9-6-26 Twenty Third Sunday of Ordinary Time

Twenty-Third Sunday, Ordinary Time

“More than five hundred years ago, two powerful Irish families discovered just how dangerous going first could be. In 1492, the Butlers of Ormonde and the Fitzgerald’s of Kildare were locked in a bitter feud. When fighting broke out near Dublin and the Butlers found themselves losing, they fled into St. Patrick’s Cathedral and barricaded themselves inside the Chapter House.                                                 Gerald FitzGerald wanted to make peace, but the Butlers feared that if they opened the door, the Fitzgeralds would kill them. And so there they remained: two families, two sides, one heavy wooden door between them.                                                                                                                                   Fitzgerald could promise peace through the door, but the men on the other side had no reason to trust him.   So, he ordered a hole cut into it and pushed his arm through.   And while, Fitzgerald could not see what was happening on the other side. He simply extended his unprotected hand into a room filled with his enemies. The Butlers could have taken his arm. Instead, they took his hand. They shook it, the door opened, and peace was made.                                                                                                                        That battered door still stands in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin. It is known as the Door of Reconciliation, and tradition associates the episode with the Irish expression “to chance your arm.”       Five centuries later, the image remains wonderfully simple: a closed door and an outstretched hand. Because reconciliation asks someone to risk something— your pride, your certainty of rejection, perhaps even the conviction that because we were the ones who were hurt, the first move belongs to somebody else.”¹                                                                                                                                                                         This story and the message from the gospel today blend perfectly with Jesus’ command to his disciples, if someone whom you know (i.e., friend, enemy, coworker, daughter or son, mother or father, etc.) hurts you, Go, says Jesus and be reconciled with them.  And Jesus does not say go once, he says Go repeatedly-  If he (i.e., the one who has offended you) does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that ‘every fact may be established on the testimony of two or three witnesses.” (Matt 18:16).  And then if your friend, or family member, etc., doesn’t listen, then bring your need for reconciliation to the community.  This is often what we do in our Prayer of the Faithful during mass.  At that moment in this prayer, when the deacon or reader pauses in the personal intentions, we can remember those who have hurt us and with whom we are not at peace and for whom we have a need of reconciliation and wholeness.  During that pause in the Prayer of the Faithful, we can remember our own need for healing of that which is broken in our lives.                                                                             You see our obligation is not to be so much successful in bringing about reconciliation between ourselves and others as it is in allowing God to hear our anxious prayer for healing and let God bring about that reconciliation that we need.  In other words, it is like sticking of our arm through the hole in the wooden door and trusting that God will enable the healing or reconciliation to happen for us.  In that Prayer of the Faithful when we offer up that need for reconciliation to the whole community of believers then we must leave it and trust that God will bring it to a successful conclusion.  Perhaps it will not happen at the time we want, but it will happen in God’s perfect time.                                             A friend recently sent me the following story from an article from a website called IngnatianSprituality.com entitled Stories of Finding God in the Unexpected.  The article contained a number of stories about this subject but one of them really spoked to me of this point of being reconciled with God, through others.  The story written by Carl Ladd is as follows:                                  “I was diagnosed with a terminal brain disease several years ago. I was admitted to a nursing home for rehabilitation, but it was assumed I was entering the last phase of my condition. During that time, I was led by the Holy Spirit to reconnect with my Catholic faith, which I had mostly abandoned.  I began praying to our Holy Mother, discovered St. Padre Pio and began praying [for his intercession], and began praying the Liturgy of the Hours. Within six months my symptoms had cleared, I was no longer confined to a wheelchair, and my cognitive decline reversed completely. My doctors were amazed but found no biomarkers of the disease! Blessed and praised be Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! Every day is a blessing for me and my family.”— Carl Ladd²                                                                                            It took a serious illness to touch Carl’s heart.  The light of God’s grace that shown in that darkness where he was enabled Carl to change his mind and to try the one thing he had abandoned so long ago, in other words to be reconciled with God.  And through the intercessions of the saints and others, whom he would never know, prayed for him, his reconciliation began.  And while the miraculous healing was tremendous still greater was Carl’s reconciliation with God.   Carl could not do for himself what he needed but through the gracing of the Holy Spirit, as he admitted to anyone who would listen, Carl learned again to trust in a power beyond that he could fully understand.                                                St. Paul in the second reading this weekend, his letter to the Romans, reminds us to “Owe nothing to anyone, except to love one another;” (Romans 13:8).  It is through this love toward God that impels Jesus to be reconciled with all humanity, and it is through that love of his that, we, as his disciples are called to go and be reconciled to one another.  Whether that “other” is a friend, an enemy, a relative, a co-worker, etc.   We, as his followers, may not always be successful on the first try or the second or the third attempt at reconciliation with another.  But this call of Jesus is not about being successful, it is about being faithful to his message and our mission in the world.  And if finally, after all our efforts, we cannot be reconciled with “the other,” then we are to bring that “other” to the community through this Prayer of the faithful.  And why must we reach out in this way, because we owe to all the “others” in our lives this “debt of love.”  A debt of love by which we mirror Jesus' loves for all of us, even while we were sinners and could not help ourselves.   God calls us to be faithful, to the love He has for us.  Whether we are successful in our efforts for reconciliation belongs to God.  Faithfulness is our duty to God.  And we can foster such attitude in ourselves when we rely of the power of God to do what we cannot.  And so, we pray, as we pray in the Responsorial psalm this weekend – “If today you (we) hear his voice, you (we) must not harden our hearts.”   And thus, let us heed Jesus words and let us Go from the table of reconciliation, where we unite ourselves to Jesus through the eucharist; let us go into the world, and bring God’s healing wherever it is needed remembering these lines from the prophet Isaiah:

            Do not fear I am with you; do not be anxious: I am your G od.                                       I will strengthen you. I will help you                                                                                 I will uphold you with my victorious right hand. (Isaiah 41:10)

                     

1.    1.   Across the Courtroom, Voicings.com, 2026

2.     2. .https://www.ignatianspirituality.com/stories of finding God in the unexpected