The Gospel for Tuesday of the eighth week in Ordinary Time is taken from Mark 10:28 to the 31st verse. Peter began to say to Jesus, we have given up everything and followed you. Jesus said, amen. I say to you, there is no one who has given up houses or brothers or sisters or. Or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and for the sake of the gospel who will not receive a hundred times more. Now in this present age, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands with persecutions and eternal life in the age to come.

But many that are first will be last and the last will be first. Jesus is giving his disciples a radically new message which flies in the face of so many things that everyone believed. And we know that when we take on some new vision of life, different from our family of origin, different from the people all around us, we’re going to experience persecution, rejection. And with Jesus warning his disciples, don’t let that be in any way, shape or form anything that would keep you from doing what I’m telling you. Because the community that you’re called to is so much more than those that have formed you in the past. Those that are being created anew through this message will make your new community and it will reach everyone.

Closing PRAYER Father, we seek approval from people. We want them to agree with us. But so much that you teach us is different and help us to be so convinced of your truth that it just resonates from us and gives people a direction to follow. And we ask this in Jesus name. Amen. May God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit bless you and keep you in his love.