Archive entries by Father Tom Sullivan brought over from old website.
Wednesday 03/31/10 Readings Posted 03/30/10 8:22pm
Today’s Gospel recalls the treachery of Judas selling Jesus to his enemies. That had English and Irish Catholics referring to this as Spy Wednesday.
Turning to courageous matter, the first reading is the third of the four Songs of the Suffering Servant. It is a wonderful picture of the thirty-three year old Jesus as he both looks back on what he has done and looks forward to what he must endure.
Looking back he recalls how morning after morning the Father both opened his ears to wisdom and opened his mouth to speak to the weary.
Looking forward, he fixes his face like flint to control his reactions to insults and spitting. He strengthens his resolve to give his back to those who whip him, his beard to those who will pluck it.
Tuesday 03/30/10 Readings Posted 03/29/10 7:15pm
Although the first reading today does not look like a song that is what it is. The latter part of the book of Isaiah has four such songs imbedded in it. We had the first of them yesterday. We will have the fourth of them tomorrow. Today we have the second.
The message in this second of the songs of the Suffering Servant is that the grace he has to offer will be more than the Jewish people will be able to take in. He will be much more than their national Messiah, he will be a Savior for all the world
It is too little, he says, for you to be my servant to raise up the
tribes of Jacob and restore the survivors of Israel:
I will make you a light to the nations, that my salvation
may reach to the ends of the earth.
