14th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Fr. Francis)
During the U. S. Independence Day celebrations on July fourth, most Americans probably heard all or part of the Emma Lazarus poem inscribed on the base of the Statue of Liberty: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…. Send these, the homeless tempest-tossed to me.” Today’s readings, especially the Gospel, give the same message in a more powerful way: “Take my yoke . . . and you will find rest” (Matthew 11:29).
During the days of the Second Vatican Council, Pope St. John XXIII used to submit all his anxieties to God with this prayer every night: “Lord, Jesus, I’m going to bed. It’s your Church. Take care of it!”
One lesson to be learned during the coronavirus pandemic is to turn to the Lord and rest in Him. It sounds easy, but it’s not. This is anything but easy, to learn to rest in the Lord, but it is possible. Most ordinary days do not permit us to spend leisurely time with God, but these have not been ordinary days. And so even though many of us want to be back at work full-time, yet we are still probably more “cooped up” than normal. It’s not just a curse; it’s also an opportunity to appreciate God and our loved ones even more than usual.
Despite the virus, this is that great time of year, on this holiday weekend, when maybe we get to slow down even more and appreciate family and friends and, especially around the Fourth of July, appreciate our country. Jesus says, “Come to me all who labor and find life burdensome, and I will give you rest.” No matter where we’re from, how blest we are to have a great country! Even if we’re from other countries, it is a very good thing to be grateful for one’s own country and to appreciate one’s homeland and, above all, to pray for one’s country, which I hope we all do today or later this week. In the United States, it is our privilege and honor to be able to pray freely for our country (perhaps with some social distancing!), founded on July 4, 1776, with the words of our Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” What a great country! Perfect? — no. Capable of constant improvement due to the freedoms we enjoy to speak out and to organize and to vote? — you bet.
St. Paul says in Romans chapter eight that the same Holy Spirit who raised our Savior Jesus Christ from the dead is going to raise us up as well. Let me repeat — God the Holy Spirit is alive and well today and will raise us up who through faith and baptism are united with Christ. Once we know that the Holy Spirit is alive and well and is working to raise us up here and hereafter with Christ, we have great trust in God our heavenly Father. And when we have trust in God our heavenly Father, then we are not afraid to pray to Him for all our needs.
Jesus teaches us to pray confidently: “Ask and you will receive, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you.” So we want to take Jesus at his word — we want to pray around the Fourth of July for our families, our friends, our neighbors, our communities, and above all, our country. We want to pray for health and prosperity for everyone. I don’t often like to sign up for group projects, but I was asked two years ago to sign up to pray the daily Rosary for our country, which sounded like a great project, something I could do and was already doing, and you know what? — I did this, and I continue to do this, and I’m going to keep doing this, precisely for the special intention that God will bless America. And I’m glad I signed up, and I myself have received unexpected graces and favors from praying the daily Rosary for our country.
It’s very important to pray for our country. We take many blessings for granted in our country. But there are certain blessings and graces that will come to us in no other way than by asking for them. It’s a great mystery why God wants us to ask for certain graces, when He loves us and wants to give us many graces. Why does God want us to ask for certain graces? — because, as you young parents know, humility and obedience and good manners are very important for those who ask for favors, like children. God our heavenly Father wants us to be humble enough, obedient enough, polite enough to ask respectfully, reverently, for what we need, and even for what we want. St. Therese the Little Flower says we need to be “little” enough, to receive all that God wants to give us. St. Alphonsus says we are to pray to God familiarly and intimately as to our best friend, and God will infallibly help us, maybe in ways we do not expect. Even if we’re praying to win the lottery and don’t win (winning might be bad for us, although some would like to take their chances!), we can be supremely confident that God our loving Father hears every prayer uttered in faith, and He will assist in some way all who ask His help.
St. Paul says in 1 Timothy 2:2 that we do well to pray for “all who are in authority . . . that we may lead lives of tranquility and devotion.” Did you ever stop to realize that one of the greatest things you can do for your country is to pray for your country, for your elected officials, for all who serve the common good, like police, firefighters, first responders, teachers, health-care workers, postal workers, and all who make this country run as well as it does? So many of these good people have been heroes in the virus crisis — thank you, heroes! And thank you, Lord, for sending us heroes when we need them most! Yes, one of the best things we can do is to pray for our country. St. Thomas Aquinas says patriotism or love of one’s country is a great virtue and a great attitude to have; patriotism is part of the virtue of religion, which is part of the virtue of justice, the virtue by which we give to God what we owe to Him — our love, our gratitude, our appreciation, our thanks. So let’s be sure this week to pray for our country, and in fact, we might pause right now for a moment of silence to ask the good Lord to bless this land, this country, this “one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” And right now we can lift up everyone in our country, and in our world, who needs our prayer and God’s help. We’ll get through this challenging time! — o yes we will, with God’s help. So let’s be still with God for a moment now, and ask His help.
Fr. A. Francis HGN