Sunday Gospel Reflection, December 14, 2014: My soul rejoices...

My soul rejoices in my God...

What brings you joy?

Ultimately, if you think about it, the answer is always God. 

Our readings for this Gaudete Sunday all focus on joy, developing the Mass’s opening call to Rejoice! because God is working in us to bring good news to all.  The prophet Isaiah, for example, rejoices because God has wrapped him in a mantle of justice, allowing him to bring glad tidings to the poor and to announce a year of favor from our God.  In place of a psalm, we hear a canticle from Luke, Mary’s Magnificat.  My spirit rejoices in God my Savior, she proclaims: during her visit with Elizabeth, Mary shares the marvelous news of what God is doing in her at that very moment, as she opens her heart to allow God’s work to take place.  The mother of Jesus gives voice to her own glad tidings, and Elizabeth participates in her joy.

The ultimate joy, of course, is Jesus, the light to which John the Baptist came to testify in John's Gospel, a light that will show the way to salvation, revealing all things, but most importantly, revealing God’s love and loving action in our lives.  And so Paul can tell the Thessalonians, Rejoice always! – by means of prayer and praise, opening themselves to the work of God that will fill them with holiness and peace. May we, too, rejoice, rejoice always, for God is about to be revealed – born – in each and every one of us again quite soon, so that we can continue to share his love, and his light, with the world.  What better reason could there possibly be to be filled with joy?

This post is based on Fr. Pat's Scripture class.
Image source:  Wordle

Sunday Gospel Reflection, November 16, 2014: You shall eat the fruit of your handiwork...

You shall eat the fruit of your handiwork...

Do you trust in God’s gifts?

In our first reading from Wisdom this Sunday, the relationship described between wife and husband is extraordinary.  In spite of all of the limitations placed on women in biblical times, the woman depicted here is called worthy, meaning that her deeds have been heroic, beyond the norm.  Her husband therefore entrusts his own thoughts and indeed, his very self, to her, because she knows him deeply, knows how he will act.  Where does her wisdom come from?  The author suggests that it is her fear of the Lord – her awe born of the recognition that all that she has and is is a gift from God, from Love – that is the source of her empowerment.  This good wife can lose herself in all that God is doing in her; she is the epitome of all that is the best in humanity, as she has learned from Love how to be love for other.  And hence, as Psalm 128 suggests, she is blessed, as is the family she nurtures and nourishes.

A similar appreciation (or lack thereof) of the gifts with which God endows us percolates through the Parable of the Talents in Matthew’s gospel as well.  Of the three servants entrusted with the master’s money, only two invest it properly and reap the rewards of their investment; the last buries his share out of fear of displeasing his master.  But indeed, it is precisely the last servant’s inaction that displeases the master:  rather than trust the gift, and the giver, this servant prefers safety and security to risk.  Now apply this logic to love:  love is, by its very nature, risky.  If we ever hope to live fruitful Christian lives, we need to be able to take the risk, open our hearts, give witness to our faith, be transformed by that faith, and live our relationship with God from a stance that includes fear of the Lord, awe in all that God does for us.  When we are fully possessed by God, nothing stands in our way.  Our hope is grounded in something we have yet to encounter (our future beyond death), but we can share in the kingdom – share in the master’s joy – here and now, acting, as Paul tells the Thessalonians, as children of the light, living in fear of the Lord and therefore with no reason to fear death, or anything else.  Then we will truly share in God’s joy, enjoying the fruit of our handiwork, assured of the bliss that will be ours, in this life, and, hopefully, in the life to come.

This post is based on Fr. Pat's Scripture class.
Image source