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A team of 200 priests comment on daily Gospel

200 priests comment on daily Gospel

Contemplating today's Gospel

Today's Gospel + homily (in 300 words)

Tuesday 14th in Ordinary Time

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1^st Reading (Gen 32:22-32): In the course of the night, Jacob arose, took his two wives, with the two maidservants and his eleven children, and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. After he had taken them across the stream and had brought over all his possessions, Jacob was left there alone. Then some man wrestled with him until the break of dawn. When the man saw that he could not prevail over him, he struck Jacob's hip at its socket, so that the hip socket was wrenched as they wrestled. The man then said, «Let me go, for it is daybreak». But Jacob said, «I will not let you go until you bless me». The man asked, «What is your name?». He answered, «Jacob». Then the man said, «You shall no longer be spoken of as Jacob, but as Israel, because you have contended with divine and human beings and have prevailed». Jacob then asked him, «Do tell me your name, please». He answered, «Why should you want to know my name?». With that, he bade him farewell. Jacob named the place Peniel, «because I have seen God face to face», he said, «yet my life has been spared». At sunrise, as he left Penuel, Jacob limped along because of his hip. That is why, to this day, the children of Israel do not eat the sciatic muscle that is on the hip socket, inasmuch as Jacob's hip socket was struck at the sciatic muscle.

Responsorial Psalm: 16

R/. In justice, I shall behold your face, o Lord.

Hear, o Lord, a just suit; attend to my outcry; hearken to my prayer from lips without deceit.

From you let my judgment come; your eyes behold what is right. Though you test my heart, searching it in the night, though you try me with fire, you shall find no malice in me.

I call upon you, for you will answer me, o God; incline your ear to me; hear my word. Show your wondrous mercies, o savior of those who flee from their foes.

Hide me in the shadow of your wings. I in justice shall behold your face; on waking, I shall be content in your presence.

Versicle before the Gospel (Jn 10:14): Alleluia. I am the good shepherd, says the Lord; I know my sheep, and mine know me. Alleluia.

Gospel text (Mt 9,32-38): Some people brought to Jesus a man who was dumb because he was possessed by a demon. When the demon was driven out, the dumb man began to speak. The crowds were astonished and said, «Nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel». (But the Pharisees said, «He drives away demons with the help of the prince of demons»).

Jesus went around all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the Kingdom, and He cured every sickness and disease. When He saw the crowds he was moved with pity, for they were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. Then He said to his disciples, «The harvest is abundant but the workers are only few. Ask the master of the harvest to send workers to gather his harvest».

«Ask the master of the harvest to send workers to gather his harvest»

Fr. Joan SOLÀ i Triadú (Girona, Spain)

Today, the Gospel speaks of the man who was dumb because he was possessed, and of how his healing provoked different reactions between the crowd and the Pharisees who, in the face of prodigious evidence, nobody could deny, they attributed it to devilish powers «He drives away demons with the help of the prince of demons» (Mt 9:34). Instead, the crowd marvels: «Nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel» (Mt 9:33). When referring to this passage St. John Chrysostom, says: «What the Pharisees truly resented was the crowds were considering Jesus superior, not only to those existing then, but to all that had ever existed».

However, the Pharisees' animadversion did not worry Jesus in the least; He faithfully went on with his mission. Not only, but before the evidence those Israel guides, instead of looking after their flock and shepherd it, what they did was to mislay it, Jesus felt sorry for those tired and depressed crowds without a true shepherd to look after them. That crowds are grateful for a good leadership and yearn for it, can be appreciated when we looked at the pastoral visits of St. John Paul II to the different places in the world. How he manages to gather immense crowds around him! How they listen to him, particularly our youth! And this, despite the Pope does not make discounts, for he preaches the Gospel with all its requirements.

St. Josemaria Escriva says: «If we should be consequent with our faith, when we look around us and contemplate the scenery of history and our world, we could not but feel that, the same feelings that animated Jesus' heart, are also invading ours», which would take us to a very generous apostolic task. But the disproportion amongst the crowds waiting for the preaching of the Good News of the Kingdom of God and the scarcity of ready workers to preach it, is quite evident. At the end of the text of the Gospel, though, Jesus gives us the solution: to ask the master of the harvest to send workers to his fields (cf. Mt 9:38).