Fr. Roger J. Landry

Visitation Convent of the Sisters of Life, Manhattan

Saturday of the Eighth Week in Ordinary Time, Year I

Memorial of Pope Saint Paul VI

May 29, 2021

Sir 51:12-20, Ps 19, Mk 27-33

 

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below: 

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/5.29.21_Homily_1.mp3

 

The following points were attempted in the homily: 

* Today we finish our study of the Book of Sirach, which takes place during the Seventh and Eighth Weeks of Ordinary Time every second year. But insofar as every year we lose one-and-a-half weeks of Ordinary Time readings due to the dates of when the Lenten and Easter seasons take place, we often lose these readings from Sirach. The last time we had today’s passage, for example, was a decade ago. So it’s important that we get the larger goal of what God is trying to communicate to us through Ben Sira. Yesterday he mentioned that the greatest of all his works is making “godly men” and women. Today we see one of the foremost attributes of someone who is holy: they pursue the truth, they hunger to see things as they really are, as God sees them, and to live according to that truth. Ben Sira describes, “When I was young and innocent, I sought wisdom openly in my prayer … and I will seek her until the end. … My heart delighted in her. My feet keep to the level path because from earliest youth I was familiar with her.” He lived the path of wisdom. “I became resolutely devoted to her — the good I persistently strove for. My soul was tormented in seeking her.” That’s a sign of the great passion he had. “My hand opened her gate and I came to know her secrets. I directed my soul to her and in cleanness I attained her.” His whole being sought to live by God’s wisdom, and because he was pure of heart, God allowed him to attain her. The reading allows us to ask ourselves how ardently we seek the truth of the Lord, how tormented we are in seeking her, whether from your youth we persistently strive for her. For Ben Sira, this meant seeking the Lord through the study of Sacred Scripture and through prayer. In the Psalm today, we see the gift of Sacred Scripture, that we’re pursuing not a straightjacket but a liberation. The Law of the Lord is perfect, soul-refreshing, trustworthy, wisdom-imparting, right, full of joy, clear, illuminating, pure, enduring, true, just, precious and sweet. That’s what one who resolutely pursues God and the word, will and wisdom of God experiences!

* In today’s Gospel, we meet scholars of the law — the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders — who likely had begun to seek wisdom in their younger days with great passion like Ben Sira, but who had become corrupted over time. They no longer sought it in cleanness of heart. They no longer kept their feet to the level path. They no longer even delighted in it, because when Jesus came to proclaim and enflesh it, they totally opposed him. And they couldn’t even admit to the truth when they were asked about it directly: they sought to spin reality toward their advantage in a refusal to walk in the light. We see all of this in today’s Gospel. The the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders were seeking to entrap Jesus the day after he had driven out the money changers from the temple. They asked him about the authority with which he was doing such things, anticipating that if he said his own authority, they could have him arrested for vandalism or worse, and if he said God’s authority they could entrap him for seeming to oppose God’s will with regard to the temple. He transcended the question by first getting them to confront the truth as proclaimed by St. John the Baptist. When Jesus asked,