Daily Scripture

Scripture:

Romans 16:3-9, 16, 22-27
Luke 16:9-15

Reflection:

In grammar school I was taught by the Sisters of Providence and for high school, I attended the Passionist Minor Seminary. The members of these communities take a vow of poverty and were great witnesses to me on what a gift that vow can be. I had also heard from members of these communities today’s gospel admonition, which explained at least in part, why they chose this life: “No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” (Luke 16: 13) Having their great witness and hearing the gospel were not enough to change my heart. I had to experience this truth on my own.

Letting go of my car twenty plus years ago is a good example of my struggle with this simple truth. I bought that car, a new, ’83 Cadillac Seville and spent much more for it than I should have because successful people in my business drove that kind of car. I wanted the image it exhibited. It worked for a time. People seemed impressed even mentioning how beautiful it was. Ten years later the time came when I realized that I was serving that car and not the other way around. It had to go. I called a friend of mine in the auto business and asked him to get rid of it for me. Finally it was gone. What remained however, were the phony thinking and the crazy contest for “personal prestige and big bank balances”. That is taking much longer.

I’m still learning today to simplify my life, letting go of things I no longer need on my journey to god. It’s not always easy and I’m a slow learner. God, I offer my life to you. Keep me from valuing anything over life with you, whatever that means giving up.

 

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

Scripture:

Romans 14:7-12
Luke 15:1-10

Reflection:

All of us have had that common experience of losing something and spending hours searching for it.  It is part of our human makeup. It transcends cultures and languages and is linked with the limitations of the human mind.  This experience is the impetus for the 15th chapter of Luke’s gospel; something is lost and then it is found.

Today’s Gospel revisits the first two of the trilogy: a sheep and a coin. A single sheep gets lost. The owner goes looking for it. Upon finding it, the owner is filled with great joy.  Notice here that it is not the shepherd of the sheep but the owner who goes looking for the lost sheep.  Does this mean there is more joy if the owner finds the sheep than if an employee finds it?

The owner has a greater vested interest.   The second story is so much like the first. Instead of it being a sheep that is lost, this time the lost object is a coin. And like the first story, again there is tremendous joy. Much like the lost sheep, it is the one with the vested interest in what was lost which receives the reward of joy. Is this what we are supposed to take from this Gospel reflection?

I certainly think the theme of joy is worth reflecting on, but did you notice the deeper theme in this gospel?   Luke doesn’t use this as a generic teaching of Jesus, nor does he use the phrase, “The kingdom of God is like…”  Luke sets the scene up with people gathered around Jesus listening to him.  Those who chose to encircle Jesus were classified as tax collectors and sinners. The first century understanding of sinner was someone who missed the mark, or even those who really didn’t have any place for the law of God in their life. So here are a group of people who never really grasped the religiousness of their lives.  I suspect they didn’t care too greatly of what religious people thought of them.   I can only imagine their enthusiasm as they are sitting around Jesus relating to him without feeling the imposition of the religious law.  They are no longer excluded, they are now part of the inner conversation and the outsiders in this circle are the ones who have always had the religious voice.  They must have been exuberant.

Luke merely says that the Scribes and Pharisees were complaining. Numerous times in both the Old and New Testaments reveal that the Divine isn’t very tolerant towards people who grumble and complain.  In this case the complaining is directed at Jesus stemming from the company he kept. If you read between the lines can you pick up on the judgmentalism of the Pharisees and their lack of gratitude?  Luke is clear. It was because of their complaining that Jesus speaks. What does he speak? He tells three parables about losing something and finding something. And he emphasizes the joy in the finding. It seems the judgmental complainers couldn’t recognize the joy in the eyes and faces of those they believed were beneath them.

What does this mean for us today? I think we can start with the simple questions.  What do you grumble and complain about?  Is the complaining keeping God from intervening?  Perhaps this is an area of conversion in your life.  If you are honest with yourself, how does grumbling and complaining fit with joy in your life?  I believe it is part of Pope Francis’ wisdom that the poor have the ability to bring us redemption, even if it is only from our own grumbling.

Fr. David Colhour, C.P. is the pastor of St. Agnes Parish in Louisville, Kentucky.

Feast of St. Charles Borromeo

Scripture:

Romans 13:8-10
Luke 14:25-33

Reflection:

Loving God, Neighbor, Self:  A Real Challenge!

At first glance, the words of Jesus in today’s Gospel and the words of St. Paul in the reading from his letter to the Romans – the words seem to contradict one another.  “…if anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children…” and “…owe nothing to anyone except to love one another…’you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself’…”.  Further reflection highlights Jesus’ use of making his point by exaggeration:  nothing and no one can stand in the way of our Christian call to loving discipleship – which includes carrying our crosses, renouncing our possessions, and following Jesus!  A real challenge for us 21^st Century folks!

Jesus’ and St. Paul’s words come alive for us as we continue our November journey and commemorate saintly people – today highlighting the person of Charles Borromeo.  A zealous man of the 16^th Century Church, he is seen as a true pastor who helped reform and grow the Church in a variety of ways.

As a bishop and Cardinal, Charles was one to encourage the intellectual and moral growth of clergy and religious, especially in forming new seminaries.  He helped author the catechism that was called for during the Council of Trent, and started the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine (CCD) for children’s growth in their faith.  He held many special meetings in his home diocese of Milan, seeking to incorporate the message and teachings of the Council of Trent.  He reached out to the poor and needy of his day, sacrificing personal wealth, honor and influence to offer hands-on service to them – even in the challenges of the plagues and famines of his day, as he ministered to the sick, the hungry, and the dying.  Truly a zealous, loving man throughout his relatively short 46 years of life!  (And I think, Charles’ life would “fit” the call to discipleship that Pope Francis is setting before us these days…)

We’re encouraged this month of November to look to the lives of those who have gone before us…the “official” saints and the “everyday saints” we each know or have known.  Love of God, neighbor, and self is at the heart of each of their lives – and no dimension of this love can be downplayed or skipped!  So…

Today, as we seek to follow Jesus with the encouragement of others, we reach out in love in our day – to God, one another, and even ourselves.  Perhaps today is the day to let Autumn come alive for you:  to experience God in the beauty of autumn leaves and the crisp air, to have some quiet time for yourself, to enjoy a favorite meal or drink, to reach out to a family member or friend… May we be blessed, and encourage others to rejoice in their blessedness…all of us “saints under construction”!

 

Fr. John Schork, C.P. is a member of the Passionist community in Chicago, Illinois. 

Scripture:

Romans 12:5-16b
Luke 14:15-24

Reflection:

In You oh Lord, I have found my peace.

This is the responsorial psalm for today. God’s peace is one of our greatest gifts, but it’s up to us to receive that gift and choose to live in peace. One of the ways we can foster peace is by controlling our thoughts.

We all experience difficult days when we let negative thinking get the best of us. I had a major melt-down several months ago. My feelings had been hurt and I was feeling very rejected and sorry for myself. One by one, negative thoughts came marching into my head. (We don’t have any real friends here. Jay’s moving to Denmark, and I may never see him again! I don’t think my shoulder will ever stop hurting. What if we have to move away from our kids and grandkids?) As each thought came, I let it stay, and soon I was spiraling toward despair, far from the peace that Jesus offers us in any circumstance.

A little later, my husband made a comment that felt like a criticism to me, and the floodgates opened. All of the negative emotion from the day came pouring out. Poor Jim! It’s so important to see how our thoughts affect our feelings and how our feelings affect our actions and decisions. If we’re not careful, our emotions can dictate how we live, rather than our faith.

How much better to stop each thought as it comes, and look for the positive, or at least remember that no matter what happens, Jesus is with us, and it will all work out! God’s peace is available to us every day, no matter what is going on. Lord help me look to You when problems and negative thoughts bombard me. Thank you for being our peace.

 

Janice Carleton and her husband Jim live in Portland, OR and partner with Passionist Fr. Cedric Pisegna in Fr. Cedric Ministries. She is the mother of 4 grown children and grandmother of 6. Janice also leads women’s retreats and recently published her second book: God IS with Us. Visit Janice’s website at http://www.janicecarleton.com/ or email her at [email protected].

All Souls Day

Scripture:

Wisdom 3:1-9
Romans 5:5-11 or 6:3-9
John 6:37-40

Reflection:

Today is a day to remember our deceased family members, loved ones, friends, and others whose lives have ended and for whose lives we are grateful.

In the history of this day, it is very obvious that nationalities, cultures, and religions have contributed to the customs associated with remembering the dead. With the association of November 1^st as All Saints Day with November 2^nd, All Souls Day (and including the vigil feast of All Hallows Eve—Halloween, Christians have, over the centuries, developed and passed on popular customs as reverential expressions of their religious convictions about death and salvation.

Today, we in the United States may look back over these customs of our ancestors, and think of them as “quaint” or, perhaps, superstitious. For example, food left out for the visiting spirits of the dead, altars and candles to comfort those waiting in darkness for their turn to enter paradise from purgatory; all Christian traditions associated with November 2^nd reflect the beliefs of some particular time in history.

At the same time, we in the United States today, seem intent on giving a new meaning to our remembering the dead, we have made Halloween into the runner-up after Christmas for holiday spending. It isn’t the children who go trick or treat-ing on Halloween who are laughing all the way to the bank.

What do the suggested readings for today’s Mass tell us about our passage through death into eternal life? How should we remember the dead in a way that pays them tribute and respect?

But they are in peace. (WIS 3:3)

What would we give to have real peace in our lives and in our world? If peace were only the absence of conflict, how much we would gain by seeking it. But even though we could work our way through the conflicts of the present political, cultural, religious and personal universes that we inhabit, would we have peace? Something else must be added for absence of conflict to bring about real peace. It is the assurance that we don’t have to fall back into conflict at the next stage of life, the next political era, or the next cultural phenomenon that drapes our generations in misunderstandings and exaggerated economic competitiveness.

If, then, we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. We know that Christ, raised from the dead, dies no more; death no longer has power over him. (ROM 6:8-9)

The citation from the Letter to the Romans tells us that true peace is possible if we live with him. Those who have died in Christ truly and fully live in the peace of Christ; they will not fall out of that peace. Those of us still engaged in our Christian, mortal lives, identify with the dying of Christ through our baptism, the epic symbol of death to sin and rising to new life that makes us living members of the Body of Christ.

Today, then, let us engage our customs and traditions; let us offer prayers for the peace of Christ to bond us with our beloved dead; and let us try just a little harder to live the peace that also bonds us with our brothers and sisters still living our mortal lives.

 

Fr. Arthur Carrillo, C.P.  is the director of the Missions for Holy Cross Province.  He lives in Chicago, Illinois.

Feast of All Saints

Scripture:

Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14
1 John 3:1-3
Matthew 5:1-12a

Reflection:

In the Church’s liturgical calendar, each November begins with the great feast of “All Saints” and then turns to “All Souls.”  This year, All Saints occurs on Sunday and displaces the usual readings because of the importance of this feast.  The exuberant Scripture readings include the gospel selection from the beatitudes, the beginning of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount found in Matthew’s Gospel, one of the New Testament’s most well-known passages. Jesus blesses those who are poor and downtrodden and lifts up those who exemplify the very values and commitments that mark his own ministry: the peacemakers, the merciful, the clean of heart, those who hunger and thirst for justice.  The first reading today is a portion from the Book of Revelation where the author, John, is treated to a vision of a “great multitude” from “every nation, race, people and tongue”—a vast procession of those who worship God and have followed Jesus, the Lamb of God.  Wedged between these readings is a beautiful selection from the First Letter of John, reminding his “beloved” Christians that God’s love for them is so intense that may be called “children of God.”

Who are the people addressed in these biblical readings?  Who is included in this feast’s “all Saints”?   Surely, as the reading from the Book of Revelation illustrates, it includes the saints from all ages past—from Augustine, the great theologian to Theresa, the little flower, from Agnes the early Roman martyr, to the mystic Hildegaarde of Bingen.  Not all the saints are formally declared such—in his recent address to Congress, Pope Francis cited two such “unofficial” saints such as Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton.  And there are all the other “saints” in that great procession of the followers of the Lamb—family members and friends we have known and whose memory still inspires us.

But this feast of “All Saints” honors more than our beloved dead.  We the living should also be listed among the “saints.”  In his letters to his communities, Paul the Apostle repeatedly called his fellow Christians the “saints” or the “holy ones.”  For Paul every baptized Christian was imbued with God’s grace and therefore was “holy.”  In Paul’s view it was not a matter of a follower of Jesus having to try to “become holy”—a Christian was already graced by God, already a “temple of the Holy Spirit,” even now, a member of the “Body of Christ.”  That is the same view expressed in John’s letter: “Beloved, we are God’s children now.” The challenge is to “be ourselves”—that is to live a life expressive of who we truly are.  “Become what you are” is one way of thinking about what we seek to do in living a life in accord with the gospel.

This great feast—and the feast of All Souls that will follow—views the church as one innumerable assembly of people united and graced by God’s love.  A people that embraces those of us who live now in this world, who, in the words of today’s responsorial psalm, “long to see God’s face,” and those who have gone before us and now see the ultimate source of all life and all joy “face to face.”

Fr. Donald Senior, C.P. is President Emeritus and Professor of New Testament at Catholic Theological Union.  He lives at the Passionist residence in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago.

Scripture:

Romans 11:1-2a, 11-12, 25-29
Luke 14:1, 7-11                           

Reflection:

 The one who humbles himself will be exalted.

 In the First Reading, St. Paul writes to the Romans “Has God rejected his people? Of course not!” (Romans 11:1-2a)  And continues, “For the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable.” (v.29) These points are so strongly echoed in our selection from Psalm 94, “The Lord will not cast off his people” (v.14) and “When I say ‘My foot is slipping, your mercy, O Lord, sustains me.’” (v.18)  And then the Gospel.  Jesus instructs, “Do not recline at the place of honor.”  Instead he says to take the lowest place, so the host can ask you to move closer to the place of honor.

On the surface, this sure looks like a social-status-climbing chess game to me.  I could just hear people saying, “OK, I get it.  I’ll sit down there because that way I’ll get the greatness and recognition I’m after.”  That sounds pretty hypocritical and selfish to me, and I don’t believe that’s what Jesus really intended as his point.

How many times have you heard the saying “It’s better to give than to receive”?

Well I don’t know about you, but I remember first hearing that as a kid, and thinking to myself “Well, that’s pretty stupid.  It’s AWESOME to get stuff.”  As time passed, though, I began to accumulate so many things that I was running out of space to keep them.  So I did what any other normal person would do in that case.  That’s right – I built a shed to hold all my stuff… stuff I really didn’t need, or want.  Ultimately, it really weighed me down.

It’s funny, in a sad way, how that transferred to my spirit and emotion.  I also held on to pain and hurt.  I held on to mistakes and brokenness.  I made space in my heart to house the betrayal and horror I had experienced.  It was like a trailer, covered with a mountainous pile of the past, on top of which I was sitting, the ceiling right at the top of my head.  I was unable to take any more.  I had no more room, and there was no place to build a shed.

If I were a betting man, I’d wager I’m not alone in this experience.

And then one day in church I heard this Gospel (for probably the 100^th time), and it hit me.  It wasn’t at all about looking good in front of your friends.  I heard Jesus explain that by humbling yourself, you are actually becoming more open to God’s call.  Being empty means God has room to fill you up!  It got me off my mountain, brought me home, and helped me prepare a place in my heart to house love, care, compassion, forgiveness, and peace.  Ultimately, it gave me a gift so huge I’ll never be able to house it… it brought me closer to God.  And that, my friends, is a gift worth having room for.

So let me ask you… what space at the table do you need to leave behind?

What things must you let go of in order to have space for God to work miracles in your life?

Let’s all pray to hear our Host say to us, “Come.”

“Dear God, thank you for all the gifts you offer us.  Please grant us the grace to always be empty enough to accept your call to rise, and sit closer to you. Amen.”

 

Paul Puccinelli is Director of Liturgy & Music at St. Rita Parish in Sierra Madre, CA, and a member of the Retreat-Team at Mater Dolorosa Retreat Center.

Scripture:

Romans 8:31b-39
Luke 13:31-35

 Reflection:

 “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

This bold and comforting statement from Paul’s letter to the Romans pretty much says it all!  We cannot be separated from the love of God.  However, we can ignore it and pretend our connection with God isn’t there.  Jesus confirms this in our second reading today.

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how many times I yearned to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you were unwilling!  Behold, your house will be abandoned.”

It would seem we each have to make a choice.  If we make a choice to affirm and accept God’s love, we clearly must reject the divisive nature of our times.  We are one with God and one with each other.  Separation from God’s love or each other negates our affirmation.

So, what I say to others matters.  Negative comments about others on social media, support for violence of any kind, absence of compassion for those without homes or countries, cursory judgments on the lives of others and bigotry towards those who are different from us do matter.  These behaviors are representative of a choice for separation and against unity with God’s love.

As a Passionist, I join with others at the foot of the Cross to affirm God’s love.  At the Cross of Jesus, we are all one in God’s love.

 

Terry McDevitt, Ph.D. is a member of the Passionist Family in Louisville, Kentucky.