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One Bread, One Body

All Issues > Volume 20, Number 4

<< Thursday, July 1, 2004 >>

Bl. Junipero Serra

Amos 7:10-17

Psalm 19

Matthew 9:1-8

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CORRECTION FLUID?

“Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, sent word to Jeroboam, king of Israel: ‘Amos has conspired against you here within Israel; the country cannot endure all his words.’ ” —Amos 7:10

Are you defensive when corrected? If someone corrects you, do you make like a porcupine and stick out your quills? Is your first reaction to correction to justify yourself?

It is natural to react to correction in this way. However, if we have been baptized into the Holy Trinity, we can live supernaturally. By our baptismal grace, we can react to correction with thanksgiving, humility, and growth in holiness.

Being corrected can be an all-win situation. If we are corrected justly, justice is being done, and we have an opportunity to repent, love others more purely and authentically, and be holier children of God. If we are corrected unfairly, we can humbly suffer redemptively as Jesus did. To be sure, sometimes we must respond to unfair correction and “set the record straight” — not for the purpose of defending ourselves but for the well-being of others. However, to be corrected unjustly is potentially an even greater opportunity to grow in holiness than it is to be corrected justly.

Therefore, let us proceed through life not trying to protect our precarious egos but maximizing our opportunities to grow in holiness and thereby be pleasing to the Lord.

Prayer: Father, send anybody to tell me anything I need to know.

Promise: Jesus “then said to the paralyzed man — ‘Stand up! Roll up your mat, and go home.’ The man stood up and went toward his home. At the sight, a feeling of awe came over the crowd, and they praised God for giving such authority to men.” —Mt 9:6-8

Praise: Bl. Junipero Serra established numerous mission churches in California. Millions of people have received the sacraments and come closer to the Lord because of his outreach.

Homily of the Day

Title:	What Does God See When He Looks at Your Heart?
Author:	Monsignor Dennis Clark, Ph.D.
Date:	Thursday, July 1, 2004

Amos 7:10-17 / Mt 9:1-8

More than a century ago, Abraham Lincoln made the famous observation, "You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you can never fool all the people all the time." Quite so, yet a lot of our politicians keep trying!

For us, an important corollary of this is that you can't fool God - ever - not even for an instant! Yet it seems that we keep trying. In today's gospel, Jesus shows us once again His ability to read people's hearts. It was the source of one of the great and continuing sadnesses of His life: He could see the envy and hatred that so many people harbored against Him, and for no reason.

What does the Lord see when He reads our hearts? Without doubt He sees our goodness - which we ourselves so often fail to see and trust - and He sees our desire to be true and to do the deeds of love. But there's another part of us that He sees as well, our sins and failures, of course, but also those locked rooms whose doors we refuse to even open.

If the Lord sees what is in us and does not reject us, why should we fear to enter those darkened rooms and to see those parts of ourselves that we fear and shudder to face? The answer is that we shouldn't, for, as the prayer says, "Lord, there is nothing that You and I can't handle together!"

Remember that, trust Him, and open those doors now!