Saint Ignatius: "Where did this man get such wisdom and mighty deeds?"

"A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and in his own house."

-- Mt 13:54-58

Jesus Christ is the one whom the Father anointed with the Holy Spirit and established as priest, prophet, and king. The whole People of God participates in these three offices of Christ and bears the responsibilities for mission and service that flow from them.

-- CCC 783

"When Ignatius reflected on worldly thoughts, he felt intense pleasure; but when he gave them up out of weariness, he felt dry and depressed. Yet when he thought of living the rigorous sort of life he knew the saints had lived, he not only experienced pleasure when he actually thought about it, but even after he dismissed these thoughts, he still experienced great joy." (From the life of Saint Ignatius from his own words by Luis Gonzalez.)

"The Kingdom of heaven is like a net"

"Then every scribe who has been instructed in the Kingdom of heaven is like the head of a household who brings from his storeroom both the new and the old."

-- Mt 13:47-53

For this reason bishops, personally or through delegates, should see to the promotion of sacred art, old and new, in all its forms and, with the same religious care, remove from the liturgy and from places of worship everything which is not in conformity with the truth of faith and the authentic beauty of sacred art.

-- CCC 2503

"The hand that assumed clay to make our flesh deigned to assume a body for our salvation. That the Creator is in His creature and God is in the flesh brings dignity to man without dishonor to to him who made him."

-- Saint Peter Chrysologus, Bishop and Doctor

Martha went to meet Jesus

“I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and anyone who lives and believes in me will never die."

-- Jn 11:19-27

But there is more. Jesus links faith in the resurrection to his own person: "I am the Resurrection and the life." It is Jesus himself who on the last day will raise up those who have believed in him, who have eaten his body and drunk his blood. Already now in this present life he gives a sign and pledge of this by restoring some of the dead to life, announcing thereby his own Resurrection, though it was to be of another order. He speaks of this unique event as the "sign of Jonah," the sign of the temple: he announces that he will be put to death but rise thereafter on the third day.

-- CCC 994

(Franciscan friars "Walking With Hope: A Journey of Faith and Discovery" a 300-mile pilgrimage from Virginia to Washington, DC. For more info visit their website with photo gallery here.)

Tuesday, 17th Wk Ord Time: “Explain to us the parable of the weeds"

The weeds are the children of the Evil One,
and the enemy who sows them is the Devil.
The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels.
Just as weeds are collected and burned up with fire,
so will it be at the end of the age.

-- Mt 13:36-43

Jesus often speaks of "Gehenna" of "the unquenchable fire" reserved for those who to the end of their lives refuse to believe and be converted, where both soul and body can be lost. Jesus solemnly proclaims that he "will send his angels, and they will gather . . . all evil doers, and throw them into the furnace of fire," and that he will pronounce the condemnation: "Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire!"

-- CCC 1034

Monday, 17th Wk Ord Time: “The Kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed"

"It is the smallest of all the seeds,
yet when full-grown it is the largest of plants.
It becomes a large bush,
and the birds of the sky come and dwell in its branches.”

-- Mt 13:31-35

"This Kingdom shines out before men in the word, in the works and in the presence of Christ." To welcome Jesus' word is to welcome "the Kingdom itself." The seed and beginning of the Kingdom are the "little flock" of those whom Jesus came to gather around him, the flock whose shepherd he is. They form Jesus' true family. To those whom he thus gathered around him, he taught a new "way of acting" and a prayer of their own.

-- CCC 764

The kingdom of heaven was inaugurated on earth by Christ. "This kingdom shone out before men in the word, in the works and in the presence of Christ" (LG 5). The Church is the seed and beginning of this kingdom. Its keys are entrusted to Peter.

-- CCC 567

17th Sunday: “Where can we buy enough food for them to eat?"

2 Kings 4, 42-44; Psalm 145; Ephesians 4, 1-6; St. John 6, 1-15

Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

"How are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?" (John 6, 5) Test question.

There is a bread which cannot be bought and which all must eat to live: "I am the Bread of Life." (John 6, 35) Christ himself is the food for which man has always yearned. Christ is the Life for which the man seeks who knows he must die. "The bread that I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh." (John 6, 51)

From the beginning of time man has sought in vain, through what he finds in himself or in other creatures, to satisfy his yearning for life, an abundant life beyond death. Only in Christ can man attain at last that perfect communion with his Creator that bridges the chasm of death which has separated the two since the first sin of Adam and Eve. And yet, even after Christ has taught that it is by forgiveness of sins that we are fed with God's life and are saved from unhappiness, there yet remain the multitudes who see in God only someone to relieve their earthly longings, their temporary misfortunes in this life. They fail to see beyond the signs, the healings and the multiplication of loaves and fishes, to the reality of the eternal God by whose power these things are done.

“By freeing some individuals from the earthly evils of hunger, injustice, illness, and death, (Cf. John 6: 5-15; Luke 19:8; Matthew 11:5) Jesus performed messianic signs. Nevertheless he did not come to abolish all evils here below, (Cf. Luke 12:13-14; John 18:36) but to free men from the gravest slavery, sin, which thwarts them in their vocation as God's sons and causes all forms of human bondage. (Cf. John 8:34-36)” (CCC 549)

All are called to no less than total and eternal communion with God himself forever. This promise begins now in an anticipation of glory by receiving the Eucharist, the Body and Blood of Christ, the Living Bread. Our relationship with the Lord will fall short, and our happiness will remain incomplete, as long as we fail to go from the signs to the reality they signify. The Eucharist is the only perfect "sign" on earth of God for, not only is his passion and death re-presented, he is really and truly present and we do indeed receive him whole and entire in the sacred host.

To possess the life of God we must receive him as he is and not as we would have him be. The sign of the Eucharist, wherein God is so often missed and overlooked, perfectly communicates this truth because it is the very Presence of God Himself. The living God always eludes those who grasp for him as an earthly Messiah only. The Gospel relates that it was from these mistaken ones that Jesus fled: "Perceiving then that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, Jesus withdrew again to the hills by himself." (John 6, 15)

If we would dwell forever in God then He, truly present in the Eucharist, must dwell within us. In the Mass and in other moments of adoration we learn to see Christ present here on earth, enjoying a communion with him in order to go "beyond the veil" of this world with its hunger and thirst, war and injustice, disease and death, to dwell with him eternally in the heavenly "communion" of perfect love and light and life.

(See also paragraphs 439, 549, 559 in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.)

I look forward to meeting you here again next week as, together, we "meet Christ in the Liturgy", Fr Cusick

Meeting Christ in the Liturgy (Publish with permission.)

Friday, 17th Wk Ord Time: "Hear the parable of the sower."

The seed sown on rocky ground
is the one who hears the word and receives it at once with joy.
But he has no root and lasts only for a time.
When some tribulation or persecution comes because of the word,
he immediately falls away.

-- Mt 13:18-23

Everyone is called to enter the kingdom. First announced to the children of Israel, this messianic kingdom is intended to accept men of all nations. To enter it, one must first accept Jesus' word:

The word of the Lord is compared to a seed which is sown in a field; those who hear it with faith and are numbered among the little flock of Christ have truly received the kingdom. Then, by its own power, the seed sprouts and grows until the harvest.

-- CCC 543

Before Christ's second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers. The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth will unveil the "mystery of iniquity" in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth. The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh.

-- CCC 675