27 SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME – CYCLE C – 2019   

The theme of the celebration seems to be “faith”   

Ø  Faith so full of trust that allows  us to  present to  God our complains and supplications   

Ø  Faith so strong as the strength needed to uproot a strong tree   

Ø  Faith so full of novelty as it would be to plant a tree in the sea  

Ø  Faith so simple that discovers the presence of the God that is behind all reality.    

THE PROPHET  HABAKKUK

Ø  The name of this prophet is unique in the Bible, it might come from the name of a plant “basil” 

Ø  We  know neither his origin, or his family, or his hometown

Ø  The three chapter of this book are difficult to understand. 

Ø  The content is a proclamation received during a vision  

Ø  The prophet does not understand and, suffers for the social situation,  and asks God for an explanation 

Ø  The time of its composition is between   606 a.C  and the Babylonian exile 587 a.C)

Ø  The message seems to be: we must abandon the traditional way to understand the retribution from God.  We must understand the intervention of God in our human history in a different way. 

FIRST READING  Habakkuk 1:2-3;2:2-4

ü  The prophet complains because he asks help from God, and it seems that God does not listen 

ü  Why do I have to see violence and destruction?   

ü  The answer from God is to tell the prophet to write the vision  

ü  “If it delays, wait for it, because it will certainly come, without delay.” 

ü  The reading ends saying “the just will live by his faith” 

ü  We have this same reading in the Liturgy of the Hours one of the days of Advent.

ü  To know that He will certainly come, fills our heart with hope and enkindles in it the fire of love. 

ü  In addition, certainly, the Lord has come, and He continues to come into our life; sometimes we complain, like the prophet, because we do not realize that He is already here. 

Salmo 95, 1-2. 6-7. 8-9

 R.  If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Come, let us sing joyfully to the LORD;
let us acclaim the Rock of our salvation.
Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving;
let us joyfully sing psalms to him.
R. If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Come, let us bow down in worship;
let us kneel before the LORD who made us.
For he is our God,
and we are the people he shepherds, the flock he guides.
R. If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Oh, that today you would hear his voice:
“Harden not your hearts as at Meribah,
as in the day of Massah in the desert,
Where your fathers tempted me;
they tested me though they had seen my works.”
R. If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts. 

v The psalmist invites us  

o   To praise God,  

o   To adore God

o   To listen to God     

GOSPEL  Lk 17:5-10

Ø    This Reading has two parts.   

Ø  In the first part the Apostles ask Jesus to increase their faith   

Ø  Maybe when they heard the mission that Jesus wanted to entrust to them, they realized that the traditional faith, still childlike, would not help them. 

Ø  Thus their petition, sometimes we do the same petition to the Lord. 

Ø  It does not mean that we do not have faith, but that our faith is still the faith the First Communion Catechesis, or the faith taught to us by our grand-mother, but that we have not made it our own yet, thus it does not help us. 

Ø  Jesus gives them a surprising answer.  

Ø  It seems that with this comparison He wants to tell them that they need:  

o   A faith as strong as the strength needed to uproot  a mulberry tree, a strong tree, difficult to uproot  

o   A faith able to accept and propose the novelty, as it would be a novelty to plant a tree in the sea. 

Ø  I copy below a fragment from a book of José Antonio Pagola, it has helped me a lot, and I wish to share it with you. (it is my own translation from Spanish)  

The theologian  Karl Rahner said, this “abandonment” proper of faith is the “maximum audacity of man.”  A tiny particle of the cosmos (universe) dares to enter into a relationship with the “incomprehensible and foundational wholeness of the universe,”   and it does it, trusting absolutely in his power and in his love. As Christians we have to be more aware of the audacity of daring  to trust in the mystery of God. 

The original message of Jesus is precisely, to invite the human being to trust unconditionally in the unfathomable Mystery, which is at the origin of everything.    This is what we hear in his proclamation “do not fear… trust in God…. call Him Abbá, loving Father. He takes care  of you. Even the hairs of your head are counted. Have faith in God.”   

SECOND READING  2Tm 1,6-8;13-14

ü  Rekindle the gifts you received with the imposition of my hands. Return to your first love.

ü  God does not want us to be cowards but daring, motivated by love and not by fear 

ü  Do not be ashamed to witness to Jesus.    

ü  Carry the hard work allotted to you.  What work?  The proclamation of the Gospel with words and  deeds. 

ü  Keep the treasure, which is in you, and in all of us, with the help of the Holy Spirit.  

ü  What treasure? The faith we have received at our Baptism, and which we need to make it grow, with the friendship and intimacy with Jesus in our prayer and in our life. 

 CLARETIAN CORNER  

 Now that I have said something about how much God our Lord is pleased by a disinterested heart, this great king of heaven and earth has protected, guided and governed me since the moment His powerful hand took me out of the convent of Tarragona (which was my first heaven) until he brought me to this new world, Santiago, Cuba city, with so great security in the midst of so many and imminent risks that only your infinite power, my God could save my life. Venerable María Antonia París, Foundress of the Claretian Sisters. Autobiography 93

As a small child I and my sister Rose, who was very devout, made frequent visits to the shrine of the Virgin called Fussimanya, a league away from my home. I cannot describe the devotion I felt at this shrine. Even before I got there, as soon as I could see the outline of the chapel, I felt so emotional that tears of tenderness welled up in my eyes. We started saying the rosary and kept praying all the way to the chapel. I have visited the shrine at Fussimanya whenever I could, not only as a child but as student, priest, and even as archbishop before I left for my diocese.  St. Anthony Mary Claret, Founder of the Claretian Missionary Sisters. Autobiography 49.

BIBLIOGRAFÍA:

CLARET, St. Anthony Mary. Autobiography.

PAGOLA, José Antonio. El camino abierto por Jesús. Lucas.

PARIS, Venerable María Antonia. Autobiography

SAGRADA BIBLIA. Versión oficial de la Conferecia Episcopal Española.