March 7, 2010
3rd Sunday of Lent
HOLY NAME
How many are the names of God! In our liturgy, we call upon the Lord, our Christ, for mercy. We ask our Father for our daily bread. We pray to the Holy Spirit to sanctify our gifts. In all this we recall the revelation to Moses that our God is the God Who Is. This most wonderful of names reminds us that the holy presence is with us always, journeying with us, one with our sacrament, speaking the word of life. The God Who Is does not abandon us but always offers us one more chance to bring forth fruit.
Text, Alice L. Camille © 1998, OCP. All rights reserved.
Reading 1: Exodus 3:1-8, 13-15 This passage is about the call of Moses to go back to Egypt and set God’s people free. He has a marvelous vision of God as fire within a bush. God tells him he has heard the cry of suffering from his people and he wants Moses to lead them out. Ten plagues and two years later, this will eventually become the setting for the story of Passover. Passover will become our link to Eucharist and Jesus’ death and rising.
Reading 2: 1Corinthians 10:1-6, 10-12 There are many symbols here. The cloud St. Paul is referring to is the pillar of cloud that led the Israelites through the desert during the day. (At night it was a pillar of fire). Paul reminds us that although the Israelites were purified by Moses by their walk through the Red Sea (“baptized into Moses”) and that they ate spiritual food (the manna in the desert God gave them) and drank spiritual drink (water from the rock—a symbol of Christ)—they still died from their disobedience. Likewise, for Christians, baptized and fed upon the body and blood of the Lord, it is still possible that they will be found displeasing to God.
Gospel: Luke 13:1-9 In Jesus’ day it was common to believe that bad things happened only to people who were sinners. Here Jesus tries to undo this thinking. He points out the ones killed by the tower were no guiltier than the Galileans. But he warns his listeners that anyone who does not repent will meet a similar fate.
From “Table of the Word”
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