Thirty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time

http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/110412.cfm

A suburban marsh

It was fitting that we should have such a high priest: 
holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, 
higher than the heavens. 
He has no need, as did the high priests, 
to offer sacrifice day after day, 
first for his own sins and then for those of the people; 
he did that once for all when he offered himself. 

During this end-of-the-year-season-of-judgment, we hear twice in today's reading the command to love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. And we also hear of Jesus, "one like us in all things but sin," who is holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners and higher than the heavens, who did indeed love God with his entire being even unto death, death on a cross.

I am struck by the statement, "It was fitting that we should have such a high priest." Once again the Divine Author puts his finger right on the Mystery, naming it and defining it without making it any more comprehensible to the mortal mind. It might be beyond our understanding but the heart does understand it.

This word evokes -- if you'll pardon the expression -- yippee! from deep within our being. If the mind stands around wondering what's going on and what does this all mean, the heart is delighted to hear of what Jesus has done for us. 

At least one of us has truly loved the Lord God as God deserves to be loved. Humble as we are -- and should be for we have so little to boast of in ourselves -- we claim him as our spokesman, representative, very own Beloved Son and Savior/Redeemer/Messiah! 

He has done it once for all when he offered himself on that Dreadful Good Friday when we saw him lifted up. We could not understand it at the time. It seemed to make no sense. Can anything good come of crucifixion? Isn't that the most appalling thing that can happen to a man, that we can do to a fellow human being? 

And yet he truly offered that sacrifice for you and me -- willingly, freely and with superabundant enthusiasm. As sad as it was -- a sadness that is deep like the deepest abyss of Hell -- it is joyful for us. 

Entering the mystery we sing out to our priest, "It is right and just" and he responds, "It is truly right and just..." 

Each Sunday we celebrate this divine mystery, and with each celebration we find ourselves renewed in courage and hope. Yes we face overwhelming troubles. Yes, this world is too much. We might be tempted to grieve with the poet Wordsworth, 

The world is too much with us; late and soon, / Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: / Little we see in Nature that is ours;/ We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! 

 and even to conclude with him:

I'd rather be / A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;/ So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, / Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn; / Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea; / Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
But the good poet, alienated from his Christian tradition,had forgotten the Mystery of the Mass.

We have seen not Proteus rising from the sea but the Son of Man rising from the dead. We do not expect to hear Triton sound his wreathed horn but we eagerly await the day when Gabriel blows his horn to gather the nations to judgment. With Jesus as our defense attorney, we're ready to face his Judgment Day.