Readings of the day: James 1:19-27; Psalm 15:2-3a, 3ab-4ab, 5; Mark 8:22-26
Who among us began today by looking in a mirror? If you did, was your
reaction to seeing your own reflection for the first time today something like,
“Wow, there is the image and likeness of God”?! Perhaps your reaction was
somewhat more modest: “I might look more like the image and likeness of God
after I have had some breakfast and maybe a cup of coffee.”
Our first reading, from the Letter of James, reminds us that we are all
created in the image and likeness of God. We can forget this, though, if we
only hear the Word of God and do not act on it. Mere hearers and not doers of
the Word become, as James says, like the one “who looks at [her or] his own
face in a mirror and promptly forgets what [she or] he looked like.”
How, then, do we avoid forgetting that we are in the image and likeness
of God? How do we become not only better hearers but doers of the Word of God?
St. Francis de Sales said that, when we pray and reflect on the Word of
God, the best way to end our reflection is with a concrete resolution to do good based on the Scripture over
which we have prayed.
What might our concrete resolutions to do good for another look like,
based on today’s readings? Perhaps we might resolve to do a small
“random act of kindness” for another. Perhaps we might make an extra effort to
be kind to someone who is often troublesome to us or makes us angry. Perhaps we
might try to listen better and more actively. Perhaps we might pray for another
person who needs our prayers. We all could, without doubt, suggest many more
resolutions based on today’s readings than I could alone.
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