On that day, as evening drew on, Jesus said to his disciples:
“Let us cross to the other side.”
Leaving the crowd, they took Jesus with them in the boat just as he was.
And other boats were with him.
A violent squall came up and waves were breaking over the boat,
so that it was already filling up.
Jesus was in the stern, asleep on a cushion.
They woke him and said to him,
“Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”
He woke up,
rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Quiet! Be still!”
The wind ceased and there was great calm.
Then he asked them, “Why are you terrified?
Do you not yet have faith?”
They were filled with great awe and said to one another,
“Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?”
Reflections on today's Gospel:
So today in the reading from the gospel for today's mass we see the disciples are on a boat and usually that's where they were because many of them were fishermen, and Jesus falls asleep as the story goes. And all of a sudden a storm erupts and the boat is being turned back and forth turbulent winds, turbulent waves. And all of a sudden they have this fear over them this feeling that they're going to drown, this fear that they are out of control of the situation, so what do they do, they wake Jesus. They wake Jesus and say Lord we're going to die do something, basically that's what they were asking, they had faith enough that Jesus was going to save them. And all of a sudden you know Jesus, he comes in and saves the day and what does he do, he says be calm, and the storm goes away and everyone is back to normal. Smooth sailing as they would say.
How many times in your life have you experienced storms? How many times did you quickly go to Jesus and say, please I will do anything just take this away? I know I have many times especially when I was feeling sick or ill in some way. And as soon as the situation passes us whatever it may be, it could be illness it could be a tragic situation in the family, but whatever, soon we forget that somehow someway you felt better and you didn't even thank Jesus for walking with you during this time of illness, or this time of fear that you were involved.
On a day like this take some time to reflect on how do we, experience fear, and how do we experience prayer, and how do we experience Jesus at the forefront when we are having difficult times. How do we weather storms when they come our way?
On this Father's Day, I reflect on all the times when I felt most afraid about something whatever, especially when I was young, and my dad, was there to help me figure everything out, when I thought I couldn't. Fathers do an incredible job caring for their children, now I'm talking about fathers who really have stepped up to the plate, that is father's who love being dads, fathers who want to be part of the lives of their children. Now I'm very much aware that there are fathers out there for some reason stepped away or walked away from their duties from their responsibilities as father, and left everybody kind of hanging. And that is very sad, because an opportunity to be a father is truly God's gift to each and every one of us.
We can father in all kinds of ways, we don't have to be a biological father, we can be foster fathers, we have things called godfathers, godfather's helping us in a very special way to hold on to our faith. We choose sponsors at confirmation people who have meant something in our lives usually boys will pick a man a man who somehow someway has helped him understand that life is a blessing, life is good, life will have difficulties, but there's always a solution if you have God in your life.
I remember as a young boy in high school we had a scoutmaster Mr. Robert Skopac who was truly a great father figure. He never married but he devoted his life to Young men, helping us to be Men full of integrity and care for the world that we lived in. What a blessing Mr. Skopac was to so many young men in his life caring for them making sure that they didn't take the wrong road.
So on this Father's Day and as we listened to the gospel of the storm let's think about the storms we had in our lives maybe we're going through a storm right now, and how has our life been changed by the father or the fathers in our lives who have helped us through life?
Peace and all good,
Brother Ed, OFM
