Author Archives: Friar Musings

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About Friar Musings

Franciscan friar and Catholic priest at St. Francis of Assisi in Triangle, VA

Some Context about the End

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This coming Sunday is the 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Lectionary Cycle C. Two Sundays ago was the encounter with Zacchaeus in Jericho (Luke 19:1-10). This followed by Jesus’ parable of the ten gold coins (19:11-27) and Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem and the events of Palm Sunday (v.28). What follows has been a series of confrontations with the Jerusalem authorities in the Temple, an example of which was the previous Sunday gospel in which the Sadducees confronted Jesus around the topic of resurrection. The confrontation now shifts to the future tense. The extended dialogue concerns the:

  • coming persecutions and destruction of the Temple (21:5-19), our gospel reading;
  • destruction of the Jerusalem (21:20-24); and
  • coming of the Son of Man (21:25-36).

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The Power of the Resurrection

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One of the things that has ever been true for the whole of history is that the tyrant always holds out death as the final word. They hold the power of death and depend on our fear of it. They yield the specter of death to bend us to their will. You see it in the dictatorial rule of strongarm dictators using death squads to disappear enemies and their associates. You see it in the bombing of civilian infrastructure, utilities, and housing. A reign of terror so that whoever is not killed in the onslaught, will face the terror of a Ukrainian winter without shelter or heat. As ballistic missiles continue to fall, it adds to the toll of death and despair.  The tyrant presents the such power as ultimate and the resulting death as the end. Continue reading →

Self-sufficient

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The first reading for today is from St. Paul’s Letter to the Philippians he mentions one of the value: self-sufficiency: “I have learned, in whatever situation I find myself, to be self-sufficient. I know indeed how to live in humble circumstances; I know also how to live with abundance. In every circumstance and in all things I have learned the secret of being well fed and of going hungry, of living in abundance and of being in need.” (Philippians 4:11-12) Continue reading →

Along the way

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This coming Sunday is the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Lectionary Cycle C. In yesterday’s post completed our thoughts about the Resurrection and addressed the “real question” being debated by the Sadducees: the authority to interpret Scripture. But along the way, there is a statement Jesus makes that we did not address: “The children of this age marry and remarry; but those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage.” (Luke 20:34-35) Does this mean that Christians shouldn’t get married and have children?

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God of the Living and the Dead

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This coming Sunday is the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Lectionary Cycle C. In yesterday’s post we touched on the Sadducees’ belief that there is no afterlife. We pointed out that their belief was rooted in an assumption that there was no possibility of a life that was different from the one experienced here on earth. As well, we pointed out that even among people who believed in life after death there was a tendency to see it as an indefinite prolongation of this life. Today we will continue that line of thought. Continue reading →

Blessings

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Once we have honored our dearly departed with a funeral, a heart-felt eulogy and a gathering of friends, we settled into our on-going lives. For many that means finding a new normal.  In time, stories arise that were not part of the eulogy. When I was growing up, these later stories were told on the porch, in the small gatherings of family and friends. They were told on benches, told to the rhythm of a rocking chair, told in love, and sometimes ending with “God bless their heart.” Continue reading →

The Real Question

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This coming Sunday is the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Lectionary Cycle C. In yesterday’s post we considered the identity of the Sadducees and their resistance to the idea of Resurrection. Today we pick up the dialogue between Jesus and the Sadducees.

“Teacher, Moses wrote for us, ‘If someone’s brother dies leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother.’ 29 Now there were seven brothers; the first married a woman but died childless. 30 Then the second 31 and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died childless. 32 Finally the woman also died. 33 Now at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had been married to her.”

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Known and Unknown

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Today we celebrate, remember, and honor all the saints, known and unknown.  Back in the earliest days of the Church, martyrs were especially esteemed. The local church celebrated the anniversary of a martyr’s death in the name of Christ – on the anniversary date and in the place of martyrdom – it was all part of what people just knew. By the 4th century the list of martyrs was much longer and the Church was caught between its desire to remember and celebrate the martyr’s witness and death, an ever expanding geography, and the practical matter of finding days to set aside to celebrate. Very soon there was a movement to find a common day to celebrate martyrs that were important to the Church while leaving the local communities to set aside days for martyrs that loomed larger in local memory. Continue reading →

All Saints Day with the saints

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During the first 300 year of the Christian church, the people of God endured periods of peace, but also extended periods of persecution. Especially in the local churches, each generation remembered the martyrs and the leaders who exemplified the faith. By the fourth century these women and men were honored in liturgies that commemorated their passing into God’s bright glory. In time, churches were named to honor their memory, sometimes even built on their tombs. And in time relics were collected and honored. Continue reading →

The Sadducees and Resurrection

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This coming Sunday is the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Lectionary Cycle C. The gospel addresses questions on Resurrection through a dialogue between Jesus and some Sadducees “those who deny that there is a resurrection.” (Luke 20:27). In yesterday’s post we considered the many Lucan passages that lay between the encounter with Zacchaeus (31st Sunday) and our gospel for the 32nd Sunday. Today’s post introduces the Sadducees and that they did not believe in the resurrection. Both of these ideas need some background. Continue reading →