Episode Transcript
[00:00:06] Speaker A: This is Sundays with Bishop Ken.
Thanks for sharing some quiet time with the Lord.
This week on Sundays with Bishop Ken, our guest, Father Pete Gaspini, shares today's gospel with us, followed by one of Bishop Ken's homilies.
[00:00:34] Speaker B: A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Mark.
In the course of his teaching, Jesus said to the crowds, beware of the scribes who like to go around in long robes and accept greetings in the marketplaces, seats of honor in synagogues, and places of honor at banquets.
They devour the houses of widows and as a pretext, recite lengthy prayers.
They will receive a very severe condemnation.
He sat down opposite the treasury and observed how the crowd put money into the treasury.
Many rich people put in large sums.
A poor widow also came and put in two small coins worth a few cents.
Calling his disciples to himself, he said to them, amen, I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the other contributors to the treasury, for they have all contributed from their surplus wealth, but she, from her poverty, has contributed all she had, her whole livelihood.
The gospel of the Lord the more we learn about the human person and human growth, the more we discover that Christianity, in its best traditions, teaches the same thing.
Jesus came to teach us the meaning of life, how to achieve fulfillment, to reach the destiny for which we were created.
He did not come to superimpose upon human nature something that twisted it and turned us against ourselves.
We don't always appreciate that.
Very often we think that Christianity takes all the fun out of life, takes the heart out of being human.
Just the opposite is true.
An example of this parallel between Christianity and our discoveries about what is healthy for the human person would be what psychologists today refer to as narcissism.
Narcissism describes an unhealthy tendency to focus on ourselves and make ourselves the center of our efforts.
In greek mythology, Narcissus was a young boy who one day happened upon a still pool of water and saw his own reflection.
He didn't realize that it was his reflection, and he fell in love with it.
He was frustrated because he couldn't reach out and touch this person he loved, nor could he possess him.
He was consumed by this frustrated love and died.
Today we hear that God did not make us to turn inward on ourselves.
We are made to go outward, and that is the only path to fulfillment.
You and I have to think about that, because like Narcissus, we can sometimes turn inward on ourselves without even knowing it.
Everyone ought to ask the question, to what extent are most of my energies most of my thoughts, most of my efforts directed toward myself or toward my own family. And to what extent do they go outward?
The true Christian and we are learning the healthy human being is someone who can include others besides himself at the center of his life.
For christians, we place at the center of our lives not only ourselves, but Jesus and his friends.
No one, of course, except a very strange person, turns completely in on himself or herself.
But even at that, when we do go outward, our self giving is often carefully measured and grudgingly metered.
I am not speaking here simply of giving money, and certainly not simply of giving money in the collection at church.
I'm talking about the way we share ourselves, our time, our caring, and the things that we possess with others.
Jesus was anything but a grudging giver.
His life was characterized by generous, joyful, and unmeasured giving.
Nobody had time for the blind man at the gate, but he did.
When they brought the little children to him at the end of a long day, he had time for them.
99 sheep were not enough. He went after the 100th.
And when the time came even to give his life, he gave it generously.
The trouble is, down deep we all fear that if we start giving ourselves to others and going the distance with Christianity, we would be drained dry.
We are reluctant to give ourselves over to the Lord because we feel that he will take all the fun out of life. And life would become exceedingly difficult, probably filled with much suffering.
That is not true.
It is strange that we would think of God that way, although most of us do.
We have a hard time trusting that if we gave ourselves over to him entirely, he would not fill our lives with great suffering.
Peter had the same concern.
That's one of the nice things about Peter. He always asked the questions and says the things that are on our minds.
Peter came up to the Lord and said they were giving up everything for him, and he wondered what they were going to get in return.
Jesus told Peter that he would get everything in return, not just in the next life, but even now he would inherit the earth a hundredfold.
Jesus taught that by self giving, by unfilling ourselves, we are really fulfilled.
And that is what happened to the widow in the Old Testament story.
She shared the little food she had, and lo and behold, the jar of flour never emptied, the jug of oil never ran dry.
The same was true of the loaves and fish.
The apostles brought the amount they had and they never ran out.
That is the reality of the vine and the branches left to ourselves. You and I would be drained dry.
But we are united with the Lord. We draw upon his life and his resources, and we find more fulfillment than we ever would have found. Another way we have to learn to look upon this life not as God testing us, but rather as God shaping us, helping us to become fulfilled, to achieve the potential for which we were created.
And we achieved this through the generous, joyful self giving that characterized the life of Jesus.
[00:08:14] Speaker A: Thanks for joining us today. If you like this week's reflection, subscribe on your favorite podcast platform.
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