1st
Reading: First Book of Kings 17:10-16
The widow of Zarephat
shares the last of her food with Elijah
So he set out and went
to Zarephath. When he came to the gate of the town a widow was there gathering sticks;
he called to her and said, "Bring me a little water in a vessel, so that I
may drink." As he was going to bring it, he called to her and said,
"Bring me a morsel of bread in your hand." But she said, "As the
Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of meal in a jar, and
a little oil in a jug; I am now gathering a couple of sticks, so that I may go
home and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it, and die."
Elijah said to her,
"Do not be afraid; go and do as you have said; but first make me a little
cake of it and bring it to me, and afterwards make something for yourself and
your son. For thus says the Lord the God of Israel: The jar of meal will not be
emptied and the jug of oil will not fail until the day that the Lord sends rain
on the earth."
She went and did as
Elijah said, so that she as well as he and her household ate for many days. The
jar of meal was not emptied, neither did the jug of oil ail, according to the
word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah.
2nd
Reading : Epistle to the Hebrews
Christ our High priest
opened for us the door of salvation
For Christ did not
enter the sanctuary made by human hands, a mere copy of the true one, but he
entered into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.
Nor was it to offer himself again and again, as the high priest enters the Holy
place year after year with blood that is not his own; for then he would have
had to suffer again and again since the foundation of the world. But as it is,
he has appeared once for all at the end of the age to remove sin by the
sacrifice of himself. And just as it is appointed for mortals to die once , and
after that the judgment , so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins
of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who
are eagerly waiting for him.
Gospel:
Mark 12:38-44
The offering of the
widow had great value in God's sight
As he taught, he said,
" Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and to
greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the
synagogues and places of honor at banquets! They devour widows' houses and for the
sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater
condemnation."He sat down opposite the treasury, and watched the crowd
putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor
widow came and put in two small copper coins, which are worth a penny. Then he
called his disciples and said to them, "Truly I tell you, this poor widow
has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of
them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out o her poverty has put
in everything she had, all she had to live on."
REFLECTIONS
AND MEDITATIONS ON THE READINGS
Bishop Desmond Tutu of
South Africa is very fond of this joke: " When the missionaries came to
Africa, we had the land and they had the Bible. They then said, ' Let us
pray...' and asked us to close our eyes. By the time the prayer was over, they
now had the land and we had the Bible." And he usually ends the joke by
adding, "And I think we got the better deal." In this joke we have a
substantiation of Karl Marx's criticism of the Christianity of his day as the
" opium of the people,"- that which puts people to sleep while the
ground under their feet is taken away from them.
In today's gospel Jesus
warns his followers against religious leaders who propagate this kind of
anaesthetic religiosity. "Beware of the scribes , who ...... devour
widows' houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will
receive the greater condemnation" ( Mark12:38-40). In the second half of
the gospel reading, the story of the widow's Mite we see a tragic example of
the product of this kind of religiosity. Jesus commends the victim but condemns
the victimizer.
The
end of religion must be for man's well being, not for man's exploitation.
Traditionally we have
read widow's Mite story as the story about boundless generosity and
self-sacrifice. However, we should first read it in the context in which Mark
wrote it, as a tragic evidence of the religious exploitation for which Jesus
condemned the temple religious establishment. Before reading the story as model
to encourage generosity to organized religion we need to read it first as a
condemnation of the use of religion to exploit simple, suffering and powerless
humanity. Jesus is teaching in the temple. He has just condemned the
unscrupulous scribes who devour widow's property under pretext of religious
fervor. Then he looks up sees this widow putting "everything she had, her
whole living" into treasury and he points to her and says, " See what
I mean?" The scribes never literally robbed widow's houses. But by their
teaching they exploited widows by persuading them in their privation to give up
even the very little they had. In this context, what about our religious
leaders and political leaders in our respective countries, how do they deal
with the marginalized, poor people and other vulnerable of the society?
Today's scripture tells
of a poor widow who showed practical compassion by sharing her last crust with
the prophet Elijah. Was she practicing the faith? Indeed because she did what
Jesus expects of us. I was hungry and you...... If you give a cup
of water in my name... then that other poor woman in the temple, who
quietly put in her last savings so that God would be properly worshipped, was she practicing
the faith, through a work of mercy? Yes, she followed generous impulse of her heart. Whoever gives
whole-heatedly of himself/herself to a worthy cause is following the example
of Jesus, whether they are aware of it or not. They have the blessing and are
promised their reward.
The
cheerful Giver
Gifts from ordinary
people support many projects and causes in Catholic Church, just as they kept
the Jerusalem temple going in Jesus' day. It may seem strange, but at the same
time common truth, that generosity is more widespread among those who seem to
have little in terms of money and properties. The story from the gospel reading
invites to examine the quality of giving in our lives- this does not only
pertain to church's collections, but to whatever worthy cause attracts our
attention and our sympathy. More than once Jesus spoke about this subject. Our
generosity should entail anonymity, non-fussy way, so that "the left hand
does not know what the right hand is doing." An act of generosity should
be done because it pleases God rather than winning credit or praise from
others.
The real act of generosity should possess the following qualities:
giving up some of our time, giving up our comfort, giving up some of our time
for something worthwhile.
We are all invited not
only to sharpen our skill for making money, we must also develop, above all,
our talent for giving it especially to the needy and the poor one. Ken Wilson
called this spiritual talent of giving money as "Generosity Gift."
How do we give? one
writer once commented on giving, he said three important things on generosity:
1. Give without blowing
your trumpet.
2.Give willingly or not
begrudgingly or under compulsion.
3.Mother Theresa'
advice was to " give until it hurts."
There is the story of a
man called Leo Tolstoy who happened to meet a beggar. Tolstoy searched in his
pockets to look for something he could give. However, there was none. He had
earlier given away all his money. In his pity, he reached out , took the beggar
in his arms, embraced him, kissed him on his hollow checks and said: "
Don't be angry with me, my brother, I have nothing to give." immediately,
the beggar's lit up. Tears flowed from his eyes, as he said: But you embraced
me and kissed me. You called me your brother- You have given me yourself- that
is a great gift."
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