Bulletin Reflection for 33rd Sunday Ordinary Time, Year B "Look Around"

Look around. The leaves are dying and falling to the ground. The days are getting shorter and the darkness is getting longer. Halloween has come and gone. November is here and Christmas is still a long way off. It seems to me that I would expect some words of comfort in these dark times. Yet the readings this time of year are hardly comforting. They talk about the sun being darkened and the moon losing its light, stars falling and the heavens being shaken. These are words of distress and tribulation.

But maybe these images have something to say to us today and aren't simply speaking of a future time. Look around. These are distressing times. There are plenty of trials and tribulations facing us. We face personal trials. Our community has its own struggles. Our nation seems to have more challenges at home and abroad than we can handle. Look around.

The readings for the next several weeks do speak a message of comfort, but not the pious platitude that "everything will be all right" or that "its not a big deal." The scriptures do not ignore the fact that our world is messed up. Look around. But the scriptures do promise that in the midst of this mess God is near. He is "at the gates" during these troubled times. These images of distress can also convey a sense of expectation. When it seems like the world is falling apart, look around. God is waiting at the gates with a word that will not pass away. "The wise shall shine brightly like the splendor of the firmament, and those who lead the many to justice shall be like the stars forever." Look around. God is here, even in the middle of the mess of our lives. Look around!

Catechetical Moment: New Beginnings

I want you to imagine playing golf. You set yourself up carefully at
the first tee. You slowly bring your club back, feeling the energy
build. You swing… the ball sails into the air… wait, no it doesn't…
clunk… it sails into the tree 10 yards down the fairway and ricochets
into the rough.

Mulligan! Do over! Take another shot.

In today's first reading we hear about a "new covenant" which God has
written on our hearts. It is a time of new beginning, a chance for
the people of Israel to begin again after having failed to live up to
their covenant with God.

We celebrate this new covenant in Jesus at this liturgy. But we all
know that sometimes we fail to live out the promise we celebrate. We
have to admit that sometimes our decisions have sent our relationship
with God clunking into a tree. We need a mulligan, a "do over."

On Tuesday night at 7:30pm we will gather together to renew this
covenant through adoration and benediction. Through songs, readings,
and stillness we will prepare ourselves for Easter. We will also have
the opportunity to celebrate the sacrament of Reconciliation. This
sacrament renews us by wiping away all of our past failures. It
renews our heart and reconciles us with the God who loves us. It
allows us to "do over," to begin again as beloved children of God and
take another shot at living out the promises we celebrate tonight.

Next week is Holy Week. Wouldn't it be nice to enter it freshly
renewed in God's grace? I would urge all of us to take advantage of
the opportunity to end our Lenten journey by celebrating the sacrament
of Reconciliation. The opportunity is here… 7:30pm, Tuesday night.
Come and begin again!