Sister Barbara Jean Mihalchick posts videos of her reflections each week at the Facebook of the Sisters of St. Basil the Great.
View them at: https://www.facebook.com/sistersofstbasil.uniontown/.
This is a transcript of her Oct. 4, 2019 reflection.
Glory to Jesus Christ!
Have you discovered that there are some people you naturally like and some people you naturally don’t like? What happens in a chance encounter?
Well, the Gospel story this Sunday is Jesus in a chance encounter. He’s with the widow of Nain, whose son is being taken away to burial.
Jesus immediately goes to her. Yes, these are moments when we normally feel compassion and Jesus did.
In fact, if we could read the Greek version of the Gospel, we would see that Jesus — whenever He met misery of any kind — He had a gut reaction and He wanted to relieve that misery. He does in this particular instance, restoring the son to his mother.
So this raises the question for us. I talked last time about encounter and overflow; the “encounter” being with the Lord Himself and learning to encounter the Lord in other people. This is something we can only do by grace, God’s grace.
I began to wonder, when we think of encountering the Lord, do we immediately see His beautiful side, His joyful side, His compassion toward us?
Do we picture Him as generous, loving, forgiving? One Who always wants to strengthen us?
The one law He has given all of us is love one another, without exception. The greatest challenge, really, of a lifetime.
But His grace is in us to do that and His examples throughout the Gospels are there.
Each day, I suggest we ask ourselves: “Was I loving and compassionate today? When I thought of the Lord, did I picture a loving and compassionate source of life and love? And did I overflow that, like Him?”
My friends, we have the gift of grace. We have the Eucharist; we take in the One who is all love. Let’s ask that grace flow. Ask for that ability, and be strengthened in it, as we strive to put on the mind and heart of Christ.
God bless you
