Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe

 "Christ is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he himself might be preeminent." Col 1:18

Although we can and often do turn away from God and the covenant God made with us in Jesus, God cannot and will not renege on his promise to be with and guide us always. Paul is clear about this. The Apostle to the Gentiles acknowledges that although the Jews were often disobedient, abandoned the law and worshiped false Gods, God was and remains merciful to them and us. Paul wants his Gentile listeners to know this and be comforted. The God who has come to us in Jesus is proof of this. The new and eternal covenant, Jesus is the incarnation of God's promise, a gift we can reject but which will never be withdrawn.

The challenge of God's promise is demanding. Made in God's image, the only way we can demonstrate to others and especially to our enemies that God's love lives in us is to love everyone no matter how often our love is rejected to ridiculed. If God is forever faithful so too must we be faithful. This is not to say we should or must allow ourselves to be abused. Rather, while we ought to withdraw quietly from any situation that allows another to strip us of our good name or reduce to an object of their wrath, we must stand ready to reconcile with our oppressors for the sake of the Gospel.

Today, enjoy God's everlasting love.

What must you let go of in order to love like God?

Listening with an Open Heart

 "He is not God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive." Lk 20:38

The implications of this passage are broad and important. Knowing that we will live forever ought to be freeing, unless of course we are stuck in guilt or shame. In that case, living forever feels like hell, literally, but this is not Jesus' intent. Reminding his listeners and us that we will live forever is a reminder to let go of guilt and to put aside shame for the sake of others. Our task is to announce this good news despite the difficulties we encounter. Wherever we are stuck, whether in anger, confusion, anxiety or darkness, we must pray for the faith to see all these emotions as self absorbing and destructive of community and the church. Our self concern blocks our ability to be for others.

When the Sadducees, who denied the Resurrection, tried to trap Jesus in a silly argument about which of a woman's seven husbands will be her husband in the afterlife, Jesus refuses to take the bait. The Sadducees are stuck trying to be right and use logic to reinforce their argument, but Jesus insists that the after life is not about marrying or giving in marriage, but in accepting the gift of living with God forever. Failing to appreciate this free gift of God, the Sadducees walked away thinking they won the argument while the crowd who listened to Jesus drew even closer to him.

Not infrequently, we are like the Sadducees. Insisting that we are right in an argument in order to win, we jeopardize our relationship with both friends and foes, making it very difficult to find common ground in the next go round. Without a relationship, even simple conversations become problematic and awkward. and that is what happens to the Sadducees. Embarrassed and confused by Jesus they look for other opportunities to prove their point and lose any chance to hear the transforming word of God. Unless we listen to the Lord with an open spirit, the same can happen to us.

Today, ask God for the gift of listening with an open heart.

When has your pride interfered with your ability to hear the truth

Just Anger

"Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, saying to them,  'It is written, My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.'" Lk 19 45-46

Few gospel scenes are more dramatic than Jesus chasing the money changers out of the temple precincts, and with good reason. Jesus was angry, an emotion we rarely associate with him or Christianity, despite the fact that it is almost always anger that brings about change in a society. It was anger over taxation without representation that spurred the American revolution. Though uncomfortable, anger is an important emotion for all to feel.

Jesus is not angry that people are making a small profit exchanging one currency for another. His anger is at those who charge whatever they can get from pilgrims, most of whom were surely poor. In the Palestine of Jesus' day, pilgrims would come to the temple once in their life from all over the known world. If they were Greek, they would have to change their drachmas into shekels and then when they arrived at the temple they would have to change their shekels into temple shekels, and this last exchange was often usurious. Money changers would charge whatever their unsuspecting victims would pay. That this might mean the pilgrims and their families would not eat properly that day meant little to the money changers. Their profit ruled their consciences.

While all of us expect to pay more for basic services, like food and drink, when we visit a shrine or monument, gouging is never acceptable. That Jesus would defend those being abused by unscrupulous business men reminds us to do the same on behalf of the poor. Injustice and oppression, especially against the poor, is never o.k. Anger that leads to transformation is.

Today, examine your conscience regarding the practices you might employ to gain leverage over others.

Has the anger and outrage of others ever moved you to change?

Random Suffering

 "As Jesus drew near to Jerusalem, he saw the city and wept over it." Lk 19:41

Distress and upset comes to everyone, even Jesus. We can curse it, fight it, deny it or cry over it, like Jesus, but we cannot avoid it, and our faith tradition is clear. Until we learn to accept suffering as an ordinary part of every life, we will waste time trying to elude it. If Jesus, the God man, was not immune to suffering, neither are we.

At the same time, the Gospel does not ask us to seek suffering, but to accept it when it comes, often without warning or obvious meaning. In a poignant and demanding book, Where the Hell is God, Richard Leonard, an Australian Jesuit, explores suffering from the inside. Devastated and lost after a car accident that left his sister a quadriplegic, Leonard reminds his readers that God does not will our suffering, but will enter it with us if we allow it. Avoiding easy answers and cliches about God testing us, Leonard invites his readers to walk together in faith as they seek meaning in darkness.

Today, revisit an incident of suffering in your life and ask God for healing.

How do you make sense of random suffering?

St Elizabeth of Hungary

 "While it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being, because this widow keeps bothering me I shall deliver a just decision for her lest she finally come and strike me." Lk 18 4-5

While it is difficult to imagine St. Elizabeth of Hungary, like the demanding widow in Luke's gospel, threatening to hit someone, it is not hard to see her pushing God on behalf of the poor and the needy. Married at fourteen, she led a simple life and had three children before her husband, Louis, died in battle. Making sure her children were well cared for, she committed herself to a life of total service and fed hundreds of people everyday until her own death at twenty four.

Renowned for her care of the needy, Elizabeth so unnerved her husband's family that they evicted her from the palace, an act that only emboldened her. She joined the secular Franciscan order, lived a prayerful and austere life, and was so popular during her lifetime that she was canonized four years after her death. Like the widow of the gospel Elizabeth's life keeps bothering us as we hear Christ's call to feed the hungry and clothe the naked.

Today, speak up on behalf of someone in real need.

How do you react to people who agitate for change?

Come Down Quickly, Zacchaeus

 "Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house." Lk 19:5

Why should Zacchaeus come down quickly to join Jesus? Were others vying for the Lord's attention? Were Jesus' disciples urging him to meet with new followers in order to further instruct and form them? Whatever the reason, Zacchaeus listens and responds to the Lord and becomes a model for us.

Often enough we are not exactly sure what we are do to help build God's reign, but at others times we know exactly what it is the Lord is saying and we resist. Like those invited to a wedding feast, we make up excuses for not living the Gospel. We don't like how God seems to be acting in our life. We wonder if we are making everything up about life in the Spirit, or we fight God's call because it demands that we let go unconditionally, and we are the kind of persons who want clear explanations before we act.

The Lord call us and wants to stay in our house today. What is so difficult about this? Perhaps because we have other things planned or wanted some time alone, we resist, forgetting that God is never a bother if only we let God be God and live in God's presence with peace. The things we have planned can be moved to another time. The few moments of quiet will keep. God wants to eat with us. We need to learn to drop everything and respond.

Today, ask not what you are supposed to do today, but what God wants you to do.

What are your biggest resistances to God?

The Loss of our Senses

 "A blind man was sitting by the roadside begging." Lk 18:35

A older friend, struggling with his hearing and beginning to feel very isolated told me that he was embarrassed to ask people to repeat themselves and found himself not participating in conversations and shying away from communal gatherings. Though he has hearing aids, he still often feels alone in a group and ignored by people with whom he often had enjoyable conversations.

Whether one is struggling with blindness or deafness is not the point of today's Gospel. The isolation and loneliness that accompanies the loss of any our faculties is painful, unnerving and confusing, especially in a society that often looked at physical infirmities as punishment for sin, and it is this to which Jesus addresses himself. The Lord wants us to feel and be an integral part of his body, the church. Anything that inhibits or limits this participation is his concern, and should be ours. 

Sometimes, although we see and hear perfectly well, we fail to respond to others who are struggling. Too busy, too self absorbed or too compulsed by the need to succeed, we are blind and deaf to the needy. 

Today, listen to someone you normally avoid.

What have you been privileged to see or hear that opened your heart to the Gospel?