16th Sunday in Ordinary TIme

Our readings for the 16th Sunday of Ordinary Time are:

1. Jeremiah 23: 1-6
2. Psalms 23: 1-3, 3-4, 5, 6
3. Ephesians 2: 13-18
4. Mark 6: 30-34

• Defense from error
• Once upon a time, there was a parish where the Confirmation sacramental preparation was done by volunteers, mostly parents.  The teens were divided up into groups that met in homes, much like the early church.  Then along came a teacher who felt that these parents were often uninformed, mistaken, or just sloppy about their teaching, so he took all of those teenagers, had them meet in one large room each week, and he taught them himself to make sure that there was no error in the teaching.
• We often speak of the distinction between faith formation, and information.  What would you say is the difference between the two?
• Is one or the other more important?
• At what point and in which way(s) do we become adults, and have to start taking responsibility for our own formation?
• Do you think that someone could be influencing/forming/teaching another without knowing it?
• How do we keep each other honest?

• Who wants to be a sheep?
• As Westerners, and certainly as males, we are conditioned to appreciate and praise those who push the boundaries, who succeed in spite of the odds, who have the courage to go beyond their comfort zone.  Hardly an ethic that you associate with sheep.
• Do you think that there are things in this life that are just out and out impossible for you?
• Would it make your life any better to try those things?
• If you don't think that anything is impossible to you, then think about flapping your arms and flying, or being able to compose a truly great sonata, or finding the cure to cancer.
• If not these things, then what are your strengths?
• Do you think that you might have strengths that you've not stumbled into?
• How have you found your strengths, your genius, your calling in life?
• Do you think that was just luck, or something else?
• How can you be more open to that "something else"?

• Chasing the Prodigal
• In the parable of the prodigal son, what I like to call the prodigal father, the father waits patiently, longingly, for the son to come back.  He's the first to see that weary, beaten son come over the horizon from distant lands, and he runs toward that young man as though his very life depended on that reunion.
• Who are some of those in your life who have "gone prodigal" and left, be it a violent rending of relationships, or an inexorable corrosion?
• Is anyone looking for them?
• What do they have to do before anyone is willing/able to receive them back?
• What will they have to do if they ever came back, before anyone would trust them again?
• Who decided that anyway?

• Life is what happens along the way
• Sanctuary is a place, time, space where we go to recuperate.  For the introvert, such sanctuary can be very tangible.  They prefer quiet, a spell where they can center themselves, recover from the demands of people all around them, and rediscover their inner compass.  Other folks crave time with nature, time in their gardens, time on the phone with their best friend, an hour spent in front of the reserved Eucharist, you name it.
• Where is your sanctuary?
• Do you go there regularly?
• Do you bring an agenda with you when you go there?
• How much of your sanctuary do you bring back with you when you rejoin humanity?
• What is the difference between sanctuary and trying to escape?

• Preparation for Reconciliation:

1. Where/what am I teaching God's people?
2. Where might God be calling me outside my comfort zone?
3. Who am I waiting for to come home?  Do they know that?
4. What am I doing to strengthen my prayer-life?

Shalom!