SUNDAY READINGS - 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time
FIRST READING: 1 Kings 19:9, 11-13. Elijah came to a cave, and lodged there; and behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and he said to him, "Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the Lord." And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice. And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave.
EXPLANATION: The northern tribes broke away from Judah on the death of Solomon (922 B.C.), and formed an independent country which was called Israel. Separated from the temple and the priestly caste (the tribe of Levi which remained with Judah and Benjamin), they gradually lost their knowledge and belief in Yahweh, the true God, as well. During the reign of Ahab (869-850), their seventh King, idolatry became rampant in Israel. Ahab had married a pagan called Jezebel, a daughter of the king of Tyre. She set up a temple to Baal in Samaria and had 400 pagan priests daily at her table. She banished all the prophets of the true God from the country or almost all, for Elijah remained to preserve the true faith and make life miserable for Jezebel.
After his victory over the priests of Baal on Mount Carmel (1 Kgs. 18: 16-40) and his execution of 400 of them Elijah decided it was safer to leave Israel to escape the wrath of Jezebel. He was heading for Mount Sinai, evidently in the hope of meeting Yahweh where Moses had seen him, when the incident narrated in today's reading took place. Remember, Elijah was a holy man of God, who wanted God to be a God of fire and sword for he was waging a one-man war against the queen and her forces.
Elijah . . . cave: He had reached Mount Horeb in Sinai and was resting in a cave when a voice told him to come out and meet Yahweh the Lord. (In verses 10 and 11, not included in the reading, God had asked him why he had run away and he answered that he had run to save his life.)
great . . . fire: In all of these physical proofs (wind, an earthquake, a fire) of God's might and power, which Elijah felt were needed in Israel, God was not present.
after . . . voice: The CCD translation, "a tiny whispering sound," is more correct. JEB has: "the sound of a gentle breeze," and the NEB: "a low murmuring sound." The contrast is between the roaring and noise of the tornado, the earthquake and fire, and the gentle sound that follows them.
he wrapped . . . mantle: Elijah realized that the gentle sound meant that God was present, so lest he should see him (and die, as was the common belief), he covered his eyes.
In the verses that follow the above, God (Yahweh) tells him to return via Damascus to his country and his work.
APPLICATION: Elijah was a great prophet, a great defender of the true faith in Israel, where a defense was needed---but, being of a fiery, violent nature, he was evidently not quite satisfied with the help God was giving him. He wanted fire and brimstone poured abundantly on all God's enemies, but God did not always see things as Elijah did. When running away in despair, or with the hope of collecting reinforcements in the form of more active cooperation (according to his ideas), on the part of God, he was taught a lesson and, to his credit, he learned it.
Many of us have at least a little of the spirit of the pre-Horeb Elijah in us. When we see wickedness prosper and open opponents of God continuing to live and to thrive, we begin to wish God would step in and show his power by exterminating them, in a way that would prevent others from daring to imitate them. An earthquake could so easily swallow up the leaders of atheistic policy when they all meet in Moscow; and what a blessing for the world and for the true religion We wonder, perhaps, why God doesn't show his power and his presence in some such way to those who deny his existence.
But, as Christians, we should know better. We have the great advantage (which Elijah lacked) of Christ's teaching on God's mercy. God is the father, and the loving father, of the sinner as well as of the saint. He does not wish the death of the sinner, but that he should be converted and live. He gives his grace to all men; he lets his sun shine on the sinners and the just. He has infinite patience and is ready, up to the last moment, to welcome back the greatest sinner who turns to him. How many saints are in heaven today, who would have been cut down in their sins, if God acted as Elijah and some other devout lovers of God would have him act?
No, the lesson for each one of us today is that God is especially a God of mercy in his dealings with us. He would have us deal mercifully with our fellowman who are not serving him or who, worse still, are even denying his existence. Tornadoes of blame and abuse, thundering condemnations and threats of fire and brimstone are not the means God uses to bring back his prodigal sons, and they are not the means he wants us, his friends, to use either.
God is to be found in "the tiny gentle breeze," in the kind, charitable understanding word spoken out of a true brotherly heart. In the sinner God sees his child and still loves him. We too should see in the sinner our brother, and we should love him and wish him to reach the happy end God intends for him. A kindly word will do more to produce his conversion than torrents of abuse and condemnation. There are few of us who have not sinned and offended God during our adult years. How fortunate we were that God was not Elijah's type of God while we were in our sins! He gave us a chance because he was a merciful, understanding God. Let us be merciful and understanding to our brothers who now are what we once were. Let us pray for them and ask God to continue to be merciful towards them. Let us help them kindly and charitably whenever we can. If we are instrumental in bringing back a prodigal son to his loving Father in heaven, we can rest assured that our Father will help us on our road back to him in heaven.
SECOND READING: Romans 9: 1-5. I am speaking the truth in Christ, I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen by race. They are Israelites, and to them belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed for ever. Amen.
EXPLANATION: In the preceding eight chapters, St. Paul has been telling the Roman converts to Christianity of the blessings Christ, the Messiah, had brought to mankind. Christ was the fulfillment of all God's dealings with the Chosen People of the Old Testament---he was the fulfillment of "the Law and the prophets." Yet the Jews, as a nation, had refused to see Christ as the Messiah who was promised to them by God through their patriarchs and prophets. This question troubled Paul very much. (It must be remembered that a great many individual Jews had accepted Christianity, among them Paul and the other Apostles.) Paul would gladly have given everything, even his life and his Christian faith, to get them to accept Christ as the fulfillment of the promises. It is of this sorrow of heart that he speaks in the following verses.
I . . . lying: He solemnly declares that what he is about to say is the objective truth. He calls Christ as a witness: "in Christ."
great . . . anguish: In spite of all the sufferings and trouble the Jews had caused him ever since he began his Christian missionary activity (12 or 13 years previously), he still loves them as his brother-Jews, and he has sorrow of heart and anguish because they do not see the gift of God in Christ.
I myself were accursed: Accursed=anathema. Paul says he would be willing to be excluded from Christ---the worst possible fate he could imagine---if, as a people, the Jews who were his brethren and kinsmen by race, would thereby accept Christ.
They are Israelites: Paul gives them the more honorable and religious name of Israelites. God changed Jacob's name to Israel and his descendants inherited that name. The title "Jews" was given them by outside nations, and not always with respect. (Note how the present-day Jews who have established a political nation in Palestine called it "Israel," not "Judah." They are Israelis rather than Jews.)
To them belong: Paul goes on to mention seven of the privileges which Yahweh down through the ages had given to the Israelites, the descendants of Jacob.
1: sonship: Yahweh adopted them as his sons, his chosen ones (Ex 4: 22; Is. 1: 2).
2: glory: This was Yahweh's presence manifested by a cloud in the tabernacle, in the desert, and in the temple of Jerusalem built by Solomon (Ex. 40: 34; 1 Kgs. 8: 10-11).
3:covenants: These were the solemn pacts Yahweh made with Abraham (Gen. 15-18), with Jacob (Gen. 32: 29), and Moses (Ex. 20: 1-17), this latter being the principal one which formed them into a nation, a Chosen People.
4: law: The decalog (in Gen. 20:1-17).
5: worship: The cultic laws regulating divine worship of the one true God in the tabernacle and later in the temple of Jerusalem (Gn. 21-31).
6: promises: Yahweh made promises to Abraham, Jacob, Isaac, Moses and David. They were promises of his special protection and love made to them as his Chosen People and to David of a kingly descendant whose reign would last forever (see Sm. 7: 11ff).
7: patriarchs: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, distinguished ancestors of the Jews and friends of Yahweh.
the Christ . . . all: The final and crowning gift and privilege, which they unfortunately did not accept or acknowledge, was Christ, the Messiah, who was God as well as man. It was because he claimed to be God as well as man (a claim he proved by his miracles and especially by his resurrection) that they rejected him and handed him over to the Roman authorities to be crucified, "because he has claimed to be the Son of God" (Jn. 20: 7).
APPLICATION: Like St. Paul we too can and should grieve that God's Chosen People of the Old Testament refused, and still refuse, as a nation to accept the last and greatest of the many gifts he gave them, his Messiah, Christ. For eighteen centuries he treated them as a people apart. He let the other nations go their way, but to them he revealed himself as the true and only God, who made and regulated the whole universe and all it contains. And his reason for this special treatment was that his Son (according to the flesh), whom he was going to send on earth to make all nations his new Chosen People, would be a descendant of Abraham, a member of their race.
While we regret that they are not our brothers in Christ, and while we must always pray that one day they will become our Christian brothers, we must realize that they are a small percentage of those who reject Christ today. There are millions living among us---men and women---who know nothing and care nothing for God or for their own eternal future. If they were not baptized then their parents were, but indifference followed by disbelief has ousted the faith in families, and almost in whole nations, in much of the so-called civilized part of our world.
What is the cause of this? It is the same as that which prevented the Jews of St. Paul's day from accepting Christ: pride and worldliness. The leaders of the Jews, the Pharisees and the priestly caste, could not bear to be taught by Christ. What was he but a country carpenter, while they were doctors of the law! They had nothing to learn, they thought. Our ex-Christians and anti-Christians today think they have all the answers to all questions too. Because they know a little more than their grand-parents about the things of this world, they think they can ignore or deny the existence of what does not come within the range of their bodily senses.
As well as being proud, the priests and Pharisees of Paul's day were worldly and politically minded. They looked for a Messiah who would not only set them free from the hated Roman rule, but who would make of their country a world-power. And in this new empire they would, of course, have the seats of honor. Christ's teaching was concerned not with power or wealth in this world but with the eternal joy and happiness that men could obtain for themselves in the next. Our ex-Christians today have no time, and no thought, for God or for Christ's teaching, because they are totally occupied with obtaining the pleasures, the wealth, the comforts of this world. They may not think in terms of world-power for themselves, but they have put themselves completely and entirely in the power of this world. Talk of a future-life is to them sheer folly---the present is what counts: "eat, sleep, drink and be merry" is their motto, their creed. They are reluctant to add "for tomorrow you die'!---that might disturb their present bliss!
What should be our reaction to this sad state of so many of our fellowmen? Our first reaction should be a fervent "Thank you, God, for the true faith we have; please give us the grace to live in it until we draw our last breath." Our second thought must be to ask the good God to send the light of faith to the descendants of Abraham, and to re-light it among those Gentiles who have extinguished it. It is not enough for a true Christian that he should live his own life according to the laws of Christ, true charity demands that he be seriously interested in the spiritual welfare of his neighbors.
GOSPEL: Matthew 14:22-33. Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up into the hills by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but the boat by this time was many furlongs distant from the land, beaten by the waves; for the wind was against them. And in the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, "It is a ghost!" And they cried out for fear. But immediately he spoke to them, saying, "Take heart, it is I; have no fear."
And Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, bid me to come to you on the water." He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus, but when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, "Lord, save me." Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "O man of little faith, why did you doubt?" And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God."
EXPLANATION: In this reading from St. Matthew's gospel we have two miracles worked by our Lord; he walks on the water and calms a storm. The faith and trust of Peter in Christ is greater than that of the other Apostles, but it is as yet not complete and unquestioning.
Christ had spent the day somewhere on the eastern shore of Lake Genesareth. As evening came he told the disciples to return home by boat to the western shore. He himself spent most of the night alone in prayer. The disciples ran into a heavy head-wind and were hardly making any headway---they still hadn't reached the western shore at 3 a.m. Suddenly Jesus came near them, walking on the water. The disciples were terrified; they thought he was a ghost. Jesus told them not to be afraid, that it was he, their Master, who was there. Peter was ready to believe him, but put him to the test. If he really was the Master he could give them the power to walk on the water. Christ gave him the power and while his faith in Christ lasted he walked on the water. But his faith weakened when he saw a large wave approaching, and he then began to sink. He called out to his master: "Lord save me." Christ caught him and lifted him up, remarking that it was the wavering of his faith that caused him to sink. They both got into the boat and immediately the wind ceased. The others in the boat declared then that truly he was the "Son of God." This was not a proclamation of their faith in his divinity---this conviction did not come to them until after the resurrection---but an affirmation that he was the Messiah.
APPLICATION: Our Lord sent his disciples to row across the lake, knowing that they would meet strong, gale-force head-winds and be in danger. He did this because he wanted to strengthen their faith and trust in himself. He intended to come to them at the right moment, working two miracles---walking on the water and calming the storm. This he did and the result was as he had intended---their faith in him was strengthened, they declared he was the Messiah, the Chosen of God. Peter, already the recognized leader, and always the most daring among them, showed himself ready to risk drowning in order to prove his trust and confidence in Christ. While he trusted in Christ, all went well, but when his faith weakened he would have been lost were it not for the outstretched helping hand of his master. This was also a very necessary lesson in the education of Peter and his companions.
For us, too, there is a necessary lesson in this incident. It is that we must continue to trust in Christ and his loving Father, even when God seems to have deserted us. Most of the troubles and trials of our lives are caused by the injustice and lack of charity of our fellowman. The remainder can be attributed to our own defects and sins or to some weakness in our mental and bodily make-up. But God foresees all these misfortunes, and can prevent them. Instead he lets them take their course, because they can and should be the means of educating us in our knowledge of life's true meaning and they should draw us closer to him.
Christ foresaw the storm and the grave risk his Apostles would run when he sent them off across the lake. But that trial and the grave danger they ran was for their own good, because they learned to realize that he was from God and they could always trust him. Our trials and our earthly ailments are also foreseen by God and permitted by him (even if inflicted on us by a sinful fellowman) so that they will draw us closer to him and help us on the road to heaven.
This they will do, if we accept them and bear with them until he comes to our aid. Our troubles in life are like the growing pains of our youth---they are necessary if we are to arrive at our full stature as sons of God. They form, mold and shape our religious character and bring us closer to God---if we allow them to do so. For the lukewarm Christian who rebels against God because of his earthly sufferings, they can do the opposite. He cannot see the purpose and value of suffering because he has never seriously pondered or grasped the real meaning of this life and God's loving plans for him.
As in the first reading today, God may not be in the tornadoes or earthquakes or roaring fires, nor does he cause them perhaps, but he is ever near to his true children when such calamities occur. He has a purpose in every trial or tribulation which crosses the path of our lives, a purpose always to our eternal advantage if only we will see and accept his will in these trials.-a296