February 21, 2025
Friday of the Sixth
Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 339
Reading 1
The whole world spoke the same language, using the same
words.
While the people were migrating in the east,
they came upon a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there.
They said to one another,
"Come, let us mold bricks and harden them with fire."
They used bricks for stone, and bitumen for mortar.
Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city
and a tower with its top in the sky,
and so make a name for ourselves;
otherwise we shall be scattered all over the earth."
The LORD came down to see the city and the tower
that they had built.
Then the LORD said: "If now, while they are one people,
all speaking the same language,
they have started to do this,
nothing will later stop them from doing whatever they presume to do.
Let us then go down and there confuse their language,
so that one will not understand what another says."
Thus the LORD scattered them from there all over the earth,
and they stopped building the city.
That is why it was called Babel,
because there the LORD confused the speech of all the world.
It was from that place that he scattered them all over the earth.
Responsorial Psalm
R. (12) Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be
his own.
The LORD brings to nought the plans of nations;
he foils the designs of peoples.
But the plan of the LORD stands forever;
the design of his heart, through all generations.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Blessed the nation whose God is the LORD,
the people he has chosen for his own inheritance.
From heaven the LORD looks down;
he sees all mankind.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
From his fixed throne he beholds
all who dwell on the earth,
He who fashioned the heart of each,
he who knows all their works.
R. Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
I call you my friends, says the Lord,
for I have made known to you all that the Father has told me.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
Jesus summoned the crowd with his disciples and said to
them,
"Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself,
take up his cross, and follow me.
For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it,
but whoever loses his life for my sake
and that of the Gospel will save it.
What profit is there for one to gain the whole world
and forfeit his life?
What could one give in exchange for his life?
Whoever is ashamed of me and of my words
in this faithless and sinful generation,
the Son of Man will be ashamed of
when he comes in his Father's glory with the holy angels."
He also said to them,
"Amen, I say to you,
there are some standing here who will not taste death
until they see that the Kingdom of God has come in power."
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/022125.cfm
Commentary on
Genesis 11:1-9
We are now at the end of our selected readings from the
story of Creation and our tragic fall from the life that God originally
intended for us. Today’s story is based on the stepped or terraced temple
towers called ziggurats in ancient Babylon, a city with few
happy memories for the Israelites and, for them, the home of idolatry and
religious corruption. The context is used by the writer to show
humanity’s increasing wickedness, here shown by an arrogant desire to create an
urban culture without God. A secondary theme is an explanation of the
huge diversity of languages and dialects in people who, in most respects, seem
so similar, and also an explanation for the meaning of the name ‘Babylon’.
Like the garden of Eden story, it is a folktale of human
pride and folly and reflective of Israel’s strong anti-urban bias. We are told
that originally, the whole of humanity had just one language and one
vocabulary. Then the world’s people migrated from the east and settled in
the plain of Shinar. This is ancient Sumer in southern Mesopotamia
(today, southern Iraq), and also known as Babylonia.
Here they developed construction techniques, learning how to
make bricks instead of using stone and bitumen as mortar. Bricks were so
easy to make and so convenient, when compared to the tedious process of cutting
stone. Buildings could be bigger and constructed so much more
quickly. Stone and mortar were used as building materials in Canaan,
rocky country where the Israelites lived. Stone was scarce in
Mesopotamia, so mud brick and bitumen were used as determined by archaeological
excavation.
The people in Shinar decided to build a whole city,
including a tower that would reach upwards, penetrating the heavens. This
is a direct reference to the chief ziggurat of Babylon,
the E-sag-ila, signifying “the house that raises high its
head”. Ziggurats were pyramidic temple structures intended to serve as
staircases from earth to heaven. They were square at the base and had
sloping, stepped sides that led to a small shrine at the top. They could
be called the earliest ‘skyscrapers’.
These structures were intended to symbolise the holy
mountain and resting-place of the deity, and the builders were apparently
seeking a means of meeting their god. But the biblical writer sees their
project as an act of arrogant pride. They built this tower because:
…otherwise we shall be scattered abroad upon the face of
the whole earth.
As so often is the case, the root of overweening ambition is
often fear. The theme of the tower is combined with that of the whole city, as
a condemnation of urban civilisation.
God was not at all pleased with what he saw. They were
all one people, united by a common language, and this was only the beginning of
what they could do. Nothing would seem impossible. There would be
no limits to their unrestrained rebellion against God. The kingdom of Man
would try to displace and exclude the kingdom of God (something often seen
today).
In order to put a stop to such ambition, God says:
Come, let us go down and confuse their language there, so
that they will not understand one another’s speech.
The result was that, divided by incomprehensible languages,
they were scattered over the face of the earth, and the building of their city
had to be abandoned. The very thing they feared ultimately took place.
Finally, the city was called Babel, because it was there
that the Lord had thrown the language of the earth into confusion and scattered
the earth’s peoples in all directions. Babel is the
Hebrew form of the name ‘Babylon’, originally Bab-ili, meaning
‘Gate of the gods’. Apparently the name referred originally only to a
certain part of the city, the district near the gate that led to the temple
area. There is a play here on the similarly-sounding Hebrew word balil,
which means “to be confused”.
For the biblical writer, the dream of building a tower
reaching up to heaven is just another example of the sinfulness of the human
family, this time of their arrogance and pride. It is a repetition of the
sin of the man and the woman in the garden who thought they would gain infinite
wisdom by eating the forbidden fruit.
There is also a theological explanation of why our single
species, once thought to be living in one place and sharing one language, is
now so divided by language, and why we are scattered and separated over such a
wide area.
Arrogance can be found in many places today, and is a
feeling that we are in total control of our lives and our destinies. But events
that happen in all our lives constantly remind us just how fragile and
contingent our existence really is.
However, the divisions of Babel and mutual
incomprehensibility are reversed on the day of Pentecost. As Peter speaks
to the crowds coming from so many different places, they are amazed that they
can all understand the message. It is a message for everyone, and one
which is in total harmony with the deepest needs and desires of every single
person (Acts 2:5-12). There is a similar gathering of the whole of
humanity in the presence of God described in the Book of Revelation (Rev 7:9-10).
It is our mission as followers of Christ to work for the
establishment of the Kingdom where all are united in truth and love as brothers
and sisters. There is still a lot of work to be done.
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Commentary on Mark
8:34—9:1
Having warned his disciples of the future that lies ahead
for him, Jesus now calls the crowds and his disciples together, and lets them
know in no uncertain terms what following him entails. To be a follower of
Jesus is to be ready to go exactly the way that he went:
If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him
renounce himself and take up his cross and follow me. Whoever wishes to save
his life, will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and that of the
Gospel will save it.
Yet, this is the paradox. Self-preservation and self-centred
aggrandisement leads to nothing, only to a kind of death. Surrendering one’s
life totally through a commitment to Jesus and to his Way (as expressed in the
Gospel) leads to an enrichment which nothing else can supply.
This is a clear challenge: that anyone who wants to follow
Jesus must be ready both to suffer and give their lives in love for others.
Those who make every effort to preserve their lives, and hang on to what they
have with no regard for transcendent values or the needs of others, are
destined to lose everything, not least their integrity, dignity and
self-respect.
This was very practical teaching for people who were
frequently being persecuted for their Christian faith. Those who betrayed that
faith to save their lives or their property had lost something more
valuable—their integrity, their wholeness, their consistency. Undoubtedly many
could not live with themselves afterwards. There are certain things which are
more important than human life or material possessions.
What gain, then, is it for a man to win the whole world
and ruin [the true meaning of] his life? And indeed what can a
man offer in exchange for his life?
We have a long list of martyrs (from the
Greek, meaning ‘witnesses’) to the faith whose memories we cherish, and whose
example we respect and admire. We have no list, and no desire, to remember
those who avoided martyrdom and compromised their faith and their values, and
who may have enjoyed wealth and position as a result. They lived on for a while
and then disappeared; the martyrs are still very much alive.
There are overtones here of a Church in persecution. There
must have been those who, when their faith was challenged, “were ashamed of
Jesus and his words” and denied their faith to save their immediate lives. They
will hear the terrible words cited in Matthew’s Gospel:
Truly I tell you, I do not know you. (Matt
25:12)
The final phrase is ambivalent:
There are some standing here who will not taste death
until they see that the Kingdom of God has come in power.
This can refer to the establishment of the Christian
communities, as witnesses to the Kingdom’s being established in the world,
which will be the result of the great experience at Pentecost. It can also
refer, of course, to a belief among many in the early Church, that the Second
Coming of Jesus, the Parousia, would take place in their lifetime.
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https://livingspace.sacredspace.ie/
Friday, February 21, 2025
Ordinary Time
Opening Prayer
Lord our God, we believe in You with all our being. Let this
faith never be a lifeless belief in abstract truths outside ourselves, but a
deep personal commitment to Your Son Jesus Christ. Give us the courage, we pray
You, to live for our brothers and sisters and if need be to lose our life for
them and for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who lives with You and the Holy
Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
Gospel Reading -
Mark 8: 34-9: 1
Jesus called the people and His disciples to Him and said,
'If anyone wants to be a follower of Mine, let him renounce himself and take up
his cross and follow Me. Anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but
anyone who loses his life for My sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will
save it. What gain, then, is it for anyone to win the whole world and forfeit
his life? And indeed what can anyone offer in exchange for his life? For if
anyone in this sinful and adulterous generation is ashamed of Me and of My
words, the Son of man will also be ashamed of him when He comes in the glory of
His Father with the holy angels.'
And He said to them, 'In truth I tell you, there are some
standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God come
with power.'
Reflection
Today’s Gospel speaks about the conditions necessary to
follow Jesus. Peter does not understand Jesus’ proposal when He speaks about
suffering and of the cross. Peter accepts Jesus as Messiah, but not a Suffering
Messiah. Before this misunderstanding of Peter, Jesus describes the announcement
of the Cross and explains the significance of the cross for the life of the
disciples (Mk 8: 27 to 9: 1).
• Historical context of Mark: In the years
70’s, when Mark writes, the situation of the communities was not easy. There
was much suffering; there were many crosses. Six years before, in 64, the
Emperor Nero had decreed the first great persecution, killing many Christians.
In the year 70, in Palestine, the Romans were destroying Jerusalem. In the
other countries an enormous tension
between converted Jews and non-converted Jews was beginning to arise. The greatest
difficulty was the Cross of Jesus. The Jews thought that a crucified person
could not be the Messiah, because the law affirmed that any crucified person
should be considered a cursed person by God (Deut 21: 22-23).
• Mark 8: 34-37: Conditions to follow
Jesus. Jesus draws the conclusions which are valid for the disciples, for the
Christians of the time of Mark and for us who are living today: If anyone wants
to follow Me let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow Me! At that
time the cross was death penalty which the Roman Empire attributed to the
marginalized. To take up the Cross and follow Him meant, definitively, to
accept to be marginalized by the unjust system which legitimized injustice. The
Cross was not the fruit of fatalism of history nor demanded by the Father. The
Cross is the consequence of the freely assumed commitment by Jesus to reveal
the Good News of the One who is Father and that, therefore, all must
be accepted and treated as brothers
and sisters. Because of this revolutionary announcement, He was persecuted, and
He was not afraid to give His own life. There is no greater love than to give
one’s life for one’s brother. Immediately, after Mark inserts two separate
phrases of the text.
• Mark 8: 38-9: 1: Two phrases: a
requirement and an announcement. The first one (Mk 8: 38) is the requirement
not to be ashamed of the Gospel, but to have the courage to profess it. The
second one (Mk 9: 1), is an announcement about the coming or the presence of
Jesus in the facts of life. Some thought that Jesus would come afterwards (1
Thess 4: 15-18). But in fact, Jesus had already
come and was already present in the people, especially in the poor. But they
were not aware of this. Jesus himself had said, “Every time that you helped the
poor, the sick, the homeless, the imprisoned, the pilgrim it was me!” (Mt 25:
34-45).
For Personal
Confrontation
• What is the cross
that weighs down on me and which makes my life heavy? How do I bear it?
• To gain or to lose
life; to gain the whole world or to lose the soul; to be ashamed of the Gospel
or to profess it publicly. How does this take place in my life?
Concluding Prayer
How blessed is anyone who fears Yahweh, who delights in His
commandments!
His descendants shall be powerful on earth, the race of the
honest shall receive blessings. (Ps 112: 1-2)
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