Friday of the Twenty-third Week in Ordinary Time
Intention: For God’s strength and protection for all who care for the world’s persecuted and dispossessed people, that their work may bear the fruits of comfort, peace, and justice.
Today’s Gospel | Luke 6:39-42
Jesus told his disciples a parable: “Can a blind person guide a blind person? Will not both fall into a pit? No disciple is superior to the teacher; but when fully trained, every disciple will be like his teacher. Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own? How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove that splinter in your eye,’ when you do not even notice the wooden beam in your own eye? You hypocrite! Remove the wooden beam from your eye first; then you will see clearly to remove the splinter in your brother’s eye.”
From the Tenth Meditation for the Time of Retreat | Saint John Baptist de La Salle
Your zeal for the children you instruct would not go very far and would not have much of a result or success if it were limited only to words. To make it effective, your example must support your instructions, and this is one of the main signs of your zeal.
Saint Paul, speaking to the Philippians after teaching them different maxims, adds, Act according to the same maxims, and so be imitators of me. Look to those who live according to the example that I have given you. Do the things I have taught you, what I have said to you, what I have written to you, and of which I have given you the example. So, the ardent zeal of this great saint for the salvation of souls was to have them observe what he practiced.
This is also the way that our Lord acted, of whom it is said that he began to do and then to teach. Speaking to his Apostles after he had washed their feet, he says, I have given you an example, so that you may do as I have done to you.
Prayer
Eternal Father, you hold all of us in your perfect heart. You see us through the eyes of love, knowing that we all are more alike than we are different. Teach us to see with your eyes. Let your wisdom instruct us to not judge others for their differences from us. Fill us with humility, so that we will accept and serve one another with understanding and gratefulness. Help us to hear your call to compassion and love and to give your word life through all of our actions. We ask this of who lives and reigns with your Son and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.