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GOSPEL REFLECTIONS FOR BUSY PEOPLE Sunday, November 7, 2004 Luke 20:27-38 Old time Sadducees were people of religion, wealth, and education. They did not believe in the resurrection, angels, and spirits. They were mixed up by their beliefs in what they see plainly, only what is there in the Law and in the world. They made religion as pride, wealth as power, and education as prestige. The Sadducees represented the vested interests of the Jews in Jerusalem. That’s why the question asked was whose “owning” was the woman in the afterlife. The belief of “owning” prevailed. The “I” specialist is the summary of their doctrine and the wealth in their minds. Modern day Sadducees still live. Church people who use religion as “ownership” and collections of pride, prestige and power. People who cannot give up the “I” in many ways. “I” without giving is self-possession, people who consider themselves to be indispensable and irreplaceable. These are people who can sing only yet not praising God; who can pray without piety; who can donate without seeing the poor, the sick, and the needy; who can do this or that acting like busy bodies without the heart of service. For them, a day is a collection of many “I’s” which is so bulky. They cannot see and enter the gates of heaven. Jesus is the Master of self-emptying. In giving the “I” we can see the mystery of brotherly and sisterly love; the voice of angels among the faithful singing and glorifying God in prayer and worship; the beauty of the many heirs of the Kingdom, the baptized participating and cooperating in the ministry of the Church in many how’s and in many why’s; “I” among many and not “many” in my “I”. In Jesus we can see the mystery of God among many, God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob…God of Israel, God of the Gentiles, God of the Bishop, God of the priest and many priests, God of Mr. X’s and Mrs. Y’s; God of the old and God of the young; and God of all; and never, never, my “own and only” God. |
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