Friday, October 06, 2017
26th Week in Ordinary Time
1st Reading: Bar 1:15-22
Gospel: Luke 10:13-16
Jesus said, “Alas for you Chorazin! Alas for you Bethsaida! So many miracles have been worked in you! If the same miracles had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would already be sitting in ashes and wearing the sackcloth of repentance. Surely for Tyre and Sidon it will be better than for you on the Judgment Day. And what of you, city of Capernaum? Will you be lifted up to heaven? You will be thrown down to the place of the dead.
“Whoever listens to you listens to me, and whoever rejects you rejects me; and he who rejects me, rejects the one who sent me.”
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the Assimilated Life Experience)
Before God rebukes a sinner he tries some miraculous interventions to evoke repentance. But many sinners suffer the effect of the so-called air-pot principle. Under this principle the human heart is likened to an electric air-pot. Because of long-time use, an air-pot develops thick crystalline deposits of impurities on its walls. When this gets too thick, boiling can take time because this hampers the conduction of heat from the air-pot wall to its water content. Something similar happens to the human heart hooked to sin. Soon it could no longer feel the warmth of God’s love. Not even miracles could dispose this kind of heart to God’s grace.
Consider what happened to Bethsaida and Capernaum. Jesus performed two of his big miracles at Bethsaida, namely, the multiplication of the loaves (Luke 9:10-17) and the healing of a blind man (Mark 8:22-25). At Capernaum he healed the paralytic (Mt. 9:1-8, Mk. 2:1-12, Lk. 5:17-26.) and Peter’s mother – in-law. Yet the people continued to practice paganism. Their continued adherence to paganism is historically supported. Excavations at Chorazin yielded remains of a synagogue with a Medusa on its wall. Medusa is a creation of Greek mythology. Pagans believe that by looking directly at her image one could turn into a stone (www.churchisraelforum.com). A Medusa and a synagogue is a scandalous mix up that only pagan-hearted people would tolerate.
We too may be suffering the effects of the air-pot principle. Like the people of Chorazin and Bethsaida we continue to despise God’s interventions by wallowing in sin. How many more miraculous interventions must God do so that we may repent? Good if He will only rebuke us as he did to Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capaernaum. What if as foretold by the Prophet Amos (3:2) we get severely punished? Who among us can bear the wrath of God? (Rev. 6:12-17). “If you, O Lord, should make a record of our sins, who can stand?” (Psalm 130:3). – (Atty.) Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM.
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