1. --
Lanie LeBlanc OP
2. --
Dennis Keller
3. --
4. -- (Your
reflection can be here!)
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1.
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Sun. 26 A 2023
The message in the Scriptures today is clear. People need
to change any evil ways they have. God's incredible mercy
will then greet and embrace them.
The list anyone could generate about why people turn to
evil ways is a really long one. Our own faults would be
listed among them, perhaps leading us down the wrong road,
just short of evil. Those definitions (faults, wrong, evil)
sound to me at least, like the initial tone in the first
reading of simply blaming God (or another or something else)
rather than taking responsibility for what we do and do not
do.
Honesty with oneself is just as hard as being totally
honest with someone else, perhaps more so. I think that this
human condition, so to speak, really pales against the
promises of our second reading. Who would not prefer
encouragement, solace, participation in the Spirit,
compassion, mercy and joy instead of a life based on lies
and deceit?
Obtaining God's promises requires that we follow the
example of Jesus, however. We all know that doing that is
also not easy. Fortunately, we are not asked to journey
alone, but have been given ample resources of many kinds
including people, songs, ministries, and writings to be our
companions.
Today, let us pinpoint just one area in our lives that we
admit we need help to change. Let us pray for guidance in
seeking how to make that change a little at a time. Then let
us confidently know that we have been graced by the Gifts,
promises, and resources by God to do exactly that.
Blessings,
Dr. Lanie
LeBlanc OP
Southern
Dominican Laity
lanie@leblanc.one
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2.
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Twenty Sixth Sunday of Ordered Time
October 1, 2023
(This reflection is from the reflection for the 26th
Sunday of Ordered time September 27 2020)
This 21st chapter of Matthew’s gospel is about Jesus
coming into the City of Peace, that is, Jerusalem in the
final phase of his ministry and saving event. He had come in
triumph as a King of Peace with the crowds shouting his
praises and insisting on his kingship. There follow
instructions, the cleansing of the temple of merchants,
money changers, con-men, and thieves. The cleansing of the
temple set him as the enemy of the Chief Priests and the
Sadducees – the powerful, i.e. the priests, and the wealthy,
the Sadducees. In today’s gospel Jesus addresses directly
the chief priests. He does so in a parable that has the
potential of being misunderstood by some but a heavy
criticism of those in leadership of the Chosen People. He
compares the son who promises the Father he will go work in
the fields to prostitutes and tax collectors. These two
classes of people were despised and rejected as the lowest
of the low. Yet Jesus does a twist when he says that these
most despised and disregarded people will enter the Kingdom
of God before them, these high priests who think themselves
righteous and deserving of the wealth of the land and the
adulation of the people. He recalls for them John, the
Baptizer, and reminds these paragons of self-righteous
virtue that prostitutes and tax collectors heard John’s
preaching and came to repent of their sinfulness, seeking
instead to live in the Kingdom of God.
It's very easy to let this story reside in history, as
something that happened then and has no relevance to now.
Jesus really put it to these proud and arrogant fools. We
may be tempted to let it go at that and think of it as just
a story. This parable deserves a more intense scrutiny and
an application to our circumstances, attitudes, and
behaviors and judgments.
First, God is the father of the two sons. The first son
says, "no way, dad. I’m not going to go out into the hot sun
and work with prickly vines, breaking my back pulling weeds,
trimming vines, heaping manure around the stalks. Not for
me. I’m your son and don’t need to stoop to the work of
slaves." These are the people, these are us who have heard
God’s call for working in his Kingdom and just are too busy,
too shy, too self-centered to spend time and energy being
compassionate to the people encountered, the family into
which we are born, the enemies who compete with us for
wealth, power, and fame. No, I’ve not got time to care about
others: no, I’ve not got energy for more than to accumulate,
acquire, and build my reputation. There is only so much time
in my days, and I need every minute for me.
We’ll note that this son goes along – for a time. Then
something happens that changes his mind. Most spiritual
writers will say that this person came into suffering which
opened his eyes and his heart. There is repentance, there is
change in attitude toward others and toward what is of
lasting value in his life. He goes, without fanfare, without
shouting, "hey, Dad, I’ve changed my mind. I’ll go work in
your vineyard and do what is for others and for the
Kingdom."
There is also the other son who quickly responds to the
father’s request. "Certainly, Father. I’ll get right to it
and make the vineyard the envy of all." Then he goes his own
way, seeking out whatever pleases him or gains for himself
things, control over others, and the bowing and scraping
that make others one’s servants.
This story is directed to the Chief Priests and the
elders. The son who at first agrees to do the work are they.
They commit to doing God’s work and then use their position
and their power to serve themselves. They accept the fruits
of leadership and authority but do not work to share the
father’s compassionate care. Certainly, this can be applied
to our leadership in church and in society. The failures of
hierarchy, clergy, religious, and laity to protect the young
and the vulnerable in our communities casts them in the
company of the Chief Priests and elders. The leadership
among our economic endeavors gladly accept tax breaks that
bend more clearly to the benefit of the most wealthy, the
most monopolistic organizations. While the public acclaim of
those tax breaks is said to encourage greater investment
that would benefit the poor, the underemployed, the
unemployed, the new immigrant, the benefit is turned to the
wealth of owners and wealthy in the form of stock buy-backs,
exorbitant bonuses. There is little thought of the common
good of citizens and those clamoring for participation in
the hope of a nation founded on principles of equality,
equity, and for the fostering of unity among diversity.
Then there’s political leadership. Many enter such
leadership with high ideals and purpose. Many succumb to the
siren call of power and power’s rewards and lose their way,
becoming the sons who said yes and then ignored their
commitments.
The Kingdom of Heaven, of God, is now and yet growing
before the extinction of the universe. The Kingdom of Heaven
is what Jesus established on the Cross and in his rising
from the tomb. It is now. But that Kingdom is present to the
universe through the work of the sons and daughters who
practice the work of the Lord in the here and now. Those who
are truly followers of the Way demonstrated, taught, and
established by Jesus bring hope and compassion to all they
meet. This is not only in Sunday church. We are accustomed
to gathering for song, for instruction by the Word, and for
sharing in the work of all consecrated into the Body of the
Christ. If we leave our faith there, our hearts are
listening to God’s call only an hour a week. Our faith-ears
should hear God’s call in every person in danger, in each
person who lacks what is necessary to flourish.
We Catholics put great stock into the idea of obedience.
So often that word is used to control, to act without
thinking – or without loving. Yet the word itself means "to
listen" to some force, some being, some value. Persons of
faith listen with their hearts. It is from the heart that
comes the response to the Father’s call to work in the
vineyard.
Perhaps we’ve overlooked the understanding of the Hebrew
understanding of vineyard. Much of Hebrew Writings speak of
the chosen people as the vineyard. That vineyard is tended
by God, tilled, watered, manured, pruned, spoken to with
kindness. When that vineyard only produced wild, tasteless
grapes, it is worthy only to be cut down and burned to make
way for more fruitful vines.
We have work to do if it is truly in our hearts to listen
to God’s word. His presence among us is to bring compassion
to the broken-hearted, to heal the wounded of those mortally
wounded, to provide hope for the hopeless, and to lift us up
to being all that we can be --- for one another. In so doing
we gives thanks to God for life itself. In so doing we grow
the Kingdom of Heaven so that what God is to us we are to
his creation.
Dennis
Keller
dkeller002@nc.rr.com
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3.
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4.
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