Friday, January 23, 2015

Friday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time

(Hebrews 8:6-13; Mark 3:13-19)

Today’s passage from the Letter to the Hebrews presents Christians with a dilemma.  We know that the Old Testament (or Old Covenant, the words mean the same thing) has immense value.  After all, it inspired and informed Jesus.  Nonetheless Hebrews, which is part of the New Testament, indicates that it is “obsolete” and “close to disappearing.” 

We must hold up both the old and the new as critical.  The Old Testament enables us to understand Jesus, and the New Testament brings him into even clearer focus.  Yet neither of them nor both together is the perfect revelation of God.  That comes in the person of Jesus.  Scripture, howsoever indispensable it is for us, is the Word of God in human words.  This last phrase bespeaks inevitable limitation and even error.  In other words, both Old and New Testaments are defective.  We only find God revealing Himself to us perfectly in the living presence of Jesus.

How can we so meet Jesus today?  We find him in the Eucharist where he nourishes us with his body and blood.  For sure, we will not interpret him perfectly there.  Nevertheless, receiving the Eucharist we hold Jesus close to our hearts.  Then we want to implore him to purify our understanding so that we live up to his call for us.

Thursday, January 22, 2015

Day of Prayer for the Legal Protection of Unborn Children

(Hebrews 5:25-8:6; Mark 3:7-12)

The first reading today speaks of Jesus as high priest.  It says that he was unlike any other.  For one thing he did not have to offer sacrifice for his own sins because he did not have any.  For another Jesus did not have to offer many sacrifices because the one he made – himself on the cross – was of infinite worth.

Although we cannot equate him to Jesus, Fr. Matt Robinson, O.P., compares in many ways to our Lord.  Like Jesus he was a person of great virtue – temperate, wise, but most of all kind.  He always had time to welcome a stranger or to hear someone’s confession.  Also like Jesus, those who knew him have a sense of his becoming a member of heaven upon passing from this life.  He was the salt of the earth as common as the sunrise.  He was also a light of knowledge in a great array of fields.   

Today there is special reason to recognize Matt Robinson.  The People of God recall with great sadness exactly forty-two years ago when the Supreme Court of the United States de-penalized abortion in practically all cases.  Fr. Robinson spent half his remarkably long priesthood ministering especially to those who worked to protect the unborn. He did it in many graceful ways like writing poetry.  Here is a sample of his moral sensitivity, so fitting a Dominican priest, expressed in verse: “The cruelest part is not the pain,/ Or that the blood is shed,/ But that the measure of one’s gain/ Is that a man is dead.”  

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Memorial of Saint Agnes, virgin and martyr

(Hebrews 5:7:1-3.15-17; Mark 3:1-6)

Much like Paul Bunyan of American folklore, Melchizedek is a shadowy figure in Scripture.  He visited Abraham in the Book of Genesis, is mentioned in the psalms as an eternal priest, and makes an appearance in the passage from the Letter to the Hebrews that is read in today’s mass. 

Melchizedek, both the king and priest of Salem, serves as a prototype for Christ in the eyes of the author of Hebrews.  The name is interpreted as meaning “my king is righteousness.”  He is also called the “king of Salem” which may be translated as “king of peace.”  Thus associated with the epitome of justice and peace, Melchizedek prefigures Jesus, who suffered death rather than betray righteousness or violate peace.  Being presented both priest and king, Melchizedek again is set as a model for Jesus who sacrificed himself for the people for whom he also served as the anointed Messiah.

The Letter to the Hebrews has been noted for its balanced Christology which views Jesus as equally God and man.  We may miss in it the references to everyday life found in Paul’s epistles.  Yet we find an elegance in its verses and a boldness in its allusions that bolster our faith in Jesus.

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Tuesday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time

(Hebrews 6:10-20; Mark 2:23-28)

Today’s first reading is the source of the familiar Christian icon for the virtue of hope.  The author of the Letter to the Hebrews is saying that hope steadies our belief in God’s promise as an anchor stays a boat.  Without hope we would drift away with the currents of fashion or the breezes of comfort.  Hope moves us to struggle if necessary to maintain our faith in God. 

Unfortunately we often trivialize hope.  We say that we hope that our team wins the Super Bowl or that it doesn’t freeze tomorrow.  These wishes are puny in comparison with the hope expressed in Hebrews for the “unshakeable kingdom,” that is eternal life.  Let us be sure that eternal life is not a “never, never land” but begins here.  It is the joy of sharing with loved ones – both living and dead – a heart-felt hymn along with a piece of consecrated bread. 

Hope has been described as the youngest of three siblings loping between her sisters, faith and love.  Often it seems that the elder children must pull along hope, which wonders how God might transform the silence of death so that we could again experience the company of our relatives, friends, and teachers who have crossed its threshold.  But sometimes hope is distinctly in front urging belief and care so that God might find us worthy of the fullness of life with our loved ones.

Monday, January 19, 2015

Monday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time

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

In the gospel Jesus asks the people to practice, at least for a time, a new kind of religiosity.  Rather than fasting as most pious people do, he wants them to give increased attention to himself as God’s representative.  He knows that religion is more than a matter of custom.  It is discerning and practicing the will of God.

Martin Luther King, Jr., had a similar sense of himself.  He spoke to the hearts of both black and white people who were searching for the living God.  He knew that many people go to church on Sundays and practice bigotry.  He implored the whole world to look beyond the color of a person’s skin to the intentions of her or his heart before judging.

We pay tribute to Martin Luther King today because in imitation of our Savior he gave up his life.  He felt danger lurking – “I may not get (to the Promised Land) with you,” he conjectured, but did not give up the quest for freedom.  He died as he lived to liberate blacks from the indignity of prejudice and whites from the sin of hatred.