Friday, December 2, 2016

The Transformation of the World and All within It

In today’s first reading, Isaiah 29: 17-24,  the prophet Isaiah gives us the following message of hope: in “a very little while, …Lebanon (insert any city anywhere in the world) shall be changed into an orchard, and the orchard be regarded as a forest! On that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book; and out of gloom and darkness, the eyes of the blind shall see. The lowly will ever find joy in the Lord, and the poor rejoice in the Holy One of Israel (Jesus, our Savior). …[T]he tyrant will be no more and the arrogant will have gone; all who are alert to evil will be cut off, those whose mere word condemns a man (a person], who ensnare his defender at the gate, and leave the just man with an empty claim.”

May the tyrant, the arrogant, those courting evil, those whose words condemn others  and who make empty claims beware of the prophet’s warning. May those doing good in the world, acting justly and loving tenderly (compare Micah 6:8)  rejoice in this hopeful message  and call upon the name of the Lord in mercy. May Jesus, our Savior, purify all of us of any tyrannical intentions,  arrogant pursuits, evil motivations, condemnatory thoughts and empty claims—sin within us now and those we have committed in our past. Like the two blind men in today’s Gospel, Matthew 9: 27-31, may we approach Jesus in humble prayer, asking to be healed and freed of our infirmities, spiritual, physical\, or psychological. 

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