The Good Samaritan, Aimé Morot, 1880
Musée des Beaux-Arts de la ville de Paris

Which of these three, in your opinion,
was neighbor to the robbers’ victim?”
He answered, “The one who treated him with mercy.”
Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
(Luke 10:36–37)

Fr. Smith’s Commentary on the Second Reading
Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Colossians 1:15–20
July 10, 2022

Our second reading for the rest of the month will be from the “Letter to the Colossians”. We read Colossians once before and an introduction can be found in the commentary for last Easter. It was written around the same time and place as the letter to the Ephesians, which we read last year, and shares some of its themes. There is some debate if Paul wrote these letters himself or if they should be credited to disciple after his death. This is not of great consequence as it does not change the situation or the message. We will for the sake of convenience say the author was Paul. More certain is that it was to a mixed audience of Jewish and Christian born believers and that he is answering philosophical or cosmic questions.

Our reading today is in the first chapter of the letter. It is a song. Indeed, the congregation might well have been familiar with the basic hymn before the letter but the hymn may have been written by Paul.

He is the image of the invisible God,
the firstborn of all creation.

(Col 1:15)

From the Greek word we are translating as image (eikon), we also get icon. Although used more widely now in a secular sense, icons originally were pictures of Jesus, Mary or the Saints in the Eastern Church and were “windows” to the reality of the sacred. Sacrament would come closer to our understanding in the west. When we meet Jesus in the flesh, we meet God. Continue reading “15th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Bringing the World to Fulfillment” →

Photo by Paz Arando on Unsplash

The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few;
so ask the master of the harvest
to send out laborers for his harvest.
(Luke 10:2)

Fr. Smith’s Commentary on the Second Reading
Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Galatians 6:14–18
July 3, 2022

This week, we read the conclusion of Paul’s letter to the Galatians. Paul is writing with great emotion and has let his guard down. As with 2^nd Corinthians, which we read earlier in the year, he will reveal much about himself. Some of this is admittedly unseemly, but they also show a man who loves God and is fiercely protective of the churches he founded.

He was protecting them from what we now call “Judaizing Christians.” These were people who came from Jerusalem and taught that the communities baptized by Paul needed to become more Jewish. The men should be circumcised, and all adopt Torah laws. They had many reasons for this, and Paul answered them throughout the letter. As he concludes, he brings to the fore a disease which would have been in the back of his readers’ minds: Jews were a protected class in the Empire. They alone did not have to offer sacrifice to the emperor. For others failure to do so was a capital crime.

Continue reading “14th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Crucifying the Petty in Us” →