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Readings for Today. Listen to our other podcasts.
Today’s readings are from Monday of the 34th week in Ordinary Time. The first reading tells the story of Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, and how they gain favor in the King’s service. The gospel tells the familiar story of the Widow’s mite.
Trust
I don’t like group projects. When I was in school, I never really liked it when we had to work with others. And there’s a reason. There’s a very obvious reason, and I’ve had to address it as a teacher, which I’ll tell you about in a minute.
But I didn’t like group projects because I didn’t trust the other people in the group to do what they said they were going to do. I didn’t trust. Now as a teacher, I learned to address this in some ways by being quite blunt with students. I remember going up to more than one student and saying, you’re the person that no one hopes is in their group because you don’t do any work. Don’t be that person.
Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn’t. Trust. Trust is the basis of any meaningful and important relationship. We cannot really have a relationship with anybody we do not trust. And trust is a common theme that we see in today’s readings.
In the first reading, these three young men are in service of King Nebuchadnezzar. Now King Nebuchadnezzar was not a nice man. He was a brutal king who readily killed anyone who looked at him the wrong way. And so it’s quite obvious we can see that that’s true because of the fear that the Chief Chamberlain, who had to be trusted by Nebuchadnezzar in some way to get that position, and yet the Chief Chamberlain is very afraid. He doesn’t want to incur the wrath of King Nebuchadnezzar.
Certainly the four young men, Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, knew this as well. He had taken over the reign of King Jehoiakim, and he had brought these men into exile. And yet they trusted in God. On some level we could say, well, what’s the big deal? Eat whatever.
But on a completely different level, by refusing to abandon the faith that they practiced before they were exiled, they’re making a profound statement and witness about their priorities in life. Namely, they will do everything they can to follow the Lord God. They are all in, to use a modern phrase.
In the Gospel, we also have a story of tremendous trust. This widow puts in two small coins, presumably not worth very much, but they’re the only two coins she has. She completely trusts that God will never be outdone in generosity, and that by placing her trust in the Lord God, she is able to give all that she has.
Christianity is one big group project. We cannot really be a good Christian unless we are willing to seek the people we can trust and to reach out to those we have not yet been able to trust because we do not know them. But one thing we can do, and that is to stand with humility before our God and place our lives completely in His hands so that like the four in the first reading and the widow in the Gospel, we too might have complete trust in God.
On the friar, you can listen to our homilies (based on the readings of the day) and reflections. You can also ask us to pray for you or to pray for others. You can subscribe to our website to be informed whenever we publish an update.
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