27th Week: Oct 3-8:
Oct 3 Monday:
The context: A scribe asked Jesus a very basic
religious question: “What should I do to inherit eternal life?” In answer to
the question, Jesus directed the scribe’s attention to the Sacred Scriptures.
The Scriptural answer is, “Love God and express it by loving your neighbor.”
However, to the scribe, the word “neighbor” meant another scribe or Pharisee,
never a Samaritan or a Gentile. Hence, the scribe insisted on further
clarification of the word “neighbor.” So, Jesus told him the parable of the
Good Samaritan. The parable clearly indicates that a “neighbor” is anyone who
needs help. Thus, the correct approach is not to ask who our neighbor is, but
instead, to ask, “Am I a good neighbor to those I meet, helping them in their needs?”
The Good Samaritan is a symbol of Jesus, himself, in his role as Savior of the
world. The parable: In the parable of the Good Samaritan,
Jesus presents three philosophies of life concerning our relationship with our
neighbor: 1) the philosophy of the thieves who robbed the Samaritan: “What
is yours is mine; I will take it by force. 2) the philosophy of the
Jewish priest and the Levite: “What is mine is mine; I won’t part with
it.” 3) the philosophy of the Samaritan: “What is mine is
yours as well. I shall share it with you.
Life message: We need to have hearts of mercy:
We need to remember that the road from Jerusalem to Jericho passes right
through our home, parish and workplace. Jesus is inviting us to show mercy and
kindness to those who are being hurt or mistreated on any of the “Jericho
Roads” of our lives in our family, neighborhood, school, workplace, and parish.
(Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Oct 4 Tuesday (St. Francis of Assisi): St.
Francis of Assisi is the best known and the most loved thirteenth century
Italian saint. He was born in Assisi, Italy, the son of a rich merchant. As a
carefree young man, he loved singing, dancing and partying. He joined the
military and returned ill, as a changed man. He marked his conversion by
hugging and kissing a leper. While at prayer in the Church of St. Damiano, he
heard the message: “Francis go and repair my Church because it is falling
down.” Francis took the command literally and got money by selling goods from
his father’s warehouse. His father was furious and publicly disowned and
disinherited Francis. Francis promptly gave back to his father everything
except his hairshirt1 and started living as a free man, wearing sackcloth and
begging for food. Possessing nothing, he started preaching the pure Gospel of
Jesus. Strangely enough a few youngsters were attracted to Francis’ way of life
and joined him. 1[Isidore O’Brien, OFM, Francis of Assisi: Mirror of Christ
(Chicago, Illinois: Franciscan Herald Press, 1978) pp.43-44]
Pope Innocent III had a vision of Francis supporting the
leaning Church of St. Johns Lateran in Rome. Subsequently, he approved the
Religious Order begun by Francis, namely the Friars Minor [Lesser Brothers]
which practiced Charity as a fourth vow along with Poverty, Chastity and
Obedience. Soon, the Franciscan Order became very popular, attracting large
numbers of committed youngsters. The friars traveled throughout central Italy
and beyond, preaching and inviting their listeners to turn from the world to
Christ. In his life and preaching, Francis emphasized simplicity and poverty,
relying on God’s providence rather than worldly goods. The brothers worked, or
begged, for what they needed to live, and any surplus was given to the poor.
Francis wrote a more detailed Rule, which was further revised by the new
leaders of the Franciscans. He gave up leadership of the Order and went to the
mountains to live in secluded prayer. There he received the Stigmata, the
wounds of Christ. Francis became partially blind and ill during his last years.
He died at Portiuncula on October 4th, 1226 at the age of 44.
Francis called for simplicity of life, poverty, and humility
before God. In all his actions, Francis sought to follow, fully and literally,
the way of life demonstrated by Christ in the Gospels. Francis loved God’s
gifts to us of nature, animals, and all natural forces, praising God for these
“brothers and sisters.” One of Francis’s most famous sermons is one he gave to
a flock of birds during one of his journeys. “From that day on, he solicitously
admonished the birds, all animals and reptiles, and even creatures that have no
feeling, to praise and love their Creator.” Francis is well known for the
“Canticle of Brother Sun.” Written late in the saint’s life, when blindness had
limited his sight of the outside world, the canticle shows that his imagination
was alive with love for God in His creation.
Life messages: 1) Let us learn to practice the
spirit of detachment of St. Francis that we may be liberated from our sinful
attachments, addictions and evil habits. In poverty one makes oneself available
for the Kingdom. Once the goods are no longer one’s own, they become available
for all. Goods are made to be shared. Let us preach the Good News of Jesus’
love, mercy and forgiveness as St. Francis did, by imbuing the true spirit of
the Gospel, loving all God’s creation and leading transparent Christian lives
radiating Jesus all around us. Tony (https://frtonyshomilies.com/):
Oct 5 Wednesday (St. Faustina Kowalska, Virgin,
Lk 11:1-4: 1 He was praying in a certain
place, and when he ceased, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to
pray, as John taught his disciples.” 2 And he said to them, “When you pray,
say: “Father, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. 3 Give us each day our
daily bread; 4 and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive every one who
is indebted to us; and lead us not into temptation.” The context: The
disciples were fascinated by watching their Master Jesus at prayer. They knew
that John the Baptist had taught his disciples how to pray. In response to the
request made by one of the apostles, Jesus taught the beautiful prayer, Our
Father. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches
that the Our Father “is truly the summary of the whole Gospel” (CCC #2761). The
great mystical Doctor of the Church Saint Teresa of Ávila gave this advice
while praying the Lord’s Prayer: “Much more is accomplished by a single word of
the Our Father said, now and then, from our heart, than by the whole prayer
repeated many times in haste and without attention.” And Saint Thérèse of
Lisieux said that the “Our Father” was one of the prayers she prayed when she
felt so spiritually barren that she could not summon up a single worthwhile
thought.
A prayer in two parts: In the first part of the prayer, we
address God, lovingly acknowledging Him as our Heavenly Father, praising and
worshipping Him. Then we ask Him that His Holy Will may be done by us in our
lives on earth as perfectly as it is done in Heaven. In the second part, we ask
our Father’s blessings on our present time (daily bread), our past (forgiveness
of sins) and our future (protection against the tempter and his temptations).
In this part we also invite the Triune God into our lives. We bring in 1) God
the Father, the Provider, by asking for daily bread, 2) God the Son, our
Savior, by asking forgiveness for our sins and 3) God the Holy Spirit, our
Guide, Advocate, Comforter, and Illuminator, by asking for protection and
deliverance from evil.
Special stress on spirit of forgiveness: In this
prayer, Jesus instructs us to ask for forgiveness from others for our offenses
and to give unconditional forgiveness to others for their offenses against us
as a condition for receiving God’s forgiveness ourselves. (Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Oct 6 Thursday: (St. Bruno, Priest;
The context: After teaching a model prayer,
Jesus instructs his disciples to pray to God their Heavenly Father with the
same boldness, daring, intimacy, conviction, persistence, and perseverance that
both Abraham and the “friend in need” in the parable used. Jesus gives us the
assurance that God will not be irritated by our requests, nor will He be
unwilling to meet them with generosity. Jesus stresses the power of
intercessory prayer and the necessity for persistence, perseverance, trusting
Faith, and the boldness of Faith in our prayer.
The parable: By presenting the parable of the “friend in
need,” Jesus emphasizes our need for that persistent and persevering prayer
which acknowledges our total dependence on God. In the ancient Hebrew world,
hospitality was the essence of one’s goodness, and, hence, to welcome a visitor
without food and drink was unthinkable. A traveler who was traveling in the
evening to avoid the heat of the afternoon might well arrive late at night. So
in this parable, when a man received an unexpected guest late at night and
found his cupboard bare, he went to the man next door, woke him up, and asked
him for a loaf of bread. Because of the persistence of his neighbor, Jesus
says, the householder though not willing to get up for friendship’s sake, would
get up and give him the bread he needed for his guest. This parable of Friend
at Midnight is both an assurance that prayer is always answered and an
encouragement to pray. This parable stresses the necessity for our persisting
in prayer as the expression of our total dependence on God. St. Paul says, “Be
constant in prayer” (Rom 12:12), “pray at all times” (Eph
6:18), “be steadfast in prayer” (Col 4:2), and
“pray constantly” (2 Thes 5:17). Jesus assures us, “Knock
and the door will be opened”(Lk 11: 10).
Life messages: We need to stop giving lame
excuses for not praying. Modern Christians give four lame excuses for not
praying: 1) We are “too busy.” This excuse should send us to our priorities
list, where God needs to be first of all, if we are to be able to live in His
peace. That settled, we will find that prayer in every form is our living
connection with Him through which He gives us Grace, fills us with His love for
us, and helps us to become our true selves. Then, with His help, we will be
able to discern the truly important things in our lives and eliminate the
unimportant and/or distracting, debilitating, and useless items. 2) We “don’t
believe that prayer does that much good, other than giving us the psychological
motivation to be better persons.” Such people forget the fact that prayer
establishes and augments our responsive relationship with God, the Source of
our power. 3) “A loving God should provide for us and protect us from the
disasters of life, such as diseases or accidents, without our asking Him.” True
– and He does! Prayer is not meant to inform God; it expresses our awareness of
our need for God Who loves us unconditionally, and of our trusting dependence
upon Him. 4) “Prayer is boring.” People who use this excuse forget the fact
that prayer is a conversation with God: listening to God speaking to us through
the Bible and talking to God through personal and family prayers. We can’t have
a close relationship with anyone, including God, without persistent and
intimate conversation. (Our Lady of the Holy Rosary)
Lk 1:26-38: This feast was established by Pope
St. Pius V in thanksgiving for the victory at Lepanto, 7 Oct 1571, which
stopped the Turkish invasion of Europe.
Importance: The word Rosary means “Crown of
Roses,” and each prayer in the Rosary is considered a flower presented to Mary.
It is called the “Breviary of the Common People” and the “Psalms of the
Illiterate” and “a compendium of the Gospel,” Pope Pius XII) The prayers we
repeat are Biblical and hence “inspired,” and the mysteries we meditate upon
are taken from the lives of Jesus and Mary. The “Our Father” is a prayer taught
by Jesus Himself. The “Hail Mary” is also rooted in the Scriptures. Its first
half echoes the words of the Archangel Gabriel and those of Elizabeth, both
addressed to Mary. The rest of our petition, “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray
for us, sinners, now and at the hour of our death” is added by the
Church, seeking Mary’s intercession for all of us. The third prayer — the
“Glory be to the Father….” — ancient in its wording, surely reflects the
unceasing prayer of adoration and praise found in the Book of Revelation. The
various events in the lives of Jesus and Mary on which we meditate during the
Rosary are expressions of the Paschal Mystery, that is, the Life, Death,
Resurrection, Ascension of Jesus to Heaven and Decent of the Holy Spirit, in
which Mary shared.
History: Prayer using rosary beads is as old as
mankind. The Hindus in India used to recite the thousand names of their gods
and goddesses and their “mantra” prayers using multi-beaded rosaries, and their
sages wear such rosaries around the neck, constantly rolling the beads in
prayer. The Jews used beads to repeat the psalms, the Laws of Moses and the
memorized sayings of the prophets. The Muslims use rosaries with a hundred
beads for their prayer. In the ninth century, the Christian monks who recited
the 150 psalms instructed the illiterate common people to recite the Our
Father 150 times. It was in the eleventh century that the Europeans
added the Hail Mary to the Our Father. In 1214,
according to the legend, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to St. Dominic
Guzman, founder of the Order of Preachers, commonly known now as the Dominicans
and instructed him to pray the Rosary in a new form as an effective antidote
against the Albigensian heresy. The Rosary devotion attained its present form
around 1500 A.D. An additional boost to the Rosary devotion was given in 1917,
when our Blessed Mother, in her sixth apparition to the three shepherd
children, on the thirteenth of May, asked them to, “Say the Rosary every
day… Pray, pray a lot and offer sacrifices for sinners… I am Our Lady of the
Rosary.” The “Fatima prayer” (O my Jesus forgive us our
sins, save us from the fires of Hell and lead all souls to Heaven, especially
those who are most in need of Your mercy), requested by Mary herself
at Fatima (July 13, 1917), was added following the “Glory be…” after the 1930
acceptance by the Bishop of the apparitions as genuine. Pope St. John Paul II
enriched the Rosary by adding the “Luminous Mysteries” (Rosarium
Virginis Mariae).
How to pray the Rosary: The ideal is to recite
at least five decades of the Rosary (and if possible, the entire twenty), with
one’s whole family daily. We need to say the Rosary slowly enough to make its
recitation devout and reverent. We are to reflect for a minute or two on the
mystery, and then concentrate on the meaning of the prayers as we say them, to
avoid distractions. Besides saying the Rosary with others in the family before
bedtime, let us make it a habit of reciting the Rosary during our journey to
the workplace and during our exercises. (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Oct 8 Saturday:
The context: A woman in the audience was so
impressed by Jesus’ powerful refutation of the slander (that Jesus collaborated
with the devil in exorcisms), that she shouted a blessing, praising the mother
of Jesus: “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that you
sucked!” She meant that any woman would be proud to have such a great
son. Jesus tells her that His mother is more blessed for obeying the word of
God throughout her life.
The reason for real blessedness: Completing the truth of the
blessing the woman had pronounced, Jesus states that the real source of
blessedness is the willingness to hear and the readiness to obey the word of
God. Mary heard God’s message at the Annunciation, and her prompt response was,
“I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your word” (Lk
1:38). That is why she could boldly proclaim to her cousin Elizabeth
in her canticle, “All generations will call me blessed”(Lk
1:48). No one listened more attentively to the word of God than Mary
did. She “kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart” (Lk
2:10). Jesus clarified the same truth on another occasion, stating
that His true mother and brothers and sisters are those who hear the
word of God and do it (Lk 8:21). In today’s Gospel, Jesus declares that
that those who hear God’s word and keep it are more blessed than those who are
related to Him only by blood.
Life messages: 1) We become the members of the Heavenly family of the Triune God, that is, we are made children of God and brothers and sisters of Jesus, by our Baptism. But it is our fidelity in hearing the word of God and in putting that word into practice in our daily lives that makes us really blessed. What makes a person happy in this life and in the life to come is precisely the fulfillment of God’s will, as we learn through the attentive reading of, and listening to, His words. (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
