Friday - July 21, 2017
God refuses only the person who does not admit his own weakness; ...The life of a soul who seeks true happiness clearly and indisputably depends on this: that those who seek their joy in God are the ones who give joy to God.
~~St. Raphael Kalinowski
TODAY'S READINGS
July 21, 2017
Friday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 393
Reading 1EX 11:10—12:14
Although Moses and Aaron performed various wondersin Pharaoh's presence,
the LORD made Pharaoh obstinate,
and he would not let the children of Israel leave his land.
The LORD said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt,
"This month shall stand at the head of your calendar;
you shall reckon it the first month of the year.
Tell the whole community of Israel: On the tenth of this month
every one of your families must procure for itself a lamb,
one apiece for each household.
If a family is too small for a whole lamb,
it shall join the nearest household in procuring one
and shall share in the lamb
in proportion to the number of persons who partake of it.
The lamb must be a year-old male and without blemish.
You may take it from either the sheep or the goats.
You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, and then,
with the whole assembly of Israel present,
it shall be slaughtered during the evening twilight.
They shall take some of its blood
and apply it to the two doorposts and the lintel
of every house in which they partake of the lamb.
That same night they shall eat its roasted flesh
with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.
It shall not be eaten raw or boiled, but roasted whole,
with its head and shanks and inner organs.
None of it must be kept beyond the next morning;
whatever is left over in the morning shall be burned up.
"This is how you are to eat it:
with your loins girt, sandals on your feet and your staff in hand,
you shall eat like those who are in flight.
It is the Passover of the LORD.
For on this same night I will go through Egypt,
striking down every first born of the land, both man and beast,
and executing judgment on all the gods of Egypt—I, the LORD!
But the blood will mark the houses where you are.
Seeing the blood, I will pass over you;
thus, when I strike the land of Egypt,
no destructive blow will come upon you.
"This day shall be a memorial feast for you,
which all your generations shall celebrate
with pilgrimage to the LORD, as a perpetual institution."
Responsorial PsalmPS 116:12-13, 15 AND 16BC, 17-18
R. (13) I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord.How shall I make a return to the LORD
for all the good he has done for me?
The cup of salvation I will take up,
and I will call upon the name of the LORD.
R. I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord.
Precious in the eyes of the LORD
is the death of his faithful ones.
I am your servant, the son of your handmaid;
you have loosed my bonds.
R. I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord.
To you will I offer sacrifice of thanksgiving,
and I will call upon the name of the LORD.
My vows to the LORD I will pay
in the presence of all his people.
R. I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord.
AlleluiaJN 10:27
R. Alleluia, alleluia.My sheep hear my voice, says the Lord,
I know them, and they follow me.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
GospelMT 12:1-8
Jesus was going through a field of grain on the sabbath.His disciples were hungry
and began to pick the heads of grain and eat them.
When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him,
"See, your disciples are doing what is unlawful to do on the sabbath."
He said to the them, "Have you not read what David did
when he and his companions were hungry,
how he went into the house of God and ate the bread of offering,
which neither he nor his companions
but only the priests could lawfully eat?
Or have you not read in the law that on the sabbath
the priests serving in the temple violate the sabbath
and are innocent?
I say to you, something greater than the temple is here.
If you knew what this meant, I desire mercy, not sacrifice,
you would not have condemned these innocent men.
For the Son of Man is Lord of the sabbath."
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God desires mercy, not legalistic sacrifices!
While Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a journalist asked him (on Nov. 30, 2002) about maintaining fidelity to old Church teachings while being open to the Holy Spirit for new interpretations. "How is it possible not to fall into the extremes of rigidity or rupture?" he asked.
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI replied that although "fidelity and openness seem to exclude one another," they do not. He explained that authentic fidelity to the Church "is a dynamic fidelity. ... participates in the dynamism of the person of Christ, who can open himself to the different challenges of reality, of the other, of the world, etc."
This dynamism -- the ability to adapt to life's challenges instead of remaining static -- is what shook up the safe little world of the Pharisees when Jesus replaced legalism with love. In the Gospel reading today, they didn't attack Jesus simply to give him a hard time. They truly believed that to be right with God, one must obey all the laws and rules literally and exactly. They also insisted that laws and rules were to be obeyed equally; rules that dealt with rituals were kept as rigidly as the laws that dealt with morality. So when Jesus broke some of the ritual laws, they could not imagine how he could be a holy man, let alone the long-awaited Messiah.
To explain his position, Jesus said: "It's mercy God desires, not sacrifice." It's a sacrifice to obey a law that's unpleasant. This is virtuous! However, forcing the disciples to go hungry on account of an over-ritualized definition of "work" would have been unmerciful. Jesus responded dynamically to the needs of the disciples based on the real purpose behind the commandment to rest on the Sabbath. What was the real purpose? Love! God's love for us! He knows that we need to rest and that without making it a commandment, those of us who work hard wouldn't get around to resting.
A sacrifice that's unloving is not what God wants. Remaining legalistically static when a situation calls for deeper examination and merciful consideration comes from a fear that any perceived disobedience is a violation of God's will and therefore deserves punishment. We forget to look at the loving purpose of the law.
The bottom line and original reason for every commandment of God and every regulation taught by the Catholic Church is love. However, this can be hard to see when we're relying on simple obedience to make us "good" enough for heaven, which will never happen. Thank God that Jesus is our Savior, not the law.
Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath; his love has authority over the Sabbath. His love is the authority over all our religious laws, rules, and norms today. When they fail to convey the love of Jesus or they work against a person's eternal salvation, we have to rediscover their real intention and determine how to apply it to the current situation. This is how we remain faithful to the Church's teachings without being merciless.
Since the real intention of religious laws, rules, and norms is to draw us closer to God's love, it's important to investigate what the Church's teaching on it is. Then, if we are humble enough to be dynamic Christians, we will realize why it's good to obey it and our attitude about it will change. This is especially true of morallaws, which are never changeable.
And when others are slow in understanding the truth of the Church's teachings, we need to be patient with them mercifully. We will never change anyone's mind without explaining the truth with loving compassion -- and often the process takes quite a lot of time.
Mercy is a dynamic response to the challenges of a changing world. If we want to imitate Christ, we have to become dynamic Christians.
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God Bless You.....
The mother of Jesus promised St. Dominic that, “one day through the rosary & the scapular I shall save the world!”
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