Third Wednesday in Ordinary Time

Wednesday, January 29, 2025

Third Week in Ordinary Time

Heb 10:11-18/Mk 4:1-20 (Lectionary #319)

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/012825.cfm

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Until Jesus said we are his “brothers and sisters and mother” he had not taught anything very mystical except to identify himself as the “bridegroom” for whom our hearts are longing. Now, however, it is almost as if he realizes that people are not getting the message. They are not able to get it, because the real Good News is simply beyond human comprehension. It is to make this point, perhaps, that Jesus changes his style of teaching. Now he begins to teach “in parables.”

Later, to those who “were around him and the Twelve,” Jesus explained why. Simplistically put, a parable is a literary form that says something without clearly spelling it out. Jesus uses parables so people can “look, but not see” and “listen, but not understand” unless they look with eyes of faith and listen with hearts intent on living out what they hear. Parables don’t hit people over the head with their meaning. This leaves some excuse to those who aren’t ready to “turn away from sin and be forgiven.”

The “Parable of the Sower” explains why, so often, the words of Jesus, God himself, have so little effect. The reason is that salvation is a two-way street. God does his part, but we have to do ours.

The first obstacle is cultural conditioning. Counter-cultural words falling on the “beaten path” are lost by  “bounce” and “pounce.” Some just bounce off without penetrating. Others are pounced on with such ridicule by peer groups and media that unless we emancipate ourselves from society’s enslavement what Jesus says will never even register. Strike one.

Even if we listen with initial attraction, the seed will not penetrate to decision depth unless we reflect on what we hear. Words only take root in choices. Strike two is shallowness.

What finally strikes us out is our attachment to what may be immediately urgent or appealing but is ultimately meaningless: “anxieties over life’s demands, the desire for wealth, and cravings of other sorts.” We can’t expect to live by the divine life of God if our response to it has too many human strings attached. Strike three: idolatry. 

Initiative: Ask what fruit God’s words are bearing in your life. Be specific. If you can’t identify anything significant, check out the three obstacles above.

Third Tuesday in Ordinary Time

Tuesday, January 28, 2025

Third Week in Ordinary Time

Memorial of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Priest and Doctor of the Church

Heb 10:1-10/Mk 3:31-35 (Lectionary #318)

 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/012825.cfm

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In Mark’s next incident we can see how Jesus’ family could think he was crazy! Jesus wouldn’t stop talking even long enough to eat. “His mother and his brothers came; and standing outside, sent word to him” that he should come home to dinner.

We would expect a normal son to say, “Okay, mother, I’ll be home in a minute.” But Jesus said, “My mother? My brothers? Who are my mother and brothers?” And then, “gazing around him,” he said,  “These are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother!”

We are tempted to think that when Jesus finally did go home, Mary may have said to him as any Jewish mother would have, even one “conceived without sin”: “So who is your mother? Who are your brothers? Go find some other woman who ‘does the will of God’ and let her give you your supper!”

Then, of course, she sat him down and made him eat until he cried for mercy.

Here again we have a very human Jesus saying something arrestingly divine. Would any of us dare to claim to be as close to Jesus, as much a part of his family, as his own mother was? But he is the one who says it. We just can’t bring ourselves to accept the mystery of what “grace” really is. Grace is the favor of sharing in the divine life of God. If we think we fully understand what that means, we don’t even understand what there is to understand!

By grace we “become Christ.” We become his real body. “In him” we are made true sons and daughters of the Father. His own Spirit bears witness to that within us: “Because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” (Romans 8:16; Galatians 4:6). Do we claim this?

How do we feel about claiming to be the “light of the world” (Matthew 5:14)? About claiming to be “one” with God and with each other “in God” as the Father is in Jesus and Jesus is in the Father (John 17:21)? About declaring that because we believe in him we can do the works that Jesus does; and, in fact, can do “greater works than these” (John 14:12)?

Don’t we feel crazy, making claims like those? But it is Jesus who says it, not us. We just have a hard time taking him seriously. The next passage we read in Mark will tell us why.

Initiative: Open your mind to mystery. Don’t think you understand what you were taught in “religion class.” Keep asking the Holy Spirit to enlighten you.

Third Monday in Ordinary Time

Monday, January 27, 2025

Third Week in Ordinary Time

Saint Angela Merici, Virgin

Heb 9:15, 24-28/Mk 3:22-30 (Lectionary #317)

 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/012725.cfm

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Mark tells us that next some “scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, ‘By the ruler of the demons he casts out demons.’” The official teachers of the Pharisee party thought Jesus was not just crazy but possessed!

Jesus responds with two teachings. First, he says, “If a kingdom is divided against itself, it cannot stand.  So if in me Satan is casting out Satan he is finished.” And second, “No one can enter a strong man’s house without first tying him up.” Jesus must be stronger than the devil, not in league with him.

So much for the argument of the scribes. But Jesus gives a third teaching addressed to all of us: “Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter. But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never find forgiveness.” What is “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit”?

Some people sin just out of weakness, or because they have been malformed by their culture. The truth is, most objections against the Catholic Church are objections against things she does not believe or teach — or against things her least representative members do, which can include priests and bishops! There is hope for people who “blaspheme” — or rail — against truth that has been presented to them distorted by the flawed example of humans. If nothing else, we can hope that when they die God will show them the truth— the things they misunderstood, the distortions they absorbed, the counter-productive responses they made to situations they found themselves in — and say to them, “This is the real truth This is what I really am. Do you accept me now?” If that is the case, their “final judgment” about God will be their Final Judgment, even if they make it after the medical profession has pronounced them legally dead. Christians believe people are “dead” when God says they are; not when the doctors do!

But some people may actually embrace evil as good, and abhor good as evil. Some reject the inspirations and enlightenment of God himself. God will forgive them if they repent, but there is less hope that they will. They are already blocking God’s best shot.

Mark tells us Jesus said this “because they had said, ‘He has an unclean spirit.’” If people can’t tell the difference between the devil and God himself, they are in serious trouble. 

Initiative: Accept both what is human and what is divine in your experience of the Church and the Church’s ministry, but do not confuse one with the other.