6 October 2025 (Monday)
Monday of week 27 in Ordinary Time or Saint Bruno, Priest or Blessed Marie‐Rose Durocher.
Monday of the Twenty-seventh Week in Ordinary Time, Saint Bruno, Priest, Hermit, Religious Founder/ Blessed Marie-Rose Durocher, Virgin, Religious Founder.
Readings from the Bible of the Roman Catholic Church:
First Reading: Jonah 1: 1 – 2: 1-2, 11
Responsorial Psalm: Jonah 2: 3, 4, 5, 8
Alleluia: John 13: 34
Gospel: Luke 10: 25-37
First Reading : Jonah 1:1‐2:1,11
The word of the Lord was addressed to Jonah son of Amittai: ‘Up!’ he said ‘Go to Nineveh, the great city, and inform them that their wickedness has become known to me.’ Jonah decided to run away from the Lord, and to go to Tarshish. He went down to Joppa and found a ship bound for Tarshish; he paid his fare and went aboard, to go with them to Tarshish, to get away from the Lord. But the Lord unleashed a violent wind on the sea, and there was such a great storm at sea that the ship threatened to break up. The sailors took fright, and each of them called on his own god, and to lighten the ship they threw the cargo overboard. Jonah, however, had gone below and lain down in the hold and fallen fast asleep. The boatswain came upon him and said, ‘What do you mean by sleeping? Get up! Call on your god! Perhaps he will spare us a thought, and not leave us to die.’ Then they said to each other, ‘Come on, let us draw lots to find out who is responsible for bringing this evil on us.’ So they cast lots, and the lot fell to Jonah. Then they said to him, ‘Tell us, what is your business? Where do you come from? What is your country? What is your nationality?’ He replied, ‘I am a Hebrew, and I worship the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the land.’ The sailors were seized with terror at this and said, ‘What have you done?’ They knew that he was trying to escape from the Lord, because he had told them so. They then said, ‘What are we to do with you, to make the sea grow calm for us?’ For the sea was growing rougher and rougher. He replied, ‘Take me and throw me into the sea, and then it will grow calm for you. For I can see it is my fault this violent storm has happened to you.’ The sailors rowed hard in an effort to reach the shore, but in vain, since the sea grew still rougher for them. They then called on the Lord and said, ‘O Lord, do not let us perish for taking this man’s life; do not hold us guilty of innocent blood; for you, the Lord, have acted as you have thought right.’ And taking hold of Jonah they threw him into the sea; and the sea grew calm again. At this the men were seized with dread of the Lord; they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows. The Lord had arranged that a great fish should be there to swallow Jonah; and Jonah remained in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights. The Lord spoke to the fish, which then vomited Jonah on to the shore.
Responsive Psalm : Jonah 2:3‐5,8
You lifted my life from the pit, O Lord.
Out of my distress I cried to the Lord and he answered me; from the belly of Sheol I cried, and you have heard my voice.
You lifted my life from the pit, O Lord.
You cast me into the abyss, into the heart of the sea, and the flood surrounded me. All your waves, your billows, washed over me.
You lifted my life from the pit, O Lord.
And I said: I am cast out from your sight. How shall I ever look again on your holy Temple?
You lifted my life from the pit, O Lord.
While my soul was fainting within me, I remembered the Lord, and my prayer came before you into your holy Temple.
You lifted my life from the pit, O Lord.
Alleluia: John 13: 34
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
34 I give you a new commandment: love one another as I have loved you.
(31. When he had gone, Jesus said: Now has the Son of man been glorified, and in him God has been glorified.
32. If God has been glorified in him, God will in turn glorify him in himself, and will glorify him very soon.
33. Little children, I shall be with you only a little longer. You will look for me, and, as I told the Jews, where I am going, you cannot come.
34. I give you a new commandment: love one another; you must love one another just as I have loved you.
35. It is by your love for one another, that everyone will recognize you as my disciples).
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel : Luke 10:25‐37
There was a lawyer who, to disconcert Jesus, stood up and said to him, ‘Master, what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the Law? What do you read there?’ He replied, ‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself.’ ‘You have answered right,’ said Jesus ‘do this and life is yours.’ But the man was anxious to justify himself and said to Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbour?’ Jesus replied, ‘A man was once on his way down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell into the hands of brigands; they took all he had, beat him and then made off, leaving him half dead. Now a priest happened to be travelling down the same road, but when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. In the same way a Levite who came to the place saw him, and passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan traveller who came upon him was moved with compassion when he saw him. He went up and bandaged his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them. He then lifted him on to his own mount, carried him to the inn and looked after him. Next day, he took out two denarii and handed them to the innkeeper. “Look after him,” he said “and on my way back I will make good any extra expense you have.” Which of these three, do you think, proved himself a neighbour to the man who fell into the brigands‘ hands?’ ‘The one who took pity on him’ he replied. Jesus said to him, ‘Go, and do the same yourself.’
For our reflection today:
We will continue to meditate on some parables of the Gospel, which are an opportunity to change perspective and open ourselves up to hope. The lack of hope, at times, is due to the fact that we fixate on a certain rigid and closed way of seeing things, and the parables help us to look at them from another point of view.
Today I would like to talk to you about an expert, knowledgeable person, a doctor of the Law, who however needs to change his perspective, because he is concentrated on himself and does not notice others (cf. Lk 10:25-37). Indeed, he questions Jesus on the way in which eternal life is “inherited”, using an expression that intends it as an unequivocal right. But behind this question perhaps it is precisely the need for attention that is concealed: the only word he asks Jesus to explain is the term “neighbour”, which literally means he who is near.
Jesus therefore tells a parable that is a path for transforming that question, to pass from who loves me? to who has loved? The first is an immature question, the second is the question of an adult who has understood the meaning of his life. The first question is the one we ask when we sit in the corner and wait, the second is the one that drives us to set out on the path.
The parable that Jesus tells has, in fact, a road as its setting, and it is a difficult and impervious road, like life. It is the road travelled by a man going down from Jerusalem, the city on the mountain, to Jericho, the city below sea level. It is an image that already foreshadows what might happen: it happens that the man is attacked, beaten, robbed and left half dead. It is the experience that happens when situations, people, sometimes even those we have trusted, take everything from us and leave us in the middle of the road.
However, life is made up of encounters, and in these encounters, we emerge for what we are. We find ourselves in front of others, faced with their fragility and weakness, and we can decide what to do: to take care of them or pretend nothing is wrong. A priest and a Levite go down that same road. They are people who serve in the Temple of Jerusalem, who live in the sacred space. And yet, the practice of worship does not automatically lead to being compassionate. Indeed, before being a religious matter, compassion is a question of humanity! Before being believers, we are called to be human.
We can imagine that, after staying a long time in Jerusalem, that priest and that Levite are in a hurry to return home. It is indeed haste, so present in our lives, that very often prevents us from feeling compassion. Those who think that their own journey must take precedence are not willing to stop for another.
But here comes someone who is actually able to stop: he is a Samaritan, hence a person belonging to a despised people (cf. 2 Kings 17). In his case, the text does not specify the direction, but only says that he was travelling. Religiosity does not enter into this. This Samaritan simply stops because he is a man faced with another man in need of help.
Compassion is expressed through practical gestures. The Evangelist Luke ponders the actions of the Samaritan, whom we call “good”, but in the text he is simply a person: a Samaritan approaches, because if you want to help someone, you cannot think of keeping your distance, you have to get involved, get dirty, perhaps be contaminated; he binds the wounds after cleaning them with oil and wine; he loads him onto his horse, taking on the burden, because one who truly helps if one is willing to feel the weight of the other’s pain; he takes him to an inn where he spends money, “two silver coins”, more or less two days of work; and he undertakes to return and eventually pay more, because the other is not a package to deliver, but someone to care for.
Dear brothers and sisters, when will we too be capable of interrupting our journey and having compassion? When we understand that the wounded man in the street represents each one of us. And then the memory of all the times that Jesus stopped to take care of us will make us more capable of compassion.
Let us pray, then, that we can grow in humanity, so that our relationships may be truer and richer in compassion. Let us ask the Heart of Jesus for the grace increasingly to have the same feelings as him (Pope Leo XIV, General Audience, 28 May 2025).
Jonathan Fabian Ginunggil,
Most High Servant,
Jesus, Mary, Joseph Ministry of Love (Blessed and Saints and the Nine Choirs of Angels)
No comments:
Post a Comment