Sunday Meditation: The Missionary Charge

So today we jump to the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time.  You might ask, as my son did at Mass this morning, how did we get to the Fourteenth week.  I just spent a half hour trying to figure this out, and I could not account for all fourteen weeks.  From the Baptism of the Lord, this year on January 12^th, to the week of Ash Wednesday, this year on March 5^th, is eight weeks, and each of those are one of the weeks of Ordinary Time.  Then we have six weeks of Lent, including Palm Sunday and Holy Week.  That is followed by seven weeks of Easter Time to Pentecost, and then it’s the tenth week of Ordinary Time.  What happened to the Ninth Week?  The Solemnities of the Holy Trinity, Body and Blood of the Lord, and Peter and Paul counts as the eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth weeks.  That brings us up to today, the Fourteenth.  But what happened to the ninth?  If someone can explain it, please let me know.

 

The Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time in Year C brings us to the mission sendoff of Christ to the disciples in the Gospel of Luke. 

 

At that time the Lord appointed seventy-two others

whom he sent ahead of him in pairs

to every town and place he intended to visit.

He said to them,

"The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few;

so ask the master of the harvest

to send out laborers for his harvest.

Go on your way; behold, I am sending you like lambs among wolves.

Carry no money bag, no sack, no sandals;

and greet no one along the way.

Into whatever house you enter, first say, 'Peace to this household.'

If a peaceful person lives there, your peace will rest on him;

but if not, it will return to you.

Stay in the same house and eat and drink what is offered to you,

for the laborer deserves his payment.

Do not move about from one house to another.

Whatever town you enter and they welcome you,

eat what is set before you, cure the sick in it and say to them,

'The kingdom of God is at hand for you.'

Whatever town you enter and they do not receive you,

go out into the streets and say,

'The dust of your town that clings to our feet, even that we shake off against you.'

Yet know this: the kingdom of God is at hand.

I tell you, it will be more tolerable for Sodom on that day than for that town."

The seventy-two returned rejoicing, and said,

"Lord, even the demons are subject to us because of your name."

Jesus said, "I have observed Satan fall like lightning from the sky.

Behold, I have given you the power to 'tread upon serpents' and scorpions and upon the full force of the enemy and nothing will harm you.  Nevertheless, do not rejoice because the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice because your names are written in heaven."

   ~Lk 10:1-12, 17-20

 

Bishop Barron gives a detailed exegesis on this passage.

So that is interesting.  There are the three inner circle of Apostles (Peter, James, and John), there are twelve apostles, and 72 disciples who He sends off here.  These parallel similar groupings with Moses in the Old Testament.

For the Pastoral Homily, I am going to post Pope Leo XIV’s Angelus Message for today.

 

Cannot do better than the Holy Father for a pastoral homily.  Did you catch this:

Dear brothers and sisters, the Church and the world do not need people who fulfill their religious duties as if the faith were merely an external label. We need laborers who are eager to work in the mission field, loving disciples who bear witness to the Kingdom of God in all places. Perhaps there is no shortage of “intermittent Christians” who occasionally act upon some religious feeling or participate in sporadic events. But there are few who are ready, on a daily basis, to labor in God’s harvest, cultivating the seed of the Gospel in their own hearts in order then to share it in their families, places of work or study, their social contexts and with those in need.

“We need laborers who are eager to work the mission fields,” not those who “occasionally act upon some religious feelings.”  Gosh, that sounds like Pope Francis!

 

You can read the transcript of his Angelus message in English, here. 

 

 

Sunday Meditation: “Whatever town you enter and they welcome you, eat what is set before you, cure the sick in it and say to them, 'The kingdom of God is at hand for you.'”

 

 

What a wonderful hymn, “Send Us Out”  by John Michael Talbot. 

 

 

Taking nothing for your journey

For God will give you His bread

And for every house that you enter

Pray the peace of God descend

 

Send us out to proclaim the reign of your kingdom.

Send us out to proclaim and to heal

Send us out with your power and your authority.

To overcome, and to heal the world