A repentant heart prospers

October 24, 2015

Saturday of the Twenty-ninth week in Ordinary Time 

Saint of the day : Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Archbishop (1807-1870) 

Readings

Letter to the Romans 8:1-11

1Hence, now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. [1] 2For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has freed you from the law of sin and death. 3For what the law, weakened by the flesh, was powerless to do, this God has done: by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for the sake of sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, 4so that the righteous decree of the law might be fulfilled in us, who live not according to the flesh but according to the spirit.

5For those who live according to the flesh are concerned with the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the spirit with the things of the spirit. 6The concern of the flesh is death, but the concern of the spirit is life and peace. 7For the concern of the flesh is hostility toward God; it does not submit to the law of God, nor can it; 8and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

9But you are not in the flesh; on the contrary, you are in the spirit, if only the Spirit of God dwells in you. Whoever does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 10But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is alive because of righteousness.11If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also, through His Spirit that dwells in you. 

Psalms 24:1-3; 4ab; 5-6

The earth is the LORD’s and all it holds, the world and those who dwell in it. 2 For He founded it on the seas, established it over the rivers. 

3Who may go up the mountain of the LORD? Who can stand in His holy place? 

4The clean of hand and pure of heart, who has not given his soul to useless things, what is vain.

5He will receive blessings from the LORD, and justice from his saving God. 6 Such is the generation that seeks Him, that seeks the face of the God of Jacob.” 

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 13:1-9

1At that time some people who were present there told Him about the Galileans[2] whose blood Pilate had mingled with the blood of their sacrifices.[3] 2He said to them in reply, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners than all other Galileans? 3By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did! 

4Or those eighteen people who were killed when the tower at Siloam fell on them - do you think they were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem?[4] 5By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did!"  

6And He told them this parable: "There once was a person who had a fig tree planted in his orchard, and when he came in search of fruit on it but found none,[5] 7he said to the gardener, 'For three years now I have come in search of fruit on this fig tree but have found none. (So) cut it down. Why should it exhaust the soil?'

8He said to him in reply, 'Sir, leave it for this year also, and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it; 9it may bear fruit in the future. If not you can cut it down.' 

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Notes on Readings

[1] Romans 8:1-13 -  his warning in Romans 7 against the wrong route to fulfillment of the objective of holiness expressed in Romans 6:22, Paul points his addressees to the correct way. Through the redemptive work of Christ, Christians have been liberated from the terrible forces of sin and death. Holiness was impossible so long as the flesh (or our "old self"), that is, self-interested hostility toward God ( Romans 8:7) h(Romans 8:7), frustrated the divine objectives expressed in the law. What is worse, sin used the law to break forth into all manner of lawlessness (Romans 8:8). All this is now changed. At the cross God broke the power of sin and pronounced sentence on it (Romans 8:3). Christians still retain the flesh, but it is alien to their new being, which is life in the spirit, namely the new self, governed by the holy Spirit. Under the direction of the holy Spirit Christians are able to fulfill the divine will that formerly found expression in the law (Romans 8:4). The same Spirit who enlivens Christians for holiness will also resurrect their bodies at the last day (Romans 8:11). Christian life is therefore the experience of a constant challenge to put to death the evil deeds of the body through life of the spirit (Romans 8:13).

[2] Luke 13:1 - The slaughter of the Galileans by Pilate is unknown outside Luke; but from what is known about Pilate from the Jewish historian Josephus, such a slaughter would be in keeping with the character of Pilate. Josephus reports that Pilate had disrupted a religious gathering of the Samaritans on Matthew. Gerizim with a slaughter of the participants (Antiquities 18, 4, 1 #86-87), and that on another occasion Pilate had killed many Jews who had opposed him when he appropriated money from the temple treasury to build an aqueduct in Jerusalem (Jewish War 2, 9, 4 #175-77; Antiquities 18, 3, 2 #60-62).

[3] Luke 13:1-5 - The death of the Galileans at the hands of Pilate (Luke 13:1) and the accidental death of those on whom the tower fell (Luke 13:4) are presented by the Lucan Jesus as timely reminders of the need for all to repent, for the victims of these tragedies should not be considered outstanding sinners who were singled out for punishment.

[4] Luke 13:4 - Like the incident mentioned in  Luke 13:1 nothing of this accident in Jerusalem is known outside Luke and the New Testament.

[5] Luke 13:6-9 - Following on the call to repentance in Luke 13:1-5, the parable of the barren fig tree presents a story about the continuing patience of God with those who have not yet given evidence of their repentance (see Luke 3;8). The parable may also be alluding to the delay of the end time, when punishment will be meted out, and the importance of preparing for the end of the age because the delay will not be permanent (Luke 13:8-9).