Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Wednesday of the Thirtieth Week in Ordinary Time

(Ephesians 6:1-9; Luke 13:22-30)

The title of a well-advertised book asks a question which approximates the one in the gospel today. Will Many Be Saved? evidently gives an answer similar to Jesus'.

Jesus does not actually say that many will be condemned but certainly the logic of his statement points in that direction. He urges his listeners to make every effort to live holy lives.  Only those, he implies, who commence the quest early and persist in long struggle will achieve their end. However, his language resists the conclusion that he means only a privileged few will find eternal happiness.  People, he says, will come from all directions to participate in the heavenly banquet.

Nevertheless, we are wise to take to heart Jesus’ implied warning. If it is the case that most people will fall short of eternal life, then our efforts may prove eminently worthwhile. And if God is as indulgent as some people think, then we will at least be an example that might save a few from human folly.

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

The Feast of Saints Simon and Jude, Apostles

(Ephesians 2:19-22; Luke 6:12-16)

A young woman recently wrote a guest editorial that was published in the Wall Street Journal. The woman has graduated from a state university in Florida and is about to pursue a master’s degree.  What’s remarkable is that having failed first and second grades, she was once considered a hopeless case.  Then her godmother took her into her home and pursued getting her a state voucher to a private school.  There the girl received the special attention she needed.  Today we celebrate the saint who may be considered the young woman’s patron.

St. Jude is sometimes surnamed Thaddeus because he is not mentioned in Mark’s and Matthew’s gospel while Thaddeus is.  But the most distinguishable remark that can be made about Jude in the gospels is that his name appears at the end of the list of apostles except for the infamous Judas Iscariot.  In other words Jude is the last of the apostles.  Yet in the eyes of many Catholics around the world Jude is perhaps the most famous other than St. Peter.  The reason for his popularity is that his being positioned in the last place has made him the patron of hopeless causes – a feeling which everyone has of herself at one time or another.

In truth none of our causes is really hopeless.  God has sent Jesus to help us.  We only need to trust in him, perhaps with the intercession of St. Jude.  He will supply us with the opportunity to rise from hopelessness.  He will make us well.

Monday, October 27, 2014

Monday of the Thirtieth Week in Ordinary Time

(Ephesians 4:32-5:8; Luke 13:10-17)

A wise man once said that it is easier to act ourselves into a new way of thinking than to think ourselves into a new way of acting.  Developing virtue, the dispositions to act well, require practice.  All the thinking and hoping in the world will not produce a person of character.  The Pauline author of Ephesians surely will concur.

The writer begs his readers to “be imitators of God.”  He (in all likelihood the writer was male) urges the people to love by doing good things for one another.   They are to support the weak, to instruct the unlearned, and to promote the welfare of everyone. 

Sometimes we want to squirm from the challenge.  Imitating God seems too much for us.  And it is true that we are utterly incapable of imitating God in every way.  But God Himself empowers us to get beyond natural limitations.  Our imitations may never be perfect, but with effort they can both please God and help our neighbors.

Friday, October 24, 2014

Friday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time

(Ephesians 4:1-6; Luke 12:54-59)

In his poem “The White-Tailed Hornet,” Robert Frost observes that humans do well to compare themselves with higher beings.  If they do not, he predicts that they will suffer one catastrophe after another.  Frost’s lines are worth remembering: “As long on earth/ As our comparisons were stoutly upward/ With gods and angels, we were men at least,/ But little lower than the gods and angels./ But once comparisons were yielded downward,/ Once we began to see our images/ Reflected in the mud and even dust./ ‘Twas disillusion upon disillusion.”  The passage from the Letter to the Ephesians today bears a similar wisdom.

Ephesians urges its readers “to live in a manner worthy of the call you have received.”  It claims that they have been chosen by God to be members of God’s family.  As God’s children then, they are to live peacefully avoiding quarrels.  More than they, they are to strive to have a like mind and heart based on truth.  It is a tall order, but it can be accomplished with God’s grace which is “over all and through all and in all.”

Anger is a definite roadblock to peace and unity.  We must garner the courage to lay aside outrage with what others say and do.  In place of getting angry, let us pray for those who bother us.  Then we will be ready for honest dialogue over their faults and ours.

Thursday, October 23, 2014

Thursday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time

(Ephesians 3:14-21; Luke 12:49-53)

“Why me?” asks a cancer patient.  “Why this?” there are no easy answers to these questions.  We believe in God and know that He will make all things right.  But should we lay these thoughts on a person suffering terribly and dying prematurely like a veneer of paint over rotting wood?  In the first reading today the Pauline author takes a different tack.

The writer says that he goes on his knees before the Lord.  He knows that consolation is beyond him but trusts that God can enlighten the darkest human situation.  He prays that his readers will sense the magnitude of God’s love that is more compelling than logic. “The breath and length and height and depth” describes how that love envelops them like the air they breathe.  It may take them where they fear to go, but it will never abandon them.

In visiting the sick we learn that our best explanation to questions about God’s mercy is our presence to them.  We assure them that we care and that God has sent us.  Our second best explanation is our going to the Lord with their needs.  We pray for enlightenment both to them and us.  In doing so, the cloud of doubt begins to clear.