Thursday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time

Today's Mass Readings

Yesterday, we went all the way down to the foundation God lays in us before we exist, the bedrock we cannot destroy. But today’s Gospel completes the picture, and the other half is sobering: the foundation beneath you may be indestructible, but the house you build on it is not. You can still raise sand on rock.

Today, Jesus states the thesis flat out, with no parable to soften it. “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father.” The right words, the right address — not enough. Then the two houses: the same rain falls on both, the same floods rise, the same wind buffets them. One stands, and one collapses. The only difference is the foundation — and the foundation, he says, is not hearing his words but acting on them.

Now look at what comes down in the first reading. Not a pagan city this time. The Temple itself. Nebuchadnezzar strips the gold Solomon made, carries off the king, the officials, the craftsmen, and empties the house of God. The holiest address on earth, the one place that said “Lord, Lord” better than anywhere in the world, and it falls. Because saying it was never the foundation. Doing it was.

This is the hardest day of the week to hear, because it cuts close. It is entirely possible to have the right words and the wrong footing — to stand inside the Temple, fluent in the language of faith, and still be building on sand. The storm does not check your address. It tests what is underneath.

The same rain falls on every house. The difference was never the weather; it was always what was beneath. So do not only admire these words of his. Do them. That is the one thing that turns rock under your feet into rock under your house.

Reflection by Fr. Etienne Huard, OSB