It’s all about Love: The Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time 2024

                                                                   It’s all about Love:

The Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time 2024

November 17, 2024

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Daniel 12:1-3; Psalm 16; Hebrews 10:1-18; Mark 13:24-32

 

We are approaching the end of the church year with exhortations to discern the signs of the times so we can make the best decisions to live with the greatest meaning. The first reading tells us nations will go through periods of distress, and Jesus tells us that we will see tribulation when the powers of the world will cast darkness over people’s hopes. The faithful ones will be saved because they can see rightly. Therefore, each day we must discern the signs so we can adjust our attitudes and amend our choices while we still have time. Let me give you a hint: It’s all about love. Also, I must tell you – loving well is hard, constant work. There’s no blueprint or roadmap. It is the road less traveled. 

 

Jesus judges well the human heart that strives to care, that bothers to even try, and to do so, it must enter the cross of another person’s life. This is scary stuff and time consuming. We make ourselves vulnerable, which creates fear and hesitation. We exist in a society dominated by narcissism and self-centeredness, and it risks becoming heartless if it does not make genuine human connections. If we lose our ability to feel and to connect meaningfully with others, we will become trapped within walls of our own making. We will be unable to form healthy relationships. To read the signs of the times, we must acquire authentic self-knowledge while keeping our minds and attitudes open to others who are in world. We must see our own suffering and that of others. It is our heart that welcomes and extends hospitality. We can become genuinely ourselves to the extent that we can acknowledge others, and it is only those who can accept themselves that are able to encounter others. 

 

Human love unifies. It connects. It binds. It has the power to look at our personal history through Christ’s eyes who reassembles the fragments of our story. I am who my heart says I am, for my ability uniquely sets me apart from others and enables me to be in communion with others. I pray because I am at the limits of my love, and I depend upon Christ to make sense of my powerlessness. My heart is the place from which I pray, my inmost core, the place that God believes in me and makes me whole. It is the place called “home,” – a safe, warm place of goodness and goodwill. It is the place that seeks harmony, the greater good, and reconciliation. My heart is the place where hope clings to life.

 

Loving is not easy. It hurts. Just as God lives eternally with a broken heart, so do we. The imbalances of the world are symptoms of the imbalance rooted in our human hearts. Reconciliation and peace are born from the human heart, so if we want world peace, we must mend the relationships in our tiny corner of the world. Christ’s heart is openness, gift, and encounter. We must learn to relate to one another in healthy and happy ways, of trusting ways, if we are to build God’s kingdom of love and justice. Our hearts are frail and wounded, and they seek a more dignified life, real human dignity for us and others. By tending to our hearts, we can experience a deep interiority, a profound contemplation. When we enter our own hearts, we find God waits for us there. We transcend the entire material universe when we settle into the gaze of our merciful God and find depths of communion that make our heart complete. We rest in God, and that grace is enough for us. 

 

Scripture for Daily Mass

Monday: (Revelation 1) The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him, to show his servants what must happen soon. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who gives witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ by reporting what he saw.

 

Tuesday: (Revelation 3) The one who has the seven spirits of God, and the seven stars says this: “I know your works, that you have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead.

 

Wednesday: (Revelation 4) At once I was caught up in spirit. A throne was there in heaven, and on the throne sat one whose appearance sparkled like jasper and carnelian.
Around the throne was a halo as brilliant as an emerald.

 

Thursday: (Revelation 5) I, John, saw a scroll in the right hand of the one who sat on the throne. It had writing on both sides and was sealed with seven seals. Then I saw a mighty angel who proclaimed in a loud voice, “Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?”

 

Friday (Revelation 10) Then the voice spoke to me and said: “Go, take the scroll that lies open in the hand of the angel who is standing on the sea and on the land.” So I went up to the angel and told him to give me the small scroll. He said to me, “Take and swallow it.

 

Saturday (Revelation 11) These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. If anyone wants to harm them, fire comes out of their mouths and devours their enemies. In this way, anyone wanting to harm them is sure to be slain.

 

Gospel: 

Monday: (Luke 18) As Jesus approached Jericho a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging, and hearing a crowd going by, he inquired what was happening. They told him,
“Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.”

 

Tuesday: (Luke 19) At that time Jesus came to Jericho and intended to pass through the town. Now a man there named Zacchaeus, who was a chief tax collector and also a wealthy man, was seeking to see who Jesus was.

 

Wednesday (Luke 19) While people were listening to Jesus speak, he proceeded to tell a parable because he was near Jerusalem, and they thought that the Kingdom of God would appear there immediately.

 

Thursday (Luke 19) As Jesus drew near Jerusalem, he saw the city and wept over it, saying, “If this day you only knew what makes for peace–but now it is hidden from your eyes.

 

Friday (Luke 19) Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, saying to them, “It is written, My house shall be a house of prayer,
but you have made it a den of thieves.”

 

Saturday (Luke 20) Now there were seven brothers; the first married a woman but died childless. Then the second and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died childless. Finally the woman also died.

 

Saints of the Week

 

November 17: Elizabeth of Hungary, (1207-1231) was the daughter of Andrew II, king of Hungary. She married Ludwig IV of Thuringia and as queen supported many charities. When her husband died in a crusade in 1227, she entered the Third Order of Franciscans. 

 

November 18: The Dedication of the Basilicas of Peter and Paul celebrates churches in honor of the two great church founders. St. Peter's basilica was begun in 323 by Emperor Constantine - directly over Peter's tomb. A new basilica was begun in 1506 and it was completed in 1626. Many great artists and architects had a hand in building it. St. Paul Outside the Walls was built in the 4th century over Paul's tomb. It was destroyed by fire in 1823 and subsequently rebuilt.

 

November 18: Rose Philippine Duchesne (1769-1852) joined the Sisters of the Sacred Heart and at age 49, traveled to Missouri to set up a missionary center and the first free school west of the Mississippi. She then founded six more missions. She worked to better the lives of the Native Americans.

 

November 21: The Presentation of Mary originated as a feast in 543 when the basilica of St. Mary's the New in Jerusalem was dedicated. The day commemorate the event when Mary's parent brought her to the Temple to dedicate her to God. The Roman church began to celebrate this feast in 1585.

 

November 22: Cecilia, martyr (2nd or 3rd century), is the patron saint of music because of the song she sang at her wedding. She died just days after her husband, Valerian, and his brother were beheaded for refusing to sacrifice to the gods. She is listed in the First Eucharistic prayer as an early church martyr.

 

November 23: Clement I, pope and martyr (d. 99) is also mentioned in the First Eucharistic prayer. He is the third pope and was martyred in exile. He is presumed to be a former slave in the imperial court. He wrote a letter to the Corinthians after a revolt and as pope he restored ordered within the ministries.   

 

November 23: Columban, abbot (d. 615) was an Irish monk who left Ireland for France with 12 companions to found a monastery as a base for preaching. They established 3 monasteries within 10 years. Columban opposed the king's polygamy and was expelled. He set up monasteries in Switzerland and Italy before he died. Though he was expelled, the monasteries were permitted to remain open.

 

November 23: Miguel Pro, S.J., martyr (1891-1927) lived in Guadalupe, Mexico before entering the Jesuits. Public worship was forbidden in Mexico so Miguel became an undercover priest often wearing disguises. He was arrested and ordered to be shot in front of a firing squad without benefit of a trial. Before he died she shouted out, "Long live Christ the King."

This Week in Jesuit History

 

• November 17, 1579. Bl Rudolph Acquaviva and two other Jesuits set out from Goa for Surat and Fattiphur, the Court of Akbar, the Great Mogul. 
• November 18, 1538. Pope Paul III caused the governor of Rome to publish the verdict proclaiming the complete innocence of Ignatius and his companions of all heresy. 
• November 19, 1526. The Inquisition in Alcala, Spain examined Ignatius. They were concerned with the novelty of his way of life and his teaching. 
• November 20, 1864. In St Peter's, Rome, the beatification of Peter Canisius by Pope Pius IX. 
• November 21, 1759. At Livorno, the harbor officials refused to let the ship, S Bonaventura, with 120 exiled Portuguese Jesuits on board, cast anchor. Carvalho sent orders to the Governor of Rio de Janeiro to make a diligent search for the supposed wealth of the Jesuits. 
• November 22, 1633. The first band of missionaries consisting of five priests and one brother, embarked from England for Maryland. They were sent at the request of Lord Baltimore. The best known among them was Fr. Andrew White. 
• November 22, 1791: Georgetown Academy opened with one student, aged 12, who was the first student taught by the Jesuits in the United States. 
• November 23, 1545: Jeronimo de Nadal, whom Ignatius had known as a student at Paris, entered the Society. Later Nadal was instrumental in getting Ignatius to narrate his autobiography.