Monday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time
June 27, 2022
Today’s Readings:
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/062722.cfm
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, our readings dispense a serious dose of fire and brimstone!
Beware, I will crush you into the ground
Amos 2:13
as a wagon crushes when laden with sheaves.
Consider this, you who forget God,
Psalm 50:22
lest I rend you and there be no one to rescue you.
Some of the prophets, and some preachers even now, have considered “F&B” an effective strategy to reach the hardened sinner. Even our sweet, gentle Jesus comes through tough in today’s Gospel:
Another of his disciples said to him,
Matthew 8:22
“Lord, let me go first and bury my father.”
But Jesus answered him, “Follow me,
and let the dead bury their dead.”
I’ve never been a fan of the hellfire approach to evangelization. I think it tends to raise a wall of fear around our hearts rather than invite a deep conversion.
Our Alleluia Verse helps me to cut through the sulfurous verbiage to the point that might actually change me: God wants to speak to me. Don’t be hard-hearted to God’s message.
Alleluia, alleluia.
If today you hear his voice,
harden not your hearts.
That’s it. That’s the message. Today it’s wrapped in some blazing language but the core is the same.
A loving God wants to speak to me
in every moment of my life.
Poetry: excerpt from Dante’s Inferno
This passage from the epic poem focuses on the sin of indifference, not caring enough to be either bad or good. It made me think of a powerful verse from the Book of Revelation:
I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.
Revelation 3: 15-16
And I — my head oppressed by horror — said:
“Master, what is it that I hear? Who are
those people so defeated by their pain?”
And he to me: “This miserable way
is taken by the sorry souls of those
who lived without disgrace and without praise.
They now commingle with the coward angels,
the company of those who were not rebels
nor faithful to their God, but stood apart.
The heavens, that their beauty not be lessened,
have cast them out, nor will deep Hell receive them —
even the wicked cannot glory in them.”
Dante Alighieri, Inferno
Music: De Profundis – Vasari Singers
| Psalmus 129 (130) | Psalm 129 (130) |
| 1 De profundis clamavi ad te Domine | 1 Out of the depths I have cried to thee, O Lord: |
| 2 Domine exaudi vocem meam fiant aures tuae intendentes in vocem deprecationis meae | 2 Lord, hear my voice. Let thy ears be attentive to the voice of my supplication. |
| 3 Si iniquitates observabis Domine Domine quis sustinebit | 3 If thou, O Lord, wilt mark iniquities: Lord, who shall stand it. |
| 4 Quia apud te propitiatio est propter legem tuam sustinui te Domine sustinuit anima mea in verbum eius | 4 For with thee there is merciful forgiveness: and by reason of thy law, I have waited for thee, O Lord. My soul hath relied on his word: |
| 5 Speravit anima mea in Domino | 5 my soul hath hoped in the Lord. |
| 6 A custodia matutina usque ad noctem speret Israel in Domino | 6 From the morning watch even until night, let Israel hope in the Lord. |
| 7 Quia apud Dominum misericordia et copiosa apud eum redemptio | 7 Because with the Lord there is mercy: and with him plentiful redemption. |
| 8 Et ipse redimet Israel ex omnibus iniquitatibus eius | 8 And he shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities. |
| ______________________ |
Lavish Mercy 