- Today's theme speaks of the end,
this same theme will be taken again during Advent.
- We may see it also as a way to
make us understand the emptiness of luxury, riches.
- It is an exhortation to be always ready for the coming of the Lord, to wait for him with love and enthusiasm.
THE BOOK
OF THE PROPHET MALACHI
v This book is found at the end of the
Old Testament.
v But what we consider a name is only a
title which means "the messenger"
v The author
is unknown
v From some words and expressions in
the text we deduce that it was written in the V century before Christ, and
before the reformation of Ezra and Nehemiah between 480 y
450 B.C.
v The temple has been rebuilt and
worship takes place in it again.
v The author denounces the worship the
priests offer in the Temple, it is empty, without surrendering to the Lord, on a routine basis.
v He sees in the spiritual purification
of the worship the strength and the source of renewal.
FIRST
READING : Mal 3:19-20a Ordinary
Time
ü The day comes blazing like and oven,
and on that day the proud and all evil doers will be stubble.
ü When the Lord is present he destroys
in us everything that is pride, vanity, lack of love. We feel like the tree without the branches of
our vanity, without the roots of our false security in ourselves
ü The day of the Lord is neither a day of destruction of the human being, nor
of fear, it is the day of the blessing by means of which our Father God
cleanses us from all our impurities which do not allow us to reflect our
Father's kind face.
ü It is like a tender mother which cleans and dresses up her little
child who has get him or herself dirtied playing.
ü The day of the Lord is a day of
blessing, which each one of us should wish present in his or her life to be
able to eliminate from ourselves all that keeps us apart from Him and from one
another
RESPONSORIAL PSALM 98: 5-6. 7-8. 9
THE LORD COMES TO RULE
THE WORLD WITH JUSTICE
Sing praise to the Lord with the harp
with the harp and melodious song
with trumpets and the sound of the horn
sing joyfully before the King the Lord
Let the sea and what fills it resound
the world and those who dwell in it
let the rivers clap their hands
the mountains shout with them for joy
Before the Lord for he comes
'for he comes to rule the earth
he will rule the world with justice
and the peoples with equity
Ø
This psalm is an invitation to the whole
created world to sing with joy the presence of God in its midst.
Ø
And it is also an
invitation to sing because the Lord governs with justice, he brings justice
among us.
Ø
Those of us who
thirst for justice among us, who long for the differences among us to be
eliminated because we are all brothers and sisters children of the one and only
Father, we are invited to join the song of joy of creation.
Ø
Also those of us
who long for that creation: plants, animals and everything in the created world
be respected and taken care of, since they are also the work of our Father we
are all invited to rejoice with the presence of the Lord.
Ø
But this will
only happen when we love him unconditionally,
above everything and everyone, when we trust in him, knowing that his love is
without end.
GOSPEL Lk 21:5-19
Some are fascinated to see the beauty and the riches
of the temple, and they say it aloud.
Jesus, as always,
will surprise them, he says that a day will come when all that beauty will be destroyed.
The material
aspect of the temple, its stones will be destroyed, and also its spiritual centrality in the worship of
the people of the Old Covenant.
They might have
thought that this was not possible, since the temple was the real presence of
the God among his people, it was the security in his protection over them.
And they want to
know when this will happen
Jesus does not
satisfy their curiosity, and does not give any concrete answer, it is enough
for them to know that it will happen, when, it is not for them to know.
After that he
tells them not to believe anyone who will come in his name, but instead to hold
fast to faith in his words and in the Father's love, in the word he says to us
in the sacred book of life and in the sacred book of the Bible.
What he has said
to them is not imminent, but yes there will be natural phenomena which scare
us: hurricanes, earthquakes, fires, and many others, but this is not the sign
of the end.
there will also
be wars, hatred among peoples, but this is not the end.
even more, they
will be persecuted by their own relatives, they will be handed over to
tribunals, condemned to death, but this is not the end.
Jesus in these
words eliminates the distance in different moments in time, because he speaks
of the destruction of the temple which happened in the year 70, and also he
speaks about things that have happened along the human race journey through
history, and are still happening.
It is as if he
was looking at a large canvas with threads of different colors which make up to
work of art. When the work of art is finished we do not know when each one of
the threads was introduced in the canvas, neither what part of the work of art
was made first.
We call this
speech of Jesus scatological, which means it speaks of what will happen at the
end.
The end will be
beautiful since it will be the instauration in creation of the kingdom of God, a
kingdom of justice and equity. Then finally we will be one family, a family
of different peoples who will love and respect each other, and all together we
will experience the fatherly embrace of the Father of Jesus, our Father God
But while we wait
for this to happen, Jesus invites us to be perseverant in seeking the good,
persevering in the way which leads us to him, and persevering in seeking and
welcoming all our brothers and sisters to journey together.
Come soon, Lord
Jesus!!!
SECOND READING 2 Tes 3:7-12v
The author of
this letter invites his community to live from its work, to not be a burden for
anyone, not acting like busy bodies.
v
He reminds them
how he lived among them, how he worked to take care of his needs, to give them
an example, maybe he wants to say to teach them with his own way of life.
v
And he adds that
he could have asked them for help, since the laborer is entitled to receive its
recompense, as we read in another letter of Paul
v
Those who are
busy doing nothing, he urges them to eat their bread working quietly, but if
they do not want to work, it is very simple
they should not eat either.
v
But he says
something that we need all of us who are on the other side of the pendulum, who
work too much, so much that we do not have time to really live our life.
v
He says
"work quietly," I think this is an invitation for us, an invitation
to seek a healthy equilibrium between
working to earn our food and to enjoy and cultivate the values of human
relationships, especially in the family.
I left with my companion on January 28, 1851
(at this time of writing, it is just six years ago. Who could tell me then the
many things I have lived!), not knowing where we would go, nor what would
happen to me, not even in what house we could stay at the moment . (Such
abandonment in his divine providence is what the Lord wanted from me in this
occasion). Because from the beginning I told my confessor that, in case it is
decided that I leave, in no way did I want to go home because I no longer
consider it mine from the day I left it
to enter the convent, the house of my Heavenly Father. Venerable María Antonia París, Foundress of the Claretian
Missionary Sisters, 108-109
Because I always went on foot, I would fall in with mule-drivers and
ordinary folk, and so I had a chance to talk with them about God and instruct
them in their religion. This had the added advantage of helping take our minds
off the road and giving us a great deal of consolation. Once when I was
traveling from Banolas to Figueras to preach a mission, I had to cross a river
that had a large boulder in the middle.
A large plank led from one side to the boulder, and another led from the
boulder to the other side. I was crossing the river with some other people
during a heavy gale. The wind blew so violently that it carried away the plank
in front of me, as well as the man who was standing on it, and threw both into
the river. There I was, stranded on that boulder in the middle of the river,
leaning on my walking stick and fighting the blast, until a stranger waded the
river, hoisted me on his shoulders, and carried me to the other side. I
continued my journey but had to fight a wind so fierce that it blew me off the
road more than once. Anyone who has traveled through Ampurdan knows what a wind
races through the place--enough to make the sandy hills of Pegu shift their
place. .Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Founder of the Claretian
Missionary Sisters, Autobiography 460.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
CLARET, Antonio María Claret, Autobiografía.
PAGOLA,
José A. Following in the Footsteps of
Jesus. Meditations on the Gospels for Year C.
PARIS, María Antonia, Autobiografía
RAVASI, Gianfranco, Según
las Escrituras, Año C.
La Biblia de Nuestro Pueblo . Luis Alonso Schökel.
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