Two persons were compared by Our dear Lord Jesus Christ in today’s Gospel. Jesus declared the second one to be pleasing to God. And that is the prayer of the tax collector who simply said “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” This shows lots of humility which pleases God so much. There is nothing like speaking the truth about oneself to the One who is everything and more. The first one’s prayer belonged to the Pharisee who prayed more about his virtues and good deeds before the One who is Good. He refrained from praying the lines about one’s insufficiency.
Today we are presented by our Mother the Church the following scene in the Gospel. He is brought a blind man they beg him to cure. He removes him from the village they are in. Jesus puts spittle on his eyes and asks him how he is with his sight. He replies that he saw people but they were like trees moving about. So Jesus proceeds to put in hand on him again and only then could the man see clearly. To carry out God’s purpose for us He proceeds step by step. At time he does things quickly with one step like the majority of his miracles. But he could also as he did with this blind person. First, one step, then came the final step. So let us appreciate also this way of God acting on us in our prayer where we may see nothing, then another prayer period we see some more and so on and so forth. Only in Heaven will we see very clearly God face to face.
Jesus asks this question of his disciples who were worrying themselves about forgetting to bring bread with them on their trip by boat. The Gospel tells us they brought only one loaf. That loaf referred to the living bread from Heaven, i.e., Jesus himself. Being aware of that still made them worry about not bring bread. Our Lord asked them what they witnessed recently of how He multiplied the loaves of bread for the crowds. They should not worry about lack of provisions. Our Lord would be enough. Let us be more perceptive of the things of God, that we be more sensitive to the motions of the Holy Spirit in our souls. This we ask from the Holy Spirit.
Today we greet each other Happy Valentine’s Day. Flowers and roses are sent to our beloved women in our lives. Today we also celebrate important historical anniversaries in Opus Dei, a personal prelature of the Catholic Church, namely, the anniversary of the start of the apostolate of Opus Dei with women and the anniversary of the foundation of the Priestly Society of the Holy Cross. Both these landmark dates point to the persevering prayer of the Founder, St. Josemaria Escriva, who initially did not think women could form part of Opus Dei and who could not find the solution of having priests ordained to serve in Opus Dei. On February 14 in their respective years, God nudged St. Josemaria forward to include women in the Prelature’s apostolate and to found the Priestly Society of the Holy Cross that will be intrinsically joined to the Prelature by which priest could be ordained with the Prelature as title of ordination.
All these should help us check our hearts’ content. The contemplation of the Finding of the Child Jesus in the Temple will aid us in appreciating the pure heart of Mary and Joseph as they experienced those anxious moments.
Today we read about the version of St. Luke of the Beatitudes. We are more familiar perhaps with the version of St. Matthew. Anyhow, we read about them in today’s Gospel. Let us remember that the Greek term makarios usually translated to Blessed can be translated as Happy or Lucky. So we can keep this in mind when we read these Beatitudes. These are the features of those of follow Christ. Here in this imperfect world we may suffer and be miserable but God assures us of his loyalty to us for He will reward us afterwards.
Today Our Lord and his disciples met the challenge of feeding about four thousand people who had gone with him for three days. He was concerned that if he asked them to go home they might faint on the way. So he asked his disciples what they had: some loaves of bread and fish. He asked for them. This is a good example for us all when we meet any challenge. We have to check what we really have instead of whining about what we do not have. Then, Our dear Lord gave thanks. Gratitude for what we have is the call of the moment. Then he asked his disciples to distribute them. We need to imitate this scene. Our Lord will supply what we lack but we need to give all we have!
Today we are presented by the Gospel in mass a scene of Jesus on his way to the Decapolis. He is presented a deaf mute. They ask him to cure him. He draws him aside and puts his finger into his ears and touches his tongue with spittle. This is amazing! Then He uttered, “Be opened”. He was cured. He began to speak and hear. We also need this miracle so that we can speak when we are supposed to in order to correct somebody, encourage someone or enthuse somebody. We need to learn to do this instead of saying bad words, curse, or utter words that puts down our neighbor. We need the miracle to get us to hear what we are supposed to hear, i.e., God’s Will, instead of listening to so many useless words, gossips, hatreds, envies, etc. But this can only happen if we have contact with Jesus. This is possible only when we spend time in prayer.
This time we find Jesus in a repartee with a Syrophoenician woman who was begging him to cure her daughter of an unclean spirit. Although Jesus begins apparently rebuffing her reaffirming his main purpose on earth was to save the chosen people of God. She did not make much of this. She just insisted in playing along in repartee with Jesus who was won over by her intelligent and creative replies. Our Lord granted her request and her daughter was healed. He appreciated women and was open and frank with them. He respected them for their obvious talents as women and encouraged them to the utmost of their potential.
Man realizes he is not a god. He is a creature beset by limitations and weaknesses. Therefore, he has this concern about what happens to him when he passes this life. The Jews were sticklers for cleansing themselves although they underscored the externals only. I suppose that was not so in the beginning but more and more these cleansings were limited to superficial manifestations that Our dear Lord expressed disapproval of their so called piety because they honored the Lord only with their lips but their hearts were far away. The Lord in today’s Gospel tells us the real culprit for our dirtiness. That is sin.
The Lord today in the Gospel of the mass today makes us think about this matter. He called the attention of the scribes and Pharisees because they expertly make up policies on practices and make them traditions for the ordinary Jew to follow. They finagle things things so that theses practices supersede the laws of God. This is another manifestation of man acting like gods, obviously a desire our first parents had to distrust Him and disobey his commandment not to eat the forbidden fruit. We should beware of this tendency we may have. We need to change how we set up these traditions and practices, i.e., they should only hold sway in our lives only when they follow the Will of God.