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Posts Tagged ‘Reflections on Scripture’

God Throws Us Life Preservers

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections from Other Writers and Speakers, Reflections on Scripture, tagged , , , , , , , , , on September 13, 2024| Leave a Comment »

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Readings for September 15th:

  1. Isaiah 50:4c–9a
  2. Psalm 116:1–2, 3–4, 5–6, 8–9
  3. James 2:14–18
  4. Mark 8:27–35

What this week’s readings say to me:

The first reading presents someone who trusts receives God’s guidance and doesn’t rebel against it. He goes where God’s Spirit prompts him to go, and he hasn’t “turned back” (New American Bible Isa. 50:5). He hasn’t “turned back” even though he’s treated the way Christ will be treated during his passion (New American Bible Isa. 50:5). He never wavers from the path God leads him on despite his being treated this way. Why? Because, as a newer translation of the same addition of the Bible says, “He who declares my innocence is near” (New American Bible Revised Edition, Isa. 50:8). So in this passage, God is the best defense attorney. God knows God’s own law better than the people who are wrongly accusing and abusing Isaiah. The case of the accusers has no foundation.

In the psalm, the narrator explains why he loves the Lord. He says he loves the Lord because the Lord has heard his cries for help. He was in danger of death. His spirit was threatened by other spirits that have rebelled against the Holy Spirit. God saw how vulnerable he was in the face of these forces and stopped them from causing him to stumble and from weeping in hopelessness (New American Bible Revised Edition, Psalm 116:8). As a result, [he] “shall walk before the Lord in the land of the living” (New American Bible Revised Edition, Psalm 116:9). According to a note in the New American Bible Revised Edition, “walk[ing] before the Lord in the land of the living” “probably refers to being present to God in the Temple” (Psalm 116:9; 116:9n). This explanation prompts me to ask the question: what can we do to be active in living with faith?

The first two verses of the Old Testament reading give one answer and the third reading, the epistle, develops that answer further, telling us that wanting others to have what they need doesn’t bring faith to life. It’s taking part in providing what others need that brings faith to life. Faith isn’t demonstrated by prayer alone. Prayer opens us to the guidance that helps us discern how best to respond to the needs around us. Whatever the needs are, God brought us into being to meet them, even in the face of extreme opposition, as is the case in the Old Testament passage.

None of us is alone and having been given this work to do. God has done this work first and has called prophets to take part in it. God has also taken on a human life and suffered for it.

We will struggle. and sometimes suffer when we imitate Him. Why? Because humans have a tendency to want to hold onto power by keeping it to themselves and using it for themselves. Christ’s power, on the other hand, comes from his willingness to share and to surrender it. If we trust that surrendering is the true source of power, we receive that power as well. We receive that life. Turning inward in fear and holding on tightly to what we have isn’t the source of life, the Gospel passage says. Being able to hold loosely to what we have because we trust in God is the source of life.

What I’m saying (to the readings and beyond) this week:

To the first reading I say that I wonder if it’s my experience that “God opens my ear” (New American Bible, Isa. 50-4c). Maybe God does but like a door, I close it again because when my spiritual ear is open, so many voices come in and none of them is perfect, and that includes my own, of course. So when I choose what voices to listen to when and I act accordingly, I’m not sure it’s God or everything less than God that I rebel against.

Because of this experience, I take comfort that Christ encountered both opposition and support from every corner. He didn’t encounter opposition or support from only one group or another that He seemed to belong to or not to belong to or that seemed to some of his contemporaries to have spiritual and/or temporal authority over Him.

It’s a challenge to internalize that God defends me and that “I am not disgraced” when I have trouble recognizing this (New American Bible Revised Edition, Isa. 50:7). It’s a challenge not to be controlled by fear and not to be held back by walls in my mind and the walls I want to build around me to protect myself.

As I reread the psalm excerpt, I see that it’s written from the perspective of someone who feels trapped — “helpless” even (New American Bible Revised Edition Psalm 116: 6). It’s God who saves this person when he cries out to God. This person alone can’t save his own life.

Reaching out to God in the midst of fear is the key to not letting the fear kill the soul. It’s a key that’s most difficult to take hold of in life’s most difficult times, but that’s why God became one of us and then allowed Himself to be killed. He took the worst parts of us onto Himself so that we could become our best selves, so that we could become more and more like Him. That’s why the name for Christ that resonates most deeply with me is “God with us” (New American Bible Revised Edition, Mat. 1:23).

What someone else is sharing about this week’s readings:

Zulma Tellez reflects on Christ on the cross as a profound a profound expression of God with us.

This week’s prayer:

Lord, You have thrown me many spiritual life preservers, the greatest of which is Your sacrifice on the cross. Don’t let me close my spiritual ears to the sound of your voice. Instead, help me tear down any walls that fear has built in my mind and heart to keep me from reaching out to You and my neighbors. Amen.

Works cited (but not linked to):

Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc. ” 24nd Sunday in Ordinary Time — 15 Sept. 2024: Readings at Mass.” The New American Bible, 2001. Universalis for Windows, Version 2.192, Universalis Publishing Ltd., 30 July 2024, https://universalis.com/n-app-windows.htm.

The New American Bible Revised Edition, Kindle edition, Fairbrother, 2011.

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The Spirit Opens Us to God and One Another

Posted in Disability, Ordinary Time, Reflections from Other Writers and Speakers, Reflections on Scripture, tagged , , , , , , , , , on September 6, 2024| Leave a Comment »

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Readings for September 8:

  1. Isaiah 35:4–7a
  2. Psalm 146:7, 8–9, 9–10
  3. James 2:1–5 
  4. Mark 7:31–37

What this week’s readings say to me:

The readings for September 8 give me more to work with in the exploration of what justice means that I began in last week’s post. The passages tell me that doing justice means making sure that everyone has what they need to thrive physically, mentally, and spiritually.

Justice serves what gives life by looking beneath the surface for signs of that life. It doesn’t serve that which is fleeting or artificial—except when what is fleeting or artificial serves what’s good and eternal.

Beyond this week’s readings:

In the previous section, I wrote that justice removes barriers rather than that justice heals, even though the readings for September 8 contain more than one reference to what are often called healings. I wrote to “removes barriers” because I’d like to propose that the references to physical healing in the readings don’t have to be as much about removing this physical impairment or that one – any physical impairment, for that matter — as we may be accustomed to thinking they are. (By the way, these perspectives on physical impairment and their relationship to well-known accounts in Scripture are far from unique to me. Ms. Iozzio, whose reflection is linked in the next section, offers a perspective that relates to my own.)

Healing is involved, but I propose that more is being healed than seems apparent. A man’s physical Deafness is removed, and his difficulties with speech are removed so that he can connect with and contribute to his community in different ways than he has before. The event inspires his faith in Jesus as God incarnate.

I find it revealing that Jesus doesn’t say to the man “hear” and “speak clearly” when he lays hands on the man. Instead, He says, “Be opened!” (Mark 7:34). Granted, I can imagine ancient peoples explaining Deafness as being caused by the ears being closed. But I can also see “Be opened!” meaning, “Be open to faith.” For this man, Jesus is also opening the door to relating to his community in a new way. I invite you to read more about that new way of relating by clicking the link in the next section.

Each of us, regardless of what our limitations are and what causes them, are our most God-like selves when we’re open to faith and community. There are multiple ways to facilitate this openness. Healing impairments is only one of them. We can remove barriers. We can also be open to alternate ways of communicating and seeing. Impairments do no mean that a person reflects God’s image any less clearly than someone who seems to be without impairments. Being a member of the Deaf community or having a disability or illness doesn’t make anyone any less complete than anyone else. This perspective affects everyone because no one on this side of heaven has an invincible body.

New Testament support passages support the perspective that, though we are called to do our best to take care of what we have, and God is present to us to us so that we can share our desire to be well, having certain abilities isn’t the ultimate goal of the spiritual life. Consider that:

  • Jesus tells his apostles that a man’s blindness is not reflection of his own sinfulness or the sinfulness of his parents (John 9:1-3).
  • Saul, who will become Paul, goes blind when Jesus speaks to him on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:7).
  • Jesus heals a paralyzed man, telling him to get up and walk so that [onlookers] “may know [He has] the authority to forgive sins (Mark 2:9-12).
  • After healing a woman who’s had a hemorrhage for years, Jesus says to her, “your faith has saved you (Luke 7:50).

The human conditions in the examples above aren’t punishments. Even in Paul’s case, I think it’s the brightness of the light that blinds him, and the blindness helps him rely on God and the people around him (Acts 9:8). Blindness means the loss of physical vision for Paul, but it also means the acquisition of clearer spiritual vision for him.

However, it’s important to note that, in the same way that having an impairment doesn’t make a person less complete, than a person without that impairment, the condition also doesn’t necessarily make a person more spiritually insightful than a person without the same impairment. It’s also important to note that God is at work in different ways in different situations and to be cautious about presuming to understand why circumstances are what they are. Every situation presents its own challenges and its own opportunities for grace.

In each of the examples above, the physical healing isn’t the only or even the primary gift Jesus offers. The miracles treat sick souls, and not just the soul of the person who experiences a physical impact, but also the souls of the people who witness the impact or learn of it more than 2,000 years later.

What someone else is sharing about this week’s readings:

Mary Jo Iozzio brings contemporary perspectives on Deafness and disability into conversation with the Gospel passage for September 8. She helps us consider that that the passage isn’t about just one person “[b]e[ing] opened,” one person receiving the physical abilities that many his neighbors have.

This week’s prayer:

Lord, help us to be open to You and to one another. Help us to respond to Your invitation to healthy relationships, which are two-way streets that can be built in many ways. Amen.

Work cited (but Not Linked to)

The New American Bible Revised Edition, Kindle edition, Fairbrother, 2011.

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I Couldn’t Say It Better

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections on Scripture, tagged , , , , on August 30, 2024| Leave a Comment »

This isn’t me. I don’t have any pictures of me in action. This image was generated by WordPress AI.

Readings for September 1:

  1. Deuteronomy 4:1–2, 6–8
  2. Psalm 15:2–3, 3–4, 4–5
  3. James 1:17–18, 21b–22, 27
  4. Mark 7:1–8, 14–15, 21–23

What this week’s readings say to me:

This week, the theme of the passages is more apparent than it sometimes is. I’m tempted to express that theme using all kinds of clichés: “Don’t just talk the talk; walk the walk. Practice what you preach.

There. I just succumbed to cliché temptation. They’re clichés, and the second version doesn’t exactly include people like me, who use wheelchairs, but the non-cliché versions that bounced around in my head sounded unnecessarily stilted.

And whose word am I called to preach? Whose walk am I called to walk? Whose hands am I called to be? God’s.

This is one of those weeks in which each passage contains a verse or verses that popped out at me for encapsulating the central message for me. I don’t feel like I could convey that message in a more accessible way then these verses do. So this week, this section will feature them.

In your observance of the commandments of the LORD, your God, which I enjoin upon you, you shall not add to what I command you nor subtract from it. . . . Observe them carefully, for thus will you give evidence of your wisdom and intelligence to the nations, who will hear of all these statutes and say, ‘This great nation is truly a wise and intelligent people.’

Deuteronomy 4:2 and 6

The one who does justice will live in the presence of the Lord.

the refrain sung between verses during Mass that also functions a statement of theme for Psalm 15

Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves . . . .
Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

James 1:22 and 27

This people honors me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me;
in vain do they worship me,
teaching as doctrines human precepts.

Isaiah 29:13 quoted in Mark 7:6-8

Beyond this week’s readings:

The refrain that is used with the September 1 psalm got me thinking about what it means to “do justice.” I got to thinking about this because I noticed some resistance in me as I read it. I think this resistance comes from my gut reaction to the word “justice. ” My initial reaction tends to associate it with revenge and punishment.

But when I give the word further thought, I’m reminded that justice means recognizing the negative consequences of an action, taking steps to prevent further negative consequences, and extending mercy. One part of extending mercy is seeking to heal the wounds that led to the injustice. Another part is recognizing that any of us could have suffered those wounds. If we haven’t, it’s only thanks to the grace of God and neighbor. We’re all in need of forgiveness and healing. Because I think many of us want forgiveness and healing and have received them from God and hopefully from our neighbors (though not always in the ways I want or expect, in both cases), we have mercy and healing to share with others. This sharing is an essential component of mercy.

What someone else is sharing about this week’s readings:

Hope, in the biblical context, doesn’t mean to stand still and quiet, but rather groaning, crying and actively striving for new life. Just as in childbirth, we go through a period of intense pain, but new life springs forth. It’s not enough for us to be listeners!

Susana Réfega, in her reflection on this week’s readings

This week’s prayer:

Our Father,
Who are in heaven,
hallowed be Thy name.

Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven

Give us this day
our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation,
but delivery us from evil. Amen

Work cited (but not linked to):

Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc. ” 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time — 1 Sept. 2024: Readings at Mass.” The New American Bible, 2001. Universalis for Windows, Version 2.192, Universalis Publishing Ltd., 30 July 2024, https://universalis.com/n-app-windows.htm.

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The Challenges and Graces that Come with Commitment

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections on Scripture, Who Am I in God, Who is God, tagged , , , , , on August 23, 2024| Leave a Comment »

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Readings for August 25:

  1. Joshua 24:1–2a, 15–17, 18b
  2. Psalm 34:2–3, 16–17, 18–19, 20–21
  3. Ephesians 5:2a, 25–32 or Ephesians 5:21–32
  4. John 6:60–69

What this week’s readings say to me:

This week’s readings speak to me about commitment. What makes commitment difficult? What’s worth committing to, and what does committing to something worth committing to look like?

The first reading asks me whether I want to commit to God or to something else that’s taking the place of God. It reminds me that when I commit to God, I’m committing to the Source of liberation, the Source of protection, and the Source of perseverance and growth. This Source is Someone worth committing to and imitating so I can be a channel for the qualities of God.

What does the psalm, the same one that’s been used for the past two weeks, have to say about commitment to God? It says that commitment to God means honoring God in word, spirit, and action. Living this way helps others have the faith to honor God in word, spirit, and action as well. This way of living also serves justice, even though serving the causes of justice is seldom easy. Yet a person who serves justice is never alone in his or her work. God always supports those who work for justice.

The choices for this week’s epistle characterize justice in terms of relationship. They compare the relationship between people and Christ to a relationship between a husband and wife.

Now I’m not married, so I’m not going to sit here and write about how Paul says husbands and wives should relate to each other. If I did, the sentences would sound too much like I’m telling married people what to do without knowing the circumstances in which they find themselves. I find that an unhelpful and ineffective way to help myself reflect on how to apply the Gospel message to my life or — God and readers willing — to help others do the same. If you want to read the advice that both of this week’s epistle choices have for husbands and wives, you can look them up here. As an unmarried person, I want to consider what the passage from Ephesians listed at the beginning of this post has to say about what committing to Christ and Christ’s commitment to us means for us.

The passage says to me that committing to Christ means caring for my body and treating it with dignity. My body has dignity and is deserving of care because it’s part of Christ’s mystical body, and it bears God’s image.

The same is true of everyone else’s body. Accordingly, the reading calls me to treat others in ways that reflect this reality. It invites me to do for others what will bring them to God, as Christ has done for me. It invites me to imitate Christ, even though doing so is hard, so hard we that we can sacrifice for others only with help of the Holy Spirit.

As if sacrifice weren’t challenging enough, so is believing in what’s difficult to see and what challenges our instincts. The prospect of it being necessary for eternal life to consume someone’s flesh and blood is instinctively revolting in many human cultures. Apparently, the culture of first century Judaism was no exception. I learned in church recently that consuming blood, a creature’s life force, was considered a pagan practice. This understanding puts the people’s reaction to Jesus’s teaching about the power of consuming His body and blood into perspective. Jesus would have understood as well as anyone the responses of those who were hearing Him.

So what does the fact that he doesn’t back down from the teaching when people object to it say? On this reading and with the bit of context I now have, the doubling down reminds me that committing to live with faith isn’t just about adhering to tradition and avoiding activities that don’t adhere to that tradition. Instead, it’s about being aware of who and what my actions serve, whether those actions are traditional or less so. Jesus’ teaching reminds me that God feeds us and never stops offering to do so.

The same cannot be said of anything else we might confuse with God. By reminding me of this spiritual truth, the Gospel passage circles back to the message of the Old Testament passage.

Beyond this week’s readings:

Do I have an unwavering commitment to serving God in how I relate to the people and use the resources around me? I wish I could say I did. I’m glad making a commitment isn’t a one-time event, an opportunity that appears once and then dissolves. I’m glad that I have opportunities moment by moment to recommit to serving God in the world around me as well as to believe in and receive the nourishment God offers me to power my recommitment.

This week’s prayer:

Thank You, Lord because, as Anna Robertson says, no matter how often each of us wavers in our commitments to what is good, You never waver in Your commitment to each of us.

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Divine Love Engages and Challenges the Senses

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections from Other Writers and Speakers, Reflections on Scripture, Social Justice, tagged , , , , , , on August 16, 2024| Leave a Comment »

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Readings for August 11:

  1. Proverbs 9:1–6
  2. Psalm 34:2–3, 4–5, 6–7 (and 9)
  3. Ephesians 5:15–20
  4. John 6:51–58

What this week’s readings say to me:

The first reading presents wisdom as a nurturing homemaker, someone who provides shelter and food. Perhaps the extended metaphor of the passage says something about how practical wisdom is necessary for meeting basic needs and how having basic needs met is necessary for a person to grow in “understanding” (Prov. 9:6).

This week’s psalm, the same as last week’s, continues to call us to recognize that God provides for our physical, emotional, and spiritual needs. God doesn’t run out all the means to provide for all of these needs. Ever.

Maybe because I focused on some of the psalm verses last week, the psalm refrain stands out to me more than the verses this week: “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord (Psalm 34:9). It invites us to use our physical senses — particularly taste and vision — to receive “the goodness of the Lord . . .” (Psalm 34:9).

Now there’s the old cliché “seeing is believing.” While it is cliché, it’s also often true for people. So it’s powerful to be able to see concrete signs of God’s goodness around us. How can the way each of us lives offer those concrete signs, not just by showing compassion, helping people see it, but by helping people experience it with their other senses.

Think what a powerful sense taste is. It’s inextricably linked to smell. Think of what emotions can be invoked by the taste and smell of a meal that reminds a person of a past special occasion. Without smell, it’s very difficult, if not impossible to taste. Think of how powerful it is to smell or taste something that you smelled or taste in the past not long before becoming sick. Given the power of these associations, the psalm refrain says to me that truly engaging with God and what God gives involves all the senses. This reality is why the celebration of the Eucharist and other sacraments engages all the senses.

This week’s epistle urges readers and listeners to engage all the senses as well and to be careful to engage all of them in the movement of the spirit, and the pursuit of wisdom, rather than dulling the senses with activities that make it more difficult for the spirit to move within and among us.

The Gospel passage reminds readers that Christ’s message engages all the senses, and in doing so, challenges them. To the crowds, he says that he’s bread, and that whoever eats this bread “will live forever” (John 6:51). The crowds see a man speaking to them. They were already wondering how this could be, and he was going to challenge them even further (John 6:52). He goes on to say that “the bread that [He] will give is [His] flesh for the life of the world and that “[w]hoever eats [His] flesh and drinks [His] blood remains in me and I in him” (John 6:51 and 56).

Christ had to give all of himself — body, blood, soul, and divinity, “for the life of the world” and for every individual in the world who will receive that life (Jon 6:56). Receiving that life in its fullness will involve all the physical senses — taste, touch, sight, and hearing — of individuals open to receiving it. It will also engage the mind and the spirit. It will challenge all of these by inviting them to enter into what self-preservation instincts tell us to run away from.

What someone else is sharing about this week’s readings:

Sarah Hart’s reflection on this week’s readings looks at different ways to “remain in” Christ, as the Gospel passage asks us to do, with none of the ways of doing so being separate from each other or less essential than another (John 6:56).

Beyond this week’s readings:

Thinking about how important smell is for taste and how important engaging all the senses is to relationship with God and others reminds me of a phrase from last week’s excerpt from Ephesians about being “imitators of God,” liv[ing] in love” (Eph. 5:1-2). This way of living that Christ modeled is described as making oneself a “sacrificial offering to God for a fragrant aroma” (Eph. 5:2).

This week’s prayer:

Lord, grant me the grace of courage to remain in You as You remain in the Father. Help me not to turn away when You challenge me with what You offer and with Your vision for the Kingdom of God. Amen (John 6:56-58).

Work cited:

Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc. ” 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time — 18 Aug. 2024: Readings at Mass.” The New American Bible, 2001. Universalis for Windows, Version 2.192, Universalis Publishing Ltd., 30 July 2024, https://universalis.com/n-app-windows.htm.

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To Receive God’s Provision and Guidance, Notice and Respond to it.

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections from Other Writers and Speakers, Reflections on Scripture, Who Am I in God, Who is God, tagged , , , , , , , , , on August 9, 2024| Leave a Comment »

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Readings for August 11:

  1. 1 Kings 19:4–8
  2. Psalm 34:2–3, 4–5, 6–7, 8–9
  3. Ephesians 4:30—5:2
  4. John 6:41–51

What this week’s readings say to me:

I think I’ll use a very current term to distill what the first reading says to me this time. It’s about the importance of self-care. When the passage begins, it seems like Elijah is physically and spiritually depleted. He asks God to end his life because he’s “no better” than anyone who came before him. (1Kings 19:4). I imagine him thanking that realizing this must mean he’s failed at the mission God has given him. After all, how can someone who’s no better than anyone who came before him be an effective prophet?

The situation is a reminder that God is at work even when we’re depleted. Sometimes, we’re most open to God working within and around us precisely when we feel we have nothing left to give. If we turn to God at no other time, many of us do so when we can’t see anywhere else to turn. I acknowledge this truth of human experience not to say that God wants us to be depleted. The Old Testament passage gives evidence to the contrary.

God knows that we need food, drink, rest, and to feel cared about to do our work and to be whole. God usually doesn’t force what we need upon us. Instead, God offers it, and it’s up to us to receive it. It was up to Elijah to acknowledge to God that he felt defeated and depleted, to rest, and then to take the nourishment that God offered.

The psalm reinforces that God provides for those who are open to receiving what God offers and to doing God’s work. It also reinforces the role the speaker has in finding what he needs, but it does so in a different way than the Old Testament passage does. The speaker says, “I will bless the Lord at all times” (Psalm 34: 2).

I had a gut reaction to this line, especially because it’s the first one included in this week’s psalm reading. I thought, “I don’t, and I won’t because there’s a lot that happens in the world that doesn’t seem like the will of a loving God, and I don’t understand why God, who I choose to believe is love, would allow these things to happen.

Thankfully, because I believe God is love, I also believe that a lot of things that happen grieve God. And I believe that sharing my grief and anger at what happens around me built as much of a connection to God is giving praise for God’s providence does.

My gut reaction also begins to feel different when I read later in this week’s psalm excerpt that the speaker “sought the Lord, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears” (Psalm 34:5). Maybe having a record and so being able to remind himself of the ways the Lord “answered [him] and delivered [him] from all [his] fears is the reason [“God’s] praise shall be ever in [his] mouth” (Psalm 34: 2; 5).

It might be helpful to consider the ways each of us can keep a record of times we’ve felt we’ve had what we needed and were seen and heard. Keeping such a record in whatever way makes sense for each of us may give us strength in those times when we don’t feel we have what we need or when we don’t feel seen and heard.

Maybe keeping a record of those experiences of abundance and connection, of grace, will help us glorify the Holy Spirit rather than “griev[ing]” it (Eph. 4:30). Maybe this practice will help us avoid what the epistle is urging us to avoid and to embrace what the epistle is asking us to embrace. I find the excerpt’s message easy to hear but difficult to put into practice. Maybe keeping track of empowering memories is a way of experiencing God’s presence with us when we find ourselves in situations that feel less empowering.

In the Gospel passage, Jesus’ contemporaries are having trouble recognizing that He’s God in their midst and that learning from Him, imitating him, and taking His words to heart would feed them, giving them life, not only in that moment, but eternally. Listening to Him and receiving what He provides leads to God, and recognizing how God has guided and provided in the past makes God present among us in the current moment. It points to Christ.

What someone else is sharing about this week’s readings:

When we are called on to make sacred sacrifices in order to ‘live in love’ – it is not our very self – our created self- that we are losing. It is the assumptions and projections of who we should be, the expectations and external pressures of others laid onto us by others.

Kasha L. Sanor — in her reflection on this week’s readings

This week’s prayer:

Lord, help us to recognize and to receive You so we can be who we are in You and do what You place on our hearts to do. Amen

Work cited:

The New American Bible Revised Edition, Kindle edition, Fairbrother, 2011.

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Trusting God’s Path to True Peace and Freedom

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections from Other Writers and Speakers, Reflections on Scripture, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on August 2, 2024| Leave a Comment »

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Readings for August 4:

  1. Exodus 16:2–4, 12–15 
  2. Psalm 78:3–4, 23–24, 25, 54
  3. Ephesians 4:17, 20–24
  4. John 6:24–35

What this week’s readings say to me:

The path to true peace, joy, and freedom — which is to say the path to union with God — isn’t often the same as the path to comfort. The first path I mentioned will require setting off without knowing what the journey will involve or what the destination will be like. In other words, following the path to union with God will ask us to trust what lies beyond our wounds, fears, and desires.

The journey will remind us that listening only to our instinct for self-preservation has led us astray in the past. It has isolated us, keeping us from finding true peace, joy, and freedom together, which is the only way we can find these gifts. We can’t find them alone.

We’re relational creatures who find our deepest sense of meaning beyond ourselves and our experiences, even beyond the communities we build with each other. We find lasting peace, joy, and true freedom when we recognize that while it’s essential to acknowledge our experiences and communities, as well as our practical needs, there is Someone who promises to provide for all of our needs and more, and we’re able to live in this reality.

What someone else is sharing about this week’s readings:

“That feeling of holy discontent doesn’t mean that yesterday’s prayer didn’t work; it means that God is building a relationship of trust with you. Just like the Israelites’ physical hunger kept them looking to the heavens for manna, our spiritual hunger turns us toward God.”

Ariell Watson Simon, in her reflection on this week’s readings

This week’s prayer:

Lord, help me not to confuse comfort with true peace, joy, and freedom. Give me the faith and courage to trust you and to follow You when doing so feels most difficult so that I can find true peace, joy, and freedom. Amen.

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The Spirit Is in the Details (As Well As in the Familiar Themes)

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections from Other Writers and Speakers, Reflections on Scripture, Scripture Readings, Social Justice, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on July 27, 2024| Leave a Comment »

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Readings for July 28th:

  1. 2 Kings 4:42–44
  2. Psalm 145:10–11, 15–16, 17–18
  3. Ephesians 4:1–6
  4. John 6:1–15

What this week’s readings say to me:

I’m used to hearing that this week’s readings are about the following:

  • God’s providence
  • God’s power over nature, demonstrated differently than in the calming of the storm
  • Christ feeding His spiritual family members his own Body and Blood, an ongoing act of love that comes to us from His apostles because He extended it to them on the night of his Last Supper.

And it is all of the above, but I feel prompted to highlight what else stood out to me as I read the passages this time around:

A man came from Baal-shalishah bringing to Elisha, the man of God, twenty barley loaves made from the firstfruits, . . . . Elisha said, “Give it to the people to eat.” But his servant objected, “How can I set this before a hundred people?” . . . . And when they had eaten, there was some left over, as the LORD had said.

2 Kings 4:42-44

This passage and the New Testament one tell me that questions and doubts are only obstacles to God to the extent that they keep a person from acting with faith. In both passages, people act as God inspires them to do, and God works with what they give. God keeps his promises and gives more than the people hope for.

The eyes of all look hopefully to you,
and you give them their food in due season . . .

Psalm 145:15

This verse reminds me that God’s timing may be different from mine. It doesn’t say God will give me what I want right now. Instead, it says God will give me what I need in due season — when the timing is best for me and for the overall plan.

Brothers and sisters: I, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to live in a manner worthy of the call you have received, with all humility and gentleness, with patience . . .

Ephesians 4:1-2

This excerpt relates to how God provides for us by giving Himself because we need God’s humility, gentleness, and patience to allow God to provide for us in other ways. God doesn’t force-feed us. Instead, God waits for us to be open to receiving Him.

Trusting in God, who isn’t limited by our sense of time and timing also takes patience.

Feeding others from the gifts we have received, in other words, making Christ visible in what we do, requires the virtues mentioned in this excerpt as well.

“’Gather the fragments left over, so that nothing will be wasted.'”

John 6:12

In addition to reinforcing the lessons of the Old Testament passage, the New Testament passage includes the above instruction. Not only does God give us more than we hope for in due season, but also we must be careful not to waste the abundance we receive. What we don’t waste can meet future needs.

What someone else is sharing about this week’s readings:

Dr. Alice Prince points out that the virtues highlighted in this week’s epistle don’t just make room to receive God’s abundance. God’s abundance is one of those proverbial two-way streets. Receiving God’s abundance helps us experience and practice those virtues.

Beyond this week’s readings:

It’s easy enough to quote Scripture passages as evidence that God provides. I even posted last week about the ways I’ve noticed God providing for me lately. Even so, I know there are plenty of situations in which it doesn’t seem like God provides. I listed some of those situations at the end of last week’s post. I find myself asking, “Lord, if you can use five loaves and two fish to feed more than 5,000 people, why aren’t you making sure everyone in Gaza, the U.S. or everywhere else in the world has enough to eat right now? Don’t you care about food insecure and starving people anymore?

Faith tells me the answer is “yes.” But I wonder how often humans get in the way of God’s providence. I know that too often what’s left over gets wasted and doesn’t make it to the people who need it.

This week’s prayer:

May we never interfere with God’s providence. May we participate in it instead. And may we never waste what we have to share, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Work cited:

Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc. ” 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time — 28 July 2024: Readings at Mass.” The New American Bible, 2001. Universalis for Windows, Version 2.191, Universalis Publishing Ltd., 21 July 2024, https://universalis.com/n-app-windows.htm.

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What Being Shepherded Looks Like to Me Now

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections from Other Writers and Speakers, Reflections on Scripture, Who Am I in God, Who is God, tagged , , , , , , on July 21, 2024| Leave a Comment »

Readings for July 21:

  1. Jeremiah 23:1–6
  2. Psalm 23:1–3, 3–4, 5, 6
  3. Ephesians 2:13–18
  4. Mark 6:30–34

Beyond this week’s readings:

I’m back — a week later than I thought I’d be. The events of the last week or so are reminders that intentions and plans aren’t guarantees. Plans and intentions can come from God. Without them, no one would start anything. So we all make blueprints of one kind or another, but none of us is working on a complete project. Rather, we’re all working on segments of that project, and only God can see what it will look like when it’s complete.

It was a storm that kept me away week longer than I thought I’d be. But because I’d planned to be away, I wasn’t long without comforts my neighbors missed for almost a week — electricity and everything it allows us to have. I’ve also been visited by a respiratory virus, that while it hasn’t required hospitalization or unusual treatment, it also hasn’t been fun. These things usually aren’t, and I’m on day thirteen of the symptoms.

Even so, I have renewed gratitude for the following:

  • the ability to power up the computer and dictate this post.
  • the ability to use my phone and to recharge it when its battery dies without having to prioritize returning my portable battery charger first
  • the ability to watch TV
  • the ability to heat, refrigerate, and freeze food
  • the ability to come out of the heat and into an air-conditioned room
  • the ability to lie down into sleep for an entire night without waking up coughing
  • the ability to breathe through one’s nose, to taste, and to smell. When I fully enjoy the privileges included in this last list item, may I never take them for granted again

I wonder how many people in the world either don’t get to enjoy the comforts I just listed or have much more limited access to them than I do.

I also know that too many people are deprived of even more basic needs, and the following are only a few:

  • the need for food
  • the need for for access to clean water
  • the need for freedom from violence and other threats to safety

This week’s prayer:

And yet, this week’s readings promise a Shepherd who meets the needs of His flock, not the least of which, as Yolanda Chavez says, is to accept the rest the Shepherd offers as we participate in the Shepherd’s work.

Good Shepherd, thank You for the safety, food, and rest You offer. Thank you for your accompanying us as we endeavor to trust in Your providence. May we be sources of that providence. Amen.

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Faith Finds Abundance in a Variety of Circumstances

Posted in Ordinary Time, Reflections on Scripture, Scripture Readings, tagged , , , , , , on June 28, 2024| Leave a Comment »

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Readings for June 30:

  1. Wisdom 1:13–15; 2:23–24
  2. Psalm 30:2, 4, 5–6, 11, 12, 13
  3. 2 Corinthians 8:7, 9, 13–15
  4. Mark 5:21–43

What this week’s readings say to me:

In this interval in which time is in shorter supply than usual, the following quotations stand out to me from the readings for June 30:

God did not make death,
nor does he rejoice in the destruction of the living.
For he fashioned all things that they might have being;
and the creatures of the world are wholesome. . . .

Wisdom 1:13-14

For you know the gracious act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich . . . . Not that others should have relief while you are burdened, but that as a matter of equality your abundance at the present time should supply their needs, so that their abundance may also supply your needs, that there may be equality.

2 Corinthians 9 and 13

On this readthrough of the Gospel passage, I’m reminded of how important each of us is to God and to the world around us, even when we feel invisible and insignificant. I’m also reminded of how important journeys are. So many opportunities come up when we’re on the way to do something else. This passage teaches that even what looked like death can be a passageway to a new experience of life.

Beyond this week’s readings:

It looks like I’m not going to get a chance to write a post for next week, so I’ll see you back here in two weeks.

This week’s prayer:

Lord, thank you for the goodness of the natural world and for caring about the concerns of everyone in it. Thank you for meeting us where we are and for helping us to do good and to appreciate the beauty around us — sometimes when we least expect to receive opportunities or to be reminded of Your presence. Amen.

Work cited

Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc. ” 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time — 30 June 2024: Readings at Mass.” The New American Bible, 2001. Universalis for Windows, Version 2.189, Universalis Publishing Ltd., 14 June 2024, https://universalis.com/n-app-windows.htm.

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