Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time – 15th September 2024
When we were baptised, regardless of when or at what age, we were brought into the Family of God and received the wonderful gift of faith. The faith we freely received was just a seed; it doesn’t grow and mature on its own. We have to nourish and nurture it; we have to care for and protect it. How do we actually do this? We help our faith to grow when we put it into practise in our ordinary lives. The second reading this Sunday has some very encouraging and challenging words for us about this. If we say we have faith but do anything with this faith, what use is that? If we see someone who is in need, pray for them and wish them well, but don’t actually do anything practical to help them, is there any good in that at all? St. James is very clear; ‘faith without good works is dead.’
In one gospel, Jesus even tells us, ‘It is not those who say, Lord, Lord who will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but the person who does the will of my father.’ Like the letter from St. James, Jesus too is telling us that it is not enough just to say that we have faith, say lots of prayers, but do nothing concrete with our faith. Perhaps for us, sometimes, it’s far easier to be an admirer of Jesus than to be his follower and disciple. But Jesus is not calling for silent passive admirers. He calls each of us by our own personal names and wants us to take up our cross and follow him. This is the demand that faith puts on each of us each and every day.