Daily Retreat 07/18/06
2006 Jul 18 Tue: Ordinary Weekday/ Camillus de Lellis, p
Is 7: 1-9/ Ps 47(48): 2-3a. 3b-4. 5-6. 7-8/ Mt 11: 20-24
From today’s readings: “Unless your faith is firm you shall not be firm!... God upholds His city for ever.... Jesus began to reproach the towns where most of His mighty deeds had been done, since they had not repented.”
Missing the Boat
How amazing that, in spite of His miracles, in spite of the patent wisdom of His teaching, in spite of the living love that emanated from Jesus, so many people of His day and place found reasons to not believe in Him, to ignore Him, and even to persecute Him.
Jesus warned that there would be dire consequences for rejecting His call to repentance. For the sake of comparison, Jesus mentioned that the pagan peoples in Tyre and Sidon would have responded more enthusiastically to Him than did the Jewish towns of Chorazin and Bethsaida, and even the sinful city of Sodom would have recognized the miracles of Jesus and their implications better than Capernaum, which was the veritable base of Christ’s operations in Galilee.
Today, nothing is left of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum, except a few archeological ruins. But the fate of the towns is inconsequential - what matters most is the eternal destiny of the people who lived there!
Some of the cities and nations of our time will no longer exist, either, after a few hundred years. And none of them will last beyond the day of judgment! But each one of us, and all the past, present and future people of every city and country will come before Christ one day, to undergo judgment on the basis of the response to grace received....
Is 7: 1-9/ Ps 47(48): 2-3a. 3b-4. 5-6. 7-8/ Mt 11: 20-24
From today’s readings: “Unless your faith is firm you shall not be firm!... God upholds His city for ever.... Jesus began to reproach the towns where most of His mighty deeds had been done, since they had not repented.”
Missing the Boat
How amazing that, in spite of His miracles, in spite of the patent wisdom of His teaching, in spite of the living love that emanated from Jesus, so many people of His day and place found reasons to not believe in Him, to ignore Him, and even to persecute Him.
Jesus warned that there would be dire consequences for rejecting His call to repentance. For the sake of comparison, Jesus mentioned that the pagan peoples in Tyre and Sidon would have responded more enthusiastically to Him than did the Jewish towns of Chorazin and Bethsaida, and even the sinful city of Sodom would have recognized the miracles of Jesus and their implications better than Capernaum, which was the veritable base of Christ’s operations in Galilee.
Today, nothing is left of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum, except a few archeological ruins. But the fate of the towns is inconsequential - what matters most is the eternal destiny of the people who lived there!
Some of the cities and nations of our time will no longer exist, either, after a few hundred years. And none of them will last beyond the day of judgment! But each one of us, and all the past, present and future people of every city and country will come before Christ one day, to undergo judgment on the basis of the response to grace received....
posted by FrPitstick | 7/17/2006
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