Past Sunday Reflections September 16, 2007
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Ghanaian Catholic Community
At Christ The King Church
At Christ The King Church
Sunday Mass at 5PM
| 141 Marcy Place | Bronx, NY 10452 |Tel: 718 538 5546 |
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SUNDAY REFLECTIONS
Dear Brothers and sisters,
Happy and blessed Sunday! We thank God for another Sunday, the joy of seeing each other again after a
wonderful celebration of send-off for Fr Paul Bafour Awuah. May God grant him travelling mercies and
happy return to Ghana and to his new assignment.
Today we have very interesting readings; First reading, Exodus 32: 7- 11, 13-14; Second reading, 1Timothy
1: 12-17, and the Gospel from Luke 15: 1-32.
All these reading are very interesting and dramatic and we could learn so much from them just reflecting on
them. Can you imagine God and Moses blaming each other for the sins of Israel? God said to Moses; "Go
down at once to your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt for they have become depraved".
But Moses implored the Lord, his God saying, "Why, O Lord, should your wrath blaze up against your
own people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with such great power and so strong a hand?".
Now listen to them, God and Moses are playing games, blaming each other. Whose people are really the
Israelites? God or Moses? So who wins?
Have you molted for yourself a golden calf as the God who delivered you from slavery? from your financial,
job, sickness and difficult problems? From your ambitious desires to be like the others? Israel wanted to be
like the other nations and their neighbours who praised their welfare and prosperity on the gods molted by
their own hands.
Time and space wouldn't allow us to go farther into the story. You fill in the gaps. So we turn to the Gospel
for today. "Tax collectors and sinners were drawing near to listen to Jesus, but the Pharisees and the scribes
began to complain, saying...(read/listen to the rest of the story in today's Gospel).
I like the Pharisees. Because I am like a Pharisee. I am a self-righteous person. After all there is a saying that
"birds for the same feathers flock together". We Pharisees are pretenders and hypocrites, unless you belong
to our party, you are a sinner and an outcast.
But Jesus can sometimes be very practical and very challenging. Here he challenges the Pharisees to their
own religious doctrine. What does God says in the 10 commandments in Exodus 20:1-17. To prove their
ignorance about the word of God, Jesus farther challenges the young lawyer (Pharisee?) in the story of the
good Samaritan (Luke, 10:25-37). Still if his followers wouldn't understand his parables on the love of the
neighbour, he demonstrates it here in this first part of the gospel. The prostitutes, the arm robbers, the
drunkards, the poor and beggars, the aliens are Jesus' neighbours, they are our neighbours. Do not ask Father
how you are to behave towards these people. We are together in the struggle to follow Jesus in his demands.
And it is not a matter of either - or.
What a long Gospel! Jesus sometimes doesn't go slow. Here, he is like all out to teach us with a lot of
parables. Now he talks about losing and finding and the joy that follows. I bet you, when I misplace
something precious I get upset and nothing pleases me the whole day, week, month until I find it. So I
understand the feelings and excitements of the man and woman who lost a sheep and coin respectively. But
let us imagine, if the man or woman had said to themselves, okay! let the sheep and coin go, after all I have
99 of them left. Then tomorrow, they lose another set of sheep and coins, okay! I still have 98 left. How
many days and they would be without nothing? God knows best to search for us or else it is a matter of
days and we are all lost.
For the last part of the Gospel (the story of the prodigal son or compassionate father), I feel like asking you
to identify yourself. Are you the father, first son or second son? What of the mother and sisters in the
family? (That does not mean that because they are not mentioned they are not part of the story, mothers
sometimes chose to stay in the back and influence things in the front lines).
The traditional exegesis of this story is very straight forward; the father is God, the first son is Israel, the
second is the gentile. But don't you think we are all of the above personalities? We are the fathers, the
mothers, the first sons, the second sons and the sisters, and the people at the feast ? Anytime we behave
likewise we bring the parable alive.
May God Bless you.
Dear Brothers and sisters,
Happy and blessed Sunday! We thank God for another Sunday, the joy of seeing each other again after a
wonderful celebration of send-off for Fr Paul Bafour Awuah. May God grant him travelling mercies and
happy return to Ghana and to his new assignment.
Today we have very interesting readings; First reading, Exodus 32: 7- 11, 13-14; Second reading, 1Timothy
1: 12-17, and the Gospel from Luke 15: 1-32.
All these reading are very interesting and dramatic and we could learn so much from them just reflecting on
them. Can you imagine God and Moses blaming each other for the sins of Israel? God said to Moses; "Go
down at once to your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt for they have become depraved".
But Moses implored the Lord, his God saying, "Why, O Lord, should your wrath blaze up against your
own people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with such great power and so strong a hand?".
Now listen to them, God and Moses are playing games, blaming each other. Whose people are really the
Israelites? God or Moses? So who wins?
Have you molted for yourself a golden calf as the God who delivered you from slavery? from your financial,
job, sickness and difficult problems? From your ambitious desires to be like the others? Israel wanted to be
like the other nations and their neighbours who praised their welfare and prosperity on the gods molted by
their own hands.
Time and space wouldn't allow us to go farther into the story. You fill in the gaps. So we turn to the Gospel
for today. "Tax collectors and sinners were drawing near to listen to Jesus, but the Pharisees and the scribes
began to complain, saying...(read/listen to the rest of the story in today's Gospel).
I like the Pharisees. Because I am like a Pharisee. I am a self-righteous person. After all there is a saying that
"birds for the same feathers flock together". We Pharisees are pretenders and hypocrites, unless you belong
to our party, you are a sinner and an outcast.
But Jesus can sometimes be very practical and very challenging. Here he challenges the Pharisees to their
own religious doctrine. What does God says in the 10 commandments in Exodus 20:1-17. To prove their
ignorance about the word of God, Jesus farther challenges the young lawyer (Pharisee?) in the story of the
good Samaritan (Luke, 10:25-37). Still if his followers wouldn't understand his parables on the love of the
neighbour, he demonstrates it here in this first part of the gospel. The prostitutes, the arm robbers, the
drunkards, the poor and beggars, the aliens are Jesus' neighbours, they are our neighbours. Do not ask Father
how you are to behave towards these people. We are together in the struggle to follow Jesus in his demands.
And it is not a matter of either - or.
What a long Gospel! Jesus sometimes doesn't go slow. Here, he is like all out to teach us with a lot of
parables. Now he talks about losing and finding and the joy that follows. I bet you, when I misplace
something precious I get upset and nothing pleases me the whole day, week, month until I find it. So I
understand the feelings and excitements of the man and woman who lost a sheep and coin respectively. But
let us imagine, if the man or woman had said to themselves, okay! let the sheep and coin go, after all I have
99 of them left. Then tomorrow, they lose another set of sheep and coins, okay! I still have 98 left. How
many days and they would be without nothing? God knows best to search for us or else it is a matter of
days and we are all lost.
For the last part of the Gospel (the story of the prodigal son or compassionate father), I feel like asking you
to identify yourself. Are you the father, first son or second son? What of the mother and sisters in the
family? (That does not mean that because they are not mentioned they are not part of the story, mothers
sometimes chose to stay in the back and influence things in the front lines).
The traditional exegesis of this story is very straight forward; the father is God, the first son is Israel, the
second is the gentile. But don't you think we are all of the above personalities? We are the fathers, the
mothers, the first sons, the second sons and the sisters, and the people at the feast ? Anytime we behave
likewise we bring the parable alive.
May God Bless you.