Are You Lazarus or Dives?

   Deus, in adjutorium meum intende: Domine, ad adjuvandum me festina.
   O God, come to my assistance. O Lord, make haste to help me.
             So begins the Introit of this Thursday of the Second Week of Lent, from Psalm 69. It continues -
   let my enemies be confounded and ashamed that seek my soul. Let them be turned backward, and blush
   for shame: that desire evils to me.

   The opening words are repeated with the praying of every hour of the Divine Office, every day. O God, come to my assistance. O Lord, make haste to help me.

   The enemies are certainly around us, barking and baying for our destruction. Do we trust in ourselves or do we trust in God to preserve us? If we do His Will, if we pray, if we listen to His words, He will hear.

   The Epistle for today's Mass is from the Old Testament once again; Jeremias 17: 5-10. In it there are two men. One puts his trust in himself, the other in God. The first dries up like heather in the desert. The other bears abundant fruits of his good works.  The Gospel today, also speaks of two men.

   The Gospel is Luke 16: 19-31. The parable Christ tells is of the poor man, Lazarus, begging at the city gate, full of sores, hoping for a crumb from the rich man's table. The rich man, Dives, gives no heed. In the end, Lazarus dies and is carried by angels "into Abraham's bosom." The rich man dies and is buried in hell. Dives sees Abraham and Lazarus and cries "Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water to cool my tongue..." Abraham reminds him that he had good things in life and Lazarus none. There is no one who can help him. Dives begs that his brethren, still living, be warned to change their lives. Abraham says: "They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them." The rich man argues that if one went to them from the dead they would do penance. Abraham ends with "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe if one rise again from the dead."

   How true is that? If we hear not the words of Our Lord, carried to all nations by his apostles and their successors on this earth, we do not believe, even when Christ has risen from the dead. We are threatened on all sides for our refusal to hear the Truth (I am the Way and the Truth and the Life) and live by it in His Name. If we turn our faces to God, He will hear us.

   The Offertory of today's liturgy is from Exodus 32: 11, 13, 14.  "Moses prayed in the sight of the Lord his God, and said: Why, O Lord, art Thou angry with Thy people? let the anger of Thy soul be appeased: remember Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to whom Thou sworest that Thou wouldst give the land flowing with milk and honey. And the Lord was appeased from the evil, which He had threatened to do to His people."

   God is allowing our chastisement because of our disobedience and trust in ourselves rather than in Christ, our King and Lord, and all that has been promised to us - the land of milk and honey - the New Jerusalem - Heaven. He can be appeased.  Lent is the season for reflection, renewal and restitution. Pray, fast, do good works.

   Deus, in adjutorium meum intende. Domine, ad adjuvandum me festina.
   O God, come to my assistance. O Lord, make haste to help me.