12 November 2020. Thursday of Week 32 | St Josaphat, bishop and martyr (Memorial)

1st Reading: Philemon verses 7-20

Philemon must welcome back his runaway slave, Onesimus

I have received much joy and encouragement from your love because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you, my brother. For this reason, though I am bold enough in Christ to command you to do your duty, yet I would rather appeal to you on the basis of love, and I, Paul, do this as an old man, and now also as a prisoner of Christ Jesus. I am appealing to you for my child, Onesimus, whose father I have become during my imprisonment.

Formerly he was useless to you, but now he is indeed useful both to you and to me. I am sending him, that is, my own heart, back to you. I wanted to keep him with me so that he might be of service to me in your place during my imprisonment for the gospel, but I preferred to do nothing without your consent so that your good deed might be voluntary and not something forced. Perhaps this is the reason he was separated from you for a while so that you might have him back forever, no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a beloved brother, especially to me but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord.

So if you consider me your partner, welcome him as you would welcome me. If he has wronged you in any way, or owes you anything, charge that to my account. I, Paul, am writing this with my own hand: I will repay it. I say nothing about your owing me even your own self. Yes, brother, let me have this benefit from you in the Lord! Refresh my heart in Christ.

The Word of the Lord

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Responsorial: Psalm 145

R./: Blessed are they whose help is the God of Jacob

My soul, give praise to the Lord;

I will praise the Lord all my days,

make music to my God while I live. (R./)

It is the Lord who keeps faith forever,

who is just to those who are oppressed

It is he who gives bread to the hungry,

the Lord, who sets prisoners free. (R./)

It is the Lord who gives sight to the blind,

who raises up those who are bowed down,

the Lord, who protects the stranger

and upholds the widow and orphan. (R./)

It is the Lord who loves the just

but thwarts the path of the wicked.

The Lord will reign forever,

Zion’s God, from age to age. (R./)

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Gospel: Luke 17:20-25

The reign of God is already here in our midst

Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, “The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you.”

Then he said to the disciples, “The days are coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it. They will say to you, ‘Look there!’ or ‘Look here!’ Do not go, do not set off in pursuit. For as the lightning flashes and lights up the sky from one side to the other, so will the Son of Man be in his day. But first, he must endure much suffering and be rejected by this generation.

The Gospel of the Lord

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Reflections - The kindness of strangers

The ties of love and friendship go beyond the letter of the law. In his letter, Paul calls Philemon a beloved friend and fellow worker, and he seems grateful for the kindness of his rich friend, because “through you, the hearts of God’s people have been refreshed.”

We too can show others a love that refreshes and unites. With the grace of God, we can come to regard each man or woman as our own kith and kin. If at first, they seem as unlike us as the runaway slave was unlike his master Philemon, we can come to love and respect them as members of the human family. While Paul does not directly take issue with slavery, he sees that both master and slave have equal Christian dignity. His principle was “There is no longer … slave nor free … for all are one in Christ Jesus (Gal 3:28). Through the courage of the 18th century Quakers, this insight would eventually banish the scandal of slavery from the Christian world.

We can be impatient like the questioners of Jesus and press him for an answer, “When will the reign of God come?” He dismisses the question, when. The kingdom of God is not to be identified with a point of time; this is an important warning to those who try to predict the end of the world on such and such a day. Jesus also refuses to locate the reign of God “here” or “there.” There is no particular, all-holy place where the kingdom must appear, in one country rather than another. Jesus’ answer is baffling but also consoling: The reign of God is already in your midst. Intimately, personally rooted within us, is the kingdom of God, already begun in Jesus who dwells within us. In him we may already taste the sweetness of eternal life. Here we get the strength to be strong and loyal, for God’s wisdom already lives in our hearts.

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Saint of the Day for November 12 | (c. 1580 –  November 12, 1623) | Saint Josaphat

In 1964, newspaper photos of Pope Paul VI embracing Athenagoras I, the Orthodox patriarch of Constantinople, marked a significant step toward the healing of a division in Christendom that has spanned more than nine centuries.

In 1595, the Orthodox bishop of Brest-Litovsk in present-day Belarus and five other bishops representing millions of Ruthenians sought reunion with Rome. John Kunsevich—who took the name Josaphat in religious life—was to dedicate his life, and die for the same cause. Born in what is now Ukraine, he went to work in Wilno and was influenced by clergy adhering to the 1596 Union of Brest. He became a Basilian monk, then a priest, and soon was well known as a preacher and an ascetic.

He became bishop of Vitebsk at a relatively young age and faced a difficult situation. Most monks, fearing interference in liturgy and customs, did not want union with Rome. By synods, catechetical instruction, reform of the clergy, and personal example, however, Josaphat was successful in winning the greater part of the Orthodox in that area to the union.

But the next year a dissident hierarchy was set up, and his opposite number spread the accusation that Josaphat had “gone Latin” and that all his people would have to do the same. He was not enthusiastically supported by the Latin bishops of Poland.

Despite warnings, he went to Vitebsk, still a hotbed of trouble. Attempts were made to foment trouble and drive him from the diocese: A priest was sent to shout insults to him from his own courtyard. When Josaphat had him removed and shut up in his house, the opposition rang the town hall bell, and a mob assembled. The priest was released, but members of the mob broke into the bishop’s home. Josaphat was struck with a halberd, then shot, and his body thrown into the river. It was later recovered and is now buried in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. He was the first saint of the Eastern Church to be canonized by Rome.

Josaphat’s death brought a movement toward Catholicism and unity, but the controversy continued, and the dissidents, too, had their martyr. After the partition of Poland, the Russians forced most Ruthenians to join the Russian Orthodox Church.

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