Daily Reflection Thursday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time

It was my ‘Come to Jesus’ moment. I was on my hands and knees on a beautiful early spring morning in 2003 – sun streaming through the kitchen window. No, I was not praying. I was scrubbing the gasket of the refrigerator freezer drawer with a tiny little toothbrush. Nothing had seemed more important. Now, in an annunciation moment of my own, I confronted this low point in my puzzling procrastinating on writing my dissertation – whose topic I loved, by the way. What was needed was to finally make the hard decision to resign from my parish part-time work (which I loved as well) and, important for a neat-nik like me, to rent office space for the next four months far removed from the temptations of the dust bunnies. I needed to be single-minded in the pursuit of this one true thing. (Yes, graduation from Fordham in 2004. Hurrah!)



Three teachings from Jesus in today’s Gospel might seem to call us to this same single-mindedness of heart and habit in the spiritual life:


The imperative of kindness. Giving a cup of water to satisfy the thirsty one. Seeing a need and responding. No nuance required; no procrastination allowed. 

The imperative of self-conciousness and examination of conscience. What is causing us to sin, to separate ourselves from the God who loves us?…or to cause harm to those who God loves in equal measure? Can we get off our knees and ‘rent space’ in a different location?


The imperative of leading a life of integrity. (My Bible labels this passage ‘The Simile of the Salt.’ Lovely alliteration there.) What is our essence, our true identity, the principles around which we integrate our lives? How does every step we take, each decision we make, give witness to this clarity of vision and purpose? All is revealed here.


May we Exercise a bit today with Ignatius, who called us to let go of foolishness and inordinate attachments, to discern among what might seem to be competing goods, to respond in a deeper way with singleminded focus to our life in God, to making a wholehearted commitment to Jesus’ mission because of our intimate friendship with him. Who knows. We just might give the adjective ‘stubborn’ a new gloss.