24th Week in Ordinary Time

1st Reading: 1 Tim 6:2c–12
Gospel: Lk 8:1–3
Jesus walked through towns and countryside, preaching and giving the good news of the kingdom of God. The Twelve followed him, and also some women who had been healed of evil spirits and diseases: Mary called Magdalene, who had been freed of seven demons; Joanna, wife of Chuza, Herod’s steward; Suzanna and others who provided for them out of their own funds.

Commentary
Today, we practice letting go of all those values that we have surrendered to the world. We leave the world free of its purposes and its dreams. We hold it purposeless within our minds, and loosen it from all we wish it were. We lift the chains, which bar the door to our freedom from the world. The world we see has nothing that we need; nothing that we can use in any way, nor anything at all that serves to give us joy. Believing this thought, we are saved from years of misery, from countless disappointments, and from hopes that turn to bitter ashes of despair.
We all must accept this thought as true, if we would leave this world behind and soar beyond its petty scope and little ways. Each thing we value here is but a chain that binds us to the world; and it will serve no other end but to bind us in its thrall. We only ever make sense of this world, when we become prepared to pass it by, without delaying to perceive hope, where there is none. Let us be deceived no more: the world we see has nothing that we need!

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