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It was an unhappy division that has been made between faith and works; though in my intellect I may divide them; just as in the candle I know there is both light and heat: but yet put out the candle, and they are both gone.
- John Selden (1584-1654), Table-Talk
(Faith and works, light and heat: how do you experience this connection in your life?)
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2 PT 1:2-7; PS 91:1-2, 14-15B, 15C-16
MK 12:1-12
Jesus began to speak to the chief priests, the
scribes,
and the elders in parables.
"A man planted a vineyard, put a hedge around it,
dug a wine press, and built a tower.
Then he leased it to tenant farmers and left on a journey.
At the proper time he sent a servant to the tenants
to obtain from them some of the produce of the vineyard.
But they seized him, beat him,
and sent him away empty-handed.
Again he sent them another servant.
And that one they beat over the head and treated shamefully.
He sent yet
another whom they killed.
So, too, many others; some they beat, others they killed.
He had one other to send, a beloved son.
He sent him to them last of all, thinking, 'They will respect my son.'
But those tenants said to one another, 'This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.'
So they seized him and killed him,
and threw him out of the vineyard.
What then will the owner of the vineyard do?
He will come, put the tenants to death,
and
give the vineyard to others.
Have you not read this Scripture passage:
The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
by the Lord has this been done,
and it is wonderful in our eyes?"
They
were seeking to arrest him, but they feared the crowd,
for they realized that he had addressed the parable to them.
So they left him and went away. USCCB lectionary
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Reflection on the Scripture |
"You who have fled a world corrupted by lust might become sharers
of the divine nature." —2 Peter 1:4
When we give our lives to Jesus, we flee a world corrupted by lust — lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes (1 Jn 2:16, RSV-CE), sexual lust, and lusts for money (Eph 5:5; Col 3:5), power, pleasure, etc. Though our lusts are strong, we are nevertheless unhappy when we give in to them, for they tend to make us like animals, to dehumanize us. If we are even
slightly honest, we must admit that our lusts motivate us to treat people as objects to be manipulated and enslaved for our gratification. There is something sick and perverted about our lusts. Therefore, we rejoice that in Jesus we can flee "a world corrupted by lust" (2 Pt 1:4).
The Lord calls some people to flee a lustful world by being monks, consecrated virgins, nuns, or religious brothers. These
people are like Jesus, "signs of contradiction" (see Lk 2:34). However, the Lord calls most people to be in the world but not of it — to live in the world but to have fled from its lusts. While being crucified to the world and the world to them (Gal 6:14), they live in the world. Consequently, the world hates them (Jn 17:14) for their righteousness and purity in the midst of its lust (see Wis 2:12, 16).
Rejoice in whatever way you are free to flee "a world corrupted by lust" (2 Pt 1:4).
Prayer: Father, open my eyes to the dehumanizing slavery of the life of lust.
Promise: "The Stone rejected by the builders has become the Keystone of the structure. It was the Lord Who did it and we find it
marvelous to behold." —Mk 12:10-11; Ps 118:22ff
Presentation Ministries
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Abandonment to Divine Providence - by Jean-Pierre de Caussade Section
III: The Work of Our Sanctification
Would to God that kings, and their ministers, princes of the Church and of the world, priests and soldiers, the peasantry and labourers, in a word, all people could know how very easy it would be for them to arrive at a high degree of sanctity. They would only have to fulfill the simple duties of Christianity and of their state of life; to
embrace with submission the crosses belonging to that state, and to submit with faith and love to the designs of Providence in all those things that have to be done or suffered without going out of their way to seek occasions for themselves. This is the spirit by which the patriarchs and prophets were animated and sanctified before there were so many systems of so many masters of the spiritual life. This is the spirituality of all ages and of every state. No state of life can, assuredly, be
sanctified in a more exalted manner, nor in a more wonderful and easy way than by the simple use of the means that God, the sovereign director of souls, gives them to do or to suffer at each moment.
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