Oct. 20th

Post date: Oct 21, 2019 6:16:20 PM

October 20, 2019 Homily by Fr. Karl Schray

Did Jesus just tell his disciples to pray continually and never lose heart?

Some people do not see the value of regular prayer.

Why is prayer important? What does it do?

Praying involves reading and listening to God’s messages.

It helps us to discern between the important and the trivial.

It teaches us what to aspire to.

It helps to implant in us the ideals we ought to cherish.

Its main purpose is to foster our relationship with God.

Prayer is not asking things of God but receiving what God wants to give us.

We don’t need to keep on asking to keep God informed

but that somehow, we need to keep on praying

because we are changed through prayer. We discover more fully

our dependence on God as our provider and father.

We discover that maybe God has better plans for us. For whatever reason,

prayer develops our relationship with God and changes us—

it does not change God.

Jesus asks at the end of today’s Gospel,

“When the Son of Man comes, will he find Faith on earth?”

The answer, of course, is “yes”,

he will find Faith in those who haven’t given up praying—

for Faith will always be found in those who pray,

and prayerful people are Faith-filled people.

Jesus tells the story of the persistent widow and the indifferent judge.

Are we supposed to equate the judge with God?

The Bible is full of lines saying God hears the cry of the poor,

that God is eager and willing to give good things to those who ask.

So, it is hard when you really look at it, to equate the insensitive judge with God. Besides,

is the message that if you badger God long enough, you can eventually

wear God down and get what you want? How’s that working for you?

I suggest there is a more fruitful and less obvious, - and unexpected- way to understand this Gospel.

Why not see the widow, not the judge, as the image of God.

Once you reverse characters, then a whole new perspective emerges.

When the widow is seen as a God-like figure, then the message of the

parable becomes crystal clear: anyone who determinedly resists injustice,

faces it, and denounces it until right is achieved, is acting as God does.

Powerless as Jesus on the cross, who defeats the power of death,

the widow achieves victory for right. Through her persistence, the widow

becomes a kind of Gandhi or Martin Luther King Jr. figure. Against all odds,

she will endure until justice is done and God will be present.

This parable is not about strategies to wear down a reluctant God

with non-stop prayer. It is about us little people persistently seeking,

often against terrible odds, to have justice done.

Whenever we hold self-serving authorities’ feet to the fire

and break down barriers that separate people,

we are imitating God.

This parable is about justice as well as prayer.