August 22, 2010 Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time

[이 안드레아]

2010년 8월 22일 연중 제21주일

제1독서

이사야서. 66,18-21
주님께서 이렇게 말씀하신다. 18 “나는 모든 민족들과 언어가 다른 모든 사람들을 모으러 오리니, 그들이 와서 나의 영광을 보리라.
19 나는 그들 가운데에 표징을 세우고, 그들 가운데 살아남은 자들을 타르시스와 풋, 활 잘 쏘는 루드, 투발과 야완 등 뭇 민족들에게 보내고, 나에 대하여 아무것도 듣지 못하고 내 영광을 본 적도 없는 먼 섬들에 보내리니, 그들은 민족들에게 나의 영광을 알리리라.
20 마치 이스라엘 자손들이 깨끗한 그릇에 제물을 담아 주님의 집으로 가져오듯이, 그들도 모든 민족들에게서 너희 동포들을 주님에게 올리는 제물로 말과 수레와 마차와 노새와 낙타에 태워, 나의 거룩한 산 예루살렘으로 데려오리라. ─ 주님께서 말씀하신다. ─
21 그러면 나는 그들 가운데에서 더러는 사제로, 더러는 레위인으로 삼으리라. ─ 주님께서 말씀하신다. ─”

제2독서

히브리서 12,5-7.11-13
형제 여러분, 5 여러분은 하느님께서 여러분을 자녀로 대하시면서 내리시는 권고를 잊어버렸습니다. “내 아들아, 주님의 훈육을 하찮게 여기지 말고, 그분께 책망을 받아도 낙심하지 마라. 6 주님께서는 사랑하시는 이를 훈육하시고, 아들로 인정하시는 모든 이를 채찍질하신다.”
7 여러분의 시련을 훈육으로 여겨 견디어 내십시오. 하느님께서는 여러분을 자녀로 대하십니다. 아버지에게서 훈육을 받지 않는 아들이 어디 있습니까?
11 모든 훈육이 당장은 기쁨이 아니라 슬픔으로 여겨집니다. 그러나 나중에는 그것으로 훈련된 이들에게 평화와 의로움의 열매를 가져다줍니다.
12 그러므로 맥 풀린 손과 힘 빠진 무릎을 바로 세워, 13 바른길을 달려가십시오. 그리하여 절름거리는 다리가 접질리지 않고 오히려 낫게 하십시오.

복음
루카 13,22-30
그때에 22 예수님께서는 예루살렘으로 여행을 하시는 동안, 여러 고을과 마을을 지나며 가르치셨다.
23 그런데 어떤 사람이 예수님께 “주님, 구원받을 사람은 적습니까?” 하고 물었다.
예수님께서 그들에게 이르셨다. 24 “너희는 좁은 문으로 들어가도록 힘써라. 내가 너희에게 말한다. 많은 사람이 그곳으로 들어가려고 하겠지만, 들어가지 못할 것이다.
25 집주인이 일어나 문을 닫아 버리면, 너희가 밖에 서서 ‘주님, 문을 열어 주십시오.’ 하며 문을 두드리기 시작하여도, 그는 ‘너희가 어디에서 온 사람들인지 나는 모른다.’ 하고 대답할 것이다.
26 그러면 너희는 이렇게 말하기 시작할 것이다. ‘저희는 주님 앞에서 먹고 마셨고, 주님께서는 저희가 사는 길거리에서 가르치셨습니다.’ 27 그러나 집주인은 ‘너희가 어디에서 온 사람들인지 나는 모른다. 모두 내게서 물러가라, 불의를 일삼는 자들아!’ 하고 너희에게 말할 것이다.
28 너희는 아브라함과 이사악과 야곱과 모든 예언자가 하느님의 나라 안에 있는데 너희만 밖으로 쫓겨나 있는 것을 보게 되면, 거기에서 울며 이를 갈 것이다.
29 그러나 동쪽과 서쪽, 북쪽과 남쪽에서 사람들이 와, 하느님 나라의 잔칫상에 자리 잡을 것이다.
30 보라, 지금은 꼴찌지만 첫째가 되는 이들이 있고, 지금은 첫째지만 꼴찌가 되는 이들이 있을 것이다.”

http://www.usccb.org/nab/

August 22, 2010
Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time

Reading 1

Is 66:18-21

Thus says the LORD:
I know their works and their thoughts,
and I come to gather nations of every language;
they shall come and see my glory.
I will set a sign among them;
from them I will send fugitives to the nations:
to Tarshish, Put and Lud, Mosoch, Tubal and Javan,
to the distant coastlands
that have never heard of my fame, or seen my glory;
and they shall proclaim my glory among the nations.
They shall bring all your brothers and sisters from all the nations
as an offering to the LORD,
on horses and in chariots, in carts, upon mules and dromedaries,
to Jerusalem, my holy mountain, says the LORD,
just as the Israelites bring their offering
to the house of the LORD in clean vessels.
Some of these I will take as priests and Levites, says the LORD.

Responsorial Psalm

Ps. 117:1, 2

R. (Mk 16:15) Go out to all the world and tell the Good News.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Praise the LORD all you nations;
glorify him, all you peoples!
R. Go out to all the world and tell the Good News.
or:
R. Alleluia.
For steadfast is his kindness toward us,
and the fidelity of the LORD endures forever.
R. Go out to all the world and tell the Good News.
or:
R. Alleluia.

Reading 2

Heb 12:5-7, 11-13

Brothers and sisters,
You have forgotten the exhortation addressed to you as children:
“My son, do not disdain the discipline of the Lord
or lose heart when reproved by him;
for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines;
he scourges every son he acknowledges.”
Endure your trials as “discipline”;
God treats you as sons.
For what “son” is there whom his father does not discipline?
At the time,
all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain,
yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness
to those who are trained by it.

So strengthen your drooping hands and your weak knees.
Make straight paths for your feet,
that what is lame may not be disjointed but healed.

Gospel

Lk 13:22-30

Jesus passed through towns and villages,
teaching as he went and making his way to Jerusalem.
Someone asked him,
“Lord, will only a few people be saved?”
He answered them,
“Strive to enter through the narrow gate,
for many, I tell you, will attempt to enter
but will not be strong enough.
After the master of the house has arisen and locked the door,
then will you stand outside knocking and saying,
‘Lord, open the door for us.’
He will say to you in reply,
‘I do not know where you are from.
And you will say,
‘We ate and drank in your company and you taught in our streets.’
Then he will say to you,
‘I do not know where you are from.
Depart from me, all you evildoers!’
And there will be wailing and grinding of teeth
when you see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
and all the prophets in the kingdom of God
and you yourselves cast out.
And people will come from the east and the west
and from the north and the south
and will recline at table in the kingdom of God.
For behold, some are last who will be first,
and some are first who will be last.”

http://www.staygreat.com/ 

http://www.franciscanretreats.net/  

 http://www.evangeli.net/gospel/gospel.html

 http://www.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/daily.html

PRE-PRAYERING

We are praying with our natural fears about whether we are going to “make it”; will we be good enough. We are praying with the more than natural graces of our faith and hope. We do belong, we are included in Jesus’ embrace of us all from the cross. The natural and the supernatural are in tension within us at all times. Grace and nature form the struggle of our spiritual lives.

We can pray with the challenge that our fears and doubts create and be consoled with the comfort which our faith in Jesus provides. Belief is the choice we make to receive God’s choice not to abandon the sisters and brothers of Jesus.

REFLECTION

I, a city boy, once asked a lad attending our school from the ranching area in western Nebraska, how large his family’s ranch might be. He answered that it was “pretty big”. I asked if it were twelve square miles and he said it probably was about that. “wow” I said, four miles one way and three the other, that’s big.” “Oh no, it’s twelve miles by twelve miles, square.” I was talking like a city dandy, and yet he knew what I meant.

Our readings deal with somewhat the same question. “How large is your God’s ranch?” We are dealing with “boundary issues” as goes the current jargon. Isaiah is concluding his prophecies with something very new in this last chapter. For all the chapters and verses written concerning the speciality of Israel as God’s flock, family and spouse, what we hear today is broadening.

Peoples from Spain to Africa and Turkey will someday be both included and brought to know their own speciality. All will come to know the glory or love of God shown first to Israel. They all shall come to Jerusalem to know the God of Israel as their God and live according to the newness of the Ancient One. Even from these strangers, God will select religious leaders to keep reminding and remembering all the people that they are who they are by God’s embrace. God’s ranch is larger than miles; territory is measured by response and the invitation has no boundaries. The boundaries are the fears, doubts, and selfishness which can limit the human response to these invitations.

Remember now, the Pharisees and religious leaders in the time of Jesus had definite “boundary issues”. In the chapter from which our Gospel reading is taken, Jesus heals a woman on the Sabbath. There were strict boundaries concerning activities allowed and disallowed on this holy day of reflection and gratitude. Jesus has replied to these leaders’ being concerned with his activities. He relates three parables about a “mustard seed”, a “fig tree” and “yeast”. What we hear today is the topper!

Being “saved” by keeping the laws, such as Sabbath observances, did constitute religious belief. Jesus speaks, in today’s Gospel, right to this very issue. The “boundaries” are more around observing Jesus and his teachings. He is the “narrow gate” through whom life passes into this world and leads to the “Kingdom of God”. Jesus then puts words into the mouths of some of these leaders.

Notice carefully how Luke puts these words of protest. They are pictured as saying that “we ate and drank in your company and you taught in our streets.” Again - boundaries - there is nothing about their buying into, or becoming intimate with Jesus personally. They did not join his company or take in the teaching offered in their streets. Then the finish to the topper.

Those from beyond the geographic, national and religious boundaries have not been the first to be invited, but the “kingdom” is a broadening of the invitation to those who now will be first. Those who were first will be last and left out completely. Here Jesus is speaking directly to the Jewish leaders who are reminded that their ancient prophets, and Father Abraham and Isaac and Jacob will all be at the heavenly table with these “late” comers. Now that really is a stinger. The Jewish leaders and their followers were dedicated to their traditions and beliefs. Jesus is turning many of their traditions over and asking to let him be God’s invitation again to walk more personally with the personal God of their traditions and beliefs. This invitation is being extended beyond and in new forms, but the ancient call to trusting the inviting God remains central. Jesus is not replacing the old, but intensifying the revelation of that ancient divine love.

How big is God? How large of an embrace does God have for the human clan? Twelve square miles of ranch might seem mighty large to most of us. Twelve by twelve could seem impossibly huge. We are lately quite taken up with definitions which word literally means “putting down limits or boundaries”. Political parties, ethnic families, financial levels, and even religious groups define, limit, wall in and wall out, “Those others”. Labels create distance and distance provides the luxury of suspicion and self-ratification. The more we affirm our being identified through Jesus, the more we are available to those from the north/south and east/west. Only our walls of fear confine the growth of God’s kingdom. I’d like to picture Jesus as a doorway punched through the wall of human boundaryism.  

The question for us is not about whether or not we will “make it”, but what we will make of Christ’s having made “it” for us. Holiness just might be expressed in our observing the laws of Jesus about punching holes in the human need for walls. Good fences make good boundaries, but make neighbors distant, easily misjudged and eventually, enemies.

”Go out to all the world and tell the good news.” Ps. 117

http://www.rc.net/wcc/readings/ 

): Do not risk being shut out!

What does the image of a door say to us about the kingdom of God? Jesus' story about the door being shut to those who come too late suggests they had offended their host and deserved to be excluded. It was customary for teachers in Jesus' time to close the door on tardy students and not allow them back for a whole week in order to teach them a lesson in discipline and faithfulness. Jesus told this story in response to the question of who will make it to heaven. Many rabbis held that all Israel would be saved, except for a few blatant sinners who excluded themselves! After all, they were specially chosen by God when he established a covenant with them.

Jesus doesn't directly answer the question, however; but his response is nonetheless unsettling on two counts. First, Jesus surprised his listeners by saying that one's membership as a covenanted people does not automatically mean entry into the kingdom of God. Second, Jesus asserts that many from the gentile nations would enter God's kingdom. God's invitation is open to Jew and Gentile alike. But Jesus warns that we can be excluded if we do not strive to enter by the narrow door.  What did Jesus mean by this expression‎? The door which Jesus had in mind was himself. I am the door; if any one enters by me, he will be saved (John 10:9).  Jesus opens the way for us to enter into God's kingdom through the cross where he has laid down his life as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. If we want to enter and remain citizens of God's kingdom, then we must follow Jesus in the way of the cross. The word strive can also be translated agony. To enter the kingdom of God one must struggle against the forces of temptation to sin and whatever would hinder us from doing the will of God (even apathy, indifference, and compromise).

The good news is that we do not struggle alone. God is with us and his grace is sufficient! As we strive side by side  for the faith of the gospel (Philippians 1:27) Jesus assures us of complete victory! Do you trust in God's grace and help, especially in times of testing and temptation?

"Lord Jesus, help me to always trust in your saving grace, especially when I am tempted and put to the test. Help me to be faithful to you and give me the courage and strength to resist temptation, especially the temptation to compromise or to be indifferent to your word."

Psalm 117:1-2

1 Praise the LORD, all nations! Extol him, all peoples!
2 For great is his steadfast love toward us; and the faithfulness of the LORD endures for ever.  Praise the LORD!

 http://www.daily-meditations.org/index2.html

 http://goodnews.ie/calendar.php

I knew a gentle Indian nun who had lived a year in Europe and was beginning to get courage to comment on things.  “Europeans are always asking Why?” she said, “and ‘How much?’ and ‘What time is it?’” We want to quantify things; it’s a way to feel in control.  They are all good questions in themselves, but they are not the right questions in every situation.  Jesus ignored the question “How many?” in this reading.  He ignored a similar question in Matthew 24: about “when” the end will be. 

We imagine the person with a question to be in a superior position, especially if he or she has a microphone in hand.  We imagine them to be neutral, clear-headed, authoritative -  almost like judges.  And we image that we are morally obliged to answer every question.  But a question can be just as confused and wrong-headed as a statement; it can be biased and belittling; it can express, while trying to conceal, a personal agenda; it can be trivial; it can be everything that a statement can be.  In fact, even at its best, a question is just an ambiguous statement. 

It is as necessary to pay attention to our questions as to our answers - especially in religious matters.  “Who made you?” someone asked the little slave girl in Uncle Tom’s Cabin.  “Don’t think nobody ever made me,” she replied, “I s’pect I growed.”  Her answer was better than the question.  The questioner’s image of God was of a craftsman of some kind: someone who makes objects and puts them there.  We always have some image of God; it helps to hold some ideas and experiences and feelings together.  But we know that no image can do justice to God.  The trouble is when we have images that we are not conscious of having.  Even very sophisticated people can be held captive by buried images of God.  I once knew a moral theologian who had been a mechanical engineer before studying for the priesthood.  His moral theology was a perfect piece of engineering: from an infinite tank grace flowed in to activate the four cardinal virtues, like pistons, which made the wheels of your moral life to turn…. It is very seldom that you get a simple theologian.  Instead you get a theologian-engineer, or a theologian-accountant, or a theologian-lawyer…. What makes the difference is the question we ask, and the way we ask it.   A loaded question gives you back only what you loaded it with. 

Will only a few be saved?  That is a question that a statistician would ask.  The mind works comfortably when its object is ‘out there’, in the third person, so to speak.  But Jesus’ reply was in the second person: “Strive to enter by the narrow door….”  We have a tendency to survey our faith as if it were a landscape that did not include ourselves.  But a genuine spiritual question is always intensely practical and personal.  “What good deed must I do to possess eternal life?” asked the young man; and then “What more do I need to do?” (Mt 19:16, 20).  They were real questions, even though he didn’t prove capable of acting on the answers to them.  He had the grace to go away “sad”; he didn’t go away like the Pharisees thinking he was better than other people.  There was hope for him.  There is always hope for an honest person looking for the right way.

 http://www.presentationministries.com/

ARE YOU SAVED?

"I come to gather nations of every language; they shall come and see My glory." 뾋saiah 66:18

Years ago in the fire and brimstone era of the Church, we got the idea that hardly anyone went to heaven. Most people hoped to just slip into the back door of purgatory. Nowadays, we get the idea that everyone goes to heaven. Some people even say there is no hell, or if there is, no one's there but Judas, Hitler, and Jack the Ripper.

What does Jesus say? In answer to the question about whether few would be saved, Jesus replied: "Try to come in through the narrow door. Many, I tell you, will try to enter and be unable" (Lk 13:24). Jesus also said: "The invited are many, the elect are few" (Mt 22:14).

It seems unbiblical and presumptuous to think that almost everyone accepts Jesus as Lord and goes to heaven. On the other hand, it is not part of our heavenly Father's plan that even one person be lost (Mt 18:14), for He wants all to be saved (1 Tm 2:4). If God had His way, all would be saved and go to heaven.

Therefore, we should be confident but not presumptuous about our eternal life with Jesus. "Be solicitous to make your call and election permanent, brothers; surely those who do so will never be lost. On the contrary, your entry into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be richly provided for" (2 Pt 1:10-11).

Prayer: Jesus, Savior, have mercy on me!

Promise: "Make straight the paths you walk on, that your halting limbs may not be dislocated but healed." 뾊eb 12:13

Praise: Praise You, risen Jesus. You came to seek and save the lost (Lk 19:10). You are our Salvation (Ps 27:1). Alleluia!

 http://www.judeop.org/dailyreflections.htm

 http://biblereflection.blogspot.com/

Homily from Father James Gilhooley

Arthur Tonne tells an interesting tale. Most people have seen the famous photo of Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal. It pictures United States Marines raising the American flag on a hill in bloody Iwo Jima during World War II. Many of us too have stood mesmerized by the equally famous heroic size bronze likeness of the scene sculpted in Washington DC.
    
What is little known is that the photographer Mr Rosenthal was a convert to the Church from Judaism. For his conversion, he was shunned by fellow Jews for abandoning the faith of his people. But Rosenthal was not intimidated.
    
He wrote, "The day before we went ashore on Iwo Jima, I attended Mass and received Holy Communion. If a man is genuinely convinced of the truth and still neglects it, he is a traitor and that goes not only for my Jewish friends who do not attend synagogue each Saturday but also for my friends who miss Mass each Sunday."
    
The Teacher was pulling himself through the towns and villages of Palestine. Busily He was teaching all the time. His destination was Jerusalem. There He would keep His long-planned rendezvous with death. He was asked by someone, "Lord, are those to be saved few in number?"
    
The exhausted Christ, desperately needing a shower and a cold drink, ignored the query. Oftentimes the question put to Him did not touch on His syllabus. But He took advantage of the well-intentioned question to say in effect, "The door to the kingdom is unlocked. Keep in mind it is not wide, but it freely swings open on well-oiled hinges. Those willing to exert themselves will walk right in. No people at any time need stand outside with their noses pressed against the glass door wistfully looking in."
    
All of us need a re-introduction to the real Christ. Many of us live in a fantasy world in relation to Him. Today's Gospel is as good a teaching tool as any. He is not the naive individual many of us imagine. He is neither a patsy nor an easy touch. Rather, He is a no-nonsense Man who tells it like it is. This Gospel reveals that His favorite sport is not softball but hard ball. Solemnly I apologize to writers of insipid greeting cards verses for sharing the real Jesus with you.
   
In very blunt language today, the Nazarene informs us that no one has a lock on Heaven. Rather, it is the payoff for a lifetime of hard labor. What our parents or grandparents may have done for the Christ matters not. Everyone must pay his or her own dues. Why should anyone of us have the bonus without the onus? Even in the spiritual life there is no such thing as a free lunch. We belong to what someone has aptly called the Church of the Narrow Door. Given these ground rules, one can see why the Joe Rosenthals of our culture travel first class with the Teacher.
    
That dog-eared certificate of Baptism in the tin box under the bed is not necessarily a passport into the next life. At best, it is only the first few pages in a six hundred page autobiography everyone of us is writing each day. After all, almost all of us here did not consciously choose Baptism like Mr Rosenthal. Why then should it give us a guaranteed leg-up on everyone else in the neighborhood?
   
Those who think, an author suggests, that they have the heavenly seating chart arranged, are in for quite a shock.
    
One does not need to be a genetic scientist to identify the DNA of today's Gospel. As we are advised, the Christian life is forever a task of putting one foot in front of the other and one hand on top of another. As Will Rogers puts the case, even if you are on the right track, you will get run over if all you do is just sit there.
    
Some years ago I said a weekday Mass in Rhode Island. Among the worshipers was Felix de Welden. He is the celebrated sculptor responsible for the bronze image of Rosenthal's Iwo Jima picture in Washington, DC. He, like Mr Rosenthal, was just paying his dues. He attends Mass daily.
   
However, do not grow discouraged as you attempt often with  little success to put on Christ. "The only way to fail," says St Teresa of Avila, "is to stop."

Homily from Father Joseph Pellegrino
http://www.st.ignatius.net/pastor.html

In today’s Gospel Jesus speaks about the narrow gate. It is the answer to the question: “Lord, will only a few people be saved?”  Those who the narrow gate will enjoy the Father’s eternal banquet.  Those who do not have the determination and courage to live their faith will remain outside the Master’s House.  You get the sense that the people left outside are  lukewarm Christians.  They had known the Master. They ate and drank with him.  They had been witnesses to his teaching.  But now they were outside.  They thought it was their right to receive his beneficence, but they were shut out. This was their choice.  They no longer had a relationship with the Master.

We are not outside.  We are inside.  We are with the Lord.  That is the goal of our lives “to be with Jesus, at all times and for all eternity.” 

Why are we here?  The answer is far deeper than just “to go to Mass.”  We are here because we need to be with our Loving Lord. And we need to be with Him always, not just one hour a week in a Church, but throughout the week, wherever He can be found.

People often attempt to justify their faith life by speaking about their past relations with God, how they went to Catholic school, or attended religious education class.  Quite often someone will come into the parish office with a request of some sort and preface their request with a summary of their past involvement with the Church. For example, they want to put a child in a Catholic school and want the Church to help pay for this, to give them the same subsidy it gives to those who are in Church every week.  They haven’t been to Church in years. But, still, they will say, “You know, Father, I went to Catholic school for nine years.”  They hope that the past would get them by.  This is just an example.  Many people go through life thinking that their past is all that matters.  It doesn’t occur to them that their present relationship with God is what really matters. The relationship with God is the source of  spiritual life.  If that relationship is no longer present, then the source of life is gone.  Then there is death.

Why would anyone do this?  Why would anyone who once valued his or her relationship with God, push God aside, or even out of his or her life?  The answer is the gate to heaven is  narrow for many. Evil is all around us.  It invites us to an immoral party, to an immoral life.  It tells us that plenty of people we know are at that party.  It is so easy to join them.  It is so much harder to go in a different direction.  The different direction is the narrow gate.  It is easier to go through the wide gate, to go along with a crowd.  It is difficult to be one of the few that rejects the values of the crowd.  That is the call to holiness.  The call to be set apart for the Lord. Since we are one, and our faith and morals are one, when we choose the wide gate over the narrow gate, we find ourselves diminishing the importance of our relationship with God.  So, the person who once felt God’s presence within him or her now decides that God doesn’t really care what he or she is doing.  Of course God cares.  And He has compassion on us when we push Him away. He calls us to come back inside.  We call this call “grace.” 

We are here, we are with God because the Life of the Son is our life.  We are not dead.  We are alive.  We are alive in Christ. The Blood of Jesus Christ is our life blood.  That is the treasure we cannot sacrifice to the pagan world, no matter how wide the gate is that is attracting us. We cannot allow ourselves to fall for the absurdity that we decide when God sees us and when He doesn’t see us.

The people of the second reading, those addressed in the Letter to the Hebrews, acted as though the Christian faith was too difficult.  They had drooping hands and knocking knees.  They were wrong.  Our faith is not difficult.  It is our way to happiness.  We make sacrifices that the world may think are major sacrifices like being faithful, being truthful, being giving and compassionate to others.  We realize are just minor gifts of ourselves to our God.  In return we receive the one thing the world longs for but cannot grasp: we receive happiness.  For no one is happy unless he or she is united to the Source of Goodness and Happiness.

Why are we here?  We are here because this is where we want to be, inside, at the banquet of the Lord.  Why are we here?  We are here because we are alive!

Today, we pray for the courage to stay inside the house with the Master.  We pray for the courage to live our faith.  

Homily from Father Phil Bloom
http://www.geocities.com/seapadre_1999/

Bottom line: Today in the Gospel, we do encounter something more important than life or death.

I heard a story about a man in Liverpool. He was a huge fan of the local soccer team. In fact, his life revolved around his team's fortunes. Someone asked him if he considered soccer a matter of life or death. "No," he said indignantly, "Soccer is much more important than that!"

Some people in Seattle probably feel the same about the Seahawks. They, of course, know that they are exaggerating. But today in the Gospel, we do encounter something more important than life or death, namely, where we will spend eternity: The question of eternal life or eternal death.

A man asks Jesus, "Lord, will only a few people be saved?" Will only a few people get to heaven or will almost everyone make it? One reading favors an optimistic answer. Jesus speaks about people coming "from east and west, north and south" to "recline at the table in the kingdom of God." People hear verses like that and conclude that it is fairly easy to get into heaven, that a person would have to foul up "big time" in order to wind up in hell. That is a comforting view.

Jesus, however, says something else in today's Gospel. He says, "Strive to enter by the narrow gate." And he speaks about people who thought they had it made, being locked out. Jesus wants you and me to consider the possibility that we might not be saved. Cardinal Hans Urs von Balthasar - who was one of the gentlest of all theologians - put it this way: "It is indispensable that every individual Christian be confronted, in the greatest seriousness, with the possibility of his becoming lost."

The possibility of being lost - eternally - is the one matter more important than life or death.* We can see it in the life of St. Francis de Sales. When he was a young man, he went through a time of terrible anguish. He had the strong impression of being excluded from the saved, of being destined for eternal damnation. One afternoon in January, Francis entered a church. He knelt in front of an image of Our Lady and made an act of total abandonment to God. He threw himself on the mercy of God and insisted that he would love God - no matter where he might wind up after death. His fear left him and when he stood up, he later wrote, his anguish fell from him "like scales from a leper." He felt re-born.**

Francis de Sales entered the seminary and as a priest - and later as a bishop - he brought a significant part of Europe back into the Catholic Faith. When people met him and listened to him speak, he communicated to them the seriousness of this life: That each person has to make a choice - a choice more important than life or death.

Jesus invites us to make that choice today. He warns that the gate is narrow, that some who seem to be in first place now, will wind up last. And vica versa. In the words of our second reading, "Strengthen your drooping hands and your weak knees." "Do not disdain the discipline of the Lord or lose heart." What is at stake is something more important than life or death."  

Homily from Father Andrew M. Greeley
http://www.agreeley.com/homilies.html

Background:
This is a chilling Gospel. Jesus sounds like he’s tired and in a bad mood. Yet how chilling is the threat that he will say to some people, “Don’t know you.”

He’s probably fed up with people asking him the silly question about how many people will be saved.

Don’t they know that the Father in heaven is nothing but forgiveness and love? He’s saying to them, “get with it!” Don’t waste your time with such silliness. Take advantage of all I have to tell you about the Father while I’m still around to tell you my stories.
 
Story:
Once upon a time a very important public official visited a certain family. They were all honored to have him in their house and they served him some of the best Irish soda bread in all the world.

Then, instead of listening to what the man might have come to say, they began to talk. Indeed they babbled. Their visitor did not have a chance to get in a word edgewise. Finally, they ran out of steam and quieted down.

Then the driver of his car honked. He sighed and got up and said he’d enjoyed the conversation and the soda bread and pot of hot tea and he was sorry but he had to run. He hoped they could talk some other time. He may have sighed with relief as he got out of the house, but if he did no one noticed.  

Homily from Saint Vincent Archabbey, Latrobe,Pa
http://www.saintvincentarchabbey.org/homilies/index.lasso

Gospel Summary

Luke reminds us once again that we are on the "way to Jerusalem" with Jesus. This means that the guiding principle in our lives ought to be the loving concern that took Jesus himself to the climax of his career as he gave his life for us in Jerusalem. Though it would be nice if we could all visit the modern city of Jerusalem, this is not what Luke had in mind. He is thinking instead about the true purpose of this human life that God has given us.

As we make this spiritual journey, we must inevitably ask the question posed in today's gospel: "Lord, will only a few people be saved?" Or, more directly, "Lord, am I among those who will make this journey successfully?" And Jesus answers our question with words that dispel any smugness that we may have been entertaining: "Strive to enter through the narrow gate." To love as he did will not be easy.

Finally, Jesus warns us about the terrible disappointment in store for those who have not taken his teaching seriously. They will discover, only when it is too late, that they have not made room in their lives for the One who alone can bring them to that ultimate joyful banquet that our Creator has prepared for us in his kingdom.

Life Implications
Most of us live in a world that is full of wonderful opportunities. A telling metaphor is the superabundance of our grocery stores. When we enter the supermarket, we scarcely know where to turn in view of all the delightful attractions that surround us. It has been noted that those who come here from impoverished countries are almost overwhelmed by amazement at the seemingly endless riches of these grocery stores.

We should all be grateful for such convenience in our lives, but we also know that such displays of worldly goods do not represent the real meaning of happiness. Some years ago, it was common to find contests offered on the radio with the winner awarded "20 minutes of free shopping in the supermarket." One can easily imagine the winner's frenetic search for the most desirable items. But I like to imagine a different scenario where the winning contestant would spend those precious minutes helping others with their shopping needs. And when questioned about this strange behavior, he would reply simply, "Oh, didn't you know that my Father owns the supermarket and that, if we are kind and thoughtful during our 20 minutes of life, the whole store will be ours forever?"

What a pity it will be if we finally see what life is all about only when it is too late! But there is still time to resist the powerful distractions that dazzle us and tell us how much more we need when only one thing is really necessary, that is, to love our gracious and generous God and to be kind and forgiving toward his precious people.

mily from Father Cusick
http://www.christusrex.org/www1/mcitl/lowhome.html Meeting Christ in the Liturgy

"Lord, will those who are saved be few?" "Strive to enter by the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able." (Lk 13:24.)
The disciples ask a question that continues to be of importance to many today. Every manner of person, Catholic or not, Christian or not, all want to know: Does life go on after this world?
If it does, is there a heaven and a hell? Some give up wondering and just say, like a famous actress once did, I dont look forward to heaven, I dont look forward to hell, I just look forward to oblivion. Perhaps, by saying so, she wanted to sound sophisticated and condescending, as if to maintain the supercilious upper class hauteur for which she had become famous. Regardless, even for one who reacts thusly, the mystery is not resolved this side of the grave.
Only faith can assure us with the knowledge that the soul is eternal, and that it is a natural consequence of the gift of our free will that when we depart this life we will either go to heaven, perhaps by way of purgatory, or to hell, a traditional name for the state of eternal separation from God. God has revealed his desire that all be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth desire since the time of Adam and Eve.
This revelation was not broken off by our first parents' sin. After the fall, [God] buoyed them up with the hope of salvation, by promising redemption; and he has never ceased to show his solicitude for the human race. For he wishes to give eternal life to all those who seek salvation by patience in well-doing. Even when he disobeyed you and lost your friendship you did not abandon him to the power of death. . . Again and again you offered a covenant to man.(Roman Missal, Eucharistic Prayer IV) (CCC 55)

The narrow door is the way of Christ Jesus. One enters the way of life in Christ, of the grace of the sacramental life, beginning with baptism. The fullness of the life of sanctifying grace in the universal Church enables man to fully live the law of God in love. Thus living the life of grace, man and woman look forward with confidence to their salvation in Christ.
Salvation comes from God alone; but because we receive the life of faith through the Church, she is our mother: We believe the Church as the mother of our new birth, and not in the Church as if she were the author of our salvation. (Faustus of Riez, De Spiritu Sancto) Because she is our mother, she is also our teacher in the faith. (CCC 169)

For those who die before the final judgment, depicted with such awesome grandeur by the artistic genius Michelangelo in the Sistine chapel, there comes first an individual judgement.
Then, at the last trumpet all will rise, both the living and the dead, to learn who will and who will not be saved. The final judgment is an article of faith which we proclaim each time we recite the Creed.
The resurrection of all the dead, of both the just and the unjust, (Acts 24:15) will precede the Last Judgment. This will be the hour when all who are in the tombs will hear [the Son of man's] voice and come forth, those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment. (Jn 5:28-29.)
Then Christ will come in his glory, and all the angels with him....Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate them one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and he will place the sheep at his right hand, but the goats at the left...And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. (Mt 25:31, 32, 46.) (Catechism of the Catholic Church 1038)

Each of us prepare throughout our lives on earth for that great and final day when we meet Christ face to face, he who knows us perfectly, but also loves us perfectly. At the judgment we will learn whether we truly loved Him in return and thus can enter into the joy of the Lord. In the presence of Christ, who is Truth itself, the truth of each man's relationship with God will be laid bare. (Cf. Jn 12:49.) The Last Judgment will reveal even to its furthest consequences the good each person has done or failed to do during his earthly life: All that the wicked do is recorded, and they do not know. When "our God comes, he does not keep silence"...he will turn towards those at his left hand:..."I placed my poor little ones on earth for you. I as their head was seated in heaven at the right hand of my Father-- but on earth my members were suffering, my members on earth were in need. If you gave anything to my members, what you gave would reach their Head.
Would that you had known that my little ones were in need when I place them on earth for you and appointed them your stewards to bring your good works into my treasury. But you have placed nothing in their hands; therefore you have found nothing in my presence." (St. Augustine, Sermo 18, 4: PL 38, 130-131; cf. Ps 50:3.) (CCC 1039)
If we begin now to know and serve the Lord in the least of his brothers and sisters, to love Him in the poor, the outcast, the lonely and the sinner, then we will not be like those who "stand outside" and "knock at the door" when once the householder "has risen up and shut the door." (Lk 13:25.), we need not fear to hear him say: "I do not know where you come from." (Lk 13:25.)
See also paragraph numbers 1040-1060 in the Catechism. http://www.christusrex.org/www1/mcitl/
(Publish with permission.)http://www.christusrex.org/www1/mcitl/ 

Homily from Father Alex McAllister SDS
http://www.ctk-thornbury.org.uk/

The readings today seem to be about salvation and the question of the villager is as relevant today as when it was first posed: Will only a few be saved? And then there is the question behind the question: Will I be saved?

Jesus’ reply is paradoxical, but we expect no less from him. He says that many will try to enter the door of heaven but will not succeed. Yet hundreds upon hundreds will come from the four corners of the globe and take their places at the heavenly banquet.

His message is that salvation is meant for all; because, as we know, Jesus came to open up the way to salvation for all people, for each and every person he created. But in the parable there is a warning, a severe warning that we cannot presume to be saved.

When we arrive at the gate of heaven the master of the house might say to us: I do not know you. And we might find ourselves pleading that we were good Catholics and did everything prescribed and yet still the master might say: I do not know you. And people from the east and the west and from the north and the south will take their places in the Kingdom ahead of us.

The message is that it is easy to delude ourselves, easy to think that because we have followed the rules we have earned our place in heaven. We know intellectually that this could never be the case because we realise that salvation is entirely in the free gift of God. It can never be earned, it can never be presumed.

The key, of course, is in the simple words: I do not know you. It is all about our relationship with God, he wants to know us; he wants to love us. He does know us and he does love us; the life and death of Jesus proves that this is so. But God also wants us in our turn to know him and love him freely and without compulsion.

Unfortunately we are poor creatures, we are easily deluded and we are world experts at deceiving ourselves. We can convince ourselves that we are doing all the right things; we can convince ourselves that hours spent in prayer and in doing good to others has earned us great credit in heaven, and that our place in heaven is already assured.

We completely forget that in comparison to the love God has for us anything we do is a mere nothing.

We completely forget that in the great plan of God our piffling schemes and projects are of no significance.

We completely forget that we cannot earn or bribe our way into heaven by novenas and prayers and penances.

What God wants from us is love and for this we need hearts. We need hearts large enough to praise and glorify and bless his holy name.

Hearts full of compassion for others; hearts that beat with passionate love for those nearest to us; hearts that will make enormous sacrifices without a second thought. Hearts that are filled with sorrow for the many sins we have committed, hearts that pour out appeals to God imploring him for mercy.

We can count ourselves among the privileged few. We are so fortunate to have come to knowledge of and believe in Christ and in his Church and to have heard the message of the Gospel in all its fullness.
As members of the Catholic Church we can feel proud to be in direct line with the Church of the Apostles. We know that the Holy Spirit keeps the Church faithful to the Gospel in matters of faith and morals and we feel privileged to be the inheritors of this the richest of all the Christian traditions.

We know that this greatest of all gifts brings with it heavy responsibilities. We know that we must keep faith with Christ and follow the teaching and prescriptions of the Church. We know that we have a duty to bear witness to his name in the world. We know that we have the obligation and the duty to remain faithful to all that has been handed down to us.

But being the recipients of these advantages guarantees us nothing in relation to heaven. Whether we be laity, religious, priests, bishops or popes we have no built-in advantage over anyone else. The biggest sinner could get into heaven far ahead of us if he truly repents.

They way in is to be found only in Christ: I am the way, the truth and the life. He is the way, and it is only through him and with him and in him that we will be saved.

And he wants us to be saved. This is why he took the form of a slave and emptied himself and made peace by the blood of his cross.

He has poured out his life for us and the invitation to us is to pour out our lives for him and our brothers and sisters in the human family.

We live our lives in imitation of him. We learn from the words and actions of Jesus how to speak and act ourselves. We put his words on our lips, we walk in his footsteps, we touch with his hands.

We become so like him that when at that most significant moment of our lives the master opens the door to our knock he does not see us, instead he sees his Son.

We have emptied ourselves of all our egoism, all our pride, all our superiority, all our arrogance and have become humble as Jesus was humble, patient as Jesus was patient, loving as Jesus was loving, compassionate as Jesus was compassionate. But doing what he does we have become like him, become his true witnesses and ambassadors on earth.

Although we cannot earn salvation, although we cannot presume it; we can certainly, and indeed ought to, hope and pray for salvation. Indeed we ought to pray for it every day of our lives for ourselves and for those around us.

We have received already so many wonderful gifts from God, let us pray that he will grant us that one, final and best of all possible gifts—the gift of salvation itself.