The School of the Lord’s Service, 14th Saturday (I), July 11, 2015

Fr. Roger J. Landry
Visitation Convent of the Sisters of Life, Manhattan
Saturday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time, Year I
Memorial of St. Benedict
July 11, 2015
Gen 49:29-32.50:15-26, Ps 105, Mt 10:24-33

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below: 

The following points were attempted in the homily: 

• Today on this Feast of St. Benedict, the great founder of western monasticism and one of the greatest saints who ever lived, and within the heart of this Year of Consecrated Life, it’s key for us to grasp what he did. He founded the Benedictine Order, as he said in his famous Rule, as a “school of the Lord’s service.” Jesus told us in the Gospel, “No disciple is above his teacher. … It is enough for the disciple that he become like his teacher,” and St. Benedict sought to become like his Master and to train others to enter that same school of the Lord’s service. St. Benedict and his Benedictine sons and daughters seek to serve the Lord in their prayer, especially their common liturgical prayer that he called the “opus Dei,” the work of God. They seek to serve the Lord in their work. Prior to St. Benedict’s revolution, manual work, like working the fields, being in shops, even copying manuscripts, were considered things done by slaves. The Benedictines sought to do it as slaves of the Lord, not in a slavish way, but learning from the Master in the school of service how to do it well. They also sought to serve the Lord in their study, zealously learning from the Master in such a way that they could not only live it but pass on as of the first important what they themselves received. Ora et labora et studium: They served the Lord and learned from him in this three course classroom of prayer, work, and study. Those remain the three principle courses in the life of every Christian. St. Benedict would finish his rule instructing them to put nothing before the love of God, and it is in prayer that we put God first, it is in our work that we seek to offer him the sacrifice of Abel, it’s in study that we come on fire for him and for the truth that he has revealed in so many settings.
• Today in the Gospel, Jesus continues his instructions to the Twelve about the mission he was giving them to complete his own. It is the Master’s own school of divine service. It’s all meant to help them to go out in the person of Christ, with his words, with his authority, and even with his sufferings. Jesus lets them know that if they’ve insulted him and tried to ascribe his work to the devil, they will do the same to the Apostles and us. But he reiterates to us not to be afraid, but to speak in the light what Jesus says in the darkness, to proclaim on the housetops what he whispers. He reminds us that we have nothing to fear from those who will seek to kill our bodies but can’t harm our souls. This is what gave St. Paul the courage to proclaim the Gospel despite all the vicissitudes he encountered, because he knew that after fighting the good fight, finishing the race, keeping the faith and being poured out like a libation, a crown of righteousness was awaiting him. That God loved them all, had counted every strand of hair, and would care for them more than he cares for sparrows and lilies who never go without. The whole school of divine service was to get us to acknowledge Christ before others, literally to lead others to the knowledge of Christ.
• In that school of the Lord’s service, perhaps the most important message of all is mercy. This is a message we need to learn so that we might proclaim it in light from the housetops. And in today’s first reading we see what in so many ways is the Old Testament prelude to Jesus’ famous Parable of the Prodigal Son. Joseph the Patriarch’s brothers are all worried that after Jacob their father’s death, Joseph will seek his revenge on them. They said, “Suppose Joseph has been nursing a grudge against us and now plans to pay us back in full for all the wrong we did him!” Knowing their desperation, much like the Prodigal Son, they rehearse a speech to say to Joseph and finish by saying “Let us be your slaves!” They know that without the provisions Joseph would give they wouldn’t survive. But they still weren’t relating to Joseph as their brother because they still hadn’t realized the meaning of their father Jacob’s love. So Joseph said to them, “Have no fear. Can I take the place of God? Even though you meant harm to me, God meant it for good, to achieve his present end, the survival of many people. Therefore have no fear. I will provide for you and for your children.” Mercy is entering once more into a relationship of loving filiation and fraternity. Joseph was treating his brothers as brothers, while they were still viewing him as a slave master, much in the same way that both brothers in Jesus’ parable didn’t get the Father and his merciful love. In this school of the Lord’s service, in our prayer, work and study, we must focus above all on these lessons. And we see how central they are in God’s salvific plan. It was from these 10 brothers who so much needed mercy and to understand what it meant, and from Joseph and Benjamin who needed mercy and salvation in other ways, that the twelve tribes of Israel descended. The “Lion of the Tribe of Judah,” one of Jesus’ titles in the Book of Revelation, descended from Judah who sought to kill and then sell his brother. All of the priests descended from Levi. The school of the Lord’s service teaches its lessons in surprising ways.
• Today we come forward on this Feast of St. Benedict before the Master, who teaches us and then feeds and strengthens us for his service today through our prayer, through our work in welcoming so many who need help in choosing life, through our study. We are so grateful that in Christ in the Eucharist we meet mercy incarnate who provides for us and for our whole spiritual family like Joseph did his. And through that mercy, as we prayed this morning, we might conform our entire life with love and haste to what the Lord is asking, as we reiterate the prayer we made at the beginning of Mass today: “O God, who made the Abbot Saint Benedict an outstanding master in the school of divine service, grant, we pray, that, putting nothing before love of you, we may hasten with a loving heart in the way of your commands.” Amen!

The readings for today’s Mass were: