The Friar Factor

Blessed are the poor, the hungry, the weeping, the hated and the insulted. But what does this mean? It seems rather odd, if we do not properly reflect on this passage from the Gospel of Luke. How can we say that we are blessed because we are poor? How can we say that those who hunger are blessed, or that God looks favorably on those who are persecuted for believing in him?
To really understand this passage, we have to look at the context in which Jesus is speaking. Jesus was speaking to a crowd of Hebrews, and their concept of blessing is not a divine pat on the back, but rather an opportunity to encounter God. The Beatitudes are the true sense of the word blessing, because they bring us happiness, a happiness that we can only experience when we encounter God, face to face in our every day life. The word beatitude actually means happy, a happiness that flows directly from God into our lives.
Blessed are the poor, the kingdom of God is yours. If we go through life like this is the final stop, like this is all that there is, then we have a problem. When our lives are lived trying to selfishly gain all that we can, with out consideration for the needy, the oppressed and marginalized then how can we expect to enter the kingdom? If we can not bring ourselves to be poor in the sense of putting ourselves AFTER our obligation to bring Jesus to those who need Jesus the most then how can we expect to be hear from God “well done good and faithful servant, enter into your heavenly reward” Jesus also says But woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your consolation. If your heaven is found here on earth, then what are we looking forward to? If we do not see something waiting for us after this temporary stay here on earth then we need to reevaluate what true wealth is, it is not riches here on earth that will get us into heaven, but riches of God’s grace and love found in our heart that will prove to be most valuable in our lives.
Blessed are those who hunger, you will be satisfied. Jesus is not talking about physical hunger, though he has proven himself in that matter as well through the multiplication of the loaves and fishes. BUT we are called to hunger for something deeper, something that will not pass, and something that will nourish us in every aspect of our lives. We must hunger for righteousness, for justice, we must hunger to be saints. You know, coaches tell the players on their teams, that they should want to win so bad they should taste it. Well, we should want to be God’s so bad, we should taste it, God’s presence in our lives should leave a proverbial sweet taste in our mouth. Therefore, blessed are we because we find God in our midst when we truly hunger for him. But he continues, Woe to you who are filled now for you will be hungry. If we do not have any room in our hearts to be open to receiving God, then our spiritual life will come to a screeching halt, and when that happens our relationship with God is in grave danger. We must not be filled with the things of the world that are like plaque in our spiritual arteries, blocking the flow of God’s graces in our lives, but our lives must allow God’s grace to flow freely, which is vital to our journey towards our heavenly reward.
Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude and insult you, and denounce your name as evil on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice and leap for joy on that day! You must be thinking he can’t be serious. We should be happy when we are hated and insulted because of our faith? YES, and it has been that way for 2000 years. Martyrs even up to this century have given witness, which is what the word martyr means, in Greek μάρτεριον means “to give witness”. Blessed are we who are persecuted for our beliefs, because that means we are doing something right! If we are half as unwavering about our belief in God as Society is adamant in not needing God, then our message is guaranteed to change the lives of those who we come in contact with. Hopefully we will put all our efforts into making our belief known, because we are all called to be witnesses, maybe not to suffer physically as the martyrs have done over the ages, but to at least be willing to defend our faith as best as we can, when ever we can.
The first reading today spells out for us in no uncertain terms our responsibility as Christians Cursed is the one who trusts in human beings, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the LORD. So blessed are you if you accept God, trust in God, and see his presence among you, but God help you, literally when we reject God. Why? Because he has made the ultimate sacrifice for us, and he asks us to give him our undivided devotion, to be his in every moment of our lives. We are called to look at our lives in a new way, to listen to all of Jesus’ characteristics of one who is blessed, and evaluate our lives of how well we fit into that mold. If we do not see ourselves fitting into the mold, remember we are clay in the hands of God, the potter of our lives, and we must be willing to be molded into the Christian that we are called to be. Allow your lives to be molded so that when you look at your life, you can say I am blessed, because I see God is very present in my life. Once we can say that about our lives, we can be even more confident in hearing the words of Jesus from the Gospel Behold your reward will be great in heaven.
May God, who calls us all to find our happiness in him, give you his peace!

The Following is my homily from the 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time, 2007:

You may have heard in past homilies about “Little Johnny”, but we have not heard too much about his little brother Mikey. One day Johnny and Mikey were sitting at the breakfast table enjoying their favorite breakfast, French Toast, after gorging themselves they looked up at the plate in the center of the table with wide eyes, looked at each other, and immediately started to fight about who should get the last piece. Johnny and Mikey’s mother stopped their fight and said, “now boys, if Jesus was here, he would say to the other, you take the last piece.” Johnny and Mikey looked at each other, waiting, finally Mikey spoke up, and smiling lovingly at his brother he said “Johnny, you be Jesus.”
Our readings today at Mass are full of little helps, encouragements and admonitions about our life as Christians, our life as followers of Jesus.
The first reading in today’s Mass tells us, that God is our strength, he is our fortress in our times of distress. In the face of upset and in times that we seem to lose hope, the book of Jeremiah reminds us GOD IS THERE WITH US. He tells us this in no uncertain terms, when we are standing before a discouraging situations “Be not crushed on their account, as though I would leave you crushed before them”. And when we have to make the decision between sin and rightousness, and we know that we have to make these decisions CONSTANTLY God tells us again, “They will fight against you but not prevail over you, for I am with you to deliver you.” Where else can we find such encouragement? Where else can we find such love? We find it perfectly in God, but we have to be instruments of that love as well.
St. Paul writes to the Corinthians, one of the earliest communities that St. Paul we a Spiritual leader to and tells the citizens of Corinth the message of God, which is LOVE. This love is not just some unreachable ideal that we are being told about, but a goal that we MUST strive to reach, a love that eliminates from our world prejudice, hate, violence and countless other atrocities, which we hear about every day. This love that St. Paul tells the Corinthians about is our PERSONAL invitation to be Jesus to everyone around us. We have all heard this reading several times I am sure. “Love is patient, love is kind, It is not jealous, it is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests,it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things,hopes all things, endures all things.” An important question to ask ourselves when we hear any passage from the Bible is: how does this relate to me? How can I put this into practice to make myself, my family, my community, my country and my world a better place? It is easy to put this passage into practice, every time you hear the word “love” put in the pronoun “I”, and we get this: “I am Patient, I am kind, I am not jealous, I am not pompous, I am not inflated, I am not rude, I do not seek, my own interests, I am not quick-tempered, I do not brood over injury, I do not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoice with the truth, etc.” If we can honestly say that this sounds like us, then we are on the road to perfection, the road to the heavenly banquet. Most likely, we can not say that this is us 100%, which is normal, so what do we do about that? We work harder; we try every day to become more of who we say we are.
When we try to show love to other people no matter where we go, our world is bound to become a better place. BUT when it seems to just not be taking, when despite our best efforts, we just can not see a noticeable difference in society, we MUST NOT lose hope. Our society is not used to love and affection, we can see that just by turning on the TV, so we will meet opposition in our efforts, because we are being counter-cultural. Sound familiar? It should, Jesus was also counter-cultural, and he met opposition, in the gospel we hear about that opposition: “They rose up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town had been built, to hurl him down headlong. But Jesus passed through the midst of them and went away.” Jesus is love to everyone he met, yet they still put him up there, on the cross, but he did not see that as defeat, but saw it as the greatest opportunity to love. When all seems like it is falling apart around us, trust in God, he is our fortress and stronghold, when all seems to be hatred and war in the world, LOVE harder than you ever have, and when someone is reaching out to us looking for a smile and a helping hand, let us respond to little Mikey’s message: “YOU BE JESUS.”