“SPRINGS OF LIVING WATER”
Daily Spiritual Reflections
14th November 2021
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SUNDAY, THIRTY THIRD WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME
Dan 12: 1-3; Ps 16:5,8-11; Heb 10: 11-14, 18; Mk 13: 24-32
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RESURRECTION – A PLANNED REALITY
Today is the penultimate Sunday in the liturgical year, and the liturgy invites us to reflect on the Last Judgement as a prelude to the celebration of the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of the Universe.
The first reading from the book of Prophet Daniel looks towards the end of all things. It is a crucial passage, for here, for the first time in the Bible, the resurrection of the dead is proclaimed. This book of Scripture was written during a great persecution of the Jews a couple of centuries before Christ. It was then that finally the resurrection of those who remain true to the Lord was revealed by the Spirit. The earlier Israelites pictured the afterlife as a sort of powerless, shadowy half-existence in Sheol, where the dead could not even praise God. Yet there had been many hints of conviction that God would never desert those who love him: “But I know that my Redeemer lives, and in the end He will stand upon the earth. Even after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God” (Job 19:25-26). Only now, under the stress of the death of the martyrs in persecution, is the full truth revealed: at the end of time God will intervene to draw his own to himself to the fullness of life. In this reading, we come across the phrase, “many will awaken”. This does not mean that some will not awaken; it merely indicates a vast number, the almost limitless multitude of the dead.
In the second reading from the letter to the Hebrews, Christ is pictured as the son of God, sharing God’s throne. His sacrifice on the cross was not an act of vengeance by God, inflicting on Jesus the pains which we deserve, after which God suddenly changed his mind and rehabilitated Jesus. It was the consummate act of loving obedience, by which Jesus, on behalf of all humanity, reversed the disobedience of Adam and united us all to God. The resurrection, by which Christ was raised to glory, the glory of the son of God in power, was the recognition of this renewal of life. The sacrifices of the Old Law were partial, temporary and needed to be repeated. Christ’s offering in obedience was complete, and could never be repeated.
In the gospel passage today, we see Jesus, using the example of the fig tree, to speak about the end times. Jesus saw his mission to be the establishment of the sovereignty of God, the kingship and rule of God over the world, even in rebellious human hearts. Using the language and imagery of his time, he described this ‘earth-shaking’ event in terms of cosmic disturbances. The coming of God, the Day of the Lord, would constitute the end of the world as we know it.
As Christians we must acknowledge that the death and resurrection of Christ utterly changed the world forever; it was the Day of the Lord. And yet the world continues, and we have still to prepare for the Day of the Lord when we will come into that awesome presence. That meeting can be pictured only in terms of collapse and upheaval, our world turned upside down. At death, all our familiar realities cease, even the ticking of the clock. At death, time ceases to have meaning. We do not know and have no need to know, when or how this will occur. It will come for all, and at that moment, the son of Man will gather his own, in great power and glory.
Response: Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge.
FIFTH WORLD DAY OF THE POOR
November 14, 2021 (33rd Sunday of Ordinary Time)
Theme: “The poor you will always have with you” (Mk 14:7)
“It is my hope that the celebration of the World Day of the Poor, now in its fifth year, will grow in our local Churches and inspire a movement of evangelization that meets the poor personally wherever they may be. We cannot wait for the poor to knock on our door; we need urgently to reach them in their homes, in hospitals and nursing homes, on the streets and in the dark corners where they sometimes hide, in shelters and reception centres. It is important to understand how they feel, what they are experiencing and what their hearts desire.” - Pope Francis
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