These reflections are a result of more than 40 years of ministry as a Roman Catholic priest. Most of these years I spent in the Diocese of Charlotte which covers Western North Carolina. Now I am retired, and live in Medellín, Colombia where I continue to serve as a priest in the Archdiocese of Medellín.
Blessed is the one who reads aloud
and blessed are those who listen to this prophetic message
and heed what is written in it, for the appointed time is near.
(Rev 1:3)
This little verse holds a key to understanding this mysterious book of the Bible. “Blessed is the one who reads aloud and blessed are those who listen” describes a liturgical setting and further on the writer says that it was “on the Lord’s day” (Rev 1:10). And perhaps, the liturgy is the proper place to situate this book and to understand its message, a message not only to early Christians facing persecution, but also to overstuffed Christians two thousand years later who have “lost the love you had at first” (Rev 2:4). These last two weeks of Ordinary Time should be interesting.
'Well done, my good and faithful servant.
Come, share your master's joy.’
(Mt 25:23)
In the Parable of the Talents it is important to remember that a Biblical talent was MONEY, not an ability or skill. And it wasn’t just a few dollars . . . it was serious money, like over a million bucks today. So a master giving one or two or five talents to his slaves . . . well that doesn’t happen. Nobody in our world would give their servant five million bucks . . . but maybe, just maybe God would.
Jesus told his disciples a parable
about the necessity for them to pray always without becoming weary.
He said, “There was a judge in a certain town
who neither feared God nor respected any human being.
And a widow in that town used to come to him and say,
‘Render a just decision for me against my adversary.’
For a long time the judge was unwilling, but eventually he thought,
‘While it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being,
because this widow keeps bothering me
I shall deliver a just decision for her
lest she finally come and strike me.’”
(Lk 18:1-5)
What is Jesus doing in this parable? The figure of the dishonest judge afraid that a widow might beat him up as a symbol of God? Perhaps there’s more to the parables than we ever imagined!
But now, I ask you,
not as though I were writing a new commandment
but the one we have had from the beginning:
let us love one another.
(2 Jn 1:5)
Sometimes it must seem like a broken record, but “let us love one another” has to be said over and over again. It’s the problem with Christian community as our professor in seminary once said. She said, “Christian community never fully arrives, you always have to build it . . . it’s a lot like that old Paul Simon song which says, ‘You know the nearer your destination/The more you're slip slidin' away.’” Today is the feast of Mother Cabrini, an Italian lady who immigrated to the United States, founded a religious community to care for immigrants, became a citizen, and is the first canonized saint from the United States.
Perhaps this is why Onesimus was away from you for a while,
that you might have him back forever,
no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a brother,
beloved especially to me, but even more so to you,
as a man and in the Lord.So if you regard me as a partner, welcome him as you would me.
And if he has done you any injustice
or owes you anything, charge it to me.
I, Paul, write this in my own hand: I will pay.
May I not tell you that you owe me your very self.
Yes, brother, may I profit from you in the Lord.
Refresh my heart in Christ.
(Plhm 15-20)
Poor Onesimus . . . being sent back to his master, Philemon, who had the power to execute his runaway slave. Of course, Saint Paul was pulling a few heart-strings and paved the way of return with golden words: “welcome him as you would me.” Today is the feast of Saint Josaphat, bishop and martyr of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. His tomb is in Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome.
