{"id":1447,"date":"2014-09-07T12:09:22","date_gmt":"2014-09-07T16:09:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=1447"},"modified":"2014-09-07T12:09:22","modified_gmt":"2014-09-07T16:09:22","slug":"23rd-sunday-in-ordinary-time-year-a-homily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/23rd-sunday-in-ordinary-time-year-a-homily\/","title":{"rendered":"23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A – Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

23rd<\/sup> Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A<\/a>
\nEzekiel 33:7-9
\nRomans 13:8-10
\nMatthew 18:15-20
\nSeptember 7, 2014<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Ezekiel serves the Lord as a prophet.\u00a0 Part of his duties as a prophet is to be a \u201cwatchman\u201d.\u00a0 A watchman stands on lookout to watch for trouble and, when there is trouble, alert the people.<\/p>\n

As a prophet, Ezekiel is to stand on watch for the people who might sin and stray from God.\u00a0 It is his role to tell the people when they are going astray and offer them the Lord\u2019s words on how they are called to live their lives.<\/p>\n

This is not a trivial task given to Ezekiel for it comes with a great responsibility.\u00a0 Ezekiel must tell the people of their sins and waywardness.\u00a0 To fail to do so is to sin.\u00a0 If he tells the people and they continue to sin, it is their choice but Ezekiel is innocent.<\/p>\n

In baptism, we are all anointed priest, prophet<\/em>, and king.\u00a0 Most people do not make being a prophet their career but sharing our faith must be part of how we are.\u00a0 As we see people who do not follow the Lord\u2019s ways, we too have a responsibility to speak out for what we believe in.\u00a0 It is their choice what to do.<\/p>\n

Yes, we need to alert people to their sins but we must be thoughtful about how we do it.\u00a0 We must pray for the Lord\u2019s guidance on how best to say what needs to be said.<\/p>\n

Today Jesus gives us some guidance on how to tell someone their faults.\u00a0 He gives us a process to follow that begins with going to any person who has wronged us one on one to \u201ctell them their fault\u201d.<\/p>\n

This should not, must not, begin with us going to the person and screaming, Do you know what you did?\u00a0 Do you know how much it hurt me?<\/em><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not easy to go to someone who has wronged us.\u00a0 It is not just a process.\u00a0 It\u2019s about what is in the heart.\u00a0 What is the motive of our words?\u00a0 Do we go seeking to be the one who is right?\u00a0 Do we go seeking revenge?<\/p>\n

While we might be owed an apology, I think our motive should not be rooted in getting an apology.\u00a0 Our motives are best when we go to the person seeking to help them be the best person they can be.\u00a0 Maybe they don\u2019t realize what they did.\u00a0 Maybe they don\u2019t understand why it is wrong.<\/p>\n

Jesus then tells us that if the person doesn\u2019t listen, we are to go to them with witnesses.\u00a0 Getting witnesses should not be about proving that we are right.\u00a0 The witnesses should be to help the person realize the truth and help them become a better person.<\/p>\n

The same is going to the church for help.\u00a0 Lastly, Jesus tells them if the person still refuses to listen, then treat them like a Gentile.\u00a0 Even this should be seen not as punishment or avoidance.\u00a0 It should be seen as a way to motivate the person to change so they can again be part of our community.<\/p>\n

We are people of faith.\u00a0 Part of our faith is to be people of compassion.\u00a0 It isn\u2019t easy.\u00a0 We can struggle with it all our lives but we make it our way of life.\u00a0 Most of us are baptized as little children and our parents make our baptismal promises for us but as we learn we must make our faith our own.\u00a0 A key step in this is the Sacrament of Confirmation.\u00a0 This Fall, we will have eight youth make this sacrament.\u00a0 Today they begin their final preparation and we offer them our prayers and support.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A Ezekiel 33:7-9 Romans 13:8-10 Matthew 18:15-20 September 7, 2014   Ezekiel serves the Lord as a prophet.\u00a0 Part of his duties as a prophet is to be a \u201cwatchman\u201d.\u00a0 A watchman stands on lookout to watch for trouble and, when there is trouble, alert the people. As a …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A – Homily’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-nl","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1447"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1447"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1447\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1448,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1447\/revisions\/1448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}