Items filtered by date: Friday, 04 February 2022

What’s in Your Heart?

(8^th Ordinary Sunday: Sirach 27:4-7; 1 Corinthians 15:54-58; Luke 6:39-45)

There is an ad for a credit card that ends with the question, “What’s in your wallet?” Sirach, in today’s first reading, and Jesus in the Gospel, both ask, in effect, “What’s in your heart?” and they look for the answer in how we speak.

Sirach compares speech to the sifting of grain, revealing how much, or how little, substance there is in our mind and heart. At La Salette, Mary uses an even stronger image. “If you have wheat, you must not sow it. Anything you sow the vermin will eat, and whatever does grow will fall into dust when you thresh it.”

This is, first, a warning of the famine that lies ahead; but it is also an apt symbol of the state of her people’s faith, which has fallen into dust, blighted by indifference. This is a great tragedy.

The Gospel, too, reminds us of our faults. Jesus says, “Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own?” It can be easy to criticize others, as if our personal behavior and opinions were normative for everyone else. This attitude, and perhaps many others, are not easy to overcome.

But all is not lost. Otherwise, the Beautiful Lady would never have come.

St. Paul, at the end of the long chapter on the resurrection, cries out: “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? ... Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, be firm, steadfast, always fully devoted to the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”

Yes, we need to labor, to strive to live our faith with integrity. The victory is not ours to win, however. It is beyond our strength—but not beyond our reach. At La Salette Mary reminds us of the means placed at our disposal in the Church and in our personal lives, making it possible for us to share Christ’s triumph over sin and death.

Hope of victory is more than wishing for it. It is based on promises like that of today’s psalm: “They that are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of the house of our God.” Is that in your heart?

Wayne Vanasse, and Fr. René Butler, M.S.

What a Challenge!

(7^th Ordinary Sunday: 1 Samuel 26:2-23; 1 Corinthians 15:45-49; Luke 6:27-38)

At La Salette, Mary reminded us of our obligation to honor the Lord’s Name and the Lord’s Day (Mass and rest), to respect the discipline of Lent, and to pray. These are all included in her call to submit.

There is ample material here for an examination of conscience. But today’s Gospel helps us to understand that doing what the Beautiful Lady asks is just the beginning.

Jesus makes it clear that he expects much more of his disciples than the observance of the Law. The commandments are the foundation, not the whole structure. Some of his listeners must have thought he was going too far in requiring a peaceful, even submissive attitude, towards their enemies. In our time, too, it is not easy to accept such demands.

Does our faith make us better persons? In the first reading we find an excellent model in David. His faith in the God of Israel never wavered. So, when he had the opportunity to destroy his mortal enemy, King Saul, he showed him mercy instead, rather than strike the Lord’s anointed.

This is what the world needs today. It’s what the world has always needed, and will always need. There never was and can never be an excess of charity, that love which is poured into our hearts by God. It will never be perfect or complete, because, as St. Paul says in the second reading, we bear the earthly image of the earthly man, Adam.

We need not be discouraged, however. We are never beyond God’s power to forgive. We can, by God’s grace, bear the image of the heavenly man, Jesus Christ.

At the same time, we must not be complacent, as though our thoughts and words and actions really do not matter to God. The Lord knows what we think and say and do, but he also knows our hearts. For example, when we carry out Jesus’ command, “Give to everyone who asks of you,” is our motive pure?

Oh, the challenge of being faithful and faith-filled! With all our heart, let us pray the words of today’s opening prayer: “Grant that we may carry out in both word and deed that which is pleasing to you.”

Wayne Vanasse, and Fr. René Butler, M.S.