Sunday 10th of November 2024 - Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

1 Kings 17:10-16/ Psalm 145(146)/ Hebrews 9:24-28/ Mark 12:38-44

Doing things for charity is a popular pastime it seems. There are charity dinners and events where large sums of money are spent in putting on an event, in purchasing the tickets, and in ensuring that suitable clothes are bought or hired. There are adventure holidays available whereby people can climb mountains or explore rain forests while being sponsored for one charity or another. Many of these events involve spending more on the event and being seen to be involved in charity fund raising than is raised for the charity. There are awards and honours bestowed for charitable work. The Christian understanding of charity is more about being a disciple of Jesus, following Jesus in his care for all and in giving everything in the course of following God’s will.

In the readings today we have two examples of discipleship in which the women involved are prepared to give all they have in the complete faith and trust that as a disciple God will care for them. The woman in the first reading is down to the last ingredients to provide a final meal for herself and her child but is willing to share it with a stranger. The woman in the gospel has only two very small coins that amount to nothing against the amounts of money being thrown into the collection boxes by the well to do seeking to be noticed for their apparent generosity. It is of note that the woman had two coins, she could have given one and kept the other, but her giving was total, and she held nothing back.

Charity is not something that we should seek to gain from. True charity, a word derived from the Latin word caritas, which means love or affection, should be sacrificial, a giving of self without the expectation of reward or acknowledgement. We give of what we have because what we have is not our own. All we have is gifted from God and as all people are created by God in God’s image and likeness, all are equally entitled to share in what creation provides. Our charity should be costly, we should not simply give of what we might have left over but give of ourselves. It is easy to donate money to many causes these days but is it always true sacrificial charitable giving if we do not even feel the impact of our giving? How about giving of our time? That might have a greater cost to our everyday lives and be more productive and helpful to others than a bit of spare cash. As Saint Teresa of Calcutta once said, ‘God calls us to love others until it hurts’.

The second reading reminds us that Jesus, who is God and has sovereignty over all, gave up everything to become human and then went even further offering his own human life on behalf of humanity, many of which fail or refuse even to acknowledge him, so that we might be saved from our pitiful sinful state and returned to the glorified life we were created for. This is the total giving that the disciple is called to follow by example. Not an easy path but one that is possible through faith, a faith that is displayed by the two women in today’s scripture. A faith that fulfils the command to love God and love neighbour.

The generosity of the two women in our scripture is still found daily even now. It can be humbling and an example to us how people of limited means somehow manage to find ways of contributing to those in need, either financially or by giving of their time. The gospel today comes to life through the little unnoticed people who give of the little they have. Praying for and visiting the sick and lonely, contributing to food banks, or helping with the distribution of resources, passing used clothing to charity shops, seeking those even poorer than they are to follow Jesus as a disciple.

Let us not seek to be seen and acknowledged for our good works, to flaunt our wealth, good fortune and generous giving. Rather let us quietly become self-giving disciples of Jesus, following his example, and the example of the two poor women. They learned to give not through having much but by knowing what it was to have little.

God Bless Brendan.