Daily Scripture

Scripture:

Tobit 6:10-11; 7:1bcde,9-17; 8:4-9a
Mark 12:28-34

 

Reflection:

Loving Jesus…in Many Ways!

Today’s Gospel selection begins with a probing question from one of the Scribes:  “Which is the first of all the commandments?”  Jesus’ response flowed from his knowledge of the ancient Scriptures:  love God with every dimension of your person — and love your neighbor as yourself.

A single question was asked by the scribe, an important one.  Jesus’ answer combined two commandments of the Old Testament into one…thus stating that the two cannot be separated.  We cannot truly love God if we do not love our fellow human beings…as we love ourselves.

This encouragement on love comes at a special time in our calendar year:  the month of June.  These days of June have traditionally been days for many people to celebrate their commitments in marriage, or the ordination of those called to sacramental priesthood.  This June 2015 is also part of the year-long celebration of Consecrated Life established by Pope Francis; religious men and women are invited to collaborate on service projects during the summer months, highlighting the special character of consecrated life.  And for the Passionists of Holy Cross Province, we will gather June 10 – 16 in our Provincial Chapter to deepen our love of God, neighbor and self as we look to the future and consider our Passionist community life and ministries.  The Church likewise celebrates the love of Jesus for us all in the Feast of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus on Friday, June 12.  Love!!

For each of us, Jesus’ words are a challenge to look deep in our hearts and reflect on the quality of our love.  Is God first and foremost?  Do we truly love our sisters and brothers?  Even our love of self these days:  do we truly care for our physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual well-being?  No doubt, we each can deepen our love on all levels…and our pondering of the person of Jesus in the Scriptures, our reception of the Sacraments of Eucharist and Reconciliation can greatly help our love grow and be even more fruitful.

Jesus passionately loves each of us, and invites us to celebrate and grow in His love as we ponder his Sacred Passion and credibly live our vocations.  May we be blessed these summer days!

 

Fr. John Schork, C.P. is the local leader of the Passionist community in Louisville, Kentucky. 

Scripture:

Tobit 3:1-11a, 16-17a
Mark 12:18-27

 

Reflection:

Command my life breath to be taken from me . . . It is better for me to die than to live . . . I am overwhelmed with grief. Tobit 3:6

Sometimes we are so overwhelmed with life that we want to give up. It seems that it would just be easier to die. And sometimes, we may even entertain the idea of suicide.

I was a freshman in college when I considered killing myself. I had had an abortion, and I hated myself. I couldn’t find the forgiveness I needed even though I had gone to confession. I was driving down the freeway and thought that if I just drove into oncoming traffic, my pain would be over in an instant. I would finally be at peace. But then I thought of the pain I would cause another family or families who would also be involved in the accident, so I couldn’t do it.

I finally told our chaplain that I was entertaining suicidal thoughts. He helped me so much that day. He told me that any thoughts of suicide come straight from the pit of hell and that the next time one came, I was to reject it immediately and ask God to protect me. He said that my reasons for not wanting to live were all lies from Satan who is a liar and the father of lies. Father Frank saved my life that day.

Others are not so fortunate to have someone help them face their demons, and they do in fact kill themselves. Growing up, I believed a person would go to hell if they committed suicide, but today I believe you aren’t culpable for your sin if you are desperate enough to kill yourself.

The catechism states this: “We should not despair of the eternal salvation of persons who have taken their own lives. By ways known to Him alone, God can provide the opportunity for salutary repentance. The Church prays for persons who have taken their own lives.” (Catechism 2283)

Father, today we lift up anyone who is considering suicide, and for families who are suffering the pain of losing someone to suicide. Please send them the help they need, and the assurance of your love and consolation. We pray in Jesus’s Name. Amen.

 

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 wrote her first book: God Speaks to Ordinary People – Like You and Me. Visit Janice’s website at http://www.janicecarleton.com/ or email her at [email protected].

Scripture:

Tobit 2:9-14
Mark 12:13-17

Reflection:

The coin in today’s gospel passage—the coin which Jesus used to respond to the “trick question” which had been put to him—reminded me of the first reading’s closing passage, in which Tobit’s wife, Anna, challenges him for being “two-faced”.

Tobit has been introduced to us as a generous and pious person, faithful to the covenant even though his family had splintered from the Jerusalem Temple. Following the exile into Assyria, he continued his virtuous practices, especially the burial of the dead. This practice ultimately leads to his becoming a fugitive until the untimely death of the king, Sennacherib, makes possible his re-establishing his family life in Nineveh.

Following his misfortune that leads to blindness, Tobit seems to change, he seems to lose his pious and charitable attitude. When he rashly judges that his wife, Anna, has brought home a stolen goat, he refuses to keep it and demands that she return it to its owner. Anna then rebukes him, and asks what became of his pious nature; perhaps this is his real character now being displayed.

I think all of us can relate to Tobit’s response. We go through our life’s duties trying to be faithful to our Catholic way of life. We make efforts, consciously, to do the right thing. Eventually, all of us will come to the crisis that unleashes a run of words, throws up a wall of silence, or sharpens the biting rebuke that is not at all our “best self”.

Anna accuses her husband of being hypocritical, of finally revealing his true “side”. We are probably not surprised at Anna’s behavior; she has been hurt by the refusal of Tobit to accept her explanation that the goat was a “bonus” for a job well-done. Perhaps Tobit’s doubts are being interpreted by Anna as doubts about the quality of her work, implying that no one would give her a bonus for her work.

Let us bring Jesus into our reflection. We know from today’s gospel passage that Jesus was quite adept at turning his accusers’ traps and plots back on themselves. Jesus knew human nature, our shared human nature, and it is the reason that Jesus can be compassionate with us. As we will discover in the continuation of this reading, tomorrow, the compassion of Jesus flows as healing balm into our hearts when we repent, when we recognize the wrong we have done, and ask forgiveness, seek reconciliation with God and with those whom we have offended.

The two sides of a coin can always remind us that our human nature is flawed but redeemed. Which side of the coin of our personhood will we offer to Jesus and to our neighbor?

 

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

Feast of Saint Justin, Martyr

Scripture:

Tobit 1:3, 2:1b-8
Mark 12:1-12

Reflection:

Today is the feast of St. Justin, an early Christian martyr who lived in the second century.  He was a brilliant philosopher and a stout defender of the Christian faith—a stance that ultimately cost him his life.

The readings for today are part of the ordinary weekly cycle but their content makes us think about the cost of Christian discipleship.  The gospel story of the workers in the vineyard who abuse the emissaries of the owner and finally even kill his son—a harbinger of Jesus’ own suffering and death—is familiar to us.   But we seldom hear readings from the Book of Tobit like the one we have today.   This unusual book was probably written sometime in the second century before Christ,  and meant as a story of encouragement in the wake of Alexander the Great’s conquest of the Middle East, which left the Jews of the region living under foreign rule.  The author of Tobit casts the story much earlier, when Israel was in exile due to the Assyrian invasion in the 7^th century B.C.  Tobit is a devout and faithful Jew living in Nineveh with his family.  In the quaint scene depicted in our reading, Tobit is enjoying a “fine dinner” celebrating the feast of Pentecost.  Reflecting Tobit’s goodness, he tells his son Tobiah to go out and find a poor man with whom Tobit can share his feast.  However, the son returns with a very different report—he has discovered the body of a fellow Jew who had been executed and left lying in the street.  In accord with Jewish piety, Tobit immediately leaves his dinner table and goes to bury the man—earning the wrath of his neighbors who preferred that this executed man would suffer the indignity of not even being buried.

As the story of Tobit continues—beyond the passage we have today—we learn that despite Tobit’s goodness he continues to suffer calamities in his life, including being blinded (from bird droppings while he is asleep!).  A parallel account in Tobit is that of the beautiful Sarah who has seen seven of her newlywed husbands in succession die on their wedding night!

Ultimately the story of this righteous suffering receives comfort and relief.  The Angel Raphael (the name in Hebrew means, “God heals”) works to heal Tobit’s blindness and to break the cycle of death that engulfs Sarah’s life (she will successfully marry Tobiah, Tobit’s son!)—all through the healing powers drawn from the entrails of a fish! [Read the whole book to get the amazing details!]

Like ourselves, the original readers of this great biblical fable may have chuckled at some of its outrageous features.  But the underlying message contains sober truth.  Living a devout and righteous life does not necessarily protect one from acute suffering.  I think of the innocent Christians of Iraq and Syria who are suffering terrible persecution and death itself at the hands of hate-mongers who use the cover of religion for their treachery and violence.  All of us can experience suffering of a less dramatic sort that makes us ask where is God at our time of need.

But the book of Tobit in its winsome way, also reminds us of the deepest wellsprings of our faith, particularly in this Easter season.  Ultimately, God will heal us and bring us home, despite the mystery of evil and the suffering it can inflict on us.  We pray today that, like Tobit and Sarah, like Justin Martyr and all of the contemporary unnamed martyrs who suffer around the globe, that God would send the Angel Raphael, God’s own comfort, to sustain us.

 

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:

Sirach 44:1, 9-13
Mark 11:11-26

Reflection:

Sometimes a reflection is simply a reflection.  It is not an attempt to make another person accept my point of view or a “soap box” opportunity to preach about my favorite theme.  Today’s story from Mark’s gospel regarding Jesus and the temple is an opportunity to simply reflect.

“They came to Jerusalem, and on entering the temple area he began to drive out those selling and buying there.  He overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who were selling doves.  He did not permit anyone to carry anything through the temple area.”

In today’s gospel, Jesus looks angry.

One of the desert fathers, Abba (father) Poeman says, “If your brother plucks out your right eye and cuts off your right hand, and you get angry with him, you are angry without cause.  But if he separates you from God, then be angry with him.”

Jesus did not want people to be separated from God’s presence in the temple or anywhere else.  Deliberate separation from God was the worst form of injustice.  Separation from others and our world also is unjust.  We are one.

Jesus got angry when He saw this injustice.  Today’s reflection is simple.  Am I angry enough to “turn over the tables” when I see divisiveness in the sacred temple of our world?

 

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

Scripture:

Sirach 36:1, 4-5a, 10-17
Mark 10:32-45

Reflection:

Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem and the Son of Man will be handed over.

Today’s Gospel concludes one of the “framing” or “sandwich” technique examples in Mark’s Gospel. The evangelist skillfully applies this method to induce the reader to pay attention; but our temptation is to get lost in the bread and not get to the meat! You see, back in the eighth chapter of Mark’s narrative we read about Jesus healing a blind man at the pool of Bethsaida; remember, when Jesus asked if he could see, the man replied he could, but people were like trees walking, and Jesus had to come back and heal again! After that, at three different times, Jesus predicts his own Passion. Today’s Gospel is the third and final scenario. In tomorrow’s Gospel, from the latter part of Mark 10, Jesus will heal another blind person, Bartimaeus, the man who kept shouting, “Son of David, have pity on me! What Mark is trying to do by framing the three Passion narratives with the stories of the healing of two blind men is to remind us that the disciples were blind, unable to see Jesus’ destiny and their own.

How many times am I reluctant to hear or see what God is trying to communicate to me? To grow in holiness is not so much about concluding a significant prayer time, or taking my moral temperature on self-perfection, or giving myself a report card on good behavior. It is much a more about a growing sensitivity to God’s presence in my life. It is sort of like fine-tuning an old-time radio, trying to get on God’s wavelength. Commenting on Moses’ call in Exodus 3, when God spoke from a burning bush, the poet Elizabeth Barret Browning, penned these words,

“Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God,
But only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round and pluck blackberries.” (Aurora Leigh)

How patient the Lord was with his Twelve in their “blindness” and inability to see! How patient with me when I just don’t pay attention.

 

Fr. Jack Conley, C.P. is the director of the Office of Mission Effectiveness.  He is a member of the Passionist formation community at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. 

Scripture:

Sirach 35:1-12
Mark 10:28-31

Reflection:

The readings today are centered on giving things up to God.  Sirach tells us how to keep the law by doing works of justice, works of charity, and the giving of alms.  These works truly please God; these are the true sacrifices that enrich the altar more than gifts laid upon it.  As much as any incense, they send up a sweet odor to the Most High.  Sirach ends his litany with the exhortation: “Give to the Most High as He has given to you, generously, according to your means.”

This verse catches my eye – causes me to pause and to think.  “. . . as He has given to you.”  Can I ever enumerate all the ways that God has given to me?  If I start with today and begin to work backwards, day by day, will I ever get to the end?   As I start to move through my memories, I get lost in pauses and reveries of wonder.  Through it all, Jesus stands out – over it all and central to it all is Jesus.

A poem-prayer attributed to St. Francis Xavier in an English translation begins:

“My God, I love Thee not that I
may gain a greater place in heaven thereby.
Nor yet because all those who love not Thee
will burn in hell eternally.
No, Thou, my Jesus, whilst on the tree,
didst in Thine arms encompass me.
The nails, the lance, Thou didst endure,
. . .                   . . .                     . . .”

Francis Xavier knew that Jesus loved him personally, and that He gave Himself up upon the cross for love of him: – “. . . didst in Thine arms encompass me.”  Francis simply had to love back.

Many of us are old enough to remember retreats and missions, and maybe even religion class lessons, where we were prompted to prepare for the sacrament of penance by gazing at the crucifix and thinking, “My sins did this to you, Jesus.  I crucified you, Jesus.  I caused you this pain and horrible death.”   By such pondering we were to arouse true sorrow and repentance for our sins.

Nowadays we have recovered a much better response.  With Francis Xavier, with our own Paul of the Cross, with Teresa of Avila and Therese of Lisieux – in fact with all the great mystics and teachers  – we can gaze at Jesus crucified and ponder how in His great love, and because of His great love, Jesus did this for us.  In our prayer we can hear Him saying to us, “I did this for you – I do this for you.”

This is the much better way, I believe, to prepare for the sacrament: To keep our eye on Jesus and His great love, not on ourselves and our sins.  As we gaze upon the Lord and His love, we don’t have to worry about our sins, nor fret about the quality of our sorrow.  Jesus will take care of our sins.  He will make our sins known to us in His own way; and we shall find ourselves more easily dealing with our sinfulness and the root of our sin as He wants us to in His own time.

“Give to the Most High as He has given to you.”  “God so loved the world that He sent His only Son . . . ”

Gazing upon the generosity of God’s love in Jesus crucified will lead us, I think, to be truly generous ourselves.

 

Peter Fitzpatrick, CFX, is a Xaverian Brother living at Ryken House, Louisville, across  Bear Grass Creek from the Passionist Community Sacred Heart Monastery.  

 

Scripture:

Sirach 17:20-24
Mark 10:17-27

Reflection:

Our western civilization, even in these difficult economic times, is one of the wealthiest in history.  So when we hear Mark’s Gospel today, it might cause us to panic.  But it is not wealth itself that poses the biggest threat to our salvation, but rather the attachments we form to the things that wealth buys.  We lament often about our society’s fascination with our “toys” – Depending on our interest, we may long for a big screen TV, the latest I-Pad or I-phone or a new car, top of the line golf clubs, or a big house or any of the myriad of other items we see on TV or in the ads.  And we should be clear.  These things are not evil in themselves, but certainly our attachment to them – both in the longing and in the possession can turn these things to evil for us.  If the possessions cause us to make bad choices – such as not sharing what we have with those who are in need, or spending an inordinate time with our toys and hobbies – or if our possessions become an obstacle in our relationship with God, then these things do become evil and impede our entrance into eternal life.

The last two lines of today’s gospel, however, tell a story of everlasting hope.  As members of our wealthy society today, it certainly will be hard to enter heaven.  In fact, it’s probably accurate to say that most of us as members of our culture today could never achieve heaven on our own.  But not to worry,   God has our back.  Yes, we are going to make mistakes, give in to temptations,  but God is there for us.  God will forgive us and God will love us.  As today’s Gospel tells us, it is probably impossible for us to achieve heaven, but for God, it is possible.

Let us pray for God’s mercy and rejoice always in the love God shared with us through the passion and death of Jesus, our Savior.

 

Mary Lou Butler is a long-time friend and partner in ministry to the Passionists in California.