Thursday, February 16, 2017

Thursday of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time

(Genesis 9:1-13; Mark 8:27-33)

When Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. Navy Seals, there was no outcry from Catholic hierarchy.  Pope Benedict must have recognized the legitimacy of the execution even though there was never a trial.  Taking alive bin Laden, whose guilt for mass murder was widely recognized, and putting him on trial would have surely resulted in violent outbursts around the world.  The incident provides the exception that proves the rule for the Church’s opposition to capital punishment.

Following today’s passage from Genesis, the Church does not deny the validity of capital punishment when a life has been unjustly taken.  It also notes, however, that there are an inordinate number of innocent lives taken today, especially by procured abortions.  To bolster its affirmation of life, then, Pope St. John Paul II and his two successors have taught that the state should never execute a human being except in extraordinary situations like bin Laden’s arrest.

We need to constantly reassert our support of life.  We should be participating in the campaigns abortion, capital punishment, and euthanasia.  We might also check our appetite for violence in entertainment.  If we relish viewing wanton slaughter, we are abetting the culture of death which will inevitably hurt those whom we love.

Wednesday, February 15, 2017

Wednesday of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time

(Genesis 8:6-13.20-22; Mark 8:22-26)

The dove in the Baptism of Jesus represents the Holy Spirit.  Its whiteness indicates God’s purity.  Its being a bird of flight suggests presence anywhere and everywhere.  As in today’s passage from Genesis, the dove guides humans to salvation.  It is absolutely necessary since, according to the passage, the human heart has been always set on evil.

Yet God still loves humans.  Indeed, He will gradually incline their hearts toward goodness.  First, related in tomorrow’s reading, He will make a covenant with them.  He will give them sovereignty over the earth and require from them mutual respect.  Then He will train a specific nation to be His showcase of justice.  Finally, He will send His Son to complete the project with all the peoples of the earth. The gradual nature of God’s work is depicted in today’s gospel as Jesus gives sight to the blind man.  With Jesus’ first imposition of hands the man cannot see clearly.  But when he lays his hands on him again, he sees everything distinctly.

We have to keep our eyes open.  The inclination toward evil is still prevalent in many places.  As we recall how Jesus has transformed us with the Holy Spirit, we should act to transform evil.  Considerate words may relieve some of the tension in hearts set on evil.  Caring actions may turn those hearts to God.

Tuesday, February 14, 2017

Memorial of Saint Cyril, monk, and Saint Methodius, bishop

(Genesis 6:5-8.7:1-5.10; Mark 8:14-21)

Today, as lovers present their beloveds Valentine chocolate, the gospel hints at a more precious gift.  It suggests that Jesus is God’s gift of life to the world.  He is the “one loaf” of bread, the basic nutrition of Palestinian as well as most western societies.  Unable to grasp this meaning, the disciples misunderstand Jesus’ association of the Pharisees with leaven as a reference to bread.  They do not realize that he is warning them about puffed up egos that make people think of themselves as better than others.

In contrast Jesus expects his disciples to serve one another.  They are to give themselves as, if you will, Valentines of care.  Jesus indicates his own abundant love when he points to all the leftover bread which he produced.  The disciples will not be able to appreciate all that Jesus means until he sends them forth to preach after his death and resurrection.

Rather than St. Valentine, a Roman martyr about whom little is definitely known, the Church today celebrates Saints Cyril and Methodius.  These two brothers preached Jesus’ love and his call to people to serve one another in the Ukraine and Moravia.  They were so diligent and successful that Pope St. John Paul II proclaimed them among the patrons of all Europe.

Monday, February 13, 2017

Monday of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time

(Genesis 4:1-15.25; Mark 8:11-13)

The story of Cain and Abel has been noted as an anthropological explanation of the enmity between farmers and herders.  It can also be seen as a model for sibling rivalry.  Although we expect brothers and sisters to be the best of friends, they often compete with one another.  Reasons for the competition are not hard to imagine.  Each desires the parents’ utmost attention but often cannot achieve it.  Perhaps the last-born child receives inordinate affection because the parents are tired of disciplining.  Or perhaps the eldest through constant parental prodding becomes an overachiever whose accomplishments the parents cannot cease praising.

In the fourth preface for weekday masses, the priest prays that God has no need of our sacrifice.  Indeed, God does not ask sacrifices from Cain and Abel.  Responding to an instinctual impulse, the elder brother makes his harvest offering.  Possibly out of imitation, Abel serves up a lamb.  The text does not explain why Cain’s gift is rejected, but it is also not hard to suggest a reason here.  Too often sacrifices to God are half-hearted like the feeble Lenten penances that are abandoned before the end of the first week.  Also, as the old critique of Friday abstinence maintained, some people give up steak only to dine on lobster!

Cain reacts to God’s preference of Abel’s sacrifice by murdering him.  It is no impetuous act but methodically arranged to indicate the depth of the elder brother’s hatred.  As the Lord takes notice of the act, we discover what God most expects of us.  Beyond our sacrifices we must strive ever harder to live in peace with all our brothers and sisters.

Friday, February 10, 2017

Memorial of Saint Scholastica, virgin

(Genesis 3:1-8; Mark 7:31-37)

Although the serpent in the first reading is traditionally considered the devil, Genesis does not say it.  It may profitably be considered as the complex of desires which often clouds human reason.  People fall into sin after debating in their minds proposals that counter the principles by which they live.  Human desires conjure these proposals which often appear reasonable but whose half-truths are misleading. 

Nothing that the serpent tells the woman in the garden proves to be completely false.  God did prohibit the pair from eating of at least one of the trees.  When they eat of the forbidden fruit, they do not die immediately.  And their action does end in new knowledge making them less innocent and experienced.  These half-truths, however, masquerade the enormity of the offense which their desires for autonomy, immortality, and knowledge induce.

It is really an old story that has been refurbished many times.  Alice McDermott’s Child of My Heart gives a version of it. The novel tells of a teenage girl who lives with her parents near the beach.  When a sick cousin comes to spend the summer, the girl enjoys doting on the child so much that she refuses to tell anyone that her cousin has begun to hemorrhage.  The story, like that of the first humans in the garden, ends tragically.  The cousin dies prematurely because the girl allows her desires to get the better of her reason.