Claire Smith

Scripture:

Isaiah 45:1, 4-6
1 Thessalonians 1:1-5b
Matthew 22:15-21

Reflection:

…the Pharisees took counsel how to entangle him in his talk…they went along with the Herodians…

Wow!  This line could be taken directly out of today’s news…they plotted against him, they wanted to trip him up, they wanted him to fail so they could win!  Do you ever wonder why it is that human nature feels the need to make everything so transactional?  Why is it that humans need tear others down in order to feel good about themselves?  Why is it so easy to get ‘sucked’ in to negativity, mistrust, judgment and cynicism?  Pharisees and Herodians were very strange bedfellows – they hated each other!  Maybe that is the message of today’s gospel, be careful who you hate – hate never has a good outcome!

Jesus is always about love.  Oh, they wanted to trip him up, they would do anything to ‘catch’ him – even join their hate together…  Jesus is able to see beyond the façade, see into the heart – and he refuses to respond in kind.  But he does challenge – from a place of truth – give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and give to God what is God’s. 

We all belong to God’s Kingdom – in fact, we are first heirs to God and God’s kingdom, defines for us who we are and whose we are.  We have a privileged citizenship and we are called to extend that privilege to all in God’s kingdom.   We, like Jesus need to be voices of love and truth to all facets of our lives.  We can’t be about plotting against, we must be about building the kingdom, finding ways to bridge rather than divide, search for common ground that makes room for growth, vision and possibility.  Can we, like Jesus learn to make room for the light of the Holy Spirit – and trust where that light shines?

Faith Offman is the Associate Director of Ministry at St. Paul of the Cross Passionist Retreat and Conference Center in Detroit, Michigan.

Scripture:

Ephesians 1:11-14
Luke 12:1-7

Reflection:

Here in the Gospel of Luke people numbering in the thousands were getting out of hand.  In their eagerness to hear Jesus they were stepping over each other. Jesus reminds his disciples not to let the success of their preaching go to their heads like the Pharisees have done.  Jesus reminds the disciples that the word used for “preaching” is (Charay).  Jesus tells his disciples their preaching should be like a string of pearls.  In other words, each word we preach should be like a precious jewel!  

Jesus sounds like he is saying that our thoughts and words need to be marshaled carefully. If they are not treated carefully, they will take on the quality of the Pharisees which is “hypocrisy.”  What we must do is first of all to” listen.”  In other words, in the Gospels “to listen” is to embrace the message of Jesus.  First, Jesus is the Son of God. Come and be with him, and second, serve God’s people.

The disciples of Jesus will undergo persecution, but do not fear.  Don’t worry about those who can destroy the body.  Remember you are precious in the eyes of God.  The sparrows are protected by God. They can be purchased for one cent. Five sparrows are worth two cents.  Luke tells us each hair on our head is precious in the eye of God.  In the time of Jesus, the Rabbis use to say “God loves each one of us.” “Every blade of Grass has its own Guardian Angel!”  We are valued because God watches over us.  This is only place in the Synoptics that Jesus addresses his disciples as “My friends” don’t worry. God is loyal.  The Scriptures reminds us one of the virtues each disciple has is the virtue of “fearlessness!” 

Fr. Ken O’Malley, C.P., is a member of the Passionist Community at Sacred Heart Monastery in Louisville, Kentucky.

Scripture:

Galatians 4:22-24, 26-27, 31-5:1
Luke 11:29-32

Reflection:

This meditation begins with a subtle hint that it is good that we do not go it alone when seeking to follow and imitate Christ.

You are reading this on your own, but it is wise to be able to talk it through with another, at least. There are manifestations (showings) of God’s presence and directions, i.e., signs of God’s presence and guidance. But if no one is attentive and is willing to name what is going on, we miss the opportunity to cooperate with the revelations of God’s salvific history.

Warning: you may be troubled by my conclusion. Trust me and read on. It is all about faith, which is beyond the human eye and judgement. Please follow along with this meditation.

I want to declare that there are immense depths in us. Yes, there are fantastic possibilities in us, but they can remain hidden if they are not stimulated by someone else. Thus, my warning at the beginning that we do not go it alone when seeking to follow and imitate Christ.

It is pointed out at the beginning of this Gospel incident that the crowds were getting larger surrounding Christ. They listened, observed, and touched him. Something in them stirred when they did all of this. In looking around they realized that they were not alone in recognizing that he was someone special. That is why so many accompanied him. Many converted to his way and changed their lives. Something was awakened in them. Some dynamic between Jesus and the Father was communicated to the many. They felt empowered by him.

Throughout both Testaments miracles, and unusual events, along with dreams and encounters with the Spirit are identified as signs. And God’s self-revelation continues today.

Even within the conflictual relationship between Hagar and Sarah, God planned good things for their descendants.

Important significance fills the world. And part of our spiritual work is to learn to recognize it. We need companions along the journey, we need communities that can help us discern the signs that lead us toward personal decisions and other signs of the times to interpret for us the significance of what is going on.

“Do you not see?” is a challenging question for our times. But we don’t see. But we can learn, by reflecting on the encounters, that is, what is going on around us with an eye for what forces are at work and where grace continues to happen.

God is showing us all the time what we need to know. But it is a matter of living with daily expectancy and trust that God is “witnessing” us, and accompanying us and meeting and inviting us to be channels of God’s work for the transformation of the world, always striving with hope and not necessarily knowing from moment to moment what is next.

The introductory verse to the Gospel says it all. “If today you hear His voice, harden not your hearts.”

Fr. Alex Steinmiller, C.P., is a member of the Passionist Community in Detroit, Michigan.

Scripture:

Galatians 3:22-29
Luke 11:27-28

Reflection:

Jesus refused the cult of personality. He did not call attention to himself. He always pointed to others – to God above all, but also to those who had faith, regardless of their ethnicity, wealth, employment, or status in life. He even refused a follower’s blessing that was directed toward his mother and her role in bearing and nurturing him. He always deflected praise and attention in order to point to God.

He didn’t do this with an aura of false humility. He wasn’t a person who cut himself down or diminished himself in ways that either negated his obvious gifts and abilities or, on the other side of the spectrum, made people want to jump in with praise in order to build him back up. He was genuine – offering who he was, by the grace of God, for the glory of God and the building of the kingdom that was far greater than most of us can even imagine. He lived for a bigger purpose.   

How different that is from our situation today! We seem to live in a world where humility is no longer a virtue, where the goal is attention and personal adulation. No one else’s accomplishment is too good to claim for oneself. No negative situation is too awful or complex to simply blame it on someone else. No evidence is too strong to counter one’s personal alternative version of reality. No lie is too big to tell if it serves a purpose. All is done to gain and maintain power, and to enrich oneself at the expense of others.

Have we, as individuals, as self-professed Christians, and as a nation built on Christian principles, actually clothed ourselves with Christ? In what ways are we creating a world where “there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free person, there is not male and female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus”? Where is this unity and kinship on display? Where are the prophets calling us to care for the least, the poor, the immigrant and refugee, the down-trodden, the unemployed, the hungry, and “huddled masses yearning to breathe free”?

We have an election coming up. I will not wade into politics here. What I will do is examine myself and urge that you do the same in the strongest possible terms. We need our votes to reflect the fullness and depth of the Gospel message. We need to live for a larger purpose and elect those who share that vision, demeanor, morality, and thirst for justice. We need to fulfill the dream of Jesus that all may be one. We need to ensure to the greatest extent we can that our laws and our nation ever more fully share God’s abiding love for all people and bring the Kingdom Jesus preached into being.

Amy Florian is a teacher and consultant working in Chicago.  For many years she has partnered with the Passionists.  Visit Amy’s website: http://www.corgenius.com/.

Scripture:

Galatians 3: 1-5
Luke 11: 15-26

Reflection:

Persistence in Prayer

Have you ever been worn down by someone consistently asking you for something? Today’s Gospel is God’s encouragement, and even His command, to be persistent. Jesus teaches us: “I tell you, even though he does not get up and take care of the man because of friendship, he will do so because of his persistence” (Lk 11:8). Most of the time when you give your children something, it is out of love, but sometimes, as today’s parable says, it was not out of love, but only because of the person’s persistence, which wore us down.

Our intercessory prayers and petitions are to be persistent, but not for the purpose of breaking down God so we get what we request. God is never worn down. He loves us so deeply. It is He Who tells us to ask, seek, knock (Mt 7:7). God is the One Who is persistent in loving us. He is the Parent we tried to be with our children. So, in trust and obedience, we persist in intercessory prayer. God is far from being weary of our prayer. He is more concerned with our faith, and that we would lose hope and stop praying.

Therefore, continue to ask, knock, seek, and persist, despite what seems to be no answer from the Lord. Never lose faith in God’s desire to hear and answer our prayer (see Mt 6:6). Always rely on the grace of God, on the Holy Spirit, to help you in your time of need and to aid your weakness. In return, God always gives us the Holy Spirit who comes to aid our weakness.

Deacon Peter Smith serves at St. Mary’s/Holy Family Parish in Alabama, a religion teacher at Holy Family Cristo Rey Catholic High School in Birmingham, and a member of our Passionist Family.

Memorial of Our Lady of the Rosary

Scripture:

Galatians 2:1-2, 7-14
Luke 11:1-4

Reflection:

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

This growing up business seems to be a lifetime process. Today, I wonder what it’s all about, and what do I want to be when I grow up? Just when I think I’ve got this living business down, along comes COVID-19. Today I wonder and ask my God, what do you want of me?

Pulling from my past experience and remembering today’s feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, I recall all the times the rosary has pulled me through. My first experience was as a child. After dinner we would gather in the living room, and all take a chair to kneel in front of, as my father led us through the mysteries of life: the joyful mysteries; the sorrowful mysteries; and finally, the glorious mysteries. I remember thinking that Jesus and Mary lived really strange and different lives back then.

In Warrenton, Missouri, as Passionist high school seminarians, we would gather in the chapel after dinner and repeat the same process above. I still thought, Jesus and Mary lived really strange and different lives back then. Through most of my life since then, I’ve let go of thinking of these mysteries. After all they don’t really apply to my life.

Today, I’m beginning to think maybe they do. Just like Jesus and Mary, I am challenged. While I see no angel appearing to prepare me for the new life I will help bring into the world, I do realize that COVID-19, while not an angel, challenges me, and I believe all of us to do the same thing: “You will share in the experience of new ways of learning and they will call it online. That child will be the cause of much suffering and growth for you and for many, but it will rise and take its rightful place in the creation of my world filled with joyful, sorrowful and glorious mysteries.”

Dear God, I pray with the apostles today: “Teach me to pray!” I say: “Thank You, God!” Thank you for the good times, the challenging ones, but especially thank you for the crosses You’ve given me to bear. Finally, I pray with Mary: “My soul magnifies the lord and my spirit rejoices in God my savior.”

Dan O’Donnell is a Passionist Partner and a longtime friend of the Passionists.  He lives in Chicago.  

Scripture:

Galatians 1: 13-24
Luke 10: 38-42

Reflection:

We live in a rushed culture. Despite the deceleration of daily living forced by a worldwide pandemic, internally we are still programmed from toddlerhood for quick, constant action.

“This is your chance to save!”
“Hurry, it won’t last long!”
“I can’t wait until I am in high school!”
“Let’s take advantage of the interest rates now and buy a bigger house!”
“Get that job finished now! Another is waiting!”
“She needs this day care center now to best prepare her for grade school!”
“Time is money!”
“Act now! Don’t miss out!”

These declarations sound familiar? If so it is because, in a myriad of ways, we are all pressured by external forces to act, move, and get it done. Now.

Curiously, God seldom acts quickly.

Science tells us the Great Emergence, or Great Bang, occurred 13.8 Billion years ago. But complex humans have been around just 200,000 years…a miniscule fraction of time compared to the unimaginable billions of years that preceded human existence.

At my recent annual eye exam, I engaged the doctor in a discussion of the miracle of human sight. He said humans will never design a human eye; the nerve endings alone…1.5 million extending from the back of the eye to the brain in a circumference not bigger than the lead in a pencil… is beyond our imagination or abilities to reproduce. It is even more astounding that it took nearly 14 billion years of evolution to create the human eye.

In contemplating these phenomena, a respect for God’s pace emerges.

In today’s section from the letter to the Galatians, Paul’s reflects on the slowness of his discernment of God’s will for his life. He tells us it was a long, circuitous route. He didn’t just fall off the horse and start preaching to the Gentiles the next day. Reading his full life story, we know God’s plan for him took decades to be realized.

Today’s psalm is good to read in moments of quiet: “I give thanks that I am fearfully, wonderfully made; wonderful are your works.” All on God’s time.

And as we read the passage from Luke about Jesus welcoming Mary Magdalene to sit at his feet and learn as a disciple, as only male could do in that culture, we understand the inclusivity of God. She wanted to know more of God’s awesome ways…the ways of grace, working with time and nature, to form a creation that reflects God’s immense love for each of us.

As we all face the serious suffering and fears of COVID-19, economic hardships, human threats to our natural environment, racial injustice and political incivility we may be tempted to get anxious and worried (like Martha?) and want quick solutions.

There are no quick solutions.

But there is hope.

As Christ’s disciples, we are offered one way to strengthen hope: God’s will. To discern it we must go to our rooms in quiet, as Jesus directed.

Then, be patient and listen. If you give God this space God will lead you, on God’s schedule, in the direction you must go. This and this alone, will give you relief from our crazy, rushed culture. This way alone will provide you the deep, lasting peace you seek.

Jim Wayne is a board member of the Passionist Solidarity Network (PSN), and author of The Unfinished Man. He lives in Louisville, Kentucky.

Scripture:

Galatians 1:6-12
Luke 10:25-37

Reflection:

Spending some time with Paul’s letter to the Galatians of this Monday morning, we read how Paul is disappointed in the fickleness of this Galatian community. They seem to have quickly forgotten certain teachings Paul had inspired within them, and now they began to listen to and follow other teachings. He reasserts that the Gospel he proclaimed to them was not his, but it had come from Christ. Therefore, to not listen to the Gospel, he proclaimed was to not listen to Christ.  It even implies that one is rejecting what Christ has taught.

The word “gospel” comes from the Greek word “eualgelion.” Breaking that word apart, “eu”  translates to the English word “good” and the word “angelion” best translates to the English word “announcement.” (Notice the word angel in angelion,  Scripturally, angels have been the ones who make God’s announcements.)  Thus, we frequently say that the word gospel means good news.

If you read this text, you’ll notice Paul uses the word Gospel to mean two different things.  Sometimes he capitalizes the term and sometimes he leaves it lower case.  This is to make his point.  When the word “gospel” is capitalized, Paul is referring to the Gospel which Jesus brought to us. It is written in lowercase when Paul is referring to teachings away from the teaching of Christ.  So in reading this text, the capitalized word “Gospel” has a completely different meaning than the lowercase “gospel.”

Yet isn’t that where we are today? I live in Chicago. Last weekend we had 43 shootings reported to the police. That doesn’t include the shootings that weren’t reported, or the other murders, or the numerous other violent and nonviolent crimes that don’t get reported to the general public. Most people who are perpetrators of these crimes aren’t operating out of a Gospel with a capital “G.” They operate out of self-centered desires. They base their good news on self-centeredness. What benefits their personal self is what they deem good news.  This kind of attitude rarely takes others into consideration. 

Take for instance where we are amidst this pandemic.  With over 200,000 US citizens having already died we all meet people who think only about themselves.  We all meet people who don’t take precautions on spreading the virus to others. Nor do they care if they spread the virus to others. 

Or another example are the over seventy-nine million displaced people in our world who have been forced from their homes by conflict and persecution. Thirty million are refugees. And half of them are under the age of eighteen. Over two-thirds came from just five countries. Do those in power in these countries think about good news in terms a capital letter “G”  or a small “g”?     And with this idea or thought in mind, how does the rest of the world receive these displaced people? What is Good News in the midst of actions which were motivated by self-absorption?

Four years ago in a parish I was working, after a particular Sunday liturgy, I discovered Maria dancing in front of the Blessed Virgin Mary statue.  She was bubbling over with enthusiasm. Her eyes were luminous. And her whole body was moving to a song playing deep in the core of her spirit. I inquired, “Maria what brings you such a joy today?”  With tears in her radiant eyes she announced, “We bought a house!!! We own a house!! Praise Jesus! After years of living in refugee camps and Government housing, we now OWN a house! I never thought this would happen.”    I knew I was standing before someone who knew and lived Gospel with a capital “G.” And Luke’s words were as true at that moment as they were on the day of the Annunciation, “Blessed are you who believe that the promise of the Lord would be fulfilled.”

As we hear Paul’s letter today, we can almost feel his disappointment and frustration as he tries to bring to light the Good news of the Gospel of Jesus which is beyond any human definition of good news.  I suggest our work today is to be more attentive to Good News, amidst the world looking to please themselves.  And then the big challenge is to find exciting ways to share and proclaim that Good News.

Fr. David Colhour, C.P. is the local superior of St. Vincent Strambi Community in Chicago, Illinois.