HOMILY FOR THE SIXTEENTH SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME – YEAR C
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the Church today celebrates the 16 th Sunday in
Ordinary Time. The Sundays in Ordinary Time are characteristic of very interesting
stories. Last week we listened to the story of the Good Samaritan, and today we just
listened to the interesting account of the visit of Jesus to the home of Mary and
Martha.
I would like us to take our minds 20 centuries back, let us put ourselves into this
scene. In the 1st Century Palestine, as in many parts of the world to this day, houses
were divided into the male ‘space’, the female ‘space’, and the male and female roles
were clearly demarcated as well. The kitchen, and other quarters unseen by
outsiders belonged to the women. The public room was the place where the men
would meet. This culture was even felt at the time of Abraham as we saw in our First
Reading today. When the visitors came Sarah was the one who prepared the food,
but she would not sit with Abraham and the visitors. When they asked where she
was, Abraham said she was in the tent.
Mary crossed this invisible but very important boundary within the house. For the
Jews, only a shameless woman who behave in such a way. She also crossed another
boundary, her posture is very crucial – the posture of a disciple. In the temple in
Jerusalem, the women had their own area; in the synagogues they listened to the
Torah from behind a curtain. Given such a cultural religious context, the scene of a
woman sitting at the Rabi’s feet was a taboo, even Martha could not bear the sight.
She reminds the Master and the disciple that her place is in the kitchen.
Now let us look at Martha, what is she doing? She is preparing something for the
Master to eat and to drink; it was a tedious journey moving up to Jerusalem. It was a
good thing to work for the Lord. But there was a problem with Martha as well…if
we look at the verse again we notice that she was “distracted with service”. To be
distracted means to be pulled away from the present and attracted to something else.
Again Jesus tells Martha that she is anxious. To be anxious is to remember of to be
thinking about so many things. This calls to mind the Parable of the sower – the
seeds that fell in the thorn bush grew, but were choked up, choked up by the
anxieties about things of this world.
Now we see that while Martha was “Busy for Christ,” Mary broke all the barriers of
culture to become “busy with Christ”. It is important to be both busy for Christ and
busy with Christ, but it is a question of which of these is to come first. To be busy for
Christ is to belong, to participate and to contribute. Most of us are active Christians,
we belong to the CWA, the CMA, the CYC, the YCS, the YCW, SSG, Cadets of Mary
and whatever group there is in the Church. This is great! We contribute generously
with our time and talent to build this parish. This is equally great! We participate in
Church cleaning and the devotions in the Church, the Precious Blood Devotion, the
1000 Hail Mary devotion, the Blog Rosary Devotion. This is equally great!
But there is there is one thing we leave out, which is the better thing, We don’t sit
down here at the feet of the Lord to listen to him. We must form that habit of prayer.
How many of us come here on Thursdays and Sundays when the Blessed Sacrament
is exposed. It is interesting to see the parish busy outside on Thursdays and very
lonely inside.
Now like Mary, we must overcome all the obstacles that stop up from sitting
at the Lord’s feet.
- If in your family the normal routine is: rise up, Children rush to School, Mum
rushes to make Dad’s breakfast, Dad wakes up, eats and goes to Work; You
can make a difference today, break this culture and include some time of
Prayer.
- If the evening culture is, News, and while the boring news goes on, children
go to the room with their phones and at the end Dad puts of the TV and
retires and Children get tired of Texting and retire as well – You can break
that culture. Gather everyone, examine the day, and make a prayer as a
family.
- If your culture is to go to work and just get busy with papers and documents
and turning up and down – make a difference, begin your work with prayer
and end with prayer.
Prayer is like a Chimney that warms up our hearts and propels us to run smoothly,
to carry out every other activity well and with God’s guidance. If we all draw our
strength from our quiet moments with Christ, then all our parish activities would
have fuller meaning and would be more precious in the eyes of the Lord. There
would be no distractions or diversion of our attention, there would be no anxiety,
everything shall flow in love and harmony and peace. We pray that the blessed
Virgin Mary who listened and treasured all in her heart, would help us, in our daily
struggle.
