Ordinary 26

Ordinary 26
October 1, 2006

by Jude Siciliano, OP

Numbers 11: 25-29
Psalm 19
James 5: 1-6
Mark 9: 38-43, 47-48

PRENOTES:
Several weeks ago we were pleased to announce that one of our friars, R.B. Williams, OP had begun writing reflections on the daily liturgical readings. His concise comments are posted early in the morning and will be helpful for those who want some input on the daily scriptures.

In addition:
We are delighted to announce that we have also begun to post "DAILY BREAD," short reflections on each day's scripture readings for preachers and others who use the daily lectionary in their prayer. This is a regular monthly feature of "Celebration: A Comprehensive Worship Resource" and we are grateful to the editor, Pat Marrin for making this service available to readers of "First Impressions."
Go to
http://www.opsouth.org/ Or http:///www.judeop.org and click on "Daily Reflections" and "Daily Bread."

Dear Preachers: There was a popular book about 30 years entitled, YOUR GOD IS TOO SMALL, by J. B. Phillips. The author was an Anglican priest, he died in 1982. Phillips was a biblical translator and one of his most popular works was, THE NEW TESTAMENT IN MODERN ENGLISH. (He wrote it because he felt the young generation needed an accessible New Testament if they were ever to become biblically literate.) Phillips said that we believers don't have a big enough God for our modern needs. Our God suffers from the limitations we put on God. According to Phillips, some of the constricting titles we use for God are, "Resident Police Officer," "Grand Old Man," "Meek-And-Mild" and "Managing Director." Phillips suggested ways to find a more meaningful God for ourselves. Judging from the history of religious conflicts, wars, crusades, current fundamentalism and fanaticism, Phillips' accusation about our constricted sense of God seems to ring true.

The first reading starts our reflection and raises the challenge for us: are our notions of God too restrictive? Have we confined God to our own particular religious box and failed, or refused to see, God in other places and manifestations? Numbers speaks of Eldad and Medad, who missed the meeting with Moses and the other chosen elders. So, it would appear, they missed the distribution of the spirit Moses had and God was to share with them. The elders were supposed to help Moses in his responsibility of leading the murmuring Israelites in the desert. The people's complaints were wearing Moses down so God ordered Moses to select seventy from the twelve tribes to share in the role of leadership. Eldad and Medad were among the seventy, but weren't in the right place at the right time.

God's Spirit was to be spread beyond Moses and more of the people were to share in it. But Joshua, perhaps not as willing to share authority over the people, complains to Moses about Eldad and Medad. Rather than feeling deprived of his power and prerogatives, Moses responds to Joshua's complaint, telling him, "Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the people of the Lord were prophets! Would that the Lord might bestow God's gifts on them all!" The two exclamation points after his statements convey a sense of Moses's strong conviction for what he had just said. He really wants to see the spirit he has received spread around the whole community. He wants all people to become prophets. A prophet is one who hears God's Word and speaks and acts on it in this time and place so that others will come to know and be guided by God.

The two elders weren't there for the bestowal of the Spirit. Does that limit what God will do or can do? Remember what Phillips said, our notion of God is small. God is quite capable of working outside the special "tent," or any other box in which we want to confine God's presence and activities. The Hebrew texts constantly bear witness that God breathes on many. This spirit that Moses had is evident in many manifestations in the ancient texts and is the one we call the Holy Spirit. Recalling the stories in both Old and New Testaments we learn that this same Spirit raises up: just people who speak for the unheard; leaders who guide the lost; peacemakers who broker an end to conflicts; prophets who proclaim God's Word and healers who bind the wounds of the injured and those whose spirits are broken.

Moses acknowledges the same Spirit Jesus does when the Lord advised Nicodemus that the Spirit is like the wind, we don't know, "where it comes from or where it goes" (John 3: 8). Moses and Jesus both knew a God that was very big indeed and they constantly challenged those whose God was too small. Both encourage us not to fear or be suspicious of the ways God's Spirit works or appears. In Genesis and throughout the bible, the Spirit is the One who gives the breath of life. It is the wind or breath ("ruach") that revives the fallen and breathes the breath of life into God's servants so they can do the works of God---within or outside whatever "boxes" we have constructed. Or, to use the metaphor of our first reading, people outside the "tent" can still receive the Spirit and do the work of God, even though some insiders don't think it fitting.

The Spirit, like love, isn't diminished by its being shared. While we do need authority and order in the "camp," the reading reminds us that God can and often does, raise up charismatic leaders wherever and whenever God chooses. One just has to think of Gandhi, or any other "non-believer," who has performed heroic sacrifices for others and led lives of deep integrity and goodness. How could they have done that unless God had bestowed a divine spirit on them, outside the "tent?"

The gospel selection is a challenge today since it seems disjointed, made up of fragmentary bits and pieces, sayings of Jesus loosely hung together. But there are discernible threads that hold the reading together.

The gospel parallels the Numbers reading. But now the outsider is a strange exorcist. John tells Jesus that the man is driving out demons in Jesus' name---but is not a follower. What stirs up the issue of the "non-follower" is a previous discussion (9:33-37) about what it means to be a disciples. (It always helps to know the context of a passage!) Following on the previous discussion, today's passage raises the question: who is a true disciple? Formerly, Jesus had described disciples as being, "the least one of all and the servant of all" (9:35). Thus, disciples are the "little ones."

Today we learn about hospitality: that disciples are also those who offer hospitality to one of the "little ones." In this case, the little ones could be those who are new to the faith community. The newcomers must be welcomed; not considered as late comers and somehow inferior disciples. They are to be offered hospitality and not led into sin or caused to stumble because of the behavior of the older members. What kind of behavior? For example, some non-churchgoers have said they stopped going because they felt anonymous; that the "regulars" seemed to pay more attention to each other and just didn't acknowledge the newcomers or visitors. Or, one reason the poor claim they don't feel comfortable in some of our churches is that they are ignored and feel invisible. Is it because of the way they dress? Is it that they don't speak the language fluently? Is it because they have less education? Jesus' teaching speaks to our modern congregations: the life of the disciples is to be so exemplary and hospitable, that newcomers, or those less formed in faith, would feel welcomed. To summarize: our behavior must edify, not scandalize.

Jesus expects such exemplary lives on the part of the disciples that he uses typical semitic hyperbole to make his point. If a hand, foot or eye is a cause for sin, then it must be cut off or plucked out. We might respond, "Well is isn't my foot that sins, but where I go, where I let my feet take me--- that is the sin. I am the one responsible, not just my foot." Yes, but Jesus' strong and vivid language certainly gets the point across.

Another take on the "little ones." We can tell from the title "little ones," used to describe Jesus' followers, that he is not primarily referring to children or just recent converts, the "little ones" in the faith. The term applies to us all. Before God and through God's Spirit, we have entrusted ourselves, like children, to Christ. We are "little ones," still novices in our discipleship and learning as we go along. We are trying to be loyal to Christ and to others in our faith community. Jesus places such a priority on this loyalty that no one must interfere with it, or cause a member to lose the relationship they have with him.

In his vivid and figurative language, Jesus says that not even our own hand, foot or eye should cause us to be separated from him through sin. No matter how painful, the disciple must sever from her/himself whatever stands in the way, diminishes, or preoccupies us from being disciples. If we discern that a relationship, job, career or possession has drawn us away from attentiveness to Christ and what following him requires, then we must "cut it off," or "pluck it out." Strong language to make it clear to us: Jesus wants total loyalty from us. Not just for his sake, but because such a relationship gives us a life that nothing else can satisfy and so we must sacrifice whatever keeps us from that life.

Jesus doesn't miss an opportunity to be very vivid to get his point across. Were he and his disciples standing within sight or smell of Jerusalem's garbage dump, Gehenna, when he spoke about avoiding being thrown into it? The dump smoldered constantly and it probably stunk too! The town people and workers dumped everything worthless there. Jesus tells his listeners they had better be full-time, loyal members of his reign. If not, they will be of no more value than the burning, stinking garbage pile Gehenna. It reminds me of the mountains of slag outside coal mines in West Virginia. The slag was the leftover materials from the mine after all the coal was extracted. Well, almost all the coal, since some always remained. The slag heaps would catch fire because the coal remaining would be ignited by small fires or lightning. And the underground, slow-burning fires were impossible to extinguish. One valley of slag had been smoldering for 50 years---wisps of smoke coming from the ground throughout the little valley, polluting the air and making passage impossible. Those slag heaps were modern Gehennas, as are all the environmental degradations of the earth that remind us of waste and human carelessness. (See "Quotable" below) They are as useless for life as are so-called disciples of Jesus who have surrendered loyalty to him for some other lesser good.

QUOTABLE

"To choose life involves rejecting every form of violence: the violence of poverty and hunger, which afflicts so many human beings; the violence of armed conflict; the violence of criminal trafficking in drugs and arms; the violence of mindless damage to the natural environment. In every circumstance, the right to life must be promoted and safeguarded with appropriate legal and political guarantees, for no offense against the right to life, against the dignity of any single person, is ever unimportant. Rather, we must recognize Christ in the poorest and the most marginalized, those whom the Eucharist---which is communion in the body and blood of Christ given up for us---commits us to serve. As the parable of the rich man, who will remain forever without a name, and the poor man called Lazarus clearly shows, "in the stark contrast between the insensitive rich man and the poor in need of everything, God is on the latter's side." We too must be on his side." ---John Paul II, in his address for the 1999 World Peace Day. Quoted by John F. Kavanaugh, S.J., in, PREACH: ENLIVENING THE PASTORAL ART. September/October, 2006, page17.

JUSTICE NOTES

"The wages you withheld from the workers who harvested your fields are crying aloud". (James 5:1-6)
"The challenge of immigration today is not just at the borders, but in our labor markets. Immigrants come, as did the ancestors of most Americans, seeking work and a better life for their families. They come, in part, because U.S. employers need their labor and our economy depends upon them."
"Those realities and our inadequate immigration system have led to a sadly divisive national debate. The current situation raises many questions for society, ranging from "How are we to address the reality that over 10 million people are here without legal documentation, but, with few exceptions, leading lives that share our values of work, family and community?" and "How can we stand with some American workers who feel left behind or pushed aside? How are we to protect our borders against those who would do us harm?"
Catholic teaching says that individuals have a basic right to support themselves and their families, to have decent and fair wages, health care and time off, and to be represented by trade unions. These basic human and economic rights are not invalidated or relinquished when one crosses a border. The US Catholic bishops support comprehensive immigration legislation, including a temporary guest worker program. For the Catholic Church, immigration is not a political issue, but a fundamental human and moral issue," (U.S.Bishops' Committee on Domestic Policy 9/06)

Did you know?

Immigrants account for 15 percent of U.S. workers. What you can do:

  1. Consider the immigration question through the eyes of:
  2. A father in Mexico who cannot feed his family, or a rancher on the border whose land has become a dangerous path for desperate people."
  3. A worker without legal status cutting meat or picking fruit, or a U.S. worker with few skills, searching for a job at a decent wage.
  4. A farmer who can't find enough workers, or a union leader working for exploited and unrepresented workers.
  5. A border guard asked to do an impossible task with limited resources, or a legislator who must reconcile these very different perspectives in pursuit of the common good.
  6. Pray for all immigrants, for those who advocate on their behalf and for legislators who must make just and fair decisions about immigration.

    (Submitted by Anne and Bill Werdel, from the parish bulletin of Sacred Heart Cathedral, Raleigh, NC)

POSTCARDS TO DEATH ROW INMATES

"It is time to abandon the death penalty -- not just because of what it does to those who are executed, but because of how it diminishes all of us... We ask all Catholics--pastors, catechists, educators and parishioners -- to join us in rethinking this difficult issue and committing ourselves to pursuing justice without vengeance. With our Holy Father, we seek to build a society so committed to human life that it will not sanction the killing of any human person.
------( "Responsibility, Rehabilitation, and Restoration: A Catholic Perspective on Crime and Criminal Justice," U.S. Catholic Bishops, Nov. 2000,)
Inmates on death row are the most forgotten people in the prison system. Each week I am posting in this space several inmates' names and locations. I invite you to write a postcard to one or more of them to let them know that: we have not forgotten them; are praying for them and their families; or, whatever personal encouragement you might like to give them. If you like, tell them you heard about them through North Carolina's, "People of Faith Against the Death Penalty." Thanks, Jude Siciliano, OP
Please write to:........................................
Clinton R. Rose #0351933 (On death row since 12/19/91)
Edward E. Davis #0100579 (3/12/92)
Kenneth B. Rouse #0100579 (3/25/92)
---Central Prison 1300 Western Blvd. Raleigh, NC 27606

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

CD Available: "FIRST IMPRESSIONS: PREACHING REFLECTIONS ON LITURGICAL YEAR B" This compilation, from past "First Impressions," includes two reflections on almost all Sundays and major feasts for this liturgical year.
NEW CD Available: "FIRST IMPRESSIONS: PREACHING REFLECTIONS ON LITURGICAL YEAR C." The CD contains two reflections for almost all the Sundays and major feasts of the year. In addition, there are helpful essays for preaching during the liturgical seasons (Advent, Lent, the Triduum, etc.),ten book reviews and essays on various aspects of preaching. The files are in three formats (Microsoft Word, WordPerfect and Adobe Acrobat Reader) so you should have no trouble opening them on your computer. For more information and to purchase go to: http://judeop.ispraleigh.com/

ABOUT DONATIONS: If you would like to support this ministry, please send tax deductible contributions to Jude Siciliano, O.P., Make checks to "Dominican Friars of Raleigh." Mail contributions to: Jude Siciliano, O.P., Dominican Friars of Raleigh, P.O. Box 12927, Raleigh, N.C. 27605

REGULAR INFORMATION

I get notes from people responding to these reflections. Sometimes they tell how they use "First Impressions" in their ministry and for personal use. Others respond to the reflections, make suggestions and additions. I think our readers would benefit from these additional thoughts. If you drop me a BRIEF note, I will be happy to add your thoughts and reflections to my own. (Judeop@Juno.com)

Our webpage addresses:
(Where you will find "Preachers' Exchange," which includes these reflections and Homilias Dominicales, as well as articles, book reviews and quotes pertinent to preaching.)
http://www.opsouth.org Under "Preachers' Exchange"
http://www.op.org/exchange/

"Homilias Dominicales"-- these Spanish reflections are written by four friars of the Southern Dominican Province experienced in Hispanic Ministry, Isidore Vicente, Carmen Mele, Brian Pierce and Juan Martin Torres. Like "First Impressions", "Homilias Dominicales" are a preacher's early reflections on the upcoming Sunday readings and liturgy. So, if you or a friend would like to receive "Homilias Dominicales" drop a note to John Boll, O.P. at: jboll@opsouth.org
"First Impressions" is a service to preachers and those wishing to prepare for Sunday worship. It is sponsored by the Southern Dominican Province, U.S.A. If you would like "First Impressions" sent weekly to a friend, send a note to John Boll at the above Email address.
If you would like to support this ministry, please send tax deductible contributions to:
Jude Siciliano, OP, Promoter of Preaching
Southern Dominican Province, USA
P.O. Box 12927,
Raleigh, N.C. 27605
(919) 833-1893
Make checks to: Dominican Friars of Raleigh.
Thank you.