16th Week, Saturday, July 26: Sts Joachim and Anne
Exodus
24:3-8 / Matthew 13:24-30
God
covenants his people; 'This is God's covenant with you.”
The covenant experience transformed Israel from a mob of ex-slaves into a chosen people. It gave them an identity and a destiny. A modern Jew, Will Herberg, puts it this way: "Israel is not a 'natural' nation; it is, indeed, not a nation at all like the nations of the world. It is a supernatural community, called into being by God to serve his eternal purposes in history." Israel's covenant experience at Mt. Sinai gave the people a uniqueness. Apart from Christianity and Islam, which owe their origin, in part, to Israel, no other religion originated as Judaism did. Other religions sprang from nature; Judaism sprang from an event in history.
***
Do we
recognize our spiritual debt to Israel? "Apart from the covenant, Israel
is as nothing and Jewish existence is a mere illusion. The covenant is at the
very heart of the Jewish self-understanding of its own reality." Will Herberg
***
Today’s
first reading describes the rite of the covenant, by which Israel became God’s chosen
people with whom God made a blood compact, a “sangduguan” (was an
ancient ritual in the Philippines intended to seal a friendship or treaty, or
to validate an agreement. The contracting parties would cut their wrists and
pour their blood into a cup filled with liquid, such as wine, and drink the
mixture., whereby they became his blood relations.) “I am the Lord thy God” (in
the singular, “thy”, term of intimacy). The tremendous, inaccessible God of
Sinai is the God who is present to every person and who accepts to go along
with people in their adventures of hope and love, of life and death. He is the
God of his people. By taking the risk to be with us, he obliges us to take the
risk of faith to seek him and to be near to him. Christ will raise this
covenant to a deeper level and make it everlasting. At the heart of every
eucharist, in the consecration, he tells us: “You are my blood brothers and
sisters. This is the blood of the new and everlasting covenant.”
***
We may know of some people who have left the Church because of a bad experience. The bad experience can be anything from being told off by a priest to an argument with another Catholic in Church. And their common grouse is this - How can Church people/ Catholics be like this? Yes, how can Catholics or people who go to Church be like this? Just what is the Church all about?
Well,
ideally, we would think that the Church is made up of good and nice people who
would not give any kind of trouble whatsoever. After all the Church is called
the Holy Catholic Church. Yet if Jesus came for sinners, then the Church is
also refuge for sinners and a place where sinners will slowly learn to be
saints.
Even Jesus
Himself did not weed out people like Peter and Judas, and He even gave hope to
sinners who want to repent. May we acknowledge that we are indeed sinners but
let us also acknowledge the power of God's grace. May we journey on in
repentance and conversion and may others see the Church as a sign of salvation.
***
All around
us, but in our hearts as well, weeds are growing together with the wheat – the
bad with the good. This is life, and it is not easy to take. We see first of
all the weeds growing in the garden of our neighbour, and we want him to pull
them out. But we should look into our own hearts as well. What to do? To pluck
out the bad as best as we can. And not to be upset that, after all, we are not
entirely good. We have to live with it in faith and in hope and leave it all in
the hands of God.
***
Prayer: Almighty and inaccessible God, you have made yourself
our God and placed yourself into our hands. Make us conscious of all the tender
love that prompts you to take the risk of entering our life and death, of
sharing our fleeting hopes and destiny, of being with us all the way. Give us
the faith to take the risk of seeking you with all our hearts, that you may
indeed be our God and we your kinfolk and people through our brother, Jesus
Christ our Lord. Amen
***
Saints Joachim and Ann
Feast day July 26
You have probably heard the expression: The apple does not fall far from the tree. It means that children are often like their parents. Scripture does not tell us anything about the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Tradition tells us that their names were Joachim and Ann. The name Ann means “grace,” while Joachim means “the Lord will judge.” Tradition also says that Joachim and Ann took their daughter to the Temple in Jerusalem when she was very young. They understood that Mary was a special child, so they dedicated her to God.
We do know that Joachim and Ann have been honored in the Church from early Christian times. By looking at Mary, their child, we can figure out several things about them. They must have set the example that Mary followed to become the loving, gentle, faith-filled, courageous woman she was—the perfect woman to bear and raise the Son of God.
Whether or not Joachim and Ann are the real names of Mary’s parents, the couple were the holy, heroic ones who faithfully prepared for the coming of the Messiah.
Because Joachim and Ann were the grandparents of Jesus, they are the patrons of grandparents. St. Ann is venerated in Canada, where there is a basilica in her honor in Quebec.
