Suy Niệm Tin Mừng thứ Ba tuần thứ 16 Thường Niên

Suy Niệm Tin Mừng thứ Ba tuần thứ 16 Thường Niên
Hôm nay, Tin Mừng có lẽ đã làm chúng ta ngạc nhiên vì Chúa Giêsu đã tự hỏi : “ai mẹ ta?” (Mt 12:48), ,. Có lẽ chúng ta hay những người Do thái có thể nghĩ là Chúa đã thái độ bất kính đối với Đức Maria, mẹ của Ngài. Nhưng không phải thếi! Điều mà Chúa Giêsu muốn làm chomọi người đươc hiểu rõ là, trong con mắt của Ngài, của Thiên Chúa. Các giá trị quan trọng của con người không dựa trên xác thịt của con người, nhưng đựợc dựa trên việc xử lý tinh thần để chấp nhận ý muốn của Thiên Chúa: “Rồi Ngài chỉ cho các môn đệ và nói: ": "Đây là mẹ tôi, đây là anh em tôi.  Vì phàm ai thi hành ý muốn của Cha tôi, Đấng ngự trên trời, người ấy là anh chị em tôi, là mẹ tôi."Mt 12: 49-50). Vào thời điểm đó, ý của Thiên Chúa là Chúa Giêsu sai xuống với chúng ta để rao giảng Tin Mừng mọi người  lắng nghe và cho những người thực sự  nghe lời Chúa dạy. Đây là một sự ưu tiên hơn bất kỳ những giá trị ưu tiên nào khác, không có vấn đề kỳ thị. Và để tuân theo ý muốn của Cha Ngài, Chúa Giêsu Kitô đã để lại Đức Maria một mình và  giờ đay Ngài đã ra dì và rao giảng nhưng nơi xa nhà.
Nhưng, những ai là người đã từng sẵn sàng tuân theo ý của Thiên Chúa hơn là Đức Maria? “Vâng, tôi đây là nữ tỳ của Chúa, xin Chúa cứ làm cho tôi như lời sứ thần nói."(Lc 1:38). Đây là lý do tại sao, Thánh Augustinô nói rằng Đức Maria, Trước tiên là đã chấp nhận Lời Chúa với một tinh thần vâng phục, và chỉ sau đó, Đức Maria mới được thụ thai với mầu nhiệm Ngôi Hai  Nhập Thể trong cung lòng của bà.
`           Nói cách khác: Thiên Chúa yêu thương chúng ta theo sự thánh thiện của chúng ta. Đức Trinh Nữ Maria là người được may mắn nhất, và, do đó, là những người thân yêu nhất. Tuy nhiên, Thiên Chúa không yêu chúng ta bởi vì chúng ta có thể được nên thánh. Nhưng thật ra không phải thế mà ngược lại: chúng ta được nên thánh vì Ngài yêu thương chúng ta. Nhưng người đầu tiên mà tỏ lộ tình yêu thương chúng ta luôn luôn là Thiên Chúa (x 1Jn 4:10). Đức Maria đã chứng minh điều đó khi bà nói: “Vì Ngài đã đoái thương nhìn người tôi tớ thấp hèn” (Lc 1:48). Trong mắt của Thiên Chúa, sự khiêm nhường của chúng ta là điều hiển nhiên; nhưng Ngài muốn đưa chúng ta lên, để thánh hóa chúng ta.
 
Reflection: Monday 16^th Ordinary Time
Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is for me (...) mother
Today, to start with, the Gospel surprises us: «Who is my mother? (Mt 12:48), wonders Jesus. It would seem the Lord is showing a contemptuous attitude towards Mary, his mother. Nothing of the sort! What Jesus wants to make quite clear is that, in his own eyes —God's eyes— the crucial value of a person does not lie on flesh and blood facts, but on the spiritual disposition to accept God's will: «Then He pointed to his disciples and said, ‘Look! Here are my mother and my brothers. Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is for me brother, sister, or mother’» (Mt 12:49-50). At that time, God's will was for Jesus to evangelize those who were listening and for these ones to actually listen to him. This was a priority over any other value, no matter how dear. To abide by his Father's will, Jesus Christ had left Mary and now He was preaching far away from home. 
But, who was ever more willing to abide by God's will than Mary? «‘I am the Lord's servant’, Mary answered. ‘May it be to me as you have said’» (Lk 1:38). This is why, St. Augustine says that Mary, first accepted God's word with a spirit of obedience and, only afterwards, she conceived it in her womb for the Incarnation. 
In other words: God loves us as per our saintliness. The Virgin Mary is the most blessed, and, therefore, the most loved. However, God does not love us because we may be saints. It is rather the other way round: we are saints because He loves us. The first one to love is always our Lord (cf. 1Jn 4:10). Mary proves it when she says: «For He has looked upon his handmaid's lowliness» (Lk 1:48). In God's eyes our own lowliness is evident; but He wants to magnify us, to sanctify us.
 
Tuesday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time 2026
Someone told him, “Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, asking to speak with you.” But he said in reply to the one who told him,“Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?” And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother.” Matthew 12:47–50
Those unfamiliar with Catholic teaching and devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary might misinterpret this passage as diminishing Jesus’ love for His mother or the singular role she holds in salvation history. Such an interpretation is gravely mistaken.
The purpose of Jesus’ words is to highlight the eternal reality of spiritual kinship in the Kingdom of Heaven that begins here on earth. In God’s Kingdom, our communion is not based on earthly bloodlines. While biological relationships—between parents, children, and siblings—may retain a unique bond in Heaven, the deepest and most enduring union is forged through shared obedience to the will of the Father.
This spiritual kinship does not begin in Heaven; it begins now. Through the grace of Baptism, we become sons and daughters of the Father and members of Christ’s Body. From that moment, we are united not by flesh, but by adoption—through faith and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. The Church, as God’s family on earth, is already a foretaste of the eternal communion we hope to enjoy in glory.
This truth is clearly expressed in the Lord’s Prayer. When Jesus taught us to address God as “Our Father,” the “our” does not refer to earthly relatives, but to all who live as God’s children, united by grace and fidelity to His will. On earth and in Heaven, it is filial obedience that binds us to the Eternal Son and forms the Mystical Body of Christ. In that union, we cry out together, “Father!”
Among those who have conformed themselves well to the will of God, none has equaled the perfection of the Blessed Virgin Mary. From the moment of her Immaculate Conception, she listened attentively to the Father’s voice and responded with unwavering fidelity. Her cooperation with grace was complete, so that the Angel Gabriel rightly called her “full of grace.” To be full is to lack nothing—to be wholly receptive to God’s will. Therefore, when Jesus said, “Whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother,” His words applied supremely to His own mother. Far from diminishing her, they reveal the depth of her sanctity. She was not only His mother according to the flesh, but also His most perfect spiritual kin. In her, the ideal of divine sonship and discipleship is fulfilled to the highest degree.
Alongside the Blessed Mother—who is uniquely and perfectly united to her Son in spiritual kinship—we, too, are invited to share in God’s family. In Christ, we become kin to Jesus, to His mother, to the angels and saints, and to one another as children of the Father. Though we remain pilgrims on earth, we share in these bonds to the extent that we conform ourselves to the Father’s will. In Heaven, those bonds will be perfected, and we will forever rejoice in the reward of belonging to God’s household. Nothing could be greater.
Reflect today on your deep longing to belong. We often seek acceptance from family, friends, and those around us, but that longing is ultimately fulfilled only by grace, in the spiritual communion that flows from obedience to the Father’s will. Obeying God is a blessing, not a burden. It makes us who we are meant to be. The fruit of that obedience is the deepest peace and joy the heart can know: the joy of belonging to God’s eternal family.
Heavenly Father, You have called me not only to follow You, but to belong to You. May Your will be my delight. Form me in the image of Your Son, that I may live in the communion of love that unites all Your children. Through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, draw me deeper into the mystery of divine kinship. Father, I love You. Jesus, I trust in You.
 
Tuesday 16^th Ordinary Time 2026
Opening Prayer: Heavenly Father, I thank you for adopting me as your beloved child through your Son, Jesus Christ. You desire my salvation and sanctification, and you lovingly guide me toward the fullness of life. Open my mind to hear your Word, my heart to delight in your will, and my hands to carry out your loving purpose each day. May I grow ever more into the likeness of your Son and become a faithful member of your family.
Encountering the Word of God
1. Who Belongs to the Kingdom? To understand today’s Gospel, it is important to read and see it in its context. In no way is Jesus being disrespectful to his mother or relatives. We need to ask questions like “Why does Matthew place the story here?” To answer this, we should recall that Matthew is building up to Jesus’ third major discourse, which contains seven parables on the Kingdom of Heaven. Many of the parables contrast two ways of either welcoming the Kingdom or being in the Kingdom. A major truth is that entry into or belonging to the Kingdom of Heaven is not based on ethnicity or bloodlines. The Kingdom is not just for the descendants of Israel. It is for the people of all nations. Today's Gospel prepares us for that teaching by redefining what it means to belong to God’s people. Membership in the Kingdom is determined not by natural descent but by a living relationship with Jesus that is expressed in hearing and doing the Father’s will.
2. Who Belongs to Jesus’ Family? The seven parables on the Kingdom (Matthew 13) will symbolize it as a seed sown in rich and poor soil, a mustard seed planted in a garden, a buried treasure in a field, a merchant seeking fine pearls, yeast in bread dough, and a net cast into the sea. None of the seven parables compares the Kingdom of Heaven to a family. But that important dimension of the Kingdom is brought out in today’s Gospel. Jesus speaks to the crowds and gestures with his hand toward his disciples: “Here are my mother and my brothers” (Matthew 12:49). The Church, as the beginning and seed of the Kingdom of Heaven, is also, in a mysterious way, the new family of God. Disciples who learn from Jesus and do the will of the Father are members of Jesus’ spiritual family. We can act as mothers of Jesus by bringing Jesus into the world – in our own families, in our workplace, and in our community. We are brothers and sisters of Jesus by loving one another with the same generous love that binds the family of God. We rejoice with those who rejoice, bear one another's burdens, forgive one another's faults, and encourage one another to persevere in doing the Father’s will. We are brothers and sisters of Jesus by walking beside one another as members of the Father’s household, helping each other hear God’s word, do his will, and grow together into the fullness of life in Christ.
3. How do we Become Part of God’s Family? The final line in today's Gospel speaks about doing the will of our heavenly Father. We should not reduce this to a servant-master relationship, as though God simply imposes arbitrary commands upon us. Through Christ, we have become God’s beloved children. Throughout the Old Testament, God’s “will” is closely associated with his good pleasure, favor, and gracious desire for his people. A loving parent does not arbitrarily command or impose their will just for the sake of commanding. They desire the flourishing of their children and guide them toward the good. In the same way, God wills our salvation (1 Timothy 2:3–4) and our sanctification (1 Thessalonians 4:3). To do our heavenly Father’s will, then, is not merely to obey external rules but to entrust ourselves to his loving wisdom, allowing his gracious love to shape our minds, hearts, and desires. Through daily prayer, meditation on the Word of God, and wise spiritual guidance, we gradually learn to want what the Father wills, and in doing so, we become true brothers and sisters of Jesus. Our will is not abolished but perfected, for grace heals and elevates our freedom. As God’s good pleasure becomes our good pleasure, what delights the Father increasingly delights us