Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time. November 11th, 2018. St. Anthony's Hospital Chapel.

Today in our Gospel, St Mark continues the theme of the Gospels of the last quite a few weeks, that of giving all of our wealth to the Lord. And so, today we hear the tale of two widows, one from the Old Testament times and one from the time of the Gospel. In both times, Old and New, there was not too many other people that were more destitute than a widow. Remember, before Christianity, and the rise of Western Christian Civilization, the dignity of woman was understood as being less than that of the household slave. So, in both of these cases the action of these two women point out something much deeper than just their great generosity, it points to the women’s motivation behind their actions.

The first widow by giving to this man of God, the great prophet Elijah, what little food she has, results in her being incredibly rewarded; in fact, her entire family is blessed through her. Same too with the widow in our gospel, by giving what little money she had in the temple, Jesus says of her, that her contribution though seemingly of insignificant value was actually worth more in the eyes of God than all those who gave of their surplus wealth, for she contributed all she had, her whole livelihood.

But what was it about both of these woman’s contribution that made them so acceptable in the eyes of the Lord? It surely wasn’t the amount or the worth of the gift! What was it that these women were actually contributing?
Isn’t it true that, each of these women’s gift represented much more than the gift of a thing, that what they were really giving was worth much more than a thing? For the gift that each of them really gave was the gift of their self to the Lord.
As a result, these women are blessed not by the value of the material gift, but by the value of the gift it signified, the gift of everything they had, and are, back to God. In the case of the woman in our first reading shown by giving food to the man of God, Elijah; in other words, by giving everything to the one who represented God on earth she was indeed giving everything to God. And the woman in the Gospel, her gift given to God in the temple, which was the symbol of Jesus on earth, she was giving everything to God.

God does not desire things from us. When, He says, as he did to the rich young man, that he desires that we sell everything we have and give it to the poor, his words are not about things per say. God is not about things, but about person. And so strictly speaking, He doesn’t want things from us; he doesn’t even want good works from us, for the sake of the good works, but instead, he wants what those goods works of donation, of time, talent and treasure should represent, our interior motives behind them, which is to love Him, and to love others for love of him; in other words, to show by our actions that we wish to give to God ourselves in an act of self-donation, freely given, acts of self-giving Love, to show our motive to give our self to God, totally.

Perhaps to even understand this in a deeper way we need to look at the very nature of God, Who God is. God is pure act. He is always acting as who He is. And who He is, is Pure Love. Love is an act of self-donation, and so God is always acting in self-donation for the sake of the other. This is the love between the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity, their love is always in Pure Act. Always acting in an act of totally self-donation of love to the other. And this Act of God, this Love of God is what we are all called to enter into, beginning here on earth. With the help of God’s grace we are call to live our entire life, using everything we have, everything we do, think and say, according to the will of God in act of self-donating love. Even we give unto others, even if it be all that we possess—even if we lay down our life for them, the motive behind this act must be--giving this, doing that, as exterior act in order to express our interior motivation of total self-donation to God, total self-gift to God.

Another important aspect of the loving self-gift of these woman to God, was that it occurring precisely during great hardship and suffering in their life; in others words, at a time in their life when they were encountering the cross. Their actions also show that they were saying yes, to the cross and yes to the sacrifice of love that it represents.

By His own accepting of the cross, by suffering and dying on the cross, as one of us, Jesus shows us perfect love--offering one’s entire self for sake of his friends—Us. This is why the crucifixion of Christ points to the gift of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. Jesus died on the cross in order to give us Himself in love, for God to give Himself to us in the holy Eucharist; in this He gives us everything He has. In this, Jesus makes present the Trinitarian eternal Act of Love, of self-donation that occurs between each of the three divine Persons of the Blessed Trinity. And because this act of Jesus on the cross is an act of one of those Three Persons—namely Jesus, this sacrifice of Jesus can become actualized in our midst, truly present in our midst on this altar at this Holy Mass.

And through this Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, by our full and actual participation in it; that is our interior motivation to offer our self in union with Jesus to the Father, we can literally share in the power of God’s pure eternal Act of Love, and actualize this love in our life, experience it on a daily basis and share it with others—this goes beyond emotion and feeling, because we live this most especially in midst of suffering, in the midst of the passion, in the midst of the cross…in fact, nothing good comes to us but by way of the cross in our lives, that is if we say yes to it. And if we do open our self, by our act of faith and of trust, we open ourselves up to the grace that God wishes to give us through the cross, and we become truly blessed, and others are blessed through us, for we truly become Christ-like.

And this brings us to our motives at Holy Mass, and our motives for how actions in everything we think, say or do in our life. The Second Vatican two said, Man cannot find himself except through a sincere gift of self-donation. This gift of self begins at Holy Mass, if we choose to freely say yes, and offer our self on the Altar. This act of self-donating is made possible by the Grace of the Holy Mass and it can only come to completion in perfection in our lives, through the Holy Mass.

In light of this great truth of our faith, and in light of the actions of the widow in today’s readings, let us examine our motives for being here? and Let us examine our motives behind the way we live our life. Why are we here today at Holy Mass? Is it because of an establish routine of our life, out of habit alone? Is because we feel bad, as we say, if we don’t get to Holy Mass on Sunday? Is it merely that? Is it chiefly because we adhere to a tradition rooted in our ancestry or ethnic background or family habits? Why are we here; why do we participate? And what are our motives behind how we participate? It is merely to express our self-righteousness? After all, “I am not like the others who don’t go to church on Sundays!!!” Additionally, why do I do the good deeds that I do in my life, give to the Church, or give to the poor? Is it for the same types of motivation? It is not sacrifice and oblation that the Lord wants, but the gift of pure heart, one that desires to do God’s Holy Will. And I said, “I have come to do your will Oh Lord, as a way to show love, as a way to answer in love to You—You who are Love, as a way to offer myself back to You, who as Pure Love, has offer to me, and continues to offer to me everything, including your very self.

Prayer to Our Lady of Hope
O Mary, my Mother, I kneel before you with heavy heart. The burden of my sins oppresses me. The knowledge of my weakness discourages me. I am beset by fears and temptations of every sort (especially fear of the cross). Yet I am so attached to the things of this world that instead of longing for Heaven I am filled with dread at the thought of death.
O Mother of Mercy, have pity on me in my distress. You are all-powerful with your Divine Son. He can refuse no request of your Immaculate Heart. Show yourself a true Mother to me by being my advocate before His throne. O Refuge of Sinners and Hope of the Hopeless, to whom shall I turn if not you?
Obtain for me, then, O Mother of Hope, the grace of true sorrow for my sins, the gift of perfect resignation to God's Holy Will, and the courage to take up my cross and follow Jesus.
But above all I pray, O dearest Mother, that through your most powerful intercession my heart may be filled with Holy Hope, so that in life's darkest hour I may never fail to trust in God my Savior, but by walking in the way of His commandments I may merit to be united with Him, and with you in the eternal joys of Heaven. Amen.
Mary, our Hope, have pity on us.
Hope of the Hopeless, pray for us.