30th Week in OT 2020 - Monday - Healing our crippled natures

 

The miraculous healing of the crippled woman in the synagogue is a passage only found in Luke’s Gospel. While teaching in the synagogue, the Lord notices this woman, hunched over, unable to stand upright. St. Luke tells us that she was afflicted by an unclean spirit for 18 years. Her affliction was not just physical, but spiritual as well. Some spiritual evil was keeping her from the uprightness God desires for us all. Her physical affliction is certainly symbolic of the moral and spiritual state of sinful humanity. We are crippled by sin. Sin cripples our minds, our bodies, and our souls.

Well, the Lord, notices the crippled woman, goes to her, and sets her free from her infirmity. Through this miracle she is immediately able to stand erect and immediately glorifies God. 

This healing, again, is symbolic of the Lord’s entire mission. God has compassion for the waywardness that is ours, humanity’s fallen state. We are crippled by sin, unable to walk in the freedom for which we were created—our intellect is darkened, our wills are weakened. And Through Christ we are liberated, healed, set free, able to walk upright again, and worship God in spirit and in truth. 

St. Paul understands this and explains to the ephesians how what God has done for us in Christ has changed everything. We have been set free, we have been liberated, and so we must strive to be imitators of God, as beloved children, living in love. Jesus did not die for us just so we can return to being hunched over and crippled again by impurity and immorality. We are liberated from sin so that we can be imitators of God. Like the woman in the Gospel, our response to being healed by God is to make our lives a sacrificial offering to God; patterned after the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, we are to become a fragrant aroma to God, offering to God all of our time, talent, and treasure in self-giving love. 

We are to strive for holiness—uprightness—in our conduct, not simply out of fear that we will be punished for breaking divine commandments, but because we know and understand that we have been changed, recreated through Christ. Our natures—our bodies and souls have been remade, so much so  that we are now more like God than we were before the fall—we participate more fully in the communion of life and love and joy of the Blessed Trinity, even now, while still on earth. We don’t wait until we die to go to heaven—heaven, in a sense, begins now, for Christians.

May we, who were once in darkness, as St. Paul says, live in the light of the Lord, today and all days, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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That the effects of sin may continue to be healed in us, that we may walk in the moral uprightness God desires for his children. 

For the healing of all the wounds of division afflicting the Church, for an end to heresy and schism, for turning away from all doctrinal error and hardness of heart, we pray to the Lord.

For spiritual healing and mercy upon all those who have fallen away from the Church, those who have fallen to mortal sin, for those who blaspheme, for the conversion of atheists and non-believers, we pray to the Lord.

For the healing of all those afflicted with physical, mental, emotional illness, for those in hospitals, nursing homes, hospice care, those struggling with addictions, for those who grieve the loss of a loved one, and those who will die today.

For the repose of the souls of our beloved dead, for all of the poor souls in purgatory, for the deceased members of our families, friends, and parish, for deceased clergy and religious, for those who have fought and died for our freedom, we pray to the Lord.

Heavenly Father, hear our prayers. May the grace of Christ Your Son, the Divine Physician, bring healing of our sinfulness, and make us worthy of the kingdom of heaven, through the same Christ our Lord.

29th Week in OT 2020 - Friday - Humility, Gentleness, Patience

From prison, Paul pleaded with his Christian brothers and sisters to "live a life worthy" of their calling.  

Paul then describes the type of conduct he is urging: humility, gentleness, patience. Let’s look at these three virtues.

For Paul, humility means regarding others as more important than ourselves.  To imitate the Lord’s humility, early Christians would wash each other’s feet, as Jesus did at the last supper. We are to stoop low in order to serve others. 

Next, Paul urges gentleness.  Here is another virtue evidenced and extolled by our Lord: “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble of heart.” What is gentleness? Gentleness involves calm, reasonable restraint. It avoids physical or emotional outbursts and harshness. It is careful not to bruise others. 

Thirdly, Paul says, be patient. The scriptural word for patience literally means, to be “long-tempered” as opposed to short-tempered. The Psalms describe God as “slow to anger”. Christians are to be “slow to anger”—putting-up with the faults and idiosyncrasies of others—even when we are bruised in the process.

Paul then explains the reason for these virtues: humility, gentleness, and patience help us to maintain unity which should be a hallmark of our relationships and of our Church.  Think of how many relationships are broken because humility, gentleness, and patience are not practiced—because self-restraint and patience are not practiced in speech and in deed. 

A marriage, a family, a parish, or a diocese, even, can become more and more divided when the call to practice these virtues is ignored. And it’s not easy. Our culture promotes not humility, gentleness, and patience, but arrogance, harshness, and pettiness. 

But when we practice these things, we exhibit a peace that the world does not know. We become a calm and peaceful harbor in which souls can discover Christ. 

But to do so, we must exert real effort to cultivate these virtues and to pray for these virtues. We must practice self-restraint and look for opportunities to stoop down in service. But when we do, we become ever-more effective instruments for the building up of the Church for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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On this day of prayer and fasting for priests, we pray for the sanctification of our priests, that they may have the endurance to remain faithful to their calling amidst so many challenges. Let us pray to the Lord.

For healing of all sinful division in our families, parishes, and diocese. Let us pray to the Lord.

For the transformation of all attitudes which lead to war, violence, racial hatred, and religious persecution.

That, during this month dedicated to the Holy Rosary, many Christians will discover new and deep devotion to Our Lady’s powerful intercession and maternal care for the Church

That the love of Christ, the divine physician, may bring healing to the sick and peace to all the suffering. 

For the deceased members of our families, friends, and parish, and all the poor souls in purgatory, for the repose of the souls of all those who made our reception of the faith possible. 

O God, you know that our life in this present age is subject to suffering and need, hear the prayers of those who cry to you and receive the prayers of those who believe in you. Through Christ our Lord.

29th Week in OT - Tuesday - Christ is our peace

 

“Christ is our peace”. What a simple yet powerful teaching in our first reading today. Peace is not just the absence of war, nor a sense of calm when all of your day’s work is done. Christ is our peace. In order to have true peace, we must have Christ. 

You can’t have peace in the world unless Christ dwells there, and you can’t have peace in your heart unless Christ dwells there.

This morning, I saw headlines that two beautiful Churches in the Archdiocese of Santiago Chile, were torched and burned as part of anti-government protests. Don’t these protestors know that the peace, the justice, and the love they long for is found inside those churches? They cut themselves off from the very peace they long for. There is always something demonic behind the burning of churches: a demonic lie that peace can be discovered or obtained through purely human means without God. 

And sadly, the burning of these Chilean Churches are not isolated. There appears to be a real demonic campaign to stir up anger and violence. And as a nation falls farther and farther away from God, as God is divorced from life, anger and violence will increase. 

Which is why what we do here matters. To pray for peace, to receive Christ in the Eucharist who is peace itself. But also, we are to be bearers in peace. 

At the end of Mass, when the priest says, Go in peace. He doesn’t just mean leave the church quietly. It is an instruction to bring the peace of Christ into the world: to introduce souls out there—in the world—to the peace of Christ—to Christ who is peace. We are tasked with going out into the world—to help souls be reconciled to God through Christ—souls who are lost, souls who are searching, souls who believe that the answer to the worlds problems lies simply in politics, power, or money. Souls who believe happiness can be found at the bottom of a liquor bottle or in promiscuous sex. 

Souls out there long for peace, and we must bear peace, bring peace, to them. It’s not someone else’s job, it’s our job. The Lord says blessed are those servants who are prepared for his return. Well, we are prepared only when his peace already fills our hearts and our lives and we are busy with the work with which we have been tasked—to bring Christ’s peace to souls and souls to Christ’s peace, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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That those who are far off from God may come to know reconciliation and peace through the Church’s evangelization work.

That world leaders may look upon the Son of God, believe in him, and seek the peace and justice that only he can bring.

For the transformation of all attitudes which lead to war, violence, racial hatred, and religious persecution.

That, during this month dedicated to the Holy Rosary, many Christians will discover new and deep devotion to Our Lady’s powerful intercession and maternal care for the Church

That the love of Christ, the divine physician, may bring healing to the sick and peace to all the suffering. 

For the deceased members of our families, friends, and parish, and all the poor souls in purgatory, for the repose of the souls of all those who made our reception of the faith possible. 

O God, you know that our life in this present age is subject to suffering and need, hear the prayers of those who cry to you and receive the prayers of those who believe in you. Through Christ our Lord.