My name is Don and I’ve been a Catholic priest for over 50 years. During that time, I’ve pondered these readings over and over again and have discovered something that I never saw there before. It’s given me new hope, new energy, new image of what I do and how I do it. I pray the message that I’m sending you will be equally valuable to you if you find it. So please share these podcasts with your friends. Thank you.

Good morning. Before we begin the reflections on the fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time, I’d like to just say a few words to my new listeners. For 35 plus years I’ve been on the radio in Dallas Fort Worth area, and only recently have I broadened my outreach to stations almost, well, 10 stations and also on SiriusXM. And so I’ve gone from a small audience to now over 60 million households. And that just is exciting and kind of scary at the same time, even though I feel like I’m a little guy that was used to playing bars and now I’m in a big auditorium or something as an entertainer. But anyway, my point is, I want to welcome you.

And since you don’t know much about me, it might be interesting to look at my website, pastoralreflectionsinstitute.com and if you’re interested in my background, interested in things that I do besides this radio program, it might be really helpful if you checked me out on my website. It’s all true, I promise. And anyway, that would be a way that we can begin a deeper connection. So thank you for listening. If you’re a new listener, thank you. If you’re an older listener, thank you for your support and all that you do for me and for this ministry.

Now let’s look at the fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time, the opening prayer. Grant us, Lord our God, that we may honor you with all our mind and love, everyone in truth of heart, through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen. The reading from the Old Testament is from Jeremiah 1st chapter 4 through the 5th verse and 17 through the 19th verse. The word of the Lord came to me saying, before I formed you in the womb, I knew you before you were born. I dedicated you a prophet to the nations.

I appointed you. But do you gird your loins? Stand up and tell them all that I command you, be not crushed on their account, as though I would leave you crushed before them. For it is I this day who have made you a fortified city, a Pillar of iron, a wall of brass. Against the whole land, against Judah’s kings and princes, against its priests and people, they will fight against you, but not prevail over you. For I am with you to deliver you, says the Lord, the word of the Lord.

I will sing of your salvation. In you, O Lord, I take refuge. Let me never be put to shame your justice. Rescue me and deliver me. Incline your ear to me, save me. I will sing of your salvation.

Be my rock of refuge, a stronghold, Give me safety, for you are my rock and my fortress. O my God, rescue me from the hand of the wicked. I will sing of your salvation, for you are my hope, O Lord, my trust, O Lord, from my youth on you I depend, from birth, from my mother’s womb, you are my strength. I will sing of your salvation. My mouth shall declare your justice day by day. Your salvation, O God, you have taught me.

From my youth until the present, I proclaim your wondrous deeds. I will sing of your salvation. A reading from the New Testament. From St. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, 12th chapter, 31st verse to the 13th chapter, 13th verse. Strive eagerly for the greatest spiritual gifts, but I will show you still a more excellent way.

If I speak in human tongues and angelic, but do not have love, I am a resounding gong and a clashing cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge, if I have all faith, so to move mountains, but do not have love, I’m nothing if I give away everything I own. And if I hand my body over so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. 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 interest, 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. Love never fails.

If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing. If tongues, they will cease. If knowledge, it will be brought to nothing. For we know partially, and we will prophesy partially. But when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child.

When I became a man, I put aside childish things. At present we see indistinctly as in a mirror, but then face to face. At present I know partially then I shall know fully as I am fully known. So faith, hope, love, remain these three, but the greatest of these is love. The Word of the Lord. Alleluia Verse the Lord sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives.

Hallelujah. The Gospel this Sunday is taken from St. Luke 4:21 30 Jesus began speaking in the synagogue, saying, today this scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing. And all spoke highly of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They also asked, isn’t this the son of Joseph? He said to them, surely you will quote me, the prophet.

Physician, cure yourself and say do here in your native place. The things that we heard were done in Capernaum. And he said, amen. I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own native place. Indeed, I will tell you There were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the sky was closed for three and a half years and a severe famine spread over the entire land. It was to none of these that Elijah was sent, but only to a widow in Zarephath, in the land of Sidon.

Again, there were many lepers in Israel during the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian. When the people in the synagogue heard this, they were filled with fury. 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. The Gospel of the Lord SA the beautiful thing about this opening prayer I just prayed is the way it focuses on two very, very essential things that we are called to do. And one of the things we’re called to do, first and foremost, is to be reflective, to live a reflective life, to not just allow things to be what they are on the surface, but to take some time to look deeply into what is going on in the world around us, in ourselves and the people that we love.

Pay attention. Pay attention. It was about 11 years ago that I stepped away from my active ministry. I’d been at it for a very long time, over 40 years, and I remember those years were years of wonderfully, wonderfully filled with memories and events and celebrations and struggles with my own self and with the work that I had before me. But there was something about that time where I was moving so quickly from one thing to another to another to another, and there was just one sort of focus I had in my head and that was, how can I take care of this thing right now that’s before me? And that may be, like, your life.

Some of us that are still so caught up in things that are happening, and there’s nothing. I mean, we have to be, in a sense. But the wisdom that we’re called to have, the wisdom that’s found in this opening prayer when it says so simply that there are two things that we need to do to honor God and to love with our hearts. And, you know, that seems so very simple and so very easy. But it’s to ask ourselves at times to reflect on who God is and what’s going on in the world. And how do we imagine God being some force in the world that we need to understand and to be in touch with?

How do we understand what it means to love each other? What’s our responsibility to each other? Those are things that are not easy questions. And unless we sit with them and reflect on them, them, we can’t develop the spiritual life that is our inheritance. So we start the reflections on this set of readings with that understanding. There are two very simple things.

Who is God? And what are we to do in this world in relationship to our brothers and sisters? And the first reading is so beautiful from Jeremiah because it starts off with a phrase that is so wonderful to ponder. Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. Before you were born, I dedicated you. I appointed you to the role, to the task that I want you to have.

And this is directed to a prophet. And prophets seem to be those unique people that God calls to be his voice. But we have to understand there’s a prophetic role that every believer, every human being carries by their very human nature. We are proclaiming what we believe and how we see the world without ever having to use a word about describing it. Our very actions, you know, make clear to another person who we are and what we see our role in this world to be. If we’re filled with anxiety, if we’re filled with worry, that it’s pretty clear that we don’t believe in a God who is there to take care of us and protect us, practice.

If we’re constantly competing with each other, if we’re threatened by each other’s successes, or take pride in being better than someone else, we’re really not loving like we should. So these are the two things that I think we are, again, focusing on. So the first reading gives us Jeremiah, and he’s basically saying, unless we look at this God for who he is, we’ll Miss one very essential point, role that he has, and that’s to make us a pillar of iron, a wall of brass, to be able to endure anything that comes to us. Now, I don’t know if you’re like me, but most of the time, when I get overwhelmed, like I feel like I am during this pandemic, at times confused as to what it is, what I should do to protect myself, how I should do that, whether I’ll get it or not. And truth is, last Christmas, I did get it, but had no symptoms because I’d been vaccinated and boosted. But whatever.

The point is, when those moments come, do I believe in my heart that I have this strength inside of me that is divine, and that begins with a reflection on what is divinity? And if divinity isn’t for you, some kind of sense of God’s indwelling presence, he lives inside of you. That’s the whole message of Jesus. Jesus is the incarnation of God in human beings. And Jesus remained mysteriously a fully human being and a fully divine figure in the world. And that is our destiny, to live in divinity.

And if you try to say, well, what does that mean? Then what you need to do again is to reflect on what does it mean that God dwells in me? And where does he dwell? He dwells in our hearts. And so that opening prayer, the truth of the heart, the reality of God living inside of you, guiding you, directing you, being the strength you need. And if you look for signs of that, if you look for them, that’s not where you start.

You start with a conviction that it’s true. Why? Because the story, the salvation history story, is all about that one mysterious union of divinity and humanity. So one of the ways in which we imagine this divinity inside of us is the ability that it gives us to withstand that which might throw us into darkness and depression. And it was never fully there until Jesus, until that mysterious thing called salvation. God in Jesus, saving the world from sin and from darkness.

So we see the image in this first reading that we need to look very carefully at who God is and what he’s doing within us. And it’s about giving us strength, a strength that is then empowering us. And one would think that one would want that, you know, gosh, I would love to have this strength inside of me, you know, doing what I long to do on my own, but I can’t. And so if you look at this Gospel passage, which is fascinating, about Jesus going back to his hometown as a prophet, as one who carries this message in his very Being that divinity now dwells in human beings and he proclaims it to his friends and his family in his hometown. And his reputation there might have been, as many say, not so perfect. He wasn’t the perfect man in the image of the people in the village because they knew about this marriage thing with his parents.

And it’s pretty clear that they believe that Jesus might be illegitimate and then born out of wedlock. And if that were the case, of course, that would mean that he was the outcast. So let’s just imagine, if not an outcast, he was just one of the ordinary people and he stands up in the synagogue. But he had. That’s something he did. It wasn’t like he was a layman, just got up and started talking in the microphone and said, who is this guy?

No, he’d done this many times, stood up and taught. But his message, his message was so astounding and so amazing that even though the way he said it and the beauty of the way he put things was so obvious, that he was an extraordinary teacher and preacher. And yet they heard something very, very, very different. And that was the part of them, the part of them that felt judged, I believe, because what Jesus was reading from was the prophet Isaiah. Last week we heard that reading, and basically what he was saying is, look, I’m here because you don’t really see that much. You need to see more.

So I’ve come to open your eyes. And he’s also said, many of you are living in darkness, a darkness of self centeredness, a darkness of using people, a darkness of sin, whatever, or depression. I’ve come to free you from that. So here’s a buddy that they grew up with coming in to say, I’m the one that is going to be the voice of God, and I am going to open your eyes and help you to see things and help you to be aware of your faults and. And I’m there for you. And all of a sudden, they took it in the wrong way.

I think they took it as, here’s an ordinary person who has his own faults and his own darkness, and he’s telling us that we need help and that we are dark. And they were enraged, you know, And I thought to myself, what is it in someone that is that visceral in their response to being told they need help? It’s a person living in a world of control and of fear and of hidden shame and of repressed anger. And it was triggered in that moment instead of saying, you know, I don’t really think this guy has much to say. He’s too ordinary, and let’s just walk away. No, they wanted to kill him.

They wanted to kill him. The message that you are not enough on your own can trigger in a human being an action. If they are frightened, that that is true, and they’re living as if they can handle everything on their own, and they’re very autonomous and don’t think they need anyone’s help. You’re going to get a reaction like that. And so what is that saying to us? The importance of being in union with your humanity.

It’s natural not to see. It’s natural not to be aware of the darkness that’s in you and not aware of the help that God longs to give you. And when someone points that out, you should say, my God, you’re right. Help me. Show me. And then the middle reading is so beautiful.

It says, okay, you want to know what it is that I’ve come? Jesus would be saying, if you want to know, what I’m coming to do is I’m asking you not so much to be judged, because I’m going to do something for you where I’m going to forgive you of all your sins. But he couldn’t fully say that all in that first homily in the synagogue in his hometown. But the point is that I want to make is that the thing that God has come to say in Jesus is not a condemning voice, but rather an encouraging voice that says, there’s one core thing you need to do beyond honoring me, God the Father, for giving you a destiny, for guiding you and making you exactly who you are and placing in the world exactly when you need to be there. And the only thing I want you to do for me is ask me to help you, but don’t ask. So much for spectacular gifts and powers and to be able to give the perfect homily on a Sunday morning.

I’m just kidding. It’s not to empower us to be great, but the beauty of this message is to empower you to treat each other with dignity and with an intention. And the intention is, I have been loved. I have been given something from God that gives me for the first time, insight, awareness. I feel safe because I have his strength inside of me. I feel empowered because he’s giving me the ability to do the essential thing, which is to be there for my brothers and sisters.

I have all that. That. And so that’s this incredible invitation in the part of this beautiful passage that’s probably one of the most famous passages of St. Paul when he’s saying, look, don’t strive to be extraordinary. You know, don’t strive to be better than your brothers and sisters in anything, much less the spiritual world. But do this.

Pay attention to the simplest of things. Love. Love is the essential core of what it means to carry divinity through you. If you have it inside of you, it passes through you to another person. And it’s not going to be through healing them of cancer or giving them some insight that they look at you and say, you’re the smartest, most wonderful person in the world. No, it’s going to come from the ordinariness of being in their presence with an intention flowing out of your heart.

It says, you are valuable, you are loved, you are beautiful. I want to be there for you. And that’s something that when you begin to feel it and do it, it is so satisfying. And when you think, well, what am I being strengthened to do? How am I going to see God’s strength working through me? I want to do something spectacular so that everybody says, oh, my God, God is real.

He did this miracle. No, God is real in people’s lives because the people that are claiming to be his followers, knowing him, realizing he’s inside of you, are a constant flow of energy and light that lifts us out of darkness. A light that gives us a sense of our value. What greater gift could we have? And it’s so simple, because it’s a mindset that I’m here to treat everyone as I would like to be treated. Is that that hard to do?

When you think about it, how many people will tell you about customer service and somebody treats them badly and how offensive it is, and yet we do that to other people without even realizing it. So the key in the heart of this whole thing is love. The Closing prayer. Father, your strength is so beyond ours. It’s hard for us to imagine that you would share your strength with us, but that yous will. That’s yous desire to dwell in our hearts and empower us to be who youo want, who youo want to be in the lives of the people in our circle, our family of friends.

So bless us with a conviction of faith in that gift so that our hearts are never frightened or never struggling to find something that gives us a sense of value. We have a value in being the most simple, loving, ordinary people. So give us that strength, give us that joy, and give us that peace. And we ask this in Jesus name, Amen. The original piece of music entitled Humble was composed and produced by Ryan Hartner for our program. I’d like to remind you that the program you just listened to is available on our website, pastoreflectionsinstitute.com as well as on our podcast.

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