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Tuesday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Micah 7:14-15, 18-20
Psalm 85:2-4, 5-6, 7-8
Matthew 12:46-50
S
UMMARY
Jesus is addressing a crowd and is told that His mother and brothers are
outside and wish to speak to Him. Christ then turns to those gathered and
says to them, ˈHere are my mother and my brothers.
For whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister,
and mother."
R
EFLECTION
When someone says to us, ˈ
You
are Familyˉ, that is generally an indication
of a deep and intimate relationship reserved only for those as close to us
(or closer) as our own birth-family. And though at first read, I found this
treatment of His mother a bit off-putting, I realized I was completely miss-
ing the point ˀ what Christ is actually telling us is that this is how
he loves
us
ˀ as intimately as He loves Blessed Mother and His ˈbrothersˉ.
I was blessed to be raised in a family where my parents had an ˈopen-door
policyˉ, that is ˀ all were welcome ˀ and that is not an exaggeration. In
fact, it was rather unusual when I was growing-up to have only the nine of
us around the dining-room table. My parents never locked their door so
that the ˈextended familyˉ could just walk right in (they still don˅t ˀ despite
my protestations). When you become a friend to a Schimmoller ˀ you in-
stantly have a family (whether you want one or not ) ˀ because you are
welcomed in by all. I believe my parents have fed the world with the hun-
dreds of dinners, birthdays, showers, holidays and celebrations they have
had and continue to have in their home.
They have given shelter to co-workers in the middle of the night who were
being abused by their boyfriends and had nowhere else to go, welcomed