Sunday Gospel Reflection, November 1, 2026: Everyone who has this hope...

Everyone who has this hope…
What is our hope? 

 

    In the time of King David, anyone who approached the temple had to respond to a series of questions before they would be allowed in. Psalm 24 speaks of the people that longs to see the Lord’s face. Are we ready to stand before the Lord, ready to see God face to face? Do we clearly desire to be in his presence, and if so, are we dedicated to doing his will? Who can ascend the mountain of the Lord? the psalmist asks. One whose hands are sinless, whose heart is clean, who desires not what is vain. 

    The saints are those who we believe have been brought into the blessing of God’s presence. In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount offers a series of blessings, or beatitudes, designed to help us to know that blessing one day as well. We are to be poor in spirit, surrendering ourselves in spirit to our dependence upon God, renouncing all desire for power and thus remaining meek in the eyes of God, opening our hearts – our clean hearts – in mercy and making peace for all by revealing the love of God as something we all hold in common. Like the saints, we hope that our reward will be great in heaven, that we might see the face of God. 

    As the author of the First Letter of St. John writes, what we shall be has not yet been revealed. But right now, we know the love the Father has bestowed on us, that we might be called the children of God, and that is a tremendous blessing indeed. And so we hope for salvation, making ourselves pure, as he is pure, striving to become the very image of God. 

    Many have entered the Kingdom of God before us – a great multitude, the Book of Revelation tells us – and are standing before the throne and before the Lamb, worshipping God. We too hope to be marked with the seal of the living God, marked as belonging to God, and thus ready for perfect union in heaven. May this Solemnity of All Saints offer us encouragement, that we might stay true to our hope, remaining faithful to our God forever, that our blessings may be eternal! 

This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture Class. 

Image source: www.wordclouds.com

Sunday Gospel Reflection, November 1, 2020: What we shall be has not yet been revealed...

What we shall be has not yet been revealed…

Are you waiting to be transformed?

   We long for transformation.  Before the Christian era, Psalm 24 pointed to a human desire for transformation through a powerful encounter with God:  Lord, this is the people that longs to see your face, the psalmist sings.  Christians would read back into Psalm 24 a longing for transformation through our own death and dying; death and resurrection represent the ongoing transformation of our lives.  And it is through our own ongoing death and resurrection that Christ is revealed in us, as he is revealed in the saints whom we celebrate this weekend on the Solemnity of All Saints.  In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus reveals the Beatitudes to his disciples after going up a mountain, a place of transformation and of revelation.  The Beatitudes define our existence; they explain how our relationship with God is lived out in the context of one another.  Our success in so doing is to be cause for rejoicing, for, as Jesus tells the disciples, our reward will be great in heaven.

   The early Christian community hoped for that reward even as they knew what it meant to struggle to maintain their faith against forces pushing against that faith.  In the Book of Revelation, the servants of God are marked for Christ, and bear a seal on their foreheads.  They have been transformed inwardly by the pain and suffering of life – this is the journey of the Christian.  The community addressed in 1 John is looking forward to that same reward:  what we shall be has not yet been revealed; we do know that when it is revealed, we shall be like him.  This is the ultimate transformation, to be like him, a transformation that results from our entering more deeply into relationship with the Lord, from our becoming children of God, true to the will of the Father, open to every expression of God’s love in our lives, and willing to be transformed by it into its very source, in anticipation of seeing that face we long for in perfect union with God in heaven.

This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.

Image source:  www.wordclouds.com