Only Faith Working Through Love October 17

For freedom Christ set us free; so stand firm and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery. Galatians 5:1

Did not the maker of the outside also make the inside? But as to what is within, give alms, and behold, everything will be clean for you. Luke 11:40-41

Piety

Let us pray: God of Infinite Patience, help us to listen to your son and learn a new way of thinking and worshipping, praising and doing. Protect us from the yoke of slavery to laws and to sin. Remind us that we have it in our heart, mind and soul everything needed to fulfill your mission of love. When the forces of evil distract us, remind us with the gentle presence of Jesus and the Holy Spirit in our lives. Deliver us from evil and grant us peace today. Amen.

Study
http://www.usccb.org/nab/101706.shtml

A certain network likes to start off its Monday night football broadcasts with a song that begins, “Are you ready for some football?”

Are you ready from some Jesus? If not, buckle your seat belts because you might be in for a bumpy ride on familiar highways.

Ours is a Church founded on laws and commandments. The Ten. The Greatest. Yet Jesus, the prophets of the Hebrew Bible and the apostles writing the Good News spend an inordinate amount of time telling us to ignore the laws. Furthermore, for someone so critical of the Pharisees, Luke depicts Jesus having dinner with the Pharisees fairly often in his Gospel.

This is not an accident. The interaction with the Pharisees helps Jesus drive home some of his points about how the law falls short of what God intends for each of us to do. Jesus’ appearance on earth changes everything, He helps us make a bridge to a new way of thinking and worshipping, praising and doing.

We are warned over and over again not to submit to the yoke of slavery to sin or slavery to laws. Instead, we must maintain our own independent conscience and judgment. We can’t always rely on some law to lay down how we are to act. But, we fail over and over again. So, God, with Infinite Patience, keeps sending us reminders – from Jesus, from Luke, from Paul, from the Galatians.

Just like the rich man in Sunday’s Gospel reading from St. Mark, we can follow the laws and still fall short of what God expects. God asks for our undivided attention to his call. If we are distracted, he will send Jesus down every day to have dinner with us, in our house.

If we knew that Jesus is expected to visit tonight, we would spend the day cleaning everything he might see – the dishes, the floors, the utensils, the windows, the house. Everything external. But would we also clean the inside? Would we cleanse our hearts? Would we cleanse our minds? Would we cleanse our souls?

Would the message drive all the way home, like it did when that famous student Nicodemus visited Jesus at night? Would that message find us, with Nicodemus and Joseph of Aramethea, ready to take down Jesus’ body for a proper burial?

Action

In less than a month, there will be a vote in Virginia. This year, one of our choices will be for the Marriage Protection Amendment.

The late Pope John Paul said, “The future of humanity passes by way of the family. It is therefore indispensable and urgent that every person of good will should endeavor to save and foster the values and requirements of the family.”

But as we are reminded in today’s readings, we can not rely on laws alone. We have to save and foster these values in our hearts and souls and actions. And we can not stop at Marriage.

Why not hold an election of your own? See if you can pass these following acts unanimously into your heart. The Protection of the Preferential Option for the Poor Amendment. The Widows Protection Amendment. The Orphans Protection Amendment.

As citizens and voters and Catholics, we face serious questions. From Richmond to Rwanda, every life is sacred. Are we ready to value and protect all of them in our hearts?