FIFTH SUNDAY OF LENT  – CICLO C – 2016

INTRODUCTION

• In this V Sunday of Lent, Jesus continues to show to us through his actions the mercy of his Father and our Father.  
• Today it is a woman who is caught in the act of adultery who experiences Jesus’ kindness and respect toward her.  

FIRST READING   Is 43:16-21

• This Reading is taken from the Second Isaiah or Deutero-Isaiah, which goes from chapter  40 to 55 of the book of Isaiah.  
• God speaks to his people and introduces himself as the author of the exodus from Egypt  
  • He is the one who opens a way in the sea  
  • And a road through the raging waters   
  • Who throws off horse and rider who end  up being like a quenched wick. 

• But now think of the past only to look forward to the present, to the future, Look 
  • I am doing something new 
  • It springs off, do you not see it?   
  • I open a way in the desert, now it is not in the sea, but in the desert   
  • In the dry lands I open rivers   
  • The wild animals look for me    
  • Because I put water in the desert    
  • For my chosen people to drink
  • The people I have formed for me  to praise me and make others praise me too.   
• These words are addressed also to us  
  • “Do not stop in the past, or in its sufferings, or in the great things God has done for you  
  • That the memories be only to open your eyes and see the present around you and see the wonderful things God does for you,  in your family, in your society, in your church, in your place of work, in the youth who blooms around you, see and  discover…  
     RESPONSORIAL PSALM. Ps  126
    R. (3) The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
    When the LORD brought back the captives of Zion,
    we were like men dreaming.
    Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
    and our tongue with rejoicing.
    R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
    Then they said among the nations,
    “The LORD has done great things for them.”
    The LORD has done great things for us;
    we are glad indeed.
    R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
    Restore our fortunes, O LORD,
    like the torrents in the southern desert.
    Those that sow in tears
    shall reap rejoicing.
    R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
    Although they go forth weeping,
    carrying the seed to be sown,
    They shall come back rejoicing,
    carrying their sheaves.
    R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.

1. Beautiful psalm that describes and paints in a poetic way the difference between sowing and ripping.    
2. The sowing of the earth, and of our heart too, is always difficult, full of uncertainties, not knowing the results, with the danger of storms and losing the harvest.  
3. The harvest is always a time of great joy, winter is gone as well as the difficulties, now it is time to rejoice and to collect the fruits.   
4. This is true in our life at all levels: material and spiritual.   

SECOND READING  PHL 3:8-14

• Paul speaks to his dearest community, the community of Philippi   
• He considers everything as waste, the only thing that is worth is the knowledge of Christ, his Lord, for whom he has accepted to lose everything.  
• Because he only wants to be with him, not being just in his own eyes, not being just according to the law, but by  faith-love-trust in Christ.    
• And thus to know him and the power of his resurrection.  
• In his encounter with Christ, Paul has discovered the treasure of the risen Christ.The law   was only a preparation to encounter the Lord.   
• He does not consider that he has reached the goal, but he continues. According to the words of the first reading, he does not look behind to the past, but to the future, to his dream, to be able to reach the reward who is Christ Jesus himself.    
  GOSPEL John 8:1-11

1. The frame of this narrative of John is the Temple where Jesus returns every day during the week preceding his death. At night he goes to the Mount of Olives to pray, and he stays probably with his friends Lazarus, Martha and Mary.  
2. He is already in the Temple, people are listening to him and asking him about the kingdom, the good news, the Father, and he teaches them with love and  tirelessly.  
3. While he is still speaking some scribes and Pharisees come dragging a woman caught in the act of adultery.     
   • Estrange situation and accusation, adultery is always between two: a man and a woman, it is never a question of only one person.    
   • They explain the situation to Jesus, their intentions are not right, they do not care about the woman and what she was doing, they do not care either about the sin as an offense to God, they only want to use this woman to be able to accuse and condemn Jesus. 
   • Jesus writes with his finger on the ground. The finger of God, in the exodus the finger of God wrote the commandments on the stones.    
     • The commandments which God has first written in the human heart.   
     • To teach us how to be brothers and sisters, to recognize that we are all equal, sinners, poor, in need of pardon from the  Father of all.   
     • Jesus, our eldest brother; the only son of the Father; the beloved,  writes on the sand. What does he write? We will never know. We will imagine many things, but they will be only that,  imaginations.  
     • The woman’s accuser continue to annoy Jesus with their demands of a sentence, the woman also waits for his words.   
     • She has probably heard about the rabbi Joshua, the good man who listens to all, but she has committed a great sin, she is dirty, impure, and this is a just and holy man, he will probably condemn her.  

• Now something surprising happens, Jesus tells them that the one without sin may throw the first stone to her.    

• We have to give credit to them, to  their honesty, they put the stones down and leave one by one, beginning by the eldest. At least they recognize themselves sinners.  

• Jesus and the woman are left alone, face to face. 

• Woman, where are your accusers? No one has condemned you?  
• No one Sir.
• Neither do I condemned you, go, do not sin anymore. Jesus has not come to condemn but to save, to restore, to seek what was lost. His word, his gaze,  his respect for this woman probably helped her not to sin anymore, to seek for the true love and not for the false love.  
• We are all called to make Jesus’ salvation reach all, and avoid our condemnations which do not help anyone, because they do not come from love but from our falsehood and sin. 
• We are all called to see each other as brothers and sisters, to feel sorry for our sins and for the sins of others, to give up our life as Christ gave up his life for the salvation of all, and thus make the kingdom of the Father present among us, little by little, person to person, one by one...   
   
  

Today I want to share with you some sentences from the writings of one of our Claretian Sisters, María Teresita Albarracín, who died very young, on March 12 1946, two month before her second renewal of vows and before turning 19 years old. Her cause of beatification has been introduced and the church has acknowledged her heroic virtues.    

 

• My heart belongs to God; I  can only love him, in Him, for Him and to Him. I belong completely to God. 
• I am going to consecrate myself to God by my religious profession. I am going to consecrate my body… my soul… mi heart… and what is consecrated to God, can only be used for the divine service. 
• By the mercy of God, since my profession peace reigns in my heart, and a great joy fills all my being on remembering the consecration that I have made of myself to God our Lord.  
• In spite of that I have felt dryness, distractions, repugnance, sadness, but in all this moments Jesus and Mary have supported me in such a way that I have even been able to smile, in spite of my tears. Blessed be God!    
• I want to live completely surrendered in his arms, trusting without limits in his mercy.   In the abyss of your mercy I throw my miseries.
• I trust in You, because you are my Jesus, because you are my spouse.
• Good bye, Mother, I send you a kiss 
   
                                                  Within it my  poor heart is hidden  
                                                  With its weeds and little roses   
                                                  So that you may do with it a loving throne for you.  
   

• At the end of her last poem entitled “Do not look at the gift but look at the giver” we read   
  What will you do now with the thorn?  
  Will you throw it with anger?  
  Kiss it, because the same love
   Gave to you the thorn and the rose.    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
  Novice in Barcelona – Spain                                       Professed – painting  
  Photography

                             

FOURTH SUNDAY OF LENT  – CYCLE  C – 2016

INTRODUCTION

• The center of the readings is the parable of the Prodigal Son, which certainly could be called the parable of the Good Father .
• This father is the Father in Heaven, the Father that Jesus wants to share with us, as he said the day of his resurrection “my Father and your Father…” 
• Let us see the message that the readings give to us. 

FIRST READING   Jos 5:9-12

• The book of Joshua is the first book of the Bible after the Pentateuch.  The people of Israel that has arrived to the Promise Land will have to adapt his life to the new situation. 
• They had been nomads that journeyed through the desert to the land promised to their Fathers. 
• Now they will have to adapt new forms of life, they will have to learn how to cultivate the soil, they will be farmers.   
• They will have also to adapt the way they worship.   
• What do the readings say to us?  
  • God reminds them that He is the one who has liberated them, that has taken away the shame they suffered being slaves in Egypt  
  • Now they are in the land and they will celebrate for the first time the Passover in the land.  
  • This same day the manna disappeared, from now on they will have to provide by themselves cultivating the land which will provide what they need. 

RESPONSORIAL PSALM  Ps  34

TASTE AND SEE THE GOODNESS OF THE LORD  

I will bless the Lord at all times

His praise shall be ever in my  mouth

Let my soul glory in the Lord

The lowly will hear and be glad

 

Glorify the Lord with me

Let us together extol his name

I sought the Lord, and he answered me

And delivered me from all my fears.

 

Look to him that you may be radiant with joy

And your faces may not blush with shame.

When the poor one called out, the Lord heard

And from all his distress eh saved him

 

SECOND READING  2 Cor 5,17-21

• Paul speaks to his community of Corinth about the newness of those who are in Christ.  
• We began to be in Christ when we were baptized, when we became new creatures. 
• He also reminds them that whatever is old has passed away, it does not exist anymore.   
• He says that all of this was possible through the loving initiative of God in Christ that reconciled us with the Father. 
• And this reconciliation that Christ made on the cross, he has given it to us, to the Church, so that we might become ministers of reconciliation in the world.  
• As ministers of reconciliation we need to say to our brothers “be reconciled to God.”  
• For our sake he made him to be sin who did not know sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him, that is be holy.  
  GOSPEL Lk  15:1-3.11-32

1. Verses 1 to 3 provide  the  setting  for this wonderful story, parable. 
   • Jesus is surrounded by “sinners” = tax collectors and others.  
   • The Pharisees are there also, but they are not there with the same intention as the sinners. They are there to judge what Jesus is doing, Jesus who welcomes those whom they considered “lost.”  
   • Jesus in response to those feelings which they have in their hearts tells them and us this wonderful parable. In all of us we find the “sinner” and the “Pharisee that judges.”  
   • The parable of the Prodigal Son which should be called the Parable of the Good Father.  
   • This parable has different scenes which we are going to contemplate one by one. 
   • The first one: the younger son asks for his inheritance and goes away from home:   
     • Give me my inheritance!  This is an insolent petition. The inheritance is received after the death of the person who leaves it.   
     • The father does not argue, he divides his possession between the two sons he has.  
     • The younger son goes away from home to a far distant country.  Distant country means a place far from home, from all that is familiar, from the love of his father. The reality is that he has always been far from home even living in it. His heart has always been far from the love of his father.    
     • Here the first scene ends .   
   • The second scene: the younger son in the foreign country and the father  waits for him to return.   
     • What does the son do in the far away country? What does the father do at home?  
     • The son expends all his possessions in a dissolute life, while he has money he has a lot of friends. 
     • The father at home goes to the road every day  to see if the son returns. He wants to see his son even knowing that the son does not love him.   
     • The son is out of money and loses all his friends. He feels lonely, hungry and humiliated. He feels so low and so hungry that he goes to work feeding pigs. A profession that a Jew will never have, pigs are impure animals.  In this situation he comes back to his senses and decides to do something: “I will go back….”  
     • The father keeps going to the road ….    
   • The third scene is the return home of the younger son   
     • The father who goes every day to the road to see him returning, recognizes him from afar and runs to meet him. 
     • The son says to his father the words he has prepared “I have sinned… I am nor worthy… accept me as one of your workers…”  
     • The father does not allow him to finish. Quickly bring the tunic, the sandals, the ring… let us celebrate.   
     • Why? Because this son was lost and has been found, was dead and has come back to life.   
     • The celebration begins, the father is filled with joy.    
   • Last Scene  – The Elder Brother  
     • He comes back from the fields,  where he has been working all day long.  He hears the voices of  joy, the music, the laughter… What is this? Because   there has been only sadness in the house since his brother had left.
     • Your brother has come back, and your father is so happy to have recovered him in good health that he has killed the fatted calf and has called for a celebration.   
     • The elder son is angry he does not want to join the celebration.  The father comes out and begs him to enter, to rejoice because his brother was dead and he is alive, was lost and he has been found.  “Everything that I have is yours my son. You are always with me.”  
     • We do not know if he joined the celebration, Jesus leaves us in suspense. Maybe because we are the ones who have to finish the story,   we are at the same time the younger son who sins  enjoying the pleasures money gives him,  and the elder who sins judging and being sad. We are at the same time like the “tax collector” and the “Pharisee.” 
     • I read once a book by Henri Nouwen and he said that a friend told him to forget about being the elder or the younger son, and trying to be like the Father full of love, mercy and joy  
        
       Do not make fun of anything nor mock at gestures or words of others, in these matters that seem witty remarks in the mouth of lay people, loses very much the priest of the seriousness of his character making himself despicable.
       The good missionary must adjust himself to the disposition of the persons with whom he relates and be all for everybody in order to gain them all.
       Never speak ill of the country God will send him; nor tolerate that his brothers or companions speak ill of those poor people that God has entrusted them.
       The whole world must be country for the missionary of Christ, because our Divine Redeemer came to redeem all, sending to preach the same Gospel all over the world. Venerable Maria Antonia Paris, Foundress of the Claretian Missionary Sisters, The Apostolic Missionary 7-10
       On August 26, 1861, at 7:00 in the evening while I was at prayer in the church of the Rosary at La Granja, the Lord granted me the great grace of keeping the sacramental species intact within me and of having the Blessed Sacrament always present, day and night, in my breast. Because of this I must always be very recollected and inwardly devout. Furthermore I must pray and confront all the evils of Spain, as the Lord has told me. To help me do this, I have engraved in my memory a number of things, such as that without any merit, talent, or personal recommendation, He has lifted me up from the lowest of the low to the highest post, at the side of the kings of this earth. And now He has put me at the side of the King of Heaven. "Glorify God and bear him about in your body" (1 Cor. 6: 20). Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Founder of the Claretian Missionary Sisters, Autobiographty 694.