Fr. Roger J. Landry
Ste. Marie’s Parish, Manchester, New Hampshire
Parish Day of Recollection: “Eucharistic Lenten Mission”
Friday of the Second Week of Lent
March 1, 2024
Gen 37:3-4.12-13.17-18, Ps 105, Mt 21:33-43.45-46
To listen to an audio recording of tonight’s homily, please click below:
The following text guided the homily:
- Today at the beginning of this Parish Lenten Mission dedicated to the Holy Eucharist and how in the Eucharist, the source and summit of our faith, Jesus teaches us how better to pray, fast and give alms. In today’s readings, we have a chance to focus a little bit on why the U.S. Bishops have begun a three-year-plus Eucharistic Revival. It’s the theme of human rejection of God and how God responds to that rejection. We remember how when Jesus, in the Synagogue of Capernaum, announced he would give us his body and blood in Holy Communion, most of his disciples said, “This teaching is hard; who can endure it?,” and walked away. The Revival has been called because, sadly, so many Catholics have walked away from Jesus himself in the Eucharist; only one of six Catholics comes to Mass each Sunday. Many haven’t made a conscious choice to reject Jesus. Many have just drifted away. The Revival is an opportunity to try to pray them back, invite the back, and help them stay when they return. It’s a time to turn rejection into a building project on Jesus the Cornerstone. Jesus in today’s Gospel says that he is the stone rejected by the builders who has become the Cornerstone. Even if others have rejected him, even if we in the past have rejected him, even if we in the present routinely marginalize him, this Lent, this Revival, is a chance for us to do something different: to build on him anew. That’s the grace that’s before us.
- Let’s enter into the readings to see how God wants to bring something great from something evil. In the first reading from the Book of Genesis, we witness how Joseph’s brothers were envious of him because he was their father Jacob’s favorite. The fact that Jacob loved Joseph the most didn’t mean he didn’t love the other brothers, but their envy led them not only to close themselves to the love their father had for them but also to the love they should have had for their father and their brother. Their envy led them, as Genesis tells us, to “hate [Joseph] so much that they would not even greet him,” and that interior poison led them to do something much worse. When Joseph went out to help his brothers tend the flocks in Dothan, the brothers conspired to plan to murder him, toss his dead body into a cistern and then lie about it to their father by saying a wild beast had devoured him. They wanted to replicate Cain’s invidious murder of his brother Abel. To save Joseph’s life, one of the brothers, Reuben, persuaded the other siblings just to abandon Joseph into an empty cistern so that he might be able to rescue him later. And so they agreed and threw him down into an inescapable situation, with most of the brothers likely thinking that, while they themselves didn’t shed his blood, it would just be a longer dying process. But then they saw a group of Ishmaelites — basically their second cousins through their grandfather Isaac’s half-brother Ishmael — and sold him into slavery for 20 pieces of silver, not as an act of mercy but of simple profiteering from what they anticipated would be a situation tantamount to his death in Egypt. At every stage, their envy at Joseph’s good fortune led to evil. Their brotherly betrayal was a prophetic type of what would eventually happen to Jesus when he would be sold by one of his spiritual brothers, one of his closest friends, for silver, too.
- Jesus describes that betrayal, and the envy that led to it, in today’s Gospel. Jesus spoke to the chief priests and the scribes in a parable about the way they had treated all the messengers God had sent them and how they were going to treat him. In the prophets Israel had often been referred to as a vineyard planted by God (Hos 10:1). God had made the Israelites stewards of that vineyard but expected a harvest when vintage time grew near. The prophets were the ones sent to remind them of that yield of good deeds, but, as Jesus said, “one they beat, another they killed and a third they stoned.” Other prophets were sent and maltreated the same way. Finally, God sent his Son but, in prophetic tones that would be fulfilled in the cry of “Crucify Him!” in Pontius Pilate’s praetorium, they shouted out, “This is the heir. Come let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.” They wanted to be owners, not stewards, of what they had received and were prepared to commit murder in order to maintain their privileges. They wanted to be the ones in charge of the inheritance of faith, not God himself. The chief motivation behind the persecution of the prophets and the crucifixion of Jesus, Jesus implies in the image, was envy, envy that led to a hatred so severe that it resulted in homicide.
- But we know that that’s not the end of either story. God’s mercy intervenes. God always seeks to bring good out of evil and in both cases God’s goodness triumphed over the worst of human wickedness. Joseph’s being sold for 20 pieces of silver, becoming a slave in Egypt and his ability to interpret dreams eventually brought him to the attention of Pharaoh and to the second position in the Kingdom, an office he was able to use not only to save millions of Egyptians lives during a time of famine but also his family. Likewise, Jesus’ being sold for 30 pieces of silver, taking on the appearance of a slave in order to serve us all and enduring the worst of nightmares, led him to save not only millions of Egyptian lives and so many fellow Israelites but the entire human race, including those who had conspired to have him crucified. That’s why the Responsorial Psalm has us proclaim today, repeatedly, “Remember the marvels the Lord has done!” That’s why in the Gospel, Jesus, citing Psalm 118, says, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. By the Lord has this been done; it is wonderful in our eyes!” (Ps 118:22-23). The verse right after that is the essential verse of Easter, “This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice in it and be glad.” To prepare ourselves in Lent for Easter, we must enter more deeply into the paschal mystery of Jesus’ passion, death and resurrection, we must enter into his experience of rejection and how God brings something marvelous out of it. It wasn’t enough for him just to suffer and die for us. It wasn’t enough for him to take on our nature and enter the world. He wanted to become our food, so that we could build on him each day.
- As we prepare now to receive that “Stone rejected by the builders” in Holy Communion — the greatest marvel of all in our eyes and God’s — we ask him for the grace to build our entire life on Him, our most secure foundation. We ask him to bless this Parish retreat and indeed the whole Eucharistic Revival. Rather than saying, “Come, let us kill him!,” and rejecting Jesus, instead we shout out tonight, remember the marvels the Lord has done, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!,” and “Blessed are those called to the Supper of the Lamb!”
The readings for tonight’s Mass were:
Reading 1
Israel loved Joseph best of all his sons,
for he was the child of his old age;
and he had made him a long tunic.
When his brothers saw that their father loved him best of all his sons,
they hated him so much that they would not even greet him.One day, when his brothers had gone
to pasture their father’s flocks at Shechem,
Israel said to Joseph,
“Your brothers, you know, are tending our flocks at Shechem.
Get ready; I will send you to them.”
for he was the child of his old age;
and he had made him a long tunic.
When his brothers saw that their father loved him best of all his sons,
they hated him so much that they would not even greet him.One day, when his brothers had gone
to pasture their father’s flocks at Shechem,
Israel said to Joseph,
“Your brothers, you know, are tending our flocks at Shechem.
Get ready; I will send you to them.”
So Joseph went after his brothers and caught up with them in Dothan.
They noticed him from a distance,
and before he came up to them, they plotted to kill him.
They said to one another: “Here comes that master dreamer!
Come on, let us kill him and throw him into one of the cisterns here;
we could say that a wild beast devoured him.
We shall then see what comes of his dreams.”
When Reuben heard this,
he tried to save him from their hands, saying,
“We must not take his life.
Instead of shedding blood,” he continued,
“just throw him into that cistern there in the desert;
but do not kill him outright.”
His purpose was to rescue him from their hands
and return him to his father.
So when Joseph came up to them,
they stripped him of the long tunic he had on;
then they took him and threw him into the cistern,
which was empty and dry.
They then sat down to their meal.
Looking up, they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead,
their camels laden with gum, balm and resin
to be taken down to Egypt.
Judah said to his brothers:
“What is to be gained by killing our brother and concealing his blood?
Rather, let us sell him to these Ishmaelites,
instead of doing away with him ourselves.
After all, he is our brother, our own flesh.”
His brothers agreed.
They sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver.
Responsorial Psalm
R. (5a) Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
When the LORD called down a famine on the land
and ruined the crop that sustained them,
He sent a man before them,
Joseph, sold as a slave.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
They had weighed him down with fetters,
and he was bound with chains,
Till his prediction came to pass
and the word of the LORD proved him true.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
The king sent and released him,
the ruler of the peoples set him free.
He made him lord of his house
and ruler of all his possessions.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
When the LORD called down a famine on the land
and ruined the crop that sustained them,
He sent a man before them,
Joseph, sold as a slave.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
They had weighed him down with fetters,
and he was bound with chains,
Till his prediction came to pass
and the word of the LORD proved him true.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
The king sent and released him,
the ruler of the peoples set him free.
He made him lord of his house
and ruler of all his possessions.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
Verse Before the Gospel
God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son;
so that everyone who believes in him might have eternal life.
so that everyone who believes in him might have eternal life.
Gospel
Jesus said to the chief priests and the elders of the people:
“Hear another parable.
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard,
put a hedge around it,
dug a wine press in it, and built a tower.
Then he leased it to tenants and went on a journey.
When vintage time drew near,
he sent his servants to the tenants to obtain his produce.
But the tenants seized the servants and one they beat,
another they killed, and a third they stoned.
Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones,
but they treated them in the same way.
Finally, he sent his son to them,
thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’
But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another,
‘This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.’
They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
What will the owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes?”
They answered him,
“He will put those wretched men to a wretched death
and lease his vineyard to other tenants
who will give him the produce at the proper times.”
Jesus said to them, “Did you never read in the Scriptures:The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
by the Lord has this been done,
and it is wonderful in our eyes?
“Hear another parable.
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard,
put a hedge around it,
dug a wine press in it, and built a tower.
Then he leased it to tenants and went on a journey.
When vintage time drew near,
he sent his servants to the tenants to obtain his produce.
But the tenants seized the servants and one they beat,
another they killed, and a third they stoned.
Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones,
but they treated them in the same way.
Finally, he sent his son to them,
thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’
But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another,
‘This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.’
They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
What will the owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes?”
They answered him,
“He will put those wretched men to a wretched death
and lease his vineyard to other tenants
who will give him the produce at the proper times.”
Jesus said to them, “Did you never read in the Scriptures:The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
by the Lord has this been done,
and it is wonderful in our eyes?
Therefore, I say to you,
the Kingdom of God will be taken away from you
and given to a people that will produce its fruit.”
When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables,
they knew that he was speaking about them.
And although they were attempting to arrest him,
they feared the crowds, for they regarded him as a prophet.
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