TWENTY-FIRST SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME – AUGUST 25, 2024
I
–We will serve the Lord, for his is our God.
R
–Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.
II
– This is a great mystery, regarding Christ and the Church.
A
– Your words, Lord, are Spirit and life; you have the words of everlasting
life.
G –To
whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.
+ We reach the grand
conclusion of the great Discourse on the Most Holy Eucharist today, as it
is related to us in the Gospel of St. John. This doctrine and reality are
central and essential to Jesus whole mission. He came into the world to
redeem it and to give it the “key to life.” The Eucharistic presence of his
own real Body and Blood in transubstantiated elements of bread and wine is that
key! It is not a secret key, nor an invisible key, but it does take
something very special in order to see it, use it and operate it: it takes
faith, simple faith! Faith being the gift of God and our cooperation with
it, which gives the ability to see all things as God sees them, as they really
are; and to use them the way he intends for them to be used.
It is quite apparent that many
of Jesus’ disciples did not accept the gift of faith, and so they could not use
it;
and therefore their only course of action was to murmur about his insistence that they eat his real flesh and drink his
real blood, and so they walk away confused and probably a bit annoyed that
following Jesus around for so long a time ended with this impasse. Jesus
then makes reference to how things are seen with the eyes of faith, rather than
the human eyes: all things, but especially religious things must have something
to do with “Spirit and life” – these things are “super-natural” – these things
are the fruit of the activation of a simple and real faith!
And so, Jesus says to those
who wander away, then “go, go, but remember I told you that no one can come
to me and remain unless it is granted him by my Father,” apparently, for
the time being, it has not been granted to you – but maybe, in time; I will
pray for you for a time in the future when you will be more pliant to the
action of the Spirit in your life.
And
you,
he then turns to the Apostles and says, do
you want to go too? After I have very carefully given you the benefit of
countless hours of “private lessons” and practical experience even on difficult
matters to understand – do you want to
leave me too? But then Peter, speaking for the rest, as he always did said
to him: Lord, to whom shall we go (quo
vadis?), you have the words of eternal life; we have come to believe and are
convinced that you are the Holy One of God. How relieved Jesus must
have been, we can see him smiling at Peter now, and the others, and saying to
them: thank you, for your sakes, thank
you, and you shall see and hear even greater things in the very near future!
The first reading today, in a
sense gives us another decision made for
God, rather than against him, a walking away: Joshua, addressing the elders of
the tribes of Israel said: decide who
you will serve from now on (which way are you going to go?); but as for me and my household, we will serve
the Lord. Any other kind of
life, such as the kind the other tribes were involved in, just did not seem
right to Joshua – and so he made his choice and God was very pleased. And, because of Joshua’s example, the rest
of the tribes chose the Lord too.
Sometimes, it takes a simple
straightforward statement in favor of God and his ways for others to activate
faith, to “get onboard” – like Joshua, like Peter, like all the Apostles and
their successors – and billions of disciples of Christ throughout the ages – we
too can influence others to set their sights on heavenly goals, and to modify
their earthly sojourn in order for it to end up in the right place at the right
time!
Taste and see the goodness of the Lord, and
then tell everyone you can about it, and let them know that it is for them too!
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