Fr. Michael Carlini sx
Comment of the Gospel of the 13th Sunday OT – Year A by Fr. Michael Carlini
The theme that the liturgy proposes to us today is the arduous, challenging and difficult attitude of hospitality, considered as a welcoming not only of a stranger, but mainly as a model of acceptance of any person we meet. In fact, any man is different from myself, is an Other from me, an he bursts with his/her diversity in my everyday life and therefore imposes a comparison, a dialogue, a questioning of the acquired securities I cherish so much. Hospitality obliges us to verify our identity because each guest reveals to us the part of stranger that is inside of us, thus opening us to a greater knowledge of ourselves and of God, who reveals himself as the Other “par excellence”.
In these days we see a great resistance in living the spirit of openness to the foreigner, at various levels: Nations, which waste precious resources in building walls and fences to keep away immigrants from their borders; local entities, that only value their own limited geographic or cultural area, neglecting the greater space surrounding them, etc. Those walls are physical representations of our fears and immaturities, and many times also of the hatred that dwells in our minds.
The Letter to the Hebrews offers us this diamond: “Do not neglect hospitality, for through it some [Abraham and Sarah] have unknowingly entertained angels” (c. 13).
At every Mass we are foreigners that God invites at his table, and from strangers we are transformed into the Lord’s adopted children, members of his family.
Water is thicker than blood
Sunday’s gospel ends the ‘Missionary Discourse’ (Mt c. 10). Matthew reports some precious remarks by Jesus: “Anyone who prefers father or mother to me is not worthy of me; Anyone who welcomes a prophet will have a prophet’s reward”. When we decided to become Christians we were welcomed into God’s family, through the Water of baptism. That water is more powerful than our biological blood, inherited from our parents. It is deeper than the cultural identity in which we are rooted: “What is born of flesh is flesh and what is born of spirit is spirit” (Jn 3); worldly things are necessary, there is no life in this world without them, but it is the Spirit that gives life.
The Pandemic
The second reading is mirrored in the plague the whole world is going through: “When we were baptised in Christ Jesus we were baptised in his death; … so that as Christ was raised from the dead, we too might live a new life”. Sunday we shall continue to offer our prayers for the healing of the human family, that has been going through so much anguish, and to be able to experience liberation from this great torment. Let life prevail again!
A cup of water
“Whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, that person will certainly not lose his/her reward.” Let us practice hospitality without fear: it is only the rice that we share that really feeds our hunger, it is only the water that we give to the thirsty that quenches our inner thirst! We pray for all our donors and benefactors, who support our missionary activity with much more than a glass of water: may the good Lord grant them serenity and the reward allocated for the prophets.
Comment of the Gospel of the 13th Sunday OT – Year A by Fr. Michael Carlini
The theme that the liturgy proposes to us today is the arduous, challenging and difficult attitude of hospitality, considered as a welcoming not only of a stranger, but mainly as a model of acceptance of any person we meet. In fact, any man is different from myself, is an Other from me, an he bursts with his/her diversity in my everyday life and therefore imposes a comparison, a dialogue, a questioning of the acquired securities I cherish so much. Hospitality obliges us to verify our identity because each guest reveals to us the part of stranger that is inside of us, thus opening us to a greater knowledge of ourselves and of God, who reveals himself as the Other “par excellence”.
In these days we see a great resistance in living the spirit of openness to the foreigner, at various levels: Nations, which waste precious resources in building walls and fences to keep away immigrants from their borders; local entities, that only value their own limited geographic or cultural area, neglecting the greater space surrounding them, etc. Those walls are physical representations of our fears and immaturities, and many times also of the hatred that dwells in our minds.
The Letter to the Hebrews offers us this diamond: “Do not neglect hospitality, for through it some [Abraham and Sarah] have unknowingly entertained angels” (c. 13).
At every Mass we are foreigners that God invites at his table, and from strangers we are transformed into the Lord’s adopted children, members of his family.
Water is thicker than blood
Sunday’s gospel ends the ‘Missionary Discourse’ (Mt c. 10). Matthew reports some precious remarks by Jesus: “Anyone who prefers father or mother to me is not worthy of me; Anyone who welcomes a prophet will have a prophet’s reward”. When we decided to become Christians we were welcomed into God’s family, through the Water of baptism. That water is more powerful than our biological blood, inherited from our parents. It is deeper than the cultural identity in which we are rooted: “What is born of flesh is flesh and what is born of spirit is spirit” (Jn 3); worldly things are necessary, there is no life in this world without them, but it is the Spirit that gives life.
The Pandemic
The second reading is mirrored in the plague the whole world is going through: “When we were baptised in Christ Jesus we were baptised in his death; … so that as Christ was raised from the dead, we too might live a new life”. Sunday we shall continue to offer our prayers for the healing of the human family, that has been going through so much anguish, and to be able to experience liberation from this great torment. Let life prevail again!
A cup of water
“Whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, that person will certainly not lose his/her reward.” Let us practice hospitality without fear: it is only the rice that we share that really feeds our hunger, it is only the water that we give to the thirsty that quenches our inner thirst! We pray for all our donors and benefactors, who support our missionary activity with much more than a glass of water: may the good Lord grant them serenity and the reward allocated for the prophets.