Daily Scripture

Scripture:

Genesis 6:5-8, 7:1-5, 10
Mark 8:14-21

Reflection:

Jesus was a person of tremendous contemplative intuition.  I would guess, that as he was growing up, he was often the observer, silently watching people and their interactions; the eruptions of their feeling and emotions; how they acted in response to different stimuli that touched them.  His contemplative intuition began to reveal the inner hearts of those he was observing.

The very fact we grow older and have many experiences in life, helps us develop an ability to see underneath a lot of commotion.  Children who are experiencing many things for the first time in their young lives, have no idea that the adults watching them can often see right through them.  As an adult we may be chuckling and saying to ourselves, "Been there.  Done that."

Teenagers may be a little more difficult to read.  They often feel that they are surrounded by a secret shield that makes the adult world stand in shock and a state of dumbfoundedness.  Parents, because of their emotional involvement with their own teenagers, can lose some of this adult perception and begin to pull out their hair in frustration.  It may take a little more intuitive ability, but teenagers are not that hard to read with regards to their basic patterns of growth.  Each new generation seems to need to reinvent the wheel.

A certain contemplative ability comes with age and experience.  However, there are much more profound levels of life harvesting intuitions that must be developed with prayer and reflection and the guidance of the Holy Spirit.  We need to dwell with suffering; get inside and abide in the human heart; feel the pain and loneliness of others; meditate on the passion and death of Jesus; learn more about other cultures and how people feel and live their lives there.  We try not to let life just pass us by as a blur.  We try to intuit the heart of what is happening.

Our readings today reveal this contemplative ability in God.  In the Genesis passage, God not only sees how great was the external wickedness of man but he also saw "how no desire that his heart conceived was ever anything but evil, he regretted that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was grieved."  But God, able to read hearts, knew the goodness of heart of Noah and his family.

The disciples, in the boat, were all befuddled when Jesus began speaking about the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.  They concluded that Jesus spoke these words because they forget to bring enough bread for the crossing.  As he did so often, Jesus must have shook his head in amazement at their lack of understanding.  But reading their hearts and seeing their inner darkness and confusion, he responded, "….. Are you hearts so hardened?"  Do you have eyes and not see, ears and not hear?

The eyes we use to see and the ears we use to hear must lead us beyond the mere externals and help us to read the inner dimensions of what we are experiencing.  We are all called to this kind of contemplation.  True, some seem to be highly gifted in this area and we love to read their reflections on life.  But don’t underestimate your calling to do the same.

 

Fr. Blaise Czaja, C.P. gives parish missions and retreats.  He is a member of the Passionist Community in Detroit, Michigan. 

Scripture:

Genesis 3:1-8
Mark 7:31-37

Reflection:

 Antoine de Saint-Exupery wrote: "What is essential is invisible to the eye."

Today’s readings are deeply immersed in the human senses, especially those of sight and hearing.  What gifts all of our senses are!  When all of our senses are working well, we are able to "make sense" of our world (at least the small world of our immediate family, community and friends). The deception of Adam and Eve by the serpent was a case of trying to go beyond their human senses, to a place reserved only for God.  After they ate of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, we read, "then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked."  In going beyond the only limit God had imposed on them, they knew shame, and even worse, fear of God’s presence.

In the Gospel, Jesus heals a deaf man who had a speech impediment.  Jesus orders the stopped-up ears: "BE OPENED!", and immediately the man could hear and speak plainly. 

Perhaps our readings are asking you and me a couple of simple questions today: "What in me (in us, as church, society) is stopped-up, or deaf?  Are we deaf (even partially so) to the sufferings/needs of others?  How can we (I) help others to open up more fully to God’s healing love in and around them?

"What is essential is invisible to the eye."  Indeed.  Only by taking on Jesus’ heart as our very own, will we be able to see, hear and then do God’s loving will fully.

 

Fr. Bob Bovenzi, C.P. is stationed in Chicago, Illinois.

Scripture:

Genesis 2:18-25
Mark 7:24-30

Reflection:

Today is the 200th anniversary of the births of two men who significantly changed the course of history: Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin.  Interestingly enough today’s first reading from Genesis relates a section of one of that book’s accounts of creation.  The conjunction of these events prompts a reflection on humanness-what it means to be human. 

Human, humus, and humility-they all derive from the same root meaning "of the soil" or "of lowly origin". In the first reading we have the image of God taking earth (humus) and fashioning all manner of creatures.  But the only worthy mate for the human was the one of common origin. 

Inspired by Darwin, scientists have begun to explain the "how" of our beginnings as humans.  While we may think of humus (the common soil beneath our feet) as being of lowly origin, in fact its richness demands that (as astrophysicist Carl Sagan would put it) it is made of "star stuff".  The complex organic compounds that make up earth in fact come from elements that result from exploding stars.  So this stuff that makes up dirt is here only because distant stars have met their demise.  The stuff that makes us up, carbon and other elements came from cosmic events.  Our bodies have literally been billions of years in the making.  Human beings are creation conscious of creation.  God has created us in a most wondrous way. 

Humanity has not consistently recognized the inherent dignity of us all.  Some factions constantly plot to suppress other groups.   Is this competition for survival run amuck?  Is this the "original sin"?  God became incarnate to bring the Good News that we are to love one another.  Still, the United States Constitution actually counted slaves as less than a full persons.  Abraham Lincoln came along at a point in time when we needed to be reminded that all races deserved equal treatment.  His insights help us recognize that the very nature of human beings means that all share a common dignity.  His efforts led eventually to the Constitution’s encoding the recognition of the dignity of all people.   

Humility is truth. Our physical origins consist of the common stuff of the earth, and that stuff itself has cosmic origins.  Possessing the virtue of humility means accepting our strong points and our weaknesses as well. We neither falsely put ourselves down nor falsely exalt ourselves as someone we are not.  The Gospel reading is a story of Jesus driving out a demon.  Not all our "demons" are outside us.  For example, the twelve-step programs tell us we cannot "cure" or drive out many addictions.  We live a virtuous life by learning to live with them.  Being naked with no shame can mean facing fault or addiction and knowing we are dealing with it.  We can modify our behavior but the addiction is still there.  That requires a lot of humility. 

So today’s readings remind us that God has created us in a most wondrous way, and bestowed upon us a fantastic dignity.  Let us walk humbly with God.

 

Brother John Monzyk, C.P. is a physicist and a member of the Passionist community in Louisville, Kentucky.

Scripture:

Genesis 2:4b-9, 15-17
Mark 7:14-23

Reflection:

With every new RCIA class, someone always asks the question:  "What was so bad about Adam and Eve eating an apple that would cause God to punish them so severely?"  A variation on that question is: Are Catholics who disobeyed the Church many years ago by eating a hotdog on Friday really burning in hell?  The corollary is this: Who can love a God (Church) who is so unjust as to level the same eternal condemnation against cruel, evil people and on hotdog eaters?

The answer is, of course, that there nothing inherently wrong in eating apples or hotdogs; and God is not petty and unjust.

God gave Adam and Eve breathtaking freedom in the Garden of Eden.  But this was not unlimited freedom, another word for anarchy.  With their freedom came limits.  God asked our first parents – and us – to obey him and respect those limits.  When we disobey, we suffer the consequences; we punish ourselves.

True freedom is found only in God; outside of God, there is no freedom.  To use our freedom outside of God is fall into the slavery of sin.

Simple example: In the United States, I am free to go anywhere I choose.  But when driving on the highway system, I am not free to disregard traffic laws simply because I don’t feel like stopping or slowing down.

Viktor E. Frankl said it well: "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."

Neither apple nor hotdog defile us.  All foods are clean.  Rather, it is in our response to Christ that we grow and find true freedom.

 

Deacon Manuel Valencia is on the staff at Mater Dolorasa Passionist Retreat Center, Sierra Madre, California.

Scripture:

Job 7:1-4, 6-7
1 Corinthians 9:16-19, 22-23
Mark 1:29-39

Reflection:

During this jubilee year of Paul the apostle today’s second reading gives us great insight into his person. The Gospel was precious to Paul. He was not ashamed of this good news. He knew personally the power and wisdom of its message. Like Jeremiah of old, the Gospel becomes a fire in Paul’s bones and he is compelled to proclaim it. I remember studying the Scriptures in Israel, Greece and Egypt as a part of my Masters degree at our theologate, the Catholic Theological Union. While visiting Egypt, the Egyptian children used to run up to us shouting, "backsheesh!" This is an Arabic word for begging that literally means, "share the wealth." Pope Paul VI in the Magna Charta of evangelization Evangelii Nuntiadi wrote, "The Gospel is not something we impose on people. People have a right to hear good news." The late Holy Father saw the Gospel as an eternal treasure that people have a right to. Paul, also, was desperate about making the Gospel known because all deserve its riches.

Paul so wanted people to know the riches of the Gospel that he became "all things to all people." Some would consider this people pleasing or being codependent. Paul was simply behaving how ever he could to work with people beginning at their level of understanding and approach to worship so that they could "be saved." As a missionary I meet liberals, conservatives, traditionalists, charismatics, Marianists and every other brand of Catholics that exists. My role is not to change them into what I am, but to find common ground with them. Then the door opens to inspire them to be the best they can be. Often this requires that I swallow my spiritual pride and lay aside the "flavor" of Catholicism that I adhere to. Missionaries are invited to accept and identify with people as they are for the sake of the Gospel. This is a great challenge, but has borne fruit.

Mark’s Gospel tells us that Peter’s mother-in-law went from fever to fervor because of the touch of Jesus. She went from being passive to a passionate servant. Because of Jesus’ touch we too have a new energy, a new fire, and we are compelled to share the treasure that is Jesus. If we listen closely, we will hear the world crying out, "backsheesh!, backsheesh!" Paul gives us a wonderful example of how to share the Gospel effectively and fervently.

 

Fr. Cedric Pisegna, C.P. is a missionary preacher, author of 12 books and creator of the TV program Live with Passion! airing in many cities. You can learn more about his ministry at: http://www.frcedric.org/

Scripture:

Hebrews 13:1-8
Mark 6:14-29

Reflection:

I was driving in the neighborhood recently and a large sign on the front lawn of a church caught my attention. It was a very uncomplicated, one-word sign: WELCOME. I know people who say they go to a particular church because the pastor is an outstanding preacher or because the church community is very welcoming. Even if there is a church closer, they will drive further to be with a community where they feel welcomed.

The author of Hebrews tells us, "Do not neglect hospitality…" The biblical demand for hospitality is clear in both Old and New Testaments. In the Scriptures God has welcomed us, who are aliens and strangers, into the "household of faith." Now we are required to offer hospitality to others. Hospitality makes room for the stranger, especially those in most acute need. This is more than social entertaining and is not based on self-interest and does not expect anything in return.

The characters in our gospel story today are positively removed from a spirit of hospitality. Rather, they are frozen in their own self-interest. Herodias harbored a grudge against John the Baptist. Herod didn’t want to be embarrassed in front of his guests so he reluctantly decreed the beheading of John the Baptist to save face.

Hospitality is not about me. When my ego gets involved, I am definitely missing the primary reason for hospitality. John Ruskin, a poet of the 19th century, writes, "When a man is all wrapped up in himself, he makes a pretty small package." That certainly describes Herod and Herodias.

If you want to extend compassionate hospitality, consider talking with a person who is often ignored by others, comfort the grieving, share your faith with someone searching for meaning, speak an encouraging word to the weak, visit the sick, host neighbors in your home for the sole purpose of getting to know them, respond to those in a crisis, provide food for the homeless or support a food pantry, offer a kind word to the beggar at the street corner, visit a widow in your neighborhood on a regular basis, reach out to those who are experiencing domestic violence/abuse in their homes, have lunch with your obnoxious or agnostic co-worker, invite someone to Sunday Mass with you.  

As Jesus welcomes us as strangers, may we have the grace to welcome the stranger into our life and community.

Today is the feast of the Martyrs of Japan. Paul Miki, age 35, along with 25 other Japanese Catholics, was crucified on February 5, 1597. All were canonized by Pope Pius IX in 1862. Let us remember their heroism and, through the intercession of these martyrs, pray for the Catholic Church in Japan.

 

Fr. Don Webber, C.P., is Provincial Superior of Holy Cross Province and resides in Chicago.

Scripture:

Hebrews 12:1-4
Mark 5:21-43

Reflection:

When ever the Gospels tell of Jesus crossing in the boat "to the other side" we know that we are about to experience something beyond our control. Such an experience is described in the Second Step of AA. "Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity." We know that insanity is "making the same mistake over and over with the same results." When Jesus arrived in the room of the apparently dead daughter of Jairus, he proceeded to put out of the room those who were weeping and wailing, as well, as those who were laughing at him. The "same results" would not happen here in Jesus’ presence. His facing into the appearence of certain death or hopelessness is met with a breakthrough of life and hope. When I put my fears, resentments, and disappointments into God’s hands, I experience the "other side" of faith. This experience of putting one’s life (or death to self) into the hands of God brings about a transformation  that is not necessarily felt. Such experiences of letting go strengthen us to continue to "run with perseverance the race that is set before us," that is the human race of compasion and mercy and justice.

 

Fr. Alex Steinmiller, C.P. is president of Holy Family Cristo Rey High School, Birmingham, Alabama.

Scripture:

Hebrews 13:15-17, 20-21
Mark 6:30-34

Reflection:

"Come by yourselves to an out-of-the-way place and rest a little".  The Apostles were not only cherished friends of Jesus, they were part of his mission of salvation.  We know how he encountered and attracted seven of the twelve!  Our reading tells us of his delight with their first mission.  .  He prepared them well.  Only after they had watched and shared the preaching and conduct of the Lord did he give them detailed instructions on their first independent mission.  Now they are back and elated at their successes in curing and driving out demons.  It had been exhausting work and the Lord wanted to give them a rest.

It was not to be!  Jesus had the twelve take a boat and head for the rest spot.  The crowds who had assembled knew of a short cut and were waiting for Jesus as they landed.  Jesus would meet their need and spent the day teaching.  As evening approached, 5,000 and more were fed on a few loaves and fishes. The apostles were employed as servers!  Not much rest!  Ministry came first!

Then and now the apostolate of Jesus involves the assistants he inspires.  Vatican II tells us that in our day: "Lay people have the right and duty to be apostles."  Jesus cherishes today’s apostles as truly as he cared for his first twelve.   Today, some spend themselves in churchly functions, others fulfill their calling by serving the common good of humanity.  Today’s apostolate can be as demanding as was toil up and down the hills of Galilee.  We, too, would appreciate hearing "Rest a little.." 

Apostles in every age have known the stress of ministry.  St. Paul of the Cross reflected: "For us the saying is not ‘Rest in peace.’    For us there is work."

But it is the Lord’s work, he has chosen us and is at our side to strengthen and bless.  He loves his apostles of years long past and today.

 

Fr. Fred Sucher, C.P. is retired and lives in the Passionist community in Chicago.  For many years he taught philosophy to Passionist seminarians.