TWENTY-EIGHTH WEEK OF THE YEAR

MONDAY OF THE TWENTY-EIGHTH WEEK OF THE YEAR (Luke 11:29-3
”the sign of Jonah” the immediate reaction to this is the story of Jonah spending three days in the belly of a whale...when we read the story of Jonah, however, this is not the sign that he gave to the people to whom he preached. The sign of the book of Jonah, is the warm reception to conversion that the Ninevites gave to his preaching....the sign of Jonah is the new heart which looks to God.
Once again my thoughts are turned to listening. The people in Nineveh had to listen, their hearts had to be open. But why did they listen?
The reason I ask this question is because good old Jonah was not very convinced of what he was preaching. Scripture tells us that Nineveh was a rather large city that took about three days to get across, Jonah made the journey in one day. It seems as though Jonah went through the streets on the equivalent of an ancient bicycle. He did not really preach to the people has much as he ran through the streets trying to get the job done as quickly as possible. The impression he gave was of someone not very interested in his job.
Ordinarily these are very difficult people to listen to and practically impossible to respond to. If the messenger isn’t convinced the message usually does not get through. If a car salesman had the same amount of conviction and enthusiasm about his product as Jonah did, you more than likely would not buy it.
So what we have as a sign is a weak instrument, Jonah, but pointing out that even with the weak instrument God accomplishes what He wants. Now the disciple is convinced and does have enthusiasm...but is also very weak. There are times in preaching the Gospel that we do have a headache, that our nerves are not what they should be, there are times that as we preach about charity the patience which is the mark of charity is not present. We are reminded that the sign of the power of God is the very weakness of the messengers He chooses. We should always try to be worthy messengers, this goes without saying.....but remember also that the gift is in a vessel of clay.
TUESDAY OF THE TWENTY-EIGHTH WEEK OF THE YEAR (Luke 11:37-41)
Do not be surprised at what happens in side the Christian community. Luke was speaking about the Christian community. The Pharisees are not the enemies of Christ who also appear in the Gospels but rather people who claim to believe in Him. The message, for most of us at least, is one of constant reflection.
We can get spiritually lazy. We do nothing bad, as a matter of fact we may be doing a lot of good things, Going to Mass, saying the Rosary, being involved all Church activities, and even have consecrated our lives to the Lord. But if we are not careful all these things, as good as they are, can become stumbling blocks. Our relationship with the Lord is measured by what we do rather than who we are. The people in today’s Gospel, all did the “good things”. Yet the problem is they were not being what their actions said they should be. “to be” is an attitude of the heart. Eventually, the difference between my heart and what I do will come out.
I used to be afraid of the Pharisee lurking within me. Perhaps even denying his existence...to do, to accomplish...to identify what I did with who I am. To acknowledge his existence was the first step, to trust in the healing power of the Lord was the next....the final step, to rejoice in the great things the Lord can do.




WEDNESDAY OF THE TWENTY-EIGHTH WEEK OF THE YEAR (Luke 11: 42-46) Every year around Christmas time I become very busy. This “business” is not the result of the ordinary pressure of the season but rather because I manage to find work. The reason for this is that writing Christmas cards is a very difficult thing for me to do. I manufacture things to do just to avoid the task of sitting at my desk and doing what I am supposed to do. I hide behind the cover of “being busy.” I always manage to get an exceptional amount of work done during this season, but doing what I am supposed to do escapes until the very last moment.
Simple example, but getting caught up in doing things and taking consolation in the fact of how much we are doing without every asking the question: is this what I am supposed to be doing? Sometimes the “busyness” which we get captured into can be a draw back to doing our task. To set up a list of tasks to be accomplished on a given day, to have some sort of program, is good common sense. But they are not meant to stifle but to give us freedom for the intrusion of God into our lives.
The Pharisees in today’s Gospel always did more than they had to. People were probably awed at how much tax they paid. This was the manufactured work. They never got around to writing the Christmas cards (mercy and love) which they were supposed to do.
“put burdens on people” expectations are good. We have to have a goal to shoot at and we also have to have expectations of other people. To have a feeling that people do not expect anything of you is devastating. It takes the joy away from life, and leads to a state of inertia. There is a two edged sword here. We can not make the expectations “impossible”....they have to be realistic. This means whether it is the expectations we place on ourselves or on other people they must be based on acceptance of the other person. To make them too high will lead to frustration to make them to low leads to an emotional and psychological boredom.

THURSDAY OF THE TWENTY-EIGHTH WEEK OF THE YEAR (Luke 11:47-54) Who are the prophets today? Probably never before has this question been so important. The reason for its importance is that there are so many who are being proclaimed as prophets that without a discerning eye we can be very easily led astray and what is worse we may even “ kill” the real prophets. This phenomena was present right from the beginning of the Church…the false teachers were accepted and the prophets sent by God persecuted. Paul is constantly warning his people of the “false teachers”. Just because something is popular, just because the majority of people believe it, just because it seems to be politically correct, is no indication that we are dealing with true prophets.
If we are to find the true prophet look to the one who says things which causes him to considered “obnoxious” by certain people, if we are to find the true prophet look for the one who says things which are not popular nor politically correct. The true prophet’s voice breaks through darkness, but darkness does not give up without a fight. It is always darkest before the dawn almost like night does not want to surrender. So it is with the light of the prophet. It meets the wall of anger, fear, covered by terms such as: irrelevancy, out of date. If we are not very careful we may find ourselves also building the tombs of the prophets...but they will rise, and their voices will not be snuffed out by the darkness.

FRIDAY OF THE TWENTY-EIGHTH WEEK OF THE YEAR (Luke 12:1-7) Yeast makes things grow. A little yeast will make bread. Growth is important. If something does not grow we can say it is dead. But to grow in the correct way, that is the trick.
The human body is a good example of growth. The baby grows , the muscles become larger, the limbs extend, but the person is the same. Nothing is added are taken away...we can say that the finger on the hand of someone 60yrs.old is the same as the finger that person had when he was born.
In growing in our life of faith the same continuum must be honored. The faith we had when we were 8yrs.old must deepen, must be applied to our daily lives in a different way, the implications must become deeper, but it will still be the faith I had as an 8yr.old.
Two problems arise. One is that unlike our natural bodies which grow with or without us willing it, the relationship with Christ may stay at the level of the 8yr.old. Unfortunately, this happens many times. Our relationship with Christ (faith) stands the danger of being irrelevant because we make faith judgments on life from that perspective. Natural growth, emotional, psychological, take place but faith growth is left far behind.
The other problem is that growing in the correct way. The yeast which nourishes our relationship with the Lord must be the good yeast of the Gospel, the sacraments and the teaching of the Church. These are the hands and feet we were born into our life of faith with and they must be recognizable when we are mature or else our growth has gone amiss.
There is almost a paradox....we cannot solve the problems of a mature person with the answers we learned many years ago and at the same time we cannot solve these problems without the continuity of those answers. Those answers learned many years ago were the foundation upon which the recognizable house has been built.

SATURDAY TWENTY-EIGHTH WEEK OF THE YEAR (Luke 12:,8-12)
How do I acknowledge or deny the Lord? By overtly saying “I do not believe”, I affirm Him by saying: I believe and by living that way. This, to use a big word, is the transcendental. In everyday life I have found that this affirmation or denial takes on different meaning.
It is the affirmation of Christ as King in all of creation, “all creation is full of your glory” it is the denial of this. It is the affirmation that each and every individual is in some way united to the Lord and must be treated as such....I deny Christ when I deny His presence in all people. I acknowledge Him when I look at history as the ongoing process of the revealing of His plan for us...I deny Him when I look at history as just a number of events with no ultimate end...I acknowledge Christ when I see Him as the center and that all things are tending towards Him. I deny Christ when the things of this world become either ends in themselves or just things to be used .
I deny the Holy Spirit when I close my heart to the need for forgiveness. It isn’t that forgiveness is ever denied us it is just that we do not want it. God does not turn from us it is that we have turned from God. God always gives the gift of forgiveness but like every gift we can say no.