Navarre Bible Commentary:Saturday, 22nd Week in Ordinary Time

Luke 6:1–5

1 On a sabbath, while he was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked and ate some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands. 2 But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the sabbath?” 3 And Jesus answered, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: 4 how he entered the house of God, and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?” 5 And he said to them, “The Son of man is lord of the sabbath.”

Catholic Exegesis:

The Second Vatican Council teaches  that if we are to derive the true meaning from the sacred texts,  attention must be devoted “not only to their content but to the unity of the whole of Scripture, the living tradition of the entire Church, and the analogy of faith. […] Everything to do with the interpretation of Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgment of the Church, which exercises the divinely conferred communion and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God” (Dei Verbum, 12).

St. John Paul II, when he promulgated the Catechism of the Catholic Church,  explained that the Catechism "is a statement of the Church's faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church's Magisterium."  He went on to "declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion" (Fidei Depositum).

Cited in the Catechism:

Passages from this Gospel reading are not cited in the Catechism.

Commentary:

The law of the sabbath

6:1–5. Accused by the Pharisees of breaking the sabbath, Jesus explains the correct way of understanding the sabbath rest, using an example from the Old Testament. And, by stating that he is “Lord of the sabbath” he is openly revealing that he is God himself, for it was God who gave this precept to the people of Israel. For more on this, see the notes on Mt 12:2 and 12:3–8.

Source: The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries. Biblical text from the Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and by Scepter Publishers in the United States. We encourage readers to purchase The Navarre Bible for personal study. See Scepter Publishers for details.

"Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ." St Jerome  

Navarre Bible Commentary:Friday, 22nd Week in Ordinary Time

Via Terrace Palms

Luke 5:33–39

33 And they said to him, “The disciples of John fast often and offer prayers, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours eat and drink.” 34 And Jesus said to them, “Can you make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? 35 The days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.” 36 He told them a parable also: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it upon an old garment; if he does, he will tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. 37 And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; if he does, the new wine will burst the skins and it will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. 38 But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. 39 And no one after drinking old wine desires new; for he says, ‘The old is good.’”

Catholic Exegesis:

The Second Vatican Council teaches  that if we are to derive the true meaning from the sacred texts,  attention must be devoted “not only to their content but to the unity of the whole of Scripture, the living tradition of the entire Church, and the analogy of faith. […] Everything to do with the interpretation of Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgment of the Church, which exercises the divinely conferred communion and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God” (Dei Verbum, 12).

St. John Paul II, when he promulgated the Catechism of the Catholic Church,  explained that the Catechism "is a statement of the Church's faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church's Magisterium."  He went on to "declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion" (Fidei Depositum).

Cited in the Catechism:

Passages from this Gospel reading are not cited in the Catechism.

Commentary:

A discussion on fasting

5:33–35. In the Old Testament God established certain days as days of fasting—the main one being the “day of atonement” (Num 29:7; Acts 27:9). Fasting implied total or partial abstinence from food or drink. Moses and Elijah fasted (Ex 34:28; 1 Kings 19:8) and our Lord himself fasted in the desert for forty days before beginning his public ministry. In the present passage Jesus gives a deeper meaning to the word “fasting”—the deprivation of his physical presence which his apostles would experience after his death. All through his public life Jesus is trying to prepare his disciples for the final parting. At first the apostles were not very robust and Christ’s physical presence did them more good than the practice of fasting.

Christians should sometimes abstain from food. “Fast and abstain from flesh meat when Holy Mother Church so ordains” (St Pius X, Catechism, 495). That is the purpose of the fourth commandment of the Church, but it has a deeper meaning, as St Leo the Great tells us: “The merit of our fasts does not consist only in abstinence from food; there is no use in depriving the body of nourishment if the soul does not cut itself off from iniquity and if the tongue does not cease to speak evil” (Sermo IV in Quadragesima).

Source: The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries. Biblical text from the Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and by Scepter Publishers in the United States. We encourage readers to purchase The Navarre Bible for personal study. See Scepter Publishers for details.

"Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ." St Jerome  

Navarre Bible Commentary:Thursday, 22nd Week in Ordinary Time

Luke 5:1–11

1 While the people pressed upon him to hear the word of God, he was standing by the lake of Gennesaret. 2 And he saw two boats by the lake; but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. 3 Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, he asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat. 4 And when he had ceased speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” 5 And Simon answered, “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.” 6 And when they had done this, they enclosed a great shoal of fish; and as their nets were breaking, 7 they beckoned to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both the boats, so that they began to sink. 8 But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” 9 For he was astonished, and all that were with him, at the catch of fish which they had taken; 10 and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; henceforth you will be catching men.” 11 And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him.

Catholic Exegesis:

The Second Vatican Council teaches  that if we are to derive the true meaning from the sacred texts,  attention must be devoted “not only to their content but to the unity of the whole of Scripture, the living tradition of the entire Church, and the analogy of faith. […] Everything to do with the interpretation of Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgment of the Church, which exercises the divinely conferred communion and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God” (Dei Verbum, 12).

St. John Paul II, when he promulgated the Catechism of the Catholic Church,  explained that the Catechism "is a statement of the Church's faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church's Magisterium."  He went on to "declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion" (Fidei Depositum).

Cited in the Catechism:

Passages from this Gospel reading are cited in the Catechism paragraph 208.

Commentary:

The miraculous catch of fish and the calling of the first disciples

5:1. “Just as they do today! Can’t you see? They want to hear God’s message, even though outwardly they may not show it. Some perhaps have forgotten Christ’s teachings. Others, through no fault of their own, have never known them and they think that religion is something odd. But of this we can be sure, that in every man’s life there comes a time sooner or later when his soul draws the line. He has had enough of the usual explanations. The lies of the false prophets no longer satisfy. Even though they may not admit it at the time, such people are longing to quench their thirst with the teachings of our Lord” (St Josemaría Escrivá, Friends of God, 260).

5:3. The Fathers saw in Simon’s boat a symbol of the pilgrim Church on earth. “This is the boat which according to St Matthew was in danger of sinking and according to St Luke was filled with fish. Here we can see the difficult beginnings of the Church and its later fruitfulness” (St Ambrose, Expositio Evangelii sec. Lucam, in loc.). Christ gets into the boat in order to teach the crowds—and from the barque of Peter, the Church, he continues to teach the whole world.

Each of us can also see himself as this boat Christ uses for preaching. Externally no change is evident: “What has changed? There is a change inside our soul, now that Christ has come aboard, as he went aboard Peter’s boat. Its horizon has opened wider. It feels a greater ambition to serve and an irrepressible desire to tell all creation about the magnalia Dei (Acts 2:11), the marvellous doings of our Lord, if only we let him work” (St Josemaría Escrivá, Friends of God, 265).

5:4. “When he had finished his catechising, he told Simon: ‘Put out into the deep, and lower your nets for a catch’ (Lk 5:4). Christ is the master of this boat. He it is who prepares the fishing. It is for this that he has come into the world, to do all he can so that his brothers may find the way to glory and to the love of the Father” (Friends of God, 260). To carry this task out, our Lord charges all of them to cast their nets, but it is only Peter he tells to put out into the deep.

This whole passage refers in some way to the life of the Church. In the Church the bishop of Rome, Peter’s successor, “is the vicar of Jesus Christ because he represents him on earth and acts for him in the government of the Church” (St Pius X, Catechism, 195). Christ is also addressing each one of us, urging us to be daring in apostolate: “ ‘Duc in altum—Put out into deep water!’ Cast aside the pessimism that makes a coward of you. ‘Et laxate retia vestra in capturam—And lower your nets for a catch.’ Don’t you see that, as Peter said: ‘In nomine tuo, laxabo rete—At your word I will lower the net’, you can say, Jesus, in your name, I will seek souls!” (St J. Escrivá, The Way, 792).

“If you were to fall into the temptation of wondering, ‘Who’s telling me to embark on this?’ we would have to reply, ‘Christ himself is telling you, is begging you.’ ‘The harvest is plentiful enough, but the labourers are few. You must ask the Lord to whom the harvest belongs to send labourers out for the harvesting’ (Mt 9:37–38). Don’t take the easy way out. Don’t say, ‘I’m no good at this sort of thing; there are others who can do it; it isn’t my line.’ No, for this sort of thing, there is no one else: if you could get away with that argument, so could everyone else. Christ’s plea is addressed to each and every Christian. No one can consider himself excused, for whatever reason—age, health or occupation. There are no excuses whatsoever. Either we carry out a fruitful apostolate, or our faith will prove barren” (Friends of God, 272).

5:5. When Christ gives him these instructions, Peter states the difficulties involved. “A reasonable enough reply. The night hours were their normal time for fishing, and this time the catch had yielded nothing. What was the point of fishing by day? But Peter has faith: ‘But at your word I will let down the nets’ (Lk 5:5). He decides to act on Christ’s suggestion. He undertakes the work relying entirely on the word of our Lord” (St Josemaría Escrivá, Friends of God, 261).

5:8. Peter does not want Christ to leave him; aware of his sins, he declares his unworthiness to be near Christ. This reminds us of the attitude of the centurion who confesses his unworthiness to receive Jesus into his house (cf. Mt 8:8). The Church requires her children to repeat these exact words of the centurion before receiving the Blessed Eucharist. She also teaches us to show due external reverence to the Blessed Sacrament when going to Communion: by falling down on his knees Peter also shows that internal adoration of God should also be expressed externally.

5:11. Perfection is not simply a matter of leaving all things but of doing so in order to follow Christ—which is what the apostles did: they gave up everything in order to be available to do what God’s calling involved.

We should develop this attitude of availability, for “Jesus is never satisfied ‘sharing’: he wants all” (St Josemaría Escrivá, The Way, 155).

If we don’t give ourselves generously we will find it very difficult to follow Jesus: “Detach yourself from people and things until you are stripped of them. For, says Pope Saint Gregory, the devil has nothing of his own in this world, and he goes into battle naked. If you are clothed when you fight him, you will soon be pulled to the ground, because he will have something to grab on to” (The Way, 149).

Source: The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries. Biblical text from the Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and by Scepter Publishers in the United States. We encourage readers to purchase The Navarre Bible for personal study. See Scepter Publishers for details.

"Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ." St Jerome  

Navarre Bible Commentary:Wednesday, 22nd Week in Ordinary Time

Luke 4:38–44

38 And he arose and left the synagogue, and entered Simon’s house. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was ill with a high fever, and they besought him for her. 39 And he stood over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her; and immediately she rose and served them.

40 Now when the sun was setting, all those who had any that were sick with various diseases brought them to him; and he laid his hands on every one of them and healed them. 41 And demons also came out of many, crying, “You are the Son of God!” But he rebuked them, and would not allow them to speak, because they knew that he was the Christ.

42 And when it was day he departed and went into a lonely place. And the people sought him and came to him, and would have kept him from leaving them; 43 but he said to them, “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other cities also; for I was sent for this purpose.” 44 And he was preaching in the synagogues of Judea.

Catholic Exegesis:

The Second Vatican Council teaches  that if we are to derive the true meaning from the sacred texts,  attention must be devoted “not only to their content but to the unity of the whole of Scripture, the living tradition of the entire Church, and the analogy of faith. […] Everything to do with the interpretation of Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgment of the Church, which exercises the divinely conferred communion and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God” (Dei Verbum, 12).

St. John Paul II, when he promulgated the Catechism of the Catholic Church,  explained that the Catechism "is a statement of the Church's faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church's Magisterium."  He went on to "declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion" (Fidei Depositum).

Cited in the Catechism:

Passages from this Gospel reading are not cited in the Catechism.

Commentary:

Curing of Peter’s mother-in-law

4:38–39. In the public life of Jesus we find many touching episodes (cf. e.g. Lk 19:1ff; Jn 2:1ff) which show the high regard he had for everyday family life.

Here we can clearly see the effectiveness of prayer on behalf of other people: “No sooner did they pray to the Saviour”, St Jerome says, “than he immediately healed the sick; from this we learn that he also listens to the prayers of the faithful for help against sinful passions” (Expositio in Evangelium sec. Lucam, in loc.).

St John Chrysostom refers to this total, instantaneous cure: “Since this was a curable type of illness he displayed his power through the way he brought healing, doing what medicine could not do. Even after being cured of fever, patients need time to recover their former strength, but here the cure was instantaneous” (Hom. on St Matthew, 27).

The Fathers saw in this lady’s fever a symbol of concupiscence: “Peter’s mother-in-law’s fever represents our flesh affected by various illnesses and concupiscences; our fever is passion, our fever is lust, our fever is anger—vices which, although they affect the body, perturb the soul, the mind and the feelings” (St Ambrose, Expositio evangelii sec. Lucam, in loc.).

On the practical consequences of this St Cyril says: “Let us receive Jesus Christ, because when he visits us and we take him into our minds and hearts, even our worst passions are extinguished and we are kept safe to serve him, that is, to do what pleases him” (Hom. 28 in Mattheum).

Jesus preaches in other cities in Judea

4:43. Our Lord again stresses one of the reasons why he has come into the world. St Thomas, when discussing the purpose of the Eucharist, says that Christ “came into the world, first, to make the truth known, as he himself says: ‘for this I was born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth’ (Jn 18:37). Hence it was not fitting that he should hide himself by leading a solitary life, but rather that he should appear openly and preach in public. For this reason he tells those who wanted to detain him, ‘I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other cities also; for I was sent for this purpose.’ Secondly, he came in order to free men from sin; as the apostle says, ‘Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners’ (1 Tim 1:15). This is why Chrysostom says, ‘Although Christ might, while staying in the same place, have drawn all men to himself to hear his preaching, he did not do so—in order to give us the example to go out and seek the lost sheep, as the shepherd does, or as the doctor does, who visits the sick person.’ Thirdly, he came so that ‘we might obtain access to God’ (Rom 5:2)” (Summa theologiae, 3, 40, 1, c.).

Source: The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries. Biblical text from the Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and by Scepter Publishers in the United States. We encourage readers to purchase The Navarre Bible for personal study. See Scepter Publishers for details.

"Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ." St Jerome  

Navarre Bible Commentary:Tuesday, 22nd Week in Ordinary Time

Luke 4:31–37

31 And he went down to Caperna-um, a city of Galilee. And he was teaching them on the sabbath; 32 and they were astonished at his teaching, for his word was with authority. 33 And in the synagogue there was a man who had the spirit of an unclean demon; and he cried out with a loud voice, 34 “Ah! What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” 35 But Jesus rebuked him, saying, “Be silent, and come out of him!” And when the demon had thrown him down in the midst, he came out of him, having done him no harm. 36 And they were all amazed and said to one another, “What is this word?  For with authority and power he commands the unclean spirits, and they come out.” 37 And reports of him went out into every place in the surrounding region.

Catholic Exegesis:

The Second Vatican Council teaches  that if we are to derive the true meaning from the sacred texts,  attention must be devoted “not only to their content but to the unity of the whole of Scripture, the living tradition of the entire Church, and the analogy of faith. […] Everything to do with the interpretation of Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgment of the Church, which exercises the divinely conferred communion and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God” (Dei Verbum, 12).

St. John Paul II, when he promulgated the Catechism of the Catholic Church,  explained that the Catechism "is a statement of the Church's faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church's Magisterium."  He went on to "declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion" (Fidei Depositum).

Cited in the Catechism:

Passages from this Gospel reading are not cited in the Catechism.

Commentary:

In the synagogue in Capernaum

4:31–37. Jesus now demonstrates by his actions that authority which was evident in his words.

4:34. The demon tells the truth here when he calls Jesus “the Holy One of God”, but Jesus does not accept this testimony from the “father of lies” (Jn 8:44). This shows that the devil usually says something partially true in order to disguise untruth; by sowing confusion in this way, he can more readily deceive people. By silencing and expelling the demon, Jesus teaches us to be prudent and not let ourselves be deceived by half-truths.

Source: The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries. Biblical text from the Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and by Scepter Publishers in the United States. We encourage readers to purchase The Navarre Bible for personal study. See Scepter Publishers for details.

"Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ." St Jerome