Tuesday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
July 23, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/072324.cfm

---

Shepherd your people with your staff,
the flock of your inheritance,
That dwells apart in a woodland,
in the midst of Carmel.
Let them feed in Bashan and Gilead,
as in the days of old;
As in the days when you came from the land of Egypt,
show us wonderful signs…
Who is there like you, the God who removes guilt
and pardons sin for the remnant of his inheritance;
Who does not persist in anger forever,
but delights rather in mercy…
Micah 7:14-15; 18

---

Micah prophesied about 700 years before Christ. His world was under siege by Sennacherib the Assyrian king. In the midst of this devastation, many abandoned the one true faith. But there was a small faithful portion of believers – the remnant – whom Micah sought to both warn and encourage by his prophecies.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We, too, live in a time of siege. Our faith is constantly challenged by our culture, our politics, religious institutionalization, and our self-serving economy.

But Micah reminds us that still God shepherds us tenderly. God awaits our recognition of God’s graces and call to be among the remnant who do not lose faith.

---

Poetry: Friday – Elizabeth Jennings (1926-2001)
Jennings ranks among the finest British poets of the second half of the twentieth century. She is also England’s best Catholic poet since Gerard Manley Hopkins.

---

We nailed the hands long ago,
Wove the thorns, took up the scourge and shouted
For excitement's sake, we stood at the dusty edge
Of the pebbled path and watched the extreme of pain.

But one or two prayed, one or two
Were silent, shocked, stood back
And remembered remnants of words, a new vision,
The cross is up with its crying victim, the clouds
Cover the sun, we learn a new way to lose
What we did not know we had
Until this bleak and sacrificial day,
Until we turned from our bad
Past and knelt and cried out our dismay,
The dice still clicking, the voices dying away.

---

Music: Arise and Shine – New Wine

Not a pleasing piece of music, but perhaps what Micah would sound like were he preaching today?