Saturday in the Eighth Week of Ordinary Time, June 1, 2024

Mark 11, 27-33

Jesus and his disciples returned once more to Jerusalem. As he was walking in the temple area, the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders approached him and said to him, “By what authority are you doing these things? Or who gave you this authority to do them?” Jesus said to them, I shall ask you one question. Answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things. Was John’s baptism of heavenly or of human origin? Answer me.” They discussed this among themselves and said, “If we say, ‘Of heavenly origin,’ he will say, ‘Then why did you not believe him?’ But shall we say, ‘Of human origin’?”– they feared the crowd, for they all thought John really was a prophet. So they said to Jesus in reply, “We do not know.” Then Jesus said to them, “Neither shall I tell you by what authority I do these things.”

“By what authority are you doing these things? Or who gave you this authority to do them?”  The priests and the elders demanded that the Lord Jesus answer their questions after he had cast the moneychangers and the sellers of animals out of the Temple precinct, thereby challenging their authority.  They ask important questions, but they ask in bad faith for whatever Jesus answered them they would reject.  Because of this, the Lord replies by asking them an important question.  We might wonder why they would drop their questions in order to ponder how to answer his, for in doing so they show themselves uncertain of their own authority And to place that of Jesus above theirs.  Perhaps they wanted to express their outrage over his challenge to them but they in actuality did not want to know the answer to their questions.  They might have also felt themselves put into an awkward position because many other people were looking on who were much more interested in what they thought about John the Baptist than in what Jesus might say about his actions.

“I shall ask you one question. Answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things. Was John’s baptism of heavenly or of human origin?”  Their uncertainty and weakness is exposed when they hesitate to answer the question he poses to them.  The Lord’s confidence in his authority likewise is on display.  As if to drive it home further, the Lord repeats, “Answer me.”  The apparent weakness of the chief priests and elders before the Lord is repeated in the Garden of Gethsemane when the soldiers approach him and he asks them whom they are looking for.  They halt at his word and said, “Jesus of Nazareth.”  When the Lord declared to them that he was Jesus of Nazareth, they “went backward and fell to the ground” (John 18, 6).  And again, when Pilate told Jesus that he had the power to crucify or to release him, the Lord told him, “You should not have any power against me, unless it had been given you from above” (John 19, 11).  Pilate wilted at this and “from that point, Pilate sought to release him” (John 19, 12).  All these people recognized that it was Jesus who possessed authority and that their own authority paled before his.

“If we say, ‘Of heavenly origin,’ he will say, ‘Then why did you not believe him?’ But shall we say, ‘Of human origin’?”  We note that they do not even consider telling them their true opinion.  For them, it is not relevant to the question.  Their lack of integrity and good faith leads them into a trap of their own making.  Psalm 57, 6: “They dug a pit in my path, but they have fallen into it themselves.”  It is interesting to try to see from their words what they actually thought about John the Baptist.  The main point that we can certainly draw from their words was that as long as John did not pose a threat to them, they did not care whether his mission was of heavenly or human origin.

“So they said to Jesus in reply, ‘We do not know.’ ”  This seemed the best answer to them, yet it must have galled them to give it because the the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders prided themselves on their wisdom and knowledge.  Here, in order to avoid being completely discredited they had to admit to weakness, to indecision, and to a lack of wisdom.  But at least they are able to limp away to lick their wounds.

“Neither shall I tell you by what authority I do these things.”  The Lord Jesus pronounces their sentence: they are unworthy of hearing his answer to their question.  We can almost hear the voice of the master in the parable who says, regarding the useless servant who did not invest his master’s money: “Cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness; where there shall be weeping and the  gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 25, 30).

There are many who go about in the garb of authority, but some are usurpers and many others are pretenders.  The one authority in our lives whom we can always trust is the Lord Jesus, who can “neither deceive nor be deceived”, as the traditional “Act of Faith” says.

 The Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Friday, May 31, 2024

Luke 1, 39-56

Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice and said, “Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.”  And Mary said: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant. From this day all generations will call me blessed: the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name. He has mercy on those who fear him in every generation. He has shown the strength of his arm, he has scattered the proud in their conceit. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. He has come to the help of his servant Israel for he has remembered his promise of mercy, the promise he made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children for ever.”  Mary remained with her about three months and then returned to her home.

The Angel Gabriel announced to the Blessed Virgin Mary that the Holy Spirit would overshadow her and that she would conceive in her womb the Son of God.  The Angel did not tell her any details about the course of her pregnancy, or where the Child was to be born, whether she should live with Joseph her husband (for he had not yet brought her to his house), or about how or where or by whom the Child was to be raised.  He does reveal to her, in the context of praising God’s power in the wonderful conception of his Son in Mary’s womb that her relative Elizabeth had become pregnant in her old age.  But then he departed.  For the Virgin Mary, to hear that someone might stand in need of aid amounted to an order and so she joined the next caravan traveling to Jerusalem and left it near the town where Elizabeth and her husband, the priest Zechariah, lived.  And there, Mary knew, she could learn how to perform the will of God with regards to his Son, now growing within her. 

“When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice.”  Because Elizabeth had secluded herself in the house for six months, she would have heard Mary’s voice in her room as Mary was entering the house.  Zechariah, a town elder, would have spent the day by the town’s gate with the other elders and he would have seen her first.  Since he was now deaf and dumb he could not greet her properly but he would have brought her to his house.  Mary would have called out to Elizabeth when she entered the house, not seeing her right away and Elizabeth would have emerged.  The infant, John the Baptist, heard Mary’s greeting through his mother’s ears.  That is, her sweetness and humility so filled Elizabeth with joy that her child felt it too, but also the Infant Jesus was already speaking through Mary’s voice so that they issued their greeting together.  Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit in that instant and felt rapturous happiness.  We can think of Elizabeth’s six months of seclusion as a period of preparation for meeting Christ and learn from this example of how we ought to spend some time before Mass, before we even come to church, preparing for Holy Communion.

“Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”  The Church applies the praise of Judith, who saved Israel from the Babylonians, to the Virgin Mary: “You are the glory of Jerusalem, you are the joy of Israel, you are the honor of our people” (Judith 15, 10).  Her peerless faith and her obedience to God in all things made her the perfect woman to give birth to God’s Son and to raise him.  As Elizabeth declares, “Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.”  

Mary’s response to Elizabeth shows her awe of what God has done: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.”  She knew herself to be the lowliest servant in God’s household and yet he has chosen her for the highest responsibility.  “From this day all generations will call me blessed.”  Far from hiding the honor bestowed upon her by Almighty God, she freely acknowledges it and also the place she will hold in the history of the world.  This tells us that she understood very well that she carried God’s Son, who would save the world, in her womb.

“Mary remained with her about three months and then returned to her home.”  Mary assisted her relative for three months, placing herself among the house servants.  But then she leaves just as the time arrives for the birth of John the Baptist.  This is written in a way that is mysterious and abrupt.  It seems that she had to return to Nazareth at that time for her own wedding feast with Joseph, when he would lead her to his home and they would set up housekeeping.  It is hard to think of another reason for why she would leave just then.  She stayed as long as she could and then made her return.  Her own pregnancy might have also begun to show by then.

As we celebrate this feast let us pray for the gift of a strong faith so that one day we shall hear the praise of Jesus at the end of our lives: “Well done, good and faithful servant!  Because you have been faithful over a little, I will place you over much. Enter into the joy of your Lord!” (Matthew 25, 21).

 Thursday in the Eighth Week of Ordinary Time, May 30, 2024

Mark 10, 46-52

As Jesus was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a sizable crowd, Bartimaeus, a blind man, the son of Timaeus, sat by the roadside begging. On hearing that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, “Jesus, son of David, have pity on me.” And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent. But he kept calling out all the more, “Son of David, have pity on me.” Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.” So they called the blind man, saying to him, “Take courage; get up, Jesus is calling you.” He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus. Jesus said to him in reply, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man replied to him, “Master, I want to see.” Jesus told him, ‘Go your way; your faith has saved you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed him on the way.

“Bartimaeus, a blind man, the son of Timaeus, sat by the roadside begging.”  St. Luke, who relates the same event, does not know the blind man’s name, only referring to him as “a certain blind man” (Luke 18, 35).  St. Mark’s giving his name indicates that St. Peter, from whom St. Mark gained his information, knew his name, and this, in turn, suggests that Bartimaeus played a significant role in the Church during the time of the Apostles.  This is hinted at when Mark says, at the end of the Gospel Reading, that after he was cured, he “followed [Jesus] on the way”, as distinct from the many other whom the Lord cured and went their own way afterwards.  The cure itself takes place outside of Jericho, about eighteen miles from Jerusalem, the Lord’s destination.

“On hearing that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out.”  The Gospels are silent as to whether Jesus had visited Jericho previous to his last journey to Jerusalem.  Bartimaeus certainly knew of Jesus and that he had the power to heal.  He also must have heard the crowd talking about Jesus for him to know that Jesus was passing by.  “Jesus, son of David, have pity on me.”  By the time Bartimaeus knows Jesus is on the road, the Lord would have passed him by and gone a little distance.  The blind man would have cried out with all his strength so that Jesus could hear him.  His cry was a plaintive, desperate one because this chance might never come again.  We should think about the plight of a blind man in those days.  Unable to work and apparently little or no family to care for him, he was reduced to begging so that he might eat, and probably sleeping outside in all weather.  Sores from exposure and lack of shelter covered him, and the smell from being unwashed filled the air around him.  His one possession was his irreplaceable cloak.  He calls Jesus “the son of David”, which the crowd, thinking that he was the Messiah who would restore Israel, called him.  But to call someone a “son” of someone also meant that he was taken from the same mold.  David had shown mercy to King Saul when Saul was in his power; Jesus would show mercy to the blind.

“And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent.”  The crowd, believing that it is beneath the Lord’s dignity to mix with a wretched, blind beggar, calls on Bartimaeus to be silent as though it was their responsibility to do so.  They saw themselves as the escort of a king making his progress to his capital.  We should compare this to the Apostles attempting to prevent people from being their children to Jesus in Mark 10, 13.  “But he kept calling out all the more.”  Bartimaeus knows Jesus is growing more distant with every passing second.  His only chance to escape life-long misery is passing away.  It must have seemed to him that the iron prison doors, which had opened a crack, were slamming shut on him forever.  

“Jesus stopped.”  The Lord could have stopped the first time he heard his name called, but he elicits perseverance from the blind man and he gives this example to us to pray even when it seems too late for God’s answer to help.  “Call him.”  The Lord acts through others, involving them in the man’s healing so that they might see later how the Lord would act through them in preaching the Gospel.  “Take courage; get up, Jesus is calling you.”  The crowd, instructed by the Lord, changes obediently to serve their Lord.  They even add their own consoling words, bidding him take courage.  “He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus.”  His cloak would only have tripped him up as he hurried to the Lord and so he casts it aside.  We can think of how we must cast aside our former way of life in order to hurry to Jesus.  But even without the encumbrance of his cloak, Bartimaeus needed help in reaching the Lord.  Many hands would have assisted him as he made his way to the head of the procession.  “What do you want me to do for you?”  Now, it was plain to all that Bartimaeus was blind.  The Lord asks him this question in order to further involve the man in his own healing.  The Lord knows full well what it is we need but he wants us to ask him for it.  “Master, I want to see.”  In the Greek text, Bartimaeus calls Jesus “Rabbi.”  He acknowledges Jesus now not as a worldly king as the crowd does, but as a religious teacher.  “Go your way; your faith has saved you.”  We can compare the Lord’s response to the faith of Bartimaeus with the Lord’s response to that of the centurion’s servant (Matthew 8, 13) and the bleeding woman who touched him (Mark 5, 34), keeping in mind the words of Hebrews 11, 6: “Without faith it is impossible to please God. For he who comes to God must believe that he exists, and rewards those who seek him.”

“Immediately he received his sight and followed him on the way.”  One moment Bartimaeus knew only darkness; the next was vibrant with bright light and color.  The newly sighted man marveled for a moment as the Lord resumed his journey, and then, instead of going into Jericho, he followed the Lord Jesus, making his “way” the Lord’s way.

We see the Lord in this Reading acting with majesty and with power, acting through those who were escorting him as though they were the servants of his palace.  He shows his power through a simple act.  And then he returns to the matter at hand, the journey to Jerusalem.

May our persevering faith so please the Lord that he will grant us our requests!

 Wednesday in the Eighth Week of Ordinary Time, May 29, 2024

Mark 10, 32-45

The disciples were on the way, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus went ahead of them. They were amazed, and those who followed were afraid. Taking the Twelve aside again, he began to tell them what was going to happen to him. “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death and hand him over to the Gentiles who will mock him, spit upon him, scourge him, and put him to death, but after three days he will rise.” Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to Jesus and said to him, ‘Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” He replied, ‘What do you wish me to do for you?” They answered him, “Grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.” Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Can you drink the chalice that I drink or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” They said to him, ‘We can.” Jesus said to them, “The chalice that I drink, you will drink, and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized; but to sit at my right or at my left is not mine to give but is for those for whom it has been prepared.” When the ten heard this, they became indignant at James and John. Jesus summoned them and said to them, “You know that those who are recognized as rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones make their authority over them felt. But it shall not be so among you. Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you will be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you will be the slave of all. For the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

“The disciples were on the way, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus went ahead of them. They were amazed, and those who followed were afraid.”  The Apostles were “amazed” that the Lord would return to Jerusalem after he had nearly been stoned a few months before when he had last preached there.  The crowds who accompanied him on the annual pilgrimage preceding the Passover “were afraid” for his safety, and perhaps that his arrival in the city might spark a riot.  But the Lord Jesus “steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9, 51).

The Lord did not hide from his Apostles that he would suffer there: “Taking the Twelve aside again, he began to tell them what was going to happen to him.”  He gave them a detailed description of his Passion and Death, leaving out nothing.  Yet this did not fit in with their expectations of Jesus restoring Israel and so they set aside what he told them, perhaps thinking that he was testing their courage.  That they did so is clear from the request which James and John, the “sons of thunder”, made of him: “Grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.”  Because Jesus would receive his glory only in heaven in his Resurrection and Ascension, he replied to them: “You do not know what you are asking.”  He gave them time to think and to ask what he meant, but they continued to stand before him, eager and expectant.  We should note that according to Matthew 20, 20-21, it was Salome, the mother of James and John, who asked Jesus for this favor for her sons.  As St. Peter recalled the incident for St. Mark, years later, James and John made the request themselves.  St. Matthew is probably more accurate, but we lose nothing in the meaning in Mark through his omission.  

“Can you drink the chalice that I drink or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?”  James and John do not hesitate to answer.  They have absolute confidence in the Lord Jesus to come out victorious and they will stick with him through thick and thin: “We can.”  To this, the Lord answered, “The chalice that I drink, you will drink, and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized.”  Jesus is speaking of the grace he will give them to do this and of their future perseverance in it.

“But to sit at my right or at my left is not mine to give but is for those for whom it has been prepared.”  That is, he will not reveal to them their place in the world to come.  Only to the Good Thief does he say this, as they are both dying: “And Jesus said to him: Amen I say to thee: This day you shall be with me in paradise” (Luke 23, 43).

“But it shall not be so among you.”  James and John were asking for positions of authority in the restored Kingdom of Israel and the other Apostles saw them as attempting to get in the way of the authority they expected to receive.  And until the time of Jesus, possessing authority meant living well while having others do their work: “Their great ones make their authority over them felt.”  Jesus shows the true purpose of authority: to be in a position in which a person can most effectively serve others, directing others to assist if need be.  And all authority ultimately come from God: “There is no authority but from God” (Romans 13, 1).  So all authority is meant for service: “Whoever wishes to be great among you will be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you will be the slave of all.”

The Lord does not give some abstract teaching but provides an example with which they were very familiar: “The Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.”  If even the Son of Man came to serve, how much more should those who wish to be counted as his servants should serve each other?  The Lord also teaches the purpose of his ultimate service to the human race: to die for the forgiveness of our sins.  

 Tuesday in the Eighth Week of Ordinary Time, May 28, 2024

Mark 10, 28-31

Peter began to say to Jesus, “We have given up everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Amen, I say to you, there is no one who has given up house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and for the sake of the Gospel who will not receive a hundred times more now in this present age: houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and eternal life in the age to come. But many that are first will be last, and the last will be first.”

This Gospel Reading follows the episode of the rich young man who would not follow Jesus because he prized his possessions more than he prized life with the Lord.  The Lord’s responded, as he watched the man walk away, “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the Kingdom of God!”  This greatly agitated the Apostles, who, like all the Jews at the time, believed that riches indicated God’s favor, so naturally these would be saved.

“We have given up everything and followed you.”  Peter speaks for himself and for the other Apostles.  They made themselves poor, that is, in the expectation that when the Lord restored Israel, “the Kingdom of God”, as they expected, they would be enriched with wealth and authority.  Jesus seemed to say that his followers must always be poor.  The Apostles are not thinking of the Kingdom of God as heaven but as the restored Israel. Jesus reassures them: “Amen, I say to you, there is no one who has given up house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and for the sake of the Gospel who will not receive a hundred times more now in this present age.”  Holy poverty, accepted for the sake of the Gospel, frees a person to accept fellow believers as “brothers or sisters or mother or father or children”, all heirs of heaven.  And the freedom from being tied down to a plot of land or to the care of possessions allows him to go throughout the world, accepting hospitality wherever it is offered to him as a missionary, a legate of Jesus Christ.  “With persecutions.”  The Lord does not hide from his Apostles that they will be persecuted for their faith in him as well as rewarded.  The persecution, in fact, would affirm for them that they were doing affectively the work he had given them that required their poverty.

“And eternal life in the age to come.”  And this is the purpose of it all: the Kingdom of God is not made of brick and stone but of the glory of God, and they who give up all on earth for Jesus shall enter into it.  How do we give up our “all”, though, since so many believers must have money and possessions to take care of those entrusted to their care, such as their children or the elderly in their families?  The most important thing we give up, and that “wealth” signifies, is our will.  The rich young man walked away from Jesus because his will was set on his possessions.  The Apostles left the relative little they had, but they turned their wills towards Jesus and were gradually giving their wills fully to him.  So when we give the Lord our wills and follow him unreservedly we pass through “the eye of the needle”, whatever our station in life.  Therefore, “Many that are first will be last, and the last will be first.”  Those who make themselves first, dedicating themselves to furthering themselves in the world, will be made last by Jesus.  Those who make themselves last, making themselves the “handmaids” of the Lord, will be made first by him in the Kingdom of God.

 Monday in the Eighth Week of Ordinary Time, May 27, 2024

Mark 10, 17-27

As Jesus was setting out on a journey, a man ran up, knelt down before him, and asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus answered him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: You shall not kill; you shall not commit adultery; you shall not steal; you shall not bear false witness; you shall not defraud; honor your father and your mother.”  He replied and said to him, “Teacher, all of these I have observed from my youth.” Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said to him, “You are lacking in one thing. Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” At that statement, his face fell, and he went away sad, for he had many possessions. Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the Kingdom of God!” The disciples were amazed at his words. So Jesus again said to them in reply, “Children, how hard it is to enter the Kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for one who is rich to enter the Kingdom of God.” They were exceedingly astonished and said among themselves, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “For men it is impossible, but not for God. All things are possible for God.”

This Gospel Reading should be read together with Mark 10, 13-16 wherein Jesus tells his Apostles that “whoever does not accept the Kingdom of God like a child will not enter it”, for the two readings complement each other: those who become like children entering the Kingdom of God and those who want to enter without becoming like children, “camels” who will not make themselves small so as to enter through the eye of the needle, “the narrow gate” (cf. Matthew 7, 13).  

“Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.”  The Lord responds to the young man’s attempt at a compliment by challenging him and seeking to draw a confession of faith from him: if, as the young man says, Jesus is a “good” teacher, but only God is good, does the young man mean to confess that Jesus is God?  The Lord’s question should be read so that a period of silence ensues afterwards, with the Lord awaiting an answer.  When the young man does not answer, the Lord went through some of the commandments, especially those which a young man could have easily kept: “Teacher, all of these I have observed from my youth.”

“Jesus, looking at him, loved him.”  St. Peter, recalling this episode many years later, remembered the Lord’s expression as he looked upon the young man.  The Lord Jesus felt intense love for each person and primarily showed this in his deeds for them.  Here we have an occasion in which he shows his love through his facial expression.  We can only imagine the joy this look gives to those who die in the state of grace and open their eyes in the next life to see him!  “You are lacking in one thing. Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”  So what is it that the young man is lacking that selling his property to follow Jesus will solve?  It will put him in a position of complete dependency on Christ.  If he, as a rich man, tries to follow Jesus, he can always say to himself that if Jesus asks too much of him, he can always go back to his former life.  Or, he can use his wealth to buffer himself from the harder things the Lord demands of his disciples.  There is also the question of attitude, that the rich man will always prefer his ideas to those of others because, after all, he is rich.  In sum, Jesus tells him to make himself “a little one”, a child (cf. Mark 10, 15).

“His face fell, and he went away sad, for he had many possessions.”  We should keep in mind how the Lord had looked on this man with love.  The Lord’s love for him flowed out to him, and the man’s face fell and he “went away sad” because as much as he wanted to return that love and follow Jesus, he could not because he loved his things more.  “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the Kingdom of God!”  The wealthy tend to rely on their wealth and their position in society to obtain whatever they wish.  Wealth thus becomes a barrier between a man and his God.  It is difficult as well for the wealthy to understand their absolute dependence on Almighty God and their position in this world as his servants.  But the Lord says it is “hard”, not impossible, for the wealthy to enter the Kingdom of God.  What is necessary is that they, like the rest of us, pray for humility and for the heart of a servant.  Numerous examples of the wealthy are found in the Martyrology, such as St. Louis, King of France.  To emphasize what the wealthy — and all of us — need to do, the Lord addresses his Apostles, who have given up everything for him, as “children”: “Children, how hard it is to enter the Kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for one who is rich to enter the Kingdom of God.”

“Then who can be saved?”  The Apostles had been raised in a religious culture which saw possessions and property in this life as signs of God’s benediction, and that they would necessarily pass on to heaven.  The severity of their agitation at the Lord’s words shows how deeply baked in them this view was.  “For men it is impossible, but not for God. All things are possible for God.”  That is, All are sinners and no one can save himself.  We are saved solely by the mercy of Almighty God through the redemption wrought by the Blood of his Son.

 The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, Sunday, May 26, 2024

Matthew 28, 16–20

The eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had ordered them. When they all saw him, they worshiped, but they doubted. Then Jesus approached and said to them, “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”

Several solemnities follow in order in the weeks after Pentecost, the first of which is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, set in the calendar by Pope John XXII (d. 1334).  The Most Holy Trinity is worshipped at each Mass every day of the week, but this feast, coming after Easter and Pentecost, particularly and explicitly is dedicated to the Most Holy Trinity.  

The doctrine of God as a Trinity of Persons is taught in the New Testament, especially in the Gospel of St. John, but the Christian can look back to the Old Testament and see hints of it.  The Fathers did not fail to point out that Genesis 1, 26 shows God saying: “Let us make man to our image and likeness.”  This, the Fathers taught, was God the Father speaking to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.  Elsewhere, in Genesis 18, 1-2, Almighty God appeared to Abraham in the form of “three men”.  In the New Testament, the doctrine is taught most succinctly at the end of the Gospel of St. Matthew: “Baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”  We see the three Persons named and their equality in power and majesty is shown in the simple sequence of the naming.  We see their unity in the fact that the Lord Jesus says “the name” and not “the names”.  The “name” of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is God, and he is one.

The doctrine of the Most Holy Trinity endured attacks in the early years of the Church by those who, like the Egyptian priest Arius, doubted the divinity of the Son.  His heresy was condemned by the Council of Nicaea in 325.  The Creed composed at this council, which is centered on his teaching, is recited today at Mass.  A later heresy denied the divinity of the Holy Spirit and this was likewise condemned.  A comprehensive statement regarding the Holy Trinity was drawn up by St. Athanasius (d. 373), Bishop of Alexandria, the so-called Athanasian Creed.

The Lord Jesus considered it of the greatest importance for us to know who God is, and risked stoning in order to teach us this.  In order to love someone, we must know him even if, ultimately, he is beyond our comprehension.  And it is in knowing and loving God that we find our true happiness.  The beatific vision in heaven consists entirely in gazing at God, the Holy Trinity, and bathing in the light and love that flows out from that which the Persons lavish on each other from their inmost selves in infinite  torrents.

 Saturday in the Seventh Week of Ordinary Time, May 25, 2024

Mark 10, 13-16

People were bringing children to Jesus that he might touch them, but the disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw this he became indignant and said to them, “Let the children come to me; do not prevent them, for the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Amen, I say to you, whoever does not accept the Kingdom of God like a child will not enter it.” Then he embraced the children and blessed them, placing his hands on them.

Psalm 8, 2: “Out of the mouth of infants and of sucklings you have perfected praise.”  From this well-known passage we learn that Almighty God perfects his praise which comes from even the mouths of “infants and sucklings”.  He “perfects” it in that he bestows grace upon the children so that they might praise him perfectly, that is, with their whole hearts.  But how do such small children, even those still nursing, praise God?  The newly baptized do so simply by living.  Their innocence, their beauty, all testify to the greatness and love of the God who created them.

“People were bringing children to Jesus that he might touch them, but the disciples rebuked them.”  The disciples acted as though they thought the touch of the children might render their Teacher unclean.  They evidently thought that this amounted to an affront to his dignity and so they acted on their own without waiting for direction from him.  It is not clear as to whether the people with the children came as a group or as individual families, nor is it clear whether Jesus was trying to teach at the time.  St. Mark does not inform us as to the site of this episode, if it took place in a town or in the countryside.  The people may have come a little distance to see him and brought their children with them.

“When Jesus saw this he became indignant.”  The Greek word translated here as “indignant” really means “to be angry”.  Jesus was angered by the interference of the disciples.  He shows anger in order to teach how strongly he feels about letting the little children come to him: “Let the children come to me; do not prevent them.”  The Lord makes no distinction between the adults who come to him for healing and these children, just as he makes no distinction in dying for both the Gentiles and the Jews.  All of us stand in need of him and he opens his arms to all who come to him.  “For the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these.”  He uses the occasion to teach about who will inherit the Kingdom of God.  He does not say that these particular children will go to heaven but that we must become as “such as these” — we must become child-like — in order to enter heaven.  Without romanticizing children or childhood we can certainly say that the Lord has in mind innocence and simple love.  

But how do we attain or regain innocence?  We do so through prayer, fasting, and alms-giving.  Many people today seek to look and feel younger than they are and they pursue all sorts of (usually expensive) remedies.  But  we can recover innocence and also the virtue of loving simply through these means.  This enables us to gain heaven: “Amen, I say to you, whoever does not accept the Kingdom of God like a child will not enter it.”  The Greek word translated here as “accept” can also be translated as “to welcome”: Whoever does not welcome the Kingdom of God like a child will not enter it.  That is, with excitement and joy.

“Then he embraced the children and blessed them, placing his hands on them.”  This is how the Lord will welcome each of us should we live our lives in love with him.

 Friday in the Seventh Week of Ordinary Time, May 24, 2024

Mark 10, 1-12

Jesus came into the district of Judea and across the Jordan. Again crowds gathered around him and, as was his custom, he again taught them. The Pharisees approached him and asked, “Is it lawful for a husband to divorce his wife?” They were testing him. He said to them in reply, “What did Moses command you?” They replied, “Moses permitted a husband to write a bill of divorce and dismiss her.” But Jesus told them, “Because of the hardness of your hearts he wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, no human being must separate.” In the house the disciples again questioned Jesus about this. He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

The last of the Prophets, speaking two hundred years before the Birth of Jesus, confounded the Jews with these words: “So take heed to yourselves, and let none be faithless to the wife of his youth. For I hate divorce, says the Lord the God of Israel, and covering one’s garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So take heed to yourselves and do not be faithless” (Malachi 2, 15–16).  God, speaking through the Prophet, seems to contradict the regulations within the Law of Moses allowing for divorce.  God seems to contradict himself, and that cannot be.  But the Jewish teachers and high priests had no answer for this problem and divorce went on as before between Jewish husbands and wives.

Now the Pharisees bring this long-standing difficulty before the Lord.  This looks like an act of surprising prudence, approaching the Son of God on a matter they cannot solve.  They might only have sought to trap him in his words, but St. Mark does not ascribe this motive to them.  They might, then, have used this problem in order to get him to reveal more about himself to them: “they were testing him”.  At any rate, they showed interested in his opinion, though he was “untaught” (cf. John 7, 15).

“What did Moses command you?”  The Lord proceeds methodically, putting the Pharisees in the position of students.  They accept this, replying, “Moses permitted a husband to write a bill of divorce and dismiss her.”  They would have expected Jesus at this point to quote the Prophets in order to introduce his own answer, but instead, he speaks on his own authority and out of his own knowledge: “Because of the hardness of your hearts he wrote you this commandment.”  That is, in the time before grace, God’s design of marriage was not understood well and without the help of his grace was difficult to achieve.  Here, the Lord Jesus makes it clear: “From the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”  Like the doctrine that there was only one God, this teaching set the Jews apart from every other people, but it had been neglected for many ages.  Jesus reaffirms that the human race was made male and female, equal in dignity, and that, leaving their families behind them, a man and woman are joined together by God in such an intimate way that they become “one flesh”.  And because this union is the work of God, no human or even an angel, can unmake them or separate them so that they can be joined to anyone else: “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

St. Matthew reports that after the Lord had given this teaching, his Apostles, taken aback, said to him, “His disciples say unto him: If the case of a man with his wife be so, it is not expedient to marry” (Matthew 19, 10).  The Lord replied that not everyone was designed by God for marriage, with the implication that if a person did not think he could persevere in marriage, he should not marry, and that he incurred no shame if he did not.

It should be mentioned here that when the Church declares a marriage null, she does so because based on testimony, what she understands by marriage did not, in fact, occur.  The Church does not “make” a marriage null but she can declare it based on the discovery that one or both parties felt forced into it, that one person lied to another in order to gain the other’s consent to marry, that one or both parties were too immature to understand what they were doing, or other similar grounds.

The Lord’s teaching on marriage fulfills the Scripture which first reveals it in the very opening pages of the Book of Genesis.  He shows its place in God’s marvelous plan for the salvation of the world, and he teaches the intimacy at its heart, an intimacy which itself is modeled after that between the Persons of the Holy Trinity.