Wednesday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time
The Oxford Annotated Bible makes a comment on the term, “unclean spirits” which might be helpful in hearing today’s Gospel: “The spirit or demon, was called unclean because the effect of the condition was to separate [people] from the worship of God.”
St. Catherine of Siena makes a helpful remark: “Understand that if we don’t want to lose the weapon with which we have to defend ourselves [against the devil] we must keep it hidden in the house of our soul in true self-knowledge of ourselves.”
The self-knowledge in question is a holy dependency. It is a real need for God! In Gospel language, it is child-like trust which implies a healthy distrust of self-only. In our weakened, human condition, we are accustomed to trust only in ourselves and our perceptions. The disciple of Jesus has to learn to surrender, in all matters, to God.
This trust is accomplished, usually very gradually, in the school of prayer. We learn that all circumstances of our lives are the stuff of prayer. We learn to relate our entire lives to God. This is actually a liberation that orients our entire human experience toward our true home in God. We become again a child but with a new maturity where we are at home with God’s patience. The pull away from this reverence toward God is essentially demonic. That is, it separates us from the worship of God.
One small thing this can mean for day-to-day living is the practice of reverence with the material goods we use each day, above all, our bodies and our minds. We bless God in the use we make of all things! They no longer become an occasion of separating us from God but of joining us to God in grateful prayer.
Reflection by Fr. Xavier Nacke, OSB
Posted in Articles for Ordinary Time, Daily Reflections