Built Together Into a Dwelling Place

October 28, 2009

Feast of Saints Simon and Jude, Apostles

So then 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. Ephesians 2:19-22

In those days he departed to the mountain to pray, and he spent the night in prayer to God. When day came, he called his disciples to himself, and from them he chose Twelve, whom he also named apostles. Luke 6:12-13

Piety

We are now called, as a people, transformed in Jesus Christ our Cornerstone, to go forward with boldness, to take risks for the kingdom, so that we can be vital and alive, both as a Community on the move and a sacred space where adoration, affirmation, challenge and transformation, for the sake of the Kingdom, can regularly be the order of the day. (Canon Barry Naylor, The Transformed Church: A Homily for the Feast of Saints Simon and Jude)

Study

We interrupt our regularly scheduled Ordinary Time to celebrate the feast day of two apostles who also were brothers. Simon the Zealot (to avoid confusion with Simon Peter) and his brother Jude Thaddeus (to avoid confusion with the traitor Judas) preached and were martyred in ancient Persia.

The apostles were not just a band of “strangers and sojourners” who were called to follow Jesus. Some of them had known Jesus their whole lives. Simon and Jude not only were brothers but also were first cousins to Jesus. They started with a relationship with Jesus which grew in a new dimension as they carried out their mission.Beyond that, except for legends and short lives of the saints, little is known about these two saints. According to the www.AmericanCatholic.org website we learn that “As in the case of all the apostles except for Peter, James and John, we are faced with men who are really unknown, and we are struck by the fact that their holiness is simply taken to be a gift of Christ. He chose some unlikely people: a former Zealot, a former (crooked) tax collector, an impetuous fisherman, two "sons of thunder" and a man named Judas Iscariot.

"It is a reminder that we cannot receive too often. Holiness does not depend on human merit, culture, personality, effort or achievement. It is entirely God's creation and gift. God needs no Zealots to bring about the kingdom by force. Jude, like all the saints, is the saint of the impossible: only God can create his divine life in human beings. And God wills to do so, for all of us.” (http://www.americancatholic.org/Features/Saints/saint.aspx?id=1182)

Action

God sent Jesus who spread the word among these Twelve apostles. These apostles laid a foundation that grew into the structure of the Church as we know it today, formed and re-formed, into the dwelling place for Christ.

These very normal people helped to build the kingdom of God. They laid the foundation of the house and Jesus was the capstone at the top of the doorway arch. The tradition is now passed to us to continue to build the temple as the Church continues to strengthen us for the mission we are asked to undertake.

Before we undertake any part of that mission, we also must realize that we are here to emulate Christ. Jesus did not do anything, especially anything important without praying about it first. Today, we learn that Jesus did not make these twelve ordinary men his chosen apostles until he spent the night in prayer one more time. As we prepare to set forth on this journey, we must make sure we prepare ourselves for the journey with sufficient prayer.