Monday in the Fourth Week of Ordinary Time, February 1, 2021

Mark 5:1-20

Jesus and his disciples came to the other side of the sea, to the territory of the Gerasenes. When he got out of the boat, at once a man from the tombs who had an unclean spirit met him. The man had been dwelling among the tombs, and no one could restrain him any longer, even with a chain. In fact, he had frequently been bound with shackles and chains, but the chains had been pulled apart by him and the shackles smashed, and no one was strong enough to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the hillsides he was always crying out and bruising himself with stones. Catching sight of Jesus from a distance, he ran up and prostrated himself before him, crying out in a loud voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me!” (He had been saying to him, “Unclean spirit, come out of the man!”) He asked him, “What is your name?” He replied, “Legion is my name. There are many of us.” And he pleaded earnestly with him not to drive them away from that territory. Now a large herd of swine was feeding there on the hillside. And they pleaded with him, “Send us into the swine. Let us enter them.” And he let them, and the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine. The herd of about two thousand rushed down a steep bank into the sea, where they were drowned. The swineherds ran away and reported the incident in the town and throughout the countryside. And people came out to see what had happened. As they approached Jesus, they caught sight of the man who had been possessed by Legion, sitting there clothed and in his right mind. And they were seized with fear. Those who witnessed the incident explained to them what had happened to the possessed man and to the swine. Then they began to beg him to leave their district. As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed pleaded to remain with him. But Jesus would not permit him but told him instead, “Go home to your family and announce to them all that the Lord in his pity has done for you.” Then the man went off and began to proclaim in the Decapolis what Jesus had done for him; and all were amazed.

This episode with the Gerasene demoniac follows directly after that of Jesus calming the storm.  We can see in this that the Lord Jesus prepared his Apostles for the even more terrifying experience of facing Legion by showing them his power over the nearly disastrous squall.  We could also see this as the demons, aware of the approach of the Lord over the sea, attempting to scare him and drive him off, if not kill him, by causing this storm.  The Lord, then, wards off this attack, then heads directly for his enemies.  “At once a man from the tombs who had an unclean spirit met him.”  The demons, having failed with the storm, now attempt to thwart the Lord with the hideous appearance of the man whom they have seized, as though to warn Jesus that he will wind up even as that man: “Night and day among the tombs and on the hillsides he was always crying out and bruising himself with stones.”  No monster portrayed in our movies approaches this man in his horrible aspect.  “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me!”  The devil often appeals to humans that he is the wronged party in his struggle with God, that he is an underdog worthy of sympathy.  He does this during modern exorcisms, and he does it in our society, attempting to make us normalize, accept, and celebrate that which should not be.  Here he tries to disguise himself as a lowly creature whom no one, let alone  “the Son of the Most High God”, should deign to notice.  Almost comically, the demon hides behind the man whose life he has torn apart, as though he and the man were one and the same.

“He asked him, ‘What is your name?’ ”  Jesus ignores the evil one’s entreaty and commands it to give its name, thereby forcing its surrender.  He does this for the sake of the Apostles, who are watching nearby, stiff and pale.  He is teaching them about his authority and power.  Ultimately this will help them to understand how easily he could have escaped his Death on the Cross if he had chosen to do this, and to see his Passion and Death as a true, voluntary Sacrifice.  Its answer, “Legion”, does not necessarily imply that six thousand demons inhabited this man.  It might have meant even more.  “Send us into the swine. Let us enter them.”  Anything is preferable to a demon than to return to hell after being expelled from a man.  Its fellow demons jeer and mock with great ferocity.  It would have been worse for Legion because not even it as an immense mob of spirits could hold onto a single man, driven out by a single man with a simple command.  The Lord allows them to enter the vast herd of swine feeding on the hillside.  This took place early in the day, since the Lord and the Apostles had crossed the Sea of Galilee that evening.  The weather was calm.  A few clouds might have dotted the sky, but it was mostly clear following the squall.  And then, without warning, the man fell to the ground, unconscious, and the swine howled and stampeded.  Now, a pig can squeal as loudly as a hundred decibels or more.  Mark tells us there were two thousand pigs in the herd.  The high pitched sounds of the shrieks of the pigs, even from a distance, would have been shattering.  The ground, too, would have shook as they pounded their way desperately for the cliff.  Not even a pig wanted to be home for a demon.

And then it was over, and a sweet quiet reigned until a crowd from the nearby town came up.  The formerly possessed man was “sitting there clothed and in his right mind.”  Perhaps one of the Apostles threw a blanket or his mantle over him.  The man looked about him in wonderment, untroubled for the first time in a very long time.  He did not know all that had happened.  He was bruised, gashed, and bleeding, but his mind was “right”.  It was “right” enough for him to ask the Lord if he could go with him.  But the Lord wanted him to stay, to witness to the Gentiles of the region what the God of the Jews had done for him, a Gentile.  And in this way prepare the land for the preaching of the Apostles after Pentecost.

Mark tells us that all those who later heard the man speak were “amazed” — a better word might be “awe-struck”.  The Evangelist does not tell us the reaction of the Apostles.   

 The Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time, January 31, 2021

Mark 1:21–28

Then they came to Capernaum, and on the sabbath Jesus entered the synagogue and taught. The people were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes. In their synagogue was a man with an unclean spirit; he cried out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!” Jesus rebuked him and said, “Quiet! Come out of him!” The unclean spirit convulsed him and with a loud cry came out of him. All were amazed and asked one another, “What is this? A new teaching with authority. He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him.” His fame spread everywhere throughout the whole region of Galilee.

The Evangelists emphasize the “authority” of Jesus, each in his own way.  St. Matthew does so by showing how the prophets spoke of the Lord, and how the Lord fulfilled both the Law and their prophecies.  St. Mark emphasizes it by showing how both the natural and the supernatural worlds bow to his very word.  For instance, in the Gospel reading for yesterday’s Mass (Mark 4:35-41), the Evangelist presented a sharp picture of the Lord commanding the winds and the storm threatening his Apostles on the Sea of Galilee.  He told the winds and the sea, “Quiet!  Be still!”  And they subsided immediately.  Throughout his Gospel, Mark devoted himself to showing what Jesus did and not as much to telling us what he said.  For instance, he relates very few of the Lord’s parables.  Instead, he fills his narrative with the Lord’s works, showing him as superior to all things and all people.

“The people were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority.”  He reveals the fullness of the teachings of the Law and the Prophets and does so on his own merit, and not relying on some acknowledged authority, such as a rabbinical writing.  And he shows the power which is the basis for his authority by casting out the demon that afflicts this man in the synagogue.  It cried out in its panic, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”  The demon seeks to protect itself by threatening to reveal the Lord’s identity before he is ready to do this himself.  This in spite of the fact that the demon did not really know who “Jesus of Nazareth” was.  

Utterly disregarding the demon’s words, the Lord speaks to it as he will speak to the winds and the storm: “Quiet!  Come out of him!”  And the demon leaves at once.  

The Lord commands storms, demons, diseases, and fig trees, and they do right away what he tells them to do.  He is the one who said, “Let there be light!”  And there was light.  He commands us too, but he does not force us to do anything, as he does these things.  But we ought to obey him even more readily than these other things, as a sign of our love for him.

 Saturday in the Third Week of Ordinary Time, January 30, 2021

Mark 4:35-41

On that day, as evening drew on, Jesus said to his disciples: “Let us cross to the other side.” Leaving the crowd, they took Jesus with them in the boat just as he was. And other boats were with him. A violent squall came up and waves were breaking over the boat, so that it was already filling up. Jesus was in the stern, asleep on a cushion. They woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Quiet! Be still!” The wind ceased and there was great calm. Then he asked them, “Why are you terrified? Do you not yet have faith?” They were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?”

The Lord Jesus has spent the day teaching large crowds who press upon him so that he is standing on the wet sand lapped by the Sea of Galilee.  At times he has sat apart from the multitudes with his Apostles in order to explain to them in greater detail what he has already told the people.  Possibly he would have done this around the noon hour when the sun stood high in the sky and hungry laborers returned home for a meal and a little rest.  But people were departing and arriving all the time, not allowing him much of a respite.  

As the sun began to set and the deep darkness only possible away from the towns and cities began to spread over the land, he dismissed the people who had remained, who had drunk up his every word even when they did not understand what he was telling him, and told his followers, “Let us cross to the other side.”  Now, while this time of the early night might have seen fishermen start towards their boats for their long vigils with their nets, it was not a good time to lose sight of the coast, much less to “cross over to the other side”.  Unless the moon was full, it would have been difficult to see where they were going.  Also, the threat of sudden squalls during the night was a real one, and in this case anyone at sea would be fighting to stay alive in nearly complete darkness.  The Apostles looked out at the sky, adorned with the stars in their familiar constellations.  They could make it.  The evening was still early and the sky was clear, and the moon shone forth in its glory.

“They took Jesus in the boat with them just as he was.”  That is, Jesus was wearing his ordinary clothes, a simple tunic and a mantle, along with his sandals.  He did not tuck in his tunic as the experienced fishermen did, which would have made it easier to swim if necessary, and certainly would have made it easier for him to move about if water splashed on him.  He acted as though he expected a swift, uneventful trip.  The Apostles would have noted this.  “And other boats were with him.”  These were not fishing boats, but were conveying people to the other side to be with Jesus.  “A violent squall came up and waves were breaking over the boat, so that it was already filling up.”  The Greek actually says, “a great violent squall came into being”.  The sense is that the sea and sky erupted and convulsed without warning.  Almost immediately, the shaken fishing boat began to fill up with water and the Apostles bailed desperately, but in vain.  

“Jesus was in the stern, asleep on a cushion.”  The detail of the Lord asleep “on a cushion” remained with St. Peter even decades later when he told it to Mark.  Perhaps it stuck out to him because the Lord afforded himself so few necessities that the idea of him lying on a cushion seemed out of place.  The detail, though, provides us with the contrast between the raging, deadly storm and the peacefully reposing Jesus Christ.  He had not been knocked unconscious, in other words, but was sound asleep.  It is the only time in the Gospels that we hear of him sleeping.  “They woke him.”  As if he were so deep in sleep that not even the heaving of the sea, the battering of the rain, and the filling of the ship could rouse him, and the Apostles had to jostle him themselves.  It was almost as though he were dead, and they were trying to wake him.  But he rose up without their help in his good time, fully alert, and not at all alarmed.  

“Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”  Here they only call him “teacher”.  They do not seem to know him as “Lord” yet, but they will soon.  The question they shout at him above the crashing of the waves and the howling of the wind, is an odd one.  They may have been pleading with him to help them bail the water pouring in.  Still, their respect for him prevents them from ordering him to do this.  On the other hand, their situation was deteriorating rapidly and they realized it.  Their cries to him did not quite ring with despair, but they did carry the tone of incredulity.  Why was he untouched by fear?  Why was he not fighting down mounting panic as they were?  “He . . . rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Quiet! Be still!’ ”  He “rebuked” the wind, as though it were a child acting up.  Then he spoke to the sea — St. Mark does not say that he cried out or shouted.  He speaks simply to the battering sea as though to soothe it, again, as though speaking to a child who has begun to cry: “Quiet! Be still!”  And the wind and the sea heard him, and with the same frightening suddenness with which the storm burst upon them, it was over.  It did not subside, it disappeared.  The moon and the stars shone again, and all was as it had been before.  

The Apostles looked about them as though they had woken from a nightmare: “The wind ceased and there was great calm.”  After a little while, as the Apostles collected their wits, he demanded of them, “Why are you terrified? Do you not yet have faith?”  The two questions go together.  It may also be that the end of the storm was as terrifying to them as when it exploded upon them.  The questions seem a little harsh, but many of the Fathers understood that Jesus had deliberately made this all to happen in order to teach his Apostles that despite all they had seen him do, their faith in him was still in its beginning stages, not much beyond that of the crowds.    They now have a hard question they must answer: “Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?”  Only later will one of them commit to the answer: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16, 16).  

“Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?”  It is a good question to ponder.  Who do we believe that he is?

 Friday in the Third Week of Ordinary Time, January 29, 2021

Mark 4:26-34

Jesus said to the crowds: “This is how it is with the Kingdom of God; it is as if a man were to scatter seed on the land and would sleep and rise night and day and the seed would sprout and grow, he knows not how. Of its own accord the land yields fruit, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the grain is ripe, he wields the sickle at once, for the harvest has come.  To what shall we compare the Kingdom of God, or what parable can we use for it? It is like a mustard seed that, when it is sown in the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on the earth. But once it is sown, it springs up and becomes the largest of plants and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the sky can dwell in its shade.” With many such parables he spoke the word to them as they were able to understand it. Without parables he did not speak to them, but to his own disciples he explained everything in private.

The crowds expected their Messiah to talk about the kingdom of God in terms of its mighty buildings, its invincible armies, its completed Temple, and its fabulous wealth.  After all, he was to restore the kingdom to Israel (Acts 1, 6).  Instead, he spoke of anything but these things.  He talked about women sweeping their houses for lost coins, merchants finding pearls, and seeds growing into plants, bushes, and trees.  They listened in silence, waiting for hints as to what he meant, and then when they did not hear anything that made sense or that they recognized as pertaining to the kingdom they expected, they drifted away, unsatisfied.  They listened, but they did not understand, and they did not cheer, as they had expected to do.  But neither did they ask questions that would lead them to deeper understanding.  They would rather fade away than know for sure what it all meant.  To the Pharisees he once explained, “The kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17, 20), but this left them silent as well, though of all people, they were the ones who should have understood. 

“He knows not how.”  The growth of faith in a person is a deep mystery, even to that person, let alone to others.  It can be likened to the terms of reproduction, wherein a single, simple word or look can stick in a person’s mind, and the Holy Spirit “fertilizes” it, and faith begins to grow, nourished or hampered by the person who has received it through their behavior, their reading, and praying.  They can also be fortified by the prayers of others, often of others who are far away and unseen, as the prayers of St. Therese of Lisieux from her Carmel in France assisted in the conversion of many Vietnamese she did not meet while on this earth.  But not knowing how this works in a given person does not prevent us from scattering all the seed we can and praying for good results.  “Of its own accord the land yields fruit, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear.”  It only seems to the outsider that faith grows of “its own accord”.  The believer in Jesus knows that it is the result of someone cooperating with the grace God has freely granted.  And it is a joy to behold the growth in all its flourishing mystery.  Indeed, witnessing the growth of faith in another fosters our own growth in faith.  “And when the grain is ripe, he wields the sickle at once, for the harvest has come.”  When a person has matured in faith as much as he will, then God brings him into his barn.  It is the end of his life in this world and the beginning of his life in the next.  Some achieve this more quickly than others, while others live long lives in order to teach and inspire.  Some are cut off at a certain point so that they do not fall into deadly sin later on.  And some people are given a long length of time, as we reckon time, for a repentance that they continually put off and perhaps leave this world without.  

“It is like a mustard seed that, when it is sown in the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on the earth.”  Oftentimes we do not realize that we are scattering seed.  We go about our day according to our customs and habits and speak and act as we normally do, but some person hears us speak a word or two, not necessarily directed at that person, and it acts like a gentle rain upon a parched field.  It may not even be a word but a gesture like a smile that is the first smile someone has seen that is not sarcastic or cruel, but is full of kindness.  Sometimes it happens that we do not even recognize a seed as a seed but scatter it anyway.  Mustard seed does not look like seed.  It looks like dirt.  But if it is flung in the right place — and we poor mortals cannot on our own know what is that place, so we fling it in all directions — it will grow marvelously and we will wonder at the mystery.  It will even grow so that “the birds of the sky can dwell in its shade”, that is, even those who firmly believe in the Lord and so already dwell in heaven in their prayers and hopes, will find refreshing coolness in their company.

 Thursday in the Third Week of Ordinary Time, January 28, 2021

The Feast of St. Thomas Aquinas 

Hebrews 10:19-25

Brothers and sisters: Since through the Blood of Jesus we have confidence of entrance into the sanctuary by the new and living way he opened for us through the veil, that is, his Flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us approach with a sincere heart and in absolute trust, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed in pure water. Let us hold unwaveringly to our confession that gives us hope, for he who made the promise is trustworthy. We must consider how to rouse one another to love and good works. We should not stay away from our assembly, as is the custom of some, but encourage one another, and this all the more as you see the day drawing near.

“Since through the Blood of Jesus we have confidence of entrance into the sanctuary.”  While the Blood of Jesus, shed on the Cross for us, makes our salvation possible, it also provides us a tangible reason to hope for it.  St. Paul identifies heaven, the place of our salvation, with the “sanctuary” of a temple, particularly with that of the Temple in Jerusalem.  This Temple was divided into sections where people would go depending upon who they were.  For instance, there was a court for women and children.  Men could not normally go there, but neither could women and children enter the men’s court. There was also a certain court beyond which the Gentiles could not go.  Only the priests could enter the sanctuary, and only the high priest could enter the Holy of Holies beside it.  A non-priest could never hope to enter the sanctuary or the Holy of Holies.  But Paul has made it clear that, in Baptism, in the Blood of Jesus, we are made a priestly people and so we have the privilege of entering not only the sanctuary but even the Holy of Holies.  The way to the Holy of Holies went through the veil that hung between it and the sanctuary — a veil that was torn from top to bottom at the moment of the sacrificial Death of the Lord Jesus (cf. Matthew 27, 51).  “By the new and living way he opened for us through the veil, that is, his Flesh.”  This “way” is his Church.  Paul identifies the veil of the Holy of Holies with the Flesh of the Lord, which is fitting because the veil was the exterior of the Holy of Holies, “veiling” the divine within, just as the Flesh of the Lord veiled the Lord’s divinity.  With his Death, the “veil” is torn, revealing his divinity, which even the Roman centurion acknowledged: “Truly, this was the Son of God” (Matthew 27, 54).  This is signified by the tearing of the veil in the Temple.  “Through his Flesh”, then, we have salvation.  

“Since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us approach with a sincere heart and in absolute trust.”  Jesus is the “great” priest, not the successor to wicked Caiphas as “high priest”, but “great” in the sense of offering the Sacrifice of himself for us.  He is the great priest of the Church, the true “house of God”, and in our knowledge of this we approach the Holy of Holies, heaven, in solemn procession, girded with “a sincere heart” and “absolute trust”.  After all, what has he left undone for us?  “With our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed in pure water.”  That is, we are cleansed heart and mind, body and soul, in Baptism.  Washed in this way, we are prepared to enter this most holy of places.

“Let us hold unwaveringly to our confession that gives us hope, for he who made the promise is trustworthy.”  Just as the Lord showed his trustworthiness with absolutely clarity in his Death for us, so we cling without reservation to our Faith, which he revealed to us and in which we were baptized.  “We must consider how to rouse one another to love and good works.”  We do not enter heaven each of us alone, as in the case of the high priest who entered the earthly Holy of Holies alone.  We assist one another with good example, prayers, and with urging to do good works and to live a holy life in imitation of the Lord Jesus.  “We should not stay away from our assembly, as is the custom of some.”  At the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, to which all believers are invited, we worship our God as he has commanded us.  At the same time, we see one another there and recognize that God has purposely put us believers together in the world so that we might help each other on the road to salvation.  “But encourage one another, and this all the more as you see the day drawing near.”  We encourage one another to come to Holy Mass in order to worship God and to draw solace from the presence of others in our fellowship.  We do this “all the more” — with greater zeal — as we see that the passing of each day draws us ever nearer the great day of the second coming of the Lord Jesus.  Paul continually speaks to us in the plural.  He does not say, I have such a great High Priest, or You (singular) have such a great High Priest, but that We have such a great High Priest, and he laid down his life for us all.  Therefore we work together so that we may fill the true Holy of Holies with our souls.

Wednesday in the Third Week of Ordinary Time, January 27, 2021

Hebrews 10:11-18

Every priest stands daily at his ministry, offering frequently those same sacrifices that can never take away sins. But this one offered one sacrifice for sins, and took his seat forever at the right hand of God; now he waits until his enemies are made his footstool. For by one offering he has made perfect forever those who are being consecrated. The Holy Spirit also testifies to us, for after saying:  “This is the covenant I will establish with them after those days, says the Lord: ‘I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them upon their minds.’ ”  He also says: “Their sins and their evildoing I will remember no more.”  Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer offering for sin.

In the first reading for today’s Mass we continue with the Letter to the Hebrews.  St. Paul here compares the old priesthood with its sacrifices and the new Priesthood of Christ, in which the Lord offered the sacrifice of himself.  He says that, “Every priest stands daily at his ministry, offering frequently those same sacrifices that can never take away sins.”  God had given the old law to Moses about 1,500 years before the Birth of Christ, and for nearly all those years until the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D. the Jewish priests had offered sacrifices for sins — sacrifices which could only take away ritual uncleanness, but not sin itself.  These sacrifices signified the one Sacrifice by which sin would actually be forgiven.  

It is good to think about how sin and virtue affects a person, especially on how it affects a person’s ability to receive the Gospel, which leads to the forgiveness of that person’s sins.  We can get an idea of this by looking at the Parable of the Sower and the Seed, which is today’s Gospel reading.  The Lord speaks of different types of soil and the results that come from casting seed upon them.  The types of soil signify types of people, or the dispositions of people.  People receive  the “seed” of faith and react to it according to their abiding dispositions.  These dispositions come about through time and experience, through actions and reactions, through the exercise of the will.  They regulate a person’s openness to new ideas and even to reason.  A life of repeated sin will affect a person in a very different way than a life in pursuit of virtue.  A wicked person will look at a new idea with suspicion and through a prism of selfishness.  A virtuous person may be cautious with anything new, but generally will be curious and will be confident in being able to judge whether an idea or a proposed course of action is a good one or not.  Now, the first type of soil in the parable is a hard “path”.  The seed lies on top of the soil and is ineffectual.  Jesus says that this signifies those who hear the Gospel, but that “immediately Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown” (Mark 4, 15).  That is, because of the effect of repeated sinful actions in the past, these people have closed themselves off to the Gospel even before they encounter it, and so they reject it when they hear it.  The second type of soil is “rocky ground”.  This signifies those whose lives are less sinful but who are very attached to this world and the opinions of others.  Their moral choices have brought them to this point.  Unlike the wicked, they are excited to hear the Gospel, and its novelty appeals to them, but its demands are too much for them.  They fear that they will lose the esteem of others and dread the possibility of being scorned by others in society.  The third type of soil is thorny ground.  This signifies people who seek power and control over others.  The Gospel has little chance with them, for “the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts after other things . . . choke the word” (Mark 4, 19).  The fourth type of soil is “rich”.  This signifies those who have continually sought God, who pursue virtue.  Years of living good lives have prepared them to become “fruitful” in the Gospel.  

The world in which we live is dominated and ruled by those who have rejected the Gospel, or would reject it if they heard it through the continual hardening of their hearts that results from sin against what we call “natural law”, a law written on our hearts which everyone can know, even those who do not know God.  They did not get to where they are except by steady effort.  We ought to look upon what sin has done to these people and to our world, the hatred it has brought with its feuds, quarrels, and wars, as well as its envies, its lusts.  We ought to look upon it and then upon the lives of the saints and upon the Lord Jesus who so desires all to be saved that he would die on the Cross as many times as there are people if this were necessary, as St. Alphonsus  Liguori says.  So let us step away from sin and corruption and bask in the forgiveness the Lord so readily offers us, and make ourselves ever more open to his will through our faith and virtuous works.

 

 Tuesday in the Third Week of Ordinary Time, January 26, 2021

The Feast of Saint Timothy and Saint Titus

Mark 4:21-25

Jesus said to his disciples, “Is a lamp brought in to be placed under a bushel basket or under a bed, and not to be placed on a lamp-stand? For there is nothing hidden except to be made visible; nothing is secret except to come to light. Anyone who has ears to hear ought to hear.” He also told them, “Take care what you hear. The measure with which you measure will be measured out to you, and still more will be given to you. To the one who has, more will be given; from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”

St. Timothy, a First Century native of Asia Minor, was born of a gentile father and a Jewish woman named Eunice who became a Christian, herself the daughter of a Christian woman named Lois, both of whom Paul commends for their faith.  He became one of St. Paul’s most steadfast companions and accompanied him on several missions.  Paul appointed him the first bishop of the church at Ephesus, and addressed two very personal Letters to him which are included in the New Testament. They are filled with sound, practical advice for church order.  Tradition hands down that Timothy was stoned to death by the pagans of Ephesus when he was an old man.  Formerly he had his own feast day, January 24.  St. Titus was born in Antioch, Syria, of gentile parents and was converted as a young man by the preaching of St. Paul.  He became another of Paul’s most trusted companions.  Paul’s trust in him is shown in that he appointed him bishop of the church on the island of Crete.  He may have died there, but no record of this has come down to us.  St. Paul’s Letter to Titus also adorns the Holy Scriptures.  Formerly he also had his own feast day, on February 6, until the reform of the Roman calendar in 1969.

In the Gospel reading for today’s Mass, the Lord teaches on the subject of faith.  Faith, he tells us, is not some private belief that is to be kept locked up or disguised.  He uses a lamp as a figure for faith, but in the way he talks about it, it seems to be a living thing announcing its presence: “Is a lamp brought in to be placed under a bushel basket or under a bed, and not to be placed on a lamp-stand?”  As though to say that the lamp will not tolerate being hidden under a bushel basket or stuck under a bed.  If the lamp is lit, hiding it in such places will only result in a fire, anyway.  Its light will shine forth one way or another.  In the same way, we believers are lamps and the flame is our faith, or, the faith committed to us.  The fuel we contain for the flame is the grace of God.  The purpose of the lamp is to provide the basis for light, and the purpose of the light is not to illumine the lamp so that people can admire it but to throw back the darkness all around as though it were a heavy curtain, so that reality may be seen.  That reality is God and his love for us.  To cover up the lamp and its light in order to continue walking in the darkness is madness.  “For there is nothing hidden except to be made visible; nothing is secret except to come to light.”  God does not hide himself from us, though we sometimes try to hide him from ourselves by covering our eyes with our hands or by distracting ourselves by gazing into the darkness beyond the reach of the lamp’s light.  He wants us to see his glory: we were made to see his glory.  Only those who resolutely flee from his glory never see it.  And many do so, preferring their own imagined glory to that of Almighty God: “I will ascend above the height of the clouds, I will be like the most High” (Isaiah 14, 14). 

“The measure with which you measure will be measured out to you, and still more will be given to you.”  The Lord teaches us here that the greater our belief, the more enduring our perseverance in our faith during tribulation, the greater the reward he shall give us in heaven: “To him who overcomes I will give to eat of the tree of life which is in the paradise of my God” (Revelation 2, 7).  We should also know that since the “measure” of our faith is a lit lamp: the greater the measure, the brighter the lamp, and so the more unbelievers our faith shall bring to the glory of the Lord.  And, “to the one who has, more will be given”, that is, the Lord will provide more grace to us whose flame already burns furiously, but “from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”  This warning takes another form in Revelation 2:5: “Be mindful therefore from whence you are fallen: and do penance, and do the first works [of your faith]. Or else I come to you and will move your candlestick out of its place, except you do penance.”  A person may burn brightly at first, but then he stops praying, fasting, and doing good works.  He may even stop worshipping God at Holy Mass.  He is like the seed scattered on stony ground, which signifies the person who “hears the word [of the Gospel], and immediately receives it with joy.  Yet it has no root in him, but is only for a time: and when there arises tribulation and persecution because of the word, he is presently scandalized.”  Or the seed that is scattered among thorns, signifying the person who “hears the word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches chokes up the word, and he becomes fruitless” (Matthew 13, 20-22).  

 The Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, Monday, January 25, 2021

Acts 9:1-22

Saul, still breathing murderous threats against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, that, if he should find any men or women who belonged to the Way, he might bring them back to Jerusalem in chains. On his journey, as he was nearing Damascus, a light from the sky suddenly flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” He said, “Who are you, sir?” The reply came, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. Now get up and go into the city and you will be told what you must do.” The men who were traveling with him stood speechless, for they heard the voice but could see no one. Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing; so they led him by the hand and brought him to Damascus. For three days he was unable to see, and he neither ate nor drank.  There was a disciple in Damascus named Ananias, and the Lord said to him in a vision, Ananias.” He answered, “Here I am, Lord.” The Lord said to him, “Get up and go to the street called Straight and ask at the house of Judas for a man from Tarsus named Saul. He is there praying, and in a vision he has seen a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him, that he may regain his sight.” But Ananias replied, “Lord, I have heard from many sources about this man, what evil things he has done to your holy ones in Jerusalem. And here he has authority from the chief priests to imprison all who call upon your name.” But the Lord said to him, “Go, for this man is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before Gentiles, kings, and children of Israel, and I will show him what he will have to suffer for my name.” So Ananias went and entered the house; laying his hands on him, he said, “Saul, my brother, the Lord has sent me, Jesus who appeared to you on the way by which you came, that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” Immediately things like scales fell from his eyes and he regained his sight. He got up and was baptized, and when he had eaten, he recovered his strength.  He stayed some days with the disciples in Damascus, and he began at once to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, that he is the Son of God. All who heard him were astounded and said, “Is not this the man who in Jerusalem ravaged those who call upon this name, and came here expressly to take them back in chains to the chief priests?” But Saul grew all the stronger and confounded the Jews who lived in Damascus, proving that this is the Christ.

The Holy Church recognizes in Paul of Tarsus so great a saint that she assigns him two feast days: that honoring his conversion, and one on which he is joined with St. Peter, the rock on whom the Lord Jesus has built his Church.

The First Reading assigned to the present feast is taken from the Acts of the Apostles, written by Paul’s close co-worker, St. Luke.  Paul himself also tells us of his conversion in a brief account we find in his Letter to the Galatians: “I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it . . . But . . . he who had set me apart before I was born, and had called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me” (Galatians 1, 13, 15-16).  He does not overstate the violence with which he persecuted the Church.  Luke tells us that he “was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison” (Acts 8, 3).  He tortured and killed Christians throughout Judea and Galilee, and was on his way to arrest Christians in the city of Damascus, outside of the Holy Land, at the time he was accosted by the Lord Jesus in a vision.  

We might wonder about his conversion.  It seems impossible that a man with such strong, even violent, convictions as Saul of Tarsus would ever entertain the question whether he was doing rightly or not in persecuting these heretical Christians.  But the future apostle did truly love God.  He loved him so much that he was completely open to his will, whatever it might mean for him.  Before his conversion he saw the Christians as Jews who had rejected the God of their fathers and the law he had given them, and were seeking to destroy the Temple and the old priesthood.  They had even made a mere man into their God after the Romans had crucified him.  In his vision he did saw a tremendous flash of light and he heard the voice of the Lord with its Galilean accent, calling him by name.  He learned from the Lord his will, which was that he go on into Damascus where he would be told what to do, but nothing more than that for the time being.  

Paul could have said no.  He could have proceeded to Damascus and carried out his original plan, or he could have returned to Jerusalem, or he could have gone back to Tarsus, his hometown.  He had been blinded following the vision and had a good excuse to turn aside and go back.  But he saw in the vision and his blindness a message from God, and out of love for God he did as he was told.  We can only imagine the violent shock Paul must have received in the vision.  He must have felt absolutely turned inside out.  The foundation upon which he stood had broken away and he was plunging into a vast void, his arms flailing wildly.  And yet he gathered himself and had his men lead him on to Damascus, where he pledged himself to do what he was told.  

A person armed only with convictions could not do what Paul did.  For Paul, God was everything.  His convictions about how to serve him were based on his best understanding of God’s will at the time, while being ready to change these if he learned otherwise.  For Paul, it was God who was in charge, not himself.  He knew himself to be only a servant, one who obeyed the orders of the superior, and that he — not his superior — was subject to error. With even greater zeal than he had persecuted the Christians, he preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ, suffering greatly for him in doing so.  To do what Paul did, there must be profound humility and absolute dedication to the Lord.

Almighty God chose a village girl for the Mother of his Son, a fisherman as the Rock of his Church, and the enemy of his Church to spread the Faith throughout the Mediterranean region.  He picks the most outwardly unlikely people to do his greatest works.  In our own ways, we are unlikely too, yet God has called us to do great works as well.

 The Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, January 24, 2021

1 Corinthians 7:29–31

I tell you, brothers and sisters, the time is running out. From now on, let those having wives act as not having them, those weeping as not weeping, those rejoicing as not rejoicing, those buying as not owning, those using the world as not using it fully. For the world in its present form is passing away.

The context for the Second Reading for today’s Mass is an answer to a question about marriage St. Paul was asked by a certain person among the faithful in the Church at the Greek city of Corinth.  After speaking of the holiness of marriage, Paul counseled the unmarried not to marry, basing this on his understanding that the Second Coming was imminent.  If Jesus is coming any day now, he reasoned, then each Christians should be devoted entirely to preparing for this.  Marriage, in this case, would be a distraction.  

The expectation of the Lord’s imminent coming has lessened over the years, particularly since the signs spoken of by the Lord Jesus and the Apostles have not appeared yet, and so it is not a consideration at all when the question of a couple marrying arises.  All the same, Paul’s counsel remains valuable.  It helps us to understand the seriousness with which we must live our faith; it confirms the reality of the Second Coming; and it tells us of the attitude we ought to have as Christians in a dissolving world.

“The time is running out.”  Time has been running out since its beginning.  All of physical creation exists on a temporary basis, and at a certain point each physical thing decays.  We often live in denial that time is running out for each of us.  We do this partly in order to get on with our work and responsibilities, for to stare constantly at the prospects of death is to become paralyzed by fear or despair.  “From now on, let those having wives act as not having them.”  Paul connects his thoughts on the end times with his previous subject, which was marriage.  The verse applies equally to husbands as to wives: Let those who have husbands act as not having them.  Paul does not teach that spouses should ignore each other.  To the contrary, he has just spoken of how spouses should work for each other’s salvation: “For how do you know, O wife, whether you shall save your husband? Or how do you know, O husband, whether you shall save your wife?” (1 Corinthians 7, 16).  Paul is saying that our own salvation is more important to us than that of another, even that of a spouse.  Another way to put it is that we are not to lose our soul in order to save another’s.  “Those weeping as not weeping, those rejoicing as not rejoicing, those buying as not owning.”  We cannot avoid engaging with others and providing for ourselves while we live in this world, but doing so must not distract us from providing ourselves with treasure in heaven.  As the Lord Jesus says, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal” (Matthew 6, 19-20).  “Those using the world as not using it fully.”  We use the goods that will nourish and assist us so that we may serve God and one another.  The world offers many more things than these, and dresses them up very attractively, but we must beware, for also the fruit that Adam and Eve ate “was a delight to the eyes” (Genesis 3, 6).

“For the world in its present form is passing away.”  It is indeed “passing away”.  Yet in the time we have left, we ought to “till it and keep it” (Genesis 2, 15), as Almighty God commanded Adam and Eve in the beginning.  And we ought to “tend” and “keep” one another, as well, for we are passing from this world even as it passes from us.  By living in this world as a preparation for living in the next, we will live well here and we will be ripe for heaven.

Saturday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 23, 2021

Hebrews 9:2-3, 11-14

A tabernacle was constructed, the outer one, in which were the lamp stand, the table, and the bread of offering; this is called the Holy Place. Behind the second veil was the tabernacle called the Holy of Holies. But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that have come to be, passing through the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made by hands, that is, not belonging to this creation, he entered once for all into the sanctuary, not with the blood of goats and calves but with his own Blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption. For if the blood of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of a heifer’s ashes can sanctify those who are defiled so that their flesh is cleansed, how much more will the Blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from dead works to worship the living God.

We have another description of the scene of the Lord Jesus entering the heavenly Holy of Holies in Revelation 5, 6: “And I saw: and behold in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures and in the midst of the ancients, a Lamb standing, as it were slain, having seven horns and seven eyes.”  The Lamb of God, who is at once Priest and Victim, stands before the throne of the Father, surrounded by the Church in the form of the ancients and the four living creatures.  He presents himself to the Father with his mortal wounds, and the Church cries out in jubilation at his intercession: “You were slain and have redeemed us to God in your Blood, out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, and have made us to our God a kingdom and priests, and we shall reign on the earth!” (Revelation 5, 9-10).  Under the Old Law, the Jewish high priest offered bread in the Holy Place, and on the Day of Atonement, in the Holy of Holies, he would offer a bull for himself and a goat for the people, sprinkling the blood.  This sign of the true Sacrifice of the Son of God is fulfilled by the Lord offering his Body and Blood on Golgotha.  This is signified by the tearing of the veil or curtain that separated the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies, at the same time showing that the time of the sacrifices of the Old Law was finished.  In the verses cited from Revelation, we see that the Lamb is not alone with God, for the ancients and the four living creatures, signifying the Church, are present as well: with the veil torn, those who share in his Priesthood through their baptism, may now enter into this most sacred place with him.  There they offer their worship, singing, “To him who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb, benediction and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever!” (Revelation 5, 13).  

“For if the blood of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of a heifer’s ashes can sanctify those who are defiled so that their flesh is cleansed, how much more will the Blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from dead works to worship the living God.”  These verses, among others, show that the Temple worship was very much continuing at the time this Letter was written.  At least some of the Jewish Christians to whom St. Paul was writing may have still been worshipping there, as well as insisting on circumcision and the following of the Jewish law by the Gentile Christians.  While Paul reacts with great vehemence when he hears that some of the Gentile Christians are adopting these practices, as in his Letter to the Galatians, here he explains calmly to the Jewish Christians how the Sacrifice of Jesus has put an end to the works of the Old Law.  Paul emphasizes this by saying that these are “dead” works since they are to be performed no more.  But they are also transformed into the new works of the New Covenant: Baptism, the Eucharist, and the other Sacraments.  Through our reception of these Sacraments now, we begin to learn to sing the eternal praises of God with the Saints in heaven.

 

 Friday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 22, 2021

Hebrews 8:6-13

Brothers and sisters: Now our high priest has obtained so much more excellent a ministry as he is mediator of a better covenant, enacted on better promises. For if that first covenant had been faultless, no place would have been sought for a second one. But he finds fault with them and says: “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will conclude a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their fathers the day I took them by the hand to lead them forth from the land of Egypt; for they did not stand by my covenant and I ignored them, says the Lord. But this is the covenant I will establish with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my laws in their minds and I will write them upon their hearts. I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall not teach, each one his fellow citizen and kin, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all shall know me, from least to greatest. For I will forgive their evildoing and remember their sins no more.”  When he speaks of a “new” covenant, he declares the first one obsolete. And what has become obsolete and has grown old is close to disappearing.

God made two covenants with the humans he had created over the course of time before the coming of his Son into the world.  He made one with Abraham, in which he promised to make a great nation of him and give his descendants the land of Canaan to live in.  When the descendants of Abraham had become the great nation of the Hebrews and were journeying to this land from their slavery in Egypt, God made a covenant with them through Moses: they would obey the laws which the Lord their God had made for them, and he, for his part, would never abandon them and would make them his own possession: “If therefore you will hear my voice, and keep my covenant, you shall be my peculiar possession above all people: for all the earth is mine. And you shall be to me a priestly kingdom, and a holy nation” (Exodus 19, 5-6).  Effectively, the Lord transforms the covenant he had made with Abraham.  We can understand this “new” covenant as an expansion or evolution of the former covenant.  Likewise, the New Covenant in the Blood of the Lord Jesus can be seen as a transformation — the fulfillment — of this covenant, which had bound the people to obey the laws given through Moses.  But in the fulfillment of the Old Covenant and the inauguration of the New, the Old Law is also fulfilled: there is no longer any need to worship in the Temple in Jerusalem, for Christ himself is the true Temple; circumcision is fulfilled in the sacrament of Baptism; the sacrifices in the Temple come to an end because they were only signs of the Sacrifice of the Lord Jesus; and the old priesthood ends too, as it is fulfilled in the One who offered himself as the perfect Sacrifice on the Cross.  The old law, in fact, becomes “obsolete”.  The “new and eternal” Covenant is the fulfillment of the old, and so far surpasses it in its promises that it really is “new”, and certainly the Apostles spoke of it in this way.  This is what St. Paul means when he declares: “Now our high priest has obtained so much more excellent a ministry as he is mediator of a better covenant, enacted on better promises.”  

We can see the progression of the covenants: in that with Abraham, Almighty God promised to make of Abraham a great nation;  in that with Moses, God promised to make this great nation a “priestly people”; in that with humanity, God promises eternal life through the Blood of the Mediator of that Covenant, the Lord Jesus.  The earlier covenants of Abraham and Moses were sealed with the blood of animals, but this one, the fulfillment of these, which were signs of it, in the Blood of the God-made-man.  It makes the best promises and cannot in anyway be surpassed.   The first two covenants were entered into by the blood-line, through physical descent, and so was limited to the Jews.  The New Covenant is entered into through being washed with the Blood of Christ in Baptism, and is open to all.

The quote at the heart of today’s First Reading is from Jeremiah 31, 31-34.  In it, Almighty God announced to the Jews, in the years before the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple, that he would make a “new” covenant, but that “it will not be like the covenant I made with their fathers”, for the people “did not stand by my covenant.”  This new covenant would not merely legislate behavior, but would convert hearts: “I will put my laws in their minds and I will write them upon their hearts. I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”  We see the Lord Jesus instituting the laws of the New Covenant through the fulfillment of the old when he says, for instance, “You have heard that it was said to them of old: You shall not kill. And whosoever shall kill, shall be in danger of the judgment. But I say to you, that whosoever is angry with his brother, shall be in danger of the judgment” (Matthew 5, 21-22).   The Lord Jesus gives the new law as the fulfillment of the old, gives the promise of eternal life as the fulfillment of life in the Promised Land, and then ratifies this New Covenant not in the blood of beasts, but in his own Blood.

Almighty God says of the New Covenant, that “I will put my laws in their minds and I will write them upon their hearts.”  For those who are incorporated into the New Covenant, God writes his laws on their hearts with the pen of the Cross, the ink of which is the Blood of his beloved Son.  Let us be true to him who mediated this Covenant for us.

 Thursday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 21, 2021

Mark 3:7-12

Jesus withdrew toward the sea with his disciples. A large number of people followed from Galilee and from Judea. Hearing what he was doing, a large number of people came to him also from Jerusalem, from Idumea, from beyond the Jordan, and from the neighborhood of Tyre and Sidon. He told his disciples to have a boat ready for him because of the crowd, so that they would not crush him. He had cured many and, as a result, those who had diseases were pressing upon him to touch him. And whenever unclean spirits saw him they would fall down before him and shout, “You are the Son of God.” He warned them sternly not to make him known.

In the Gospel reading for today’s Mass, we see our High Priest amongst the crowd.  “Holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, higher than the heavens”, as he is, he yet walks among the sinners, the sick, and those whose only hope is in him.  Not only does he walk among them and speak to them, though he has no need to do this, but he allows them such access to himself that there is danger that they will crush him, and he makes provision for that.  And he heals them.  St. Mark gives us some sense of our Lord’s enormous labor simply by telling of the places where all these people come from: “from Galilee and Judea . . . from Jerusalem, from Idumea, from beyond the Jordan, and from the neighborhood of Tyre and Sidon.”  Not all of these were Jews, but all of them were desperate.  They came to be healed.  “He had cured many and, as a result, those who had diseases were pressing upon him to touch him.”  We can imagine this crowd, “pressing upon him”, grabbing his arms, calling his name, pushing him, each person striving for his attention.  This would have gone on for hours each day.  Our Lord patiently endured it and “cured many”.  That is, he cured all who came to him, and there were “many” who came.  By sunset, he must have been exhausted, with no time to eat or rest.  He spent many days in this way as he moved through Galilee and Judea.  Even before he hung of the Cross for us, our High Priest was offering his sufferings and labors for us.  Each encounter signified his taking on of our flesh.  Each cure acted as a sign of the healing his Death would bring.  

 Wednesday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 20, 2021

Hebrews 7:1-3, 15-17

Melchizedek, king of Salem and priest of God Most High, met Abraham as he returned from his defeat of the kings and blessed him. And Abraham apportioned to him a tenth of everything. His name first means righteous king, and he was also “king of Salem,” that is, king of peace. Without father, mother, or ancestry, without beginning of days or end of life, thus made to resemble the Son of God, he remains a priest forever. It is even more obvious if another priest is raised up after the likeness of Melchizedek, who has become so, not by a law expressed in a commandment concerning physical descent but by the power of a life that cannot be destroyed. For it is testified:  You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

Some early Jewish writings, such as the Babylonian Talmud, teach that the person identified in Genesis 14 as “Melchizedek”, the “king of Salem” who came to Abraham was Shem, the son of Noah.  According to these sources, Shem would have been 465 years old at that time.  According to Genesis 11, 10-11, Shem lived six hundred years, ninety-eight of them before the Flood.  “Melchizedek” is actually a title, rather than a proper name.  It means “the king of righteousness”.  Shem was also “the priest of the most high God” “Genesis 14, 18).  The author of the Letter to the Hebrews knows that the Lord Jesus was descended not from Aaron, the brother of Moses, who was appointed high priest at the time the Ark of the Covenant was built and the worship of the Old Law was established, but from Shem, the son of Noah (cf. Luke 3, 36).  Thus, the Lord Jesus is not of the priesthood of Aaron but is the legitimate high priest according to the original line of the priests of God.  The messiah was long prophesied to be of this line, meaning that the line of Aaron would be finished.  The prophecy is found in Psalm 110, 4, quoted at the end of today’s First Reading.  The verse is surprising, even shocking, and meant the inconceivable: the end of the Temple.  Perhaps knowing this gave extra impetus to the high priests to do away with Jesus: the true Messiah meant their finish.  It also would further prove that they killed him not because they did not know who he was, but because they did.

“Melchizedek . . . met Abraham as he returned from his defeat of the kings and blessed him. And Abraham apportioned to him a tenth of everything.”  We can understand these lines spiritually: Abraham signifies the man or woman who has come to realize the futility of the world: they defeat the “kings” of the world in this way.  Melchizedek, that is, the Lord Jesus, comes and “blesses” this person with the grace to live the life of faith.  Abraham, the person who has now received grace, responds to the Lord with thanks, praise, and service.

“Without father, mother, or ancestry, without beginning of days or end of life.”  By concealing Shem under his title of the “king of righteousness”, the author of Genesis shows that he is also a sign of the priest or of the righteous believer, but particularly, as Paul points out, as a sign of the Incarnate Son of God.   “If another priest is raised up after the likeness of Melchizedek.”  Paul is now speaking not only of the Lord Jesus but also of those subsequently raised up in him to share in his Priesthood for the good of the faithful throughout time.  “Who has become so, not by a law expressed in a commandment concerning physical descent but by the power of a life that cannot be destroyed.”  It is not the Law that makes priests, but grace.  “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”  The psalm containing this verse was sung in the Temple for a thousand years by men who knew that their positions would become obsolete when it was fulfilled.  The holy ones among them only wanted to do the will of God and were willing to give up even the priesthood of Aaron if that was what obedience to him required.  And when the Lord did come, this was what John the Baptist, the son of the priest Zechariah, did.

 Tuesday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 19, 2021

Hebrews 6:10-20

God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love you have demonstrated for his name by having served and continuing to serve the holy ones. We earnestly desire each of you to demonstrate the same eagerness for the fulfillment of hope until the end, so that you may not become sluggish, but imitators of those who, through faith and patience, are inheriting the promises. When God made the promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself, and said, I will indeed bless you and multiply you. And so, after patient waiting, Abraham obtained the promise. Now, men swear by someone greater than themselves; for them an oath serves as a guarantee and puts an end to all argument. So when God wanted to give the heirs of his promise an even clearer demonstration of the immutability of his purpose, he intervened with an oath, so that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge might be strongly encouraged to hold fast to the hope that lies before us. This we have as an anchor of the soul, sure and firm, which reaches into the interior behind the veil, where Jesus has entered on our behalf as forerunner, becoming high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

At the beginning of this portion of the Letter to the Hebrews, which the Church uses for the First Reading of today’s Mass, Paul is contrasting the wickedness of Christians who give up the Faith with his congregation, which has not.  

“Your work and the love you have demonstrated for his name by having served and continuing to serve the holy ones.”  This work and love are for those suffering for their belief in the Lord.  As Paul will say later in this letter, “You endured a great fight of afflictions. And on the one hand indeed, by reproaches and tribulations, were humiliated; and on the other, became companions of them that were used in such sort. For you both had compassion on them that were in chains and took with joy the being stripped of your own goods, knowing that you have a better and a lasting substance” (Hebrews 10, 32-34).  Paul alludes here to the persecution which the Jewish leaders waged following their stoning of St. Stephen (in which he himself had been involved).  Those to whom he was writing were continuing to “serve the holy ones” undergoing persecution.  God, he says, “is not unjust so as to overlook” their charity, but will reward them for it.  They must persevere in this faith and in these good works, however: “We earnestly desire each of you to demonstrate the same eagerness for the fulfillment of hope until the end.”  This brings to mind the warning our Lord gave to the Ephesian Christians: “I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Be mindful therefore how far you are fallen: and do penance and do the works you did at first” (Revelation 2, 4-5).  Paul warns them that they may not become “sluggish” but that they might burn with the same fervor as the persecuted Christians they are assisting: “[Become] imitators of those who, through faith and patience, are inheriting the promises.”  Let us note his use of the verb “are inheriting”: these are the adopted sons and daughters of God who receive what their Father has promised them.  They receive the grace of adoption at baptism, and then “act” like God’s sons and daughters, imitating the Father’s only begotten Son.  

Paul compares these Jewish Christians to their ancestor Abraham, and reminds them of how Abraham believed in the Lord’s promise to him: “And so, after patient waiting, Abraham obtained the promise.”  Abraham was ninety-nine years old when Sarah gave birth to their son Isaac.  He persisted in his trust for decades through all his hard labor, travels, and battles.  He persisted in the face of failing biology.  He did not give in even when no reason remained to hope except that God had promised him a son.  This is faith: when there is no rational reason to believe and every reason to give up, but a person holds on.  This is the faith that leads to heaven, the faith held by the martyrs in their torments, the faith clutched by missionaries in faraway places.  Almighty God promised Abraham, “I will indeed bless you and multiply you.”  He makes the same promise to us who are baptized: I will bless you with grace, and I will multiply your joys in heaven.  

We are “strongly encouraged to hold fast to the hope that lies before us”, as were the first Christians, by the promise of God, and also by his Son, who suffered for us and has become the “anchor” of our souls through entering the throne room of heaven on our behalf as our “forerunner”, as our “high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek”, presenting his Sacrifice before the Father.  The crucifix that hangs in our homes and churches, which the early Christians disguised in their art as an anchor, is the divine guarantee of the promise the Lord makes to us.

 Monday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 18, 2021

Hebrews 5:1-10

Brothers and sisters: Every high priest is taken from among men and made their representative before God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. He is able to deal patiently with the ignorant and erring, for he himself is beset by weakness and so, for this reason, must make sin offerings for himself as well as for the people. No one takes this honor upon himself but only when called by God, just as Aaron was. In the same way, it was not Christ who glorified himself in becoming high priest, but rather the one who said to him: You are my Son: this day I have begotten you; just as he says in another place, You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. In the days when he was in the Flesh, he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered; and when he was made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.  

“Every high priest is taken from among men and made their representative before God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.”  St. Paul very succinctly and elegantly defines exactly what a priest (of whatever level) is and what he does.  He “is taken from among men” so that he no longer belongs with them, but is set apart.  In order for the priest to learn this, he must not live among other men, but ought either to live away from them alone or with other priests.  It is necessary for him to learn and to know his unique state so that he can perform his duty properly.  His is not a job like any other, but is completely unlike other jobs or responsibilities.  He is made “their representative before God: he is an appointed sign of other men in the presence of God.  “To offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.”  The priest does this   on behalf of others.  If he were not appointed for this task by God himself, he could only offer “gifts and sacrifices” for himself.  He would represent only himself.  

“He is able to deal patiently with the ignorant and erring, for he himself is beset by weakness.”  The Greek says, “able to have compassion”, which is more than “dealing patiently” because “dealing patiently” is merely an outward action and does not speak to what is in the heart.  Thus, the priest’s compassion informs and motivates his work of sacrifice because he himself “is beset with weakness”.  The true priest does not hide his weakness from himself as though it were beneath him to have any weakness, but admits this fact to himself, allowing him to marvel that God chose him at all for this work.  “For this reason, [he] must make sin offerings for himself as well as for the people.”  Now, he, as one possessing a fallen human nature, may be affected with weakness — but not malice, a very different thing.  “No one takes this honor upon himself but only when called by God, just as Aaron was.”  The point, for Paul, is important enough to reiterate: the priest “is taken from among men and made their representative” — both verbs in the passive voice.  “No one takes this honor” — active voice.  “But only when called by God” — passive voice.  The work is God’s, not a man’s.  A man cannot ordain himself to the priesthood.   The word translated here as “honor” can also mean “price” or “value”.  The priest cannot impose worthiness or value upon himself anymore than a slave could in ancient times.  It must come from a higher authority.  “As Aaron”.  Before God sent Moses to Pharaoh, Aaron was just another Hebrew slave making bricks out of clay and mud for the Egyptians.  “In the same way, it was not Christ who glorified himself in becoming high priest.”  The Lord Jesus is the model, the exemplar, here.  But even he, the Son of God, did not glorify himself in his ordination by the Father.  This brings to mind Paul saying that the Lord, “being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God” (Philippians 2, 6): that is, the Son knowing himself to be begotten by the Father, understood that all he was and had came from the Father, his divinity included.  The human priest must possess this most profound humility and self-knowledge or he will fail in his duties (however well he might seem to the human eye to execute them) and be lost forever.  

That God has begotten a Son is clear from the words of the Psalm: “You are my Son: this day I have begotten you” (Psalm 2, 7).  To this verse Paul couples Psalm 110, 4: “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”  Both of these psalms were regarded by the Jews as pertaining to the Messiah.  We note here that the Father, speaking in the Psalm, does not call his Son a priest forever “according to the order of Aaron”, which would have been expected, since it was the descendants of Aaron who formed the Temple priesthood.  No, this is an utterly different Priesthood, one from the line of Shem, the son of Noah, who lived into the times of Abraham and became known as the “righteous king” , the meaning of “Melchizedek”.  Noah offered sacrifices, as priest, pleasing to God after the Flood.  This is a Priesthood of righteousness, then.  It is the fulfillment of the priesthood of Aaron, which was but a sign.  The Lord Jesus, then, is not only the new High Priest, but the High Priest of the Priesthood of righteousness.  “In the days when he was in the Flesh, he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears.”  No Jewish high priest ever offered sacrifices in this way.  The Lord did this because of the compassion he had for others, having taken their flesh upon himself, and also because of his love for them as the God who created them — each one of them, individually, with care and foresight.  The love of our God is such that he even weeps for unrepentant sinners: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kills the prophets and stones them that are sent unto you, how often would I have gathered together your children, as the hen gathers her chickens under her wings, and you would not?” (Matthew 23, 37).  “When he was in the Flesh”: during his lifetime on earth, as distinct from his life in heaven in which his Flesh is glorified.  This verse indicates that the Lord Jesus was offering sacrifices for us all through his life, and not only at his Passion.  Or, we can see his whole life as one great Sacrifice, culminating in his Passion and Death.  “He was heard because of his reverence.”  The Greek word translated here as “reverence” actually means “obedience”.  The Lord Jesus did not make exterior offerings such as cattle and goats to his Father for us, but offered himself in obedience to him.  The “price” of his Priesthood was himself: he was ordained by the Father to offer himself.  “Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered.”  That is, his human nature learned it.  He learned obedience from his sufferings in that he understood that obedience costs something substantial of the one who offers it.  There is no easy obedience.  It is itself a sacrifice, and it is offered here not because of a superior master, but out of absolute love for his Father and out of compassion for us.  

“In the days when he was in the Flesh, he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered; and when he was made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.”  These few verses comprise the deepest insight into our Savior and his life.  They, along with the opening verses of St. John’s Gospel, are the most significant words ever written.  They reveal to us the truth of God and man, of divinity and humanity.  They reveal the Heart of our Lord for us.  Do we draw near, or do we look away?  Do we enter his Heart or flee for our childish diversions?  

These verses also tell us of the Priesthood our Lord has established, and in which those whom he calls, share.  They are priests in the Priest; they are alter Christus — another Christ — not symbolically or even as a sign, but truly.  Only in this way could the Lord’s Sacrifice be perpetuated on earth, could his command, “Do this in memory of me”, be accomplished.  Because they are weak, sharing in the fallen human nature which is the lot of all the members of our species, save the Blessed Virgin Mary, they must be prayed for that in all things they may act in Christ and for Christ, continuing his Offering day after day, making his obedience and love their own, in their hearts.