February 13th 2022.  Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time

GOSPEL   Luke 6:17, 20-26

Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

 

Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading . . .

 

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GOSPEL   Luke 6:17, 20-26

Jesus came down with the twelve and stood on a stretch of level ground
with a great crowd of his disciples and a large number of the people
from all Judea and Jerusalem and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon.
And raising his eyes toward his disciples he said:
“Blessed are you who are poor, for the kingdom of God is yours.
Blessed are you who are now hungry, for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who are now weeping, for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude and insult you,
and denounce your name as evil on account of the Son of Man.
Rejoice and leap for joy on that day! Behold, your reward will be great in heaven.
For their ancestors treated the prophets in the same way.
But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.
Woe to you who are filled now, for you will be hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now, for you will grieve and weep.
Woe to you when all speak well of you, for their ancestors treated the false prophets in this way.”

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

 

SUMMARY OF HOMILY

1. Our culture centres itself on the “flesh” - on our own capacities, our own intelligence. Our hearts are distant from God.

The first reading from Jeremiah prepares us for the Gospel reading, which contains the contraposition of beatitudes and woes from St Luke’s account.  The Lord says to Jeremiah, ‘A curse on the man who puts his trust in man, who relies on things of flesh, whose heart turns from the Lord. He is like dry scrub in the wastelands: if good comes, he has no eyes for it’. This curse is not something that is inflicted by God upon humanity. Rather, it is an expression of divine wisdom: it points to what will inevitably happen if man puts his trust in “the flesh” (his own capacities, his own intelligence, distancing his heart from the Lord). The reference to the isolated “scrub” in the wasteland is relevant for the actual culture in which we live, in which man lives a life centred on himself, and does not recognize the good when it appears. This oracle from Jeremiah prepares us to read the beatitudes from Luke.

 

2. We tend to lose sight of salvation and grace whenever we are satisfied, rich and well-fed. Those who are suffering are more open to the visit of God’s grace.

In the first three beatitudes, Jesus speaks of the present moment: “Blessed are you who are poor, for the kingdom of God is yours. Blessed are you who are now hungry, for you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who are now weeping, for you will laugh.” This is contrasted with the woes: “But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are filled now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you will grieve and weep.” Why is there such an emphasis on now, the present moment? Because Jesus is with them but they do not recognize “the good that has come”, as the first reading said. The Lord is among them, the Messiah has come, but the only people who see him are the poor, the hungry, those who mourn, those who are persecuted. It is a fact of the human condition that whenever we are rich, satisfied or contented, we lose sight of grace, light and salvation. A life directed to the satisfaction of appetites and entertainment is a life of the fool. Often, it is our tears, our poverty and our hunger that turn us towards authentic salvation. Our happiness – when based on ourselves - is of short duration and deceptive. It is all about now and has no future. It is worthless vainglory. We mustn’t live for a satisfaction that is never enough, stupefied by entertainment.

 

3. Our sufferings and insufficiencies are the avenues by which God enters our lives.

In a society that is fixated by gratification, it is only the suffering who are open to the visit of the Lord. The Sunday liturgy opens the week for us, and this week it encourages us to open our eyes to the goodness that the Lord sends our way. The blessing of the Lord does not come for the rich but for the poor, does not manifest itself for the satisfied but for the hungry, is not felt by those who are stupefied by entertainment but by those who shed tears in grief. The Lord enriches us, feeds us and consoles us by means of our very insufficiencies. This Gospel is not asking us to go out and seek poverty, distress or persecution. The fact is that all of us are already insufficient in multifarious ways. These insufficiencies are the portal of entry for the work of God in us.

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ALTERNATIVE HOMILY

In Sunday’s Gospel Jesus proclaims the Beatitudes. Why does Jesus say that the poor, the bereaved, the hungry and the persecuted are blessed, whilst the rich, the satisfied, the contented and those who are much-admired are not blessed? When we are rich, satisfied and admired by others, we tend to consider ourselves self-sufficient. We are distracted by our success and do not turn to the Lord. But the poor, the bereaved and the persecuted turn readily to the Lord and acknowledge their need of salvation. When we are successful, we tend to be less aware of our own mediocrity. In the Magnificat, Mary expresses the same sentiments – like mother, like son! Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit she sees that the rich and powerful do not turn to their merciful Father in heaven. In the spiritual life, our misery is actually our strength. It is the avenue by which our Redeemer can enter and save us. Here we are confronted by a radical inversion of the usual order of things by the Gospel. The happiness that derives from Christ is not available to the one who has his stomach full. The salvation that Jesus brings is not for the healthy, the well-off, the rich. The one who is satisfied, entertained, and compensated tends not to be aware of his desperate need for God. One of the psalms has the following sobering words: “Man in his prosperity has no comprehension; like the animals he perishes”. Preaching to the rich and powerful is often a waste of time. We must be humbly aware of our misery before we can embrace salvation.