Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

His slaves said to him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ He replied, ‘No, if you pull up the weeds you might uproot the wheat along with them. Let them grow together until harvest; then at harvest time I will say to the harvesters, “First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles for burning; but gather the wheat into my barn.”

Sometimes we might wonder why there is evil in this world. However, it wasn’t God who brought sin and wickedness into His creation, but the Devil and our own pride. The temptation to believe we know better than God is one we constantly are faced with in great and small ways. Evil exists because God gave us the freedom to choose between right and wrong, but this free will is also a blessing because it also allows us to love and do good. God could have chosen to uproot evil in the human race, but that would have robbed us of our Divine Image and made us into something less than human. Without choice, we cannot love God or His children or do good works because there is no other option and love and goodness cannot be forced upon us. And so God lets evil exist, not because He wants it to, but because He doesn’t want to violate our humanity or rob us of His Divine Image.

What are the weeds in our lives? How can we uproot them and become more faithful servants? What can we do to use our free will for good?

O Lord, burn away our imperfections and sins, leaving us only with the fruits of your divine image within us.

Amen.

Twenty-Seventh Saturday of Ordinary Time

While Jesus was speaking, a woman from the crowd called out and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that carried you and the breasts at which you nursed.” He replied, “Rather, blessed are those who hear the word of God and observe it.”

We are blessed by God in many ways. Firstly, we are blessed with our lives, which God gave to us as a gift. However, we are also blessed in that we have the ability to freely choose to listen to the Word of God and observe it. It is this gift of a loving heart that we should be most thankful for. It is one of the things that sets us apart from other creatures. True love requires there to be a choice to love. Love cannot be forced, it must be freely given just as God gave us our lives without expectation of return of His Love. So too, our love must be without strings attached. Love is a freeing act, not a binding one. The union between two true loves is liberating in that both choose to give themselves completely to the other. They become one with another and thereby free themselves from the constraints of selfishness and instead bind themselves together in a common purpose: to love each other as they want to be loved. When we add our faith to this, then we take it a step further, we love each other as Jesus loves us and love God without reservation because we realize that it is only in uniting ourselves with God's Love that we can fulfill our vocation to know, love, and serve God and His children.

Do we thank God for giving us the gift of life? Do we listen to the Word of God and observe it? Do we love God and others as we are called to love them, freely and unselfishly?

O Lord, teach us how to love you and your children with all our hearts, souls, minds, and strengths.

Amen.

Memorial of Saint Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church

“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have repented, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you.”

Jesus has shown us what it means to know, love, and serve God and His children. He has spoken the Good News to us and given us an example of how to live out our calling to be saints. It is up to us to accept this vocation to love, just as St. Therese did in her life. She loved God and others through her Little Way and we can, too. We do not have to do great works to fulfill God's Will, we just have to do everything with great love. It is the only way for us to avoid the woes of those who rejected Jesus and choose their own way. It is the only path we have that will lead to our acceptance in heaven.

Are we following the example of Christ? Have we repented of our sins and chosen the Way of Love? Do we strive to do everything with great love?

O Lord, we chose love!

Amen.

Third Friday of Lent

The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength… You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Love is the key to the commandments God has given us all. Our Lord asks us to open our hearts, souls, minds, and strengths for him and all His children. This request reveals the need for love to be a choice of our entire being. We cannot love others halfway. We either do or do not love them. We are also reminded in these commandments of the need to love ourselves as well. We need to love ourselves in light of God’s love for us in order to be able to live lives of Christian charity in regard to others. Just as there are three persons in Our One God, so too there are three persons we need to love in our lives: God, others, and ourselves.

How do we express our love for our God? Our neighbors? Ourselves?

O Lord, we love you, help us to love others and ourselves in light of that love.

Amen.