11th Sunday - Year A - Spiritual Crisis

Deacon Tom Copyright © 2022 -2026 
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Transcript

Speaker 0:19

Permanent Deacon talking, the eleventh Sunday of ordinary time, year A.

Speaker 0:28

The Lord be with you. A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew. At that time when Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. And he said to his disciples, The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. And he called to him his twelve disciples, and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every affliction. The names of the twelve apostles are these. First, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother. James the son of Zebedee and John his brother. Philip and Bartholomew. Thomas and Matthew the tax collector. James the son of Alphaeus and Thaddeus. Simon the zealot and Judas his traitor who betrayed him. These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and proclaim as you go, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying, give without paying.

Speaker 2:20 Speaker 2:20

The gospel of the Lord.

Speaker 2:22

Isn't it strange that we are here in chapter nine of Matthew's gospel and he's only just naming the twelve apostles? I wonder how Matthew remembered their names? Did he have a mnemonic? Well, his name can give four of them straight away. If he starts with Matthew, and you take the first four letters M-A-T-T, you've got Matthew, Andrew, Thomas, and Thaddeus. And then you add four J's James, James the Less, John, Judas. And that just leaves four to finish the list. Bart and Peter, who perhaps should be at the top, and as a final P. S. Philip and Simon the zealot. There was some difficulty in naming the apostles through the different u versions of the gospels M a M Perhaps they they needed something to help them remember. I don't know. If you look back to chapter four of Matthew, he does introduce the apostles where Jesus goes to Galilee to bring the his ministry, to begin his ministry. He calls his first four disciples to become fishers of men and women. And then in chapter 9, he specifically rates the calling of Matthew, the tax collector, who was originally known as Levi. And some say that's why the gospel has been given the name Matthew. Matthew's gospel. Jesus justifies his selection of this tax collector so disliked at the time by saying that he's come to call sinners, not the righteous. And now at the end of the chapter, Jesus describes how the harvest of people needs labourers, and we learn the names of his workers, where they are to go, and what they are to do. Saint Oscar Romero implies that these actions that he gives them to complete constitutes an involvement in Jesus' mission of salvation. He states, the salvation that Christ brought is salvation from all the kinds of slavery that oppress humankind. He says of his own time and place in South America. It is necessary that the person of today who lives under the sign of so many kinds of oppression and slavery, fear that enslaves our hearts, illness that oppresses our bodies, sadness, worry, the terror that oppresses our liberty and our life. And St. Oscar goes on to say that we have to break all these chains. Rather than saying, patience, heaven will come, endure. We can't just sit back and do nothing in the face of this type of oppression. He didn't. And he paid the ultimate price just as Jesus did. And the idea that we shouldn't occur or worry about anyone else who's in need is so against the whole idea of Christian love. Jesus saw that action was needed by his laborers even now while he was still with them. But he doesn't send them out powerless. He gives them authority over unclean spirits and the power to heal. Father Raymond Brown, a premier Catholic mid-century scripture scholar, said that this was Jesus giving them his power to proclaim the kingdom of heaven, even before the resurrection, even before he was crucified. Does this mean that we today are taking things too easy? We're here in the midst of scenes of chaos in the 21st century. Do we have a role to play still in the spreading of the good news and the ongoing mission in this apostolic work that Jesus describes? It's evident that Pope Leo believes this to be the case. In his recent visit to Spain, talking June 2026, he warns of a profound world spiritual crisis. When he spoke to the Spanish Parliament, he listed three areas that I think we should be aware of, I need to be aware of. Escalating conflict, deepening polarization, and the widespread disregard for human rights. At his level, he is repeating his opposition to increase European military spending by urging politicians instead to end the wars ravaging the globe and to continue to help migrants who specifically went to the Canary Islands to describe the situation there. As the descendants of the apostles and the disciples that they created, because if you go to chapter 28, uh going towards the the end of Matthew's gospel, Jesus has another role added to the apostles. They're given a greater task by Jesus to make disciples of all nations. Well, that's what they did. We're the descendants. So what should we be doing in the face of local decisions that may create greater polarization? Uh disregard for minority human rights. Even our local councils can be doing that. Are we in the call of the kingdom meant to just stand back and say,” Well you know, it w ill sort itself out.” What is our Christian position towards the homeless or migrants in our own neighbourhoods? Pope Leo's words are very clear. Love those lives that pass through the greatest fragility. When questioned himself about the moral greatness of a nation being close to the kingdom of God, Jesus said measure how much it loves God and measure how much love it shows to its neighbour. Or to put it in a more personable level, what we really do know is that the greatest commandment for all of us is to show love by our actions towards those who demonstrate the greatest fragility in our increasingly fragile world of today.