Daily Reflection for Wednesday, October 23, 2019
| Peace and Blessings, Friends and Parishioners! We encourage you to reflect on Wednesday’s readings at this link: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/102319.cfm If you prefer to use your own Bible, the readings are: First Reading: Romans 6:12-18 Responsorial: Psalm 124:1b-3,4-6,7-8 Gospel: Luke 12:39-48 Our reflection on Wednesday’s readings: “Much will be required of the person entrusted with much...” Luke 12:48 This week I have been seeing lots of movies at the Heartland International Film Festival here in Indianapolis. Heartland’s mission is to “inspire through the transformative power of film.” Two of the films I’ve seen provide examples of people living according to today’s gospel. “For Sama” is a documentary filmed by a journalist from Syria who, together with her husband, kept a hospital open throughout the war and up to the end of the siege on Aleppo in 2016. They believed it was their purpose to stay and treat the wounded as well as to document the atrocities for the outside world despite the great personal risk to themselves and their one-year-old daughter, Sama. “The Mover” is the true story of a Latvian man who chose to put himself and his family at great risk to hide Jews from the Nazis when Germany invaded Latvia in 1941. Each time he came close to being discovered he would lament, “I have to save more, I have to save more.” It is believed that he saved at least 50 people from death in the Holocaust. These ordinary people chose to do extraordinary things because they felt a higher sense of purpose. They used their gifts and resources to help others. Most of us are blessed to live in a time and place where we are not in the middle of a war and its horrors. However, there is pain and suffering and anguish everywhere if we choose to pay attention. God places us in circumstances where we can use our gifts to make a difference, have an impact, be a force for change, and maybe even save a life. We just need to ask, “What is being required of me in this moment?” Blessings to all, Andra Liepa |