Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

My youngest daughter’s former nanny and her husband, a Baptist minister, are the embodiment of today’s gospel reading. After raising six children, they embarked this last January on a called mission.  They sold their house and belongings, spent six months traveling the country fund raising and then moved to Jamaica to manage an orphanage.  These true disciples left all behind in order to bring God’s Love to ten boys.

Of course the message here is the difference in the love of families and the Love of God.  Family love, imperfect love, always comes with strings and conditions attached.  It’s messy.  God’s Love on the other hand is Divine and perfect.  He says

when you Love me first, then I will Love your families through you. No one is left out or behind, but brought into this shared experience of Divine Love. How beautiful that what we give to God is returned to our families!

But then what about loving the unlovable? These are not just the homeless.  It could be the person sitting three feet from you in church. Every person in this world needs to become our father, mother, son, and daughter.  When we begin to live this way, our lives will drastically change and we will, deep in our hearts, know the presence of the living God.

God’s Love though is never kept in a corner.  It propels outward with concern for others, especially those vulnerable. Our first reading of Elisha and the Shunnamite woman opens the door to hospitality, a fundamental role throughout scripture.  Because we live in times of distancing, Jerry and I have talked, read, and researched an added way to help and provide for others.  We have neighbors out of work and struggling.  In the next weeks we will be adding to our front yard a Little Free Library ( www.littlefreelibrary.org).  For now the purpose is not books, but non-perishable staples.  Food.

In the times we are living in, like my daughter’s nanny, we must look at life with new eyes. We cannot see strangers in any other way except as brothers and sisters. We are called to this in our baptism in water that is never stagnant.  The ripples circle on and on.

Dorothy Day, Pray for us!