DAILY- HOMILY

June 6, 2007
Wednesday 9th Week in Ordinary Time - Year I

TOBIT 3:1-11, 16-17A
Grief-stricken in spirit, I groaned and wept aloud. Then with sobs I
began to pray: "You are righteous, O Lord, and all your deeds are
just; All your ways are mercy and truth; you are the judge of the
world. And now, O Lord, may you be mindful of me, and look with favor
upon me. Punish me not for my sins, nor for my inadvertent offenses,
nor for those of my fathers. "They sinned against you, and disobeyed
your commandments. So you handed us over to plundering, exile, and
death, till we were an object lesson, a byword, a reproach in all the
nations among whom you scattered us. "Yes, your judgments are many and
true in dealing with me as my sins and those of my fathers deserve.
For we have not kept your commandments, nor have we trodden the paths
of truth before you. "So now, deal with me as you please, and command
my life breath to be taken from me, that I may go from the face of the
earth into dust. It is better for me to die than to live, because I
have heard insulting calumnies, and I am overwhelmed with grief.
"Lord, command me to be delivered from such anguish; let me go to the
everlasting abode; Lord, refuse me not. For it is better for me to die
than to endure so much misery in life, and to hear these insults!" On
the same day, at Ecbatana in Media, it so happened that Raguel's
daughter Sarah also had to listen to abuse, from one of her father's
maids. For she had been married to seven husbands, but the wicked
demon Asmodeus killed them off before they could have intercourse with
her, as it is prescribed for wives. So the maid said to her: "You are
the one who strangles your husbands! Look at you! You have already
been married seven times, but you have had no joy with any one of your
husbands. Why do you beat us? Because your husbands are dead? Then why
not join them! May we never see a son or daughter of yours!" That day
she was deeply grieved in spirit. She went in tears to an upstairs
room in her father's house with the intention of hanging herself. But
she reconsidered, saying to herself: "No! People would level this
insult against my father: 'You had only one beloved daughter, but she
hanged herself because of ill fortune!' And thus would I cause my
father in his old age to go down to the nether world laden with
sorrow. It is far better for me not to hang myself, but to beg the
Lord to have me die, so that I need no longer live to hear such
insults." At that time, then, she spread out her hands, and facing the
window, poured out this prayer: "Blessed are you, O Lord, merciful
God! Forever blessed and honored is your holy name; may all your works
forever bless you. At that very time, the prayer of these two
suppliants was heard in the glorious presence of Almighty God. So
Raphael was sent to heal them both: to remove the cataracts from
Tobit's eyes, so that he might again see God's sunlight; and to marry
Raguel's daughter Sarah to Tobit's son Tobiah, and then drive the
wicked demon Asmodeus from her. For Tobiah had the right to claim her
before any other who might wish to marry her.In the very moment that
Tobit returned from the courtyard to his house, Raguel's daughter
Sarah came downstairs from her room.

MARK 12:18-27
Then the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him with
a question. "Teacher," they said, "Moses wrote for us that if a man's
brother dies and leaves a wife but no children, the man must marry the
widow and have children for his brother. Now there were seven
brothers. The first one married and died without leaving any children.
The second one married the widow, but he also died, leaving no child.
It was the same with the third. In fact, none of the seven left any
children. Last of all, the woman died too. At the resurrection whose
wife will she be, since the seven were married to her?" Jesus replied,
"Are you not in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the
power of God? When the dead rise, they will neither marry nor be given
in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven. Now about the
dead rising--have you not read in the book of Moses, in the account of
the bush, how God said to him, `I am the God of Abraham, the God of
Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? He is not the God of the dead, but of
the living. You are badly mistaken!"

REFLECTION
Human selfishness is all too contagious and invades and weakens the
best of us. Jesus accused the Pharisees of ruining their chance to
hear the voice of God by intruding their own desires and pet ideas as
we see in today's Gospel. Don't we all do that? Don't we make so much
noise of our own that we can't hear God's voice speaking to us in the
depths of our hearts.

We often blame other people for our troubles when it's really
ourselves who are spoiling our chances. We are not happy, because we
are always interfering with God's blueprint. God is our creator. He
knows what it takes to make us truly human. So our aim in life must be
to take things calmly, listen more and more to what God has to tell
us, and make less and less noise of our own. It is we ourselves who
spoil our happiness.

Listening to God is no easy job. Without realizing it, we turn off
God. We often think and act as if we know better than God what this
world needs and what we ought to have.

Perhaps a good prayer for all of us would be: "O Lord, give me the
good sense to make less noise, so that I can tune You in, because that
is the only way I will really learn to live. Dead to sin, alive to
You, Come Lord Jesus, make us new."

PRAYER REQUESTS
We pray ...
.. for a deep and profound respect for life, especially for the
unborn.
.. for the healing and speedy recovery of Alyssa
.. for the personal intentions of Veronica Yap
.. for the safe trip and a new beginning for Mrs. Teresita Nunez Choa
.. for spiritual and physical healing of Belinda Javier
.. for enlightenment and guidance of those who will be taking the
Nurses' Board exam on June 11
.. for all the prayer intentions in the MTQ Dailyprayer Diary.
- Birthday: Christine Go
- Birthday: Adrian Colin Yao
- Birthday: Susana L. Chung
- Birthday: Winnie Morabe
- Wedding Anniversary: Patrick & Cristy Chin
- Wedding Anniversary: Wilson Lim & Estela Lim
.. for world peace and reconciliation.

Finally, we pray for one another, for those who have asked our
prayers and for those who need our prayers the most.

Have a good day!

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