24 SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME  – CYCLE C – 2019

ü  Each Sunday we have a new teaching from Jesus narrated  by Luke  in his Gospel  

ü  Today, the first reading as well as the Gospel speak to us about God’s kindness and unconditional love. 

ü  And also of his ability to listen and to change his plans. 

ü  This might seem to us, an error  or  a mistake, but let us see what the readings tell us   

FIRST READING  Ex 32:7-11,13-14

Ø  If we go back to chapter 24, we will read that the Lord calls Moses to give to him the commandments which he had already explained on chapter 20.  

Ø  Now he is about to ratify his covenant with the people that accepted to be his people 

Ø  However, as it is usual among us, human beings, we forget what we have promised in a moment of enthusiasm. 

Ø  The people get tired to wait for Moses to come down, and they decide to make their own God, which they will be able to manipulate.  

Ø  God gets angry and decides to destroy this people, not to journey with it anymore. 

Ø  Now something interesting happens, a conversation between Moses and God in favor of the people.  

Ø  As before in the time of Abraham, when he had a conversation with God about the sinner cities, which God was about to destroy. 

Ø  Moses reminds God how; he himself saved the people and made of them his own people. Now is he going to destroy it?  

Ø  He asks God to remember Abraham, Isaac and Israel to whom he promised that their offspring would be as numerous as the stars in the sky and, the sands of the seashore. 

Ø  And, now are you going to destroy the people without keeping your promise? 

Ø  And God changes his decision, like in the case of Abraham God was ready to spare the city if he could find 10 just men instead of 50 as was Abraham’s first deal. 

Ø  I find very interesting this way to portray God, he is not the immutable God of the Greeks and of the philosophers, he is not either the God who decides and does not listen to, because he knows everything. 

Ø  On the contrary it seems to me that he is the God who accepts and listens to the words of his friends. 

Ø  Do we  not believe this to be true, if not why do we pray for the cure of a sick loved one, that our kids  do good in school, that we may find a better job, a house to buy, etc…  

Ø  Let us remember   Jesus’ parables on prayer.  

During this week I think it would be good to ask ourselves, what is my golden calf?  Not the golden calf of our society, this is very easy to point it out, because we do not feel that we are part of this negative aspect of our society. But let us take this question into our life, and with sincerity let us ask the Lord that his light illumines our inner darkness, and thus we might be able to discover our golden calf, that we keep  saved and protected so that we will not have to destroy it. 

Responsorial Psalm  Sal 50: 3-4, 12-13, 17 y 19

R.   I will rise and go to my father.
Have mercy on me, O God, in your goodness;
in the greatness of your compassion wipe out my offense.
Thoroughly wash me from my guilt
and of my sin cleanse me.
R. I will rise and go to my father.
A clean heart create for me, O God,
and a steadfast spirit renew within me.
Cast me not out from your presence,
and your Holy Spirit take not from me.
R. I will rise and go to my father.
O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth shall proclaim your praise.
My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit;
a heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.
R. I will rise and go to my father.

·       I will rise and go to my Father. What will I say to him? Will I say that I am angry with those I consider sinners? With those that do not do what I think should be done? With God who forgives those people I consider evil?

·       Or will I rise and go to my Father to say THANK YOU for your love for all of us, THANK YOU for being our Good Shepherd.

GOSPEL  LUKE 15:1-32

v The commentary will be on the last parable 

v We all know this beautiful story which touches our heart, because we feel like the younger son who wants to come back home, and we also want to return home. 

v But I would like to direct our meditation in a different direction, following something I have read, and I think it can be very useful for all of us. 

v There are two sons, let us look first at the younger one, the one who left home 

o   He asks from his father something, which does not belong to him, and his father allows him to choose his way, in spite that his heart is broken when he sees him leave.   

o   Since that money did not cost him any sacrifice or effort he spends it without any consideration. He has friends while the money is there.  

o   He looks for a job, and accepts one which is humiliating for a Jew, so low has he fallen: to take care and feed pigs.  

o   Hunger, loneliness, low self-esteem, everything comes together for this young man to touch bottom. Then he remembers his father, and finds the energy to go back.

o   “I will go back… I will say… I am not worthy… receive me as…

v The other son, the eldest 

o   He is a “wise” and hardworking man, but has allowed his heart to harden, so much is the hate he feels for the way his brother behaves.  

o   He obeys and serves, not willingly and lovingly, but only because it is his duty; and this is what he has to do to be an honorable man. 

o   He is incapable to forgive his brother, neither to rejoice because his father is happy now; this causes more resentment in his heart.   

o   You have never given me… all the time I have served…  

v None of these sons has known who his father is  

o   Maybe the youngest knows him better, at least he knows that he will be in some way accepted 

o   The eldest who has always been at home close to his father has been unable  to know him nor to be happy with his father, he has lived everything as a burden. 

o   The paradox is that the one who started off badly ends well; on the contrary the one who began well, on seeing how everything ends,  we discover that he was never well

v But what happens with the father. I am going to transcribe some thoughts  from Jose Antonio Pagola, which I find very interesting, and I prefer that you read them directly yourselves instead of giving my interpretation.  

o   More and more the contemporary interpreters of the Bible have open a new way to read this parable… to discover in it the tragedy of a father that, in spite of his “incredible love” for his  sons, he cannot build a united family. That would be, according to Jesus, the tragedy of God.   

o   The father (who went out to meet his younger son) goes now to meet his eldest and reveals to him the most deep desire of his heart: to see his children sitting at the same table, friendly sharing a festive banquet, in spite of  any confrontation, hate and condemnations.   

o   Peoples   in war to each other, blind terrorisms, lack of solidarity by political groups, religions with a harden heart, countries plunged in hunger… We will never share the earth in a dignified and happy way, if we do not look at each other with the compassionate love of God. 

o   This fresh look, is the most important thing that as followers of Jesus, we can introduce today in our world.  

v I think that these paragraphs do not need any explanation, and also they can help us to look at the parable with new eyes, new ears and new heart. 

SECOND READING   1 Tm 1:12-17

     Paul is grateful because the Lord has considered him faithful and has entrusted to him the ministry 

     This generosity of the Lord reminds to Paul his previous condition of persecutor. 

     This thought never abandoned Paul, I imagine that this helped him very much to be humble in the midst of all the gifts and graces he had received.

      He acknowledges, however, that all that he did was caused by ignorance.  

     Grace, faith and Jesus Christ love had been abundant in Paul. 

     Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, and Paul says that he knows that this is true.

     He ends this fragment of his letter with a praise to Christ Jesus, King of the ages. 

CLARETIAN CORNER

Heaven and earth know that I have said and confessed the truth without any exaggeration, rather I say less than more, because I had never paid attention to these things, and now when holy obedience compels me to write, as it is many years ago that those things happened, I prefer to omit rather then say them, for I do not consider them necessary. Because the one who will read what I have written will easily deduce the manner God uses to act in souls to whom he grants so great graces because   of his infinite goodness. And there is another motive excusing me to keep silence about them and it is that I cannot explain the manner God works in the soul with so great intimacy guiding her by the straight path of His most holy Law, because God acts in such a way that the more He acts, the less we can understand. In all that I have written, I have seen myself many times confused and full of fear remembering such benefits of God to a soul sp ungrateful. I would have turned back from my purpose a thousand times had the force of obedience not obliged me with its entire rigor. And thus, afraid and confused, I have pleaded a thousand times to the Lord to guide my pen and not to permit, by His goodness, that I might say anything untrue in its most minimal part, and that my tongue would be stuck to my palate before I could fail in telling the truth.

In these fears, our Lord, more than once had told me to write as I like, that I would not fail against the truth, and so, I could say incomparably much more than what I would say. María Antonia Paris, Foundress of the Claretian Missionary Sisters. Autobiography 84.

At about this time I discovered in our house a book called El Roser, the rose-tree, which contained pictures and explanations of the mysteries of the rosary. I learned from it how to recite the rosary, litanies, and other prayers. When my teacher heard of this, he was very pleased and had me kneel by his side in church so that I could lead the rosary. When the older boys saw how this had put me in the teacher's good graces, they learned it too. From then on we alternated in leading every other week, so that all came to learn and practice this holy devotion that, after Holy Mass, is the most profitable. St. Anthony Mary Claret, Founder of the Claretian Missionary Sisters. Autobiography 45.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

CLARET, Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Autobiography.

CONFERENCIA EPISCOPAL ESPAÑOLA. SAGRADA BIBLIA –  BAC 2012

PAGOLA, José Antonio. El camino abierto por Jesús – 2 Lucas- PPC 2011

PARIS, María Antonia . Autobiography.