Monday of the Thirty-first Week in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 485


For God delivered all to disobedience,
that he might have mercy upon all.
Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!
How inscrutable are his judgments and how unsearchable his ways!
For who has known the mind of the Lord
or who has been his counselor?
Or who has given him anything
that he may be repaid?




Saint Paul seemed to live in a continual state of astonishment. He had only to consider the mystery of sin and he would see the overwhelming mercy of God.
With that active principle it should be far easier us to be amazed, since we are continually gob smacked by stories of war, disaster, disease, rape and terror. The media hits us from every direction with these calamities. Some of us actually experience them.
Last November 9 America woke up to a new deliverance. Some rejoiced that they had been delivered from Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party; others, that we had been delivered to the disobedience of Donald Trump and Breitbart news.
It's hard to say what Saint Paul might have thought of the incident but he would certainly respond with, "that he might have mercy upon all." And then he would sing, "Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom of God...."
How can today's Christian emulate Saint Paul? The times are no worse today than they were then; nor is the Good News any less fresh. Jesus is just as near to you and me in our offices and homes as he was to the Apostle on the Roman highway.
He had the support of his fellow Christians; he didn't travel alone. So the walkers maintained their Jewish customs of daily prayer, especially reciting the psalms and canticles. As they journeyed from town to town they must have discussed the innumerable concurrences between their Jewish traditions and the Gospel. Jesus is the "new Adam." Their Eucharistic celebrations are the new holocaust. Jesus is the Son of the Shepherd King David. These reflections offered them continual delight. They would have often broke out in psalms, hymns and inspired songs as they walked, probably using different words to fit the new doctrine.
Continually they met obstacles and continually they felt the surge of the Holy Spirit within them that overcomes every difficulty. How could they keep from singing of the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!