Fr. Mike’s Homily for Thursday of the 5th Week in Ordinary Time Cycle II (1)

Fr. Mike’s Homily for Thursday of the 5th Week in Ordinary Time Cycle II

Theme: Turn to God with utter humility and complete trust.

By: Fr. Mike Lagrimas

Homily for Thursday February 10 2022

Mk 7:24‐30

Jesus went to the district of Tyre. He entered a house and wanted no one to know about it, but he could not escape notice. Soon a woman whose daughter had an unclean spirit heard about him. She came and fell at his feet. The woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth, and she begged him to drive the demon out of her daughter. He said to her, “Let the children be fed first. For it is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.” She replied and said to him, “Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s scraps.” Then he said to her, “For saying this, you may go. The demon has gone out of your daughter.” When the woman went home, she found the child lying in bed and the demon gone.

After His encounter with the scribes and Pharisees, Jesus now goes into the Gentile territories of Tyre, Sidon and the Decapolis. Perhaps He wants to be away for some time from the Jewish crowds that follow Him wherever He goes. Or this could already be His way of sending the message that His mission is not only to the Jews, and that the Gentiles are not unclean people. Hence, He ministers to them as well.

His presence in the area is soon known to many people and they come to Him. One of them is a woman whose daughter had an unclean spirit. She was Greek but Syro-Phoenician by birth. She comes and prostrates herself before Jesus and begs Him to drive away the evil spirit from her daughter.

The answer of Jesus, however, is very uncharacteristic of Him: “Let the children be fed first. For it is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.” This suggests an image of a family meal where the children are fed first, and then the leftovers are given to the dogs that are oftentimes under the table. By this statement, Jesus is implying that His mission is towards the Jews first, and only later to the Gentiles.

But the woman is unruffled by His response. Instead, she shows her genuine humility and indomitable faith in Him. She replies: “Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s scraps.” She dismisses what seems to be words of insult, and displays her readiness to endure anything just to get the favor from Jesus for the healing of her daughter. And this is coupled by her unqualified faith in Him by addressing Him as “Lord”.

The example of this pagan woman should inspire us to be firm in our faith in the Lord, especially during times of severe trials and difficulties. In truth, God does not want us to suffer. However, in His unfathomable wisdom, He allows us to undergo these difficult trials so that we may turn to Him with utter humility and complete trust. He is always ready to come to our aid and, as shown by Jesus on the cross, He is even willing to suffer and die for our sake.

The only problem, however, is that many people do not fully trust God. They still hold on to superstitions, faith healers, and other occult beliefs. St. Josemaría Escrivá said that the problem we face today is that ʺfew people pray, and those who pray… pray little.ʺ

We should, therefore, encourage more people to pray – fervently and properly – like this woman. As St. Mary Magdalen de Pazzi says that, in order to be effective, prayer “ought to be humble, fervent, resigned, persevering, and accompanied with great reverence.ʺ In addition, we should also learn to appreciate the value of praying together, that is, public prayer like all liturgical celebrations, especially the Holy Mass.

St. John Vianney explains why: “Private prayer is like straw scattered here and there: If you set it on fire it makes a lot of little flames. But gather these straws into a bundle and light them, and you get a mighty fire, rising like a column into the sky; public prayer is like that.”

By all means, let us pray on our own, with humility and fervent trust in God. But better still, we pray together as one worshipping community, for as Jesus said, ‘where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them” (Mt 18:20).

Fr. Mike Lagrimas

St. Michael the Archangel Parish

Diocese of Novaliches