Sunday 12 July 2020
Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
PARISH MASS
Our Live stream Mass for this Sunday
will begin at 10.30am
+ + +
6pm Devotions
St Peter's Catholic Church, Eastwood Parish in the Diocese of Brentwood
Served by Clergy of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham
Live Streaming on www.facebook.com/StPeterEastwood
PLEASE SEE WEBSITE FOR INFORMATION RE: RETURNING TO HOLY MASS
www,stpetereastwood.org
PLEASE NOTE ST. PETER'S REMAINS CLOSED-WE H OPEN OUR DOORS AGAI
the WEEKEND OF 25/26 JULY- Mass attendance by registration only
the WEEKEND OF 25/26 JULY- Mass attendance by registration only
The Word’s Return: Scott Hahn Reflects on the Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Sower, Laurent d’Orléans, c. 1300
Today’s readings, like last week’s, ask us to meditate on Israel’s
response to God’s Word—and our own. Why do some hear the word of the
kingdom, yet fail to accept it as a call to conversion and faith in
Jesus? That question underlies today’s Gospel, especially.
Again we see, as we did last week, that the kingdom’s mysteries are
unfolded to those who open their hearts, making of them a rich soil in
which the Word can grow and bear fruit.
As we sing in today’s Psalm, in Jesus, God’s Word has visited our
land, to water the stony earth of our hearts with the living waters of
the Spirit (see John 7:38; Revelation 22:1).
The firstfruit of the Word is the Spirit of love and adoption poured
into our hearts in Baptism, making us children of God, as Paul reminds
us in today’s Epistle (see Romans 5:5; 8:15–16). In this, we are made a “new creation” (see 2 Corinthians 5:17), the firstfruits of a new heaven and a new earth (see 2 Peter 3:13).
Since the first humans rejected God’s Word, creation has been enslaved to futility (see Genesis 3:17–19; 5:29). But God’s Word does not go forth only to return to Him void, as we hear in today’s First Reading.
His Word awaits our response. We must show ourselves to be children
of that Word. We must allow that Word to accomplish God’s will in our
lives. As Jesus warns today, we must take care lest
the devil steal it away or lest it be choked by worldly concerns.
the devil steal it away or lest it be choked by worldly concerns.
In the Eucharist, the Word gives Himself to us as bread to eat. He
does so that we might be made fertile, yielding fruits of holiness.
And we await the crowning of the year, the great harvest of the Lord’s Day (see Mark 4:29; 2 Peter 3:10; Revelation 1:10)—when His Word will have achieved the end for which it was sent.
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