{"id":1836,"date":"2016-06-12T16:23:00","date_gmt":"2016-06-12T20:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=1836"},"modified":"2016-06-12T16:23:00","modified_gmt":"2016-06-12T20:23:00","slug":"11th-sunday-in-ordinary-time-year-c-homily-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/11th-sunday-in-ordinary-time-year-c-homily-2\/","title":{"rendered":"11th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C – Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

11th<\/sup> Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C<\/a>
\n2 Samuel 12:7-10, 13
\nPsalm 32:1-2, 5, 7, 11
\nGalatians 2:16, 19-21
\nLuke 7:36-8:3
\nJune 12, 2016<\/p>\n

This Pharisee does a good thing.\u00a0 He invites Jesus to dine with him.<\/p>\n

Then comes a woman who is identified as a sinful woman.\u00a0 We are not told what her sins are and it really doesn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n

The Pharisee is astonished that Jesus associates with the sinful woman.\u00a0 In those days, good Jews didn\u2019t associate with sinners.\u00a0 So, he figures Jesus must not be a prophet because if He were, He would never associate with her.<\/p>\n

The thing is, at this moment it is the sinful woman who is doing what is expected.\u00a0 According to the customs of the time, when a guest arrived at your house, the host was to offer water for them to wash.\u00a0 The host offered a kiss and an anointing (not the Sacrament of the Sick) as a sign of welcoming.<\/p>\n

The Pharisee did not of this but the sinful woman did.<\/p>\n

The Pharisee saw himself as \u2018chosen\u2019 but did not do what was expected of him and saw no need to change.<\/p>\n

The woman had committed sins and, knowing her sins made her unworthy, she comes to Jesus not to ask for something but in complete humility to serve Jesus.\u00a0 What did Jesus do?\u00a0 Did He cast her away?\u00a0 No.\u00a0 Jesus forgives her.<\/p>\n

The Bible has stories that include various sinners.\u00a0 For instance, David was considered a great king and yet he was a sinner.\u00a0 There was King Saul before him who turned from the Lord\u2019s ways.\u00a0 David was forgiven but not Saul.\u00a0 Why?<\/p>\n

When David\u2019s sin was pointed out to him through Nathan the prophet, David admitted his sin and repented.\u00a0 Saul didn\u2019t repent.\u00a0 Saul knowingly and willingly defied God\u2019s instruction.\u00a0 David repented and remained as king.<\/p>\n

Are we willing to admit our sins to God?\u00a0 Are we willing to admit our sins to a priest?<\/p>\n

I ask both questions deliberately.\u00a0 Some people say they confess to God directly.\u00a0 Maybe they do, maybe they don\u2019t.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know.\u00a0 It shouldn\u2019t be that hard to confess our sins to God because He already knows what we have done.\u00a0 Yet, are we really open with God in praying about our sins or do we just figure He knows what our sins are and leave it at that.\u00a0 In doing so, we never really name our sins.<\/p>\n

What about confessing our sins to a priest?<\/p>\n

This can be much harder.\u00a0 First of all, if we see the priest as just another human being, we can say why we should confess to him.\u00a0 We might not see any value in it.\u00a0 Plus, we don\u2019t like to admit our faults.\u00a0 We might be afraid of what the priest will think of us.\u00a0 What could we possibly gain by telling a priest about our sins?<\/p>\n

Yet, people can feel great relief from confessing.\u00a0 It can feel like a burden is lifted (because it is).\u00a0 This can happen in two ways.\u00a0 First, on the human level, we can express a great relief in letting out something we have been carrying inside ourselves.<\/p>\n

Secondly, on the spiritual level, in confessing we are saying to God, I am not perfect.\u00a0 God I need your forgiveness, I need your mercy to do better.\u00a0 The grace we receive is a wonderful thing.<\/p>\n

I already spoke about confessing our sins directly to God.\u00a0 Confessing through a priest makes explicit what we desire in our hearts.<\/p>\n

In each of the sacraments there are things we use.\u00a0 In baptism, it is water and oils.\u00a0 In the Eucharist, it is bread and wine.\u00a0 For the sick, Confirmation, and ordination, we use oils.<\/p>\n

In confessing, the \u201cthing\u201d we bring to the sacrament is the words we say that explicitly admits our sins.\u00a0 Then God works through the words of absolution spoken by the priest to shower his forgiveness upon us.<\/p>\n

It is the humility we show with a contrite heart that opens us to God\u2019s mercy to walk in the light of Christ.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

11th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C 2 Samuel 12:7-10, 13 Psalm 32:1-2, 5, 7, 11 Galatians 2:16, 19-21 Luke 7:36-8:3 June 12, 2016 This Pharisee does a good thing.\u00a0 He invites Jesus to dine with him. Then comes a woman who is identified as a sinful woman.\u00a0 We are not told what her sins …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘11th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C – 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":[82],"tags":[180,179],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-tC","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1836"}],"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=1836"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1836\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1837,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1836\/revisions\/1837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}