19th Friday in Ordinary Time, St Jane Frances de Chantel, August 12, 2022
Ez 16:1-15, 60, 63; (Ps) Is 12:2-6; Mt 19:3-12
What a beautiful story we heard today about a young woman. Abandoned at an early age, God sees her and watches over her. Years later, when she has grown, God finds her again and makes a promises, no a covenant with her, that no matter what, He will provide. As she grows, she strays away from God, and amazed by her own beauty, she is tempted by the alluring world. Yet God remembers his covenant with her, and saves her from the worldly life she was living. This is truly an act of love, the love God had for her.
The Gospel today is also about love. Jesus reminds us that God made us male and female. So we could share that love, cling together and become one. Out of that love, will come new flesh, a child. It was, and is, meant to be this way. It is the way God intended us to be from the very beginning. The true way of love.
The world is a very tempting place. We too can be tempted to think the way the world does, and fall into its devices. Yet, through it all, God is watching, and waiting, for us to come to him, just like the girl in Ezekiel’s time. God is ready to save us from this world, and thorough Jesus, we have a new and everlasting covenant. The promise of everlasting life. All we have to do is sit at Jesus feet and say yes Lord, I believe.
St Jane Frances de Chantel, whose feast day it is today, heard that word. The promise of the new covenant of Jesus Christ. So after her husband died, she acted and founded convents or places of visitations for those marginalized by society from being a widow and other situations where they could not endure a more rigorous convent life. Over the last 30 years of her life, she founded sixty convents and spread the love of Jesus to all.
God’s love for us never ends. His greatest covenant with us was, and is through Jesus Christ. Open your hearts and hear the word, the word of Love. That God will never abandon us, no matter what we do, or where we go. Come back to him and seek the solace, peace and love, He has to give.
Saint James Catholic Church 