Breaking the Word: Remembering To Run The Race

Sunday, March 05, 2023

Remembering To Run The Race

2nd Sunday of Lent (A)

Readings: Genesis 12: 1-4; Psalm 32 (33): 4-5,18-20, 22; 2 Timothy 1: 8-10; Matthew 17:1-9

My dear friends, have you ever noticed how, in marathons and other long-distance road races, water stations are set up all along the route? These provide not just drinks, but sometimes also food. What do you think will happen if, out of the blue, a passerby were to walk up to such a station and start helping himself to the refreshments? Very likely, he’ll gently be told that they are only for those running the race.

This close connection between sustenance provided and a race to be run is central to the Transfiguration. In the gospel, the reason why Jesus leads Peter, James and John up a high mountain is to encourage and energise them. To provide them with the sustenance they need to keep following him. On the mountain, not only are they shown the Lord in his glory, they are also given assurance that Jesus is indeed the fulfilment of God’s promises in the scriptures. Even more, they are given a further unspoken promise that they will share the Lord’s glory, if only they listen to him.

But listen to him say what? To answer this question, we need to consider what happens in the gospel both before and after the Transfiguration. We need to recall that, before going up the mountain, Jesus had led his disciples to a place called Caesarea Philippi, where he asks them, who do you say that I am? (16:15). After which, he reveals to them, for the first time, that he must go to Jerusalem… undergo great suffering… be killed, and on the third day be raised (16:21). He also tells them that those who want to be his followers, must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow him (16:24). Then, after coming down the mountain, Jesus tells them a second time that he is going to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and on the third day he will be raised (17:22-23). So the experiences on the mountain are meant to help the disciples follow Jesus to Calvary.

This close connection between a sustaining promise of glory and a challenging call to discipleship is central not just to the Transfiguration. We find it in the other readings as well. God’s promise to make Abram a great nation is offered to spur him to obey the call to leave home for an undisclosed destination. And the power of God’s grace revealed in Christ is what gives Timothy the strength to answer Paul’s call to join him in bearing hardships for the sake of the Good News.

Just as the water stations in a marathon are for those who run the race, the consolations of the Transfiguration are for those who follow Christ to the Cross. And we experience this close connection not just at extraordinary moments, such as while on retreat, but also ordinarily, every time we gather for the Eucharist. But to appreciate the connection, to enjoy the sustenance, we need to keep following the Lord. Otherwise, how not to feel bored and distracted at Mass?

Sisters and brothers, the water stations are meant for those who run the race. In this season of Lent, what must we do to better enjoy the sustenance the Lord provides us, so as to bravely take up our cross everyday and follow him?

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Breaking News: Ordinary Time

Apart from those seasons having their own distinctive character, thirty-three or thirty-four weeks remain in the yearly cycle that do not celebrate a specific aspect of the mystery of Christ. Rather, especially on the Sundays, they are devoted to the mystery of Christ in all its aspects. This period is known as Ordinary Time. Ordinary Time begins on Monday after the Sunday following 6 January and continues until Tuesday before Ash Wednesday inclusive. It begins again on Monday after Pentecost and ends before Evening Prayer I of the First Sunday of Advent. This is also the reason for the series of liturgical texts found in both the Roman Missal and The Liturgy of the Hours (Vol. III - IV), for Sundays and weekdays in this season. ~ General Norms for the Liturgical Year & Calendar, 43-44

From 36th Jesuit General Congregation

It is our union with one another in Christ that testifies to the Good News more powerfully than our competences and abilities.... In our individualistic and competitive age, we should remember that the community plays a very special role since it is a privileged place of apostolic discernment.... The Jesuit community is a concrete space in which we live as friends in the Lord. This life together is always at the service of mission, but because these fraternal bonds proclaim the Gospel, it is itself a mission. –Companions in a Mission of Reconciliation and Justice (CMRJ), nn. 7-9.

With the poor, we can learn what hope and courage mean.... In our communities and apostolates, we hear the call to rediscover hospitality to strangers, to the young, to the poor, and to those who are persecuted. Christ himself teaches us this hospitality. –CMRJ, nn. 15-16.

At the heart of Ignatian spirituality is the transforming encounter with the mercy of God in Christ that moves us to a generous personal response. The experience of the merciful gaze of God on our weakness and sinfulness humbles us and fills us with gratitude, helping us to become compassionate ministers to all.... For us Jesuits, compassion is action, an action discerned together. Yet we know that there is no authentic familiarity with God if we do not allow ourselves to be moved to compassion and action by an encounter with the Christ who is revealed in the suffering, vulnerable faces of people, indeed in the suffering of creation. –CMRJ, nn. 19-20.

(T)he Society must respond more decisively to the Church’s call for a new evangelization, giving special emphasis to ministry to and with the young and with families.... A special gift Jesuits and the Ignatian family have to offer to the Church and her mission of evangelization is Ignatian spirituality, which facilitates the experience of God and can therefore greatly help the process of personal and communal conversion. –CMRJ, nn. 22-23.

In many societies, there is an increased level of conflict and polarization, which often gives rise to violence that is all the more appalling because it is motivated and justified by distorted religious convictions. In such situations, Jesuits, along with all who seek the common good, are called to contribute from their religious-spiritual traditions towards the building of peace, on local and global levels. –CMRJ, n. 28.

Pope Francis has emphasized the fundamental connection between the environmental crisis and the social crisis in which we live today. Poverty, social exclusion, and marginalization are linked with environmental degradation. These are not separate crises but one crisis that is a symptom of something much deeper: the flawed way societies and economies are organised. The current economic system with its predatory orientation discards natural resources as well as people. For this reason, Pope Francis insists that the only adequate solution must be a radical one. The direction of development must be altered if it is to be sustainable. We Jesuits are called to help heal a broken world, promoting a new way of producing and consuming, which puts God’s creation at the center.... The multifaceted challenge of caring for our common home calls for a multifaceted response from the Society. We begin by changing our personal and community lifestyles, adopting behaviour coherent with our desire for reconciliation with creation. – CMRJ, nn. 29-30

From 35th Jesuit General Congregation

From General Congregation 35

By sending us to 'those physical and spiritual places which others do not or have difficulty reaching,' the Pope entrusts to us the task to 'build bridges of understanding and dialogue,' according to the best tradition of the Society, in the diversity of its ministries.
- Decree With Renewed Fervor and Dynamism, n. 6

To be missioned to this work 'at the New Frontiers of our times' always requires that one also be rooted at the very heart of the Church. This tension, specific to the Ignatian charism, opens the way to true creative fidelity.
- Decree With Renewed Fervor and Dynamism, n. 13

In every mission that we carry out, we seek only to be where (Christ) sends us. The grace we receive as Jesuits is to be and to go with him, looking on the world with his eyes, loving it with his heart and entering into its depths with his unending compassion.
- Decree on Identity, n. 15

For ultimately, there is no reality that is only profane for those who know how to look. We must communicate this look and provide a pedagogy inspired by the Spiritual Exercises, that carries people - especially the young - into it.
- Decree on Identity, n. 10

Our ministries of proclamation of the Word and the celebration of the Life of Christ in the sacraments continue to be fundamental for our mission and our lives together as Jesuits.
- Decree on Mission, n. 19

The complexity of the problems we face and the richness of the opportunities offered demand that we engage in building bridges between rich and poor and establishing advocacy links of mutual support between those who hold political power and those who find it difficult to voice their interests. Our intellectual apostolate provides an inestimable help in setting up these bridges, offering us new ways of understanding in depth the mechanism and links among our present problems.
- Decree on Mission, n. 28

Jesuit community is not just for mission, it is itself mission.
- Decree on Mission, n. 41

In this global context it is important to highlight the extraordinary potential represented by our character as an international and multicultural body. Acting consistently with this character can not only enhance the apostolic effectiveness of our work but in a fragmented and divided world it can witness to the reconciliation in solidarity of all the children of God.
- Decree on Mission, n. 43

Faith in Jesus Christ teaches us that self-realization comes from self-giving and that freedom is not so much the power to choose as the power to order our choices toward love. At the same time, love for Jesus Christ and the desire to follow him call us to trusting commitment. Commitment to the Word Incarnate cannot be separated from commitment to the concrete manifestations of the Word that are at the center of our lives, the Church and the Society which exists to serve the Church.
- Decree on Obedience, n. 19

Sunday, March 05, 2023

Remembering To Run The Race

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