Twenty-Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time
17 October 2021, Brookings
Heb
4:14-16
Is
53:10-11
Mk
10:35-45
Praised
be Jesus Christ!
“For
we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses,
but one who has similarly been tested in every way, yet without sin.”
Jesus
– truly God and truly Man!
“Teacher,
we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” Truth to be told, that sounds like a pretty typical
prayer request from a solid believer in the “good old days”. Maybe children
still make their prayer requests that way today, but older people tend to shy
away from asking God for things that directly or confidently. I think we need
to recover our confidence in the power of prayer. Maybe we need to learn to be
like children again or at least to take inspiration from great saints like the
apostles James and John in today’s Gospel?
He
replied, “What do you wish me to do for you?” They answered him, “Grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right and
the other at your left.” Jesus said to them, “You do
not know what you are asking. Can you drink the cup
that I drink or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” How many people today are really longing to be fully a
part of Christ’s reign? If and when people pray, what do they ask of God? Do
they, do we pray with the intention to seek a share in the Lord’s cup of
suffering? All I hope is that they are not too troubled by the stuff on the news
about container ships sitting off the port of Los Angeles waiting to be unloaded,
or about supply chain problems which might put a damper on online Christmas
shopping. At least not that! Believing and praying people should have other
primary concerns.
“Grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right
and the other at your left.” …
I guess the kind of ambition or hopes
for the future expressed by the disciples James and John are understandable,
but even so, how many people ask favors of God in that manner? We do not know
what to ask or how to ask. What is the problem that makes us so standoffish as
Catholics today, God’s chosen people, who should be constantly turning to Jesus
Who answers all our needs?
I
don’t think that our hesitancy or lack of enthusiasm about turning to Jesus is
just a matter of our being at a disadvantage by comparison with those who lived
when the Lord walked this earth. I do not think the problem for us is as simple
as claiming to be at a disadvantage for not having Jesus right there on the
spot, Himself teaching and working miracles. We have 2 millennia of Catholicism
and examples in every place and time of people who insistently asked just like
James and John: “Grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right and
the other at your left.” I am wondering when I see the drop in average
Sunday Mass attendance even here in South Dakota if it is not rather that the
faith even here on the prairie finds itself in serious crisis. Giving Jesus the
silent treatment is tantamount to not loving Him and not believing in Him as
God.
We
do have a problem in our world today. I am trying to think if I know anyone who
asks the help of Jesus or asks His favor the way that James and John did. I
wonder if I know people who ask to share in Christ’s suffering, or who simply
set their sights on being part of His glorious and everlasting Kingdom. What do
people hope for? Are they simply afraid of being rebuffed like James and John? “You
do not know what you are asking.” Or do they just not care?
It
would seem that even among regular and faithful churchgoers that few are those
who recognize Jesus as Lord, Jesus as King of the World which is to come, Jesus
as the only one Who answers all our needs. A kind of materialism which ignores
or dethrones Christ is sadly all too common also or even in church circles
today. People hesitate to ask, not out of reverential fear but because their faith
in Jesus as God has grown tepid or maybe never knew any fervor, not even in
their childhood. We know that is true because we know how many children have
never been taught their prayers. We know how many young people and adults who
never pray, that is, who do not have Jesus, Mary, and the Saints as points of
reference in their daily lives.
Even
among those who do their best to be faithful Catholics the risk involved in
placing all our hope in Christ, in trusting in the Lord, seems more than they
can manage. The notion of stepping out in faith inspires a measure of terror in
the most devout and is shrugged off by the lukewarm. Indeed, the risk is that if
we were to ask for a full share in His life and victory, Jesus could probably
respond to each and every one of us here and say the same thing He said to
James and John, thereby firstly, putting us in our place, and ultimately,
challenging us to share in His Cross. This Sunday the Church would have us wake
up and open up our eyes to the demands of discipleship, which is the only thing
that being Catholic can be about… really!
“Can
you drink the cup that I drink or be baptized with the baptism with which I am
baptized?”
What
is being asked of me is to place my trust in the Lord. By failing to do so I
fall short and fail to share in Christ’s cup or in taking on His baptism with
all the consequences. The Old Testament Prophet Isaiah explains what is in play
as clearly as can be found anywhere in the Bible.
“If
he gives his life as an offering for sin, he shall see his descendants in a
long life, and the will of the LORD shall be accomplished through him. Because
of his affliction he shall see the light in fullness of days; Through his
suffering, my servant shall justify many, and their guilt he shall bear.”
Big notions like “expiation for sin” or “redemptive suffering”,
as described in Isaiah’s prophecy in our First Reading, are properly central to
the role of Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world. Through Baptism as the
Lord’s followers, we benefit from a work which was accomplished by the Lord Himself
once and for all. We benefit by sharing in this work, which is properly His. We
do so by identifying with God’s Servant and cooperating with Him, Who suffered
that we might have life in abundance. James and John had to learn as apostles
just what that would require of them. One of the biggest challenges we face
today is just that: very simply, living out the two great commands of love of
God and love of neighbor, starting concretely with observing the 10
Commandments and following the Precepts of the Church.
I guess I should be
launching into a list of things which according to your station in life may need
turning around. That would go far beyond the time limits of a regular homily.
Let me leave you today with a double challenge!
Take
up the matter of daily examining your conscience before bed at night to see how
you are doing very concretely with the 10 Commandments and the Precepts of the
Church!
Mark
your whole day by prayer:
- in
the morning on rising, before you brush your teeth, ask the Lord and your
Guardian Angel to stand by you no matter what comes,
- only
eat once you have thanked the Lord for His bounty,
- pray
the Angelus at 6-12 and 6,
- and
start building up your time with the Mother of God, start with at least a
decade of her rosary each day and go from there!
“Grant
that in your glory we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.” We are destined for no less and should not sell
ourselves short. There is work to be done.
Praised by Jesus Christ!
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