Thursday in the Thirteenth Week of Ordinary Time, July 1, 2021

Matthew 9:1-8

After entering a boat, Jesus made the crossing, and came into his own town. And there people brought to him a paralytic lying on a stretcher. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Courage, child, your sins are forgiven.” At that, some of the scribes said to themselves, “This man is blaspheming.” Jesus knew what they were thinking, and said, :Why do you harbor evil thoughts? Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”– he then said to the paralytic, “Rise, pick up your stretcher, and go home.” He rose and went home. When the crowds saw this they were struck with awe and glorified God who had given such authority to men.

St. Matthew describes the aftermath of the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount (in chapters 5-7) in terms of a series of miracles in which he drives out evils of various kinds: he heals the leper, the centurion’s servant, Peter’s mother-in-law, and the crowd.  Then he drives out the storm on the sea and the devils from the two possessed men on the other side of the sea.  Now we see the Lord forgiving sins, driving out the guilt incurred on account of sin.  This is new, and with the exception of the case of the Good Thief as the Lord hung on the Cross, it is unique in the Gospels.  No one else asks the Lord for forgiveness, which the Good Thief asks for implicitly in his confession and request that the Lord remember him.  The Lord explicitly forgives the paralyzed man’s sins in order to show that he has the power to do this, and because he knows that the man wants forgiveness but does not dare to ask for it.  

“When Jesus saw their faith.”  Matthew tells us that it is the faith of the man’s friends that the Lord sees.  He “saw” (or, “looked upon”, or “experienced”) their faith through their act of bringing the man to him, and he saw it in their hearts.  The world, which cannot see our hearts, will only see our faith when it sees our works.  “Courage, child, your sins are forgiven.”  Literally, “Be of good cheer, child.”  The Lord addressed the man as a father would his son, and then gives him what only God could give.  In calling him “child” and then forgiving his sins, the Lord shows that we do not cut ourselves off from being his children even when we sin (except by apostasy).  “This man is blaspheming.”  Jesus, who knew the thoughts of the paralyzed man, knew the thoughts of the scribes as well, and demonstrates this: “Why do you harbor evil thoughts?”  These words alone should have had an effect on these scribes.  If Jesus can read thoughts, then why could he not also have the power to forgive sins?  “Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’?”  Here, the Lord tells us that he has healed in the paralytic the deepest wound that afflicted him, which manifested as paralysis.  He does not provide a superficial cure such as simply enabling the man to walk again, but one which enables him to truly resume his life.  “But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.”  Now he tells the scribes why he acted as he had.  They need to know that he is (1) the Son of Man, the Messiah, and (2) that the Son of Man has the power to forgive sins.  This contrasts with the expectation many had of the Messiah as simply a military leader, not necessarily a religious one, much less a miracle worker who could forgive sins.  “Rise, pick up your stretcher, and go home.”  The man picks up the stretcher on which he had formerly lay, helpless.  The Lord has him show the fullness of his immediate recovery in this way.

“When the crowds saw this they were struck with awe and glorified God who had given such authority to men.”  Because we have so minimized the idea of sin, whether in general or in our own lives, we minimize the wonder of forgiveness.  The people here “were struck with awe and glorified God” when they recognized that Jesus had the power of forgive sins.  They celebrated this with great joy.  They had gone to the Temple to make sin offerings, with no certainty that their sins were forgiven.  In Jesus, they saw that he truly forgave sins, that God had come to earth to forgive sins.  They saw that the forgiveness of sins was accomplished with such great power that the healing of paralysis was but a sign of it.  We should think hard about what sin means, and what its forgiveness means.  The miracles that take place in the confessional are greater than any miracles that take place in a hospital room or on the street.  

 Wednesday in the Thirteenth Week of Ordinary Time, June 30, 2021

Matthew 8:28-34

When Jesus came to the territory of the Gadarenes, two demoniacs who were coming from the tombs met him. They were so savage that no one could travel by that road. They cried out, “What have you to do with us, Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the appointed time?” Some distance away a herd of many swine was feeding. The demons pleaded with him, “If you drive us out, send us into the herd of swine.” And he said to them, “Go then!” They came out and entered the swine, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea where they drowned. The swineherds ran away, and when they came to the town they reported everything, including what had happened to the demoniacs. Thereupon the whole town came out to meet Jesus, and when they saw him they begged him to leave their district.

As St. Mark tells the story in his Gospel, it is one demoniac, and when the Lord Jesus demands the name of the chief demon possessing the man, he declares, “Legion, for there are many of us.”  Matthew’s recalling two possessed men speaks to the ferocity and confusion of this incident, with the possessed man tearing about so chaotically that a witness might easily think more than one man was causing the fury.

Reflecting on this account helps us to learn about the nature of evil.  First, “Two demoniacs who were coming from the tombs met him.”  Evil causes death — the death of both body and soul.  Once it sets into a person, or, rather, once a person has set upon an evil life, a terrible corruption begins, a necrosis of the soul.  “They were so savage that no one could travel by that road.”. Evil isolates the one who commits it and seeks to isolate the one harmed by it.  The person harmed by it may feel tainted and unworthy of society, and as though he himself had sinned.  “What have you to do with us, Son of God?”  Evil acts as though God does not exist: “They say, ‘The Lord does not see; the God of Jacob does not perceive.’ ” (Psalm 94, 7).  And yet, deep in the heart of the wicked dwells a terrible fear that justice will come: “Have you come here to torment us before the appointed time?”  The demons already suffer fiercely, but their wickedness will be punished even more severely after the Judgment at the end of the world.  

“Some distance away a herd of many swine was feeding.”  It is no coincidence that the demons are in the same region as swine, which are very dangerous when aroused and they make an absolutely hellish sound when many of them are aroused together.  For the Jews, too, pigs were considered unclean.  “The demons pleaded with him.”  While engaged in doing evil, the wicked are confident and arrogant, but once caught, they plead and whimper childishly in order to gain sympathy and escape.  “If you drive us out, send us into the herd of swine.”  It may be that the demons think they can enlist the Lord’s compassion, and that, moved with pity, he would allow them to continue.  The wicked continually misinterpret the good as being weak.  “They came out and entered the swine, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea where they drowned.”  Their scheme backfires.  They enter the swine, but the swine prefer death to possession and drown themselves so that the demons comprising Legion must descend into the ear pit again, to the mockery, sneers, and derision of their fellows.  

The fact that even the swine detested the demons and their evil should not be lost on us, and we ought to wonder why a human would live wickedly when a pig would not.

 The solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, June 29, 2021

2 Timothy 4:6–8, 17–18

I, Paul, am already being poured out like a libation, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have competed well; I have finished the race; I have kept the faith. From now on the crown of righteousness awaits me, which the Lord, the just judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me, but to all who have longed for his appearance. The Lord stood by me and gave me strength, so that through me the proclamation might be completed and all the Gentiles might hear it. And I was rescued from the lion’s mouth. The Lord will rescue me from every evil threat and will bring me safe to his heavenly kingdom. To him be glory forever and ever. Amen.

Although St. Paul wrote the above lines in his Second Letter to Timothy, St. Peter could have written them as well, for both Apostles worked zealously for the spread of the Gospel.  Both men passionately loved the Lord Jesus.  We see his love on his rash promise, on Holy Thursday, to die for the Lord (a promise he made good on about thirty years later) and in his running to the tomb after hearing that the Lord’s Body was not there.  We see Paul’s love for the Lord in deeply touching reflections such as, “For to me, to live is Christ: and to die is gain” (Philippians 1, 21).

“I, Paul, am already being poured out like a libation.”  A “libation” was a drink offering poured out to a god on an altar.  The wine or other drink was completely emptied out, with the priest or attendant shaking the vessel so that not a drop was missing.  Paul feels as though he has nothing left to give, that he is empty.  He has been poured out by God in service to God.  True sanctity is to give oneself to God even when there is nothing left to give — friends, family, health is gone.  There remains no reason to praise God or to thank him except for his own sake.  Peter and Paul, through their extensive travels, various persecutions, arrests, beatings, and their endless work of preaching and leading the churches they founded, had arrived at this point at the time of their final arrests.  “I have competed well; I have finished the race; I have kept the faith. From now on the crown of righteousness awaits me.”  Paul says this to Timothy in order to give him an example to follow.  Paul saw his work as a competition, even as a race.  He ran, knowing that his eternal salvation depended on his “winning” the race, that is, in finishing all the work that God gave him.  He knew full well how great the work lay before him, for at the beginning of his conversion, God said to Ananias, a Christian of Damascus, “For I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name’s sake” (Acts 9, 16).  Likewise, Peter knew that suffering lay ahead of him in his service to the Lord: “When you shall be old, you shall stretch forth your hands, and another shall gird you and lead you where you would not” (John 21, 28).  “The Lord stood by me and gave me strength, so that through me the proclamation might be completed.”  Throughout the Acts of the Apostles we can see how the Lord strengthened both Peter and Paul so that they could rejoice that they had suffered for Christ.  Both men were on the point of being killed by mobs or the authorities multiple times, and both were rescued “from the lion’s mouth” in order to continue preaching.  

We know much from the Scriptures about the journeys of Paul throughout Syria, Asia Minor, and Rome.  Peter worked in Jerusalem for some years, while also preaching in cities and towns throughout Syria and Asia Minor, especially in Antioch, where he remained for a few years.  Afterwards he went to Rome, where he spent the rest of his life.  St. Jerome tells us that that this occurred in the year 42.  We do not know whether Peter and Paul met in Rome, though legends circulating in subsequent centuries say that they preached together and engaged in debate with Simon Magus, the magician mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles.  According to the Fathers, especially, Tertullian and Origen, Peter was crucified head downwards during the reign of Nero, and Paul, a Roman citizen, was accorded execution by beheading.  Both suffered in about the year 67.

 Monday in the Thirteenth Week of Ordinary Time, June 28, 2021

Matthew 8:18-22

When Jesus saw a crowd around him, he gave orders to cross to the other shore. A scribe approached and said to him, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus answered him, “Foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head.” Another of his disciples said to him, “Lord, let me go first and bury my father.” But Jesus answered him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their dead.”

“When Jesus saw a crowd around him, he gave orders to cross to the other shore.”  As St. Matthew tells it, the Lord desired to cross to another shore after he had spent the better part of the preceding evening healing the sick.  The Lord is ever on the move, preaching and healing. 

“A scribe approached and said to him, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.”  This scribe, presumably a Pharisee, comes to the Lord and announces to him that he will follow him everywhere.  He does not need to tell the Lord this; he could simply do it.  It seems, though, that he wants praise from the Lord, or an invitation to join his Apostles, or merely the approval of the crowd.  The Lord warns him, “Foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head.”  That is, even the animals have places to sleep, but he and his Apostles do not, so constant is their life on the move.  The life of preaching the Gospel requires the utmost sacrifices and eschews any worldly reward.  The Lord’s answer is wonderfully poetic in its imagery.  We can interpret it in many ways, as well, following the Fathers.  The “foxes” can be understood as thieves and robbers, while the “birds” can be understood as those who give up everything in order to live a life of prayer and contemplation: thus, even the thieves have a regular place to live, as do monks, nuns, and hermits, but not the Son of Man.

“Lord, let me go first and bury my father.”  One of those who was already a disciple says this.  According to Luke 9, 59, the disciple answers in this way after Jesus had told him, “Follow me.”  The disciple uses an idiom here, saying, in effect, I will follow you when my father dies and I have made arrangements for my family.  It is something like a refusal and reminds of the excuses offered by those invited to the great feast in the parable, such as, “I have bought a farm and I must needs go out and see it. I pray you, hold me excused” ( Luke 14, 18).  This brings a stinging rebuke from the Lord: “Follow me, and let the dead bury their dead.”  That is to say, those who will not follow him are the dead.  This disciple has life and death set before him.  To reject the invitation of the Lord is to reject true life.  The Lord Jesus was not calling him to be an Apostle, but simply to follow him steadfastly, rather than trying to follow him part-time or half-heartedly.

We need not leave our homes and families in order to follow the Lord Jesus.  We can follow him at home, within our families, and in our jobs.  We remember the practical way that Mother Teresa answered a young woman who wanted to join her order but could not because of her responsibilities: “Where I go, you cannot, but where you go, I cannot.  Together, we can do something beautiful for God.”  We can follow the Lord wherever we are if our heart is with him.

 The Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, June 27, 2021

Mark 5:21–43

When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a large crowd gathered around him, and he stayed close to the sea. One of the synagogue officials, named Jairus, came forward. Seeing him he fell at his feet and pleaded earnestly with him, saying, “My daughter is at the point of death. Please, come lay your hands on her that she may get well and live.” He went off with him, and a large crowd followed him and pressed upon him. There was a woman afflicted with hemorrhages for twelve years. She had suffered greatly at the hands of many doctors and had spent all that she had. Yet she was not helped but only grew worse. She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak. She said, “If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured.” Immediately her flow of blood dried up. She felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction. Jesus, aware at once that power had gone out from him, turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who has touched my clothes?” But his disciples said to Jesus, “You see how the crowd is pressing upon you, and yet you ask, ‘Who touched me?’” And he looked around to see who had done it. The woman, realizing what had happened to her, approached in fear and trembling. She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth. He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has saved you. Go in peace and be cured of your affliction.”  While he was still speaking, people from the synagogue official’s house arrived and said, “Your daughter has died; why trouble the teacher any longer?” Disregarding the message that was reported, Jesus said to the synagogue official, “Do not be afraid; just have faith.” He did not allow anyone to accompany him inside except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. When they arrived at the house of the synagogue official, he caught sight of a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. So he went in and said to them, “Why this commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but asleep.” And they ridiculed him. Then he put them all out. He took along the child’s father and mother and those who were with him and entered the room where the child was. He took the child by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum,” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise!” The girl, a child of twelve, arose immediately and walked around. At that they were utterly astounded. He gave strict orders that no one should know this and said that she should be given something to eat.

“My daughter is at the point of death. Please, come lay your hands on her that she may get well and live.”  The girl had become sick while the Lord was visiting the region of the Decapolis, across the sea.  By the time that Jesus returned, she was deathly ill and her father, a leader of the town’s synagogue, was looking for him.  Searching for him, he would have been told that Jesus was away with his disciples and that it was not known when he would return.  We can imagine that the man sent servants into the town to watch for Jesus, but as his daughter’s condition worsened and his desperation grew, he ran through the town himself, looking for the Lord.  When he saw the him, he threw himself at his feet and begged him to lay his hands on his daughter, that she might live.  The official is very specific in asking Jesus to lay his hands on her, as though he thought that the Lord’s healing power could only transfer into her body in this way.  Along the road, a woman afflicted with a chronic sickness that featured a flow of blood, saw the Lord passing by, and she took a chance: “If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured.”  She did not dare approach the Lord openly: he would certainly refuse to lay his hands on a woman whose condition would render him unclean.  But in her own desperation she forced her way through the crowd and just managed to touch his mantle as he walked.  At that point, the Lord stopped and turned around.  “Who has touched my clothes?”  Mark tells us that Jesus was aware that “power had gone out from him”, an interesting way to put it.  The woman then admitted what she had done, but rather than reject her, the Lord commended her faith and confirmed her healing.

“Your daughter has died; why trouble the teacher any longer?”  The coldness of the people from Jairus’s house is very striking.  The Greek tense of the word translated here as “has died” is better rendered as “she died”, as in, “Your daughter died.”  The perfect tense, used in the lectionary translation, makes it sound as if the girl has just now died.  But the Greek tense does not.  She “died” sometime in the past.  This allows us to wonder if Jairus knew his daughter was dead when he found Jesus and was hoping against hope that the Lord could still somehow save her — but certainly he would not lay his hands on her if he knew she was dead, for this would render him unclean.  The Lord reassures Jairus that he will do as he asks: “Why this commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but asleep.”  In the house, he took the girl’s cold hand in his and spoke to her in Aramaic, “Talitha, koum.”  Literally, Little girl, arise.  

In both the case of the woman and of the girl, there is the apparent danger of the Lord being rendered unclean, but he does not even hint that this means anything to him.  Particularly in the case of the woman, he shows his awareness of power “going out”, but not of having become unclean.  St. Mark shows us here that the Lord came for the “unclean”, for sinners, even for those dead in sin.  He touches our impurity and makes us pure.  It comes at a mysterious cost for him — power “goes out of him” — but it is one which he willingly accepts.  We also see here that the Lord has such power that those who touch him are cured as well as those whom he touches.  This signifies the greatness of his will to save us.

“She should be given something to eat.”  Brought back from death to life, the girl needs nourishment.  As do we, who have confessed our sins and received the forgiveness of God, need the nourishment of the Holy Eucharist in order to live the life Christ has given us.

 Saturday in the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time, June 26, 2021

Matthew 8:5-17

When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion approached him and appealed to him, saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully.” He said to him, “I will come and cure him.” The centurion said in reply, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof; only say the word and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes; and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, “Amen, I say to you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I say to you, many will come from the east and the west, and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob at the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven, but the children of the Kingdom will be driven out into the outer darkness, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.” And Jesus said to the centurion, “You may go; as you have believed, let it be done for you.” And at that very hour his servant was healed.  Jesus entered the house of Peter, and saw his mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever. He touched her hand, the fever left her, and she rose and waited on him. When it was evening, they brought him many who were possessed by demons, and he drove out the spirits by a word and cured all the sick, to fulfill what had been said by Isaiah the prophet: He took away our infirmities and bore our diseases.

“A centurion approached him”.  The hill on which the Lord delivered his Sermon on the Mount lay not far from the town of Capernaum, where he had moved.  After coming down this hill and healing the leper, he walked the rest of the way to the town.  Upon reaching it, a centurion, came to him.  A centurion commanded a company of one hundred men in the Roman army.  It was unusual to see a centurion in the town because the Romans did not station soldiers in Galilee at that time.  Perhaps he had come down from Syria.  He was a man accustomed to command, but he had come to Jesus to present an entreaty: “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully.”  We notice right away that the centurion addressed Jesus as “Lord”, quite an extraordinary thing for him to do.  We also notice that the centurion speaks in a way very similar to how the leper spoke.  The leper had not asked Jesus to heal him, but had only showed that he believed that Jesus could cure him.  This was enough for the Lord.  Here, also, the centurion does not make a request, but states a fact, however plaintively.  Jesus healed the leper, a Jewish man, right away.  To the centurion he answers, “I will come and cure him.”  

The Lord is as eager to heal the Gentiles as he is the Jews.  He has come to save all.  And just as we can see in the healing of the leper a summary of the Redemption of the human race, here we can see a summary of the Redemption particularly of the Gentiles.  The Lord made brief visits to foreign lands during his Public Life yet did no preaching there: “I was not sent but to the sheep, that are lost of the house of Israel” (Matthew 15, 24).  He desired to save the Gentiles too, but would do it through the Apostles and their successors after his Ascension into heaven: he would do it from afar.  And so, when the centurion protests that his roof is not worthy of the one he called “Lord”, Jesus does not insist on going but commends his faith and heals the servant from a distance.  He then confirmed that his primary mission was to the Jews by healing Peter’s mother-in-law, and afterwards crowds of people from the neighboring Galilean towns.  It is important to see what St. Matthew is doing here in his Gospel: writing to impoverished and persecuted Galilean Christians, he reminds them that Jesus came down from heaven especially for them.  He did not go to the Gentiles, but to the Galileans, even above the Judeans.  Certainly, he offered salvation to the Gentiles as well, but he would do this from heaven.  He had come personally to the Galileans.

The Lord comes personally to us in Holy Communion, and he does so out of his love for us and in his desire to be loved by us.  He also does this that he might work through us for the conversion of the Gentiles in our lives.

 Friday in the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time, June 25, 2021

Matthew 8:1-4

When Jesus came down from the mountain, great crowds followed him. And then a leper approached, did him homage, and said, “Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean.” He stretched out his hand, touched him, and said, “I will do it. Be made clean.” His leprosy was cleansed immediately. Then Jesus said to him, “See that you tell no one, but go show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses prescribed; that will be proof for them.”

The verses of the Gospel reading for today’s Mass are set as though apart from the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount, but they are in fact its conclusion.  The Lord has insisted that his teachings did not abolish the Law of God but instead fulfilled them, and he shows that this is so through the healing of this man, suffering from leprosy.  The power with which Jesus cures him, clearly divine, confirms his teaching, and his command for the man to go to the priests, as per the Law, shows the continuity of his teachings with the Law.  

The miracle itself sums up the work of salvation which the Lord came to perform.  We see him who has come down the mountain — the Son of God, now made man, who has come upon the earth.  A leper approaches — sinful man, recognizing that he can do nothing for himself, presents himself openly to the Lord.  The leper does him homage — sinful man acknowledges him as the Redeemer.  He says, “Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean” — sinful man confessing belief in the lord’s power and in his own need of it.  The Lord “stretched out his hand, touched him”, that is, he stretched out his arms on the Cross to redeem fallen man, and touches him with the grace of the Redemption he has won.  The Lord says (according to the Greek), “I will it. Be made clean.”  It is the will of the Lord to free all people of their sins.  The leprous man is healed immediately and completely, just as a person receiving Baptism is immediately and completely cleansed of all sin.  St. Matthew is careful to note that the healing is immediate.  In the Old Testament we read of a man being healed from leprosy, Naaman the Syrian, by the Prophet Elisha, but Naaman had to wash seven times in the Jordan River: his healing was not immediate.  The Lord shows the crowds that his power is greater even that of the revered Prophet.

We imitate the leprous man when we approach the Sacrament of Penance.  The Lord comes down to us in order to be near us and console us.  The leper in the Gospel would have kept the appropriate distance from the Lord, in accordance with the Law, and the Lord could have cured him without drawing any nearer, but not only did he come towards the man, but he touched him, a man whose body was ravaged with the terrible, inflamed sores of the disease which resulted in a vile odor.  We are touched by the merciful and loving hand of the Lord Jesus when we confess our sins with true sorrow and purpose of amendment.  And when the Lord, through the priest, speaks the words of the Act of Absolution, we are free.  Our souls soften and are made whole.  Sensation fills them again.  Grace flows within them again.  We know in the moment of our healing that it is God who has done it.  The leper, once healed, does not return to the wretched places where he lived in his sickness.  He goes to live among his family again.  So should we steer ourselves far from the occasions of our former sins, for what can be there that is better than the health we now enjoy?

 The Solemnity of the Birthday of St. John the Baptist, June 24, 2021

Luke 1:57–66, 80

When the time arrived for Elizabeth to have her child she gave birth to a son. Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown his great mercy toward her, and they rejoiced with her. When they came on the eighth day to circumcise the child, they were going to call him Zechariah after his father, but his mother said in reply, “No. He will be called John.” But they answered her, “There is no one among your relatives who has this name.” So they made signs, asking his father what he wished him to be called. He asked for a tablet and wrote, “John is his name,” and all were amazed. Immediately his mouth was opened, his tongue freed, and he spoke blessing God. Then fear came upon all their neighbors, and all these matters were discussed throughout the hill country of Judea. All who heard these things took them to heart, saying, “What, then, will this child be?” For surely the hand of the Lord was with him. The child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the desert until the day of his manifestation to Israel.

“When the time arrived for Elizabeth to have her child she gave birth to a son.”  Such great esteem fills the Holy Church for St. John the Baptist that she celebrates the day of his birth on earth as well as the day of his birth into eternal life.  As the promised Forerunner, he prepared the Chosen People for the coming of their Messiah, doing so by the example of his penitential life and by his conferred of the sign of the Baptism that Christ himself would fulfill and command.  John and his mother also present to us models of the humility necessary for those who believe, for just as Elizabeth said to Mary, at the time of her Visitation, “Who am I that the Mother of my Lord should come to me?”, so her son, John the Baptist, spoke to Jesus, “I ought to be baptized by you, and yet you come to me.”  Such should be our attitude when we approach the sacraments, for, in them, Christ comes to us.

We see John’s  humility again when his disciples point out to him that many who had followed him had begun to follow Jesus.  John replied, “The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices with joy because of the bridegroom’s voice. This my joy therefore is fulfilled. 

He must increase: but I must decrease” (John 3, 29-30).  John never forgets that his mission is not about himself but about the Lord Jesus.  Likewise, our missions here on earth are not about ourselves but about the Lord, and as we grow in faith and virtue, he becomes more evident in us.  This is also true regarding our will: the holier we become, the more nearly conformed with the will of God our own will becomes, and the less inclined we become in seeking anything that is not of God.

The importance of John the Baptist to the earliest Christians — and a sign of how significant he should be to us — is the amount of space in the Gospels given to him.  We are told more about him than about any of the Apostles.  In fact, we are told more about him than even about the Lord’s Virgin Mother, extending to what we wore and what he ate.  

In this time when the true followers of the Lord are under pressure to conform themselves to the world, we look to St. John the Baptist who conformed himself only to the word he heard from God, opposing the world, and awaiting the Christ.

 Wednesday in the Twelfth Week Ordinary Time, June 23, 2021

Matthew 7:15-20

Jesus said to his disciples: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but underneath are ravenous wolves. By their fruits you will know them. Do people pick grapes from thorn-bushes, or figs from thistles? Just so, every good tree bears good fruit, and a rotten tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. So by their fruits you will know them.”

“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but underneath are ravenous wolves.”  The Lord Jesus warns his disciples of false prophets numerous times in the Gospels.  From what he tells us, we can discern a few points about them.  These false prophets would appear after the Lord’s Ascension into heaven.  They would be members of the Church.  They would have their own interests at heart, not those of the faithful.  Their deceptions would not be errors committed in good faith, but calculated words to lead astray believers in the Lord.  They would appear as virtuous, faithful, well-read in the Scriptures, and devout.  And they would deceive many.  How can we know them so that we might protect ourselves? “By their fruits you shall know them.”  Even those of us who do not know an apple tree from looking at it can tell what it is from its luscious fruit.  Likewise, when a person says beautiful things and does terrible things, we can know to stay away.  Indeed, the Lord tells us that we must stay away, for they are “ravenous wolves”, who kill brutally and without mercy.  We see false prophets doing this when they openly teach doctrines that attack religion and truth.  Over time, these false prophets no longer care that no one takes their babbling seriously any longer — for their lies and their sinful lives have been exposed.  They are living proof that “a rotten tree bears bad fruit”.  

On the other hand, “A good tree cannot bear bad fruit.”  Christians who live according to the Gospel as best they can are the best sort of prophet, and their efforts to act virtuously bear the “good fruit” of conversions even when they fail occasionally out of weakness — for the example of getting up and trying again is one that heartens many.  As long as we seek Christ, we will find him, and as long as we seek him, we will draw others to do the same.  “Good fruit” attracts by virtue of its goodness, and it leads people to think that is the fruit is good, then how great the Tree on which it hangs must be. 

 Tuesday in the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time, June 22, 2021

Matthew 7:6, 12-14

Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not give what is holy to dogs, or throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them underfoot, and turn and tear you to pieces. Do to others whatever you would have them do to you. This is the Law and the Prophets. Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many. How narrow the gate and constricted the road that leads to life. And those who find it are few.”

Here, the Lord continues his instructions during the Sermon on the Mount.“Do not give what is holy to dogs, or throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them underfoot, and turn and tear you to pieces.”  The Lord Jesus here says for us not to give what is holy to obstinate sinners and to scoffers.  They are “dogs”, which would not profit from “holy things” since they could not tell what is holy from that which is sinful.  They are “swine” in that they would see the “pearls” of the Scriptures cast before them and take this as an assault, causing them to attack viciously.  These “dogs” and “swine” can be converted — if at all — only by long exposure to good example.  

“Do to others whatever you would have them do to you.”  The Lord sums up the Law and the Prophets in a simple rule of charity.  Since the rule exists as a practical guide for daily living, we need to understand it as pertaining to what is practical and necessary.  Therefore, we do not run around giving hundred dollar bills to strangers because that is what we would have them do to us.  It is not practical to do this, and without knowing a particular set of circumstances, it may not be necessary to do it, either.  This is the literal way of understanding the Lord’s words.  But we can also understand them as describing to us an attitude and readiness for charitable acts which the Lord desires his disciples to have.  Some folks might be stymied in trying to decide if a particular course of action truly accorded with what they would have someone else do for them, but if we understand the Lord as prescribing the attitude or stance of his followers as predisposed to charity, they can evade the trap of seeing this rule in purely objective terms.

“Enter through the narrow gate.”  We might wonder why a gate would be narrow.  It would be narrow to allow only certain animals in a given space and to keep certain animals out.  Even the animals that the gate was designed for would have to struggle to pass through it: “How narrow the gate and constricted the road.”  It is not easy to find, either.  The Lord speaks of the Faith here.  It is “narrow” in that only those who have prayed, fasted, and given alms may pass through it, but once entered, we can say with the Psalmist, “He has set me in a place of pasture. He has brought me to the waters of refreshment” (Psalm 23, 2).  The Lord also warns, “The gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction.”  That is, those who have indulged themselves throughout their lives enter through this wide gate.  While the narrow gate leads to fine pastures, the wide gate leads to the slaughterhouse.  The Lord advises us that “few” find the gate that leads to life, but “many” enter the gate that leads to destruction.  Why is this?  Because few people look for the narrow gate.  That is, many more people choose self-indulgence over the self-sacrifice required for Christian service.  Why does the Lord want us to know that few will be saved in comparison with the many who will not?  To incite us to work harder, to persevere in good works, to not take salvation for granted.

 Monday in the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time, June 21, 2021

The Feast of St. Aloysius Gonzaga

Matthew 7:1-5

Jesus said to his disciples: “Stop judging, that you may not be judged. For as you judge, so will you be judged, and the measure with which you measure will be measured out to you. Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove that splinter from your eye,’ while the wooden beam is in your eye? You hypocrite, remove the wooden beam from your eye first; then you will see clearly to remove the splinter from your brother’s eye.”

“Do not judge” sounds to us like, “Do not form and hold an opinion.” But just after the Lord tells his disciples not to judge, he tells them, “Give not that which is holy to dogs; neither cast ye your pearls before swine.”  The Lord himself seems to judge, calling unbelievers “dogs” and “swine”.  He also implies that his disciples should note that certain people are “dogs” and “swine” so as not to waste what is holy on them.  The Greek word translated here as “to judge” has many meanings, but the one that fits the context the best is “to condemn”.  We cannot do this because it is not our place.  Only one who is higher than us has the standing to condemn.  Even the Lord Jesus says it is not his work to condemn: “For God sent not his Son into the world, to judge the world: but that the world may be saved by him” (John 3, 17).  And again, “And if any man hear my words and keep them not, I do not judge him for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. He that despises me and receives not my words has one that does judge him. The word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day” (John 12:47–48).  That is, the Lord came the first time not to judge but to save; but those who refused his salvation he will judge when he comes the second time.  And so we leave the condemnation to God.  We can criticize, with an eye to correction, but we cannot use the this fraternal correcting as an excuse for acting out on our hatred and grudges.  And this is what the Lord does in speaking of “dogs” and “swine”: the disciple, recognizing a person acting in bad faith or obstinate in their refusal of the Gospel (or of  fraternal correction, for that matter), should leave the person be and go his way, in hopes that time will allow the person to change.  “The measure with which you measure will be measured out to you.”  The key is to act in charity.

“How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove that splinter from your eye,’ while the wooden beam is in your eye?”  The Lord gives an example of how we sometimes judge under the cover of charity.  We set ourselves up as seeing the fault in others while pretending to have no fault ourselves, and we do this professing that we do it for the other’s good out of charity.  

In studying the Lord in these verses we see how we “fulfills” the Law, we admire his wisdom and his authority.  There is nothing about “judging” in the Old Law.  There are prohibitions against certain actions and commandments to carry out certain others.  But the Lord shows what lies within these so that we may not simply appear just according to the letter of the Law, but holy in his eyes.

 The Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, June 20, 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 first reading for today’s Mass is one of the most striking, dramatic readings in the Scriptures: “The Lord addressed Job out of the storm and said: Who shut within doors the sea, when it burst forth from the womb; when I made the clouds its garment and thick darkness its swaddling bands? When I set limits for it and fastened the bar of its door, and said: Thus far shall you come but no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stilled!”  God is answering Job’s demand to know why is suffering, though he has always behaved justly.  God’s reply, to be brief, is that while Job owed all that he has ever could be said to possess from God, God owes nothing to him.  In the verses for the reading, God majestically points out that he is infinite and all else that exists, exists by an act of his will, and it does so according to the limits he establishes for it.  Limits are important because without them, nothing lesser than God can exist.  Limits exclude formlessness and powerlessness and permit forms and powers.  Even the most powerful of God’s creations known in ancient times, the sea, was bounded by limits.  There are, then, necessarily, limits to human beings, both physical and spiritual.  We each have a certain ability to apply our free will to our various functions.  For instance, in economically developed parts of the world, humans can choose to become carpenters or bankers.  We cannot choose to change ourselves in any intrinsic way, however: we cannot  become a new species such as zebras or ostriches, or become a new sex, or to cause ourselves to possess, naturally, new powers, such as regrowing limbs (some scientists are working to create a human/plant creature that could do this, but it would be distinctly unnatural).  Limits, boundaries, terms, are good things for us.  They allow us to exist, to co-exist, and to understand ourselves.  And understanding natural limits also enables us to think about God, who is without any limits.

In the Gospel reading for today’s Mass, we see displayed before us the power of the natural world and the infinite power of the Lord.  He is in a boat with his Apostles.  A storm rises up without warning.  St. Peter, who dictated his memories of Jesus to his secretary St. Mark, recalled the scene very vividly: “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.”  Peter cries out to the Lord in very much the same way as Job had cried out: “Do you not care that we are perishing?”  And then Jesus “woke up”, without any alarm, and “rebuked” the wind: “Quiet! Be still!”  Mark says, in the very next line, “The wind ceased and there was great calm.”  The storm vanished as though it had never been.  We note how the storm itself meant nothing to the Lord: left to himself, he would have slept through it.  He only rouses himself for the sake of his followers.  And just as without fuss or display he cured the sick and gave sight to the blind, he spoke a couple of words and it was done,  he need not have so much as that, except for the benefit of the Apostles.  Perhaps if he had not told the wind and the sea to “be still” they would have doubted later that there had been a storm st all, that they had imagined it somehow.

The Lord does not then shrug at Peter and go back to sleep, but he teaches him that his power was not confined to certain activities, such as healing, but that it was infinite; and because his power was infinite and because Peter and the others were his chosen Apostles, they could trust in him to use it to protect and assist them.  He questions Peter, “Why are you terrified? Do you not yet have faith?”  Surely, no master ever asked such a thing of a disciple before: one might understand the other’s teachings and admire them, but the Lord is demanding a personal commitment.  He is demanding that Peter acknowledge and believe in his power, as well as believing that his Lord would use it on his behalf.  Peter, ever impulsive and outspoken, cannot speak here.  He ponders, he ruminates, he prays.  He discusses with his fellows what the Lord Jesus has done: “Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?” And he will give his answer shortly, when he professes, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God” (Matthew 16, 16).  

 Saturday in the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time, June 19, 2021

Matthew 6:24-34

Jesus said to his disciples: “No one can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon. Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they? Can any of you by worrying add a single moment to your life-span? Why are you anxious about clothes? Learn from the way the wild flowers grow. They do not work or spin. But I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was clothed like one of them. If God so clothes the grass of the field, which grows today and is thrown into the oven tomorrow, will he not much more provide for you, O you of little faith? So do not worry and say, ‘What are we to eat?’ or ‘What are we to drink?’ or ‘What are we to wear?’ All these things the pagans seek. Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given you besides. Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself. Sufficient for a day is its own evil.”

“No one can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other.  You cannot serve God and Mammon.”  The Lord speaks of the ancient Syriac god of wealth, rather than of wealth itself or greed.  In doing so, he first makes the point that as “Mammon” was a foreign god, so greed and avarice ought to be foreign to those who believe in the true God.  Serving this Mammon, then, is as though to enlist in the service of a foreign king — the very idea of which the Jews of the time of Jesus found particularly abhorrent: “We are the seed of Abraham: and we have never been slaves to any man” (John 8, 33).  The Jew and the Christian of the time would have found a further aspect of Mammon quite disturbing:  Mammon was associated with the underworld, since gold and silver — wealth — was found in the ground: for Jews and Christians, the underground is the realm of demons, as in, “And when [Christ’s witnesses] shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascended out of the abyss shall make war against them and shall overcome them and kill them” (Revelation 11, 7).  Thus, we cannot serve both God and the devil.  The choice of whom we shall serve is a stark one.  In this regard, we ought to recall the words of God at the time of the Exodus: “I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Choose therefore life, that both you and your seed may live” (Deuteronomy 30, 19).  

All that we need in order to live and to serve God will be provided us.  Necessity is provided us and this compels us to work, but the monetary gains from work are outweighed by the profit won from the seeds of faith which we cast on the field — the people — of our work.  As this is the primary gain of our labor, God sees to our physical care: “Seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given you besides.”  

We are also not to worry about what we are to eat, what we are to wear, where we are to live: “Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself. Sufficient for a day is its own evil.”  This might remind us of the words of St. Peter: “Cast all your cares upon God, for he has care of you” (1 Peter 5, 7).  Some of us are given to chronic worrying and anxiety.  To overcome this it helps to spend some time thinking of all that God has done for us throughout our lives, and to make acts of thanksgiving.  The Prophets regularly reminded the people in very specific terms of how he had saved their fathers and ancestors, so that surely they could trust God to save them from the powerful kingdoms that threatened them at that time.  Spending quiet time before the Blessed Sacrament also helps.  Basking in the glow of his humility and glory, he holds us in his arms and comforts us in our need.  We have also the example and prayers of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and of the saints.  And we ought to often think of heaven and the eternal safety and abundance of every good thing which we shall enjoy there, if we follow God and reject Mammon.

 Friday in the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time, June 18, 2021

Matthew 6:19-23

Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal. But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be. The lamp of the body is the eye. If your eye is sound, your whole body will be filled with light; but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be in darkness. And if the light in you is darkness, how great will the darkness be.”

“Store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal.”  These “treasures” are the merits attributed to us by God for our good works and sacrifices done for love of him.  They are the talents earned by the industrious men in the Lord’s parable, pleasing to the Lord and bringing words of welcome from him into Paradise.  But although we can gain them, we cannot really count them or understand their value.  They are a sort of heavenly currency which only God can count up.  We can lose them, but they cannot be taken from us, as the Lord says.  We lose them through our wickedness or loss of faith.  Other things may be lost through “moth and decay”, that is, through neglect and natural destruction brought on by, say, rust; but spiritual goods are not subject to physical forces.  They cannot be stolen by thieves, since they are watched over by Almighty God.  “For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.”  The Lord offers us a very practical way of gauging our faith and our desire for him.  We can look hard at what we spend our time thinking about, planning for, working for.  Is it God?  He is the ultimate Treasure, a Treasure who loves us more than we can possibly love him; a Treasure truly worth dying for.

“The lamp of the body is the eye.” The ancient Greek physician Galen, whose medical ideas influenced the western world through the medieval period, held that rays emitted from the eyes caused sight.  The fifth century thinker Empedocles taught that a fire existed in the eye that sent forth these rays.  Objections to this idea are easily raised, but the Greeks had ready answers to these as well, and so the theory seemed settled fact for considerably over a thousand years.  This fire or other source of the eye-rays shown out into the world, but also deep into the body, and the Lord refers to this general understanding of the time.  Therefore, “If your eye is sound”, that is, if your eye is functioning properly, its rays will stream out into the world around you, and they will also stream inside of you.  However, “if your eye is bad, your whole body will be in darkness”, for either the source of the eye’s rays is not functioning or some blockage has occurred to prevent the rays from streaming inside the body.  The interior of the body will be dark indeed because one’s own light does not enlighten it nor does another’s.  Hence, the Lord’s remark, “And if the light in you is darkness, how great will the darkness be.”  The Lord here is speaking about the need to be spiritually pure so that we might see what is true treasure for us to gather and what things we ought to avoid.

We might wonder that the Lord did not correct the people’s understanding of how the eye works, but this would distract from the point he was making, and which he could make simply by adapting to current thinking.  Does that mean that the Lord adapted other commonly held ideas without correcting them?  The presumption of the vast gulf that exists between the world of Abraham’s bosom and the place of eternal punishment that the Lord incorporates in his parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man.  The idea is not put forward in the Old Testament but is found in written form in the apocryphal but highly influential First Book of Enoch.  The answer to this question is no.  When the Lord spoke on religious matters, he revealed the truth about them.  His description of the bosom of Abraham and of hell confirms the existence of these places and their conditions.

 Thursday in the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time, June 17, 2021

Matthew 6:7-15

Jesus said to his disciples: “In praying, do not babble like the pagans, who think that they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them. Your Father knows what you need before you ask him. This is how you are to pray: ‘Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.’  If you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions.” 

The Lord Jesus teaches us how to pray, in the Gospel reading for today’s Mass.  The reading begins with, “In praying, do not babble like the pagans”, which might be better translated as, “Do not chatter like the pagans.”  To babble” means to speak in such a way as to be incomprehensible.  The Greek word means “to speak empty words”, or, “to chatter”.  The Lord explains, “the pagans, who think that they will be heard because of their many words”, as though they might wear down their gods through the bulk of their rhetoric.  “Do not be like them”, that is, “Do not do as they do”.  The Lord emphasizes this because there is a great deal of difference between trying to convince an image of stone to do something for you and beseeching the living God.  “Your Father knows what you need before you ask him”: that is, “Your Father knows your business or necessity which you have before you ask him.”  

Now, we ought to pay attention to how the prayer the Lord gives us is constructed: “Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”  The first words are an address (literal translation from the Greek): “Our Father, who is in heaven, may your name be sanctified!”  We can compare this to an address to a powerful king in the Old Testament: “O king, may you live forever!” (Daniel 6, 21).  The next phrase tells us what the prayer is asking for: “May your kingdom come!”  The “Our Father” asks God to bring human history to an end, to usher in divine justice, and to welcome the righteous into eternal life.  In this, we ask for God to hasten the working of his will.  In Revelation 6, 10, we hear the holy martyrs cry out to Almighty God, “How long, O Lord, Holy and True, do you not judge and give justice for our blood on them that dwell on the earth?”  It is the cry of all the saints: “For we know that every creature groans and labors in pain, even till now. 

And not only it, but ourselves also, who have the first-fruits of the Spirit: even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption of the sons of God, the redemption of our body” (Romans 8:22–23).  Next, the Lord teaches us to pray for the sanctity we need in order to be saved in the kingdom for which we pray: “Give us now our bread, sufficient unto the next day; and forgive us our sins, as we also forgive those who sin against us.”  This “bread” is the Bread of Life, of which the Lord Jesus says, “I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever” (John 6, 51-52).  And of the necessity of forgiveness for salvation, the Lord tells us, “If you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you.”

“And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”  This is the final phrase of the prayer as it was translated into English in the sixteenth century, preceded by, if not influenced by, the earlier Middle English translation.  The Greek, translated into modern English, reads more like this: “Do not lead us into the test, but deliver us from evil (or, the evil one)”.  “The test” was judicial torture intended to cause an accused or a witness to give evidence.  We still use the phrase “putting to the test”, meaning to find out what something or someone is made of.  The Christian believer is here beseeching God not to allow him to be put into a position in which he might apostatize or inform on other Christians during persecution.  The confusion in the translation arises from the fact that in both the Greek and the Latin, the word under discussion could be translated as either “temptation” or “test”, and, originally, the word meant both.  Thus, the believer is asking God for the virtue of perseverance.

If I remember right, at the time of the revision of the lectionary a few years ago, the U.S. bishops decided to put the traditional English version of the Our Father into the readings featuring the prayer, as it is more recognizable to most Catholics, although it does jar a bit with the more modern English surrounding it.  Every now and then, someone in the Church proposes to update the translation or to retranslate it, but the ideas brought up are not intelligent and they reflect ignorance of language and history, as well as theology.   I think we should keep the prayer as it has been handed down to us, but its meaning should be taught better.

 Wednesday in the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time, June 16, 2021

Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18

Jesus said to his disciples:“Take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them; otherwise, you will have no recompense from your heavenly Father. When you give alms, do not blow a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets to win the praise of others. Amen, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right is doing, so that your almsgiving may be secret. And your Father who sees in secret will repay you. When you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, who love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on street corners so that others may see them. Amen, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you pray, go to your inner room, close the door, and pray to your Father in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will repay you. When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites. They neglect their appearance, so that they may appear to others to be fasting. Amen, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that you may not appear to others to be fasting, except to your Father who is hidden. And your Father who sees what is hidden will repay you.”

“Take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them.”  The Lord’s words here sound simple and straight-forward enough, but they seem to contradict what he had said earlier in his Sermon on the Mount, as recorded in Matthew 5, 16: “So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”  Note, though, that in the first quote, Jesus says, “Take care not to perform”, that is, Do not perform an act purposefully; and then he says, “Let your light shine”, that is, Do not hide it.  Thus, his disciples are to perform good deeds, but they are to do them for God’s glory, not for their own.  And this, properly is the nature of being a “disciple”, to bring glory to one’s master by proficiency in the master’s teachings.  On the other hand, the Lord does sound insistent on this matter, for he also says, “When you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right is doing, so that your almsgiving may be secret.”  The Lord does mean for the action to be secret, or, better, “hidden” — but from the one performing it.  His disciples must become so accustomed to looking for good deeds to do, and so natural in doing them, that the disciple does not think twice about them.  Performing charitable actions should become as normal for his disciples as breathing or walking. 

“When you pray, go to your inner room, close the door, and pray to your Father in secret.”  The Church Fathers and later spiritual writers loved this verse and understood it particularly in terms of contemplative prayer, teaching that “your inner room” is one’s innermost heart, and praying “in secret” meant losing oneself in the wonder of God.  This first applies, however, to ordinary believers: Go to a place where you can be alone and undisturbed and there open your heart to Almighty God.  Speak to him of what you cannot speak to anyone else.  Be intimate with him as with no one else.  But this is not all.  Jesus tells us, “And your Father who sees in secret will repay you.”  “Your Father who sees in secret”, that is, who knows all things and is waiting for you in the place to which you will go, “will repay you.”  The Greek word here translated as “repay” actually means “to return”, or “to give back”.  The problem with “repay” is that the word has the sense of “paying back a loan”, or “granting a reward”.  The actual sense here is that when we offer God our intimacy, he offers his to us — by his grace we make ourselves capable of experiencing his intimacy.  And this is prayer.  We talk to him as we would talk to no one else, and he listens whole-heartedly to us and responds deep in our hearts.

The Pharisees saw God walking on their streets for three years and they never asked him for anything. 

Tuesday in the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time, June 15, 2021

Matthew 5:43-48

Jesus said to his disciples: “You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have? Do not the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brothers only, what is unusual about that? Do not the pagans do the same? So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

“You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.”  While the Old Law insists on certain practices, such as the dietary and marriage laws, that in practice separate the Jews from the Gentiles, it never required that the Jews hate their enemy.  Jesus, therefore, is not quoting from the Old Testament in saying this, nor does he claim to do so.  On the other hand, hatred for certain groups had arisen over time, and was made a sort of addendum to the Law.  One example is the animosity borne by the Jews, at least those from Judea, towards the Samaritans.  The tax collectors were also hated and ostracized, as well as prostitutes and others simply known as “sinners”.  Jesus, then, is speaking not of a dictate of the Law, but of something all the same taught by the Pharisees.  He counters this by telling his disciples, “But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”  While Jesus often used hyperbole to make his points, he does not do so here.  We detect hyperbole when the Lord speaks of the impossible; but praying for one’s enemies and persecutors is something that can be done, hard though it may be.  But for what does one pray when it comes to one’s enemies?  For their conversion.  And why do we do this?  “That you may be children of your Heavenly Father.”  That is, the children do what they see their Father doing, and he “makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.”  The Lord beautifully speaks of the infinite and unstoppable love of God in this way.  That is not to say that the wicked benefit from God’s love: the lazy waste the sunshine of the day and curse the rain as though it existed only to inconvenience them.  But Almighty God does not allow anyone’s behavior to prevent him from loving them, of changing who he is.  You must love like this, Jesus says to us.  In this way we love not like mere humans but like God: “For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have?”  We must become like him if we are to share our Master’s joy (cf. Matthew 25, 21).  And we can become like him.  Indeed, Christ commands it: “Be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”  

It would seem that the commandment to be perfect is beyond our abilities.  A common saying — or, excuse — among us humans is, “No one is perfect.”  We also say, “To err is human.”  But with the grace of God we can become perfect in the one thing in which we are commanded to be perfect: in loving.  We can love perfectly, and if we doubt this we only need to look at the lives of the saints and to realize that these were not demigods destined not to fail, but our fellow humans who could have directed their lives in any way they chose, and they chose to direct them to God.  As for “To err is human”, G.K. Chesterton marvelously observed that in fact “to err” is inhuman; it is not what we were made for.  So let us love, keeping in mind that love is a sacrifice which we make — ultimately for the sake of the love God has for us.

 Monday in the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time, June 14, 2021

Matthew 5:38-42

Jesus said to his disciples: “You have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say to you, offer no resistance to one who is evil. When someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other one to him as well. If anyone wants to go to law with you over your tunic, hand him your cloak as well. Should anyone press you into service for one mile, go with him for two miles. Give to the one who asks of you, and do not turn your back on one who wants to borrow.”

The principle of “an eye for an eye” marked a major turning point for law and justice in ancient society.  It limited the punishment that a person could receive to one not greater than the crime he had committed.  Originally, this was enforced within social classes: if a person assaulted another of a higher class, the punishment would be more severe.  But the imposition of an equal punishment prevented personal vengeance which might result in an act far worse than what was committed originally, such as a cut on the hand avenged with death.  The principle was further refined and made more fair in the Mosaic Law, in which it was applied to all the classes, and allowance was provided for the wronged party to receive some other compensation, such as property, from the person who committed the crime.  Jesus goes further still, fulfilling the ordinance, saying, “Offer no resistance to one who is evil.”  He elaborates: “When someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other one to him as well.”  This sounds difficult to carry out.  In fact, it would mean the end of civilization.  The Lord here employs hyperbole in order to make a point: that his followers are not to exact revenge at all, nor may they to provoke anyone to anger, baiting a person into violent behavior in order to justify violence in return.  The sweeping command the Lord Jesus gives makes it clear that his followers must be absolutely innocent and without malice in all their dealings with others.  It also means that “an eye for an eye” must be fulfilled or completed in the sense that any justly ordered punishment, must be tempered with mercy.  The purpose of such punishment cannot merely be society exacting revenge in place of the individual, but also for the correction of the wrongdoer with an eye to his conversion.

“Turn the other one to him as well.”  Jesus teaches his followers that the one who endures unjust suffering is stronger than the one who inflicts it.  This cuts right across the notion that “might makes right”, so prevalent in ancient and in modern times.  The Lord reinforces this with his speaking of giving one’s coat to one who unjustly desires his tunic, and going a second mile with one who presses a person to go one mile.

“Give to the one who asks of you, and do not turn your back on one who wants to borrow.”  The Lord continues to employ hyperbole: his followers are to act generously, and to recall what surplus wealth is for.  It is, of course, impossible to give everything to everyone who asks, but the follower of Jesus does what he can for one who asks.  The Christian acts with prudence with what he has, first caring for himself and those for whom he is responsible, then fellow Christians, and then others.  What the Lord does that is new is to encourage his disciples to be generous with these “others” even apart from the alms to the desperately poor that the Mosaic Law and the Prophets mandate.

In all that the Lord Jesus says here, he shows himself as he is to those who hear him: the Lawgiver who surpasses Moses, the authoritative leader, the Teacher who instructs on mercy, the one who is the Lord.