Sunday, October 6, 2019 Hab 1:2-3. 2:2-4; 2 Tim 1:6-8. 13-14; Lk 17:5-10 _______________________________________________________________________________
Jesus said, “When you have done all you have been commended, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do.’” Lk 17:10
The word of God presents us today with two essential aspects of the Christian life: faith and service. With regard to faith, two specific requests are made to the Lord. Faith is the golden thread which binds us to the Lord, the pure joy of being with him, united to him; it is a gift that lasts our whole life, but bears fruit only if we play our part.
And what is our part? Jesus helps us understand that it consists of service. In the Gospel, immediately following his words on the power of faith, Jesus speaks of service. Faith and service cannot be separated; on the contrary, they are intimately linked, interwoven with each other. What is service? We might think that it consists only in being faithful to our duties or carrying out some good action. Yet, for Jesus it is much more. In today’s Gospel, and in very firm and radical terms, He asks us for complete availability, a life offered in complete openness, free of calculation and gain. Why is Jesus so exacting? Because He loved us in this way, making himself our servant “to the end” (Jn 13:1), coming “to serve, and to give his life” (Mk 10:45). And this takes place again every time we celebrate the Eucharist: the Lord comes among us, and as much as we intend to serve him and love him, it is always he who precedes us, serving us and loving us more than we can imagine or deserve. He gives us his very own life. He invites us to imitate him. Service is thus a way of life; indeed it recapitulates the entire Christian way of life: serving God in adoration and prayer; being open and available; loving our neighbor with practical deeds; passionately working for the common good. (Mass in the Church of the Immaculate, Homily of the Holy Father, Sunday, October 2, 2016)
Pierre Toussaint was born in Haiti as a slave. He came to New York with his lord. After gaining freedom, he became a renowned hairdresser of the New York nobility. Encouraged by the teaching of the Gospel, he distributed almost all of his profits to charitable works and was a great supporter of the construction of the old Cathedral of St. Patrick. He was helpful to both the black and white inhabitants of the city. His only criterion was to help the needy. His wife taught orphans to read and write, in their home. In their free time, they took care of homeless and abandoned people in their surroundings. His good heart made him the most famous and popular Catholic of the city. It was not just his generosity and service that made this man a saint. First of all, it was his relationship with Christ. For 66 years he went daily to Holy Mass, received the Eucharist and meditated on the Word of God, which became his inspiration in many of his works.
Saints grow because of the prayer and closeness to Christ from whom they can learn much. If you look into the diary today, how much space do you have in it for Jesus?
“The best way to discern if our prayer is authentic is to judge to what extent our life is being transformed in the light of mercy. For “mercy is not only an action of the Father; it becomes a criterion for ascertaining who his true children are.” Pope Francis