7^TH Sunday in Ordinary Time

”So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (Mt 5:48)

Christ’s words in today’s Gospel are the summarized teaching of Christ’s call to each person. For we are to be perfect to the extent God has prepared each person according to the charisms and talents we have received.  In a word, God shows us the road we must travel toward holiness and the means to realize complete happiness.  We hear of this in the first reading:  “Be holy, for I, the Lord, your God, am holy.” (Lev 19:1-2)  These words also summarize the teaching of the eight Beatitudes.  They indicate how we can achieve happiness and fullness of joy in Christ.  In one word, like God, we must be filled with love.  Jesus says:  “…love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.” (Mt 5:45)

Then let us pray for wisdom that we may always remain on the side of good and that we may perceive within ourselves that hidden secret–the image of God present within each person.  St Paul also writes of this:  “Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?  If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person; for the temple of God, which you are, is holy.”  (1Cor3:16-17).

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