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.
You are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the holy ones and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone. Through him the whole structure is held together and grows into a temple sacred in the Lord; in him you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit. (Eph 2:19-22)
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/102823.cfm
No longer strangers and sojourners, but rather fellow citizens, members of the household of God, a temple sacred in the Lord, a dwelling place of God in the Spirit. That is the truth of who we are! As we celebrate the choosing of the Twelve, we also celebrate our own apostolic mission to bring Good News to all the earth.
For I do not do the good I want, but I do the evil I do not want . . . Miserable one that I am! Who will deliver me from this mortal body? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Rom 7:18-25a)
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/102723.cfm
We can all sympathize with Saint Paul because we’ve all been there too. But sin is not the last word. The last word belongs to the Lord . . . and that word is grace. Pope Francis has designated today as a time of fasting, prayer and penance for peace. As the pope says, “We do not belong to any “Caesar” of this world. We are the Lord’s, and we must not be slaves to any earthly power. War is always a defeat, it is a destruction of human fraternity. Brothers, stop! Stop!”
But now that you have been freed from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit that you have leads to sanctification, and its end is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom 6:19-23)
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/102623.cfm
“For the wages of sin is death” . . . . one of Saint Paul’s most quotable lines—unfortunately used more often as a clobber-passage, to beat people over the head, rather than as the Apostle chose to emphasize: “the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Alleluia (Mt 24:42, 44)
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Stay awake! For you do not know when the Son of Man will come.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/102523.cfm
As we come to the last few weeks of Ordinary Time we begin to hear little reminders about the coming of the Lord in glory. “Stay awake” is not so much a warning, but rather an invitation to not miss the glorious coming by being “asleep.” Perhaps we need to be “faithful and prudent” servants busily preparing for that glorious coming.
Where sin increased, grace overflowed all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through justification for eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Rom 5:12,15b,17-19,20b-21)
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/102423.cfm
According to Saint Paul, the reality of sin in the world means that grace has “overflowed all the more.” There’s more grace in the world than there is sin. Perhaps the problem is the 24/7 news channels. Like they say, “if it bleeds, it leads.” But we should never forget that there’s more goodness in us than there is meanness—thanks to God’s overflowing grace that comes to us through our Lord Jesus Christ.
