A homily for the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time
I’ve always been a jogger, and a few years ago, quite a few years ago, I decided, let me see if I can do a marathon, get in shape for a marathon. Well, if you’re going to condition yourself for a marathon, that means, like, lose a lot of weight. I had to lose a lot of weight because I, the more weight you carry, the harder it is.
And so I had to shed quite a few pounds to get in shape. That’s my interpretation of today’s gospel, where Jesus says, if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off, or if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It’s not because sin is the, sinlessness is the goal. No, it’s marathon is the goal. It’s to be conditioned to do this marathon of love.
You know, love God with all your heart, soul, mind and body and love your neighbor as yourself. This is what were to be conditioned for. Life is not about remaining sinless and whammo! The door opens to heaven. No, life is about love. And whammo, love opens the door to heaven. Not sinlessness, but it gets worse because I was now watching what I was eating and I was being careful about what I ate.
I became fastidious and people, my sisters especially said, you know, Greg, you’ve become like a self-righteous diet nazi who is watching what people are eating. Because I had a watch. And that’s kind of what this is about. This is, you know, pull off that nazi stuff we do to each other criticizing or nitpicking or judging or avoiding. You know, this is the stuff we’re to be plucking out of our lives so that we can run this marathon of love.
Saint Teresa of Avila, great saint, says; “all who follow Christ, if they don’t want to get lost, must walk along the path he trod’. He was on the marathon path, and he asks us to be on the marathon path. To just love and love and love again. And fired with love within. To love and love again. That line also comes from Saint Teresa of Avila.
