Fr Kevin Kilgore

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Gospel: Luke 4: 38-44

After Jesus left the synagogue, he entered the house of Simon.
Simon’s mother-in-law was afflicted with a severe fever,
and they interceded with him about her.
He stood over her, rebuked the fever, and it left her.
She got up immediately and waited on them.

At sunset, all who had people sick with various diseases brought them to him.
He laid his hands on each of them and cured them.
And demons also came out from many, shouting, “You are the Son of God.”
But he rebuked them and did not allow them to speak
because they knew that he was the Christ.

At daybreak, Jesus left and went to a deserted place.
The crowds went looking for him, and when they came to him,
they tried to prevent him from leaving them.
But he said to them, “To the other towns also
I must proclaim the good news of the Kingdom of God,
because for this purpose I have been sent.”
And he was preaching in the synagogues of Judea.

The Gospel of the Lord.

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Tying yesterday and today’s Gospel passages together, we discover a full day in the life of Jesus.

The Lord began his day in the synagogue, where he cast out an unclean spirit from a man, revealing Christ’s power over evil.

“After lunch,” Jesus enters Simon Peter’s home, where he heals Simon’s mother-in-law who is deathly ill. 

Then he continues his ministry into the evening. As we hear in today’s Gospel, “At sunset, all who had people sick with various diseases brought them to Jesus. He laid his hands on each of them and cured them.”

I’d imagine by night, the Lord was exhausted.

But early the next morning – before dawn – Jesus is up and out, finding a quiet place to pray.

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This is what sustained him.

It’s what is meant to sustains us on our pilgrimage through life.

Prayer gives us the energy, the insight, and the compassion we need to accomplish the tasks God has in store for us each day.

The Lord reminds us today that the best time to pray is, “very early before dawn.” I’ve done it myself, praying an hour a day before dawn for the last fifteen years. It’s changed me in ways I never would have imagined.

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Give the Lord the first few minutes of each day and see what happens. 

You may be surprised by how much you become like Jesus, eager – and ready – to do your Father’s will.

I wonder what that might look like for you today.

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Image credits: (1) Complex (2) Men’s Health (3) Our Daily Bread

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Gospel: Luke 4: 31-37

Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town of Galilee.
He taught them on the sabbath,
and they were astonished at his teaching
because he spoke with authority.
In the synagogue there was a man with the spirit of an unclean demon, 
and he cried out in a loud voice,
“What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?
Have you come to destroy us?
I know who you are–the Holy One of God!”
Jesus rebuked him and said, “Be quiet! Come out of him!”
Then the demon threw the man down in front of them
and came out of him without doing him any harm.
They were all amazed and said to one another,
“What is there about his word?
For with authority and power he commands the unclean spirits,
and they come out.”
And news of him spread everywhere in the surrounding region.

The Gospel of the Lord.

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Today we celebrate a modern-day hero. 

Not because she was the Wolf of Wall Street. Not because she became the world’s wealthiest woman. Not because she was highly educated or cured cancer.

In fact, she did none of these things.

We celebrate a woman who learned how to persevere in doing ordinary things – chasing after children abandoned by their parents and offering them a home, feeding the hungry, bathing dirty feet, and picking up people who otherwise would’ve died on the streets.

For seventy years, she did ordinary things with extraordinary love.

Saint Teresa of Calcutta, affectionately known as “Mother Teresa,” became a global phenomenon, bringing poverty onto the world stage simply by being a Christian – doing the things that Christ commanded her to do.

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“Why do you do these things day after day?” She was once asked by an interviewer. “Don’t you ever tire of it all?”

Mother Teresa responded, “I’m not called to feed hungry people. I’m called to love Jesus.” Then she reached out, grabbed the interviewer’s hand, and on each of his five fingers, she repeated the words of Jesus: You – did – it – to – me.

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Much could be said about Mother Teresa – her history, her spirituality, her inexhaustible charity for the poor. But it was her love for Christ – and her knack for seeing him in her neighbor – that inspired her life and mission.

There’s a word in that for all of us.

Though we may not be surrounded by the sick, the hungry, the naked, the “losers” in this world, we are all invited to see Christ in our neighbor.

That doesn’t only include our family, our friends, and people whom we love. But also, those we’d rather avoid, those whom we disagree with, those who are different from ourselves.

Whatever we do to one another today, we do to Christ.

Saint Teresa of Calcutta, pray for us.

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Image credits: (1) Mother Teresa: The Life of a Saint, The New York Times (2) The Collector (3) The Collector

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Gospel: Luke 4: 16-30

Jesus came to Nazareth, where he had grown up,
and went according to his custom
into the synagogue on the sabbath day.
He stood up to read and was handed a scroll of the prophet Isaiah.
He unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring glad tidings to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.

Rolling up the scroll,
he handed it back to the attendant and sat down,
and the eyes of all in the synagogue looked intently at him.
He said to them,
“Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.”
And all spoke highly of him
and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth.
They also asked, “Is this not the son of Joseph?”
He said to them, “Surely you will quote me this proverb,
‘Physician, cure yourself,’ and say, ‘Do here in your native place
the things that we heard were done in Capernaum.'”
And he said,
“Amen, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own native place.
Indeed, I tell you,
there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah
when the sky was closed for three and a half years
and a severe famine spread over the entire land.
It was to none of these that Elijah was sent,
but only to a widow in Zarephath in the land of Sidon.
Again, there were many lepers in Israel
during the time of Elisha the prophet;
yet not one of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.”
When the people in the synagogue heard this,
they were all filled with fury.
They rose up, drove him out of the town,
and led him to the brow of the hill
on which their town had been built, to hurl him down headlong.
But he passed through the midst of them and went away.

The Gospel of the Lord.

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Today’s Gospel passage comes at the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry, and he’s already starting to experience both rejection and wonder from the crowds. 

For these three precious, and final, years of his life, Jesus will go public: he will cure the sick, give sight to the blind, forgive sins, and even raise a few people from the dead – all things the prophet Isaiah foretold.

We might summarize his works in three words: 

Jesus lifted burdens.

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By the power of the Holy Spirit, that is what every Christian is called to do.

We lift people’s burdens, setting them free.

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I think of all who cook in our parish soup kitchen, preparing fresh pasta for the hungry in Newark. And the Missionaries of Charity who feed, clothe, and shelter them.

Those who visit our sick and homebound parishioners; who drive them to chemo and doctor’s appointments; who tidy their homes; who bring them communion; who sit and have a conversation, lifting their burden of loneliness. 

Those who organize parish outings and events; who teach our children our faith; who work on staff; who intercede on our behalf.

Here we lift burdens.

It’s what the Catholic Church does around the world – and has done since the time of our Lord.

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Following Christ’s example, how might I lift someone’s burden today?

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Image credits: (1) Medium (2) Got Questions (3) Undefined, alyssajhoward.com