Dress to God's Word / "Liturgical Dress": Sat. after Ash Wed.

February 21, 2015: Saturday after Ash Wednesday

'Wheat' pin: Bestow your bread on the hungry (1st reading)

'Scales of justice' pin: To fast, do justice (1st reading)

'Silverware' tie bar: Levi gave a great banquet... (gospel)

'Medical' tie: Only the sick need a doctor (gospel)

'Phone' tie bar: To you I call all the day (psalm); I came to call sinners (gospel)

Blue shirt: If you remove oppression, give the hungry your bread, and satisfy the afflicted,... you'll be like a watered garden, like a spring whose water never fails. (1st reading)

Listen (mainly for 1st reading)

Return to God/ Haugen

Once to every man and nation/ Lowell: lyrics+ (read the verses; the recording only has two of the four)

We are called/ Haas

They who do justice/ Hurd

Attend and mark the solemn fast/ Logan: Common Meter (CM, 8686); try these tunes

Mighty Lord/ Foley (psalm) [needs banjo]

Pope Francis

Lenten message: Make your hearts firm: Individual Christians (part 4 of 4): Indifference tempts us individuals too; we feel we can't help in the face of the suffering around us. To avoid being caught up in this spiral:

Pray with the Church on earth and in heaven; united voices are powerful! Participate in the 24 Hours for the Lord initiative.

Practice charity, reaching out through the Church’s charitable organizations. Show concern for others by small, concrete signs of belonging to the human family.

Be converted; others' needs remind me of the uncertainty of my life and my dependence on God and others. If we implore God’s grace and accept our limitations, we'll trust that God's love gives us infinite possibilities and resist the temptation to think we can save the world on our own.

To overcome indifference and our pretensions to self-sufficiency, engage in a 'formation of the heart.' To be merciful, have a strong heart, closed to the tempter but open to God, ready for the Spirit to pierce it to bring love to others, and poor, giving itself for others. Ask the Lord: Make our hearts like yours. Receive a firm, merciful, attentive, generous, open heart, not indifferent. May this Lent prove spiritually fruitful for each believer and every community.

Read

Is 58:9b-14 If you remove oppression... and satisfy the afflicted, the Lord will guide and renew you. If you honor the sabbath, you'll delight in the Lord, and I'll nourish you.

Ps 86:1-6 "Teach me your way, O Lord, that I may walk in your truth." Have mercy on me. I lift my soul to you; gladden it. Attend to my pleading.

Lk 5:27-32 Jesus to Levi: “Follow me”; he left everything and followed. He gave a banquet for him with tax collectors and others; Pharisees complained: “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus: “The healthy don't need a doctor; just the sick. I came to call sinners.”

Reflect

Creighton: The Pharisees were so preoccupied with the law that they overlooked helping people in need. How am I 'Pharisaical,' rigid, closed, intolerant?

DailyScripture.net: When your neighbor stumbles, do you point the finger or lend a hand? Isaiah tells us that when we bless others, God blesses us. / When the Pharisees challenged Jesus' eating with sinners, Jesus' defense was simple. he sought out those in the greatest need. The Pharisees were so preoccupied, they neglected those most in need; they wanted nothing to do with people unlike themselves. Ironically, the Pharisees were as needy as those they despised....