Year C, 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time
July 27, 2025 @ St. Patrick’s
(Sunday 11am, 1pm and 4pm Masses)
First Reading: Genesis 18:20-32
Do not be angry, O
Lord if I speak
Responsorial Psalm: Psalms 138: 1-2a, 2b-3, 6-7ab, 7c-8 (R.3)
On the day I called,
O Lord, you answered me.
Second Reading: Colossians 2:12-14
God made us alive
with him, when he forgave us all our trespasses.
Gospel: Luke 11:1-13
Ask,
and it will be given you.
On this 17th Sunday in ordinary time, the Church is asking us to reflect on this great gift. This gift is PRAYER.
The Lord says in the Gospel:
“ask,
and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will
be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches
finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.”
This is not a “make-good or
feel-good” statement that politicians or any public figure do to get attention.
This comes from the Lord……. Jesus himself spoke these words. And for those who
believe, these words come with a promise – God sees, hears, and feels you and
he will act accordingly.
In the first reading, we see
Abraham interceding for Sodom and Gomorrah. God’s decision to destroy these 2
cities is a response to an “outcry” (in Hebrew implies oppression and suffering),
in this case, to extreme moral corruption and injustice.
The cities became symbols of
sin and of people who believe they are not doing anything wrong because they
have taken away God in their society and everyone decides which is good or bad.
I wonder if we can say the
same thing with what is happening in our society today.
And here was Abraham,
pleading on behalf of the righteous people of these cities – “suppose
there are fifty righteous within the city; will you then sweep away the
righteous with the wicked?” God has committed to honor Abraham’s prayer
and could have relented and turned his back. But there was none – Abraham’s
final bid – not even 10 righteous in these cities (pause).
And this is the first prayer
lesson for all of us today, my dear brothers and sisters.
(1) God hears and acts on the
prayer of a righteous man:
· Bible scholars observed that in Abraham’s
prayer, he uses one of the languages of God - mercy. It is that prayer: is first
and foremost about asking for mercy.
·
Mercy for our own self but also important,
mercy for other people.
· Abraham was not even there, but from a
distance, he pleaded and interceded for the family of Lot (wife and 2
daughters), and he was hoping there were 6 more righteous people living in
either of the cities.
Don’t we come here with prayer intentions or petitions for someone we know? We are here and offer that prayer and in doing so, we are interceding, pleading with God on their behalf.
And maybe, our city, our country and probably the world have been saved because of the intercession and pleading of righteous people, some of them maybe right here with us. And this is a good reason why it is important why need to go to Church on Sundays.
Because here, we learn the second
prayer lesson. And that is:
(2) We don’t pray alone. Seemingly
as we kneel here today, that the prayer we say is private. Something between me
and God, but it is not. Just think about this:
· Collect
prayer: by being here, the prayer you have said here becomes the prayer of not
only the 650 +/- of who are here but of all the people present on the same
Liturgy being celebrated on this 17th Sunday in ordinary time in
every place and in every time.
· It
is the same Liturgy, and we are all united in prayer wherever this Liturgy is
taking place, regardless it was said 14 hours ahead in the East or 14 hours
later in the West.
· It
is the same Liturgy and God and the heavenly realm are present in this one
Liturgy where in the mystery of God’s love unites all believers.
· We
are talking about millions of Catholic faithful in the same Mass, partaking of
the same bread that has been broken down for us.
· And
even if there are only 1000 righteous Catholics in attendance this weekend over
the millions in attendance, it is still like having a thousand Abraham pleading,
interceding and praying for you and me today. (Pause).
Supposing one night on your drive
home, you see a car wreck on the road. Paramedics, police, ambulance, fire
truck are all there to attend to the crash victim, what do you do?
If you are a good Catholic,
you make the sign of the Cross and say a prayer for the victims of this crash
and you go along.
But in case, you recognize
that the car is your son’s or daughter’s or husband’s or wife’s….. that is
another story. You will stop and run to the crash scene, not because you can do
better than the first responders, but because he or she or they are not just random
persons.
And this is the third and
final lesson about prayer for us today……
(3) That God is not a random
person and you are not a random person to God.
In the Gospel, Jesus reveals
to us that God is first our Father (Greek: Abba)
·
Abba is a word of endearment for a father.
Jesus taught us to call God – Abba
·
He is not teaching us some grammar or some
historical or geographical lessons on relationships. He is trying to teach us who
we really are.
·
If God is our Father, what are we? – we are
brothers and sisters!
Two weeks ago, we
encountered in the Gospel the man left dying after being robbed. The priest and
the Levite regard him as a random person.
·
The priest serves in the temple only 1x a
year and if he touches a random bloody person, he becomes ritually unclean and
will have to be isolated and do the religious ritual process of cleansing. It
was inconvenient and so the same for the Levite.
·
The easier option is to avoid the encounter
and continue to make way and just do what they do best.
I believe that is the same
reason why last week, Jesus commended Mary and telling Martha that Mary chose
the better part.
·
We have forgotten who we are and when we look
around, the person sitting besides us, in front of us or behind us are not
random persons – they are our brothers and sisters.
·
If blood siblings are connected via the same
umbilical cord coming from the same mother, we are all connected because we all
have been baptized by the same Holy Spirit.
· And this relationship does not end when one
dies. For we die yet we live in Christ. This is what we mean in the article of
our faith that we profess every week and we will profess in a short minute, we
say: “we believe in the communion of saints.”
· This is, if we can pray for one another here
and now, our brothers and sisters in heaven who are more alive than us can do
the same.
· And in this Liturgy, imagine how many saints
are here right now in heaven praying for you and me.
When we understand what
actually happens when we are at Mass, nothing should bother us. The stock
market can drop a thousand points in a day, flight maybe delayed or cancelled,
favorite team can lose, plans can fall apart, lose a job, diagnosed with a big
C...etc... but our joyful outlook and deep inner peace will remain in our
hearts.
I believe God created us
with some kind of a homing device right there in our hearts. This maybe what
St. Augustine was thinking when he said that 'our hearts are restless until if
finds rest in God.'
God as our Father longs for
our voice and affection. He knows our pain and we can't hide it from Him. He is
waiting for us to come and meet Him. He awaits us in the Eucharist not just as
a random person. But as a Father to a son…as a Father to a daughter. I pray we
approach him with the same disposition in our hearts. Amen.
May God bless us all…...
