Tuesday of the Twenty Second Week in Ordinary Time

Readings for Tuesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time[1][2]
Readings from the Jerusalem Bible

Commentary:

Reading 1: 1 Corinthians 2:10b-16

St. Paul continues his discourse on Christian Wisdom and perfection in the spirit. In this passage he talks about the discernment of things of the spirit and how Christian Wisdom allows the faithful to discern the will of God (…no one knows what pertains to God except the Spirit of God.”). This “will of God” seems foolish to human wisdom (“…him it is foolishness”). The Christian, however, has access to the Wisdom of God and is guided by it. (“But we have the mind of Christ.”)

Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 145:8-9, 10-11, 12-13ab, 13cd-14
R. The Lord is just in all his ways.

Psalm 145 is a hymn of praise. These strophes (because it is in the acrostic form – each verse beginning with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet) although loosely assembled, praise God for his mercy and compassion and give thanks for His creation and redemption. There is also a subtle link the Christian Wisdom that comes with putting on the mind of Christ.

Gospel: Luke 4:31-37

This passage from St. Luke’s Gospel begins a series of events around Capernaum that expand his public image from prophet to teacher, exorcist, healer and proclaimer of God’s kingdom. Here he commands an evil spirit which asks him if he has come to destroy evil. It is interesting that the Spirit uses the Lords full name, perhaps in an attempt to control him. Instead the Lord commands the evil spirit and it leaves, amazing the crowd and spreading his fame in the region.

Reflection:

As we see the power of Jesus deal with the spirit of evil in Capernaum, we cannot help reflecting upon the power available to us if we can put on the “mind of Christ”. Tapping into the Holy Spirit dwelling within us at a very high level is something that happens once in a while for most of us. The Saints seemed to have much freer access.

When we open our minds to the wisdom of Christ, we are given a reflexive ability to love ourselves and others in a totally unique way. We “naturally” do the right thing. It is that “mind of Christ” all his followers seek to manifest. If we see a person instantly and unflinchingly take the Christ-like action in situations, do we not think of that person as a great Christian, someone we would like to emulate, just as we try to understand and emulate Christ Himself?

Assuming that putting on the “mind of Christ” is something we all strive for, how can we come closer to doing that? Let us use the analogy of a great athlete.

1.) To be an Olympic Athlete on first must have natural ability, something given by God alone. We have each been given our natural ability; the Holy Spirit was placed within us at Baptism and sealed in Confirmation. Ability alone is not enough.

2.)The Athlete must train the mind and body. The actions that allow the athlete to compete at the highest levels must be practiced to such a degree that the body takes, without thinking, the exact action necessary to win in the competition. For the Christian, like the athlete, training is the hardest part of what is done. Only the tiniest fraction of time an athlete spends is in actual competition. For the Christian training is also something we spend a majority of our time doing. We first must know the rule book (the Old Testament serves a large part of this function). We also must understand how the rules must be applied (That’s were the New Testament comes in). We then must prepare mentally (all athletes do this in one way or another – for the Christian this is prayer, meditation, and contemplation.) Finally we must practice our craft, apply our beliefs.

3.)All serious athletes have coaches, in many cases several coaches. The Christian, serious about the competition should also enlist the help of a coach. Someone who knows the technical issues; that has been involved in the competition for longer and knows what is required to perform at the highest level. This is generally our spiritual leader – for most that is the pastor (he of course is coached as well and accountable to a higher body which interprets the rules for him – in the Catholics case this would be the hierarchy of the Church). A serious contender might also employ a Spiritual Director to prepare for some of the more subtle aspects of the competition.

4.)For the athlete the actual competition takes place at a specified place in a specified environment. That is were our analogy breaks down slightly – for the Christian, the competition takes place at any point in time. The Evil One, with whom we compete, does not follow any rules, attacks through others and attacks interiorly, from within ourselves. We do not even have the luxury of private training time – the Evil One may attack even there.

Today we take stock of our own participation in this competition. We ask ourselves how much effort are we willing to put into our preparation and training. It is only with the greatest effort that we can hope to put on the mind of Christ.

Pax
[1] After Links to Readings Expire
[2] The picture used today is “St. Paul” by Domenico Beccafumi, 1515
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