Sixteenth Sunday In Ordinary Time, July 21, 2013

Written by Fr. Fitz Friday, 19 July 2013 08:52

“Jesus entered a village where a woman named Martha, welcomed him.”

Today’s Gospel: LK 10:38

Is not the word “Welcome!” one of the great words of our language? It is also a favorite word of Scripture; we encounter it both in today’s first reading, as well as in today’s Gospel.

In the picture above, Fitz and Rosemary are welcomed at a “safe house,” a warm place of hospitality by John and Anna O’Connor and their dog Finley, for Balderdash.

Bachelors like me need “safe houses” where they can escape from bachelor pads.

When I was “confined” to the all male St. Paul Seminary, Rosemary’s house was a safe house for me and many Omaha seminarians on our infrequent days off.

And Jesus also was a bachelor!

Read more: Sixteenth Sunday In Ordinary Time, July 21, 2013

Fifteenth Sunday In Ordinary Time, July 14, 2013

Written by Fr. Fitz Friday, 12 July 2013 09:11

THE PARABLE OF THE GOOD SAMARITAN:

if Jesus were to tell this parable in today's terms, it might go this way:

"An undocumented immigrant was going down the road-"

(They are hated like the Samaritans were in the time of Jesus.)

An Anglo white guy, victim of a hit and run lies there.

A Tea Party activist passes by and says, "he looks poor, let him raise himself up by his own bootstraps!"

A Catholic pro-life activist passes by: "I am too busy. I am on my way to a Pro-life Rally.""

So the immigrant picks up the white guy and takes him to the emergency ward.

Well something like that happened in our Tea Party dominated House of Representatives: they removed Food stamps for the hungry poor from the Farm Bill but kept all kinds of subsidies for large corporate farm companies which amounts to corporate welfare. They will get around to food stamps later when they can really slash them . After all, the hungry poor, many of whom are children, "they can lift themselves up by their own bootstraps!" And so the hungry poor are left by the roadside, the victims of a "hit and run" by A speeding Tea Party bus.

in the meantime Rupert Murdoch, the billionaire Father of Tea Partism is leaving his third wife by the roadside.

Breakfast Question: Good food? What have I done lately for the hungry poor?

Personal Reflection: What have I told my congressman lately?

Who am I in the modern Good Samaritan story? 

July 7, 2013 14th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Written by Fr. Fitz Friday, 05 July 2013 13:25

Read more: July 7, 2013 14th Sunday in Ordinary Time

June 29, 2013, Saints Peter and Paul

Written by Fr. Fitz Friday, 28 June 2013 08:34

Imagine if Jesus went walking along the shore in Lousiana, and several cajuns fishermen were there, mending their nets.  Jesus looks at them and says, Follow me! And they do. That's the way it was with Peter, and that day that had begun like just an ordinary fishing day became like no other!

And what if in our day Jesus appeared to a terrorist like the Boston bombers and asked, "why are you persecuting me?" That is the way it was with Saul who was a terrorist in his day on the road to Damascus to deal havoc to the Christians there.

Paul's conversion journey would eventually take him to Rome. Today his bones rest beneath the altar of the Church of St. Paul outside the Walls.

Peter's amazing journey woul also lead to Rome. There in 1950 workmen excavating beneath the high altar, burst into a first century Roman road just below. There they discovered an ancient tomb with grafiti indicating they were venerating the tomb of Peter the Apostle. Peter and Paul are the yang and yang of the apostles: Peter a small businessman: fisherman, and Paul, highly educated Pharisee, and citizen of Rome.

Yet each of them were pliable to amazing grace and great change in their lives....Breakfast Question: Are you pliable to change? Personal Reflection: Are you more like Peter...or Paul?