Suy Niệm Tin Mừng thứ Năm Tuần thứ 20 Thường Niên
Tiệc cưới được đề cập trong Tin Mừng hôm nay nhắc nhở chúng ta về lời mời gọi của Thiên Chúa và lời mời gọi đó vẫn đang tiếp tục mời gọi chúng ta ở đây, và hôm nay. Bởi vì chúng ta vẫn còn có thể thấy giao ước giữa tình yêu và cuộc sống. Tin Mừng hôm nay nhắc nhở chúng ta rằng Chúa Giêsu lập Bí Tích Thánh Thể cho tất cả những ai sẵn sàng lắng nghe và thực hành lời dạy của Ngài. Chúa Kitô cho phép tình yêu của Ngài sắp sẵn và đến với tất cả mọi người. Nhưng vấn đề là ở nơi mỗi người chúng ta và sự lựa chọn của mỗi người; chúng ta có sẵn sàng mở rộng tâm hồn để đón nhận tình yêu của Chúa đem đến cho chúng ta? Hay chúng ta vẫn kép kín trái tim của chúng ta.
Mỗi khi chúng ta được Chúa mời gọi đến cùng thăm dự vào bàn với Ngài, chúng ta nên chấp nhận lời mời của Ngài với một tâm hồn cởi mở và một trái tim rộng lượng. Hãy giữ tâm hồn của chúng ta được trong sạch như chiếc áo cưới mới được mặc lên người mỗi khi chúng ta đến tham dự tiệc với Chúa Giêssu trong Thánh Thể
. Chúng ta đã biết là phải tự trọng, chuẩn bị về thể xác, bên ngoài mỗi khi chúng ta được mời và tham dự ăn tiệc với những khách quý, vì thế chúng ta cũng phải biết chuẩn bị, làm sạch tâm hồn và lòng trí của chúng ta mỗi khi chúng ta đến tham dự bàn tiệc với Ngài trong Thánh Lễ. Qua bí tích Thánh Thể mà chúng ta có thể được chia sẻ, canh tân tinh thần với tình yêu của Thiên Chúa đối với chúng ta. Vì thế, chúng ta cũng phải nên biết lắng nghe lời của Ngài.
Chúng ta phải chuẩn bị cho bản thân và tâm hồn của chúng ta như thế nào để mỗi khi chúng ta tham dự và nhận lời mời gọi của Chúa Kitô trong mỗi thánh lễ?.
REFLECTION Thursday
20 Ordinary time
The wedding banquet mentioned in today's Gospel reminds us of God's invitation and calling because it is here where we can encounter the covenant between love and life. Today's Gospel reminds us that Jesus established the Eucharist for everyone who is willing to listen and practice his teachings. He allowed his love to be available to all. It's a matter of choice; it's a matter of heart.
However, when we are called and invited to his table, we should accept his invitation with an open mind and an open heart. It is similar to wearing a clean wedding garment when we attend a banquet. We must prepare ourselves physically when we attend an invitation, but we must also cleanse our hearts and our minds when we accept the invitation to His banquet. It is through the Eucharist that we can share spiritual renewal not only because of God's love for us, but also by listening to his word.
How do we prepare ourselves when we accept his invitation?
Thursday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time
“The Kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. He dispatched his servants to summon the invited guests to the feast, but they refused to come.” Matthew 22:2–3
The king in this parable is God the Father, and the wedding is the marriage between Christ and the Church. The Father invites each one of us to be a member of the Church and to enter into divine union with His Son Jesus, thus entering into the life of the Holy Trinity. But we see right away in the parable that the invited guests “refused to come.” As the parable goes on, the king tried even harder to invite the guests, but they all responded in one of two ways. “Some ignored the invitation and went away…” and “The rest laid hold of his servants, mistreated them, and killed them.” Clearly, this was not the response hoped for by the generous king.
We see in these two responses two levels of rejection of the Gospel that are present in our world today, just as it was at the time of Jesus. The first level of rejection is indifference. Many people are very busy today. We easily become occupied with many things that matter little in the end. Many are consumed by their smartphones, computers and tablets. Many spend countless hours watching television. Others become workaholics, spending most of their time at their occupation and leaving little time for that which is most important, such as family, prayer and service. As a result, it is very easy to become indifferent to the matters of faith and easy to fail to pray every day so as to seek out and fulfill God’s will. This indifference is quite serious.
There is also a rejection of the faith in our world through a growing hostility toward the Church and morality. There are many ways in which the secular world continues to promote a culture that is contrary to the Gospel. And when Christians speak out and oppose these new cultural tendencies, they are condemned and often characterized as being prejudiced or judgmental. Such malice was displayed by the guests in this parable who “laid hold of his servants, mistreated them, and killed them.” Hostility toward the Church, the faith and clear moral principles laid down by God appears to be growing every year. This form of rejection of the Gospel is even more damaging than the simple indifference mentioned above. In this parable for today, Jesus says that in response to those who were indifferent and hostile, the king “sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city.”
This parable should not be read in such a way that we look at others and condemn them as if we were the king and had the right to do so. We do not have that right. Only God does. Instead, this parable should be read from the perspective of your own life. Hopefully you are not one of those who are hostile to the Gospel. But perhaps you and many other Christians struggle with the first form of rejection: indifference. We can easily become indifferent in many various ways and on many different levels. The opposite of being indifferent is to care and to care deeply about going to the wedding feast when invited.
Reflect, today, upon the Wedding Feast to which you are invited. You are invited to enter into the glorious celebration of becoming one with the Savior of the World. You are invited to surrender your life to Him without reserve. You are invited to holiness, moral integrity, unwavering fidelity to God, service of others, charity that knows no bounds and so much more. To enter the Wedding Feast of the Lamb is something that must take place every day and every moment of your day for the rest of your life. God is inviting you. Will you say “Yes” with every fiber of your being?
My inviting Lord, You desire that all people fully accept the invitation You have given to become one with You through spiritual marriage. You call us to the glorious Wedding Feast and eternal rejoicing. May I never be indifferent to Your invitation and always make my response with all my heart. I love You, dear Lord. Help me to love You all the more. Jesus, I trust in You.
Thursday
20 Ordinary time 2023
Opening Prayer: My Lord, here I am. I invite you to come and lay your eyes on my soul. I want to put aside all distractions and return that look.
1. There Is No Duplicity in Him: The way in which Jesus described Nathanael speaks of integrity, honesty, and justice. The Gospel passage seems to suggest further that the encounter between such a person and Christ is characterized by profound and almost immediate mutual recognition—almost as if the absence of duplicity clears the way for man to come to faith.
Thursday 20 Ordinary time
2022
Rejecting a Gift: In today’s Gospel, we have two groups of people. The first are those who were given the first opportunity to enter into God’s kingdom, the wedding feast par excellence, the eternal feast of God’s kingdom. They should have dropped everything in order to participate in it. They didn’t realize that they were rejecting the greatest possible gift, the one thing that matters. We fall into this category when we sin. We settle for inferior things that leave us spiritually empty.
Suy niệm
Trong những năm tháng thời non trẻ của chúng ta, chúng ta có thể đã có kinh nghiệm tham gia tụ tập đông người, chúng ta đã không mặc trang phục thích hợp. Đó là đáng xấu hổ như chưa được mặc quần áo đúng. Như chúng ta đã lớn tuổi chúng ta đã học như thế nào và khi nào để ăn mặc cho một dịp.\
Mỗi người chúng ta được mời đến bữa tiệc trên trời của Đức Chúa Trời. Chúng ta đã được ban cho ân tứ đức tin khi chúng ta đã được rửa tội; trong Giáo Hội Thiên Chúa của chúng ta được ban các bí tích và khác giúp để được tham gia xứng đáng tại bữa tiệc của Thiên Chúa.
Làm thế nào có chúng ta trả lời để chào của Thiên Chúa? Chúng ta đã sống lời thề rửa tội của chúng ta? Chúng ta đã đánh giá cao các bí tích của Thiên Chúa và giúp cho chúng ta? Chúng ta đã sống ra cuộc sống của chúng ta như vậy mà chúng ta trở thành khách xứng đáng để có mặt tại bữa tiệc tuyệt vời của Chúa?
Reflection:
In our younger years we may have experienced attending gatherings where we did not wear the proper attire. It was embarrassing not to have been properly dressed. As we grew in age we have learned how and when to dress for an occasion.
In the Gospel parable which was to "throw light on the kingdom of heaven," the king punished the man at the wedding banquet who was not properly dressed. The king felt insulted that a guest was not properly dressed at the wedding of his son. How did the guest get into the banquet not properly dressed? Did the king's assistants not offer him the customary festal garment? Did he refuse to wear what was offered?
Each one of us is invited to God's heavenly banquet. We were given the gift of faith when we were baptized; in God's Church we are given the sacraments and other helps to be worthy participants at God's banquet.
How have we responded to God's offers? Have we lived out our baptismal vows? Have we appreciated God's sacraments and helps to us? Have we lived out our lives such that we become guests worthy to be at the great banquet of the Lord?
Tiệc cưới được đề cập trong Tin Mừng hôm nay nhắc nhở chúng ta về lời mời gọi của Thiên Chúa và lời mời gọi đó vẫn đang tiếp tục mời gọi chúng ta ở đây, và hôm nay. Bởi vì chúng ta vẫn còn có thể thấy giao ước giữa tình yêu và cuộc sống. Tin Mừng hôm nay nhắc nhở chúng ta rằng Chúa Giêsu lập Bí Tích Thánh Thể cho tất cả những ai sẵn sàng lắng nghe và thực hành lời dạy của Ngài. Chúa Kitô cho phép tình yêu của Ngài sắp sẵn và đến với tất cả mọi người. Nhưng vấn đề là ở nơi mỗi người chúng ta và sự lựa chọn của mỗi người; chúng ta có sẵn sàng mở rộng tâm hồn để đón nhận tình yêu của Chúa đem đến cho chúng ta? Hay chúng ta vẫn kép kín trái tim của chúng ta.
Mỗi khi chúng ta được Chúa mời gọi đến cùng thăm dự vào bàn với Ngài, chúng ta nên chấp nhận lời mời của Ngài với một tâm hồn cởi mở và một trái tim rộng lượng. Hãy giữ tâm hồn của chúng ta được trong sạch như chiếc áo cưới mới được mặc lên người mỗi khi chúng ta đến tham dự tiệc với Chúa Giêssu trong Thánh Thể
. Chúng ta đã biết là phải tự trọng, chuẩn bị về thể xác, bên ngoài mỗi khi chúng ta được mời và tham dự ăn tiệc với những khách quý, vì thế chúng ta cũng phải biết chuẩn bị, làm sạch tâm hồn và lòng trí của chúng ta mỗi khi chúng ta đến tham dự bàn tiệc với Ngài trong Thánh Lễ. Qua bí tích Thánh Thể mà chúng ta có thể được chia sẻ, canh tân tinh thần với tình yêu của Thiên Chúa đối với chúng ta. Vì thế, chúng ta cũng phải nên biết lắng nghe lời của Ngài.
Chúng ta phải chuẩn bị cho bản thân và tâm hồn của chúng ta như thế nào để mỗi khi chúng ta tham dự và nhận lời mời gọi của Chúa Kitô trong mỗi thánh lễ?.
The wedding banquet mentioned in today's Gospel reminds us of God's invitation and calling because it is here where we can encounter the covenant between love and life. Today's Gospel reminds us that Jesus established the Eucharist for everyone who is willing to listen and practice his teachings. He allowed his love to be available to all. It's a matter of choice; it's a matter of heart.
However, when we are called and invited to his table, we should accept his invitation with an open mind and an open heart. It is similar to wearing a clean wedding garment when we attend a banquet. We must prepare ourselves physically when we attend an invitation, but we must also cleanse our hearts and our minds when we accept the invitation to His banquet. It is through the Eucharist that we can share spiritual renewal not only because of God's love for us, but also by listening to his word.
How do we prepare ourselves when we accept his invitation?
“The Kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. He dispatched his servants to summon the invited guests to the feast, but they refused to come.” Matthew 22:2–3
The king in this parable is God the Father, and the wedding is the marriage between Christ and the Church. The Father invites each one of us to be a member of the Church and to enter into divine union with His Son Jesus, thus entering into the life of the Holy Trinity. But we see right away in the parable that the invited guests “refused to come.” As the parable goes on, the king tried even harder to invite the guests, but they all responded in one of two ways. “Some ignored the invitation and went away…” and “The rest laid hold of his servants, mistreated them, and killed them.” Clearly, this was not the response hoped for by the generous king.
We see in these two responses two levels of rejection of the Gospel that are present in our world today, just as it was at the time of Jesus. The first level of rejection is indifference. Many people are very busy today. We easily become occupied with many things that matter little in the end. Many are consumed by their smartphones, computers and tablets. Many spend countless hours watching television. Others become workaholics, spending most of their time at their occupation and leaving little time for that which is most important, such as family, prayer and service. As a result, it is very easy to become indifferent to the matters of faith and easy to fail to pray every day so as to seek out and fulfill God’s will. This indifference is quite serious.
There is also a rejection of the faith in our world through a growing hostility toward the Church and morality. There are many ways in which the secular world continues to promote a culture that is contrary to the Gospel. And when Christians speak out and oppose these new cultural tendencies, they are condemned and often characterized as being prejudiced or judgmental. Such malice was displayed by the guests in this parable who “laid hold of his servants, mistreated them, and killed them.” Hostility toward the Church, the faith and clear moral principles laid down by God appears to be growing every year. This form of rejection of the Gospel is even more damaging than the simple indifference mentioned above. In this parable for today, Jesus says that in response to those who were indifferent and hostile, the king “sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city.”
This parable should not be read in such a way that we look at others and condemn them as if we were the king and had the right to do so. We do not have that right. Only God does. Instead, this parable should be read from the perspective of your own life. Hopefully you are not one of those who are hostile to the Gospel. But perhaps you and many other Christians struggle with the first form of rejection: indifference. We can easily become indifferent in many various ways and on many different levels. The opposite of being indifferent is to care and to care deeply about going to the wedding feast when invited.
Reflect, today, upon the Wedding Feast to which you are invited. You are invited to enter into the glorious celebration of becoming one with the Savior of the World. You are invited to surrender your life to Him without reserve. You are invited to holiness, moral integrity, unwavering fidelity to God, service of others, charity that knows no bounds and so much more. To enter the Wedding Feast of the Lamb is something that must take place every day and every moment of your day for the rest of your life. God is inviting you. Will you say “Yes” with every fiber of your being?
My inviting Lord, You desire that all people fully accept the invitation You have given to become one with You through spiritual marriage. You call us to the glorious Wedding Feast and eternal rejoicing. May I never be indifferent to Your invitation and always make my response with all my heart. I love You, dear Lord. Help me to love You all the more. Jesus, I trust in You.
Opening Prayer: My Lord, here I am. I invite you to come and lay your eyes on my soul. I want to put aside all distractions and return that look.
1. There Is No Duplicity in Him: The way in which Jesus described Nathanael speaks of integrity, honesty, and justice. The Gospel passage seems to suggest further that the encounter between such a person and Christ is characterized by profound and almost immediate mutual recognition—almost as if the absence of duplicity clears the way for man to come to faith.
Rejecting a Gift: In today’s Gospel, we have two groups of people. The first are those who were given the first opportunity to enter into God’s kingdom, the wedding feast par excellence, the eternal feast of God’s kingdom. They should have dropped everything in order to participate in it. They didn’t realize that they were rejecting the greatest possible gift, the one thing that matters. We fall into this category when we sin. We settle for inferior things that leave us spiritually empty.
Trong những năm tháng thời non trẻ của chúng ta, chúng ta có thể đã có kinh nghiệm tham gia tụ tập đông người, chúng ta đã không mặc trang phục thích hợp. Đó là đáng xấu hổ như chưa được mặc quần áo đúng. Như chúng ta đã lớn tuổi chúng ta đã học như thế nào và khi nào để ăn mặc cho một dịp.\
Mỗi người chúng ta được mời đến bữa tiệc trên trời của Đức Chúa Trời. Chúng ta đã được ban cho ân tứ đức tin khi chúng ta đã được rửa tội; trong Giáo Hội Thiên Chúa của chúng ta được ban các bí tích và khác giúp để được tham gia xứng đáng tại bữa tiệc của Thiên Chúa.
Làm thế nào có chúng ta trả lời để chào của Thiên Chúa? Chúng ta đã sống lời thề rửa tội của chúng ta? Chúng ta đã đánh giá cao các bí tích của Thiên Chúa và giúp cho chúng ta? Chúng ta đã sống ra cuộc sống của chúng ta như vậy mà chúng ta trở thành khách xứng đáng để có mặt tại bữa tiệc tuyệt vời của Chúa?
In our younger years we may have experienced attending gatherings where we did not wear the proper attire. It was embarrassing not to have been properly dressed. As we grew in age we have learned how and when to dress for an occasion.
In the Gospel parable which was to "throw light on the kingdom of heaven," the king punished the man at the wedding banquet who was not properly dressed. The king felt insulted that a guest was not properly dressed at the wedding of his son. How did the guest get into the banquet not properly dressed? Did the king's assistants not offer him the customary festal garment? Did he refuse to wear what was offered?
Each one of us is invited to God's heavenly banquet. We were given the gift of faith when we were baptized; in God's Church we are given the sacraments and other helps to be worthy participants at God's banquet.
How have we responded to God's offers? Have we lived out our baptismal vows? Have we appreciated God's sacraments and helps to us? Have we lived out our lives such that we become guests worthy to be at the great banquet of the Lord?
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