OMELIE / Omelie EN

02 lug 2023

02/07/2023 – 13th Sunday in O. T. – year A

02/07/2023 – 13^th Sunday in O. T. – year A

Reading 1 2 KINGS 1. 4, 8-11. 14-16 Psalm 88 Reading 2 l. ROM 6, 3-4. 8-11 Gospel MT 10, 37-42

The story recounted in the first reading is moving. The prophet Elisha is welcomed by a couple of spouses and invited by them to stop for some food every time he is around. Furthermore, the generosity and sensitivity of the wife is still thinking of him, because he is a man of God: she urges the husband to keep a room ready so they can take him in if he passes by! That woman is doing everything for free, happy to serve the prophet of God! And God rewards her, by granting her greatest desire. The prophet himself becomes the voice of the divine thoughts, and he announces to the woman the birth of a son! This beautiful example of generosity comes to mind by listening to Jesus’s words; maybe He Himself knew that when He was teaching the disciples. “Whoever receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever receives a righteous man because he is righteous will receive a righteous man’s reward”.

These are words which help and push to take the men of God seriously, so God Himself, who is coming to us and meets us through these concrete people. These then are words preparing the ground in our heart to welcome Jesus Himself as sent by the Father, as the Messiah, as the Son of God, as the one carrying divinity in His human body. Jesus applies the principle of the reward to His disciples: they who welcome them welcome the one who sent them, so He Himself. So the disciples feels like under God’s protection and the protection of His favour, helped and encouraged in carrying out their tasks. But, they need to be true disciples. How is that done?

Who are Jesus’s true disciples? The Master’s teaching does not pull punches. We would like to soften the blow, explain it in a accommodating way, but He does not avoid using words that might seem at first discouraging: «Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me»!

The most sacred relationships lose any value when we have the Son of God close! Our greatest love usually is for our parents and kids. This love is universally recognised. However, Jesus can be loved as a father, as a mother, as our child, nay, He should be put first, before them. Not everyone understands and accepts he needs to put Jesus first, before the deepest affections. The Christian parents however suffer when in their children’s heart there is no love for Jesus: they realise that in them there is no real deep communion with them either.

Furthermore, Jesus needs to be loved more than life itself. The apostles and the martyrs have understood it, and they have given the example. But we too know that, if we do not make some sacrifice and give up anything for the love of Jesus, and if we do not stand mockery and spite because of Him, our faith gets lost and we become empty, and our life is devoided of its most true meaning and its most beautiful content. Jesus is the treasure in men’s heart. If he is in us, we are mature, generous, available, ready to love, ready to live, open to everything, even to carry some small or big cross. If He is in us we feel and enjoy communion with many others who are sharing the same love. This communion is truly a great joy, partaking in a bliss which fills the heart and the whole life!

In the second reading Saint Paul is talking of life united to Jesus. People who are baptised in Jesus Christ are like dead for this world with its useless things and its false securities. They who are united to Jesus without rejecting His death, live with Him, live for God, live a new life, a life we call eternal because it stems now from the one of the living God. «We too might live in newness of life». They who find Jesus, find their most beautiful and truest life. I say that too, but I also say that I have started understanding it when I started loving Jesus more than my parents and my friends, more than my good reputation, more than wealth and my honor.

I pray the Lord so He may grant you too to begin. Then you not only will understand, but you will enjoy the most beautiful and lasting joys!