Mary, Mother of Mercy Parish

Mary, Mother of Mercy Parish https://www.mary-mom.com/small-groups

Gospel Reflection Small Group Outline for week beginning August 30, 2020

Twenty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time Lectionary: 124

Opening Prayer: In the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit: Lord God, we open our hearts, minds and souls to worship to you. Thank you that today we dwell in your kingdom and live in your presence. Thank you that as we gather together we join with all Catholic Christians across the world to glorify your holy name. Come be with us, inspire us and lead us in our time together. We ask all this in the beautiful name of Jesus. Amen.

This Day in the Church: Saint Fiacre Also known as

Fefvre, Fevre, Fiachrach, Fiacrius, Fiaker, Fiachra

Profile

Brother of Saint Syra of Troyes. Raised in an Irish monastery, which in the 7th century were great repositories of learning, including the use of healing herbs, a skill studied by Fiacre. His knowledge and holiness caused followers to flock to him, which destroyed the holy isolation he sought.

Fleeing to France, he established a hermitage in a cave near a spring, and was given land for his hermitage by Saint Faro of Meaux, who was bishop at the time. Fiacre asked for land for a garden for food and healing herbs. The bishop said Fiacre could have as much land as he could entrench in one day. The next

morning Fiacre walked around the perimeter of the land he wanted, dragged his spade behind him. Wherever the spade touched, trees were toppled, bushes uprooted, and the soil was entrenched. A local woman heard of this, and claimed sorcery was involved, but the bishop decided it was a miracle. This garden, miraculously obtained, became a place of pilgrimage for centuries for those seeking healing.

Fiacre had the gift of healing by laying on his hands; blindness, polypus, and fevers are mentioned by the old records as being cured by his touch; he was especially effective against a type of tumour or fistula later known as "le fic de S. Fiacre".

Fiacre's connection to cab drivers is because the Hotel de Saint Fiacre in Paris, France rented carriages. People who had no idea who Fiacre was referred to the cabs as Fiacre cabs, and eventually just as fiacres. Those who drove them assumed Fiacre as their patron.

Died

• 18 August 670 of natural causes • his relics have been distributed to several churches and cathedrals across Europe

Patronage

• against barrenness or sterility Gospel Reading Background: The First Prediction of the Passion and The Conditions of Discipleship.

Gospel Reading: Matthew 16:21-27

21 From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer greatly from the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed and on the third day be raised. 22 Then Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, “God forbid, Lord! No such thing shall ever happen to you.” 23 He turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are an obstacle to me. You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.”

24 Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. 25 For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. 26 What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or what can one give in exchange for his life? 27 For the Son of Man will come with his angels in his Father’s glory, and then he will repay everyone according to his conduct.

Reflections: 1. What phrase or phrases mean the most to you? Why?

2. Who do you identify most with? Why?

3. How does this passage relate to: a. You personally? b. You spiritually? c. Your relationship to others?

4. When Jesus and His angels come to “repay everyone according to his conduct” do you think that will be good news to everyone? What might that repayment be? Study Guide:

a. 16:21–23 This first prediction of the passion follows Mk 8:31–33 in the main and serves as a corrective to an understanding of Jesus’ messiahship as solely one of glory and triumph. By his addition of from that time on (Mt 16:21) Matthew has emphasized that Jesus’ revelation of his coming suffering and death marks a new phase of the gospel. Neither this nor the two later passion predictions (Mt 17:22–23; 20:17–19) can be taken as sayings that, as they stand, go back to Jesus himself. However, it is probable that he foresaw that his mission would entail suffering and perhaps death, but was confident that he would ultimately be vindicated by God (see Mt 26:29). b. 16:21 He: the Marcan parallel (Mk 8:31) has “the Son of Man.” Since Matthew has already designated Jesus by that title (Mt 15:13), its omission

here is not significant. The Matthean prediction is equally about the sufferings of the Son of Man. Must: this necessity is part of the tradition of all the synoptics; cf. Mk 8:31; Lk 9:21. The elders, the chief priests, and the scribes: see note on Mk 8:31. On the third day: so also Lk 9:22, against the Marcan “after three days” (Mk 8:31). Matthew’s formulation is, in the Greek, almost identical with the pre-Pauline fragment of the kerygma in 1 Cor 15:4 and also with Hos 6:2, which many take to be the Old Testament background to the confession that Jesus was raised on the third day. Josephus uses “after three days” and “on the third day” interchangeably (Antiquities 7:280–81; 8:214, 218) and there is probably no difference in meaning between the two phrases. c. 16:22–23 Peter’s refusal to accept Jesus’ predicted suffering and death is seen as a satanic attempt to deflect Jesus from his God-appointed course, and the disciple is addressed in terms that recall Jesus’ dismissal of the devil in the temptation account (Mt 4:10: “Get away, Satan!”). Peter’s satanic purpose is emphasized by Matthew’s addition to the Marcan source of the words You are an obstacle to me. d. 16:24–28 A readiness to follow Jesus even to giving up one’s life for him is the condition for true discipleship; this will be repaid by him at the final judgment. e. 16:24 Deny himself: to deny someone is to disown him (see Mt 10:33; 26:34–35) and to deny oneself is to disown oneself as the center of one’s existence. f. 16:25 See notes on Mt 10:38, 39. g. 16:27 The parousia and final judgment are described in Mt 25:31 in terms almost identical with these. Fulfillment of Old Testament Prophecy Daniel 9:26a

After the sixty-two weeks an anointed one[g] shall be cut down with no one to help him.

Catechism of the Catholic Church: GRACE AND JUSTIFICATION - IN BRIEF 2017 The grace of the Holy Spirit confers upon us the righteousness of God. Uniting us by faith and Baptism to the Passion and Resurrection of Christ, the Spirit makes us sharers in his life. 2018 Like conversion, justification has two aspects. Moved by grace, man turns toward God and away from sin, and so accepts forgiveness and righteousness from on high. 2019 Justification includes the remission of sins, sanctification, and the renewal of the inner man. 2020 Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ. It is granted us through Baptism. It conforms us to the righteousness of God, who justifies us. It has for its goal the glory of God and of Christ, and the gift of eternal life. It is the most excellent work of God's mercy. 2021 Grace is the help God gives us to respond to our vocation of becoming his adopted sons. It introduces us into the intimacy of the Trinitarian life. 2022 The divine initiative in the work of grace precedes, prepares, and elicits the free response of man. Grace responds to the deepest yearnings of human freedom, calls freedom to cooperate with it, and perfects freedom. 2023 Sanctifying grace is the gratuitous gift of his life that God makes to us; it is infused by the Holy Spirit into the soul to heal it of sin and to sanctify it. 2024 Sanctifying grace makes us "pleasing to God." Charisms, special graces of the Holy Spirit, are oriented to sanctifying grace and are intended for the common good of the Church. God also acts through many actual graces, to be distinguished from habitual grace which is permanent in us. 2025 We can have merit in God's sight only because of God's free plan to associate man with the work of his grace. Merit is to be ascribed in the first place to the grace of God, and secondly to man's collaboration. Man's merit is due to God. 2026 The grace of the Holy Spirit can confer true merit on us, by

virtue of our adoptive filiation, and in accordance with God's gratuitous justice. Charity is the principal source of merit in us before God. 2027 No one can merit the initial grace which is at the origin of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit, we can merit for ourselves and for others all the graces needed to attain eternal life, as well as necessary temporal goods. 2028 "All Christians . . . are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity" (LG 40 # 2). "Christian perfection has but one limit, that of having none" (St. Gregory of Nyssa, De vita Mos.: PG 44, 300D). 2029 "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me" (Mt 16:24). Group Intercessions: [Ask each participant if they have any specific prayer intentions that they would like the group to pray for. It may be a good idea to start a group prayer intention book and the leader can read from it each week and add new requests as needed.]

Closing Prayer: In the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit: Lord, your word is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. Thank you that we can live in your light and walk in your truth. May the things that you have revealed and thoughts that we have shared dwell in our hearts and stir us to action. We ask all this in the precious name of Jesus. Amen.