Look Inside

November 24: Monday of Week 34 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Revelation 14:1-5; Psalm 24:1-2, 3-4, 5-6; Luke 21:1-4

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings.

Thoughts to help us take responsibility as stewards of the kingship of Christ.

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life ... Step Five )

Look Inside

“Lord, this is the people that longs to see your face” (Responsorial, Psalm 24).

Desire is what life is all about. It is the source of all the good and bad we do, and, ultimately, of everything we become.

Sometimes religion begins at the wrong end, talking about behavior, when our first look should be at attitudes and values. Before we teach children what they should and should not do, we should teach them what to desire. To “examine our conscience” means to examine what we deeply accept and reject in our heart. Evaluating our performance comes afterwards.

First question: Do I really want to know God? Do I “long to see his face”? What proof of that do I find in my behavior? Do I find love for God in my heart?

Clarification: Love is not feeling. St. Teresa of Avila says love for God consists “in the firmness of our determination” to do his will. That is a choice of the heart.

Catholics are stewards, “fund-managers,” of a 2000-year tradition of responding to the mystery Jesus revealed. There is no excuse for us to be superficial law-observers, or mere repeaters of orthodox doctrines. For example, if we have not made the Mass the experienced “source and summit” of our Christian life, for ourselves and others, we are “unfaithful stewards” of the mystery it makes present in celebration. And we don’t understand Baptism.

PRAY: “Lord, put a right spirit within me” (Psalm 51:10).

PRACTICE: Examine your heart.