-off of Christ’s love for the poor and also to the impatient of Christ’s way of nonviolence. He dreamed not so much of a color-blind America but of a country where all people would be respected for the “content of their character.”

Monday, January 17, 2011

Memorial of Saint Anthony, abbot

(Hebrews 5:1-10; Mark 2:18-22)

Writer-teacher Frank McCourt tells of a bus driver who was able to relate to an African-American high school student in a way that he never could. McCourt’s class was returning from a cultural activity when the student began talking with the bus driver who was also African-American. She asked the driver about his family. The driver said that he had children and was working hard to send them to school so they wouldn’t have to drive buses for a living. He said that Black people had to work hard in the United States if they were going to get by but in the end that was good because the struggle made them stronger. When the girl told him that she wanted to become a hairdresser, he chided her that she could do better, that she was smart and could go to college.

Although there is nothing wrong with being a bus driver or a hairdresser, the lesson which the bus driver gave resembles the wisdom of the Letter to the Hebrews. Jesus’ suffering allowed him not only to identify with the rest of humanity; it also purified him so that he might give himself completely to his Father. In these ways he also “was made stronger.” This truth may sound strange if we think of Jesus as one conscious of his divinity since the day he was born. But in numerous passages the New Testament relates that he suffered like the rest of humanity. Yet the suffering did not deplete him of virtue but multiplied it within him.

Today the United States honors one of its greatest heroes. Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke up for struggling minorities who were being deprived of opportunity to show their ability. He preached to the well-off of Christ’s love for the poor and also to the impatient of Christ’s way of nonviolence. He dreamed not so much of a color-blind America but of a society in which all peoploe would be respected for the “content of their character.”

Homilette for Monday, January 19, 2009

Monday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time

(Hebrews 5:1-10; Mark 2:18-22)

Humans learn obedience when they have to do something that is hard. If a superior sends a young religious to an elite school where students learn quickly and the community has a gourmet cook, she will have no difficulty accepting the assignment. But if the superior sends her to Africa where children do not have books much less computers and the staple food is yam not ham, she will consider carefully what it means to obey.

It sounds strange to hear that Christ also had to “learn obedience” since he was God. But the Letter to the Hebrews realizes that Christ emptied himself of divinity in becoming human. He too, then, had to struggle to follow the Father’s will as indicated by his request in Gethsemane that he not have to drink of the cup of suffering. His obedience, of course, led to his being exalted as God’s own son when he rose from the dead.

It almost sounds quaint to speak of obedience today. Most people like to think of themselves as autonomous with the ability to determine right from wrong for themselves. Following Church teaching regarding birth control or days of obligation, for examples, seems to them a matter of personal discretion. Such an attitude, however, conflicts with what the Letter to the Hebrews is driving at. Obedience does not lessen a person’s stature; rather, it leads to her personal sanctification.