Scott Hahn with David Scott
We are born of the faith of our fathers, descending from a great cloud of witnesses whose faith is attested to on every page of Scripture (see Hebrews 12:1). We have been made His people, chosen for His own inheritance, as we sing in today’s Psalm.
Today’s Liturgy sings the praises of our fathers, recalling the defining moments in our “family history.” In the Epistle, we remember the calling of Abraham; in the First Reading we relive the night of the Exodus and the summons of the holy children of Israel.
Our fathers, we are told, trusted in the Word of God, put their faith in His oaths, convinced that what He promised, He would do.
None of them lived to see His promises made good. For it was not until Christ and His Church that Abraham’s descendants were made as countless as the stars and sands (see Galatians 3:16-17, 29).
It was not until His Last Supper and the Eucharist that “the sacrifice…the divine institution” of that first Passover was truly fulfilled.
And we now too await the final fulfillment of what God has promised us in Christ. As Jesus tells us in today’s Gospel, we should live with our loins girded—as the Israelites tightened their belts, cinched up their long robes and ate their Passover standing, vigilant and ready to do His will (see Exodus 12:11; 2 Kings 4:29).
The Lord will come at an hour we do not expect—will knock on our door (see Revelation 3:20), inviting us to the wedding feast in the better homeland, the heavenly one that our fathers saw from afar, and which we begin to taste in each Eucharist.
As they did, we can wait with “sure knowledge,” His Word like a lamp lighting our path (see Psalm 119:105). Our God is faithful and if we wait in faith, hope in His kindness, and love as we have been loved, we will receive His promised blessing, be delivered from death.
St. Cyprian
from Treatise on the Unity of the Church, 26-27
The Lord was looking to our days when he said, “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” (Lk 18:8) We see that what he foretold has come to pass. There is no faith in the fear of God, in the law of righteousness, in love, in good works… That which our conscience would fear if it believed, it does not fear because it does not believe at all. If it believed, it would also take heed; and if it took heed, it would be saved.
Therefore beloved brothers, let us arouse ourselves as much as we can and break the slumber of our listlessness. Let us be watchful to observe and to do the Lord’s precepts. Let us be like he himself has bidden us to be, saying, “Gird your loins and light your lamps and be like servants who await their master’s return from a wedding, ready to open immediately when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those servants whom the master finds vigilant on his arrival”.
We ought to be dressed for work, lest, when the day of setting forth comes, it should find us burdened and entangled. Let our light shine in good works, and glow in such a way as to lead us from the night of this world to the daylight of eternal brightness.
Let us always wait with solicitude and caution for the sudden coming of the Lord, so that when he knocks, our faith may be on the watch, and receive from the Lord the reward of our vigilance. If these commands be observed, if these warnings and precepts be kept, we will not be overtaken in slumber by the deceit of the devil. But we shall reign with Christ in his kingdom as servants on the watch.
Pope Benedict XVI
from Angelus Address, August 8, 2010
In this Sunday’s Gospel passage Jesus continues his teaching to the disciples on the value of the person in God’s eyes and on the futility of mundane worries. This does not mean doing nothing. Indeed, on hearing Jesus’ reassuring invitation: “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Lk 12: 32), our hearts open up to a hope which illumines and animates real life.
We have the certainty that “the Gospel is not merely a communication of things that can be known it is one that makes things happen and is life-changing. The dark door of time, of the future, has been thrown open. Whoever has hope lives differently; the one who hopes has been granted the gift of a new life” (cf. Encyclical Spe Salvi, n. 2).
As we read in the passage from the Letter to the Hebrews in today’s Liturgy, Abraham with a trusting heart entered into the hope that God opened to him, the promise of a land and of “numerous descendants”, and left “not knowing where he was to go”, trusting only in God (cf. 11: 8-12).
And Jesus in today’s Gospel illustrates through three parables how waiting for the fulfilment of the “blessed hope”, his Coming, should urge one more and more toward a profound life, rich in good works: “Sell your possessions, and give alms; provide yourselves with purses that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys” (Lk 12: 33).
It is an invitation to use things unselfishly without thirsting for possession or dominion, but according to the logic of God, the logic of consideration for others, the logic of love: as Romano Guardini succinctly wrote, “in the form of a relationship: beginning with God, in view of God” (cf. Accettare se stessi, Brescia 1992, 44).
Pope Benedict XVI
from Angelus Address, August 12, 2007
he Liturgy on this 19th Sunday of Ordinary Time prepares us in a certain way for the Solemnity of Mary’s Assumption into Heaven, which we will be celebrating on 15 August. Indeed, it is fully oriented to the future, to Heaven, where the Blessed Virgin Mary has preceded us in the joy of Paradise.
In particular, the Gospel passage, continuing last Sunday’s message, asks Christians to detach themselves from material goods, which are for the most part illusory, and to do their duty faithfully, constantly aspiring to Heaven. May the believer remain alert and watchful to be ready to welcome Jesus when he comes in his glory.
By means of examples taken from everyday life, the Lord exhorts his disciples, that is, us, to live with this inner disposition, like those servants in the parable who were waiting for their master’s return. “Blessed are those servants”, he said, “whom the master finds awake when he comes” (Lk 12: 37). We must therefore watch, praying and doing good.
It is true, we are all travellers on earth, as the Second Reading of today’s liturgy from the Letter to the Hebrews appropriately reminds us. It presents Abraham to us in the clothes of a pilgrim, as a nomad who lives in a tent and sojourns in a foreign land. He has faith to guide him.
“By faith”, the sacred author wrote, “Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place which he was to receive as an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was to go” (Heb 11: 8).
Indeed, Abraham’s true destination was “the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God” (11: 10). The city to which he was alluding is not in this world but is the heavenly Jerusalem, Paradise.
This was well known to the primitive Christian community, which considered itself “alien” here below and called its populated nucleuses in the cities “parishes”, which means, precisely, colonies of foreigners [in Greek, pároikoi] (cf. I Pt 2: 11). In this way, the first Christians expressed the most important characteristic of the Church, which is precisely the tension of living in this life in light of Heaven.
Today’s Liturgy of the Word, therefore, desires to invite us to think of “the life of the world to come”, as we repeat every time we make our profession of faith with the Creed. It is an invitation to spend our life wisely and with foresight, to consider attentively our destiny, in other words, those realities which we call final: death, the last judgement, eternity, hell and Heaven. And it is exactly in this way that we assume responsibility for the world and build a better world.
