26th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B) - 29 September
29th September 2024
“This, then, is our task: to educate both ourselves and our children in godliness; otherwise what answer will we have before Christ’s judgement-seat?” - St John Chrysostom
A reflection on today's Gospel by the Venerable Archbishop Fulton J Sheen:
"It is one of the curious anomalies of present-day civilisation that when man achieves greatest control over nature, he has the least control over himself. The great boast of our age is our domination of the universe: we have harnessed the waterfalls, made the wind a slave to carry us on wings of steel, and squeezed from the earth the secret of its age. Yet, despite this mastery of nature, there perhaps never was a time when man was less a master of himself. He is equipped like a veritable giant to control the forces of nature, but is as weak as a pigmy to control the forces of his passions and inclinations.
"If, indeed, this life is a vale of character making, and if it involves conflict with those forces and powers which would drag us away from our ideals, then it behooves us to realise that the truest conquest is self-conquest, that true progress may more properly consist in mastering our rampant impulses and selfish desires, than in mastering the winds and seas. But this conquest of self cannot be attained except by a struggle which in Christian language is mortification. Mortification means dying to live for the love of God.
"First of all, it means dying to live. It is a law of nature and grace that a higher life is purchased only by dying to a lower one, or that we live to the life of the spirit and the Kingdom of God only by dying to this world, with its flesh and its concupiscence. Recall the tremendous emphasis which our Blessed Lord placed upon this aspect of mortification - words which we but rarely hear in these milk and water Christianities of our day. 'Amen, Amen, I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falling to the ground die, itself remaineth alone. But if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit … Enter you in at the narrow gate, for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate and straight is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it. ... If any man will come after Me let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. ... If any man come to Me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. . . . And if thy hand scandalise thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into unquenchable fire; where the worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished. And if thy foot scandalise thee, cut it off. It is better for thee to enter lame into life everlasting than having two feet to be cast into the hell of unquenchable fire; where the worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished. And if thy eye scandalise thee, pluck it out. It is better for thee with one eye to enter into the kingdom of God, than having two eyes to be cast into the hell of fire; where the worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished. . . The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away. . . . For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but he that shall lose his life for My sake shall save it.'
"These warnings sound strange to our lives, moulded so often on the assumption that this life is the only one we can be sure of, and hence, while we have it, we should eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die. They sometimes are dismissed with a shrug of the shoulders, as if such suggestions belonged to the past and should have no part in our modern life of ease and luxury. The law of mortification, which consists in dying to live, is one of the fundamental laws of life and one which cannot be ignored by anyone who knows the meaning and purpose of life.
"Glance over the various levels of creation, the chemical, the plant, the animal, the human order and see how well verified is the law that a higher life is purchased only by death to a lower life.
"In like manner, if a man is ever to enter into the higher life of Christ and man has no right to say there is no higher life than his own any more than a rose has a right to say there is no higher life than it - if he is ever to enjoy communion with Him, so as to have the blood of God running in his veins and the spirit of God throbbing in his soul, he must die to the lower life of the flesh. Aye, he must be born again, for unless a man is born to that life of God by a death to the lower life of nature, he cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven. And hence the law of Calvary is the law of every Christian: unless there is the Cross there will never be the resurrection, unless there is the defeat of Calvary there will never be the victory of Easter, unless there are the nails there will never be the glorious wounds, unless there is the garment of scorn, there will never be the robes blazing like the sun, unless there is the crown of thorns there will never be the halo of light, unless there is the descent into the grave there will never be the Ascension, for the law laid down at the beginning of time which shall be effective until time shall be no more, is that no one shall be crowned unless he has struggled and overcome, and no one shall enjoy the life of God until he has died to his selfish self. But in this surrender of the lower life, let it not be thought that mortification is a sign of weakness; rather it is a sign of power: it is the will controlling itself, submitting itself to defeat at its own hands, in order to win its finest victory; it is the making of the dead self a steppingstone to better things and the conquest of self the condition of the victory which brings everlasting peace and joy with God.
"But mortification means not only dying to live. Its fullest meaning embraces also its inspiration, which is love, for the difference between pain and sacrifice is love. Love is the soul of sacrifice. The day that man forgets that love is identical with sacrifice, that day he will ask how a God of love could demand mortification and self-denial. Hence, whenever and wherever there is an intense and passionate love of Christ and Him Crucified, sacrifice involved in crushing anything which keeps one away from Him is not felt pain but the sweetest kind of love, for what is pain but sacrifice without love."
(The Moral Universe – A Preface to Christian Living)
Prayer for Avoiding Sin
Heavenly Father, please hear the prayers I offer from a contrite heart. Have pity on me as I acknowledge my sins. Lead me back to the way of holiness. Protect me now and always from the wounds of sin. May I ever keep safe in all its fullness the gift Your love once gave me and Your mercy now restores.
Jesus, pour Your Precious Blood over me, my body, mind, soul, and spirit; my conscious and sub-conscious; my intellect and will; my feelings, thoughts, emotions and passions; my words and actions; my vocation, my relationships, family, friends and possessions. Protect with Your Precious Blood all other activities of my life. Lord, I dedicate all of these things to You, and I acknowledge You as Lord and Master of all.
Mary, Immaculate Conception, pure and holy Virgin Mother of Our Lord Jesus Christ, draw me under Your veil; guard me and shield me against all attacks and temptations that would violate the virtue of chastity.
Lord Jesus Christ, I beg You for the grace to remain guarded beneath the protective mantle of Mary, surrounded by the holy briar from which was taken the Holy Crown of Thorns, and saturated with Your Precious Blood in the power of the Holy Spirit, with our Guardian Angels for the greater glory of the Father. Amen. 🙏💐💖