Monday of Week 8 of Ordinary Time – First Reading

Commentary on 1 Peter 1:3-9

Today we begin readings from the First Letter of Peter. According to the St Joseph’s Weekday Missal:

“This letter was most likely written…about 64 AD and sets forth the nature of the Christian life begun in baptism as an experience of regeneration. By their acceptance of Christianity, the Christian communities of Asia Minor had become separated from their pagan countrymen, who were abusing and persecuting them. The apostle instructs his readers that Christianity is the true religion in spite of their trials and sufferings and exhorts them to lead good Christian lives.”

The first three verses of the chapter are not included in the reading, but in them the writer tells us to whom the letter is being addressed.  They include five Roman provinces in Asia Minor and cover most of what is modern Turkey – Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia.

The letter begins in the usual way with a kind of prayer which is full of hope.  In fact, an aura of hope suffuses this whole letter.  In spite of the frequent suffering and persecution mentioned in the letter, hope is such a key thought in it (the word ‘hope’ itself is used here and in 1:13,21 and 3:5,15) that it may be called a letter of hope in the midst of suffering.  Christian hope is not just wishful thinking; it is an utter conviction of what is going to be realised.  Here there is a guarantee of “an inheritance that is imperishable” to which all can look forward with faith and confidence.  The basis of that hope is the resurrection of Jesus, who passed through such terrible suffering and death to life.  Our faith tells us that we can go the same way with him.

This hope leads to the enjoyment of an inheritance, an inheritance that is eternal, one that is being kept in store for us by God.   And we are being made safe, first, by the power of God and, second, by our faith, our total trust and commitment to God.  And this guarantees our salvation, which can be seen in three phases: 1) the salvation that comes when we first believe in Jesus as Lord and Saviour; 2) the continuing process of salvation as we grow in holiness and wholeness; and 3) our ultimately being united face to face with our God and Lord in glory.

In spite of the many trials and tribulations that the Christians are passing through, the writer assures them that there is cause for rejoicing. Such trials test their faith like gold being purified in fire and will make them even more ready to welcome Christ when he comes:

…so that the genuineness of your faith—being more precious than gold that, though perishable, is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.

As precious metals are purified by fire, so our faith is strengthened by the trials we experience in our living it out.  Experience has shown again and again that persecution has been a strong reinforcer of faith in Christians.  Jesus foretold that his followers would constantly face resistance, contempt and persecution. These challenges to our faith are not something to be deliberately sought or provoked, but at the same time, our fortitude in facing them is one of the signs of our commitment to the Kingdom and the Way of the Gospel.  The true believer makes contact with Jesus in every person and every experience they encounter.

Peter, who himself had a personal knowledge of Jesus, is presented here as praising the readers of the letter, who:

Although you have not seen him, you love him, and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him…

It reminds one of the words of Jesus to Thomas after the resurrection:

Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe. (John 20:29)

Through our faith, we are in direct contact with Jesus.  The true believer makes contact with Jesus in every person and every experience.

So, they have reason to “rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy” because they are achieving the goal of faith – and indeed the goal of life – their salvation.  ‘Salvation’ means much more than ‘going to heaven’ after we die.  It implies a restoration of our fragile and weak lives to complete wholeness, and in being totally reunited in joy and peace with him from whom we came – God our Creator.  And it begins in this life on earth.

Joy and consolation should be the over-riding experience of the committed follower of Jesus.  This joy and consolation is not taken away by our experience of hardships, testings and disappointments in our lives…quite the contrary. If that joy is not the deeper part of our Christian experience, then we need to look further for the cause.

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Tuesday of Week 8 of Ordinary Time – Gospel

Commentary on Mark 10:28-31

Having overcome their initial shock at what Jesus had to say about the danger of wealth as a serious obstacle to being a follower of Jesus or of being a member of the Kingdom, his disciples begin to take stock of their own actual situation. Clearly they cannot even be remotely numbered among the wealthy. Is there something to be said in favour of their relative poverty? Worried, the ever-irrepressible Peter exclaims:

Look, we have left everything and followed you.

Indeed they had. At the beginning of Mark’s Gospel we are told that, on Jesus’ invitation, they had abandoned their whole livelihood and become followers of Jesus. It was a bold step when they really had no idea where it would lead them.

Jesus replied:

Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the good news who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.

This sounds like a pie-in-the-sky promise, but has it been fulfilled? In fact, it has been—and many times over. By leaving a world where each one scrambles for a piece of the cake and where some get a huge piece and others only get crumbs, the Christian who truly has the spirit of the gospel enters a community where everyone takes care of everyone else, and where each one’s needs are taken care of by a sharing of the community’s resources.

This is how, by leaving one’s home and family and giving away one’s material goods, one enters a new family in which there are far more mothers, brothers and sisters; where one home is replaced by many homes offering their warmth and hospitality—in essence, offering a home away from home.

This is a reality which, unfortunately, has not been realised among many Christians—those who choose to live their daily lives in the rat race for acquisition characteristic of our modern capitalist societies. Their behavior reflects their belief that what they cannot get by their own efforts they will never come to enjoy.

Yet there are examples. One of the most obvious is religious life where the words of Jesus are lived out. The question is why should only religious have this experience of shared love and shared material goods? There are Christian communities and some charismatic groups where families live in a communal style sharing all their resources.

But by and large, we have to a great extent failed to realise that Christianity is not meant to be a religion where individuals, rich and poor, live individualistic lives and carry out certain ‘religious’ acts to “save their own souls”. Rather, Christianity essentially consists of creating a whole new way of living, by which people relate to each other in mutual love and care.

Jesus says that in his world the first will be last and the last first. In fact, he is saying that in his world there is no first and no last. Perhaps this can be illustrated by the following story.

A rich man was concerned about his future salvation, whether he would ‘go to heaven’ or not. In order to motivate himself, he asked God to give him a preview of heaven and hell, and God agreed. God said that they would first pay a visit to hell. When they got there the man was greatly surprised. He was brought into a sumptuous dining room of a large restaurant all decorated in red and gold. In the centre was a large round table and on it were the most exotic and delicious dishes that could be envisioned. Around the table were seated the diners. They were the most miserable-looking group one could imagine, all sitting there motionless and in silence just looking at the beautiful food in front of them. The reason for their glumness was that they had been given utensils which were three feet long! There was no way they could get any of the food into their mouths. And they were going to sit there like that for eternity. That was hell!

God then brought the man to heaven. Again he was amazed. Because they were in an identical banquet room, with the same kind of table and the same wonderful food. But everybody was in the highest spirits. The sound of laughter rang out everywhere. They were really enjoying themselves and the meal. Was this because they had the normal length utensils? No! Theirs were also three-feet long, but here everyone was reaching out food to serve people on the opposite side of the table—that was heaven.

It is a very good illustration of today’s Gospel. When everyone serves, everyone is served. When everyone gives, everyone gets. It is a lesson even we Christians seem to find difficult to learn.

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