OMELIE / Omelie EN

26/6/2016

21/08/2016 - 21 st Sunday of O. T - C

21/08/2016 - 21 ^st Sunday of O. T - C

1^st reading Is 66,18-21 * from Psalm 116 * 2^nd reading Heb 12,5-7.11-13 * Gospel Luke 13,22-30

Isaiah, a true prophet of God, put into ruins all the old securities. The people of Israel retained that he is the only people who is loved by God, as different from all the other peoples, which were considered to be lost for ever. Today he proclaims that this people is loved in a particular way yes, but because it must be of service, because it has the responsibility towards them: to announce the glory of God to them, it must say to all the world that God is always love, for all the peoples. Besides, the priests and the Levites thought that they were the only ones, descendants of Levis and Aron, the only ones who were authorized to serve God, offering sacrifices in the temple and consecrating their belongings; they believed that they were the only ones who could represent God for all the other tribes. But today the prophet announces that the love and the power of God do not have limits and he will choose “priests Levites” among all the children of Israel. We cannot impose to God our limits, those of our strength and of our ability to understand, which is always conditioned by our egoism and ambition. We need correction, always. We too have our own securities with which we confront ourselves with other peoples and religions. It is true that they do not have Jesus, they do not know Jesus as the son of God and thus they lack the way and the truth, but we do not posses this to be proud of. If we know Jesus, the truth and life, it is a bid gift, but it is also a responsibility: it is our duty to announce him, to make him known, to give him to others; if we do not do this, we will lack love towards that God whom we know and our life will become a lie.

The letter to the Hebrews reminds us that we need correction. We need correction, correcting the way to see and to understand our life and our relations with the others. For example, are we able to introduce Jesus in our relations with the others? do we think that we can make a good impression in front of the world with our behaviour? Am I aware that when all the things that I have must resonate positively and help the brothers in their own faith? Do I understand that when I try to love, my love is limited and must be completed and corrected by the wisdom fo the Father? For this I must wish and ask for his creativeness? Thus may make me suffer, and it hurts me when I try to correct a behavior or a mode of thinking and reasoning. It hurts us when we are corrected because we are proud, but when a correction happens we fins ourselves more rich. Our interior life will be more secure and stable, oriented with decision to will to know and to do the will of God, which are always full of love for our life.

Jesus too had to correct the ways of thinking for those people who he encountered. We have heard about that man who asked “if those who are going to be saved are few”. Jesus must have received this question as a slap in the face. Directing this question to him must have have appeared as if he was saying: “ It is true that your passion and your death is useless as is your obedience to the Father?”, And I would have said: “You what do you do so that the others are saved from their perdition? Do you limit yourself to say only useless words? do you continue to live your material interests and frugal ones? Your life like this does not serve for the salvation of no one, neither to that of yours”. Jesus was too good. He replied: “ Try to enter from the strict door”. And we understand: one does not proceed and advance in the way to holiness without sacrifices. This efforts must be yours too and not letting it be only the responsibility to others. There is the risk that those who have received with abundancy the announcement of the Word of God and have participated in the gifts of the sacraments, will be cast away if they will not work on their salvation. Yes, if we limit ourselves to think that for them it is enough the work of their own parents or their attending a Mass when they were young, or because they have someone in their family who is a priest or a nun or because they have made the sign of the cross, even if they have worked hared to accumulate riches, will be cast away. Those who will enter the kingdom of God will be those who have “came from the eat and the west, from the south and north”, those who have not had a history of Christianity, who maybe are not man of education, but they love Jesus! The words of the Lord Jesus today are very serious: he pronounced them to wake us up.