Regína sacratíssimi Rosárii, ora pro nobis!

IHS

Ave Maria!
Twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost—23 October AD 2016

Ordinary of the Mass
Mass Text - Latin
Mass Text - English

Jesus said: “Give place: for the girl is not dead, but sleepeth.
And they laughed him to scorn.”[1]

    Saint Paul wrote to the Galatians:: “God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap.”[2]  What a terrible thing to be among those who mocked Jesus, laughing Him to scorn.  Imagine how these people must have felt when they stood before Him in judgment at the end of their lives.  But, in their defense, it is likely that none of them really knew who and what Jesus was.  And they had the tangible evidence of a girl who had been sick and now exhibited every symptom of being dead.

    We can make a similar excuse for most of those people in the crowd when Jesus promised to give them His flesh to eat and His blood to drink.[3] They had seen Him work the miracle multiplying five loaves of bread and two fish in order to feed five thousand people, but giving His flesh and blood must have seemed a whole lot more miraculous.  The Apostles, with the exception of Judas, seemed to know not to question anything the Master said, even if they had no idea how he would go about doing such a thing.  Faith, after all is belief in what God has revealed—not the explanation of how the things He reveals could be possible.  Our Catholic Faith is filled with such things—from the Trinity and the Virgin Birth, on down to the more mundane miracles God works for individuals, even on down to the miracle of our existence and sustenance—even though all of these things surely are, they are beyond human explanation.

    Some conjecture that it was the very promise of His body and blood that drove Judas away from Jesus, ultimately to betray Him for thirty pieces of silver.[4]  Judas had been around since the early days, and had seen Jesus work amazing miracles, develop a great reputation, and attract large crowds.  Imagine attracting a crowd of five thousand or more with no Internet, no T.V. no radio and no advertising at all other than by word of mouth.  Saint John mentions five thousand men—it is possible that there were additional women and children, but even if the total is five thousand, the number is enormous under the circumstances.  And Jesus Himself felt compelled to flee because “he knew that they would come to take him by force, and make him king.”

    Judas recognized that they would, indeed, make Jesus a king—and that would make Judas one of the king’s officers—maybe even a prince!

    But then, in moments, every thing falls apart.  Jesus starts spouting this” crazy” stuff about giving everyone His body and blood!  The Jews … murmured at him …and they said: “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?  How then [can He say] I came down from heaven?”[5] And how can He give us His flesh to eat? “This is a hard saying, who can listen to it?”[6]  And as soon as the murmuring began, Judas’ heart fell, for he knew that all this stuff would destroy the wonderful reputation Jesus had built—and that any chances Judas might have had to be an officer or a prince had just evaporated.

    Then Jesus said to the twelve: Will you also go away? And Simon Peter answered him: “Lord … thou hast the words of eternal life.  And we have believed … that thou art the Christ, the Son of God.”  Jesus answered them: “Have not I chosen you twelve; and one of you is a devil?  Now he meant Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon: for this same was about to betray him, whereas he was one of the twelve.[7]

    It seems that Judas was just the first in a long line of men who would mock and betray Jesus.  “You don’t expect me to believe all that medieval stuff do you?”  From the Arian heretics who denied the divinity of Jesus Christ, from the fourth century until this very day:  through those of the sixteenth century who denied the very promise of Jesus to give us His flesh and blood (it could only be a symbol of His flesh and blood!); to the modernist heretics of our own century, who deny the reality of hell, reject the perpetual virginity of Mary; who reject the possibility of any miracle being more than psychological (a mere illusion worked in the mind of the beholder).  Those who reject the holy Sacrifice of the Mass.  To those who reject the sanctity of marriage and human life itself.  To those willing to send souls to Hell by withholding the moral law from them—“You don’t have to believe all that medieval stuff, ya know?”  “Who am I to judge?”

    Even the politicians now seem to be compelled to mock God and His Christ.  We hear:

    Women are still denied critical access to reproductive healthcare …. Laws have to be backed up with resources and political will. And deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs and structural biases have to be changed.[8]

    We read:

    There needs to be a Catholic Spring, in which Catholics themselves demand the end of a middle ages dictatorship and the beginning of a little democracy and respect for gender equality in the Catholic church. Is contraceptive coverage an issue around which that could happen….

    “We created Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good to organize for a moment like this,” [John Podesta] the Clinton campaign chairman writes. “But I think it lacks the leadership to do so now. Likewise Catholics United. Like most Spring movements, I think this one will have to be bottom up.”[9]

    This is completely backwards!!  Human rights and the laws of legitimate governments come from God.  No degree of leftist infiltration of the Church can change God’s truth or His morality.

    “God is not mocked.”  So let us resolve not to mock Him with our own personal disbelief and immorality.  Resolve also not to support Churchmen who mock Him—“No doctrine, no dollars; No morality, no money”!  Resolve to defeat those who would mock Him through the power of government—on election-day, be sure to vote for those who do not mock God.


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