Frederick, Maryland, United States - Daily Mass Reading & Catholic Meditation “The Word among Us” for Thursday, 24 July 2014

Frederick, Maryland, United States - Daily Mass Reading & Catholic Meditation “The Word among Us” for Thursday, 24 July 2014
Meditations: Matthew 13: Why Tell Stories?
10 The disciples came up and asked, “Why do you tell stories?”
11-15 He replied, “You’ve been given insight into God’s kingdom. You know how it works. Not everybody has this gift, this insight; it hasn’t been given to them. Whenever someone has a ready heart for this, the insights and understandings flow freely. But if there is no readiness, any trace of receptivity soon disappears. That’s why I tell stories: to create readiness, to nudge the people toward receptive insight. In their present state they can stare till doomsday and not see it, listen till they’re blue in the face and not get it. I don’t want Isaiah’s forecast repeated all over again:
Your ears are open but you don’t hear a thing.
    Your eyes are awake but you don’t see a thing.
The people are blockheads!
They stick their fingers in their ears
    so they won’t have to listen;
They screw their eyes shut
    so they won’t have to look,
    so they won’t have to deal with me face-to-face
    and let me heal them.
16-17 “But you have God-blessed eyes—eyes that see! And God-blessed ears—ears that hear! A lot of people, prophets and humble believers among them, would have given anything to see what you are seeing, to hear what you are hearing, but never had the chance.
Saint Sharbel Makhlūf, Priest
Why do you speak to the crowd in parables? (Matthew 13:10)
Comedian Buddy Hackett used to quip, “My mother’s menu consisted of two choices: take it or leave it.” Today’s Gospel reading presents the same alternatives, but about something infinitely more important than food preferences. Will we take Jesus and his teaching or leave it?
By this point in Matthew’s Gospel, those who have been listening to Jesus are making choices. The “leavers” refuse to repent; some are even plotting his death (Matthew 11:20-24; 12:14). The “takers” are opening their hearts to Jesus and his message. Yet these disciples are confused about his teaching style. Why not speak more directly? Why use parables?
Jesus’ answer—“because they look but do not see and hear but do not listen or understand” (Matthew 13:13)—highlights the deliberate rejection of the “leavers”; they have already blocked their ears and are now experiencing the consequences of this choice. Commenting on Jesus’ approach, St. John Chrysostom explains: “We ourselves do this all the time. When we see someone listening inattentively and can’t persuade him to listen at all, then all that remains is to be silent. If we continue, even his inattentiveness is aggravated. But for someone who tries to learn, we continue on and offer much.”
So is Jesus giving up on those who reject what he offers, like Mother Hackett telling her kids to “take it or leave it”? Not at all! Jesus wants everyone to receive the good news of the kingdom. This is, in fact, why he speaks in parables. These surprising, often puzzling comparisons are teaching tools that can jolt people and provoke some thinking and changing. A shepherd who abandons the whole flock to search for one stray? A harvest of a hundredfold, when a yield of seven and a half was normal? These surprising stories suggest fresh, new possibilities about what God and his kingdom are like. And they invite everyone to respond accordingly.
So come to Jesus’ table with a “take it” attitude, hungry for every word he offers. If you want to be nourished, “more will be given,” and you “will grow rich” in understanding (Matthew 13:12).
“Jesus, your word is always new. By your Spirit, help me to be a generous receiver of your grace!”  Amen!
Jeremiah 2: Israel Was God’s Holy Choice
1-3 God’s Message came to me. It went like this:
“Get out in the streets and call to Jerusalem,
    ‘God’s Message!
I remember your youthful loyalty,
    our love as newlyweds.
You stayed with me through the wilderness years,
    stuck with me through all the hard places.
Israel was God’s holy choice,
    the pick of the crop.
Anyone who laid a hand on her
    would soon wish he hadn’t!’”
        God’s Decree.
7-8 “I brought you to a garden land
    where you could eat lush fruit.
But you barged in and polluted my land,
    trashed and defiled my dear land.
The priests never thought to ask, ‘Where’s God?’
    The religion experts knew nothing of me.
The rulers defied me.
12-13 “Stand in shock, heavens, at what you see!
    Throw up your hands in disbelief—this can’t be!”
        God’s Decree.
“My people have committed a compound sin:
    they’ve walked out on me, the fountain
Of fresh flowing waters, and then dug cisterns—
    cisterns that leak, cisterns that are no better than sieves.
Psalms 36:5-6 God’s love is meteoric,
    his loyalty astronomic,
His purpose titanic,
    his verdicts oceanic.
Yet in his largeness
    nothing gets lost;
Not a man, not a mouse,
    slips through the cracks.
7-9 How exquisite your love, O God!
    How eager we are to run under your wings,
To eat our fill at the banquet you spread
    as you fill our tankards with Eden spring water.
You’re a fountain of cascading light,
    and you open our eyes to light.
10-12 Keep on loving your friends;
    do your work in welcoming hearts.
Don’t let the bullies kick me around,
    the moral midgets slap me down.
Send the upstarts sprawling
    flat on their faces in the mud.
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