Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dear Friends,

This Sunday’s Mass readings illustrate a pattern that emerges throughout Sacred Scripture in the encounter with God: a sinful man finds himself before God and, glimpsing the magnitude of his glory - the vastness of his power, his goodness and his splendour –recognizes the fundamental truth of the abyss that lies between him and his Creator. In the face of God we are confronted by the reality of our sinfulness and unworthiness before Him.

“Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” cries Isaiah; “For I am the least of the apostles, not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God,” declares Paul; and “Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man,” says Peter.

‘What right do we have - we say to ourselves - sinful and weak as we are, to face Him?’ We think in terms of meriting or deserving God, but He doesn’t think of us that way. We gaze upon the gulf between us and God; God’s gaze closes the gulf. He not only sees us up close but He draws us close to Him by drawing close to us. His gaze reaches behind and beyond the layers of sin and sees each of our hearts, those hearts that He designed since before the beginning of the world, to be with Him and to live with Him and to share Him with each other.

Despite our sins and our weaknesses He not only draws near to us but He draws near to others through us, if we accept Him and accept his love, that perfect love which casts out all fear. Then we can accept his calling to love others in and through Him, like Isaiah: “Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send? Who will go for us’ ‘Here I am,’ I said; ‘send me!’”

And we can trust in his strength and power, like Paul: “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me has not been ineffective,”

and hear his consoling words calling us to the great adventure of our lives with Him, like Peter: “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men.”

-Alan El Haj, RCIA Formator