11/10/2024 - 32nd Sunday of Ordinary Time

Trusting God to the point of Vulnerability

Our Catholic Faith teaches us to cherish the memory of our dear departed. It urges us to commune in prayer, especially at Mass, with the souls of those we loved while they walked this Earth. We are continually reminded that “life is changed, not ended.” Just as “the living” are helped over the rough patches of this early life by experiencing the love, sympathy and solidarity of their friends and family, so also, we believe that the dead are consoled and helped as they pass through the often painful “cleansing” which we call ‘purgatory’ in preparation for their ultimate encounter with God and enjoy eternal peace. We remember in a special way the members of our parish family who passed on in the last year.

The readings of this weekend remind us that widows feature prominently in the Bible. When the books of the Old Testament refer to the poor, they often list three categories of people: the stranger, the orphan and the widow (Deut. 14:29). The Hebrew Scriptures constantly invite people to be sensitive to the needs of these three types of vulnerable people: the stranger, the orphan and the widow (Ps 94:6; Jer 7:11).  When it talks about the justice of God, the Old Testament speaks of the God who defends the stranger, the orphan and the widow (Ps 146:9). Today’s readings showcase two widows as examples of extraordinary generosity. We must remember that, in biblical times, widows were not only poor, but also without any security. They lived on the fringes of society and were extremely vulnerable. On losing their husbands, they had lost their only means of livelihood and status in the community and had to depend totally on charity to survive. 

Our reading, from the first Book of Kings, recounts a memorable incident in the life of Elijah, one of the great prophets who lived 900 years before Christ. Elijah is a great example of a person who trusts so completely that he always does what God asks of him, even when it puts his own life in danger.  Elijah can complain to God because Elijah has such a close relationship with God and thus shares everything with God.  During a severe famine he enters a foreign town, Sidon (in modern day Lebanon) where he meets a widow gathering sticks. This woman is preparing to cook a final meal for herself and her son since she does not have any more provisions to survive the famine. Notwithstanding her harrowing circumstances, Elijah asks her for water and some bread, assuring her that she and her son will not starve to death. Trusting his word, despite not being a Jew, she shares her final meal with him. The story has a happy ending as we are told that ‘the jar of meal was not spent nor the jug of oil emptied’ (1Kings 17:16). The widow experiences a daily miracle during the years of famine.

In the gospel passage from Mark, we meet another widow also in dire straits. She had just two small coins left in her purse. In Jesus' time, two copper coins, often referred to as "two mites" or "two lepta," would have been worth so little that you could buy essentially nothing of significant value; perhaps a small piece of bread or a single grape, representing a minuscule fraction of a daily wage, as the coins represented the smallest denomination available at the time. In an act of seemingly reckless generosity, she puts both coins into one of the boxes of the Temple treasury. Jesus alone notices her and immortalizes her act of utterly self-less giving. He presents her to his disciples as a model of generosity, saying: ‘I tell you solemnly, this poor widow has put more in than all who have contributed to the treasury; for they have put in money they had over, but she from the little she had has put in everything she possessed, all she had to live on’ (Mark 12:43-44).

 Perhaps many of us are more practical and give to the Lord what we may have in excess of what we need.  The Lord wants more!  The Lord wants all that we have and all that we are.  The Lord invites us and waits for us.  Many of us are fearful that if we give our all, we shall have nothing left. Taken literally, the actions of the widows featured in today’s readings appear reckless and foolish, for they give, not from their abundance, but all the meagre means they have for survival. Yet their extreme generosity illustrates a profound truth about God and about what is important in life.

But the utter outpouring of those widows should remind us that the movement of our lives is indeed to be a total gift to God and others, the kind of total gift intended by the promises expressed in the vows of marriage, religious life, and the focused commitment of so many single men and women. A question that we can all ask ourselves then is: what is it that I am still holding on to – that prevents me from totally surrendering myself to God?          Fr Tom Kunnel, C.O