23rd Week: Sept 9-14:
Sept 9 Monday: St. Peter Claver:
Context: Today’s Gospel describes the Last
Judgment and its criterion using as an image the Palestinian shepherds’
practice of the nightly separation of the over-active, less docile goats from
the docile sheep. Jesus promises that he will come in all his glory as a Judge
(Christ’s Second Coming), to reward the good people and punish the bad people.
This will be the final and the public separation of the good people from the
evildoers.
The lessons: The parable teaches us that the
main criterion of the Last Judgment will be the works of Christian charity,
kindness, and mercy we have done, or not done, for others, in whom we have
actually served, or not served, Christ, knowingly or unknowingly. The parable
tells us that Christ, the Judge, is going to ask us six questions, and all of
them are based on how we have cooperated with God’s grace to do acts of
charity, kindness, and mercy for others because Jesus actually dwells in them.
The first set of questions: “I was hungry, thirsty, homeless. Did you give me
food, drink, accommodation?” The second set of questions: ”I was naked, sick,
imprisoned. Did you clothe me? Did you help me by visiting me in my illness or
in prison?” If the answers are yes, we will be eternally rewarded because we
have cooperated with God’s grace by practicing charity. But if the answers are
negative, we will be eternally punished. Mother Teresa of Calcutta said, “If
sometimes our poor people have had to die of starvation, it is not because God
didn’t care for them, but because you and I didn’t give, were not instruments
of love in the hands of God, to give them that bread, to give them that
clothing; because we did not recognize Christ, when once more Christ came in
distressing disguise.”
Life messages: 1) The Holy Bible, the Seven
Sacraments, the Ten Commandments and the precepts of the Church are all meant
to help us to practice corporal and spiritual works of charity (mercy), in this
life so that we may become able to receive God’s love, our eternal reward of
Heavenly bliss. 2) Sins of omission (in which, we fail to recognize those in
need as our brothers and sisters in Christ, and we fail to serve them in love),
are very serious matters leading us toward eternal punishment. (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Sept 10 Tuesday: The context: Today’s Gospel
passage gives a short account of the call of the Apostles and of the preaching
and healing mission of Jesus. Jesus was the first missionary, sent by His
Father with the “Good News” that God his Father is a loving, merciful, and
forgiving Father Who wants to save everyone through His Son, Jesus. Today’s
Gospel describes how this First Missionary selected and empowered twelve future
missionaries as Apostles to continue his mission.
Special features: Jesus selected very ordinary people, most
of them hard-working fishermen with no social status, learning, or political
influence. Jesus was sure that this strange mixture of people would be very
effective instruments in God’s hands. Matthew was a hated tax collector serving
the Roman Empire, while Simon the Cananaean was a Zealot, a fanatical
nationalist or terrorist of those days, determined to destroy Roman rule by any
means. The others were mostly professional fishermen with a lot of good will,
patience, and stamina. It was only Jesus‘ love for them and their admiration
and love for Jesus that united them. Jesus selected them after a night of
prayer and gave them His own Divine powers of healing and exorcism and made
them a key part of His own Messianic mission of preaching the “Kingdom of God.”
Life Messages: 1) God wants to show us that a
calling for ministry, or a vocation to priestly or religious life or family
life, is an initiative of God. 2) As Christians we have the same mission that
Jesus entrusted to his Apostles. 3) We fulfill this mission of preaching the
word of God, primarily, by living out Jesus’ teachings and by promoting and
helping world-wide missionary activities of the Church.
(https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Sept 11 Wednesday:
The context: Luke presents the Sermon on
the Plain as following immediately upon the choosing of the twelve
Apostles. Today’s Gospel passage, taken from Luke’s Sermon on the
Plain, teaches us that true happiness or beatitude lies in the
awareness of who we are and what we are supposed to do. The eight beatitudes
Jesus gives in Mathew, like the four in Luke, contradict the ideas of “real”
happiness prevalent in the Jewish culture of Jesus’ day (and in our modern
society as well), according to which wealth, health, power, pleasure and
influence are the “true” beatitudes.
The Beatitudes: Jesus instructs his disciples in the
paradoxical blessedness of poverty, hunger, sorrow, and persecution, which
contradict our natural expectations in every way. Blessed are those who are
poor, hungry, weeping, hated, excluded, insulted, and denounced because in
poverty, we recognize God’s reign; in hunger, His providence; in sorrow, true
happiness; and in persecution, true joy. Experiencing these miseries opens the
way for us to receive the true riches, the food, comfort and acceptance we find
only in His love and His presence here and in His Kingdom forever. The
Beatitudes are commands for how we should live, and what we should do. What
makes one blessed is not simply poverty or hunger or sadness or suffering for
one’s Faith, but commitment to Jesus and His spirit of sharing.
Life messages: 1) We need to respond to the
challenges of the Beatitudes in our daily life. Millions are starving,
persecuted, homeless, and leading hopeless lives. When we reach out to help
them, we are living out the Beatitudes. In addition, Jesus tells us that we are
serving him in these suffering people. We are also loving our neighbors as
Jesus loves us. That is why we are told that we will be judged on the basis of
our acts of mercy and charity (Mt 25:31-46). 2) Let us also
remember that each time we reach out to help the people who are needy, sick,
and/or oppressed, we give them the experience of God’s love for them. 3) Just
as the Apostles were called to minister to society’s untouchables, so all
Christians are called to minister to the untouchables, the discriminated
against and the marginalized in our own modern society, that they may meet
God’s love in human flesh. (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Sept 12 Thursday: Most holy Name of Mary:
The context: Today’s Gospel passage is the
second part of Jesus’ Sermon on the Plain as given by Luke. It
describes the power of Christian love when exercised by practicing
the golden rule: “Do to others as you would have them do
to you.” This golden rule is amplified by a string of particular
commands: 1) "Love your enemies…Do good to those who hate you;
bless those who curse you and pray for those who maltreat you." Jesus
orders us to love our enemies. 2) Show your Christian love to everyone,
especially to your enemies by treating them with mercy and compassion because
our Heavenly Father is merciful and compassionate to all His children. “Be
compassionate, as your Father is compassionate."3) Stop
judging and start forgiving.
Life messages: 1) We need to answer the invitation
to grace-filled behavior: What makes Christianity distinct from any
other religion is the quality known as grace, i.e., our
ability to treat others, not as we think they deserve, but with love, kindness,
the spirit of forgiveness and mercy. 2) We need to accept the challenges of
day-to-day life. Jesus challenges our willingness to endure unjust suffering
for His sake and the sake of His Gospel. 3) We need to pray
for the strength to forgive. At every Mass we pray the “Our Father,” asking God
to forgive us as we forgive others. We must forgive, because only forgiveness
truly heals our relationships and heals us. If we remember how God has forgiven
us, it will help us forgive others. 4) We need to live our lives in accordance
with “the Golden Rule." (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Sept 13 Friday: St John Chrysostom, Bishop, Doctor of the
Church: The context: Today’s Gospel passage gives us the parable
of the sower, the seeds sown, and the yield depending upon the type of soil. It
is the first parable of Jesus in the New Testament about the Kingdom of Heaven.
It is also a parable interpreted by Jesus himself. This parable was intended as
a double warning: to the hearers to be attentive to, and to the Apostles to be
hopeful about, Jesus’ preaching in the face of growing opposition to the Master
and his ideas. Jesus wants all of us to open our hearts generously to the word
of God and then to put that word into practice. The sower is God, the Church,
the parents, the teachers, and we ourselves. The seed sown is the high-yielding
word of God which is “a sharp sword” (Is 49:2), “two-edged sword” (Heb 4:12),
and “fire and hammer” (Jer 23:29).
Soil type & the yield: The hardened soil on
the footpath represents people with minds closed because of laziness, pride,
prejudice, or fear. The soil on flat rock pieces represents emotional types of
people who go after novelties without sticking to anything, and are unwilling
to surrender their wills to God. “I will remove the heart of stone from
their flesh and give them a heart of flesh” (Ez 11:19). The soil
filled with weeds represents those who are addicted to evil habits and evil
tendencies, those whose hearts are filled with hatred or jealousy, and those
whose greed focuses on acquiring money by any means and on enjoying life in any
way possible. The good and fertile soil represents well-intentioned people with
open minds and clean hearts, earnest in hearing the word and zealous in putting
it into practice. Zacchaeus, the sinful woman , the thief on Jesus’ right side,
St. Augustine, St. Francis of Assisi, and St. Francis Xavier, among others,
fall into this category of the good soil.
Life message: Let us become the good soil and
produce hundred-fold yields by earnestly hearing, faithfully assimilating and
daily cultivating the word of God we have received, so that the Holy Spirit may
produce His fruits in our lives. Fr. Tony (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Sept 14 Saturday: Jn 3: 13-17: (The Exaltation of the
Holy Cross):
Introduction: We celebrate this feast of the
Exaltation of the Cross for two reasons: (1) to understand the history of the
discovery and recovery of the True Cross and (2) to appreciate better the
importance of the symbol and reality of Christ’s sacrificial love, namely, the
cross in the daily life of every Christian.
History: The Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy
Cross is one of twelve “Master feasts” celebrated in the Church to honor Jesus
Christ, our Lord and Master. This feast is celebrated to memorialize the first
installation of the remnants of the true cross of Jesus in the Church of the
Holy Sepulcher at Mount Calvary, September 14, AD 335, and its reinstallation
on September 14, AD 630. The original cross on which Jesus was crucified was
excavated in AD 326 by a team led by St. Helena, the mother of the first Christian
Roman Emperor, Constantine. The Emperor built the Church of the Holy Sepulcher
on Calvary, it was consecrated on September 14, AD 335, and the remains of the
cross were installed in it by Archbishop Maccharios of Jerusalem. After three
centuries, the Persians invaded Jerusalem, plundered it of all valuables and
took with them the relic of the Holy Cross. In AD 630, Heraclius II defeated
the Persians, recaptured the casket containing the holy relic, and reinstalled
it in the rebuilt Church, which was destroyed by Muslims in 1009. The crusaders
rebuilt it as the present Church of the Holy Sepulcher in 1149. The largest
fragment of the holy cross is now kept in Santa Croce Church in Rome. The first
reading today (Nm 21:4b—9) describes how God healed the complaining Israelites
through the brazen serpent. The second reading Phil 2:6-11) reminds us that
Jesus, “ humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even
death on a cross,” In today’s Gospel, answering the question raised by
Nicodemus, Jesus cites the example of how, when the Israelites were in the
desert, the impaled brazen serpent (representing the healing power of God),
which God commanded Moses to raise, saved from death the serpent-bitten
Israelites who looked at it (Nm 21:4-9). Then Jesus explains how He is going to
save the world by dying on the cross.
Life messages: 1) We should honor and venerate
the cross and carry it on our person to remind ourselves of the love God has
for us and the price Jesus paid for our salvation. 2) The cross will give us
strength in our sufferings and remind us of our hope of eternal glory with the
risen Lord. With St. Paul, we express our belief that the “message of the
cross is foolishness only to those who are perishing” (1Cor 1:18-24), and
that we should “glory in the cross of Our Lord” (Gal 6:14). 3) We
should bless ourselves with the sign of the cross to remind ourselves that we
belong to Christ Jesus, to honor the Most Holy Trinity, and to ask the Triune
God to bless us, save us and protect us from all danger and evil. 4) The crucifix
should remind us that we are forgiven sinners and, hence, we are expected to
forgive those who offend us and to ask for forgiveness whenever we offend
others or hurt their feelings.
(Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
