One Minute Reflection – 2 September – Monday of the Twenty-second week in Ordinary Time, Year C, Luke 4:16–30
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free… Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”... Luke 4:18,21
REFLECTION – “The ‘today’, proclaimed by Christ that day, applies to every age, it echoes for us too in this Square, reminding us of the relevance and necessity of the salvation Jesus brought to humanity. God comes to meet the men and women of all times and places, in their real life situations. He also comes to meet us. It is always He who takes the first step, He comes to visit us with His mercy, to lift us up from the dust of our sin. He comes to extend a hand to us in order to enable us to return from the abyss into which our pride made us fall and He invites us, to receive the comforting truth of the Gospel and to walk on the paths of good. He always comes to find us, to look for us.
Let us return to the synagogue. Surely that day, in the synagogue of Nazareth, Mary, His Mother, was also there. We can imagine her heart beating, a small foreboding of what she will suffer under the Cross, seeing Jesus, there in the synagogue, first admired, then challenged, then insulted, threatened with death. In her heart, filled with faith, she kept everything. May she help us to convert from a god of miracles to the miracle of God, who is Jesus Christ.” … Pope Francis, 31 January 2016 Angelus, St Peter’s Square
PRAYER – Almighty God and Father, open our eyes to see the coming of Your Son, to recognise Him in His Word, to hear His voice as He calls each one of us. Christ be near at either hand! Grant that by the prayers of His Mother, we may hear and follow Your Son and never be among those who wish to throw Him out. Through Christ our Lord, in union with the Holy Spirit, God forever, amen.
AnaStpaul 