Wednesday - September 19, 2018
I will be kind to everybody, particularly to those whom I find troublesome.
~~ St. Anthony Mary Claret
September 19, 2018
Wednesday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 445
Reading 11 COR 12:31-13:13
Brothers and sisters:
Strive eagerly for the greatest spiritual gifts.
But I shall show you a still more excellent way.
If I speak in human and angelic tongues
but do not have love,
I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal.
And if I have the gift of prophecy
and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge;
if I have all faith so as to move mountains,
but do not have love, I am nothing.
If I give away everything I own,
and if I hand my body over so that I may boast
but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind.
It is not jealous, love is not pompous,
it is not inflated, it is not rude,
it does not seek its own interests,
it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury,
it does not rejoice over wrongdoing
but rejoices with the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails.
If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing;
if tongues, they will cease;
if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing.
For we know partially and we prophesy partially,
but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.
When I was a child, I used to talk as a child,
think as a child, reason as a child;
when I became a man, I put aside childish things.
At present we see indistinctly, as in a mirror,
but then face to face.
At present I know partially;
then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.
So faith, hope, love remain, these three;
but the greatest of these is love.
Strive eagerly for the greatest spiritual gifts.
But I shall show you a still more excellent way.
If I speak in human and angelic tongues
but do not have love,
I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal.
And if I have the gift of prophecy
and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge;
if I have all faith so as to move mountains,
but do not have love, I am nothing.
If I give away everything I own,
and if I hand my body over so that I may boast
but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind.
It is not jealous, love is not pompous,
it is not inflated, it is not rude,
it does not seek its own interests,
it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury,
it does not rejoice over wrongdoing
but rejoices with the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails.
If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing;
if tongues, they will cease;
if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing.
For we know partially and we prophesy partially,
but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.
When I was a child, I used to talk as a child,
think as a child, reason as a child;
when I became a man, I put aside childish things.
At present we see indistinctly, as in a mirror,
but then face to face.
At present I know partially;
then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.
So faith, hope, love remain, these three;
but the greatest of these is love.
Responsorial PsalmPS 33:2-3, 4-5, 12 AND 22
R. (12) Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Give thanks to the LORD on the harp;
with the ten stringed lyre chant his praises.
Sing to him a new song;
pluck the strings skillfully, with shouts of gladness.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
For upright is the word of the LORD,
and all his works are trustworthy.
He loves justice and right;
of the kindness of the LORD the earth is full.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Blessed the nation whose God is the LORD,
the people he has chosen for his own inheritance.
May your kindness, O LORD, be upon us
who have put our hope in you.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Give thanks to the LORD on the harp;
with the ten stringed lyre chant his praises.
Sing to him a new song;
pluck the strings skillfully, with shouts of gladness.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
For upright is the word of the LORD,
and all his works are trustworthy.
He loves justice and right;
of the kindness of the LORD the earth is full.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Blessed the nation whose God is the LORD,
the people he has chosen for his own inheritance.
May your kindness, O LORD, be upon us
who have put our hope in you.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
AlleluiaSEE JN 6:63C, 68C
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Your words, Lord, are Spirit and life,
you have the words of everlasting life.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Your words, Lord, are Spirit and life,
you have the words of everlasting life.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
GospelLK 7:31-35
Jesus said to the crowds:
“To what shall I compare the people of this generation?
What are they like?
They are like children who sit in the marketplace and call to one another,
‘We played the flute for you, but you did not dance.
We sang a dirge, but you did not weep.’
For John the Baptist came neither eating food nor drinking wine,
and you said, ‘He is possessed by a demon.’
The Son of Man came eating and drinking and you said,
‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard,
a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’
But wisdom is vindicated by all her children.”
“To what shall I compare the people of this generation?
What are they like?
They are like children who sit in the marketplace and call to one another,
‘We played the flute for you, but you did not dance.
We sang a dirge, but you did not weep.’
For John the Baptist came neither eating food nor drinking wine,
and you said, ‘He is possessed by a demon.’
The Son of Man came eating and drinking and you said,
‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard,
a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’
But wisdom is vindicated by all her children.”
******************************
LOVE NEVER FAILS
To be a Christian is to, as St. Paul says in today's first reading, "strive eagerly for the greatest spiritual gifts." And the greatest, he says, is excellence in love. Whatever we do without love is pointless.
Faith without love is not real faith. Why? Because God is love, and whatever we do without him is pointless. Believing in him and loving him without also loving all whom he loves (which is everybody, no matter how bad of a jerk they are) is an insufficient faith.
How well we love is measured by how much we care about the people who make us unhappy -- those who reject us, hurt our feelings, or give us reasons to fear them, or those who put obstacles in our spiritual walk or oppose us in other ways. (Hey, there's no one who is easy to love all the time.) And yet we care about them. Right?
To be a mature Christian, we have to put aside the childish ways that Paul speaks of. How do children handle bullies? They run away in fear. Or they withdraw into a depression and hide in fantasy worlds. Or they complain about how cruelly they were treated, bad-mouthing the bully every chance they get. Or they find ways to retaliate and inflict revenge.
How do mature Christians handle bullies? We run to God for the healing of our wounds and the soothing of our aches. We learn from his Word how to righteously protect our hearts without isolating ourselves. And we find ways to love others in the very moments when they are behaving as enemies, even uniting ourselves to Jesus on the cross when it's time for that. (Remember, sometimes Jesus walked away.)
To refuse to love bullies until they treat us nicely is to break away from our union with God. Paul lists some of the ways that we do this: impatience, unkind behaviors, jealousy, pride and pomposity, making ourselves seem better than others, rudeness, insisting on our own way, being quick-tempered, brooding over how we've been hurt, rejoicing when something bad happens to those who were bad to us, refusing to bear all things including unjust treatment, rejecting what the Bible and Church teachings say about unconditional love, forgetting to hope for Christ's victory, and quitting when our love for others does not produce the results we want.
Wow! What a list! It resonates with our lives all too much. Looks like it's time to go back to the Sacrament of Reconciliation or to Mass where the Rite of Penance restores us to union with God and to each other.
Love never fails to continue loving. When we walk with Jesus all the way through the valley of sorrow and hurt, we walk with love, bringing Jesus with us. Even when others fail to be converted by Christ's presence in us, his love never fails to heal us and increase in us his own holiness.
Today's Prayer
My Lord, give me the grace of discovering the endless treasure that You are. I want to learn to see my life through You. I accept You and receive Your reign in me. Amen.
God Bless You.....
Rosary Family
The mother of Jesus promised St. Dominic that, “one day through the rosary & the scapular I shall save the world!”
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