{"id":2194,"date":"2017-07-02T12:10:22","date_gmt":"2017-07-02T16:10:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=2194"},"modified":"2017-07-02T12:10:22","modified_gmt":"2017-07-02T16:10:22","slug":"13th-sunday-in-ordinary-time-year-a-homily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/13th-sunday-in-ordinary-time-year-a-homily\/","title":{"rendered":"13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A – Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

13th<\/sup> Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A<\/a>
\n2 Kings 4:8-11, 14-16a
\nPsalm 89:2-3, 16-17, 18-19
\nRomans 6:3-4, 8-11
\nMatthew 10:37-42<\/p>\n

The Fourth Commandment tells us to \u201chonor our father and mother\u201d but today Jesus says, \u201cWhoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Are these two in conflict?\u00a0 Absolutely not.\u00a0 Jesus does not tell us that we shouldn\u2019t love our mother or father.\u00a0 He says we should not love them \u201cmore than<\/em><\/strong>\u201d him.\u00a0 Remember, elsewhere Jesus tells us the greatest commandment is to love God and the second<\/em> is to love our neighbor.\u00a0 We are to love all but God should be first.<\/p>\n

Jesus goes on say, \u201cWhoever finds his life will lose it and whoever loses his life for my sake<\/strong> will find it<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 What does it mean to lose our life?<\/p>\n

We have busy lives.\u00a0 Work or school can be a full-time effort.\u00a0 Every retirees can have a lot of commitments with grandchildren or their generous volunteering.\u00a0 There can also be sports, music, and plays, or whatever your (or your children or grandchildren\u2019s) favorite activities are.\u00a0 Just caring for little children or elderly parents can take a lot of time.<\/p>\n

These things can be important and at least some of them should be important.\u00a0 Some of them help us to have happy lives but are they what we are created for?\u00a0 They are part of life but are they our whole life?<\/p>\n

The life we are created for is life with God.\u00a0 Spending time with the people we love can help us understand God\u2019s love for us.\u00a0 For instance, being a parent and struggling with a disobedient child might help us reflect on our own relationship with God as his child.<\/p>\n

God gives us gifts like the gift of music.\u00a0 God wants us to use our gifts to help others be happy and to know God<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Baptism marks a beginning of life with God but the Sacrament of Baptism is not an end.\u00a0 Through Baptism we are forever marked as a child of God but being baptized does not guarantee<\/em><\/strong> our salvation.<\/p>\n

In this precious sacrament, we are \u201cbaptized into Christ Jesus\u2026baptized into his death\u2026in newness of life<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 In his death on the Cross Jesus took away the sin of the world so that we might have newness of life.<\/p>\n

We must put God at the center of our lives if we truly want to live with him in eternity.\u00a0 This means God must be our greatest priority.\u00a0 This is not easy.\u00a0 We have to work to be able to food on the table.\u00a0 We have to take care of the children.\u00a0 God wants<\/em><\/strong> to do these things but to do them with his love.<\/p>\n

Sometimes coming to Church for Sunday Mass can just seem like one more thing on an already busy schedule.\u00a0 It can be easy to think that missing one Sunday isn\u2019t a big deal.\u00a0 Then one Sunday becomes two and\u2026.<\/p>\n

Bishop Matano spoke in his pastoral letter for the Year of the Eucharist about the importance of Sunday Mass.\u00a0 The rules about coming to Mass every Sunday and Holy Day have not changed (we do recognize sickness and significant snow as reasons not to make it).\u00a0 The Third Commandment to keep the Sabbath holy remains.<\/p>\n

We need to realize that the Third Commandment is not for God\u2019s benefit but for our benefit.\u00a0 We need what the Mass offers us.<\/p>\n

Here someone is probably thinking but I don\u2019t feel like I get anything out of Mass.\u00a0 The Mass is never meant to be a magic potion that instantly makes us feel good.\u00a0 Celebrating Mass is about praising God.\u00a0 In the way we pray at Mass, we pray not for ourselves as individuals but for all of the God\u2019s people.\u00a0 Yet, in hearing God\u2019s Word and receiving the Eucharist, we cultivate and nourish our own ongoing relationship with God.<\/p>\n

Who do we normally have our closest relationships with?\u00a0 Is it not the people we interact with often and engage in conversation?<\/p>\n

Every week at Mass we hear God\u2019s Word.\u00a0 In Ordinary Time, the gospel is read in sequence (so is the second reading).\u00a0 Missing weeks sometimes breaks up the flow of the readings or leaves us without critical components to understand the gospel as a whole.<\/p>\n

Of course, the Eucharist is offered to us as the Bread of Life each week.\u00a0 It truly is the Body and Blood of Jesus<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 We may not always appreciate this to gain the full value.<\/p>\n

We also might not always understand what goes on at Mass to appreciate it.\u00a0 That\u2019s why Bishop Matano has called for this Year of the Eucharist, to help us understand and appreciate<\/em> what we celebrate.\u00a0 That\u2019s what we are going to work on this year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A 2 Kings 4:8-11, 14-16a Psalm 89:2-3, 16-17, 18-19 Romans 6:3-4, 8-11 Matthew 10:37-42 The Fourth Commandment tells us to \u201chonor our father and mother\u201d but today Jesus says, \u201cWhoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.\u201d Are these two in conflict?\u00a0 Absolutely not.\u00a0 …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘13th 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":[113,82,157],"tags":[24,304],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-zo","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194"}],"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=2194"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2196,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2194\/revisions\/2196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}