To watch Fr. Joe’s homily for the 6th Sunday in Ordinary Time: CLICK HERE!
Recently the comic strip, For Better or Worse, shared an episode of 13 year old Michael complaining to his mother, “Mom there is nothing to wear!”
“Michael,” his mother counters, “you won’t go shopping with me, and the last time I gave you money to buy you own clothes, you did not buy anything!”
A few moments later, Michael who is staring out the window, whines, “There is nothing to do.”
His mother reminds him, “Brian ask you to go swimming, your dad asked you if you wanted to go to town with him — and you turned them both down.”
Then with Michael plopped in front of the TV and the sound turned down. Michael gripes, “There is nothing to watch.”
And mom says pointedly, “there are plenty of channels to choose from and you have video games to play.”
Then in the next panel, Dad comes home from his errands to find Michael sitting in a chair with a forlorn expression on his face. “What is with Michael,” dad asks.
Mom deadpans: “There is nothing to complain about.”
Today’s Gospel is about attitude and perspective. Michael’s pessimism is his own making and his wise mother calls on it.
But on a deeper and more serious level, Jesus in our Gospel today asks us not to consider our failings and sins, the acts themselves, but the self-centeredness at the heart of our actions.
Says Sirach in our first reading today, ” If you choose, you can keep the Commandments.”
And let me warn you, spoiler alert:
- If we choose as a person, family, community, nation… we can be reconciled with God and with one another.
- If we choose, we can be kind, forgiving, helpful, cooperative, supportive.
- If we choose, we can keep the Commandments and live the Great Commandment and live the Corporal & Spiritual Works of Mercy.
- If we chose, we can grow in faith, hope and love, and accept God’s grace to bring a bit of the Kingdom of God here on Earth, as it in Heaven.
This week, where will we choose, as person, family and parish the ways of God, at home, at work, in the community, in all those daily interactions that come our way again and again and again so we can really live…