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    • 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time
    Cycle B
    2000

    First Reading
    Numbers 11:25-29

    The Lord came down in the cloud and spoke to Moses. Taking some of the spirit that was on him, he bestowed it on the seventy elders; and as the spirit came to rest on them, they prophesied.  Now two men, one named Eldad and the other Medad, were not in the gathering but had been left in the camp. They too had been on the list, but had not gone out to the tent; yet the spirit came to rest on them also, and they prophesied in the camp. So, when a young man quickly told Moses, "Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp," Joshua, son of Nun, who from his youth had been Moses' aide, said, "Moses, my lord, stop them." But Moses answered him, "Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the people of the Lord were prophets! Would that the Lord might bestow his spirit on them all!"

    Second Reading
    James 5:1-6

    You rich, weep and wail over your impending miseries. Your wealth has rotted, your fine wardrobe has grown moth-eaten, your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion shall be a testimony against you; it will devour your flesh like a fire. See what you have stored up for yourselves against the last days. Here, crying aloud, are the wages you withheld from the farmhands who harvested your fields. The shouts of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You lived in wanton luxury on the earth; you fattened yourselves for the day of slaughter. You condemned, even killed, the just man; he does not resist you.

    Gospel
    Mark 9:38-43, 45, 47-48

    John said to Jesus, "Teacher, we saw a man using your name to expel demons and we tried to stop him because he is not of our company." Jesus said in reply: "Do not try to stop him. No man who performs a miracle using my name can at once speak ill of me. Anyone who is not against us is with us. Any man who gives you a drink of water because you belong to Christ will not, I assure you, go without his reward. But it would be better if anyone who leads astray one of these simple believers were to be plunged in the sea with a great millstone fastened around his neck.  "If your hand is your difficulty, cut it off! Better for you to enter life maimed than to keep both hands and enter Gehenna, with its unquenchable fire. If your foot is your undoing, cut it off! Better for you to enter life crippled than to be thrown into Gehenna with both feet. If your eye is your downfall, tear it out! Better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to be thrown with both eyes into Gehenna, where 'the worm dies not and the fire is never extinguished.'"

    Text from Lectionary for Mass
    © 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine
    © 1969 International Committee on English in the Liturgy, Inc.
    All rights reserved

    My Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

    Today we are taught to live for Christ and in the divine reality, wherever we find it.  We are not to be put off from this way of living by external things, such as church affiliations, one's place in society, one's background or by anything.

    In the Book of Numbers, which is our first reading, Moses is described as a very open person.  He is not jealous for his own position in his community.  He is, instead, only anxious that people discover God and try to serve God. 

    A real prophet is one who is so deeply transformed by the word of God that this word is seen at work in every aspect of life.  The prophet has to speak out in order to try to bring the world to reflect the word.  To be a prophet is not an easy task.  It is much easier to start a social movement or a group of some kind than to proclaim the word of God.  Real prophets are almost always lonely people because their deepest relationship is with the word of God, and not with others in some group.

    The second reading continues the Letter of James and speaks of how wealth and money can corrupt a person.  We know from the whole of scripture that a person who has money is not condemned by that very fact.  Rather, it is the way in which a person uses money that brings about a change in the person himself.  There are wonderful examples in history of people who have used their wealth to love others.  There are also plenty of examples of people who have misused wealth. 

    Our challenge is simple:  do I prudently share what I have?  Do I have a generous spirit towards the poor?  Or I am stingy when I should be generous?  To be prudent about how we help others is a wisdom that should not be confused with stinginess!  In the early Church, some of the writings describe people who gave all their money away and then had to be supported!  This was not and is not recommended!

    The Gospel brings us back to the reality of living in the Spirit.  This way of thinking allows us to find all that is true and spiritual in any religion, in any person, in the realities that surround us.  We must have a large vision that wants to recognize and acknowledge God in the immensity of His goodness, which is poured out on the whole world.

    Let us open out eyes today.  Let us give thanks for this overflowing goodness of God that fills the whole earth and all our world.  Let us not be fearful of seeing what is right and good where we do not expect to find it.

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    © 2000 The Monastery of Christ in the Desert