Set Apart by the Lord for a Special Vocation and a Special Ministry or Profession

In today's gospel, Mark 2: 13-17, Jesus calls Levi, a tax collector, to follow him.  At table dining with Levi in  his house, Jesus hears scribes outside the house asking why is eating with sinners and tax collectors.  His response is that he "did not come to call the righteous but sinners." And furthermore states: "Those who are well do not need a physician."  Sinners, not well spiritually, do!

Many are called be that to marriage, to single life, to religious life, to priesthood,  or to the deaconate. All of us need a physician to stay well, to remain faithful to the Lord, as Levi had even to the point of being martyred for his faith. You and I most likely will not face physical martyrdom but a spiritual martyrdom, dying to sin, to selfishness, to anything that is an obstacle within us to following the will of God for us, especially when the choices God calls us to embrace provoke others to say: Why has the Lord called this person to that way of life, to be involved in that ministry, to marry that person, to be involved in that profession?

Samuel, unlike Levi, was highly praised: "There was no other child of Israel more handsome than Saul; he stood head and shoulder above the people....When Samuel caught sight of Saul, the Lord assured him, 'This is the man of whom I told you; he is to govern my people'...[Saul anointed him, saying:) 'The Lord anoints you commander over his heritage. You are to govern the Lord's people Israel, and to save them from the grasp of their enemies roundabout."

Saul, unlike Levi, does not remain faithful to the Lord or to his calling, but get lured into evil ways with others around him.  You and I need to know that fidelity to the Lord is not a given.  We, like Saul, may face challenges to follow others paths. Without keeping our focus on the Lord and remembering that we are sinners dependent on the Lord for our salvation, we, too, could succumb to temptations all around us. 

Lord, help us remain faithful to you in whatever calling you have given us. May we stay close to you and remember our dependence upon grace to do the good  to which you have called us.

God's Message through Amos

Today’s first reading, Amos 2: 6-10, 13-16, speaks of how offensive it is to God that we worship idols and forget the commandments of love, justice and mercy; how offensive to God that we renege on the commitments we made to God through the sacraments of baptism, First Communion, First Confession, marriage, ordination or first profession of vows as religious.    You “sell the just…for silver, and the poor…for a pair of sandals.  [You] trample the heads of the weak into the dust of the earth (through physical  death or abusive behaviors in word (gossip) and deed)  and force the lowly out of the way. Son and father go to the same prostitute, profaning my holy name….”

That reading applies as much today as in the day of Amos. Children and women are sold for sex, for body parts, for slave labor in sweat shops; babies are slaughtered in the womb—their aborted fetuses “trampled” upon, so to speak.  Those labeled “lowly,”—minorities, handicapped, chronically ill, the elderly, immigrants, the homeless, the mentally ill--are pushed “out of the way,” some are  put in nursing homes and forgotten by many. Members of the LBGT community are gunned down. 

 Some ‘fathers and sons” continue the same promiscuous behaviors before or after marriage.  In today’s responsorial psalm, God says to us: “When you do these things, shall I be deaf to it. Or do you think that I am like yourself? I will correct you… Consider this, you who forget God.”

“Beware,” God says through the prophet Amos, “I will crush you into the ground as a wagon crushes when laden with sheaves.  Flight shall parish from the swift, and the strong [person] shall not retain his strength; the warrior shall not save his life, nor the bowman stand his ground. The swift of foot shall not escape, nor the horseman save his life. And the most stouthearted of warriors shall flee naked on that day, says the Lord.”

All of what happens in our day is a message from God, as in the day of Amos. Will Jesus say to you as he said to the disciples:  “You know how to read the face of the sky, but you cannot read the signs of the times”  (Mt. 16:3)?

What is God saying to you through the suffering and pain in your life or through the joys and satisfactions of your life? Both contains a message from the God who saves you