Therefore, stay awake, for you know neither the day nor the hour.

 

Feast of St. Monica

The scripture readings for today's reflection can be found at Memorial of Saint Monica | USCCB

We hear in our gospel today the familiar parable of the 10 virgins, 5 wise, and 5 foolish. With this parable, Jesus is helping us to see how we are to live out our lives in anticipation to our eventual meeting the Lord, whether it’s at the end of time with His 2^nd coming, or with our own eventual meeting God at the end of our own lives. We can ask ourselves: do we live our lives in a way that’s pleasing to God? Are we prepared to meet Him when the time comes? Or do we live out our lives like the unwise virgins, living our lives with no concern for our eventual destiny: entering heaven?

The lamps in today’s gospel can symbolize our hearts and spirit, which we need to have trimmed and ready for God, by living a life worthy of a follower of Christ. By keeping the commandment of love of God and love of neighbor, our “lamps” will be “trimmed and ready” when God calls us to meet the Bridegroom, Jesus Christ.

By not following God’s commandments and being focused only on our selfish needs, we will not be ready to answer God’s call and run the risk of having our Lord say, “Amen, I say to you, I do not know you.”

Today we celebrate the feast of St. Monica, mother of St. Augustine, who could be considered one of the “wise virgins”. She spent her life doing God’s will in praying for the conversion of her son, Augustine. St. Augustine (who’s feast we celebrate tomorrow) would, due to her prayers, come to faith in Jesus Christ, Augustine would become not only a Christian, but a bishop and doctor of the church.  This is how she “trimmed her lamp”: by constant prayer for Augustine to become a Christian and receive salvation in his faith in Jesus Christ. Once God answered her prayers and Augustine was a Christian, she became sick and was close to death. In the Confessions of St. Augustine, he quotes his mother as saying, as she was close to her death, “I do not know why I am here still here, since I have no further hopes in this world. I did have one reason for wanting to live a little longer: to see you become a Catholic Christian before I died.” God answered her prayers, and she was ready to answer the call of the bridegroom when the Lord called her. Her lamp was trimmed, and she was able to enter into that heavenly banquet when God called her.

Let us imitate St. Monica by constantly praying for those in our family who need our prayers to come to know that they are in need of God’s love and forgiveness. Then we ourselves will in turn be ready for the Bridegroom when He calls us to the heavenly banquet.

The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments

 

The scripture readings for today's reflection can be found at Memorial of Saint Bernard, Abbot and Doctor of the Church | USCCB

In our gospel for today we have Jesus’ teaching on what it means to be obedient to the commandments of God. He took the 10 commandments and broke them down to two simple statements: “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” “The second is like it: you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” It sounds simple enough, doesn’t it? But is it really?

Loving God with all our heart, soul, and mind, means that we need to be able to have God as the center of who we are. We are not to have anyone or anything else more important to us than God. All our actions and decisions are to be made with God in mind. In other words, all our decisions are to be made in such a way that they are not against any of God’s laws and commands. Further all our possessions are a gift from God, so we need to make sure we are not making them to be more important to us than our love for God. Jesus is simply saying we are not to have other idols, or false gods, in our lives that we would make more important than our love for God.

The 2^nd commandment that Jesus points out is equally as challenging: we are to love our neighbors as we love ourselves! There’s a hymn that I’m sure you may be familiar with, which says in the verse, “They will know that we are Christians by our love.” All throughout the gospels, our Lord points out who are neighbors are. With the parable about the Good Samaritan and the parable of the Last Judgement Day, our Lord points out that all those people that we come into contact within our day to day lives are our neighbors. Whether we like them or not, they are made in the image of God. By helping and loving other people, we in turn are helping and loving God. Our neighbors are not only those people that are in our families or live next door to us, but our neighbors are also those people that we come into contact within our day-to-day existence. It’s not always easy loving the people we meet each day, but that is what Jesus is calling us to do. We are to be kind and loving to all people, even with those that are most unlovable. St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta once said, “The greatest science in the world; in heaven and on earth; is love.”

As we start each day with prayer and love towards God, let us ask Him for the gift of wisdom to love all those people that we meet in our lives, whether we want to or not. Let us pray for them and their intentions that they, too, will receive blessings from our loving Creator. And let us pray for ourselves that we may become more Christ-like in our encounters with the people in our lives that are not to our liking.

They are no longer two, but one flesh

 

Scripture readings for today's reflection can be found at Friday of the Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time | USCCB

Our Lord is teaching us today the importance of the vocation of marriage and that God should be in the center of each marriage. Jesus is reminding us that, “…a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” Our Lord is reminding us to enter into marriage carefully and with love and to keep God as the center of the marital relationship. Jesus, knowing the challenges of human relations, tells us that marriage is a spiritual bond that should not be rushed into. It’s not like some sort of “business deal” where if things get tough, you just dissolve the relationship and move on. Rather, each spouse, with their love for each other, are to help each other grow ever closer to God. The vows are very clear: in good times, and in bad times, in sickness and in health, till death do us part. Further, they are to teach any children that come from this relationship, of the love that God has for them. It is the parents’ responsibility to bring the children up in the practice of their Christian faith. Is it easy? No! Is it worthwhile? Yes, it is!

The Pharisees in today’s gospel were looking at marriage not so much a relationship that should reflect God’s love, but simply as something that can be dissolved if things don’t work out. They were looking at it from the perspective of “law” as apposed to a relationship between a man and woman with God in the center. They seemed to be insensitive to the fact that there is more to marriage than just a contract. Marriage is the reflection of God’s love for us.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches us, “The matrimonial covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life, is by its nature ordered toward the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring.”

Jesus further teaches in today’s gospel that, as important as marriage is, not everyone is called to be married. He goes on to say of marriage, “Some are incapable of marriage because they were born so; some, because they were made so by others; some, because they have renounced marriage for the sake of the Kingdom of heaven.” What our Lord is teaching is that not everyone is meant to be married. Some are called to the single life, some to religious life or some to the priesthood. All vocational callings are from God and should not be taken lightly.

Let us pray for all married couples that in whatever struggles they are facing in their relationship, that they may keep God as the center of who they are as married people and show that mutual love and respect to each other so they can reflect that love of God to those in their life and to the world.

This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.

 

The scripture readings for today's reflection can be found at Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord | USCCB

On this feast of the Transfiguration, we hear of the beautiful account of our Lord taking Peter, James, and John up a high mountain. Then they experience something they never expected: Jesus in His glorified appearance. His clothes became dazzling white, such as no fuller could bleach them. This was the divinity of Jesus becoming evident to the apostles. Then out of nowhere appearing with Jesus was Moses and Elijah. No wonder Peter, James and John were so terrified.

I often wonder what Moses, Elijah and Jesus had to say to each other during their exchange on the mountain. Since Jesus was the complete fulfillment of the Old Testament Laws and prophecies, with Moses as the one who received the law from God, and Elijah the prophet who was called to bring people back to the true worship of God, I think they were probably talking about the eventual suffering and death of Jesus on the Cross in fulfillment of these Old Testament prophecies. And Peter, James and John were witnesses of this conversation in order to help them in their ministry once Jesus was crucified, rose from the dead on Easter Sunday and then ascended into heaven.

In the 2^nd letter of Peter, we hear Peter talk about that time on the Holy Mountain, indicating that they had been eyewitnesses of His Majesty. And Peter recalls the words that God the Father said to them of Jesus, “This is my Son, my beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” Further, in the gospel, we hear the Father say of Jesus, “Listen to him.”

The apostles would go into the whole world proclaiming Jesus Christ as savior, and we are Christians as a result of their sharing the good news of Jesus Christ. We, as followers of Jesus Christ, are, like the apostles, reminded by God to listen to God’s beloved Son. We are to be open to all that Jesus teaches us through Holy Scripture and through His Holy Church. By being open to the teachings of Jesus as taught through the Catholic Church, we are then being obedient to God and His command to listen to Him.

Then, once we embrace fully the teachings of God as understood in the Catholic Church, we too are called to bring this Good News to a world that is in so much need of the love and peace of God. We do this by how we live our lives: by loving God and loving our neighbor as our selves.