Shawn The Baptist - Sunday Scriptures

St. Francis found the one thing most important in life, God. Then he left everything to follow him. May we learn to do the same.

In the greatest role reversal in history, God became man in Jesus. But wait until you see the role reversal this enables for us!

God has called each of us into his vineyard, some early in life, some later. Whenever called, our response must be the same...gratitude.

Honor the anniversary of 9/11 by understanding what 'Never Forget' truly means for our nation and our hearts.

Corrective Action

A popular philosophy plaguing our society today is the idea of moral relativism. This way of thinking says that there is no truth; it's all relative to whatever morality an individual person might want to create. The supreme virtue in such a society is that of tolerance. We should condemn nothing and tolerate everything since nothing is objectively right or wrong. We often hear the Scripture quoted reminding us not to "judge" others. Yet is this really the Christian view?

In today's readings, God is clearly telling us that not only is not wrong to correct someone doing something bad, such correction is required. This is a natural consequence of a correct understanding of the fact that there is of course such a thing as absolute truth. Something can be true even if no one believes it at the time. More importantly, in our Christian beliefs, we understand something as sinful not because it breaks an arbitrary rule but because it is bad for us. Sin is bad because it ultimately makes us unhappy and less free.

In this light, we can see why the Bible is so forceful that not only must we judge when our brother or sister is doing something bad, but we must correct him or her. The key here is how we do it. Fraternal correction is an act of charity when motivated by unselfish love for our brothers and sisters. We all need the support of the community to help us get out of sin when we are stuck. We pray that our Church would be such a community where we build each other up and help each other live a moral life. Indeed we really are called to be our brother's keeper.

That Desire Might be Enkindled

In today's gospel a Canaanite woman comes to find Jesus and asks healing for her daughter. Surprisingly, Jesus won't even talk to her. When he does finally talk to her he calls her a dog. In the very next sentence he then praises her for her faith in a way that we don't even see him compliment his disciples. What is going on here?

First, we have to see that this woman is not Jewish. She is not a part of the chosen people. Jews often referred to gentiles as dogs, so we see Jesus repeating a popular objection to involving himself with a non-Jew. Notice though that this woman is said to be coming out from the land of the gentiles and is going toward Jesus. Spiritually, she represents all the gentiles who will come to have faith in Jesus. Most Christians today were not born Jewish, therefore we are gentiles and the fulfillment of the Psalmist's desire, "O God, let all the nations praise you."

However, there is a second important reason behind Jesus' delay in responding to the woman. St. Augustine remarks that "The woman is ignored, no that mercy might be denied, but that desire might be enkindled." The crisis that led the woman to leave Tyre and Sidon behind, to beg Jesus for help, allowed her desire for God to increase. God wishes to do the same for us. Through the difficulties and struggles of our life, we pray that our desire for God might be increased.

When we are ready to come out of Tyre and Sidon, to leave sin and separation from God behind, we will discover that God is also coming out to meet us. Let us therefore persevere and turn to God in moments of crisis that our desire might be enkindled and we might hear those beautiful words of Jesus, "Christian, great is your faith."

Where is God?

In today's first reading, the prophet Elijah has an amazing encounter with God. Mt. Horeb was the famous mountain where God appeared in smoke and fire to give Moses the 10 commandments. Elijah would have been full of expectation, and indeed while on the mountain he experiences some powerful signs. There is a strong wind, an earthquake, and a fire...all powerful signs that God had used in the past to show his presence. Yet, this time, Elijah discerns that God is not in any of these. Rather, Elijah encounters God somewhat unexpectedly in "a tiny whispering sound."

Where do we expect to encounter God? Do we tend to look for him primarily in big and powerful ways, in ways that stir our emotions and excite us? This can happen, and we need it to happen every now and then. However, God is more often found not in loud exciting ways, but in silence. If we make time for silence, we might just be surprised that we will have an amazing encounter with God. In the ordinary work of our day, don't forget to take some time to meet God, to be silent, and listen for the tiny whispering sound.

Satisfaction for the Thirsty

Maybe we've never experienced a lack of water in our lives, but all of us experience thirst. We have a spiritual thirst put in us by God that only he can satisfy. Society gives us all kinds of things that it says will satisfy us, but they ultimately leave us unfulfilled. Today God invites us to "come to the water."

After we have found the life giving water in our faith, Jesus then asks us to share it. Perhaps we are afraid. We may think that we're not qualified to be an "evangelist." The truth is that we don't have to be experts to share the faith. Maybe we only have a little, like 5 loaves and 2 fish. We bring to Jesus the little that we have and he does the rest. All it really takes to be an evangelist is to recognize that you are someone who is thirsty and that you've found the source of water. Now who wouldn't want to share that?

Our world is hungry like never before for the satisfaction only God will give. Don't wait for someone else to do something about it. Jesus says to us as he said to the apostles..."Give them some food yourselves."

What's in Your Field?

Jesus speaks today of a treasure hidden in a field. Hopefully we get the point that our faith is a treasure and our relationship with God worth "selling" everything. Truly there is wisdom in our Church beyond what Solomon could have imagined. Yet, do we realize this? Can we really say that our faith is what we value most of all?

We tend to focus on the man in the story who finds the treasure, but did you every stop to think about the man who sold him the field? He obviously didn't know he had a treasure. Maybe he never bothered to really look around his field or else he could have found the treasure. As a result he probably sold his field cheap, no knowing what he had.

This parable is a warning to all of us. We have a treasure in the Church. However, if we fail to learn our faith, to dig around in our field, we will one day find the little faith that we had...gone. We will run the risk of leaving the Church and selling our field cheaply, believing that we actually got a pretty good deal on what we thought was just an empty field.

A World Full of Weeds

With all the violence, difficulties, and scandals in our world, this place can really seem less than ideal. Well, it is. The good news is that we don't have to make everything right in this world. We don't have to fight to the death to avenge wrongs done to us. There is another world where all will be made right. As we go through this world, our task then is patience, like the farmer who allows the weeds and the wheat to grow together until the harvest.

While we're at it criticizing the world and everyone else in it, we can often think that of course we're the wheat. Is that so? Most of us probably look a little more like weeds than wheat at times. The good news is that God is not done with us. We are all works in progress and that is why we must be patient, with each other and with ourselves. The harvest will come when all will be made well, until then...patience.