![tornado[1]](https://thenoontimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/tornado1.jpg?w=300&h=168)
Ascension Sunday, May 24, 2020
Calamities – Part II
When calamity strikes . . . what do we do? How do we behave? Where do we go? To whom do we turn?
This chapter contains the last of Jesus’ speeches in Matthew and as we read we can feel the Messiah’s urgency to gather in his sheep before the coming storm. From a MAGNIFICAT essay by Peter John Cameron, O.P. when he quotes Aquinas, “Goodness is diffusive of itself” (Summa Theologiae). He goes on to describe God: When something is truly good, it cannot remain self-contained. It wants to go out of itself, share itself . . . Goodness implies a self-gift. And this is why intercessory prayer is the mark of a good and holy person. This is how we share divinity with Jesus, by cautioning, warning, advising, seeking, and asking . . . just as the Shepherd does with his sheep.
What do we do when calamity strikes . . . ?
Disciples will behave as Jesus does in Matthew 24.
The faithful will call constantly to one another and they will gather to intercede for those who have strayed from The Way.
This giving of self rather than preservation of self can create great difficulty and calamity for ourselves and others, but it is the work we are asked to do.
We are called to be persistent, to persevere, to endure, to walk through the fire.
Yesterday’s MAGNIFICAT MEDITATION is written by Sr. Jean-Marie Howe, O.C.S.O. who cites Simone Weil: There is no fire in a cooked dish, but one knows it has been on a fire. On the other hand, even though one may think to have seen the flames under them, if the potatoes are raw it is certain they have not been on the fire. It is not by the way a man talks about God, but by the way he talks about the things of the world that best shows whether his soul has passed through the fire of the love of God.
We can hear the urgency in Christ’s voice and that urgency is this: He knows that destruction, calamities and great tribulation are upon the world . . . and he does not want to lose even one of his lambs. That is why he has chosen us as disciples and our work is this: to go out and bring into the feast those on the highways, to be fishers of men and women, to distribute the fish and loaves and then to gather up the baskets of crumbs. And as these disciples we will walk through the fire of this world, and we will suffer in ways we had not thought possible. Yet beyond the flames, there is always the goal: the sanctuary of Christ with open arms, calling the sheep to the fold . . . the sanctuary against all calamity.
Cameron, Peter John. “Meditation of the Day.” MAGNIFICAT. 12 and 13.5 (2008). Print.
Adapted from the May 13, 2008 Noontime.
Image from https://www.climatecentral.org/blogs/tornadoes-rake-oklahoma-kansas-as-storm-threat-continues-16014
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