September 29, 2013 – Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time – Lectionary: 138
Reading 1 – Amos 6: 1A, 4-7
Thus says the LORD the God of hosts:
Woe to the complacent in Zion!
Lying upon beds of ivory,
stretched comfortably on their couches,
they eat lambs taken from the flock,
and calves from the stall!
Improvising to the music of the harp,
like David, they devise their own accompaniment.
They drink wine from bowls
and anoint themselves with the best oils;
yet they are not made ill by the collapse of Joseph!
Therefore, now they shall be the first to go into exile,
and their wanton revelry shall be done away with.
Responsorial Psalm – Psalm 14 6:7, 8-9, 9-10
- Praise the Lord, my soul!
Blessed he who keeps faith forever,
secures justice for the oppressed,
gives food to the hungry.
The LORD sets captives free. - Praise the Lord, my soul!
The LORD gives sight to the blind.
The LORD raises up those who were bowed down;
the LORD loves the just.
The LORD protects strangers. - Praise the Lord, my soul!
The fatherless and the widow he sustains,
but the way of the wicked he thwarts.
The LORD shall reign forever;
your God, O Zion, through all generations. Alleluia. - Praise the Lord, my soul!
Reading 2 – 1 Timothy 6: 11-16
But you, man of God, pursue righteousness,
devotion, faith, love, patience, and gentleness.
Compete well for the faith.
Lay hold of eternal life, to which you were called
when you made the noble confession in the presence of many witnesses.
I charge you before God, who gives life to all things,
and before Christ Jesus,
who gave testimony under Pontius Pilate for the noble confession,
to keep the commandment without stain or reproach
until the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ
that the blessed and only ruler
will make manifest at the proper time,
the King of kings and Lord of lords,
who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light,
and whom no human being has seen or can see.
To him be honor and eternal power. Amen.
Gospel – Luke 16: 19-31
Jesus said to the Pharisees:
“There was a rich man who dressed in purple garments and fine linen
and dined sumptuously each day.
And lying at his door was a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores,
who would gladly have eaten his fill of the scraps
that fell from the rich man’s table.
Dogs even used to come and lick his sores.
When the poor man died,
he was carried away by angels to the bosom of Abraham.
The rich man also died and was buried,
and from the netherworld, where he was in torment,
he raised his eyes and saw Abraham far off
and Lazarus at his side.
And he cried out, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me.
Send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue,
for I am suffering torment in these flames.’
Abraham replied,
‘My child, remember that you received
what was good during your lifetime
while Lazarus likewise received what was bad;
but now he is comforted here, whereas you are tormented.
Moreover, between us and you a great chasm is established
to prevent anyone from crossing who might wish to go
from our side to yours or from your side to ours.’
He said, ‘Then I beg you, father,
send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers,
so that he may warn them,
lest they too come to this place of torment.’
But Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the prophets.
Let them listen to them.’
He said, ‘Oh no, father Abraham,
but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’
Then Abraham said, ‘If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets,
neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead.'”
Listen to the Scriptures: click on the link below:
http://ccc.usccb.org/cccradio/NABPodcasts/16_09_25.mp3
26th Sunday of the Year – C – 25th September 2016
Theme: The wealth of the world is meant to be shared by all: it is not the preserve of a select few. Every human being has a right to the basic necessities of life: food, clothing, lodging – not merely on a subsistence level, but enough to lead a life of dignity and worth. Christ asks us to examine our conscience and to see how we can help the cause of social justice.
More than ever, Lazarus is with us: on the TV screen, we see the hollow cheeks and the distended bellies of the hungry poor of our world. They stare at us vacantly from our TV screen and our newspapers. We have all the statistics and data on their needs. They are not strangers, they are not aliens: they are our brothers and sisters in Christ, and they are our concern. The crumbs that fall from our rich tables are not enough to feed them; partial solutions cannot begin to take care of the poor of the world. What is needed is a renewal of the Christian spirit, a reawakening of the Christian conscience.
Point 1: We may enjoy the fruits of our labor. Poverty is a very sensitive subject: we try to avoid it, we tend to be uncomfortable at the words of Christ, words which condemn the selfish use of wealth – material things. We have all been brought up respecting the value of money and the desirability of material success. We feel, and rightly so, that our hard work should be rewarded, that we have earned our comforts. It is true that every worker should enjoy the fruits of his labor, but in what measure? That is the question each Christian should ask himself, and to which each one must find an equitable answer.
Point 2: We generally have more than others. Over and again in the Gospel, Christ speaks out, at times very forcefully, against the rich, against those who live in ideal luxury, unconcerned about the misery of millions of their brothers and sisters. Often, in the cities, the most expensive and extravagant dwellings are only a few blocks away from the most squalid poor slums. The contrast is painful and scandalous. Yet, we should not take comfort in the fact that, because we cannot be counted among the rich all this does not really concern us. In a world where hundreds of thousands of people are literally dying of hunger, we live in a privileged situation. We complain of petrol shortages and rising costs of food, while in others parts of the country or world people have no food and no transport but their feet.
Point 3: We must give the example of sharing. What can we do to help the poor? Christ tells us in the parable it is not enough to give the crumbs from our table. We must begin on the private and local level: in our community, in our families, in our personal lives. How can we teach our children to be generous, to be compassionate, if we do not practice what we preach? There are those who complain that the young have no respect for Christian values; but, often, the same people who insist on proper language and an impeccable moral code live lives of self-indulgence, occupied solely with their comforts, privileges, and pleasures. No wonder young people, sensitive to the glaring injustices of society, are turned off by what they feel is hypocritical behaviour. Even the Church is rethinking its policies in order to give authentic witness to the Gospel.
Conclusion: Jesus chose to live simply as a workman in a small village of Galilee. During his public life, he preached against ostentatious wealth, against those who live to accumulate money. He called the poor blessed, and urged his followers to be aware of the demands of love and justice. What does today’s parable mean in terms of our own life? It is addressed to each one of us as a call to generosity and sacrifice. In the past, this generosity was often understood in terms of alms giving; but the mere giving away of a few coins does not relieve us of our responsibilities. What Christ asks is a more profound change, a change in our attitudes, lifestyles and value-systems. No general directions are sufficient: each one of us must examine his life and determine what he must do in order to become a better follower of the Poor Man, Jesus.
QUESTIONS THAT MAY LEAD TO OTHER THOUGHTS / REFLECTION / DISCUSSION / WRITTEN
- How does this parable apply to you practically? How does it apply to the life of religious?
- Is there any area of your life in which you can practice some form of voluntary poverty in honor of the Poor Man, Jesus?
- In what way can you, can we, influence national policies, the policies of the rich nations in regard to the poor of the third world?
- Is the ownership of great wealth by a Christian, by the Church justified?
- What things or talents do you have, do we have, that make us rich?
This is a hard parable with an important and difficult message. Let us look at the two characters in it:
- First, there is the rich man, usually called Dives, which is the Latin for rich. Every phrase adds something to the luxury in which he lived. He was clothed in purple and fine linen. That is the description of the robes of the High Priests, and such robes cost anything from 400,000 cedis to 500,000 cedis, an immense sum in days when a working man’s wage was about 6,000 cedis a day. He feasted in luxury every day. The word used for feasting is the word that is used for a gourmet feeding on exotic and costly dishes. He did this every day. In so doing he definitely and positively broke the fourth commandment. That commandment not only forbids work on the Sabbath; it also says six days you shall labour (Exo.20:9).
In a country where the common people were fortunate if they ate meat once in the week and where they toiled for six days of the week, Dives is a figure of indolent self-indulgence. Lazarus was waiting for the crumbs that fell from Dives’s table. In that time there were no knives, forks or napkins. Food was eaten with the hands and, in very wealthy houses, the hands were cleansed by wiping them on hunks of bread, which were then thrown away. That was what Lazarus was waiting for.
- Second, there is Lazarus. Strangely enough Lazarus is the only character in any of the parables who is given a name. The name is the Latinized form of Eleazar and means God is my help. He was a beggar; he was covered with ulcerated sores, and so helpless that he could not even ward off the street dogs, which pestered him.
- Such is the scene in this world; then abruptly it changes to the next and there Lazarus is in glory and Dives is in torment. What was the sin of Dives? He had not ordered Lazarus to be removed from his gate. He had made no objections to his receiving the bread that was flung away from his table. He did not kick him in passing. He was not deliberately cruel to him. The sin of Dives was that he never noticed Lazarus, that he accepted him as part of the landscape and simply thought it perfectly natural and inevitable that Lazarus should lie in pain and hunger while he wallowed in luxury. As someone said, “It was not what Dives did that got him into shoal; it was what he did not do that got him into hell.”
The sin of Dives was that he could look on the world’s suffering and need and feel no answering sword of grief and pity pierce his heart; he looked at a fellow-man, hungry and in pain, and did nothing about it. His was the punishment of the man who never noticed.
It seems hard that his request that his brothers should be warned was refused. But it is the plain fact that if men possess the truth of God’s word, and if, wherever they look, there is sorrow to be comforted, needs to be supplied, pain to be relieved, and it moves them to no feeling and to no action, nothing will change them.
It is a terrible warning that the sin of Dives was not that he did wrong things, but that he did nothing.
Reading I: Amos 6:1a, 4-7
Responsorial Psalm: 146:7, 8-9, 9-10
Reading II: 1 Timothy 6:11-16
Gospel: Luke 16:19-31
Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time C – September 25, 2016
For the Church: that we may put on the mind of Christ and open the gates that isolate and protect us from all who are not like us, let us pray to the Lord.
For the grace to be rich in faith, love and good works: that our words and deeds may proclaim the greatness of God and manifest God’s reign today, let us pray to the Lord.
For openness and compassion: that we may see and hear the sufferings of our sisters and brothers who are enslaved by poverty and sacrificially respond to their need, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who are chained by their possessions: that God will touch hearts and open minds to the value and dignity of life and relationships, let us pray to the Lord.
For all ministers of the Christian community: that they may faithfully announce the Good News and bear witness to it in the lives, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who live in complete poverty, for refugees, for those who live on garbage piles, and for all the children orphaned by AIDS: that God will open new possibilities for them and open the eyes of the wealthy to see the needs that exist, let us pray to the Lord.
For a deepening ability to hear the voice of God: that our minds and hearts may recognize the Word of God spoken to us in the Scriptures, through our relationships, and in the events of our lives, let us pray to the Lord.
For a closing of the abyss between rich and poor in our cities, nation and world: that we may use our time, talent, and treasure to provide opportunities for the poor and marginalized around us, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who care for the poor and needy: that God will guide them to recognize the person who is before them and help them to share God’s love with them, let us pray to the Lord.
For all who are seeking employment: that God will give them courage to persevere and help them to recognize new ways to use their gifts and talents, let us pray to the Lord.
For those recovering from natural disasters: that God will renew their spirits and help many to respond with generosity and compassion to their loss, let us pray to the Lord.
For the Church in the Mid-East: that God will guide the bishops of the Mid-East, gathering for the special synod, to effectively proclaim the Good News and strengthen the unity of the church, let us pray to the Lord.
For faithful citizenship: that all will take their responsibility to vote seriously and allow the Gospel values to guide their choices, let us pray to the Lord.
For an end to bloodshed and violence: that swords may be turned into plowshares and vengeance may be pruned from all hearts, let us pray to the Lord.