FOURTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME CYCLE “B” July 7, 2024

 FOURTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME    CYCLE “B”                           July 7, 2024

 

So what do you think – or better, feel - about the readings today?  …           I find them to be pretty gloomy, beset with difficulties and problems and opposition. 

          In the first reading the new prophet Ezekiel gets the unwelcome but realistic news that “Hard of face and obstinate of heart are they to whom I am sending you.”   **  How’d you like that to be your audience, especially as your message is accusatory and challenging?  This was definitely going to be a challenge to sell the Lord’s message.

          In the second reading St Paul describes his problems, difficulties and shortcomings.   And then he concludes “Therefore, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions and constraints, for the sake of Christ; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”   Kind of, well, perverse. 

          And in the Gospel Jesus is questioned: ”Where did this man get all this?”  Jeus is sneered at: “Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon?”    And Jesus is rejected: “And they took offense at him.”  

          You would think that Jesus would have known what to expect from His fellow townsfolk, who apparently were pretty narrow-minded and bigoted, as can happen in some small towns. 

          But it still stung.  The Gospel states: “He was amazed at their lack of faith.”  Jesus was so badly shaken that we are told: “he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them.  He was amazed at their lack of faith.”    //

          ….   Our psalm response today was well chosen: “our souls are more than sated with the mockery of the arrogant, with the contempt of the proud.” 

          “The mockery of the arrogant, with the contempt of the proud.”  Sounds like some of our politicians and public officials. 
          What are we to make of this gloomy mess of today’s readings? 

          First of all, the Gospel is not fluff.  The Good News of the Gospel is strong and vibrant and forceful enough, not just to make nice over minor problems and difficulties, but rather the Gospel is powerful enough to confront the truly difficult and even horrific realities of life: of sexual abuse, drugs, murder, racial prejudice and injustice, war and genocide.  The Gospel is strong stuff, and not for sissies.  Ezekiel, Paul and Jesus each had to face tough, difficult, horrific realities.  But by God’s power they succeeded.               So can we.

          The victory of love over death was not easily won.  But Christ has triumphed.  For each of us, like for St. Paul, it is still a struggle, and it is not a sham fight.  To master our own unruly and destructive urges and appetites, to harness and control our pride and selfishness, to speak the truth when it is unwanted and to work for justice in the face of injustice, are all dangerous, scary and hard. 

And secondly, the Gospel is liberating.  It is freeing.  It is life-giving.  St. Paul tells us, “for when I am weak, then I am strong.”   Another of those Christian paradoxes, for God delights in turning human expectations upside down. 

          There is much in the world, in our own communities and families and our own hearts that tries to weigh us down, deflate our spirits, and bring us low.  But the power of the Gospel is stronger.  Way stronger.  So that when we are hurting and down, we can even say with St Paul, “for the sake of Christ; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”    AMEN.