Next Sunday is Lent. This Sunday’s gospel could well be a good teaching to usher us into Lent. It reveals Jesus’ remarkable understanding of the human heart and soul. The gospel contains three periscopes and opens with: ‘Can a blind person guide a blind person? Will not both fall into a pit’ (Lk 6:39). We may ponder Jesus’ question with: Who, then, is one who sees? More specifically, who is one who truly sees his or her neighbor? And Jesus gives us this reply using a metaphor: ‘Why do you notice the splinter in your brother or sister’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own?’ (Lk 6:41). How do we come to truly see another person? The key in the parable says that we must first look inwardly at our own heart, at all those quick partial judgments that so quickly rule how we see and how we engage another person.
Jesus’ Sermon on the Mountain, with His famous Blessings, is usually associated with the Evangelist Matthew, who gives the most elaborated version. But also Luke has his version. According to Luke, Jesus is rather descending into a valley – or at least towards ‘a stretch of level ground’. Though being closer to the earth, it is especially Luke who stresses the hereafter. Jesus speaks his consolation words to all those who appear to be unfortunate in this life: the poor, the hungry, the mourning and the suppressed.
In 1858 a young, simple and very poor girl had a series of experiences which became the origin of one of the greatest places of pilgrimage in the Christian world.
HOMILY FOR THE 5th SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YEAR C, Fr. Daniel
[Is 6:1-2a, 3-8 ; 1Cor 15:1-11 ; Lk 5:1-11]
Isaiah is called by the Lord through an overwhelming vision in the Temple. God’s majesty is ineffable. A heavenly choir of angels loudly proclaims the praise of the Almighty: ‘Holy, holy, holy!’.
[Heb 13:1-8 ; Mk 6:14-29]
King Herod is a coward with a vacillating heart. On the one hand he does have some interest in spiritual matters, on the other he is most eager to preserve his power position under all circumstances.
