Thirtieth Sunday - 2019

Commentary on the Sunday Gospel for  the Thirtieth Sunday, 2019 Dr. Brant Pitre, a Research Professor of Theology  at the Augustine Institute. View on Catholic Productions - LINK

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Twenty-ninth Sunday - 2019

Oh no, here she comes again! Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who call out to him day and night? Will he be slow to answer them? I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily. But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth? Luke 18:1-8 I was listening to a commentary on this text of scripture and it had a rather interesting explanation of what Jesus is literally saying about the woman in his parable. The translation we have here is from the NRSV translation and it reads “Though I have no fear of God and no respect for any human being, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.” But the literal Greek word actually says “lest she come and give me a black eye.” That’s what hypopiazō means. It’s a boxing term. This is one lady you do not want to mess with. Like in many of Jesus parables it has this attention-getting twist. Through the image of this parable, Jesus gives us another lesson on prayer, “… to pray always without becoming weary.” The question is never, will God hear my prayer, rather, when ( speedily ) and how ( justly ). I think it would be true to say, that everyone has given up on prayer a some time or other; either because it seems to be lost in time, or we fail to recognize and understand how it has been answered. In Mtt. 6:8, in the instruction on the "Our Father", Jesus reminds that the Father knows what we need, even before we ask. We start off in prayer with what we think is our need and how soon we need it. This is good to get prayer going. It is here that "faith" becomes all important. Faith dismisses the question of will God hear and answer my prayer, and turns it to a question of discernment, how is my prayer being answer? With this in mind some might be led to ask, why make petition in prayer to God at all? Since God already knows what is to be done, why pray? We pray, not to change God's mind, rather to change ours. We bring our small and limited grasp of the situation to prayer, so that it might be fulfilled, that is, filled up, expanded in ways far beyond what we would have imagined. When the man, who was born blind, reached out to Jesus to make him able to see, Jesus opened his eyes, not simply for him to have physical sight, but to see more deeply into the mystery of God's plan for his blindness, for his healing and for his new purpose in life. As Jesus passed by, He saw a man blind from birth. And His disciples asked Him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?" Jesus answered, "It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.… John 9:1 Clearly, the disciples were incorrect in assuming this man's blindness was punishment for sin. Blindness can be a result of the imperfection of the natural order. Modern medicine has discovered ways to intervene in such conditions and in some cases restore sight. No doubt grace can be a part of such a process and people of faith recognize this and praise God for such knowledge given to man. But if praying for healing does not experience the recovery of sight, does this mean the prayers are rejected?  No, something greater is at work and we must continue in prayer to discover what. No prayer made in faith will be rejected. Knowing this, first brings peace to our hearts in our situation. Now this "prayer of faith", sets out to lead us ever deeper into the mystery of God's greater plan for us, and how this situation will bring glory to God and fulfillment far beyond all our imagining. The Christian Life rest on the foundation of prayer. Prayer rests on the foundation of Faith. When the Lord comes to answer our prayer, how will we know, how will we see him, unless through the "eyes of faith"? The Prayer of Faith will not fall silent.

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Twenty-eighth Sunday - 2019

This is Thanksgiving weekend in our country. Usually when we think of Thanksgiving, you have images of the bountiful harvest of the fruits of our land for which we come together to give thanks to God. But the image we have before us in today’s gospel is of a man giving thanks to God for quite a diffrent reason. He is a man whose body was being ravaged by leprosy until he encountered Jesus who cured him. Leprosy, or Hansen's disease as it is also known, still exists today. It’s a bacterial decease affecting the nerves, respiratory tract, skin, and eyes. This may result in a lack of ability to feel pain, thus loss of parts of extremities due to repeated injuries or infection. But today it is curable by medication. In the ancient world leprosy was grouped in with other visible skin conditions and was most feared and dreaded. People with these conditions were forced to live apart from the general population, they must keep their distance while warning that they were leprous – unclean, unclean. In this gospel passage there are ten leprous men who are cured by Jesus resulting in two different responses by those cured. Nine simply return to life in their communities but with the thought that they are the luckiest men in town. But one has an entirely different response. Something greater than physical healing has happened to him – has been converted – he has encounter God, person-to-person. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. Then Jesus asked, “Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” Then Jesus said to the Samaritan, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.” In our first Reading Naaman when he saw that he was cured of leprosy proclaimed, "Now I know that there is no God in all the earth, except in Israel.” Why, because in those days only God could cure leprosy. Today the wonders of modern medicine leave us in awe over how it is able to cure us. Is our age not unlike the picture we have before us in this gospel passage? Is it not unlike the other nine in today’s gospel, simply to be content with the cure – no need to bring God into it? People of faith gather this weekend to give thanks to God. Even though we know that by our own natural resources we contribute much to our own well-being, we also know that without the guidance of the wisdom of God and his provident hand sustaining us our lives could quickly descend into ruin. Today, as God looks out at these church gatherings of people come before Him to give thanks – yet with so many empty pews – might we not hear again these words spoken by Jesus in today’s gospel: “So many lives have I filled with my blessings, so few have come back to give thanks. Where are all the others? And to us he says: “Go home to your celebrations now, knowing that it is by your faith in me I make all things well.”

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Jonah, Sign of the Resurrection to Come

Click the picture to link to commentary by Dr. Brant Pitre - Catholic Productions

Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish, 2 saying, "I called to the Lord out of my distress, and he answered me; out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice. 3 You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the flood surrounded me; all your waves and your billows passed over me. 4 Then I said, "I am driven away from your sight; how shall I look again upon your holy temple?' 5 The waters closed in over me; the deep surrounded me; weeds were wrapped around my head 6 at the roots of the mountains. I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever; yet you brought up my life from the Pit, O Lord my God. 7 As my life was ebbing away, I remembered the Lord; and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple. 8 Those who worship vain idols forsake their true loyalty. 9 But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you; what I have vowed I will pay. Deliverance belongs to the Lord!" 10 Then the Lord spoke to the fish, and it spewed Jonah out upon the dry land. Jonah 2:1-11 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to him, "Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you." 39 But he answered them, "An evil and adulterous generation asks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. 40 For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so for three days and three nights the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth. 41 The people of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the proclamation of Jonah, and see, something greater than Jonah is here! Matthew 12:38-41

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Twenty-seventh Sunday - 2019

Commentary on the Sunday Gospel for  the Twenty-seventh Sunday, 2019. Dr. Brant Pitre, a Research Professor of Theology  at the Augustine Institute. View on Catholic Productions - LINK

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