Tuesday of the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time 

The Responsorial Psalm encourages us: “Praise the Lord, my soul!” (Psalm 146), and the readings give us reasons based on faith and the experience of faith in action. 

In 2Corinthians 8: 1-9, Paul does not just praise the Corinthians for their generous contribution to the collection for the suffering Church in Jerusalem. He sees in their response another manifestation of the gift of grace in them: “you excel in everything–in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in utmost eagerness, and in the love that we have communicated to you” (Jerusalem Bible). The love the Corinthians show is a love they have learned—or better, seen—in Paul, who reminds them we have all seen it in Jesus, who, “though he was rich, yet for your sakes became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.” 

This is ministry: the Father’s love embodied and manifested in Jesus; Jesus’ love embodied and manifested in us. So, the Spirit is revealed as present and active in us who are Christ’s risen, living body on earth. “Praise the Lord, my soul!” 

In Matthew 5:43-48, Jesus exhorts us, “Be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.” This is the great call that the Church is proclaiming today: 

All the faithful of Christ of whatever rank or status are called to the fullness of the Christian life and to the perfection of love. Every Catholic must therefore aim at Christian perfection (cf. James 1:4; Romans 12:1-2) and all, according to their position, play their part so that the Church… may daily be more purified and renewed… (See Vatican II, Church 11, 40; Ecumenism 4.) 

This is a call to perfection, to union of heart and mind and will with Christ, overflowing in ministry. Or we could say it is a call to ministry flowing out of union of mind and heart with Christ. The message is the same: we must work at becoming holy (one with Christ in thought, desire and deed) in order to communicate his life to others and establish the reign of God on earth. 

 We communicate God’s divine life to others by letting the invisible life of God in us become visible in our words and actions. We are called and consecrated as priests to express our faith, our hope and our love through our bodies. We say at every Mass, in union with Christ on the cross, uniting ourselves as priests and victims to Jesus lifted up as Priest and Victim in the host: “This is my body, given up for you.” 

“No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13). But every minute we give to others is a minute of our life. Ministry is love reaching perfection. “Praise the Lord, my soul!” 

Initiative: As a priest by Baptism, show Christ’s love to every person you deal with.

— Fr. David M. Knight

View today’s Mass readings, Lectionary #366, on the USCCB website here

Fr. David M. Knight (1931-2021) was a priest of the Diocese of Memphis in Tennessee, a prolific writer, and a highly sought after confessor, spiritual director, and retreat master. He authored more than 40 books and hundreds of articles that focus primarily on lay spirituality and life-long spiritual growth.