EXPLANATION: On the Book of Wisdom, see the Nineteenth Sunday of the Year. In today’s extract the author is stressing man’s incapability of understanding the divine plans and decrees. Because we are finite, limited beings, our knowledge is finite and limited. There are many limited, finite problems all around us, which we cannot solve. How could we hope to solve the infinite ones?

What man . . . counsel: God would not be God if finite men could understand fully what he is and what he does and thinks.

who . . . what the Lord wills?: The author uses the typical Hebrew parallelism to express an idea; he says the same thing in two ways.

reasoning of mortals . . . worthless: We mortals are unsure, uncertain, in our judgments. We have only a limited knowledge, a limited intellect.

perishable body . . . the soul: The intellectual powers of man depend on the bodily senses and are restricted by them. As our bodily senses are limited and finite, so are our intellectual powers. The term “soul” here is not to be taken in the Platonic sense, as an entity complete in itself. The author was, however, acquainted with Platonic philosophy as the parallelism shows. “the earthen shelter (the body) weighs down the mind (the soul.)”

me . . . earth: It is only with difficulty that we learn, and even then only partially, the nature and meaning of the finite things of this world.

who . . . heavens: How could we possibly comprehend infinite things?

who . . . counsel?: No man could ever understand the nature or the plans of God except

Thou . . . given Wisdom: God in his goodness had revealed himself through Wisdom. Here Wisdom is personified and identified with God’s holy spirit. The doctrine of the Holy Trinity was not revealed in the Old Testament, but many hints of it were given. God revealing himself to man through his Holy Spirit was one such hint.

thus . . .the paths . . . right: God in his goodness revealed himself and his plans for mankind, and thus enabled man to see his purpose, his “paths” in this life. He would otherwise be stumbling in the dark.

APPLICATION: We can never thank God sufficiently for his goodness in revealing himself to us, and in unveiling the plans he had for us when we were created. By the use of reason, we could prove that we were created by some all-wise, all-powerful being. That would, however, be but cold philosophical knowledge. We would still not see any purpose in life except to get what we could out of it, and that would in fact be very little because life is so short, and the amount of good we could get in its short span of time is so limited.

God has revealed that he has planned an unending life for us once we have completed our term on this earth. This is surely a revelation which satisfies every human ambition that we find in ourselves, and which gives a meaning to this life which human reasoning could never of itself discover. What is more, this revelation gives us an idea of God which no human philosophy could deduce from the knowledge of a Creator. It tells us our Creator is a God of love, a God who has a very personal interest in man, the masterpiece of his creative act. He not only gave us existence for a space of time on this earth, as he gave to the other beings about us. He intended also that unending existence for us afterwards.

Fortunate indeed are we who have this revelation of God from God. The author of the Book of Wisdom was grateful for the limited knowledge that the Old Testament contained. How much more grateful should we Christians be who have seen the love of God personified and living amongst us and dying for us in the humanity of the Incarnate Son, Jesus Christ? “Greater love than this no man has than that a man lay down his life for his friends.” These are the words of Christ himself, but when it is God-made-man who does this for his mere creatures “the work of his hands:” how much greater, how much more beyond expectation is that love!

This is what God’s love has done for us. What does he ask in return? He asks that we should love and respect him in our limited little way. There isn’t much that we can give, but he accepts our tiny tokens. One way in which we can show how we appreciate all that he has done for us, is to try, by word and example, to make the infinite love of God for mankind known to those who have not yet received the Christian faith, or who once had it but lost it through their human folly.

God loves the whole human race. He intends heaven for each one of us. There is room there for all. Men will be perverse and abuse the gifts of intellect and will which he gave them. They will even turn against himself and refuse the eternal reward which he has in store for them. He cannot force their free will. He depends on us to act on his behalf. Every true Christian is an apostle. Every man who appreciates God’s goodness and love must prove to his neighbor by his life that he has the “pearl of great price.” His place must show that he has the true answer to the enigma of life, and his confidence emphasize that the innate ambitions and desires of mankind are to be, and will be, fulfilled in him who serves God faithfully, according to his lights, during his few years on earth.

Thank you, God, for the Wisdom you have sent us from heaven. Give us the grace to live up to it always, and to be ready to share it with our neighbor on every available occasion. Thus may we arrive at the gates of heaven accompanied by many fellow men, our brothers, who would otherwise have missed the road there.

SECOND READING: Philomen 9-10, 12-17. I, Paul, an ambassador and now a prisoner also for Christ Jesus—I appeal to you for my child, Onesimus, whose father I have become in my imprisonment. I am sending him back to you, sending my very heart. I would have been glad to keep him with me, in order that he might serve me on your behalf during my imprisonment for the gospel, but I preferred to do nothing without your consent in order that your goodness might not be by compulsion but of your own free will.

Perhaps this is why he was parted from you for a while, that you might have him back for ever, no longer as a slave but more than a slave, as a beloved brother, especially to me but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord. So if you consider me your partner, receive him as you would receive me.

EXPLANATION: This letter to Philemon is the shortest of St. Paul’s letters and at the same time the most personal and touching. During his first imprisonment in Rome (61-63), a slave called Onesimus, who had run away from his Christian master Philemon, a native of Colossae, came to Paul in Rome and was converted to Christianity. Paul sent him back to his master bearing this letter in which Paul touchingly appeals to Philemon to deal kindly with the runaway.

Ambassador . . . prisoner: Philemon was an old friend of Paul and one of his helpers in preaching the gospel in Colossae in Asia Minor. As ambassador, that is, official representative of Christ, he could command Philemon to do as he asked. Also the fact that he is a prisoner would move Philemon to carry out his wishes but

I appeal to you for my child: He prefers to appeal to Philemon’s Christian charity. He calls Onesimus his child whom he has begotten during his captivity, for during his imprisonment he had converted him, and therefore was the young man’s spiritual father.

I am sending my very heart: He has become attached to the runaway slave and would gladly retain him in Rome to help him—he knew Philemon would gladly give him this help while he was in prison for the faith.

nothing without your consent: He could have kept Onesimus, but out of politeness and respect for Philemon he did not do so.

parted . . . forever: Paul suggests that the running away of the slave was a blessing in disguise for the master. Because he has become a Christian, Philemon will now have Onesimus forever, not as a slave but as a beloved brother, and a brother dear to Paul as well.

more . . . brother: For he is a brother of Christ now and so all the dearer to Philemon, a brother and lover of Christ.

if . . . me your partner . . . me: Paul and Philemon were partners in the work of spreading the gospel. Therefore they regarded one another as close friends. Onesimus now is also a close friend of Paul’s, so he expects Philemon to welcome him back as a dear friend.

APPLICATION: In all his other Epistles we see St. Paul as the great apostle, the great lover of Christ, who counted suffering, imprisonment and even death as gain, so far as they were for Christ. We see the great theologian who expounds the depths and the riches and the greatness of God’s love for us as proved by the Incarnation. We see the saint who is devoting every gift of his mind, and every muscle and sinew of his body, to the service of his Master, Jesus Christ. In today’s short epistle we see Paul, the warm-hearted man, who forgets himself and his own needs in order to reconcile two brothers. They are each dear to him. He wants to make them just as dear to one another. He succeeded, we can feel sure.

It is good for us to know that the great saints of God were not like the cold statues of them which we see in our churches. They were men and women of flesh and blood, like ourselves. Becoming saints did not make them less but more human. There was a period in the history of the Church when the lives of saints were so written as to leave almost nothing human in them. This was done to edify the reader, or so the authors thought. But the fact was that instead of such lives attracting the ordinary faithful, they had the opposite effect. Who could imitate a saint who was one from birth, who not only never did anything wrong, but almost never did anything human. How could we, very human people, become saints if that was the stuff saints were made of.

Of course, it was not. They had the same human nature that we have. They had the same attachment to family and to friends that we have. They had the same weaknesses that we have. Some of them, like St. Augustine and many others, gave in to those weaknesses for a time. Eventually they overcame them. Most of the saints whose feasts are celebrated by the Church did outstanding and even extraordinary things for God and for the Church, but there are millions of others in heaven. These are saints who did nothing very big or extraordinary. They did the small things of life well, while they lived a very “ordinary” life in the grace of God.

We need have no doubt but that there are millions of such saints in heaven. If there are not, then Christ’s salvific work has been in vain. The few thousand who figure in the calendar of the Church would be a very poor harvest, in two thousand years, from the seed which Christ planted.

Yes, the ordinary, good Christian goes to heaven. He may have stumbled and fallen many a time on the way. But, aided by God’s grace, he always rose up again and kept on the road that his faith had marked out for him. We have every reason, every one of us here present, to feel confident that we will make the grade. We are dealing with a God of mercy who understands our weak human nature better than we ourselves can understand it. We are dealing with the God of infinite love who proved his love for us in the Incarnation. He is sorry for our sakes when we forget him and offend him. He is ever ready to receive us back with open arms when we see our folly and repent of our sins.

One of the great proofs, I would venture to say, that the Church is not a human invention is the Sacrament of Penance. What human mind would be big enough to say that a sinner would be pardoned, no matter how seriously and how often he sinned, provided the sinner was truly repentant. Peter suggested that the forgiving of an enemy seven times would be stretching things a bit, but Christ who was divine had a different view.

Yes, think over St. Paul’s very human nature today. Think of the very human nature of millions of others who have gone to heaven before us. What they did, we can do. We have the same helps for the same weak human nature which they had. Let us use these helps. Let us do our very ordinary day’s work well. Let us try always to stay in God’s grace, or, if temptation should overcome us, let us get back quickly to God’s grace through the sacrament of divine mercy. Very likely, we shall not get our names in the Church calendar of canonized saints, but we can get them in the heavenly calendar.

GOSPEL: Luke 14:25-33. Great multitudes accompanied Jesus, and he turned and said to them, “If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, ‘This man began to build, and was not able to finish.’ Or what king, going to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and take counsel whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends an embassy and asks terms of peace. So therefore, whoever of you does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.”

EXPLANATION: In the preceding parable (14:16-24), Our Lord tells us of a man who invited many friends to a great supper, but one and all found some excuse for not coming. The host then sent for the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame. The reference is to the banquet in the kingdom of God. The leaders of the Chosen People refused to come. The ordinary sinners, outcasts according to the Pharisees, and the Gentiles, would flock to the kingdom in their place. Christ now warns that certain conditions must be fulfilled before they can really enter the kingdom.

If anyone comes to me: To be a true follower of Christ, a man must be ready to sacrifice even what is nearest and dearest to him if it comes between him and Christ.

father and mother, and wife . . . life: Turning his back on father, mother and relatives, does not mean deserting or denying them. “His very self” shows this: one cannot desert oneself. What it means is that if ones relatives or one’s own evil inclinations prevent one from following Christ, one must oppose them and do what is right.

bear . . . cross: Accepting Christianity at any time or place, but especially in Palestine at the beginning, meant of necessity making a great sacrifice. The Jews persecuted and cast out of the family any member who became a Christian, unless the whole family became Christian. The Gentile converts in the early Church also suffered much from their families and neighbors. Hence Christ forewarns prospective followers of the difficulties they were to encounter.

For . . . desiring . . . tower . . . king . . . another king: These two parables help to emphasize the necessity of considering carefully before deciding to follow Christ. Failures would bring no credit to themselves or to Christ. Rather they would make a mockery of themselves and doubly endanger their possibility of attaining salvation.

whoever . . . be my disciple: Our Lord himself shows the parables as being intended to bring out the need for careful consideration before following him. He had to be followed sincerely and truly, or not at all. At the time there were many among the Jews who thought that he would be a political king, who would set them free from the hated rule of pagan Rome. These were anxious to join him. But he gradually made it clear to them that his kingdom was not of this world. They then lost interest in him.

renounce all . . . has: Again to be understood in the sense that one’s possessions must not impede one from following Christ sincerely. There are religious men and women, followers of Christ, who exclude by vow all right to possessions, but they are relatively few. The vast majority of Christians are not asked or expected to give up their property, even in the limited legal sense of the vow of poverty, unless their possessions prevent them from living the Christian life.

APPLICATION: The essential condition for true discipleship, demanded by Christ, was, and still is, total dedication, total commitment of oneself to him. There can be no such person as a half- Christian. “He that is not with me is against me,” he said on another occasion. We cannot be for Christ on Sunday and against him for the other six days of the week. To be his true disciples, his true followers, we must live our Christian life every day and all day.

Following Christ means making our way to heaven. It is a life-journey. We have a limited time in which to complete this journey. Therefore, we must travel a certain distance each day. This does not mean that we must spend every day in prayer and meditation. There are other tasks to be done, but we must Christianize these other tasks. Even the members of religious orders who “leave the world,” that is, who are set free from the family and financial cares of this world by their vows of chastity and poverty, have to busy themselves with other cares like teaching, nursing, tilling the soil perhaps, housekeeping, writing and many such activities. They cannot and do not spend all their day and every day in prayer and meditation. Nor does Christ demand this of them.

Much less, therefore, does he demand this of the ninety-nine percent of his followers who have to take on themselves financial and family cares. It is by fulfilling these worldly duties in a Christian way that they are dedicating themselves to his service. This is their total commitment to Christ. The married man or woman who is loyal to his or her life-partner and to the family, if there is one, and who provides diligently and honestly for his own and the family’s spiritual and temporal welfare, and who always does this with the intention of pleasing God, is following Christ and is moving steadily day by day towards heaven.

This, of course, is more easily said than done. There are temptations, there are pitfalls on every side. While we are in this life we are travelers. We have not yet seen the beauty, the joy, the happiness toward which we are traveling, whereas this world, with its attractions, its own limited joys and pleasures, is here under our eyes. This is what makes the going difficult for most, if not all, of us. Of this we have been forewarned—we must take up our cross daily—we must “turn our backs” on these earthly attractions if and when they threaten to impede or obstruct our heavenward journey.

We must Christianize our daily work therefore by accepting it and honestly carrying it out as a necessary condition of Christian discipleship. If we offer our day’s work to God for his honor and glory, it will be a continuous prayer. We are working for God and moving a step closer to heaven each day. If in spite of our honest labor we often find it harder to make ends meet, and we have done everything possible to better our situation, we must remember our Savior who “had not whereon to lay his head.” That extra bit of income we so much desire might not turn out to be the blessing we think it would. God is not forgetting us. These times of difficulty may be the very moments when he is nearest to us.

On the other hand, those among us who find life running almost too smoothly, who have no family or financial difficulties, could well look into their consciences. If they never seem to have a cross to carry, they may be forgetting God. Their financial success may not be built on Christian honesty. Their peace in their house may not be the result of Christian discipline. The children who get every material thing that they desire, and are permitted by their parents to do as they wish, are not having their feet set on the road to heaven. They will not thank their over-generous parents later on, and those parents will pay for their folly, if not in this life, assuredly in the next.

To be true Christians, therefore, we must act as Christians all our lives. We must not let this world detain us on our journey home. We must use it and not let it use us. We must be ready to give up and turn our backs on anyone or anything, no matter how near or dear to us, if it is an impediment to us on our way to heaven. On the day that we were made Christians, we set out to build a tower that will reach to heaven. We decided to win a battle against whatever foe we met in life. By perseverance, we shall win our battles, we shall finish our tower, we shall reach the home which God has prepared for us.-c324

EXPLANATION: On the Book of Sirach, or Ecclesiasticus as it was generally called up to recent times, see the Eighth Sunday of the Year. In today’s Reading we have a few more of the words of wisdom of this saintly man who spent his life meditating on the law of God revealed to the Chosen People.

My son . . . meekness: He is speaking as a loving father advising his son, and his advice is to act always with humility, that is, realizing that he is a creature of God, that any qualifications he may have are not his own but gifts from God.

loved . . . accepts: The man who deals with his neighbor as with an equal, even though he may have greater gifts of mind or body, will be esteemed more than one who gives away some of his property; the former is giving himself, a far greater gift.

Humble . . . yourself: He who has greater gifts from God must recognize this, and not take the credit to himself.

find favor . . . Lord: God will be pleased with him who gives credit to whom it belongs.

great . . . Lord: The humble man knows that his human intellect is finite. It is capable of grasping finite, limited knowledge. He must not try to probe the infinite; this is God’s sphere.

affliction . . . healing: The same wise counsel in other words. Parallelism is a Hebrew method of teaching.

mind . . . parables: Proverbs to the Israelites were maxims of conduct, instructions as to proper behavior. Every man who would be wise had to learn these instructions.

attentive ear . . . wise man’s desire: He will be the truly happy man who listens to, and puts into practice, the wisdom he learns from the wise men who went before him.

APPLICATION: Humility, the virtue recommended to all of us in today’s man of the Old Testament times, is the quotation from Sirach, a wise and saintly basic virtue of a Christian life. It is the one virtue our divine Lord told us to copy from him: “Learn of me for I am meek and humble of heart.” He had all the other virtues to the highest degree and he did not mean that we should ignore them, but as humility is the foundation on which all the other Christian virtues are built, if we have it, the others will grow from it as the tree comes from the root.

What is humility? It is an honest, truthful estimation of ourselves. Whatever we are or have, we owe to God. We did not bring ourselves into being, God created us. If we have healthy bodies, sound limbs and senses, bright and alert intellects, it was God who gave them to us. If we have used these gifts of God properly and acquired some of this world’s goods and honors, we did so because God gave us the materials with which to work. In other words, everything we are and have is a loan from God, and therefore we cannot boast of it, or grow proud because of it.

Yet the world is full of pride. Pride has been the besetting sin of man from the beginning of time. It is the original sin, the cause of all other sins, and it has been copied by generation after generation down to our own day. Puny, finite man came to realize that he had gifts which raised him above all the other beings that inhabited the earth. Instead of using his gift of reasoning he abused it by claiming these gifts as his own, shutting his eyes to the fact, which was evident, that he could not have given these gifts to himself. He not only forgot his Creator, but he turned against him, and refused to admit that the Creator had any claims on his gratitude or obedience.

This was the beginning, very early in man’s history on earth, of human opposition to God and disobedience to the wise laws of God which should regulate life on earth. It was consequently the beginning of man’s opposition to his fellow man and the cause of the wars, the strife between individuals and between races and nations, which have been the blot and disgrace of the history of man on this planet.

As the proverb says : “There is no use crying over spilt milk.” It will help in no way to waste time lamenting over the havoc that pride has caused down through the ages. What we must do is try to eradicate this human vice by cultivating its opposite virtue, humility. Each one must begin with himself. “What have I.” St. Paul reminds me, “that I have not received, and if I have received it why glory in it as if it were my own?” All I am and have are from God. Once I realize this and keep it in my mind, I will resist any temptation to look down on my neighbor or lord it over him, if he happens to have less gifts from God than I.

If I am physically or mentally stronger than my neighbor, and if I have acquired more of the goods of this world because of these extra gifts, I must give the credit to God and not to myself. I must be ready to share my surplus with those who received lesser gifts from the Creator. If I happen to be a citizen of a nation which has exploited successfully its greater natural wealth and consequently has a higher standard of education and living, I must not despise other nations or races who are less fortunate in the portion of this earth which falls to their lot. Rather, if I realize and admit that everything both I and my nation have is from God. I must be willing and ready to help in every possible way to alleviate the material and spiritual deprivations of those less fortunate neighbors of mine who are children of the same human family of God.

Thank God that this spirit of true humility, the realization of God’s dominion over all the gifts which he has given to mankind, is spreading today more than ever before among the peoples of this earth. We Christians should be in the vanguard in this movement of true fraternity and charity. We will be, if we give the virtue of true humility the place it should have in our lives, the place of honor among our Christian virtues.

SECOND READING: Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-24. You have not come to what may be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers entreat that no further messages be spoken to them. But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the first-born who are enrolled in heaven, and to judge who is God of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant.

EXPLANATION: The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, who were Jewish converts to Christianity, is here contrasting two scenes. One is the giving of the Old Covenant, which God made with the Israelites on Mount Sinai, and the other the assembly of those justified by the New Covenant in the new heavenly Jerusalem.

you have . . . blazing fire: As described in the Book of Exodus (19:12-19; 20:18-21), the preparations for the making of the covenant with the Israelites were terrifying for the people. Mount Sinai was covered with smoke and fire, and trembled violently. The people were forbidden under pain of death to approach even the base of the mountain.

a voice . . . words: The people feared and trembled when they heard God’s voice as thunder on the mountain. They begged Moses to speak the words of God, the commandments, to them, fearing that they would die if God himself spoke directly to them.

you have . . . Zion: In contrast to the Old Covenant which was received in fear and trembling, and the observance of which was motivated more by fear than by love of God, Christians are called by God to his “heavenly Jerusalem.” His covenant with them is a covenant of love, and the reward that awaits those who serve him out of love and gratitude is not the land of Canaan or the earthly Jerusalem, but the land of eternal happiness in the heavenly home of their God and Father.

angels . . . first-born: There they will meet the angelic spirits, and the first-born, that is, the saints of the Old Testament already in heaven.

judge . . . of all: They will meet God “face-to-face” having been worthy of his approval in the judgment.

just men made perfect: Those who served God faithfully in life and thus earned the perfection which God had destined for all men.

Jesus, the mediator . . . covenant: The Incarnate Son of God, who through his life on earth, climaxed by his death on the cross and his Resurrection, has brought about a new relationship between mankind and God. This is the New Covenant which makes us sons of God and heirs of heaven.

APPLICATION: The reason why the Church has selected these verses for our reading today is the same reason that the author of this Epistle had when he wrote them. He wanted to impress on the Jewish converts the superiority of the Christian religion over that of the Old Testament, which they had practised until their conversion. We, too, must never forget that our Christian religion is based on love, on the infinite love of God for mankind.

The Jews served God out of fear. They did not and could not know him as we know him. He gave them a partial revelation of himself through his dealings with them, and through the prophets and sacred writers. However, to us he has given the fullness of revelation through his divine Son who lived amongst us. The Incarnation is an act of divine love which no finite, human mind can ever fully understand in this life. That the Son of God could so humiliate himself as to take our created human nature, empty himself of his divinity, of the glory which was his as God, and live amongst us as one of ourselves, is a mystery of love which surpasses human understanding.

Add to that the extra humiliations which we sinful men, whom he had come to raise up to sonship of the Father, heaped upon him during his stay on earth. He was accused by his opponents of being a liar, a deceiver, of being in league with the devil, of being an enemy of the people, of being a blasphemer who claimed to be God. On this last accusation they had him put to the ignominious death of the cross. His very friends, the Apostles and disciples who admired his teaching and believed in his miracles, were little better. One of them sold him to his enemies for thirty pieces of silver. The others deserted him when he was arrested. Peter denied that he ever knew him. While he hung in agony on the cross, John alone, with the Blessed Mother and a few women, was near him. The others stood far off lest they should endanger their lives by associating themselves with him.

Yet all this did not prevent the Son of God from fulfilling the mission that the Father gave him. Through perfect obedience in his human nature, he reconciled disobedient mankind with God; and through sharing in our human nature, he gave us a share in the divinity.

While we cannot in this life fully appreciate the mystery of the divine love which went to such lengths in order to raise us up to the height of sonship with God, we can and do understand enough of this mystery to make us try to love him in return. We are now adopted sons of God. We have heaven as our eternal home. What does God ask of us in return? What must we do to get possession of that inheritance? Nothing very difficult. Nothing beyond our human powers, aided by the means of grace that Christ made available to us in his Church. We need not leave the world and enclose ourselves within the walls of a monastery. A few do that, but it is only for the few. We can and must live our ordinary earthly lives, using the goods of this earth which God has put here for our use. We can enjoy the normal pleasures of life. We can and must take an interest in the welfare of our families, our cities and our states.

While our Christian lives are to all external appearances very ordinary, they are extra-ordinary and special in this: they are lived within the commandments of God and the regulations and teaching of Christ’s Church. This is not something too much to expect of us, if we are true followers of Christ. Millions have done this before us and attained to Christian perfection. We can do it too, and with God’s help we will do it, and thus reach the “city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem” where “Jesus the mediator of the New Covenant” will be waiting to welcome us.

GOSPEL: Luke 14:1, 7-14. One sabbath when Jesus went to dine at the house of a ruler who belonged to the Pharisees, they were watching him.

Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he marked how they chose the places of honor, saying to them, “When you are invited by any one to a marriage feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest a more eminent man than you be invited by him; and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give place to this man,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, go up higher’; then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For every one who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your kinsmen or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”

EXPLANATION: The Pharisees were continually trying to catch Jesus in some violation of the Mosaic Law. On this occasion when he had been invited to dine in the house of a leading Pharisee, he knew this was the purpose of the invitation. They were so convinced of their own perfect knowledge and observance of the law that they thought nobody else could possibly know it or observe it as perfectly as they did. Pride was their predominant vice and the chief cause of their opposition to Jesus. He was friendly with sinners, tax-gatherers and the lower classes—they would not descend so low as even to salute such outcasts, much less befriend them or try to instruct them. Even among themselves, as on this occasion, pride showed its ugly head. Each one thought he was more important than any other and was striving to have the highest place at the table. In a very simple parable Jesus told them where their pride would lead them.

now . . . invited: To take the sting out of his lesson, as it were, he relates the parable to a wedding party—not to a dinner party.

more eminent man: Do not pick the place of honor or you may have to vacate it when somebody more important than you arrives. Then as all the other places are occupied, to your chagrin and shame, you will have to take the only vacant seat, the lowest.

sit in the lowest place: Do not think yourself the most important among the guests. That is for the host to decide. If he judges you to be important he will give you a higher place, and your fellow guests will admire your lack of self-esteem and approve of your promotion.

who exalts himself . . . exalted: This wise maxim is often fulfilled even in this life. It is in the next life, however, that it will always and unfailingly be fulfilled. It is in relation to the next life that our Lord quotes it here for the proud Pharisees.

He said to the man who had invited him: He has a special word of advice and reproval for the host, a leading Pharisee.

when you give a lunch or a banquet: He saw that the guests were the well-to-do, those who could and would repay him. It was not generosity that moved him but self-interest.

invite the poor: If he were truly generous and meant to give a meal to the needy, it is not the wealthy but the poor that he should invite. He should be generous out of true love of neighbor, and therefore love of God.

at the resurrection of the just: The man who is generous and charitable to his neighbors in this life, out of love of God, will be rewarded by God when his day of judgment comes.

APPLICATION: This parable was intended in the first instance for the Pharisees but it was preserved in the inspired Gospel because it has a lesson for all men. A proud Christian, that is, a proud follower of the humble Christ, is a contradiction in terms. Christ, the Son of God, lowered himself to our level when he took our human nature. He was born in a stable, reared in the obscure village of Nazareth; earned his meager meals as a country carpenter; died on a cross as a malefactor with two thieves as companions; was buried in a stranger’s grave. Could he have done more to induce us to listen to his counsel when he said: “Learn of me, for I am humble of heart?”

Yet, there are Christians who are proud. Like the Pharisees of old, they thank God that they are not like the rest of men. They shun any contact with sinners. They cover their ears when any scandal is mentioned. Yet they never miss the gossip, and are always ready to condemn offhand the unfortunate giver of scandal, without knowing the extenuating circumstances.

The authorities placed by Christ over them in the Church do not escape their severe censorship. The normal, humble Christian knows that pastors and individual bishops are not infallible, and that they can make mistakes at times, but to the proud, self-opinionated Christian they are always wrong except when their decisions agree to the letter with his opinions.

Worse still, the proud Christian sets himself up as a critic of God’s wisdom. He muses: God forgives sinners too easily, God doesn’t know them as well as I do. That conversion cannot be trusted, it will not last, he says. The “sinners” prosper, they are blessed with good health, a happy family, more than their share of the world’s goods, and here am I who never failed God, who always did what was right and even more, and I am neglected by God. God doesn’t know his real friends!

These are the questionings of a proud soul. Such Christians raise themselves above their neighbors in their own minds. They choose the first places, and from their self-appointed heights they look down on their fellow guests at God’s banquet. Thank God there are few whose pride leads them to these extremes, but there are far too many who set themselves up as judges over their neighbor and appoint themselves as the models to be imitated by all others.

There is a little demon of pride in every one of us. There is a natural inclination in each one to esteem himself a little better in most ways, if not in all, than his neighbor. We must keep this demon in check and not let him grow in us. Any gifts of mind or body that we have are from God—our duty is to use them properly and to thank God for the loan of them. If he gave greater gifts to another, I thank God for it. That other was able to make better use of them than I would. I have enough to go on with. I shall not be judged on the use or abuse of gifts which I did not receive.

If I use all the gifts which God gave me to help my neighbor, the spiritually poor, the lame and blind, to heaven, instead of keeping myself aloof from them as the Pharisees did, then my judgment will be easy, I shall be “repaid in the resurrection of the just.”-c317

EXPLANATION: The author of this part of the Isaiah (generally called Trito-Isaiah) was written after the return from the exile, 538 B.C. His aim was to console the returned exiles, who were depressed when they saw the sad state of Jerusalem and the poverty of the country round about. He foretold the future glory of Jerusalem to which people of all nations would come. It would be the center from which the knowledge of the true God would go out in all directions.

I . . . nations: It is God who is speaking. He would bring the nations of the world

see my glory: To a knowledge of the true God. They would realize who he was, the God of glory, the Lord of all.

I will set a sign among them: A standard or banner around which they will gather. In 7:14 the “sign” Isaiah gave to Achaz was the Immanuel, the son born to a virgin. Here it seems to be the Immanuel’s standard, his gospel, his life-work which would be the center of unity for all nations.

survivors to the nations: This refers in the first place to the Jews of the diaspora, those scattered among the Gentiles, who brought their religion with them and gave the Gentile peoples some knowledge of the true God. But it was in the Apostles and their successors that these words were truly fulfilled.

Tarshish . . . Javan: The glory of God will be made known in the most distant parts of the then-known world by these envoys from Jerusalem.

all your brethren: The diaspora will then end, all Jews will return “as an offering to the Lord.” They will be brought back to give God honor, by the Gentiles, who now acknowledge the true God.

Some of them . . . priests and . . . Levites: Hitherto only the descendants of Aaron could be priests and Levites in the Temple. The new Temple will be served by members of the Gentile races, a great advance on the narrow racial outlook hitherto practiced among the Chosen People of God.

APPLICATION: Like all the prophecies of the Old Testament these words of Trito-Isaiah contained far more than his contemporaries could grasp. The glory of Jerusalem which he foretold was to be something entirely new, something the Jews of his time could not even begin to understand. The most they could see in it was that the pagans of the world would come to recognize Yahweh, the God of Israel, and offer tribute to him in his Temple in Jerusalem. This was but a small part of the significance of the prophecy; the pagans would recognize the God of Israel, but through his divine Son, the Immanuel who had come on earth to bring all men to heaven and to his Father. The Temple of Jerusalem with its animal sacrifices and symbolic rites would be replaced by the true Temple, the Church, with its once-for-all effective sacrifice of Christ which would earn heaven for all men. The shadow would give place to the substance, the types and symbols would yield to the reality.

Reading these words of Trito-Isaiah today, words written five hundred years before Christ came on earth to fulfill them, we can see how the good and kind God was thinking of, and preparing for, the salvation of mankind down through the ages. He was gradually opening the minds of the Jews to see that the Gentiles were his children also, that the Temple of Jerusalem, where he had shown them his glory, was but a preparation, a symbol of the universal Temple in which he would really dwell among all the peoples of the earth in the person of Christ, his divine Son.

We can also see that God is not rushed in the carrying out of his plans. He delayed the sending of his Son for thousands of years, but in the meantime he was not neglecting Jew or Gentile. To the former he gave a direct but limited revelation of himself, and he accepted the crude but willing sacrifices and honor they paid to him, for which they were eventually rewarded. To the Gentiles he revealed himself indirectly through the things he had created. Even though they localized him in idols of their imagination, he did not condemn them for their sins of ignorance. The pious pagan, as well as the pious Jew, found a place in his kingdom, when the Incarnation, death and Resurrection of Christ had made this possible for man.

Today, there are still millions who do not know God and who therefore do not serve him. God is waiting patiently for willing apostles who will bring his knowledge to these people, but in the meantime they will be judged not by what they do not know, but by their compliance with the knowledge they have. We who have the full revelation of God and of his plans for us, and who have the supernatural aids which he has given to his Church, should lose no opportunity of bringing this gift to our fellow man.

They can get to heaven without this. God’s mercy is as infinite as his justice. But they will find the going much more difficult. A neighbor of mine who cannot afford transport of any kind has to go from New York to Philadelphia. He can make the journey on foot but with what hardship! I am going there by car. Would I be worthy of the title of neighbor, much less of brother, if I refused to offer that poor unfortunate man a seat in my car?

Our pagan brothers’ journey to heaven will be on foot unless we Christians, who have all the necessary transport, awaken to our obligations of fraternal charity. God is depending on us—he is calling on us daily through the many appeals to help the missions. If we continue to refuse to listen, we may find God turning a deaf ear to our entreaties when we are in need.

“They shall bring all your brethren from all the nations as an offering to the Lord,” the prophet says to us today. Am I included in that “they?” Am I helping within the limits of my means to bring my fellow man, whether in pagan lands or nearer home, back to their Father, God, and eventually to heaven? If I am not, I had better look up my spiritual roadmap. I must have taken a wrong turning somewhere. I am not on the road to heaven myself.

SECOND READING: Hebrew 12:5-7, 11-13. Have you forgotten the exhortation which addresses you as sons?—

“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor lose courage when you are punished by him. For the Lord disciplines him whom he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.”

It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant; later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.

EXPLANATION: In last Sunday’s lesson, the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews encouraged Christians to be ready to face adversity and hardships. He compared them with athletes who endure so much in order to win a contest. Today he goes on in the same strain, telling us that we must expect hardship—it is part of our training. We cannot win the prize unless we undergo this training. It is God, our loving Father, who sends us these trials—he is our Trainer. He wants us to win the eternal prize because he loves us; he is our Father.

Have you forgotten?: The author is writing to Jewish converts who should know their Old Testament. He quotes from the Book of Proverbs (which they seem to have forgotten), in which those whom God loves are advised to accept chastisement and correction from God. It is because he loves them, as a father loves his son, that God corrects and reproves them, in order to make them fit to face life and reach the goal God has destined for them.

discipline of the Lord: The author of Hebrews now tells his Christian readers to accept the trials they have to face, because it is God who is sending them. He is doing this for their spiritual good—he is acting like a loving father.

discipline . . . painful: Being human, everyone feels physical or mental pain when such trials strike. But if they are for one’s good, as is the case when they are sent or permitted by God for one’s spiritual improvement, then when the pain ends one feels the benefit, it “brings forth the fruit of peace and justice.”

drooping hands and . . . weak knees: Get rid of despondency—straighten up and face your problems.

make straight . . . feet: Don’t allow difficulties or trials to divert you from your Christian duty, your Christian path. Persevere.

out of joint . . . healed: If the Christian accepts the troubles and trials of life as coming from God and as a means towards his salvation instead of “breaking” him, they will “make” him. Instead of a hindrance, they will prove to be a great help on his journey towards eternity.

APPLICATION: This exhortation, given to the early Jewish converts, is as necessary for us today as it was in the year 67 A.D. Those converts suffered much from their fellow Jews, who refused to accept Christ as the promised Messiah and branded all Jews who became his followers as perverts and traitors to their own religion and race. In many cases they had to leave their towns and their possessions. They were persecuted, imprisoned and threatened with death (see Acts 8 and 9). Besides all this, they had poverty and sickness to contend with. Their following of Christ was surely a climbing of Calvary.

There are many parts of our world today where the same or even a worse fate is the lot of the true follower of Christ. Even in countries where there is no open persecution, there are hidden, insidious attacks on religion, especially on the Christian religion, attacks all the more dangerous because they are hidden. It is not easy for one to keep the commandments of God and the precepts of the Church when so many of his neighbors, including some who were one time “Masters in Israel,” having thrown aside all sense of Christian observance themselves, ridicule and deride his attempts to live his faith.

It is not easy, but living the Christian faith was never intended to be easy. The man who looks seriously on life and knows what it really is, a period of preparation, a training school for the eternal life that is to follow, will expect and in fact gladly accept the difficulties and hardships which this entails. Nor must we forget that God also grants his faithful ones many happy moments in this “valley of tears.” We are not crying all the time. As for the temptations which the enemies of Christ spread around us to abandon our upward climb, and the ridicule they sometimes heap on the man who is seriously concerned with the things of God, the old saying is still very true: “He who laughs last, laughs longest.”

Not that we should ever rejoice or laugh at the unfortunate ones who, because of the way they misspend their life here, will find no welcome in the heavenly kingdom. Rather, the true lover of God will want them to turn to God before it is too late, and will never miss an opportunity to help them to see the light.

True love of God demands true love of neighbor, and that neighbor is even the man who is trying to keep me from living my Christian life as I should. In fact, such a man may be a truer and a more helpful neighbor than those who never trouble me, for he is giving me a chance to practise the virtues of patience and perseverance which today’s lesson urges me to practise.

“Endure your trials as the discipline (the training) of God, who deals with you as sons.” The Christian’s trials, then, come from God, a God who is his father and wants to train him and make him fit to earn the heavenly reward. How proud, how glad, we should be that God deigns to take such an interest in us. He has made us, mere creatures that we are, his sons and heirs. Because we are his sons and heirs, he goes to the trouble of training us for the position of honor which he has prepared for us. Let us then endure our trials, knowing that God has a very special purpose in sending them to us.

GOSPEL: Luke 13:22-30. Jesus went on his way through towns and villages, teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem. And some one said to him, “Lord, will those who are saved be few?” And he said to them, “Strive to enter by the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able. When once the householder has risen up and shut the door, you will begin to stand outside and to knock at the door, saying, ‘Lord, open to us.’ He will answer you, ‘I do not know where you come from.’ Then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank in your presence, and you taught in our streets.’ But he will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you come from; depart from me, all you workers of iniquity?’ There you will weep and gnash your teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God and you yourselves thrust out. And men will come from east and west, and from north and south, and sit at table in the kingdom of God. And behold, some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last.”

EXPLANATION: Our Lord’s message in today’s Gospel was primarily intended for the Jews, who had heard his teaching but refused to follow it. However, the fate he foretells for them is the same fate which awaits all, Jews or Gentiles, who fail to accept the Gospel which he preached and live according to it.

will . . . few?: Christ did not give a direct answer to this question as to how many would be saved, but he told the questioner that many would be lost because they were unwilling to accept the restrictions which his teaching demanded of them.

enter by the narrow door: This means: if you wish to enter the kingdom of God in the hereafter, you must mortify and put restrictions on yourself in this life.

open to us: The door is locked, and all those who were worthy to enter are already inside. The latecomers are late through their own negligence; they had ignored the invitation while they still had time to reach the banquet hall.

I . . . you come from: They are unknown to the Master of the house. This is so because they failed to keep in touch with him. They had not even answered his invitation. They had ignored him, so he ignores their petitions now.

We ate and drank in your presence: They claim familiarity with him.

you taught in our streets: Yes, they had met him and they had heard him preach, but that was all they had done. They had not applied his teaching to their own lives. They remained strangers to him even though they could have become his friends.

depart . . . iniquity: The late arrival mentioned above implies guilt; they ignored him and rejected his offer of salvation. They lived on in their sinful ways until it was too late and so they excluded themselves.

weep . . . teeth: Signs of bitter regret for what they have lost, and a feeling of utter frustration.

Abraham, Isaac, Jacob . . . prophets: They will also be filled with envy that their ancestors, of whom they were once proud, are now safe forever in God’s banquet-hall, while they have excluded themselves. They learn now that descent from Abraham was not enough. They had their own part to play but failed to play it.

east . . . south: Outsiders, Gentiles, whom they so much despised, will be with Abraham in God’s kingdom, while they, the chosen race, have failed to get in.

last . . . first . . . first . . . last: The Gentiles will take the place of the chosen race in the new kingdom of God. The Jews thought that they would always be first in God’s plans, but they find now that their rejection of Christ entailed their own exclusion from the new kingdom of God. The Gentiles, with whom God had dealt only indirectly until the coming of Christ, accepted Christ and his teaching and therefore merited citizenship in heaven.

APPLICATION: While the questioner who asked how many would be saved did not get a direct answer from Christ, nevertheless it was made very clear to him and to all of us that each one’s salvation is in his own hands. All those who accept Christ, his teaching, and the helps he has made available to them, will enter the kingdom of God. On the other hand, those who are excluded from that eternal kingdom will have only themselves to blame. God invites all men to heaven. He gives all the help necessary to every man, but, because men have a free will which God cannot force, some will abuse that freedom and choose wrongly.

Christ mentions the narrow door through which we must enter into God’s kingdom. This means that we must exercise self-restraint and mortification and this we do when we respect and keep his commandments. When we are called to judgement it will be too late to shout “Sir, open for us.” We should have sought his mercy and his forgiveness during our earthly life, and he would have granted it.

Neither will it avail us to say that we knew him in life. Acquaintance with Christ is not enough. We should have loved him and become his real friends, which we could only do by being loyal followers of his. “He taught in our streets” will only prove our guilt. We could have learned his doctrine; we could have become his disciples, but we would not. The pagan who never heard of Christ will not be condemned for not following his teaching, but the Christian who did hear his doctrine and refused to carry it out will deserve condemnation.

As descent from Abraham was not a claim for special consideration on the part of the Jews, neither will any other circumstances of nationality, birth or earthly privilege help us on the day of judgement. Each one will stand or fall by his own mode of life during his term on earth. Nothing and nobody else can change the just judgement of God when that moment arrives for each one of us.

The thought of our moment of judgement is a staggering one even for the holiest of us. Things and actions that do not trouble us much now will appear in a different light then. The prayers we omitted or said carelessly, the Masses we missed on flimsy excuses, the little bit of continual injustice to a workman or customer or the dishonesty practiced by a worker against his employer, the sins of impurity of which we thought rather lightly, the bad language so freely used and the scandal we spread so flippantly, the money wasted on drink or gambling when our children needed nourishment and clothing—these, and many other such faults of which we excuse ourselves so easily now, will not be a source of joy or consolation for us on that dreaded day if we arrive at God’s justice seat still burdened with them.

We are dealing with God’s mercy while alive. He will forgive any sin and any number of sins if we truly repent, and resolve to correct these faults. To do this is the only one guarantee that even God himself can give us of a successful judgement. Every man who lives in God’s grace will die in God’s grace and be numbered among the saved. The man who lives habitually in sin, and refuses to amend his life, will die in his sinful state, and thus exclude himself from eternal salvation.

I have a free will. I can choose to pass that final examination or to fail it. The whole of my eternity, the unending life after death, depends on my choice now. If I choose to follow Christ and live according to his laws during the few years I have on this earth, I shall pass and shall be among the saved. If I ignore Christ and his laws now, he will not know me on the day of judgement. I shall be among the lost. God forbid that I should choose the latter course.-c310

EXPLANATION: On the authorship and literary style of the Book of Revelation see the 34th Sunday of the year above. The apocalyptic literature was full of imagery and visions which need not be taken in the literal and objective sense. In these verses, taken from Revelation today, John is describing the beginning of the Messianic Era, in which the powers of evil, represented by a dragon, would fight bitterly to hinder the victory of the Messiah. This dragon tries to kill the Messiah at birth but fails. The Messiah fulfills his mission and triumphantly reaches the throne of God. The woman, representing Mary the Mother of Christ, and also the Church, will likewise triumph. When the dragon has been conquered the reign of God and of Christ will begin.

God’s temple in heaven: In a vision John sees God’s throne in heaven. In his earthly Temple in Jerusalem the Ark of the Covenant was his throne. At the time of the Babylonian exile Jeremiah hid this Ark in a cavern in Mount Nebo and it was not to be rediscovered until the Messianic Era had come (see 2 Mac. 2:4-8). John is very probably referring to this.

a woman clothed with the sun . . . twelve stars: John has before his mind both Mary the Virgin Mother of Christ the Messiah, and the Church, the new Chosen People of God. The pangs of childbirth refer to the sufferings of the early Church, as does the later flight into the desert. The sun covering the heavenly woman, with the moon under her feet and the twelve stars as her diadem, are images which together attempt to describe the glory of Mary, the Mother of the triumphant Messiah. The twelve stars also symbolize the twelve tribes of Israel whose place is taken by the new Israel with the twelve Apostles as its leaders. Thus it applies to the Church.

dragon . . . ten horns: These are apocalyptic images to describe the opponents of the Messianic kingdom. Isaiah refers to Rahab and the dragon who were hacked to pieces by the Lord (Is. 51:9) and Leviathan the writhing serpent whom the Lord will punish with his powerful sword (Is. 27:1). The fourth beast in Daniel’s vision has ten horns (Dn. 7:7). John draws on these images to describe the opponents of the Messiah and his kingdom, the Church.

dragon stood before the woman: He meant to devour the woman’s child at birth. Herod comes to our mind here, but so do the Sanhedrin, and Saul before his conversion, and the Roman emperors who did everything possible to destroy and devour the infant Church.

to rule . . . nations: He was to be King of the world, a King who would be as a shepherd over his flock.

with . . . iron: There is a reference here to Psalm 2 where the Messiah is said to break the power of the impenitent pagan nations with a rod of iron, and so win freedom for his Chosen People.

caught up: John moves directly from the birth of the Messiah to his Ascension. In Acts (1:2, 11, 22) the Ascension is described as a “taking up,” a “taking away from” the Apostles. It was God the Father who took him up to heaven.

woman fled into the wilderness: St. John is here speaking of the infant Church which had to go through its period of persecution and formation just as the Chosen People of old had to go through their desert before entering the promised land. This was God’s plan and therefore a success. The blood of the martyrs became the seed of Christians.

kingdom . . . God: When Constantine the Roman Emperor became a Christian (311 A.D.) freedom was eventually given to God’s kingdom on earth.

authority of his Christ: Christ’s authority as head of the Church was then publicly admitted.

APPLICATION: This text from the Book of Revelation or Apocalypse was chosen for the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady, because of the close link between Christ our Messiah and Savior and his Blessed Mother. John stresses it in these verses. In God’s plan for our elevation to divine sonship by adoption, Mary was chosen from all eternity to be the Mother of his divine Son’s human nature. She was thus intimately connected with her Son in the carrying out of this divine plan. As this plan was to be opposed by sin, and by Satan, the head and representative of all sinners, it was to be expected that opposition would concentrate on his Blessed Mother, as well as on her offspring, Christ the Messiah.

In chapter three of Genesis this opposition was already foretold in the poetic description of the first sin of disobedience, attributed to the wiles of Satan. God said to the serpent, who represented Satan, as the dragon in Revelation does: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your offspring and hers” (Gn. 3 :15). St. John in his apocalyptic imagery, describes this opposition. We know from the Gospel story how Mary suffered with her divine Son. The culmination of that suffering was the three hours of incredible and indescribable agony she had to bear while her beloved one slowly shed his life’s blood on the cross.

Today, on the feast of our Blessed Mother’s triumph, we can omit the tragic events of her life and, like St. John, pass quickly to the victorious outcome of the struggle between the dragon and the Messiah, a victory in which Mary had played her part. In return she received a reward far exceeding any earthly pains which she had endured.

Today the Church celebrates Mary’s assumption into heaven which took place immediately after her death. She was then given the same glorified existence which her divine Son’s human nature had been given by the Father at his moment of death, and which all the elect will be given at their moment of resurrection. We believe that, after Christ, she has occupied the next highest place of glory in heaven from the moment that her earthly life ended. This has been the constant belief of the Church from the very beginning, a belief confirmed and guaranteed by the infallible declaration of Pope Pius XII in 1950.

Mary was Mother of Christ, the God-man and our Savior. She cooperated with him in his salvific mission. She suffered, as we saw above, because of our sins. She saw her beloved Son suffer and die on the cross for our sins. She is now enjoying eternal glory in heaven. Is it likely that she could lose interest in us, her other children who are brothers of Christ? No, her divine Son has not lost interest in us and therefore his Blessed Mother cannot fail to be interested in our eternal welfare. We can feel certain that she will intercede for us if we ask her, and we can rest assured that her intercession will not be ignored.

Let us honor her today in the manner in which she wants us to honor her, that is, by thanking God for all the graces which he conferred on her, graces which flowed from her privileged position as Mother of Christ. Her immediate assumption into heaven was the crowning grace and the divine reward which the infinitely loving God conferred on the woman whom he had chosen to cooperate in the Messianic mission of his beloved Son. For having been made sons of God and heirs to heaven we owe a debt of thanks, after God, Father, Incarnate Son and Holy Spirit, to the Mother of God and our Mother.

SECOND READING: 1 Corinthians 15:20-27. Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. “For God has put all things in subjection under his feet.”

EXPLANATION: In this chapter of his first letter to his Corinthian converts St. Paul is proving that we shall all rise one day from the dead. Evidently some of the converts were doubting this. St. Paul refutes this false idea by reminding them that one of the basic doctrines of the Christian faith, which they had accepted, was Christ’s Resurrection. For his proofs of this basic fact of the faith see verses 1-11 of this fifteenth chapter.

the first fruits . . . fallen asleep: As the appearance of the first fruits was a sign and proof that the rest would follow, so the Resurrection of Christ was a proof that all men would be raised from the dead one day. In the New Testament death is often compared to a sleep (see Jn. 11:11; Acts 7:60, 13:16; 1 Cor. 7:29, 11:30, etc.). This figure of speech was so common among the early Christians that the Greek word “koimeterion,” which meant a dormitory or sleeping place, came to mean the Christian burial place. Hence our English word “cemetery.”

In Adam all die: St. Paul accepted the literal interpretation of Genesis 3:5-19, and so Adam’s physical (not spiritual) death was a punishment for his disobedience. This punishment was incurred by all his descendants.

In Christ . . . alive: Christ by his death and resurrection has earned for all men, all the descendants of Adam, a resurrection from death. As St. Paul says later in this chapter, our risen bodies will be different from our present bodies: “What is sown (buried) in the earth as a perishable thing is raised imperishable, sown in humiliation, it is raised in glory; sown in weakness, it is raised in power, sown as an animal body it is raised as a spiritual body” (15:42-43).

at his coming . . . belong to Christ: Christ has already risen. At the parousia, or second coming of Christ, at the end of time, all those who belong to him, that is, those who were loyal to him in life, will rise in glory as he did. He does not say what will happen to those who were disloyal.

destroying . . . rule: Having completed his salvific mission as the incarnate Son of God, and having brought all the elect to the glory of the eternal life, he will have conquered all evil. He will then hand over the kingdom he has won to the Father.

he must reign: The end of the world will see the end of his kingdom on earth. All his opponents will be subjected to him, if not willingly, then to their own eternal loss. All his elect will be transferred to the heavenly kingdom of his Father.

APPLICATION: St. Paul says in the verse that immediately precedes today’s reading (15:19): “If it is for this life only that we had hope in Christ, we of all men are most to be pitied.” How true this is! If all were to end for us in the grave how foolish we would be to deprive ourselves of any of the pleasure, power or wealth of this life! What folly it would be for any man to mortify himself, to keep laws that were restricting his personal liberty, to waste time on prayer and other practices which produced no earthly pleasure or gain! In other words, being a Christian would mean taking on oneself unpleasant obligations which earned nothing for us but the grave!

However, St. Paul proves in this same chapter that there is a life beyond the grave, an eternal life which Christ has won for us and which God has planned for us from all eternity. We shall all rise from the dead and enter into this new life. Christ’s own resurrection is the proof that this will be so. We have another proof of this basic truth of our faith in the feast we are celebrating today. This proof has been infallibly defined by the successor of St. Peter, the head of the Church.

Our blessed Lady, Mother of Christ and our Mother, has been raised from the dead and is now in heaven in a glorified state next to the incarnate Son of God who is her Son also. The blessed Mother is one of us, a mere creature who was made of flesh and blood as we are. She differs from us in this, that because of her honored and most special relationship with God’s incarnate Son she received greater graces than any other human being, and she cooperated with these graces. If we cooperate with them each one of us is guaranteed enough graces and favors to win our own resurrection to the eternal life.

As the resurrection or assumption of our blessed Lady is a further proof and guarantee that we too shall one day rise in triumph from our graves, so also is it a source of greater confidence and hope for each one of us. She, our Mother, is in heaven. She is interested in each one of us. She has influence with her Son and with the Holy Trinity. She will use that influence on our behalf if we ask her. This fact of her power of intercession has been proved again and again down through the history of the Church. She has obtained material blessings for thousands. The spiritual blessings she has obtained for those devoted to her are innumerable. They will be known to all only on the last day.

Today, then, let us thank God first and foremost for the Incarnation, for sending his Son on earth as a man in order to lift us up to sonship with his Father. Then let us thank him for choosing this human Mother—one of ourselves—for his incarnate Son, and for giving her all the graces necessary for the position he gave her in life. She suffered with her divine Son on Calvary and that suffering was for us. She, like her beloved Son, wants us in heaven. She is able and willing to help us to get there. At the wedding feast in Cana she successfully interceded with him to save a bridal pair from temporary embarrassment. Will she not be even more successful still in her intercession to save all her devoted children from eternal embarrassment, now that she is with her Son in heaven?

All that is needed is trust and confidence on our part. Let us ask her today, on this great feast of her triumph, to be ever watching over us, directing and encouraging us to persevere in our loyalty to her divine Son. Let us resolve to follow her example and climb our Calvary as she climbed hers. If we do so, the day is not far distant when we too will rise from the dead and join her and him in the home prepared for us through the Incarnation and the infinite love of God.

GOSPEL: Luke 1:39-56. Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a city of Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and she exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord.”

And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden. For behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed; for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name. And his mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm, he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts, he has put down the mighty from their thrones, and exalted those of low degree; he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent empty away. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his posterity for ever.” And Mary remained with her about three months, and returned to her home.

EXPLANATION: The Angel Gabriel told Mary that she was to be the mother of the Messiah. Mary’s big problem was how this could be, because she intended to remain a virgin. The Angel told her that God’s power would do this, because the son whom she would conceive and give birth to would be the Son of the Most High. As a proof of this power of God the Angel told her that her cousin Elizabeth, who was barren and then quite advanced in years, had conceived, and was already in her sixth month “for God’s promises can never fail.” Mary accepted the Angel’s word saying: “I am the maidservant of the Lord, let it be done unto me as you say.” The Incarnation took place at that moment.

Mary’s first thought was to visit, congratulate and help Elizabeth. Without hesitation she left for Elizabeth’s and Zechariah’s house, which was in the hill country of Judah about five miles west of Jerusalem, a four days’ journey from Nazareth.

Elizabeth . . . filled with the Holy Spirit: On hearing Mary’s greeting, Elizabeth was inspired by the Holy Spirit and proclaimed Mary as the most blessed of all women and Mother of God. She feels how unworthy she is that the Mother of her Lord (God) should visit her. John the Baptist, the baby in her womb, also recognized the presence of the Son of God and of his Mother, and leaped in Elizabeth’s womb.

Mary said: We have now what we know as the “Magnificat,” Mary’s hymn of praise to God, who is about to fulfill the Messianic promises which he had made to Abraham and his descendants. The Son of God has become man so that all men could become sons of God. It is very likely that Mary did not compose this hymn verbatim as St. Luke gives it. However, it certainly expresses her feelings. There is gratitude for the infinite love and mercy of God toward the humble and lowly. These will be filled with good things (the fruits of the Incarnation) while the selfish and proud will not share in his generosity. She realizes how unworthy she is of the great things he has done for her. She prophesies that all ages will call her blessed because God, through his mighty power, had made her Mother of his incarnate Son.

She remained with her: Although St. Luke does not say so expressly, it is evident that Mary remained until the Baptist was born, so that she could be of help and comfort to her cousin.

APPLICATION: “All ages to come shall call me blessed” was a prophecy uttered by Our Lady and was not a boast. She who was chosen by God to be the Mother of his incarnate Son, saw in herself nothing but a maidservant, completely and entirely unworthy of the dignity conferred on her. Elizabeth had called her “blessed among women” but Mary attributes this blessedness to the “greatness of the Lord” who had “looked on his servant in her lowliness.” She had no doubts about her own unworthiness and her unfitness for the dignity conferred on her by God, but she recognized how great, how sublime that dignity was. She had been made the Mother of God.

Her prophecy has been fulfilled from the very first days of the Church. She has been given the highest place among all of God’s creatures—Queen of Angels and Queen of all Saints—right through the history of Christianity. In giving her this place of honor above all other angelic or saintly creatures, we are but following God’s own initiative—he made her the Mother of his divine Son and gave her all the graces which that position of unparalleled dignity demanded. When we honor her it is really his infinite love for, and his unbounded generosity toward, the human race that we are honoring. It was for us men and for our salvation that the Son of God came down from heaven. It was for us that he chose Mary as his Mother. She was but the human intermediary in God’s plan of salvation for mankind.

Today’s feast day of God’s Mother and ours is the climax and crowning of all the other graces and honors which God conferred on her. The assumption or the transferring of our Blessed Lady to heaven, in her glorified but identical, total personality, immediately after her death on earth, was not only the triumph of Mary but a triumph for all humanity. Where the Mother is, there will be all her loyal children. She played a large part in the redemption-work of her divine Son on earth. She continues in heaven to play a very effective part in applying the fruits of that redemption to all her children. If we follow Mary we are following Christ. If we remain close to the Mother we can never wander away from her Son. If we put ourselves under the mantle of her protection, Christ will shelter us from the enemies of our salvation. If we call on her to intercede for us our petitions will be answered by Christ.

This climax of all God’s gifts to Mary—the assumption into heaven, not of her separated soul, but of her total person, is a gift which God has ready for all of us, provided we imitate Mary on earth and be loyal to her Son and God’s Son. We cannot expect the same degree of heavenly glory which is hers, but we shall be perfectly happy with what we shall receive. All eternity will not be long enough for us to thank the Blessed Trinity, Christ in his humanity and his Blessed Mother who did so much to save us.-c414

EXPLANATION: This book is very probably the last book of the Old Testament. It was written in Greek by a Greek-speaking, pious Jew who lived in Egypt during the 1st Century B.C. Hence, it is not included in the Hebrew Canon, for it was not written in the sacred language (Hebrew) nor in the holy land (Palestine). The purpose of the author, who is unknown, was to edify his co-religionists in Egypt and to encourage them to persevere in their faith in spite of opposition and oppression. While he clearly has imbibed some of the Platonic philosophy, then well known in Egypt, regarding man’s composition, his ideas and teaching are based firmly on the religion of the Old Testament. In today’s extract he is referring to the events of the Exodus, in which God showed his mighty power to save his chosen ones from their cruel enemies. This should encourage his contemporaries to trust in the same good God, for he will listen to their pleadings, too.

That night . . . known beforehand: The night of the last plague, when the avenging angel went through the homes of Egypt killing the first-born of every Egyptian family. The Israelites, through Moses, were told of this beforehand (Ex. 12).

sure knowledge of the oaths: God had promised (sworn to) Abraham and the Patriarchs that he would make of them a great race and give them Canaan to

deliverance . . . righteous: Their descendants in slavery in Egypt believed these promises of God and felt confident that God would set them free and bring them to their promised land.

expected . . . people: The author addresses God. Your people, the Chosen People, trusted in you. They waited for your intervention which set them free and punished the cruel Egyptians.

punish our enemies: By the miracles God worked during the Exodus, he proved that the Israelites were dear to him. He punished their enemies because they had been cruel to his own people. The Egyptians’ first-born sons were destroyed because the Egyptians tried to destroy God’s first-born, Israel.

in secret . . . offered sacrifices: The Israelites, as instructed by Moses, offered a year-old lamb in sacrifice to God. This was done in secret by each family in its own home. They sprinkled their doorposts with the blood of the lamb, and the avenging angel passed by each door thus marked. In this way the sacrifice got the name of Passover. During the succeeding generations, it became one of the greatest of the annual commemorative festivals of the Israelites, and Wisdom rightly calls it a divine institution. It was God himself who ordered it.

APPLICATION: The author of the book of Wisdom, writing for his fellow Jews in Egypt, recalls to their memories the great miracles, especially the last one, which led to the liberation of their ancestors from this land of slavery. The Exodus, as it is called, resulted in their final establishment in Canaan, the land that God had promised to Abraham as the home of his descendants. He recalls this long-past event to encourage them to persevere in their faith, for the God who did these great things for their ancestors is the same God whom they worship still. He continues to be interested in those who serve him, and is always ready to come to their assistance.

This Exodus, this marvelous intervention of God on behalf of his Chosen People, is of even greater interest to us, the Chosen People of the new dispensation. It was on the occasion of the feast of the Jewish Passover that our Passover Lamb, the Son of God, was sacrificed for us and we were sprinkled with his precious blood. Thus began the Exodus of all men from the slavery of this life on earth, and thus they set out for the real promised land, their true and everlasting home.

The Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt was a type, a foreshadowing, a prophecy, of the real liberation of mankind and of the elevation of man to citizenship of the new kingdom, God’s everlasting heaven. It was for this very reason that Christ chose this great prophetic festival of the Jews on which to allow himself to be sacrificed for our liberation. Christ was the true Paschal or Passover Lamb. Through his sacrifice of himself, we have been freed from the slavery of sin, and have been made sons of God and heirs of heaven towards which we set out the moment we are baptized.

Today, by reading this lesson from the Book of Wisdom to us, the Church wants to remind us of all we owe to God. Before creation began, he was thinking of us and planning to give us the power to share his divine happiness with him. This he did through the Incarnation, because Christ shared our humanity with us, we come to share his divinity with him. Preparing the world for the Incarnation involved the whole history of the Chosen People. The Exodus from Egypt was a milestone in that history and in it was foreshadowed the event for which it was but a preparation. We Christians can never forget the Exodus, and the Passover feast which commemorates it, because the fulfillment of that prophetic event of the history of the Israelites was for us not only a milestone, but a turning point in the history of man’s relation with God.

We are now freemen of heaven. We are on our way there, because of God’s infinite love for us. Our promised land is just over the horizon; it is within the reach of every one of us. We may have a few obstacles to overcome, but, with Christ’s leadership and the assistance of the almighty power of God, there is none so weak amongst us that he cannot overcome these obstacles and reach heaven, the goal that God has prepared for him from all eternity.

SECOND READING: Hebrews 11:1-2, 8-11 (Short Form). Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it the men of old received divine approval.

By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place which he was to receive as an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was to go. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked forward to the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.

EXPLANATION: The Epistle to the Hebrews was evidently written to Jewish converts, because the author supposes the readers to have a knowledge of the Old Testament books which no Gentile convert could have had. In the verses read from this Epistle today, the author gives an existential definition of the virtue of faith, and an example of true faith as it can be seen to be active in Abraham and Sarah.

Faith is . . . assurance: The author seems to be speaking of subjective faith, the faith which a believer has. The believer is confident that what he hopes for will materialize for him. The basis of this confidence is the faith he has in God, the assurance of God’s justice and fidelity to his promises, which the knowledge of Christ and Christianity has given him.

conviction . . . not seen: The believer does not doubt that what he has been taught about God’s love for us, as shown in the Incarnation and saving death and resurrection of Christ, are actual facts, even though he cannot perceive them through his senses. He has accepted the facts of Christianity, and all it means for him, from trustworthy men backed by divine authority. The Christian therefore feels assured that God will fulfill all the promises which he has made to him. His Christian hopes will be realized in the future. He is also convinced that all the facts that he has learned about God and Christ—the basis of his assurance—are facts, and not illusion or imagination.

By faith Abraham . . . called: The author now goes on to show the great, strong faith which Abraham had. He left his home and his country and, trusting completely in the word of God, went to a strange land.

not knowing where he was to go: God gave him no information as to the nature of the country he was to go to, nor even as to its location. Yet he did as he was told.

as in a foreign land: Abraham, with Isaac and Jacob, his son and grandson—to whom also the promise was renewed—-lived in tents like strangers or nomads in the land that God promised to give them, because they had not yet become permanent residents.

forward . . . foundation: Abraham did not worry much about his abode here on earth, for he was looking forward to a permanent residence in the future life, in God’s city. This is how the author interprets Abraham’s sojourn as a stranger in Canaan. It is similar to that of the Christian on earth, a very temporary residence. “There is no eternal city for us in this life but we look for one in the life to come ” (Heb. 13:14).

Sarah . . . power to conceive: Because Sarah believed that God would and could fulfill his promises, she conceived Isaac even when she was advanced in years as well as being sterile. This conception was a reward for her faith. This is not quite how her faith is shown in Genesis.

as good as dead: A slight exaggeration. Abraham had reached the age of sexual impotence, but God remedied that defect.

descendants . . . innumerable: Abraham, as a result of his belief in the all-powerful God and his trust in God’s fidelity to his promises, became the father of the Chosen People.

APPLICATION: Our faith, our firm belief in the truth of all we have learned about God and our relationship with him, and also our unshakable trust in the promises he has solemnly given to us, is a free gift of God. It is one of the three theological virtues given to us in baptism, and it is the solid basis of the other two; we hope for all the help we need in this life and for an eternal happy future, and we love God and our neighbor because we know that God exists and is deserving of all our love.

We have never seen God. No human being is capable of seeing God while on this earth, but we know he exists because he has told us so indirectly and directly. The universe, with its precision and perfection, reveals him to us, and tells us much about his nature. He must be all-wise, all-powerful, all-loving. He must be supreme and absolutely independent of any other being. The created, finite universe demands a Creator, and our human intellect will not rest in any intermediate cause or creator; it must arrive at the uncaused Cause, another name for God. He has therefore, given us indirectly a proof of his existence.

His love for man, and his special plans for him, moved God to reveal himself directly to mankind. Firstly, he did so through the Patriarchs and the Prophets of the Old Testament, and finally, in a much more complete way, through his divine Son whom he sent on earth to tell us about the three divine persons and their plan for our eternal salvation.

As Christians, then, not only do we know that God exists, but we know enough about the nature of God and about his loving interest in us to enable us to entrust ourselves entirely to him and to be ready to obey every command and direction which he gives us for our temporal and eternal welfare. As Christians, therefore, we have confident assurance that God exists and that he loves us; that, through the Incarnation of his divine Son, he has arranged to share his heaven with us when we leave this world. That he will help us on the way is a certainty, for Christ left us his Church with the power of giving us his sacraments as well as sure guidance on our journey.

Let us thank God for this divine gift of faith and cherish it as the most valuable gift we have. Life without it would not only be an enigma, an insoluble puzzle, but, for any man who stops and thinks, it could only be the product of some diseased mind or the cruelest of jokers. All our powers, all our desires for happiness, all our marvelous gifts of intellect and will, all to perish forever in a few years’ time! Could a hole in the ground six feet by three be the end of one who can probe the heavens, control the elements, reach to the moon and beyond, and dream of ever-widening conquests of nature? Could the man who can build bridges and buildings that will last for hundreds of years, who can compose works of literature and art that will live as long as this earth is inhabited, could he end just like the cow or the horse, a lump of useless dust after a few years of life on earth?

For anyone who admits the existence of an intelligent Creator, and that should be for anyone who has the use of his reason, such a thought is absurd. God made us fit for an unending life, and, before he made us, he had prepared the way and the means to give us that eternal life. This is what our Christian faith teaches us. This is what common, human reasoning tells us ought to be. This is how things will be for each one of us, if we not only cherish our gift of faith, but live according to its teaching every day of our lives.

To get to heaven, the place God has planned for us, it is not enough to be theoretical Christians; we must put our Christian faith into daily practice.

GOSPEL: Luke 12:32-48. Jesus said to his disciples, “Fear not little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give alms; provide yourselves with purses that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

“Let your loins be girded and your lamps burning, and be like men who are waiting for their master to come home from the marriage feast, so that they may open to him at once when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes; truly, I say to you, he will gird himself and have them sit at table, and he will come and serve them. If he comes in the second watch, or in the third and finds them so, blessed are those servants! But know this, that if the householder had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would have been awake and would not have left his house to be broken into, You also must be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”

Peter said, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for all?” And the Lord said, “Who then is the faithful and wise steward, whom his master will set over his household, to give them their portion of food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master when he comes will find so doing. Truly I tell you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that servant says to himself, “My master is delayed in coming,” and begins to beat the menservants and the maidservants, and to eat and drink and get drunk, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know, and will punish him, and put him with the unfaithful. And that servant who knew his master’s will, but did not make ready or act according to his will, shall receive a severe beating. But he who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, shall receive a light beating. Every one to whom much is given, of him will much be required; and of him to whom men commit much they will demand the more.”

EXPLANATION: In a few vivid and expressive similes, our Lord tells the disciples, and through them all his followers, how they should conduct their lives on earth so that they would always be found in God’s friendship when their call to judgement comes. In answer to a question put to him by Peter, our Lord says that more will be expected of those who have received greater gifts from God than of those who received lesser gifts.

fear . . . little flock: The title “little flock” is a term of endearment. They, the disciples, were relatively few but dear to the Lord.

Father’s . . . the kingdom: God has chosen them to be citizens of his heavenly kingdom—they need fear no earthly enemy or difficulty.

sell your possessions: This applies to the disciples whose whole concern in this life was to teach his gospel to the people. It holds still for the followers of the disciples, the priests and religious in the Church.

purses . . . no moth destroys: They were to store up spiritual treasures which no earthly enemy could take from them.

where your treasure is . . . heart: Those whose aim is to collect the treasures of this world will have their heart, their desires and endeavors, set on getting these goods. The aim and desires of the spiritual will be the opposite.

loins . . . lamps burning: When the Oriental was resting, he loosened the belt which held his long robe. When working he tightened the belt, thus hitching up his robe to facilitate work and movement. Oil lamps were the only means of light during the hours of darkness in those days. These lamps required frequent care and trimming.

waiting . . . their master: If they have kept their robes hitched up and their lamps lighting, they will be ready to meet the master and light his way to his quarters, no matter what hour of the night he returns. If the master finds his servants thus prepared, they will be rewarded. The disciples of Christ must always be ready to receive him when he comes to call them from this life.

If . . . the thief was coming: A thief succeeds in robbing a house because he does not announce his arrival.

Son of man . . . expect: So will our hour of reckoning come suddenly and unexpectedly on all of us. It will find the neglectful, careless ones unprepared.

Peter said: Peter asks if this teaching holds for all people or only for the disciples, that is, for Peter and his companions?

Who . . . the faithful steward: Our Lord’s answer is that he expects greater diligence and fidelity from the disciples (and their successors in the Church) than from the ordinary faithful because he has appointed them his stewards—the directors of his faithful—and has given them greater gifts as well as greater responsibility.

The servant who knew his master’s will: The Christian, whether steward or ordinary servant, who deliberately offends God, who knows what his obligations are but refuses to carry them out, will fare worse in the judgement than those who sinned through ignorance or human weakness.

much will be required . . . more: The greater the gifts given to an individual, whether they be of grace, of mind, or of earthly goods, the greater must be his response. God is all-just. The man who receives greater gifts is expected to use them faithfully and produce a greater harvest than the man who had been given a lesser amount. The man who got the five talents was not expected to produce ten, but he who got ten was.

APPLICATION: This teaching of our Lord should make us all sit up and take serious notice this morning. He has taken us into his household. He has made us his “little flock.” We are invited guests in his home, his Church, rather than mere servants. He warns us today that we must always be busy about our vocation, about the reason why he invited us into his home. If we grasped clearly what that call of Christ means, what our Christian vocation is, we would hardly need today’s warning. We are Christians, we are members of his Church, for our own eternal good. God, through Christ’s Incarnation, has put us on the road to heaven. He is ever helping us on the way. Could we be so blind to our own welfare that we would risk losing the eternal life that God has in store for us, and for which he went to the extreme lengths of love? In our saner moments we would give an emphatic no to this question. Yet, we must look the real facts of life in the face. There are many Christians who are destined for heaven but who, in their folly, have left the only road which leads there, and are now travelling in the opposite direction.

Some of us here present may be among these foolish ones. We may have let this world get such a grip on us that we have no time or thought for the world that is to come. For such foolish people, and indeed for all of us, today’s warning is that our call to judgement will come on each one of us like a thief in the night, at a moment when we least expect it. This need not be a sudden death. Of every thousand who die after long illnesses in our hospitals, there rarely is one who knows and admits he is about to die, so actually all deaths are sudden, that is, unexpected.

However the unexpected death, which we are sure to get, need not worry the ordinary good Christian. It is the unprepared, the unprovided-for, death which must cause us anxiety. It need not, if, when it comes, it finds us living in God’s grace, living the ordinary Christian life, doing our daily tasks but doing them as part of our duty to God. We have to take an interest in the affairs of this world, but the interest must never exclude our eternal interest. Instead it can and must help us toward the one real interest that man has in this life, that is, to earn his eternal life.

Take a serious look at your way of living today. Is your behavior in the home, in your place of work, in your recreation, in your relations with God—prayers and church attendance—and with your neighbor, such that you would change nothing in it if you were told by God that you were to die tonight? If it is, thank God for it and keep on going; you are on the right road. If it is not, don’t wait for God to tell you when or where you will die; he will not tell you. Put things right today, and then you need not worry when your call to judgement comes. Death will be graduation day for the good Christian—not examination day.-c295

EXPLANATION: The author of this book, like the author of the Book of Job, poses to himself and to his readers the insoluble problem of life on this earth for man. He calls himself the son of David and king in Jerusalem. It was a literary device of that time to take the name of some distinguished, well-known historical figure. In this case it was the name of a man renowned for his wisdom, that of Solomon, the son of David.

However, even if he claimed to have all the wisdom of Solomon, which he had not, he could find no answer to his problem. He is looking for a solution in the wrong place, on this earth, where it is not found. The Jews had no revelation, or almost none, concerning a future life. They hoped that they would live on after their earthly death in some way or other. They had, however, no clear idea of how this would be. This author believes in the true God, although the way that God deals with men in this life dismays him. God, he says, does not have to justify his actions. Man has simply to take things as they come. Whereas Job is trying to understand why the innocent should suffer in this life, Ecclesiastes finds a problem even in happiness. What good is it, it is only a deception, for it cannot last.

says . . . Preacher: This Hebrew word means one who addresses the congregation or “qahal,” which in Greek is translated Ekklesia. Hence the origin of the name given the author by Greeks and Latins, Ecclesiastes, that is, Churchman.

all . . . vanity: The theme of his book. All things in this life, the pleasures as well as the sufferings, are empty and purposeless. They have no real explanation.

a man . . . leave all: To prove how useless and vain the things of this life are, he cites the example of a man who worked intelligently and skillfully and produced wealth, things of value. He has to die and leave them to somebody who did nothing to produce them. This is surely folly.

What has a man . . . toil: After all the toil and worry and strain he spent producing these goods, he has to leave them all!

all his days . . . pain: Life on earth is a succession of trials and troubles, labor and lamentation, folly and frustration.

even . . . night his mind does not rest: Man’s day is so full of labor and trouble that he cannot get to sleep at night. If he does, it is a fitful, restless sleep.

APPLICATION: While we sympathize with this poor man who could see nothing but emptiness, folly and vanity for man in this life, let us thank God that we have been given the full revelation through Christ. This is a revelation which the Jews lacked. We know that our purpose on earth is not to gather the wealth of this world or to enjoy all its pleasures and its power—all of which we have to leave behind us when death calls us. We know that we are put here for a short period of time during which, if we use our days properly, we can earn for ourselves a new life in which we shall have forever everything we need.

What a consolation, what a source of strength and encouragement this knowledge is for us! Our Christian faith puts a silver lining in the darkest clouds of life. We accept these darkest clouds of sufferings, disappointments and sorrows, because we know that God has a purpose for us in them—they are his means of making us worthy of the real life that is to come later. We accept the moments of happiness and joy with the same spirit. They are little tokens of the greater happiness and joy which will be ours in a few years time. The true, sincere Christian accepts the cross and the crown, the crumb and the feast, the aches and pains as well as the joy of good health, the funeral as well as the wedding, for he knows that all are part of God’s plan for man’s real welfare and eternal happiness.

We can appreciate our good fortune if we look around us. We need not look far to see some of our fellow men who, like the author Ecclesiastes, have no true explanation for the problems of life. They try not to think of these problems, but try as they may, they cannot keep them always in the background. They get themselves immersed in the affairs of this world. They strive to collect its wealth. They chase after earthly pleasures. They seek for power and political influence. They may succeed in getting little bits of some of these consolations. But never will they receive enough, never all together because one generally excludes the other. Worst of all, they know they have no solid grip on these slippery things of earth. They know that soon, all too soon, they must leave all these, their idols, and be taken by neighbors in a wooden box, to a plot of ground in which they will be buried deep, lest their corrupting flesh pollute the locality.

While we sincere Christians can thank God for making known to us the purpose and the value of our few years on this earth, we would not appreciate this gift of God if we did not feel the urge, and see the obligations we have, of doing all in our power to give this knowledge to our fellow men, our brothers, who also are God’s sons. The millionaire who is godless, if not anti-God, is in dire need of our help. The hobo who has no religion is in more need of prayer and a word of advice than of a dime. The communist who is striving in vain to make this earth a heaven for all men, needs to be told in what direction heaven lies.

All these are our brothers. We must help them to attain the one thing that matters. We may not be able to do much, but we must do what we can. God expects it of us. He has given us this knowledge of the true meaning and purpose of life in order that we may share it with all men.

Vanity of vanities! This world and all it holds is nothing but sheer folly and emptiness if seen by itself alone. But, if seen in the light of God’s revelation, it is a gift of God to man, a most useful and necessary gift. It is the bridge that spans the gulf between earthly and eternal life.

SECOND READING: Colossians 3:1-5, 9-11. If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old nature with its practices and have put on the new nature, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free man, but Christ is all, and in all.

EXPLANATION: In last Sunday’s lesson from this same Epistle, St. Paul reminded his converts that through baptism they had died with Christ and had risen again with him. They were now new creatures. Today he urges them to keep their eyes on the Christ with whom they have been raised up to a new spiritual level or status. They must no longer be mixed up in the sinful things of this earth. They died to all this when they died with Christ in baptism.

raised up . . . with Christ: As he had already explained (see text of Sunday) to them.

your minds . . . above: The Colossians are now raised above their ordinary earthly natures. Their home is in heaven with Christ. They must, therefore, keep their eyes always fixed on that higher kingdom where

Christ . . . seated at the right hand of God: Christ, the Son of God who took to himself our human nature, is now in the highest place in heaven after God the Father. He is at God’s (the Father’s) right hand, a human way of saying the principal place of honor. He is there in his glorified human body as well as in his divinity.

put . . . earthly: Their whole attention must always be directed to being joined with Christ in heaven one day. This does not mean that they must take no interest in the things of this world. They must provide for their earthly needs. But in providing for these needs, they must never forget their real purpose in life.

you have . . . nature: As Christians they have died and risen with Christ. They have not yet the glorified bodies which they will get after their earthly death. They will have them, however, if they stay dead to the sinful things of this world. When Christ comes in glory to judge the living and the dead, they will be with him in their glory also.

put to death . . . impurity . . . idolatry: Practical Apostle that he was, he now warns them to shun the sins which, as pagans, they commonly committed. They were especially prone to impure sins, and some of their pagan idols were supposed to encourage such sins. Sacred prostitution was practiced at the shrines of many of the pagan gods, and so, for Gentile converts, to return to impure sins was in a sense to return to idolatry.

Do not lie to one another: Another vice common in the pagan world. For Christians, who possessed the truth of revelation and who were all brothers, members of the one body of Christ, this sin, this abuse of the gift of speech, was a serious offence.

put . . . nature: Paul is continually stressing the radical change Christianity has brought about in the converts. They are no longer what they were before conversion. They are raised to a new status; they are new men. Therefore, they must put away their old habits and ways of acting.

renewed in knowledge: They must learn more about God every day, and about their relationship with him.

image of its creator: Adam, the first man (Paul accepted the Genesis story of creation in its literal sense), was made into the image of God but was still an earthly man. The Christian is made according to a real image of God a spiritual man—because he is intimately united to Christ, who is the Son of God. That is, he is made one with Christ.

Greek and Jew: In the Christian religion all men are sons of God, brothers of Christ and true brothers of one another. There is no distinction of race or nationality here. Human nature is the one and only common bond.

Christ is all, and in all: They are all in Christ, and Christ is in each and every one of them. Nothing else matters but being a Christian. The old distinctions of race, nationality or class have no place in the Christian life. Christ alone matters.

APPLICATION: We all know what a true Christian demands of us. Today St. Paul is reminding us of it again. He tells us that in baptism we have become new men. Christ has taken us, united us with himself, and raised us to the new status of sons of God. We must therefore act like sons of God, not like sons of mere earthly men. The difficulty is that, even though we have become sons of God who will one day inherit heaven, we still have to contend with our earthly selves together with all their affinities and attractions to things earthly. We have died with Christ and risen with him, but we have not yet been given risen, glorified bodies. We have been given our citizenship papers, and an official passport to enter into our new country. But we are still in our country of origin, and have to make a long, arduous voyage before we take up residence in the new one.

Some Christians waver in their resolution and at times they give up this struggle against natural inclinations which, however, go against baptismal promises and hopes. What adds to each one’s natural weakness is the fact that we are living in an age and a society in which the majority of our fellow men have long since given up even the name of Christian. If they do not openly preach from the housetops that death and the grave are the end of man’s hopes, that man’s only purpose is to get all that is possible from this earthly life, and that they no longer believe in a higher purpose for man, they certainly show by the way they live that this is their only religion.

It is indeed difficult for even a sincere, dedicated Christian to live up to his faith and his hope in such surroundings. Yet, let us not forget that St. Paul was not demanding the impossible of his Gentile converts when he commanded them to put to death, to oppose effectively, all that was earthly in their make-up. Difficult as the practice of real Christianity is in today’s western society, it was much more difficult in the Greek and Roman world of St. Paul’s day. The Colossians were surrounded by their pagan fellow-countrymen, who laughed and jeered at the folly of the converts. To them it seemed that they had foolishly given up the pleasures of this life for the sake of some fairy castle in the sky.

But the converts persevered. Not only did they retain their faith, but they gradually won over the jeers and the scoffers. We can and we will do likewise, with the help of God’s grace, if we persevere in our loyalty to Christ and to the faith he has given us. We encounter temptations both from within ourselves and from without. We have to struggle against our own weaknesses and against the difficulties which the opponents of Christianity, and all things spiritual, place in our way. It is difficult to live a pure life in the permissive society which encourages all the lower instincts in man. It is difficult to be just when injustice is rife and profitable all around us. It is difficult to be truthful when unscrupulous neighbors use lying as the key to power.

Yes, it is difficult to be a true Christian, but neither Christ himself nor any of his Apostles ever told us the Christian life was easy. It never was and never will be. And yet the man who grasps its meaning, the Christian who is convinced that it is not this life but the next that really matters, can make light of these difficulties. He will take up his cross daily, as he has been told to do. He will follow Christ, knowing full well that the reward awaiting him is worth ten thousand times any hardships in this life that he is called on to endure in order to obtain it.

The true Christian is one “who has put aside his old self with its past deeds” and “who is growing daily in the knowledge and in the likeness of the image of his Creator”.

GOSPEL: Luke 12:13-21. One of the multitude said to Jesus, “Teacher, bid my brother divide the inheritance with me.” But he said to him, “Man, who made me a judge or divider over you?” And he said to them, “Take heed, and beware of all covetousness; for a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” And he told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man brought forth plentifully; and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns, and build larger ones; and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; take your ease, eat, drink, be merry.’ But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you; and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So is he who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

EXPLANATION: This episode in our Lord’s public life is narrated by Luke only. Jesus was surrounded by a large crowd to whom he was giving his message of salvation. Some men in the crowd asked him to arbitrate in a family dispute over property. This Jesus refused to do, for very good reasons, no doubt. This interest in property gave him the occasion to teach his hearers, and all of us, in a very effective parable, the relative value of this world’s goods.

Teacher, bid my brother: Teacher, “Rabbi” in Aramaic, was a title of respect. He was accepted as a Rabbi, a teacher of religion, by the masses.

divide . . . inheritance: It is possible that this man may have lost his right to his share in the inheritance.

me a judge: Christ refuses to interfere in this family dispute and excuses himself because this was not his mission or vocation. As the following words would seem to indicate, however, it was not justice only that was in question, but greed for earthly goods.

take heed . . . covetousness . . . possessions: He then explains this statement in the parable.

a rich man . . . plentifully: A certain man was already rich. He had many earthly possessions, and now had an added store: he had a good harvest.

What shall I do?: He had so much property that his stores were too small to hold it all.

build larger ones: He decided to build larger stores which would house it.

I will say to . . . soul: When he has stored it all safely he will see that he has enough for years to come so he will tell himself

take your ease . . . merry: He foresees himself as a happy man enjoying the good things of this life for years to come.

But . . . fool . . . of you: God steps in to upset all his earthly plans. He calls him “fool”, a term reserved to those who deny that there is a God (Ps. 13:1) in the Old Testament. This very night you shall die. He was indeed a fool because he left God out of his plans completely, and also because he was planning a very happy earthly future for himself which never materialized.

whose will they be?: The wealth, which he had spent all his days accumulating, will now go to someone else.

This night . . . God: Our Lord himself applies the parable: this will be the fate of all those who think only of amassing temporal wealth, to the total neglect of their spiritual welfare. Death always comes far too soon for people whose whole heart is centered in this world. Far sooner than they think, they will have to leave the riches they have been piling up. Worse than that, they will face the future life empty-handed. They have stored up nothing spiritual for themselves. All their time was given to earthly pursuits.

APPLICATION: The lesson of this parable is obvious to all, and it is perhaps as difficult to put into practice as it is obvious. To be in this world and not of it, to collect the necessary goods of this world by honest labor and yet remain detached from them, to possess but not be possessed by worldly riches, is an ideal to which our weak human nature responds very reluctantly.

A large percentage of Christians, however, do respond to the challenge manfully and loyally. They earn and use the goods of this world, while at the same time they keep God’s laws and earn wealth for heaven. Some there are who renounce even the right, which is theirs, to possess the necessary things of this world, by taking on themselves the vows of religion. Thus they set themselves free to devote their whole time and energy to the service of God and neighbor. Others, and they are of necessity the more numerous, have to own the world’s goods in order to provide for themselves and their dependents, but, while so doing, they never let their temporal possessions come between them and their God. To do this is not easy, but God’s helping grace is always available to the willing heart.

There is still a third group—those who resemble the foolish man described in the parable. Like him they are so enmeshed and ensnared in their desire to collect good things for their earthly life, that they forget that at any moment they may have to leave this earth and all they possess in it. They may not have large barns or grain bins bursting at the seams with the fruits of their fields or their market dealings, but they have allowed their possessions, large or small, to become the prison houses of their hearts and thoughts. In their mad rush for earthly treasure they give themselves no time to stop and think of the really important thing in life, namely, that soon they must leave this world and all it holds dear to them. But it is not the departure from this world that is to be feared. Rather, it is the arrival at another for which they have made no preparation. That other world of which they have often heard, but which they shrugged off as something fit for the weak-minded, will not open before them in all its awe-inspiring immensity. They will have a momentary glimpse of the eternal beauty and happiness that they lost for a “mess of pottage,” before they enter the unending valley of sorrow which they elected for themselves when, during their period of trial, they chose earthly baubles instead of God.

This has been the fate of foolish men and women in the past. It will, also, be the fate of many more in the future. It could be my fate, too, unless I remain ever on the alert to keep myself free from the snare of worldly wealth. I must remember that it is not the quantity of this world’s goods which I possess that will be my undoing, but the quality of the hold which they have on me. There are and will be millionaires in heaven, while many in the lower income brackets will find themselves excluded.

No man will be excluded from heaven because he lawfully possessed some of this world’s wealth. But a man will exclude himself from eternal happiness if he lets this world’s wealth possess him to the exclusion of God.

The fate of the rich man in the parable need not, and should not, be mine. I have still time to stop building larger grain bins and barns, and to turn my attention instead to collecting some treasure for heaven.-c287

So the men turned from there, and went towards Sodom; but Abraham still stood before the Lord. Then Abraham drew near, and said, “Wilt thou indeed destroy the righteous with the wicked? Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; wilt thou then destroy the place and not spare it for the fifty righteous who are in it? Far be it from thee to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from thee! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” And the Lord said, “If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake.” Abraham answered, “Behold, I have taken upon myself to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes. Suppose five of the fifty righteous are lacking? Wilt thou destroy the whole city for lack of five?” And he said, “I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.” Again he spoke to him, and said, “Suppose forty are found there.” He answered, “For the sake of forty I will not do it.” Then he said, “Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak. Suppose thirty are found there.” He answered, “I will not do it, if I find thirty there.” He said, “Behold, I have taken upon myself to speak to the Lord. Suppose twenty are found there.” He answered, “For the sake of twenty I will not destroy it.” Then he said, “Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak again but this once. Suppose ten are found there.” He answered, “For the sake of ten I will not destroy it.”

EXPLANATION: This is the continuation of last Sunday’s reading from the book of Genesis. Last week we were told that the Lord, accompanied by two angels, appeared to Abraham, and promised him a son within a year. This week, as Abraham was seeing the Lord and his angels off, the Lord speaks to Abraham about the wickedness of the two towns, Sodom and Gomorrah. These two towns, which were situated near the southern end of the Dead Sea, had become infamous because of their unnatural sexual sins.

I will go down: Anthromorphism, or describing God acting as if he were a man. God, who knew all things, did not need to go down to find out.

Abraham . . . Lord: The angels went their way and the Lord remained with Abraham, who used the opportunity to plead for the innocent in the two cities if God intended to burn them to the ground because of their wickedness.

destroy . . . wicked: Abraham started by asking God if he would spare the cities if ten innocent people were to be found in them. Evidently, ten innocent people were not to be found there, and later the two cities with all their inhabitants were reduced to ashes (see Gen. 19:23).

APPLICATION: The first lesson we can learn from this episode is the power of intercessory prayer. We can pray for others and God will hear and answer our prayers. Abraham has left us a wonderful example of love of neighbor. He did not wish to see the people of those cities suddenly sent to their death. He pleaded for them and he used God’s own justice as a lever to move him from his resolve. How could the just God condemn the innocent with the wicked? If only ten just men had been found in them, the cities and their inhabitants would have been saved, saved by Abraham’s intercession.

How often do we pray for our neighbors when they are in temporal or spiritual danger or difficulties? Most of us can answer truthfully and admit that we do not do so half as often as we should. We entreat God when we ourselves are in need, but God will be much more ready to answer us in our need if we have proved true brothers to our fellow man by pleading for them when they need the divine assistance.

We can learn another valuable lesson, also, from this story. The presence of a group of pious people in our midst, people who are close to God, is a guarantee that we shall be protected from the divine vengeance which we may have thoroughly deserved. There are Catholics who question the purpose of enclosed communities of women or men who devote all their time to prayer and the liturgy. Why don’t they teach or nurse, or earn their bread in some way? Why should the people have to support them? These were the very sentiments expressed by the Reformers when they knocked down the convents in England and banished the sisters. Some Catholics are still of this opinion today.

They forget, however, that the prayers of these devout lovers of God have often saved them from the temporal punishments that they deserve. The contemplatives are the spiritual lightning-conductors in our parishes and towns. They sacrifice their personal freedom and enclose themselves for life behind their convent walls in order to intercede for all sinners, for all of us.

Instead of criticizing them and questioning their sanity, we should thank God for them and pray that they will never be short of vocations—new members in their communities who will continue their good work. The parish or the town that has a community of enclosed religious has a divine blessing in its midst. It has a powerhouse of prayer which will spread the light of God’s grace amongst the citizens of that town and parish, and will turn away the just wrath of God from those who, by their sins, deserve it. “For the sake of those ten innocent people,” said the Lord to Abraham, “I will not destroy the cities.”

Imitate Abraham’s true, unselfish love of neighbor by always remembering your needy neighbor in your prayers. Help to protect your city and your fellow citizens by a special prayer today for an increase in the number of just men living in it.

SECOND READING: Colossians 2:12-14. You were buried with Christ in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead. And you, who were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, having cancelled the bond which stood against us with its legal demands; this he set aside, nailing it to the cross.

EXPLANATION: In the early Church the Sacrament of Baptism was conferred by immersion. The person being baptized was immersed for a moment in the bath or receptacle full of water, and then raised from the water. This form of baptism symbolized the death and burial with Christ of the catechumen (the person ready for baptism). This was immediately followed by his resurrection with Christ to a new life, a life in and with Christ, a life which would lead to eternal glory.

In baptism . . . raised: Paul tells his converts that the actions they went through in their baptism were not empty symbols, but actual fact. Through accepting baptism they had put their natural selves, their merely human selves, to death. They had come out of the saving waters as new beings, joined to the glorified risen Christ. Therefore, they had been raised to the status of sons of God.

through faith: They accepted baptism and wanted to be joined to Christ because they believed and were convinced that the power of God had raised Christ from the dead in a glorified body. The full glory of his divinity (of which he had “emptied himself ” during his sojourn on earth amongst us), was then restored to him. The catechumens were well instructed in the faith of the gospel, in the truth of the Incarnation and all it meant for the human race.

dead . . . uncircumcised: The Gentiles before their conversion had offended God in many ways: by idolatry, an insult to the true God, and by the many sins occasioned by their own human weaknesses. The convert Jews had a knowledge of the true God and were dedicated to his service by the rite of circumcision. Circumcision of itself was not enough, but the Gentiles did not have even this much.

alive . . . with him: Raised up from their dead past, which they had buried in the bath of baptism, they were now “new creatures.” They were now members of Christ’s body, sons of God, heirs to an eternal life.

forgiven . . . trespasses: The death and resurrection of Christ, the climax of his salvific actions on our behalf, reconciled mankind with God. It wiped away, in each one’s baptism, all his past sins, and earned him the possibility of getting pardon for any future sins in the Sacrament of Penance.

the bond . . . against us: The sins of Gentiles and Jews had built up a debt which they could never of themselves have paid. Christ, however, took this, our debt, on himself. He paid it to the last penny in our name. Thus our debt, our bond, was cancelled.

nailing it to the cross: He took our debts on himself when he took our human nature. He identified himself with us, and when he accepted the death of the cross, he nailed our debts with himself to that same cross. He had no sin of his own for which to make atonement to God. It was our sins, the sins of the whole human race, which he atoned for on the cross.

APPLICATION: How can we ever thank God for all he has done for us! Eternity itself will not be long enough for us to sing him our full hymn of gratitude. He created us and gave us wonderful gifts. We abused his gifts, and went so far as to use the very gifts he gave us to insult him. He had planned to make us heirs to heaven, but we were more interested in this fleeting world. We lost interest in his plans for our good. Nevertheless, he did not lose interest in us. He sent his divine Son on earth to take our human nature and thus gather the whole human race into himself, thereby making us sons of his heavenly Father.

If the Incarnation had not taken place we could never reach heaven. Mere man could never of himself become a citizen of that kingdom to which his nature gave him no claim. An alien, coming to live in a country not his by birth, needs a special act, a gratuitous act on the part of that country, to become its citizen. Similarly man, a native of earth, needed a special gratuitous act on the part of God to make him a citizen of heaven.

This is what the Incarnation did for us. The Son of God deigned to share our humanity with us. We are thus enabled to share his divinity with him. We have been given the citizenship of heaven. The conferring of that citizenship on us takes place in baptism as arranged by Christ. In baptism we die with Christ. That means that we cast off the man of flesh, the mere mortal man of this earth, and rise from the baptismal waters, clothed with divinity, because Christ has made us one with him, who is God and Man.

Of course, we are not yet in heaven. But we have a heavenly passport: we have the right to get there, and what is more we have been given in abundance the means of getting there. Christ saw to that. He knew our weaknesses. He provided us with his Church to which he gave and gives, his sacraments. He also gives, through the Holy Spirit, the divine assistance which will ensure for us a safe journey.

How truly fortunate we followers of Christ are! We have a passport, a ticket from him. We have sufficient means to pay for all our needs on the journey homewards. Let us thank God from our hearts this morning, for his infinite kindness to us. Let us turn our thoughts for a moment to our unfortunate fellow men, who are also brothers of Christ and heirs to heaven. They are also brothers of ours. They either do not know God and all that he has done for them, or, worse still, they know him but despise him and his gifts. Thus, they are seriously risking their own future happiness. God wants them all in heaven. Christ died for all. The heavenly citizenship is there for all, though it cannot be forced on any man.

We can do much to help these brothers of ours. To do so will be the best way we can show our appreciation of God’s goodness to us, the best way to prove our gratitude. Prayer is a way of helping that is open to all, young and old, rich and poor. Every day of our lives, we should beg God to put a knowledge of his infinite love into the hearts of those who do not have it. When we need some temporal favor for ourselves, the best way we can pray for it is to forget our little needs and to pray instead for this most essential need of the neighbor who does not know God, and is jeopardizing his future—his eternal future. God will, in his own way and his own time, answer that prayer of true charity. Our temporal needs will not be forgotten either.

Most of us can help by cooperating financially and otherwise with those who are giving their lives to spreading the knowledge of God and his goodness among the pagans, old and new. We have many of the latter right in our midst. Each one of us can find a way to get this knowledge to those nearest him. For those living in their own pagan countries, we can, besides praying, help to support the generous men and women who have gone to these lands and are doing God’s work, and our work there for us.

Finally, if each one of us would give the good example of a Christian life, Christ would soon have more followers. We would show that our Christian life is lived by one who appreciates it; by one who realizes that he is on the way to heaven and that he will not allow earthly attractions or earthly trials to impede his journey.

All I can do is one man’s part. However, I am ready to do that much. I hope that many others will follow suit. God grant that it may be so.

GOSPEL: Luke 11:1-13. Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he ceased, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.”

And he said to them, “When you pray, say: ‘Father, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread; and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive every one who is indebted to us; and lead us not into temptation.”‘

And he said to them, “Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves; for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him’; and he will answer from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything’? I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him whatever he needs. And I tell you, ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

EXPLANATION: The disciples had often seen Jesus praying alone. They were anxious to learn some special prayers from him, as John the Baptist had evidently taught his disciples some special prayers. As Jews, the disciples knew the ordinary morning and evening prayers. Prayers before eating were usually said by the Jews too, and the disciples also would know them. Our Lord’s answer to this request was the prayer we all know as the “Our Father.” Luke’s version of it differs in some details from that of Matthew. The substance is the same in both. As this prayer hardly needs explanation, we shall go on to the parable which Jesus added to show the efficacy of prayer.

lend me three loaves: The parable is very true to life. It could happen anywhere, any night. A friend comes from afar late at night. There was no bread in the house. Fresh bread was usually baked each morning, so he goes to a neighbor whom he knows to have some and asks him to lend him three loaves.

do not . . . me: The neighbor was reluctant to get out of bed and probably wake the children at such a late hour. He was not reluctant to give the bread.

because of his importunity: The man outside was not going to be put off by one simple refusal. He kept on knocking until the neighbor had to get up and do as he was asked. If he did not, the children would have been awakened in any case by the repeated knockings.

I tell you: Learn from this parable to persevere in your prayer. If God does not answer your first request, your perseverance will prove to him how deserving your case is and he will answer.

ask . . . seek . . . knock: Our Lord uses three expressions to stress the need for perseverance in prayer. It is not that God is lazy or slow or unwilling to help us. He wants us to prove our sincerity and our filial trust in him. He is our Father.

what father . . . will give a serpent: The answer of our Father in heaven will always be what is for our good. A human father would not give his son a poisonous snake when his son asked for a fish,

or . . . an egg . . . a scorpion: That is, endanger his son’s life when he should nourish it.

If you . . . the heavenly Father: If sinful, earthly fathers are generous enough to give their children all they need, how much more generous will the heavenly Father be to you his children. His store is unlimited. His love is infinite.

Holy Spirit . . . who ask him: St. Matthew has “good things,” instead of the Holy Spirit, but Luke is mentioning the greatest gift the Father can give, the Holy Spirit, to sanctify them and aid them on the road to heaven. He who gives the greater gift will give the lesser also.

APPLICATION: The disciples asked to be taught how to pray to God. Jesus told them how. He gave them a formula which contains the essence of all prayer. God is addressed as our Father. He really is, since he made his Son our brother. We praise and honor him and wish that all will honor him. Then we ask for our daily, temporal needs, and especially for our spiritual needs. We ask forgiveness of all our offences, while we likewise promise to forgive our brothers if they offend us.

Jesus then went on to stress the necessity of perseverance in our prayers. We must honor God daily and pray that all will honor him. We must also keep on asking for our temporal and spiritual needs. This is the meaning of the parable. The Father may delay the granting of our request because he wants us to continue to trust in him. This very perseverance in our prayer is bringing us closer and making us dearer to God. This is a greater blessing for us than the favor for which we were asking.

As regards requests for help in our spiritual life, we can rest assured that, if God delays his answer, the reason is that he has some more important spiritual gift for us. Our perseverance in prayer will bring it to us. Many great saints often wondered why God did not answer their fervent prayers and remove some temptation, or some lack of virtue which they felt was impeding their progress. They found out later that it was because God was slow in granting their requests that they actually progressed in sanctity.

As far as temporal favors are concerned, we do not always know what is best for us. God does. Of this we can be sure: if our requests for temporal favors are sincere and persevering, we are sure to get an answer. Christ himself says so. The answer, however, may not always be what we asked. If not, it will be something better, something we do not even know we need. God knows it and gives it to us, instead of the less essential gift we were asking for.

Looking back over our lives, many of us can see now how fortunate we were that some of the favors we sought so fervently from God in our youth were not given us. He gave us instead some gift which we had not even thought of, but which changed the course of our lives and saved us from the tribulations, spiritual and temporal, which the gift we were so anxiously seeking would have caused us if God had granted it. There are thousands of men and women in heaven today who would not be there had God granted them the temporal favors they thought they needed so badly. One of our joys in heaven, among the lesser ones perhaps, will be in discovering how cleverly our heavenly Father helped us to get there by refusing certain of our requests, and by giving us others for which we had not asked.

Not only, therefore, may we, but we must, ask our heavenly Father for our spiritual and temporal needs. This we are told to do by Christ. We must continue to ask. He has put us in this world in order to earn heaven. Our life here is of its very nature a journey. All journeys entail some, and often many, hardships. For one on his way home, the journey’s hardships are bearable. For some they may at times border on the unbearable, but such people can turn to their heavenly Father. He has a personal knowledge of, and interest in, each individual’s progress. Ask him to remove the cross, for the time being at least. Loving Father that he is, he will do just that, or he will strengthen the shoulder that has to bear it.

Remember our Lord’s advice to us: “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you will find, knock and it shall be opened to you.”-c280