HOMILY FOR THE 10TH SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME B
THE TRUE FAMILY OF CHRIST
1. Summary of ideas of 10th Sunday of Ordinary Time year B readings
Today’s first reading presents the promise God made to Satan after our Adam and Eve disobeyed God: that the offspring of the woman would crush the head of the serpent, even though the serpent would bruise his heel.
This prophecy is fully fulfilled in Jesus Christ when he defeats Satan by casting him out of those possessed by him as we see in the Gospel. In this way, he shows his power over sin and death. However, out of envy and disbelief, the scribes and the pharisees attributed Jesus’ miracle of casting out the devil from the possessed to the devil himself. Thus, Jesus tells them that they are blaspheming against the Holy Spirit and their sin is unforgiveable because they themselves are enclosed to receiving God’s grace.
On the other hand, those who listen to God’s word and do his will, we will be saved by becoming part of his family in faith (Gospel). From there we can be witnesses “knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us with Jesus” (cf. Second Reading). But if we constantly resist believing in him, we will have no forgiveness and will carry that sin with us forever (cf. Gospel).
2. God fulfills his promises
He is not a god who bears grudges but rather one who promised to save us from sin and death, right from the start after our first parents’ sin (Gn 3:15). He is not a God who seeks condemnation, but rather redemption. He fulfilled that promise through His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Jesus fulfilled the will of God the Father but this was made possible through the fiat of the Blessed Virgin Mary during the Annunciation, thereby fulfilling God’s will and becoming an instrument to carry out God’s plan of salvation.
3. Fulfilling God’s will is what makes us united with God.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus reveals to us that to belong to God’s family and be united to Him requires not blood ties but something more profound and vital.
Who are my mother and my brothers?” And looking around at those seated in the circle he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.
- “Jesus did not say this to disown his mother, but to show that she is worthy of honour not only on account having given birth to Jesus, but also because she has all the virtues” (Theonhilactus, Enarratio in Evangelium Marci, in loc.).
- Therefore, the Church reminds us that the Blessed Virgin “in the course of her Son’s preaching received the words whereby, in extolling a kingdom beyond the concerns and ties of flesh and blood, he declared blessed those who heard and kept the word of God as she was faithfully doing” (Vatican II, Lumen gentium, 58).
- Our Lord, then, is also telling us that if we follow him we will share his life more intimately than if we were a member of his family.
“Jesus’ response was not a lack of respect for his mother and his brethren. Rather, for Mary it is the greatest recognition, precisely because she herself is the perfect disciple who completely obeyed God’s will (Pope Francis Angelus, 10 June 2018).”
This is what it takes to be truly part of God’s family: doing God’s will. Family ties are important but they are not the only thing that bind us together. Jesus wishes to emphasize that the true family of God is built on something that transcends blood ties: doing God’s will.
What does doing God’s will mean?
- It means responding generously to our vocation to holiness.
- It consists in knowing God’s Word and teachings and living them, putting them into practice. “Jesus formed a new family, no longer based on natural ties, but on faith in him, on his love which welcomes us and unites us to each other, in the Holy Spirit. All those who welcome Jesus’ word are children of God and brothers and sisters among themselves. Welcoming the word of Jesus makes us brothers and sisters, makes us Jesus’ family. Speaking ill of others, destroying others’ reputations, makes us the devil’s family (Ibid.).”
- It means fulfilling His commandments, summed up in love of God and of our neighbor, as Jesus loved us.
- It requires patience, fortitude and perseverance in our daily struggle done out of love for God to overcome our inclination to pride, laziness, egotism, sensuality, anger, greed, vanity, gluttony.
- It means following Jesus faithfully and living His life, not only when we feel like it but above all when the going gets rough.
Wanting what God wants, rejecting what God rejects. Only then can we be in union with God and form part of His true family, as exemplified for us by life of the saints, especially of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph, to whom we go asking their prayers and intercession so that like them, we may fulfill God’s Will in our daily life and be instruments of His mercy and love to the people around us.
A Blessed Sunday and week ahead!
Fr. Rolly Arjonillo
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Thanks and God bless you and your loved ones! Fr. Rolly Arjonillo.
