AD SENSE

15th Week: July 12-17:

July 12 Monday:

The context: Jesus declares, “I have not come to bring peace but the sword,” meaning the Messianic ministry will divide family member and the society as a whole between those who accept the ideas and ideals preached and the Master who preaches them, from those who oppose both. Jesus then concludes this great “missionary discourse” with an instruction to the twelve Apostles on the cost and the reward found in the commitment to discipleship.

The first half of these sayings of Jesus is about the behavior expected from the apostles and disciples, and the second half is about the behavior of others towards them. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword: Jesus clarifies that Hen Messianic mission offers people lasting, rather than the temporary, worldly peace, of the simple absence of war and freedom from all conflicts in the family and society instead of the transformation of all in that True Peace. Our role is to keep fighting against our evil habits and addictions using the spiritual sword of the word of God which is “lively and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12). “Whoever loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy ofM….” : What Jesus means is that all loyalties must give place to loyalty to God.  In other words, we cannot condone immoral practices even in members of our family, let alone in ourselves. Jesus is not speaking against the family, but rather reminding us that we are part of the larger family of our fellow-Christians and, hence, we have more responsibilities. We must be ready to lose our lives for Christ: By “losing one’s life” Jesus means that we must stop living for ourselves alone.  Instead, we must spend our lives for others and care for those who are sick and hungry.  We are to give hospitality to strangers in Jesus’ name. (“offering a cup of cold water”): There are four main links in the chain of salvation: i) God who has sent Jesus with His message, ii) Jesus who has preached the “Good News,” iii) the human messenger who preaches Jesus’ message through his words and life, and iv) the believer who welcomes the messengers and then lives out the message. Hence, giving hospitality to a preacher or a believer is the same as welcoming Jesus, the messenger’s Master. The basis of all hospitality is that we all belong to God’s family, and that every person is our brother or sister.

Life message: 1) We need to be hospitable and generous: Hospitality allows us to encounter the presence of God in others, usually in those in whom we least expect to find Him, and to share our love with them. We become fully alive as Christians through the generous giving of ourselves to others. (http://frtonyshomilies.com/) L/21

July 13 Tuesday (St. Henry): 

The context: Jesus reminds these cities that they deserve God’s punishment because they have forgotten the responsibilities which their numerous meetings with the Messiah in their midst have laid upon them. They should have listened to the Master’s message, put it into practice, and borne witness to the miracles Jesus had worked for them.

 Chorazin, Bethsaida, Capernaum: Nothing is mentioned in any of the Gospels about the “wonders” Jesus worked in these cities. Bethsaida was a fishing village on the west bank of Jordan at the northern end of the lake. Chorazin was a town one hour’s walking distance north of Capernaum. Jesus expresses holy anger and sorrowful pity from a broken heart at the irresponsible disregard and indifference these three ungrateful cities have shown to the Good News. Jesus warns them, “it shall be more tolerable on the Day of Judgment for Tyre and Sidon .. [and] the land of Sodom” than for them, because Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom were not fortunate enough to hear Jesus and to receive the opportunitoes for conversion given to Bethsaida, Chorazin and Capernaum.

Life Messages: Privileges always carry responsibilities: 1) We are privileged to have the holy Bible, so we have the responsibility of making use of it. 2) We have the Eucharistic celebration every day in our Churches, so we have the responsibility of participating in it when we are able to do so. 3) We have the Sacrament of Reconciliation, so we have the responsibility of using it to be reconciled with Jesus and his Church. 4) We are blessed with having the Holy Spirit to guide the teaching authority in the Church, so we have the responsibility of studying and following the Church’s directives and teachings. 5) We have Mary, the mother of Jesus, and numerous saints as our role models, so we have the responsibility of following Jesus in their footsteps. (http://frtonyshomilies.com/) L/21

July 14 Wednesday (St. Kateri Tekakwitha, Virgin, U. S. A.) 

The context: Jesus knew that ordinary people with large, sensitive hearts, rather than proud intellectuals like the Scribes and the Pharisees, were able accept the “Good News” the Master preached. Such people would inherit Heaven rather than the learned and the wise who prided themselves on   their intellectual achievements. Hence, in the first part of today’s Gospel Jesus prays loudly, thanking God his Father and praising Him for revealing Himself to the simple-hearted, thus condemning intellectual pride. A person who is full of self-centeredness fails to perceive supernatural things.

Jesus’ unique claim of God’s perfect reflection: No one really knows the Father except the Son, and him to whom the Son wishes to reveal Him” (Matthew 11:27). The claim that Jesus alone can reveal God to men forms the center of the Christian Faith. John records Jesus’ claim in different words which He spoke at the Last Supper: “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (Jn 14:9). What Jesus says is this: “If you want to see what God is like, if you want to see the mind of God, the heart of God, the nature of God, if you want to see God’s whole attitude to men–look at Me!”

Life message: 1) We need to know and love God better by studying Jesus’ revelation about God his Father. We do this by daily reading the Holy Bible, especially the Gospels, by meditating on the passages read and by applying them to our lives. 2) The more we study the Bible, the more we learn about the Triune God, and especially about Jesus our Savior. This knowledge will help us to love Jesus more, experience Jesus’ presence in our daily lives, see Jesus’ face in everyone around us, and surrender our lives to Jesus by rendering humble service to everyone around us. (http://frtonyshomilies.com/) L/21

July 15 Thursday (St. Bonaventure, Bishop, Doctor of the Church): https://www.franciscanmedia.org/saint-of-the-day/saint-bonaventure 

The context: In today’s Gospel, Jesus offers rest to those who labor and are burdened, if they are ready to accept Christ’s easy yoke and light burden. For the Orthodox Jew, religion was a matter of burdens, namely, 613 Mosaic laws and thousands of oral interpretations, which dictated every aspect of life. Christ invites the overburdened Israel, and us, to take Jesus’ yoke upon our shoulders. In Palestine, ox-yokes were made of wood and were carved to fit the ox comfortably. The yoke of Christ can be seen as the sum of our Christian responsibilities and duties. Jesus’ yoke is light because it is given with love. It is the commandment to love others as Jesus did. Besides, the yoke of Christ is not just a yoke from Christ but also a yoke with Jesus. So, we are not yoked alone to pull the plow by our own unaided power. We are yoked together with Christ to work with Christ using Christ’s strength. Jesus is inviting each one of us to be yoked this way , to unite our life, our will, and our heart with the Life, ,Will, and Heart of Christ. By saying that this “yoke is easy,” Jesus means that whatever God sends us is made to fit our needs and our abilities exactly.

The second part of Jesus’ claim is: “My burden is light.”  Jesus does not mean that this burden is easy to carry, but that it is laid on us in love. This burden is meant to be carried in love, and love makes even the heaviest burden light.  By following Jesus, one will find peace, rest, and real refreshment. We are burdened with many things: business, concerns about jobs, marriage, money, health, children, security, old age, and a thousand other things. Jesus is asking us to give all these burdens and take on the yoke offered here.. By telling us, “Take my yoke . . . and you will find rest,” Christ is asking us to do things the Christian way. When we are centered in God, when we follow God’s commandments, we have no heavy burdens.

Life messages:  1) We need to be freed from unnecessary burdens: Jesus is interested in lifting off our backs the burdens that drain us and suck the life out of us, so that Christ can place around our necks Jesus’ own yoke and Jesus’ burden, that bring to us, and to others through us, new life, new energy, and new joy.

2) We need to unload our burdens before the Lord. One of the functions of worship for many of us is that it gives us a time for rest and refreshment, when we let the overheated radiators of our hectic lives cool down before the Lord. This is especially true when we unload the burdens of our sins and worries and evil addictions on the altar and offer them to God during the Holy Mass. (Fr. Kadavil) (http://frtonyshomilies.com/) L/21

July 16 Friday (Our Lady of Mount Carmel) https://www.franciscanmedia.org/saint-of-the-day/our-lady-of-mount-carmel : Mt 12: 1-8: Mount Carmel is a mountain in northern Palestine about twenty miles from Nazareth and overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, it lies three miles south of Haifa in modern Israel. 1 Kgs 18 describes how the prophet Elijah’s prayer on Mount Carmel for rain was answered and how he defeated the 450 pagan priests of Baal on the same mountain. He challenged them to bring fire from Heaven to burn the sacrificed bulls placed on the altar, and he proved that only Yahweh was the true God. According to the most ancient Carmelite chronicles, the Order had its origins with the disciples of the prophets Elijah and Eliseus on Mount Carmel. They lived very ascetic lives in caves on Mount Carmel honoring the “Holy Virgin” of the Messianic prophecies who would give birth to the promised Messiah. When the Apostles started preaching Jesus, the pious ascetics of Carmel accepted the Christian Faith. In the 13th century, a group of pilgrims who followed the Crusaders was impressed by the lifestyle of the disciples of Elijah. Hence, they set up a religious community on the western slopes of Mount Carmel and started living very ascetic lives. This was the beginning of the modern Carmelite Order, whose members started leading a contemplative life under the patronage of Mary, honoring her as the Mother of God and  Our Lady of Mount Carmel. The people began to call them Friars of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel. Pope Honorius III approved the order’s rule in 1232 (or 1236?) . Since the Turks had started conquering Palestine by 1235, the hermits decided to go back to Europe, where they built monasteries in Cyprus, Italy, France, and England. St. Simon Stock, an English Carmelite, became the superior of all the Carmelites in 1247. He helped the order expand and adapt to the times, patterning the order on the Dominicans and Franciscans. The feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel was instituted first for the Carmelites in 1332 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the approval of the rule of the Carmelite Order. The Order of Discalced Carmelites of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel (OCD) resulted from 16th century reforms of the Carmelites by St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross, and the order Carmelites of Mary Immaculate (CMI) still later in Kerala state of India.  Our Lady of Mount Carmel and the Brown scapular: According a popular legend, Mary appeared to St. Simon Stock on July 16, 1251, and gave him the Brown Scapular with the following words: “This will be for you and for all Carmelites the privilege, that he who dies in this will not suffer eternal fire.” Mary promised her protection to all those who would wear the blessed habit and lead a life of prayer and sacrifice. Pope St. Pius X (1903 -1914) declared that that the common people could have the same blessings if they would wear the metallic scapular medal carrying the picture of Our Lady of the Scapular on one side and the Sacred Heart on the other. The feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel challenges us both to imitate the simple and ascetic life of the Blessed Virgin Mary with her trusting Faith in God and her humility, and to seek her guidance and maternal protection in our Christian lives. (Fr. Tony) L/21 

July 17 Saturday: 

The context: The confrontation between Jesus and the Pharisees reached its climax with Jesus’ “blasphemous” statement: “The Sabbath is made for man and not man for the Sabbath. The Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.” Jesus realized that there was more work of preaching and healing that needed to be done. So, withdrawing to to a less-known place to avoid a premature arrest, Jesus asked people not to give publicity to their miraculous healings. Further, , Jesus wanted to avoid being labelled a false messiah or revolt-inducer against the Roman empire, allegations the hostile religious and political leaders of Israel longed to make and substantiate. Jesus uses the occasion (quoting from the “Suffering Servant” prophecy, Isaiah 42:1-4), to teach the apostles and the people that the Messiah’s role is not using crushing power to subdue people but offering sacrificial service to uplift them. Isaiah 42:1-4 directly refers to the conquering Persian king Cyrus (whom God used as His instrument to discipline His people), but indirectly and in its full meaning, it refers to the promised Messiah, Jesus. The prophecy teaches that 1) the Messiah will be anointed with God’s Spirit; 2) the Messiah will bring justice to the Gentiles in showing them how to give to God what is due to Him and to men what is due them; 3) the Messiah will preach gentle and forgiving love; 4) the Messiah will bring God’s healing love of hope and encouragement to the Gentiles, even though their Faith and witnessing be weak as a reed or feeble as a flickering lamp.

Life messages: 1) Let us have the courage of our Christian convictions in the face of opposition to our practice of the Faith. 2) Let us keep hoping in God and trusting in His mercy and justice in thepains and suffering inflicted on us by others. (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)