Friends, today in our
Gospel some Pharisees ask Jesus for a sign. And Jesus replies, “An
evil and unfaithful generation seeks a sign, but no sign will be given
it except the sign of Jonah the prophet,” who was in the belly of the
whale for three days and nights.
Jonah
was called by God to preach conversion to Nineveh, which is described
as an enormously large city. It took, they said, three days to walk
through it. I can’t help but think of
Nineveh as one of our large, modern cities, a center of all sorts of
worldly activity and preoccupation.
What
would its conversion look like? A turning back to God as the only
enduring good. After hearing the word of Jonah, the Ninevites
“proclaimed a fast, and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth.”
What is the purpose of these ascetic practices? To wean people away
from an attachment to worldly pleasures.
Go
beyond the mind that you have. Repent. Live as though nothing in this
world finally matters. And you will be living in the kingdom
Monday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 395
Hear what the LORD says:
Arise, present your plea before the mountains,
and let the hills hear your voice!
Hear, O mountains, the plea of the LORD,
pay attention, O foundations of the earth!
For the LORD has a plea against his people,
and he enters into trial with Israel.
O my people, what have I done to you,
or how have I wearied you? Answer me!
For I brought you up from the land of Egypt,
from the place of slavery I released you;
and I sent before you Moses,
Aaron, and Miriam.
With what shall I come before the LORD,
and bow before God most high?
Shall I come before him with burnt offerings,
with calves a year old?
Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams,
with myriad streams of oil?
Shall I give my first-born for my crime,
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
You have been told, O man, what is good,
and what the LORD requires of you:
Only to do the right and to love goodness,
and to walk humbly with your God.
Some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Jesus,
“Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.”
He said to them in reply,
“An evil and unfaithful generation seeks a sign,
but no sign will be given it
except the sign of Jonah the prophet.
Just as Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights,
so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth
three days and three nights.
At the judgment, the men of Nineveh will arise with this generation
and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah;
and there is something greater than Jonah here.
At the judgment the queen of the south will arise with this generation
and condemn it, because she came from the ends of the earth
to hear the wisdom of Solomon;
and there is something greater than Solomon here.”
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