See this week's bulletins.
ST. MARY'S BULLETINCELEBRATE SUNDAY
WITH ST. MARY'S
SIXTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
Life is a journey of virtue and overcoming sin.
THE SIXTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
Within each individual is the capacity to do both good things and sinful things. Our moral life is filled with the constant struggle between choosing sin and pursuing goodness, and when we look at the fall of humanity and how we have slowly descended into our sin, it can be quite hopeless to think that there is a way out of it for us. Fortunately, God is active in our past, present, and future–He guided us towards salvation, He remains with us in our struggles, and He will be there for us when our journey comes to an end. The journey itself, though, is one in which we assume responsibility to be children of God. This personal journey for each one of us follows a pattern throughout human history, and we can see the trajectory of our own choices throughout Salvation History.
READ THIS SUNDAY'S MESSAGE
Our calling as a people of God is constantly being refined. When God passed on the Law to the Israelites in the Old Testament, it laid out how we should behave towards God. Through Christ, the Law did not pass away because we were still required to behave towards God in the same way. However, it was refined in the context of Jesus’ humanity. In this Sunday’s Gospel, there is an underlying message of how we must treat each other. History seems to indicate that the virtuous and the good have been treated poorly, while the “false prophets” are treated well. Throughout his life, Jesus taught us how to show our love for God through other human beings, in charity, kindness, and empathy. Even in the face of abuse, we must show love to our fellow neighbors; after all, this is what God does to us. The theme that can be found throughout the readings this Sunday is the dichotomy between goodness and wickedness. As humans, we tend to see the world in this way: we have ourselves and those “on our side” versus those who exist apart from us, who we may see as strangers and agents of chaos. The act of “othering” is a comforting coping mechanism for ourselves, but prevents us from loving in the same way Christ did–by seeking after those who may not be like us, but are just as much in need of love as those closest to us. Unfamiliarity can cause distrust, which is exacerbated through thinking according to communities. But Scripture points to a much more severe truth–the struggle between goodness and wickedness is most intense within the individual soul.
By acknowledging the Law, which indicates to us how to treat God, we shift the focus from ourselves to that which is greater than us. The Law permits us to abandon selfishness for selflessness, to recognize humanity’s weaknesses, and humble ourselves before God. But this does not end with our attitude towards God; selflessness is refined in how we treat our neighbors and our enemies, which Christ shows us through the Beatitudes, or in these paradoxical teachings of his: the poor will inherit the Kingdom of God, the hungry will be satisfied, the weeping will laugh, etc. In those who suffer, they are incapable of falling into the vices of excess. So, in the days of excess, ridding ourselves of the vices that lay at the heart of sin gives us hope that God will guide us in our goodness. When you choose goodness over wickedness, God promises the reward of Heaven. This is not a payment or prize for good behavior, but a fulfillment of what it means to be human and what we were fundamentally created for.
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