REFLECTION/HOMILY FOR MONDAY OF THE 31ST WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME YEAR I 6TH NOVEMBER 2023

REFLECTION/HOMILY FOR MONDAY OF THE 31ST WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME YEAR I 6TH NOVEMBER 2023

Romans 11:29-36; Ps.1319; Luke 14:12-14

Authentic Charity

At face value, today’s gospel is a difficult one. Jesus is asking us not to invite those we are familiar with when we prepare a banquet but to invite the poor, the lame, the blind and so on. However, on closer look, we discover that Jesus was not primarily teaching on the class of people to be invited to a banquet. Such a teaching will ordinarily have no bearing for our salvation. Basically, Jesus was inviting us to embrace the proper way of doing charity.

For charity to be charity, it must be done with all selflessness. When selfishness (in whatever colour it presents itself) accompanies our act of giving, it becomes investment, no longer charity. For every investment both capital and profit is expected.

When we honestly access ourselves, we realize that more often than not, what we have done as charity were actually investments because we habour(ed) some forms of expectations from the person(s) we have helped such as: a “thank you” visit to us, more regard and respect for us, telling others what we have done for them, obliging our requests henceforth even when they would have otherwise refused to, to help us too when we are in need, to become our fan who will always support us in whatever we do or say. The list is endless.

This has made some persons to say and believe that nothing is actually free. When someone freely gives you something, just know that you will pay back in one way or the other. This is what Jesus is kicking against in today’s gospel.

Help people and expect nothing in return; help people and forget about it. Some persons may seem to be selfless when they give but at the slightest provocation in the future, they will narrate the incident of their help to the person in the past to prove that the person is ungrateful, ill-mannered, proud, and so on. This is blackmailing under the guise of charity. Be careful of what you do with the knowledge of your charitable deeds.

Without selflessness, charity becomes a bait to trap another. Charity means love; but when we use it to trap others, we are not loving them but hunting them. After creation, God asked man to cultivate the land not to cultivate humans.