Monday of the Twenty-eighth Week in Ordinary Time

Today's Mass Readings

With a nod toward nostalgia, most of us can remember and appreciate knowing our many relatives. We grew up exchanging and enjoying time spent with our “cousins by the dozens.” As we grew older it was important to know who was related to whom. The underlying point here is that relationships whether they be close or extended carry personal and social responsibilities.

St. Paul was very clear when he wrote to the Romans in today’s first reading that his relationship with the Lord Jesus was an unbreakable bond as an apostle. It was a bond established through the gift of faith which became a commission to be passed forward. St. Paul makes it abundantly clear that we also share in that same transforming relationship.

The relationship effects our vision. If we see and believe that the Lord Jesus took on our humanity as an act of salvation from the moment of his conception to the moment of rising from the dead we are committed to that relationship. We have the advantage of seeing the full picture and the full covenant of God’s love for us.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus is calling the people to expand their vision. Jesus is saying look beyond the “amazing things” in the story of the reluctant prophet Jonah. Being swallowed by a fish and living is nothing compared to the power of God using a weak hesitant prophet to bring a whole city into a converted relationship with God. What do we see in our own lives? Are we impressed?

Reflection by Fr. Daniel Petsche, OSB