The Good Word

PAZ Y BIEN!…¡SANTA ALEGRÍA!Paz y Bien…Santa Alegría!!  Dicen algunos que este saludo viene del mismo San Francisco de Asís cuya fiesta celebramos hoy. Puede ser que algunos de Uds. traerán sus mascotas: perros, gatos y otros animales para que los padres de tu parroquia los bendigan hoy. Viene o no viene este saludo del mismo San Francisco sabemos que él era un hombre, un santo hombre lleno de la paz y la misma alegría de Jesús. El evangelio de hoy dice esto: En aquella misma hora, Jesús se llenó de júbilo en el Espíritu Santo y exclamó: "¡Te doy gracias, Padre, Señor del cielo y de la tierra, porque has escondido estas cosas a los sabios y a los entendidos, y las has revelado a la gente sencilla!  Entonces Jesús les dice esto:Alégrense más bien de que sus nombres están escritos en el cielo". En su famoso canto Cántico al Sol San Francisco habla de Sus Hermanos: Sol, Luna, Viento, Agua Fuego y de su Hermana Madre Tierra. Porque Francisco sabía que todos que nos atraen a Dios, todas las cosas de la tierra que nos animan a vivir en Santa Comunión con Dios y en santa y alegre y generosa santa comunión con los demás pues son todas esas cosas motivos de Paz y de Bien para nosotros.  Además de todo eso San Francisco habla de la Hermana Muerte. Porque la muerte es para los que hemos amado y seguido a Jesús la Muerte es para nosotros la PUERTA hacia la Paz y Bien y la Santa Alegría con Dios.Si me desean comunicar:tdeely7352@hotmail.com

LOS POBRES PUEDEN SER NUESTROS DEFENSORESComo sabrán Uds. que nos conocen a nosotros los Redentoristas nuestro lema o consigna: EN CRISTO HAY ABUNDANTE REDENCIÓN. San Alfonso nos fundó para predicar la Palabra de Dios a los pobres. Eso mismo hemos hecho desde nuestro inicio hacen casi 300 año atrás en las lomas del Sur de Italia. Predicamos la palabra de Dios a los pastores de ovejas y chivos o cabras. San Alfonso nos animó a vivir cerca de los pobres y a vivir de una forma sencilla y humilde. La historia del Hombre Rico y el pobre Lázaro habla de lo que el evangelio llama “un abismo inmenso” o un barranco en Lázaro en el cielo y el rico condenado al infierno.  Porque cuando Lázaro le pide a Abrahán que le dejara cruzar para estar con él y con Lázaro, Abrahán le dice que hay aquel inmenso abismo o diría yo un profundo barranco que no se puede cruzar nadie. Pero acá en la tierra podemos cruzar los que tienen hacia los pobres que no tienen. El gran Sobre esta historia del pobre Lázaro y el rico tacaño nos dice quién fue el Papa Gregorio :Los Lazaros pobres están frente a nosotros todos los días. Ellos necesitan los alimentos que diariamente caen de nuestras mesas. ..Diariamente vemos al Lázaro si es que lo buscamos. Los pobres siempre están a nuestro lado…... Un ejemplo muy urgente de eso es la situación de la buena gente de Gaza. Muchos países del mundo, incluyendo mi propio país no ven a Lázaro en la gente inocente de Gaza que están muriendo del hambre y del rechazo porque hay personas y naciones enteras al igual que el Rico Epulón del Evangelio. No ven los Lázaros de Gaza con amor, respeto y compasión. Les invito oír las palabras que Pablo le dice a Timoteo hoy cuando le dice: Tú, como hombre de Dios, lleva una vida de rectitud, piedad, fe, amor, paciencia y mansedumbre. Lucha en el noble combate de la fe, conquista la vida eterna a la que has sido llamado.¨tdeely7352@hotmail.com

Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time CSeptember 21, 2025  Hello and welcome to the Word, bringing you the Good News of Jesus Christ every day from the Redemptorists of the Baltimore Province. I am Fr. Karl Esker from the Basilica of our Lady of Perpetual Help in Brooklyn, NY. Today is the Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time. Our reading today is from the holy gospel according to Luke Jesus said to his disciples, "A rich man had a steward who was reported to him for squandering his property. He summoned him and said, 'What is this I hear about you? Prepare a full account of your stewardship, because you can no longer be my steward.' The steward said to himself, 'What shall I do, now that my master is taking the position of steward away from me? I am not strong enough to dig and I am ashamed to beg. I know what I shall do so that, when I am removed from the stewardship, they may welcome me into their homes.' He called in his master's debtors one by one. To the first he said, 'How much do you owe my master?' He replied, 'One hundred measures of olive oil.' He said to him, 'Here is your promissory note. Sit down and quickly write one for fifty.' Then to another the steward said, 'And you, how much do you owe?' He replied, 'One hundred kors of wheat.' The steward said to him, 'Here is your promissory note; write one for eighty.' And the master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently. "For the children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. I tell you, make friends for yourselves with dishonest wealth, so that when it fails, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings. The person who is trustworthy in very small matters is also trustworthy in great ones; and the person who is dishonest in very small matters is also dishonest in great ones. If, therefore, you are not trustworthy with dishonest wealth, who will trust you with true wealth? If you are not trustworthy with what belongs to another, who will give you what is yours? No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and mammon."The gospel of the Lord.Homily The parable in today's gospel is not a homey metaphor we often expect from Jesus' parables. It is a brutal presentation of class exploitation and an example of the lengths to which an unscrupulous person will go for self-preservation. Still, Jesus is able to find a positive message in the actions of the unjust steward and bemoans the fact that those dedicated to the kingdom of God are not as single-minded. We need to understand that the size of the debts in the parable was very large and would be difficult to pay back. The steward had erred in allowing his master's clients to accumulate such large debts. And then, to ingratiate himself with those same clients, he reduces their debts, also by large amounts. We can imagine the shock and joy on the faces of the debtors as their debts were written down. More difficult is imagining the face of the master. He could have lost money, but overnight his reputation had gone from Mr. Scrooge to Santa Claus. The townspeople would be telling everyone what a good guy he was. And in Jesus' neighborhood, that kind of capital was worth more than the money. The point Jesus was trying to make is that even an unjust steward can be good to his neighbors, when his own life is on the line; and he questions why it is so difficult for his disciples to be good to one another, when eternal life is on the line? Jesus seems to be saying that the goods of this earth are to be used in building up and caring for one another, and if we cannot learn the proper use of the goods of the earth, how will we ever learn to use the spiritual goods of God's kingdom? Taking advantage of one another seems to be rooted in our human nature since the fall of Adam and Eve. In the first reading, the prophet Amos condemns those “who trample upon the needy and destroy the poor of the land!” Even though they kept the Sabbath and the holy days, they were anxious for them to be over, so that they could get back to making a profit. And yet we admire people like Mother Theresa of Calcutta and Dorothy Day for their dedication to serving the poor. Jesus tells us that admiration is not enough; we need to imitate their virtue. In the second reading, Saint Paul gives us one of the roads to the goods of the kingdom: Prayer. “Beloved: I ask that supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings be offered for everyone, for kings and for all in authority, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity.” We must ask God for the graces of justice, kindness and mercy for our leaders as well as for ourselves. And he continues: “It is my wish, then, that in every place the men should pray, lifting up holy hands, without anger or argument.” And then we must set about turning into reality the things that we have prayed for, serving not so much the world, as our fellow pilgrims in the world. For, as Jesus said: “No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and mammon." May God bless you. Fr. Karl E. Esker CSsR Basilica of our Lady of Perpetual Help Brooklyn, NY

Sometimes a small step in the wrong direction can be magnified by factors such as greed and willful moral blindness. This was the case seventy years before St. Peter Claver was born to a farming family outside of Barcelona, Spain in 1580. King Ferdinand of Spain authorized the purchase of 250 African slaves in Lisbon for his territories in New Spain. One hundred years later, 10,000 African slaves were arriving every year to the New Kingdom of Granada, today known as Columbia. The king's small decision to supposedly help farmers and landowners in New Spain meet their need for laborers allowed the slave trade to grow to epidemic proportions throughout the Americas.  St. Peter's life's work as a Jesuit priest was helping the men and women who arrived sick, exhausted, and maltreated to the port city of Cartagena. He would meet the ships upon their arrival and go down into the holds where the human cargo was packed tightly together. It is estimated that one third of the men and women died in transit. Peter would carry medicine, food, bread, and lemons to those who survived. He attended to their human needs first and then, over time, tried his best to meet their spiritual needs.  Peter also preached the Gospel message to the merchants, sailors, and ship owners. He tried to impress upon them that we are all human beings and that we have a common need to be treated with dignity and respect. When he visited the plantations where the African slaves were working, he would stay with them rather than in the comfortable homes of the landowners. He preached in the city squares, country areas, and was often among the sick in the hospitals. Fellow Jesuit Fr. John Hardon could have been reflecting on the life of Peter Claver when he wrote: “Love is shown more in deeds than in words. Love does not mean that I like doing what I'm doing, love means that I do it, and the doing is your love.”    Over the course of his life, the conservative estimate is that Peter baptized 300,000 people - and he continued his instructions after they were baptized by distributing holy pictures and having translators help him to preach. He heard 5,000 confessions on a yearly basis. It should be no surprise that his last years were filled with ill health. Unable to leave his room, his community assigned an ex-slave to attend to his needs. Unfortunately, this man mistreated Fr. Claver and stole his food. Peter did not complain, seeing his ill treatment as a penance for his sins. When he died on September 8, 1654, word spread quickly. People came from all over the countryside to visit his room, which was soon stripped of everything that might be considered a relic. His life was such a heroic example of the Christian praxis of love and the exercise of human rights that September 9th, the day after Peter's death, is celebrated today in Columbia as Human Rights Day.  St. Peter Claver, friend of the marginalized and oppressed, pray for us.   Blessings, Fr. Kevin MacDonald, C.Ss.R.