DAILY READING and REFLECTIONS For Friday, September 26, 2014 25th Week in Ordinary Time - Psalter 1 (Green/Red) Optional Memorial: St. Cosmas and St. Damian, Martyrs Readings: Ecl 3:1-11; Ps 144:1-4; Lk 9:18-22 Response: Blessed be the Lord, my rock. Rosary: Sorrowful Mysteries Verse Highlight: Who do you say I am? SAINT OF THE DAY: Saints Cosmas and Damian, Martyrs Patron of Druggist Sts. Cosmas and Damian were brothers, born in Arabia, who had become eminent for their skill in the science of medicine. Being Christians, they were filled with the spirit of charity and never took money for their services. At Egaea in Cilicia, where they lived, they enjoyed the highest esteem of the people. When the persecution under Diocletian broke out, their very prominence rendered them marked objects of persecution. Being apprehended by order of Lysias, governor of Cilicia, they underwent various torments about the year 283. Their feast day is September 26th. They are patron saints of pharmacists. READINGS FROM THE NEW AMERICAN BIBLE: READING 1, Ecclesiastes 3:1-11 1 There is a season for everything, a time for every occupation under heaven: 2 A time for giving birth, a time for dying; a time for planting, a time for uprooting what has been planted. 3 A time for killing, a time for healing; a time for knocking down, a time for building. 4 A time for tears, a time for laughter; a time for mourning, a time for dancing. 5 A time for throwing stones away, a time for gathering them; a time for embracing, a time to refrain from embracing. 6 A time for searching, a time for losing; a time for keeping, a time for discarding. 7 A time for tearing, a time for sewing; a time for keeping silent, a time for speaking. 8 A time for loving, a time for hating; a time for war, a time for peace. 9 What do people gain from the efforts they make? 10 I contemplate the task that God gives humanity to labour at. 11 All that he does is apt for its time; but although he has given us an awareness of the passage of time, we can grasp neither the beginning nor the end of what God does. RESPONSORIAL PSALM, Psalms 144:1-2, 3-4 1 [Of David] Blessed be Yahweh, my rock, who trains my hands for war and my fingers for battle, 2 my faithful love, my bastion, my citadel, my Saviour; I shelter behind him, my shield, he makes the peoples submit to me. 3 Yahweh, what is a human being for you to notice, a child of Adam for you to think about? 4 Human life, a mere puff of wind, days as fleeting as a shadow. GOSPEL, Luke 9:18-22 18 Now it happened that he was praying alone, and his disciples came to him and he put this question to them, Who do the crowds say I am? 19 And they answered, Some say John the Baptist; others Elijah; others again one of the ancient prophets come back to life. 20 But you, he said to them, who do you say I am? It was Peter who spoke up. The Christ of God, he said. 21 But he gave them strict orders and charged them not to say this to anyone. 22 He said, The Son of man is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day. REFLECTIONS: Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam (To the Greater Glory of God) OPENING PRAYER: Father, guide us, as you guide creation according to your law of love. May we love one another and come to perfection in the eternal life prepared for us. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. ON READING 1: Ecclesiastes 3:1-11 (For everything there is a season, Man cannot see far) After arriving at the previous conclusion, the sacred writer picks up the thread of his discourse to say something along the same lines as 1:3-7, but this time focussing not on the created world but on seasonal changes in human life. These, too, are fixed in advance and man can do nothing to alter them (vv. 1-9). However, even though he may not be able to make sense of them, man has to accept that it is God who makes everything beautiful in its time (vv. 10-11), and therefore man should enjoy life as a gift from God (vv. 12-13), conscious that God controls what happens now and in the future (vv. 14-15; cf. 1:9). In this passage the teacher of Israel uses some ideas from the Greek philosophers. He lists fourteen pairs of times in the ordinary life of man. In Hebrew culture, numbers had symbolic values, multiples of seven denoting completeness; so this list is meant to include all the stages and tasks of life. By putting birth and death first he is giving them pride of place: all the other pairs fit in between birth and death. The Stoic philosophers claimed that the human mind can know the season fixed for each activity, and that a virtuous man knows and respects the appropriate time for each thing. As the Preacher sees it, man can know them, but he cannot change them, because it is God who has established those times and he has charged man with the task of discovering them. Moreover, the seasons of life, the times at which events in mans life happen, are presented here as transcending mans understanding, while, at the same time, they lie at the core of his existence. Believing, as we do, that the coming of Christ marks the fullness of time, we see time to be the backdrop against which the salvation history unfolds: In Christianity, time has a fundamental importance, said St. John Paul II. Within the dimension of time the world was created; within it the history of salvation unfolds, finding its culmination in the fullness of time of the Incarnation, and its goal in the glorious return of the Son of God at the end of time. In Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, time becomes a dimension of God, who is himself eternal. With the coming of Christ there begin the last days (cf. Heb 1:2), the last hour (cf. 1 Jn 2:18), and the time of the Church, which will last until the Parousia. From this relationship of God with time there arises the duty to sanctify time. This is done, for example, when individual times, days or weeks, are dedicated to God, as once happened in the religion of the Old Covenant, and as happens still, though in a new way, in Christianity. In the liturgy of the Easter Vigil the celebrant, as he blesses the candle which symbolizes the Risen Christ, proclaims: Christ yesterday and today, the beginning and the end. Alpha and Omega, all time belongs to him, and all the ages, to him be glory and power through every age for ever. He says these words as he inscribes on the candle the numerals of the current year. The meaning of this rite is clear: it emphasizes the fact that Christ is the Lord of time; he is its beginning and its end; every year, every day and every moment are embraced by his Incarnation and Resurrection, and thus become part of the fullness of time (Tertio millenio adveniente, 10). Thus, every time, every moment, is not purely transitory; it is an eternal dimension. So, what is important is to make good use of time, that time which is always slipping from our grasp and which to a Christian is more precious than gold, because it represents a foretaste of the glory that will he granted us hereafter (St. J. Escriva, Friends of God, 212). Earlier, the sacred writer spoke about his personal reflections (I said to myself: 1:16; 2:1, 15); now he is going to speak about what he sees, what his own experience has been (I have seen: v. 10; cf. 3:16; 4:1; etc.). He sees mans activity as the business entrusted to him by God. Although man does not grasp the full import of his actions, he can still take some pleasure from them and benefit from them. ON THE GOSPEL: Luke 9:18-22 (Peters Confession of Faith, First Prophecy of the Passion) The Gospel today follows the same theme as that of Yesterday: the opinion of the people on Jesus. Yesterday, beginning with Herod, today it is Jesus who asks what do people think, the public opinion and the Apostles respond giving the same opinion which was given yesterday. Immediately follows the first announcement of the Passion, death and Resurrection of Jesus. Luke 9, 18: The question of Jesus after his prayer. “One day, while Jesus was praying alone, his disciples came to him and he put this question to them: “Who do the crowds say I am?” In Luke’s Gospel, on several important and decisive occasions, Jesus is presented in prayer: in his Baptism when he assumes his mission (Lk 3, 21); in the 40 days in the desert, when, he overcame the temptations presented by the devil Lk 4, 1-13); the night before choosing the twelve apostles (Lk 6, 12); in the Transfiguration, when, with Moses and Elijah he spoke about his passion in Jerusalem (Lc 9, 29); in the Garden when he suffers his agony (Lk 22, 39-46); on the Cross, when he asks pardon for the soldier (Lk 23, 34) and when he commits his spirit to God (Lk 23, 46). Luke 9, 19: The opinion of the people on Jesus. “They answered: “For some John the Baptist; others Elijah, but others think that you are one of the ancient prophets who has risen from the dead”. Like Herod, many thought that John the Baptist had risen in Jesus. It was a common belief that the prophet Elijah had to return (Mt 17, 10-13; Mk 9, 11-12; Ml 3, 23-24; Eclo 48, 10). And all nourished the hope of the coming of the Prophet promised by Moses (Dt 18,15). This was an insufficient response. Luke 9, 20: The question of Jesus to the disciples. After having heard the opinion of others, Jesus asks: “And you, who do you say I am?” Peter answers: “The Messiah of God!” Peter recognizes that Jesus is the one whom the people are waiting for and that he comes to fulfil the promise. Luke omits the reaction of Peter who tries to dissuade Jesus to follow the way of the cross and omits also the harsh criticism of Jesus to Peter (Mk 8, 32-33; Mt 16, 22-23). Christ means anointed and is a name indicating honor and office. In the Old Law priests were anointed (Exodus 29:7 and 40:13), as were kings (1 Samuel 9:16), because God laid down that they should receiving anointing in view of their position; there was also a custom to anoint prophets (1 Samuel 16:13) because they were interpreters and intermediaries of God. When Jesus Christ our Savior came into the world, He assumed the position and obligations of the three offices of priest, king and prophet and was therefore called Christ (St. Pius V Catechism, I, 3, 7). Luke 9, 21: The prohibition to reveal that Jesus is the Messiah of God. “Then Jesus gave them strict orders and charged them not to say this to anyone”. It was forbidden to them to reveal to the people that Jesus is the Messiah of God. Why does Jesus prohibit this? At that time, as we have already seen, everybody was expecting the coming of the Messiah, but, each one in his own way: some expected a king, others a priest, others a doctor, a warrior, a judge or a prophet! Nobody seemed to expect the Messiah Servant, announced by Isaiah (Is 42, 1-9). Anyone who insists in maintaining Peter’s idea, that is, of a glorious Messiah, without the cross, understands nothing and will never be able to assume the attitude of a true disciple. He will continue to be blind, exchanging people for trees (cf. Mk 8, 24). Because without the cross it is impossible to understand who Jesus is and what it means to follow Jesus. Because of this, Jesus insists again on the Cross and makes the second announcement of his passion, death and resurrection. Luke 9, 22: The second announcement of the Passion. And Jesus adds: “The Son of Man is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders and chief priests and Scribes and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day”. The full understanding of the following of Jesus is not obtained through theoretical instruction, but through practical commitment, walking together with him along the road of service, from Galilee up to Jerusalem. The road of the following is the road of the gift of self, of abandonment, of service, of availability, of acceptance of conflict, knowing that there will be a resurrection. The cross is not an accident on the way; it forms part of our way. This because in the organized world starting from egoism, love and service can exist only if they are crucified! Anyone who makes of his life a service to others disturbs those who live attached to privileges, and suffers. Jesus prophesied His passion and death in order to help His disciples believe in him. It also showed that He was freely accepting these sufferings He would undergo. Christ did not seek to be glorified: He chose to come without glory in order to undergo suffering; and you, who have been born without glory, do you wish to be glorified? The route you must take is the one Christ took. This means recognizing Him and it means imitating Him both in His ignominy and in His good repute; thus you will glory in the Cross, which was His path to glory. That was what Paul did, and therefore he glorified in saying, Far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ (Galatians 6:14) (St. Ambrose, Expositio Evangelii Sec. Lucam, in loc.). FINAL PRAYERS: Blessed be Yahweh, my rock, who trains my hands for war and my fingers for battle, my faithful love, my bastion, my citadel, my Saviour; I shelter behind him. (Ps 144,1-2) Lord, we pray for Liberia and the people of West Africa struck by the ebola virus. Strengthen those in positions of leadership and influence to do everything possible to bring the Ebola outbreak to an end. Protect the amazing health care workers and bring healing and comfort to the suffering. Aid those mourning for family and friends fighting this disease and bring solace to those grieving the loss of a loved one. Amen. It is by God’s mercy that we are saved. May we never tire of spreading this joyful message to the world. -- Pope Francis Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ. -- St. Jerome The Father uttered one Word; that Word is His Son, and He utters Him forever in everlasting silence; and in silence the soul has to hear it. -- St. John of the Cross
Posted on: Thu, 25 Sep 2014 21:21:34 +0000
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