Questions for Reflection for February 11, 2023 HD

Reflection on Reading 1, Genesis 3:9-24
1. The Genesis Account is not only a record of creation, it is a profound framework for understanding the consequences of the Original Sin of our first parents – and what it set into motion:

Separation from God, separation from one another, separation from the prior harmonious relationship with nature itself.

Sin separates. Grace Liberates. Faith integrates.

As we continue today, we see Adam hiding from a loving God because he was afraid, and because he all of a sudden experienced “shame”, he knew was naked. Shame and fear entered into what once was a wonderful relationship of freedom and loving communion, a time when God walked with our first parents in the cool of the day. (Genesis 3:8)

In addition, the “blame game” is set into motion. When asked by the Lord to confess his sin, acknowledge that he disobeyed the Lords explicit instruction to not eat of the tree the man blames the woman, his wife.

It continues, when the Lord confronts Eve, the woman, whose name means the mother of the living, she blames the serpent. This original sin also changed the way in which man and woman worked. In the garden, work was a blessing, a participation in Gods ongoing creation and care for His creation. After the fall, work becomes something quite different.

The wrong use of their freedom, sin, bore the bad fruit of separation from God and His loving plan. And, brought with it, death. But God did not cease caring for and loving our first parents. In fact, the entire history of salvation follows.

Where are we separating ourselves from Gods loving plan? Where are we sinning, and breaking the communion with the Lord restored for us by Jesus Christ? When was the last time we went to confession?

Reflection on Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 90:2, 3-4, 5-6, 12-13
2. The Psalmist sings of the love and sovereignty of God, demonstrated in His loving care of all creation.

He reminds us that God never separates Himself from us. He watches over us in both our waking hours and our sleep. He reminds us as well, that a day in the Lord is like a thousand years and a thousand years as a day.

Time itself is a creature, given to us for our progress in holiness.

How do we view time? Do we see it as a tutor or a tyrant? Do we use it for the Lord… or do we waste it?

Reflection on Gospel, Mark 8:1-10
3. This Gospel passage from St. Mark is one of the accounts of the multiplication of the loaves and the fish in the Gospel accounts. Not only are these accounts of physical miracles, which they are, and signs of the kingdom.

They teach us deeper lessons, intended to shape our walk of faith and open our eyes and hearts to a new understanding of how we can cooperate with God’s grace, at work in our lives, right now.

The miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fish is found in all four gospels, emphasizing its significance. As is often the case, each of the four evangelists focus on particular aspects of the miracle in order to emphasize for the reader the significance and implication of the event in their own lives.

During this account in Mark’s Gospel, we are told that the disciples encouraged Jesus to dismiss the crowd because – from their perspective – they simply could not feed these hungry people, even with two hundred days wages. They did not see the need of the crowd with the eyes of living faith. However, Jesus did – and He wants all who bear His name to learn to walk by the light of that same faith. He gives us the grace to do so.

In His Sacred Humanity, Jesus was moved with compassion for the crowd. The Greek root of the word for compassion means to suffer with. The disciples viewed the matter as a problem. They approached it through a lens of economic scarcity. Jesus understood the economy of heaven. The question He asks of all of us today is – do we?

Jesus asked the disciples a simple question: “what do you have?” They did not understand. They had been invited to participate in God’s work by simply giving what they had in a Holy Exchange. When they finally did, Jesus used the matter given by men, loaves and fish, to manifest the manna of heaven. He still does.

Do we believe this? Do we live differently as a result?

More on Daily Readings:
https://www.catholic.org/bible/daily_reading/?select_date=2023-02-11

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