Saturday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time
June 18, 2022
Today’s readings:
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/061822.cfm
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, our Alleluia Verse tells us a secret: there is a greater wealth than this world would have us believe. It is a wealth contradicted by human definitions but proven in the Resurrection of Christ.
Alleluia, alleluia.
Jesus Christ became poor although he was rich,
so that by his poverty you might become rich.
This secret doesn’t make sense to one without faith. But if we observe the Iives of those with faith, we will discover their accumulating riches: peace, joy, trust, enthusiasm, hope, gratitude, wisdom, courage….
The Gospel to which our verse leads describes such a faithful life:
Look at the birds in the sky;
Matthew 6: 26-27
they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns,
yet your heavenly Father feeds them.
Are not you more important than they?
Can any of you by worrying add a single moment to your life-span?
Why are you anxious about clothes?
Learn from the way the wild flowers grow.
They do not work or spin.
But I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor
was clothed like one of them.
Does this all mean we won’t have challenges in our lives, or disappointment, or suffering? No, I don’t think so.
What is does mean is that we will know what is truly important and precious in our lives – those things that “money can’t buy”. And we will honor them, work for them, share them. Hopefully, people can look at us and find that kind of wealth.
Poetry: Worry About Money – Kathleen Raine
Wearing worry about money like a hair shirt
I lie down in my bed and wrestle with my angel.
My bank-manager could not sanction my continuance for another day
But life itself wakes me each morning, and love
Urges me to give although I have no money
In the bank at this moment, and ought properly
To cease to exist in a world where poverty
Is a shameful and ridiculous offence.
Having no one to advise me, I open the Bible
And shut my eyes and put my finger on a text
And read that the widow with the young son
Must give first to the prophetic genius
From the little there is in the bin of flour and the cruse of oil.
Music: two songs today – one for reflection and one for fun
The Glory Way – Badnarik
Side by Side – Brenda Lee
Lavish Mercy 