Word to the Wise
Sunday, January 24, 2016 - 3rdSunday in Ordinary Time - C
[Neh 8:2-4a, 5-6, 8-10; 1 Cor 12:12-30 or 12:12-14, 27; Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21]As a body is one though it has any parts, and all the partsof the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, slaves or free persons, and we were all given to drink of one Spirit. [1 Corinthians]
Recently a friend of mine sent me an article online that described the various functions of the organs of the human body and all the things that are going on from skin to marrow to brain all at the same time. It was an amazing list, and too complicated to contemplate for a long time. One must trust that each part is "doing its thing" and get on with whatever the day offers. However, we know, especially as we grow older, that if one part is not functioning correctly, the rest of the body will know about it and the body will find a way to make us conscious of the fact most of the time.
I hope that your parish will read the longer version of the passage from St. Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians today. He uses the human body as a way of describing the Church in all its complexity and unity. The unity part is manifested in baptism in which we become a part of the Body of Christ. The diversity is more obvious as we look around us on the local, national, and international levels. For example, during the current war in Iraq, we may be learning about our brothers and sisters of the Chaldean Rite of the Church, which is as much a part of the one Catholic Church as the "Latin Rite" which most of us know. They are suffering terribly and we should be joined in prayer for them. St. Paul puts it this way: "If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy."
St. Paul offers us the opportunity to reflect on our Church with its more than one billion members and to realize that our baptism joins us with each of them from Pope to newborn. We are all one in Christ. AMEN
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