20th Week, Thursday, August 18
Ezekiel 36:23-28 / Matthew 22:1-14
God makes a promise; "I will give you a new heart and a new spirit."
An accident left 17-year-old Joni Eareckson a quadriplegic. Her body was
completely broken and helpless. But even more broken than her body were her heart
and her spirit. She wondered how she would ever be able to live out the rest of
her life in her tragic condition. Yet, thanks to prayer and to her daily
reading of the Bible, she began to glimpse possibilities in life that she never
dreamed of before her accident. Today,
Joni is an accomplished painter (holding the brush in her teeth), a
best-selling author, a singer, and a popular lecturer to young people. God,
indeed, breathed into her a new heart and a new spirit. *** Do we believe that
God can use us in ways we never dreamed to be possible? Do we believe he can
use us to work miracles? "There is nothing that God cannot do,"
through us, if we but let him. Luke 1:37
***
We have heard it said that love is many a splendored thing. Indeed, it
truly is, and every human heart longs for that many splendored love. But the
problem comes when the longing becomes a demand for love. Demand for love makes
it a many horrored thing. So love moves from beauty to tragedy when the demand
comes in and that is where loving turns into hating.
Yet true love is indeed a many splendored thing when it comes from God. That
love is expressed in the 1st reading when God spoke to His people through the
prophet Ezekiel : You shall be My people and I will be your God. It is a
self-giving love and it is also a love that makes no demands, but only invites
others to give and to share in it. Like the wedding banquet parable in the gospel,
God does not force us to love Him.He invites us to come to Him and be loved by
Him and to be His people. It is in God that we see that true love is indeed a
many splendored thing.
May we learn to love as God has loved us.
***
CALLED TO THE FEAST
Introduction
Israel had profaned God’s name among the nations, making it
look weak when he had to send Israel into exile. Now Ezekiel consoles them when
they are in exile. He will again restore his people, giving them a new heart
and a new spirit.
All are invited to the kingdom of God, even repeatedly, the good and the bad alike. Salvation is open to all. But they should be willing, they must respond to the call. And once they respond, they should be consistent. They must share in the death struggle of Christ against evil, to live with the life of Christ. The force to live the Christ life is indeed given to us in the Eucharistic meal. There the Lord prepares us for the royal marriage feast.
Opening Prayer
Merciful Father of all people, you open the doors of your
kingdom to invite us all, good and bad alike, to share the life of Jesus, your
Son. Give us the wisdom and the strength to respond to your generous call with
the whole of our being. Help us to go the loyal way to you and to one another of
Jesus Christ, your Son and our Lord, who lives with you and the Holy Spirit, one
God, now and for ever.
Commentary
Faith ultimately is a matter of the heart, not simply feast
days and rituals. Like Jeremiah, Ezekiel speaks of a new era wherein the Lord
will renew the religious spirit within us. The law will not be written on stone
tablets but on the flesh of the human heart. Cleansed of our impurities, we
will respond to God from inner conviction and with a true sense of personal
purpose. Religion, to be authentic, must go beyond externals and emanate from
the very core of our being. Many of the people in today’s parable saw the
wedding invitation as simply another calendar event, not a divine calling to be
taken with the utmost seriousness. While not as guilty as those who refused,
the improperly clothed guest lacks a true appreciation of what God is offering.
The lesson should strike us as being particularly meaningful. The fact that we
are identified as Christian or Catholic says very litde in and of itself. But
we all know what it means to take faith seriously. We have met it in people
many times. The kind word, availability, service to others, as well as love of
the Eucharist. With these values in place, we are properly dressed for the
wedding. We will never be embarrassed by being improperly clothed. We have
received that new Spirit within us, the first gift of the risen Christ.
Points to Ponder
Religious faith: stone tablets or a new heart Excuses:
God’s interests will come later
The wedding feast: being properly attired
Intercessions
– That the Lord may gather all peoples in one common praise
of his name, we pray:
– That the lives of all Christians may radiate joy and hope
and bring a feast of happiness to others, we pray:
– That the communities without priests, isolated and
abandoned as they often feel, may receive the word of the Lord as their food
and occasionally also the Lord’s body, we pray:
Prayer over the Gifts
Lord our God, in these signs of bread and wine you invite us
now to the table of your Son Jesus Christ, as a token and pledge of your
unending feast meal in heaven. Give us the strength to respond to your call, that
we may become new in Christ and live his life day after day, until you let us
share in his glory for ever and ever.
Prayer after Communion
Loving Father, we thank you for giving us your Son as our
food and drink on the long road to you. Through this Eucharist make us resemble
him more and more, that we may respect and love him in one another, that we may
be his image to the world, and that you may recognize his traits in us when you
welcome us to the everlasting feast of joy. Grant us this through Christ our
Lord.
Blessing
All are invited to the Lord’s feast meal, but not all come.
Are some absent because we do not make them feel welcome? Let us do all we can
to make people feel at home with us. May God bless you all, the Father, and the
Son, and the Holy Spirit.