27th July, 2008 17th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year A
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The gospel this weekend is really fitting…… after a week of World Youth Day celebrations…. we are very much aware that we belong to One universal, catholic, apostolic Church…. the Spiritual head of the church, the Pope, gathered with people representing the people from all nations…… and we celebrated our unity, our hope…. and the rich treasures that our Catholic/ Christian tradition is……./ I know that this has renewed in the pilgrims and all of us, a powerful desire to continue on our humble journey of discovering the richness and depth of the treasury of our faith that Jesus offers us, in and through the Catholic tradition, firmly founded on the Gospels.
So the parable about a person finding a treasure in a field…. is very fitting…….// last weekend… we celebrated a treasure lying in a race course……. the treasury of the people of God…. the treasure of the Good news entrusted to us by Jesus himself…. and the rich treasury of the Catholic Church’s transitions, history and wisdom……. // it is humbling… and invites us to respond by deepening our search, deepening our study…. and deepening our prayer……. to immerse ourselves in this treasury… completely…….
In the parable… a man discovers a treasure in a field and sees that it is so valuable that he goes and sells EVERYTHING, TO HAVE IT … and then goes back to dig it up…..
Jesus is guaranteeing that his kingdom,..// his good news…// his offer of life and relationship is SO SPECIAL.. IT IS LIKE A RARE TREASURE… Nothing else on earth is as valuable as this…… It is worth giving up everything else to attain…//… It has a richness and a depth that can never be fully plumbed……
As I read that parable…..I am reminded of the quote from GK Chesterton, (the great English scholar and writer)… (and I am paraphrasing it liberally here)…. He writes….. ‘It’s not that Christianity hasn’t worked, its just that nobody’s really tried it yet !’
So, to me,.,….. what I fear in this day and age is that people are experiencing their faith like this parable………. Imagine a person digging in a field when they come across a pointy rock….. … it is hard… jutting out of the dirt…….but the little rock looks downright ordinary…. So the person stops digging and goes away after being distracted by a few shiny stones they see off in the distance….. .. little did they know that this pointy old rock is an unpolished diamond…. And in fact it is merely the tip of a much larger treasure…. // If they had continued to dig…. And dig in the right places…..they would have found a whole connected seam of the most fabulous treasure they ever could have imagined….. but… no…. the unattractive ….pointy bit above the surface was all they needed to know that there was nothing in this field worth buying…. I feel that this is the same with the richness of our Catholic Faith… it is a priceless treasure…… deep, rich, complex, diverse…. its is over two thousand years of tradition, history and heritage….. including the writings of countless saints and scholars, mystics and historians…… and our liturgies…. deeply enriched by two thousand years of traditions – filled with meaning upon meaning…/ significance upon significance…… one person could not hope to mine completely in a lifetime….. or a thousane lifetimes for that matter….
We could profitably spend a lifetime depthing the richness of the catholic/ Christian faith tradition… ////////We can trust that we are being offered a unique treasure…. //… it will bear enormous fruit… we are promised that….
whilst the religious traditions of other non-christian religions are fascinating too…// … nevertheless, I am sure you will forgive me for this one little bias……….. The Christian faith and tradition has a treasury no less rich…. (and in fact to us Christian’s profoundly and uniquely /infinitely richer …..)….. One gets a curious feeling that some people have rushed off to ‘mine the riches’ of another religion without appearing to know that there ARE ‘depths to mine’ in their own Christian religion….//perhaps it is the ‘grass is greener syndrome…’ . // I will eat my hat if most people who have rushed off to follow another religion have first deeply plumbed the depths of the Christian treasury… as opposed to what they think is the full package of Christianity.. which for most people through no fault of their own… might have been actually “christianity Lite”……(the edited version) // (I have mentioned this before, but it remains a timely thought…)….How many people know of the ‘Christian mystic tradition’. It is also very ancient……//… which also taps into meditation, and mantras, wisdom literature and proverbs…… and profound insights into the human mind and heart………. and extraordinary relationships with one’s environment…. And so on…. Have they read the writings of the desert fathers… do they even know who or what the desert fathers are…… //
….. and that is just to name one thing that springs to mind…...
Our Christian tradition (our Catholic tradition) although rich with nourishment…. is becoming the best kept secret in history.. to an increasing majority who appear to be on a spiritual fast food diet…
This parable today calls us to quiet humility…. // even after seven years of training and study of scripture, theology, ministry, philosophy, church history and liturgy……in the seminary… (and I am deeply grateful to the church for the amazing opportunity of a holistic theological education in my preparation for service in the church….)……. and then after countless in-services and ongoing study and reflection over more than ten years of ministry in parishes, I believe that after all that, nevertheless… I still feel I am only scratching the surface of the riches of Jesus’ Good news to be discovered in the Catholic tradition….// this journey certainly gives a sense of the complexity, richness, subtlety and breadth of what we are being offered…..// certainly will never bore me or fail to satisfy//……so… I am delighted to keep digging…. the richness of what God offers us, never ceases to astound me…..//
Our faith is a treasure of incredible depth… if one thinks they have grasped it enough to ‘find it wanting’… They need to be very careful that they have not rejected a pale shadow of the treasure hidden in a field…
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These weekday reflections refer frequently to gimpses and tastes of the rich history, writing and heritage of our Church, it is an endless source of inspiration and reflection:
Extra weekday reflections:
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
A riddle wrapped in a mystery
Jesus mentions the kingdom of heaven 38 times in Matthew’s gospel. Clearly he wants us to understand exactly what it is. Yet the kingdom is mysterious; it is not something that can be defined once and for all. The best Jesus can do is to describe what it is like, not what it is. The kingdom is like a treasure buried in a field . . . it is like a merchant searching for valuable pearls. In other words the kingdom of heaven is both that which we find and that which is searching to find us. Hmm. Jesus wants to know if his disciples understand. Today would be a good day to contemplate the kingdom of heaven so that our answer, like that of the disciples, will be “Yes.”
Today’s
“ ‘Have you understood all this?’ They answered, ‘Yes.’ ”
Monday, July 28
The parable of the holy underwear
If you haven’t heard or read the first scripture reading for today, you might want to take a look. It’s a story containing the earthy detail of a prophet, on direct orders from God, burying a loincloth, which is a polite word for his shorts. Scholars say this story is a kind of street—or desert—theater: Folks would see Jeremiah hiding the loincloth, which then rots, and would ask themselves, “What the heck is he trying to say?” That the people are to be as close to God as a loincloth to, well, loins. When the people turn from this relationship by, say, chasing after other gods, the symbol of their closeness falls apart and can’t be worn anymore. Do you cling to God like clothes to a body?
Today’s
“For as the loincloth clings to one’s loins, so I made the whole house of
Tuesday, July 29
Feast of Saint Martha
“Do you believe this?”
That was Jesus’ question to Saint Martha in the Gospel of John. In the aftermath of her brother Lazarus’ death—and before Jesus raised him from the dead—Christ tells her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” What a promise! Then the crucial question: “Do you believe this?” In her answer Martha speaks the words Saint Peter gets in the other gospels: “ ‘Yes, Lord, I believe you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.’ ” Hard to believe? What is your answer to the question?
Today’s
“Yes, Lord, I believe you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”
Wednesday, July 30
Feast of Peter Chrysologus, bishop, doctor of the church
In search of the singular pearl
Saint Peter Chrysologus (d. 450), homilist extraordinaire and doctor of the church, preached often on the role of the Virgin Mary in salvation history: “A gentle maiden having accepted to bear God within her, asks as its price, peace for the world, salvation for those who are lost, and life for the dead.” Are we willing to accept those terms: peace, salvation, and everlasting life? We’d be crazy not to. But like children still unsure of the difference between a “dime and a nickel,” many of us trade our most precious gift—our faith—for what looks bigger and better—money and power. God sees each of us as a pearl of great price worth selling all one has to own. No person or thing could ever value us more. Accept God’s terms of discipleship.
Today’s
“On finding one pearl of great value, the merchant went and sold all that he had and bought it.”
Thursday, July 31
Feast of Ignatius of Loyola, priest
Take it to heart
Ignatius of Loyola is honored for many reasons, one of which is the lovely and powerful prayer he wrote, which goes in part: Take, Lord, receive all my liberty: my memory, understanding, and my entire will, all that I have and call my own. You have given it all to me. To you, Lord, I return it. Everything is yours; do with it what you will. Give me only your love and grace. That is enough for me.
The prayer is often recited by those professing a commitment to religious life. You can apply the prayer to your own life as you wish; the important thing is to apply it!
Today’s
“Just like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand, O house of
Friday, August 1
Feast of Alphonsus Liguori, bishop, doctor of the church
Problem report
One could say Saint Alphonsus (1696-1787) knew what it was like to live on the margins. He removed himself from his legal career after a professional disaster, sought his vocation in a hospital for incurably ill people, endured the resistance of his family, struggled to form a religious order, as a bishop revived a flagging diocese though nearly crippled by rheumatism, and late in life was tricked out of membership in his own community. Despite these difficulties, he became one of the church’s great moral theologians and pastors. Don’t let adversity knock you off the course of pursuing what you know to be good and right.
Today’s
“Prophets are not without honor except in their own country and in their own house.”
Saturday, August 2
Mistaken identity
Jesus and John the Baptist did not have Facebook or MySpace pages, and you couldn’t Google them to check out their photos. So when Jesus was walking around performing mighty deeds, poor King Herod mistook him for John the Baptist come back from the dead—a death to which Herod had sent John on a whim. Herod completely missed the significance of the Baptizer: Just as John pointed the way to Jesus’ life and ministry, so, by his own example, he pointed to Jesus’ death. Herod’s error cautions us to recognize and welcome the real Christ.
Today’s
“This is John the Baptist; he has been raised from the dead; and for this reason these powers are at work in him.”
©2008 by TrueQuest Communications, L.L.C. Phone: 800-942-2811; e-mail: mail@takefiveforfaith.com; website: www.TakeFiveForFaith.com. Licensed for noncommercial use. All rights reserved. Scripture quotes come from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible.
Contributors: Father Paul Boudreau, Alice Camille, Daniel Grippo, Father Larry Janowski, Ann O’Connor, Sean Reynolds, Joel Schorn, and Patrice J. Tuohy
