Wednesday of the Twenty-fifth Week in Ordinary Time
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“…a short time ago, mercy came to us from the Lord, our God, who left us a remnant and gave us a stake in his holy place; thus our God has brightened our eyes and given us relief in our servitude.” (Ezra 9:8)
“Then they (the Apostles) set out and went from village to village proclaiming the good news and curing diseases everywhere.” (Luke 9:6)
Lord, thank you for the opportunity to praise you throughout the liturgical year. Help me to carry forth your good news and cure suffering through my words, thoughts, and actions today and every day.
Study
http://www.usccb.org/nab/092607.shtml
http://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/articles.cfm?ID=33
“I dread ordinary time,” a Cursillista said to me earlier this year. “It’s such a letdown after the joy of the Resurrection or of Advent. Even the vestments are a letdown, that dreary green.” And here we are, at the beginning of the fall season with weeks and weeks of ordinary time to go before the end of the liturgical year.
Me, I like ordinary time. Love it, actually. (And yes, I know that ordinary time draws its name from the word ordinal, or numbered.) The pageantry of Advent, Christmas, Lent, and Easter can be too much, can be almost beyond my comprehension level. The concept of trying to live life day to day with God, who “has brightened our eyes and given us relief in our servitude,” resonates deeply. We, like the Apostles, can go out today, tomorrow, and the next day “proclaiming the good news and curing diseases everywhere,” diseases from indifference to fear to hunger to intolerance. All it takes is a little ordinary time, talent, and treasure. God loves us for our small miracles too, the smile we might put on a homeless child’s face with the gift of school supplies or the hug a seriously ill friend provides when we stop by for a visit.
Jeffrey Mirus, founder of Trinity Communications, writes of this time at www.catholicculture.org:
The renewed stretch of Ordinary Time which marks the last portion of the Liturgical year is no longer misperceived as ordinary in the sense of uninteresting, but ordinary in the sense of a regular motion of the weeks and months by which we measure our progress toward the goal and the Gift we have received. … As with the natural seasons, so with the supernatural: instead of greeting them with joy and living them through, we so often awaken only just in time to regret their passing. The arrival of Fall once again reminds us of a prodigious responsibility to love all of our seasons and use them well—one of the clearest lessons nature has to give.
Action
Do something small and “ordinary” today. Drop the price of a cup of coffee into a street musician’s cup. Treat a neighbor or coworker to lunch. Sit down and listen to what your daughter is saying about her day at school instead of half-listening as you prepare dinner or fold laundry. Make a loan of as little as $25 to change lives through Kiva.org. The outcome will be far more than ordinary.
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