We Eat What We Believe: The Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time 2024

                                                       We Eat What We Believe:

The Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time 2024 

August 11, 2024

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1 Kings 19:4-8; Psalm 34; Ephesians 4:30-5:2; John 6:41-51

 

These readings depict the way God nourishes the faithful and encourages them to eat the right food to continue the mission. Elijah was at the point of death and chose to die before God roused him from sleep and gave him strength through food and drink. A second time, Elijah was given food to continue his journey to Mount Horeb to be closer to God. The theme in the Fourth Gospel continues: God feeds the people, but this time it is through the person of Jesus. After eating, many people could not understand the words of Jesus, that he was the Bread sent by God to feed them eternally. 

 

We eat what we believe. Some of the people around Jesus saw his human origins and held the viewpoint that humans are not essentially good and need redeeming. Those types believed nothing good could come from Jesus because they knew his parents. These are people who do not believe in the works of God. Others were able to see the divine within humanity, to lift their heads and find God at work in each person, to see the extraordinary presence of God within Jesus. They are people of faith. Faith sees what the mind alone cannot process.

I’ll put it in a way to show what the opposites do for one another. I found this on the internet and modified it.

Laziness destroys ambition, but ambition destroys laziness.

Anger halts wisdom, but wisdom halts anger.

Fear thrashes dreams, but dreams thrash fears.

Ego reverses growth, but growth reverses ego.

Jealously overwhelms peace, but peace overwhelms jealousy.

Doubt defeats confidence, but confidence defeat doubts.

 

How are we inclined to look at God’s work in humanity? Do we look up or down? Jesus asks us to see with faith. Perhaps an easy way to reflect upon that is to find out how others perceive us. Do they see us as people who express no hope, that everything in life is bad, that we find fault is everyone and everything around us, that we criticize and wrongly express our dissatisfaction and anger? This is one who lives in fear, and fear is the absence of faith. Or, do they see us as people who bless everyone we encounter, find reasons for gratitude, honor and cherish those who are close to us, and speak words that build connections and offer hope? This is a person of faith. These are the words of everlasting life.

 

          Our worldview is reflected in the words we speak. The church is reflected in its statements as well. A major question for some is: Do faith and culture intersect? Some in the church will speak in ways to dismiss the larger society, to categorize it and call names, to separate themselves from the culture of the world. They profess that the church must stand over and against the world’s cultures because they are inherently bad and do not represent God’s dream. The church must be a fortress of righteous that will keep out the sinners. Others in the church will see human society as the place of encounter of God with humanity. Human experience is the place where God is revealed, and society is where the virtues of faith, hope, and love have a life beyond the boundaries of the church. Culture and art are expressions of the human search for meaning. In this longing, with an attitude of openness and the restlessness of the human heart, God is present. God presents anonymously in expressions of human openness, desire, and hope, and even when we do not recognize God is present, God is in secular culture. God is the depth of all reality. Faith, hope, and love are places of encounter between God and us. God is found in grace and freedom. God’s life is open to our investigation. 

 

          In which worldview do we find ourselves? From which loaf of bread do we want to be nourished? We have our Eucharist, a real sign, symbol, and sacrament of God’s fidelity, a place we are fed in faith. We have signs of God’s presence all around us too, especially in the secular world. Where are those places where we are also nourished? By faith, we can find God’s presence in all places and partake of the living bread that leads us to a forever life with God. Let us try to see the world as God sees it, and then let’s come together to eat and be nourished by what we believe.

 

Scripture for Daily Mass

Monday: (Ezekiel 1) Above the firmament over their heads something like a throne could be seen, looking like sapphire. Upon it was seated, up above, one who had the appearance of a man.

 

Tuesday: (Ezekiel 2) The Lord GOD said to me: As for you, son of man, obey me when I speak to you: be not rebellious like this house of rebellion, but open your mouth and eat what I shall give you.

 

Wednesday: (Ezekiel 9) The LORD cried loud for me to hear: Come, you scourges of the city! With that I saw six men coming from the direction of the upper gate which faces the north, each with a destroying weapon in his hand.

 

Thursday: (1 Chronicles 15) David assembled all Israel in Jerusalem to bring the ark of the Lord to the place which he had prepared for it. David also called together the sons of Aaron and the Levites.

 

Friday (Ezekiel 16) Thus says the Lord GOD to Jerusalem: By origin and birth you are of the land of Canaan; your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite. As for your birth, the day you were born your navel cord was not cut; you were neither washed with water nor anointed, nor were you rubbed with salt, nor swathed in swaddling clothes.

 

Saturday (Ezekiel 18) I swear that there shall no longer be anyone among you who will repeat this proverb in Israel. For all lives are mine; the life of the father is like the life of the son, both are mine; only the one who sins shall die.

 

Gospel: 

Monday: (Matthew 17) When they came to Capernaum, the collectors of the temple tax approached Peter and said, "Does not your teacher pay the temple tax?" "Yes," he said.

 

Tuesday: (Matthew 18) “Who is the greatest in the Kingdom of heaven?” He called a child over, placed it in their midst, and said, “Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the Kingdom of heaven.

 

Wednesday (Matthew 18) If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that every fact may be established.

 

Thursday (Luke 11) “Blessed is the womb that carried you and the breasts at which you nursed.” He replied, “Rather, blessed are those who hear the word of God and observe it.”

 

Friday (Matthew 19) They said to him, "Then why did Moses command that the man give the woman a bill of divorce and dismiss her?" He said to them, "Because of the hardness of your hearts Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.

 

Saturday (Matthew 19) Children were brought to Jesus that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples rebuked them, but Jesus said, “Let the children come to me, and do not prevent them.

 

Saints of the Week

 

August 11: Clare, founder (1193-1253), was inspired by Francis of Assist so much that she fled her home for his community to receive the Franciscan habit on Passion Sunday 1212. She lived in a nearby Benedictine convent until she was made superior of a new community in San Damiano. She practiced radical poverty by wearing no shoes, sleeping on the ground, and giving up meat. 

 

August 12: Jane Frances de Chantal, religious (1572-1641), founded the Congregation of the Visitation with her spiritual advisor, Francis de Sales. This congregation was for women who wanted to live in religious life, but without the austerity of the other orders. Jane was married to a Baron with whom she had six children and she sought religious answers to her suffering. Her order established eighty-five convents dedicated to serving the poor before she died. 

 

August 13: Pontian, pope and martyr and Hippolytus, priest and martyr (d.236). Pontian's papacy was interrupted by a persecution when the Roman Emperor Maximinus arrested him and his rival, Hippolytus, and banished them to Sardinia. Pontian resigned so another pope could succeed him. Hippolytus, who formed a schismatic group and claimed to be the real pope, reconciled with the church before he and Pontian were martyred.

 

August 14: Maximilian Kolbe, priest and martyr (1894-1941), was born in Russian-occupied Poland. He entered the Franciscans in 1910 and preached the gospel with his devotion to Mary in Poland and Japan. When the Nazis conquered Poland in 1939, he ministered to thousands of refugees. He was arrested, sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp. When a prisoner escaped and retaliation was sought, Kolbe offered himself to replace one of the ten randomly chosen men to be executed.

 

August 15: The Assumption of Mary is the principal feast of Mary with her Queenship celebrated at the end of the octave. This feast celebrates that she was taken up to heaven, body and soul, at the end of her earthly life. The Council of Ephesus in 431 proclaimed her Mother of God and devotion of her dormition followed afterwards. 

 

August 16: Stephen of Hungary (975-1038) tried to unite the Magyar families and was able to establish the church in Hungary through Pope Sylvester II's support. Rome crowed Stephen as the first king in 1001 and he instituted many reforms in religious and civil practices. He built churches and trained local clergy.

This Week in Jesuit History

 

• August 11, 1846. The death of Benedict Joseph Fenwick. He was the second bishop of Boston, twice the president of Georgetown, and the founder of the College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts. 
• August 12, 1877. The death of Fr. Maurice Gailland. He was an expert in languages and spent many years at St Mary's Mission in Kansas. He wrote a 450.page dictionary and grammar of the Potawatomi language. 
• August 13, 1621. The death in Rome of St John Berchmans. He died while still in studies, preparing for a public disputation. 
• August 14, 1812. Napoleon I and his army arrived at Polosk, in White Russia. They plunder the property of the Society and violate the tombs of the Generals. 
• August 15, 1821. Fr. Peter DeSmet sailed from Amsterdam to America. He hoped to work among the Native Americans. He became the best known missionary of the northwest portion of the United States. 
• August 15, 1955: The Wisconsin Province was formed from the Missouri Province and the Detroit Province was formed from the Chicago province. 
• August 16, 1649: At Drogheda, Cromwell's soldiers shot Fr. John Bath and his brother, a secular priest, in the marketplace. 

August 17, 1823: Fr. Van Quickenborne and a small band of missionaries descended the Missouri River to evangelize the Indians at the request of the bishop of St. Louis. On this date in 1829, the College of St. Louis opened.