Living WORD 

Points for Reflection: I am sharing to my dear readers these stories which I have collected to help you reflect as the Universal Church celebrates the 12th Sunday-A. Here they are:

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# 1. Tom Brown’s School Days was a famous British novel. It was made into a movie that became a box-office hit. Tom Brown was a popular boy who attended a boarding school in England. He lived with about a dozen other boys in one of the school’s dormitories. Whatever Tom said or did always had a big impact on what the other boys in the school said or did.

One day a new boy came to the school. When it came time for bed that night, the new boy innocently knelt down beside his bed to say his prayers.

A few of the boys began to snicker. A couple of others began to laugh and joke. One even threw a shoe at the kneeling boy.

That night Tom didn’t go to sleep right away. He lay awake, thinking about what had happened to the newcomer.

He also began to think about his mother and the prayers she taught him to say each night before bed – prayers he had not said since coming to school.,

The next night several of the boys in the dormitory were looking forward to poking fun at the new boy again. When bedtime came, however, something totally unexpected happened.

When the new boy knelt down to say his night prayers, Tom knelt down also. When the other boys in the dormitory saw Tom kneeling and praying, they did no carry out their plans.

That simple little episode from Tom Brown’s School Days illustrates in a dramatic and poignant way what Jesus had in mind when he said in today’s gospel: “Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father.

But whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father.”

For instance, the example of Tom Brown’s mother and her witness to her faith was the determining factor that led Tom to bear witness to his faith in front of his peers. (Mark Link, S.J.)

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# 2. In April 1987, the Catholic Digest carried an interview of a couple who had just celebrated

their 25th year of marriage. In the course of the interview, the couple revealed that they had prayed together every night since their wedding night. At first they simply recited prayers

like the Our Father or the Hail Mary.

As time went on, they read Scripture together and shared reflections on what they read.

Another way they prayed together was spontaneously from the heart. Sometimes this involved asking God’s help for a problem that they were both having.

Each spouse admitted that praying this way was not easy at first. But they also admitted

that this kind of honest prayer from the heart was a tremendous source of grace to them.

Commenting on this the husband said, ”I’d sometimes not pray about something because I wouldn’t want to say it to Rita.”

He said he eventually overcame his reluctance when he realized that this was being dishonest not only with Rita but also with God.

When he finally got over the reluctance, this form of prayer became a great help

in getting them through some tough times, especially in the first seven years of their marriage.

The couple explained that they got the idea of praying together from Rita’s parents. “In my family, when I was growing up,” she said, “we didn’t close doors much. I could hear my parents praying at night. It was a very comforting sound. Sometimes they’d invite us in, and we’d all go sit on their bed. They read from the Bible and from a book called The Upper Room. ” ++++

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# 3. An expectant father was pacing up and down the hall in front of the operating room at the hospital, waiting to hear whether it was a boy or a girl.

The door opened, two nurses came out and passed by the waiting father without looking in his direction. Then the doctor came to the door, hesitated a moment, and motioned the impatient father to enter.

“Before you go in,” the doctor began, “I must prepare you for a shock. It’s a boy and he was born without ears. He hasn’t the slightest sign of ears, and of course he will be deaf all his life.”

“He may have been born without ears,” the father exclaimed, “but he will not go through life deaf!” (Napoleon Hill) ++++

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# 4. Once day in the bush village back home, a young father was playing with his little son while his wife was out in the kitchen with her pots and pans. The doting father walked around the house with his little son straddling his neck. Then they came to the middle of the house and he let his little boy stand up on his shoulders and reach up and touch a rafter.

The little toddler was thrilled and yelled out in baby talk, “Mommy,

here, look at me … I’m bigger than Daddy is … Look! I can touch the rafter and he can’t.”

“That’s right, you’re a big, big boy,” mamma agreed …

Then the daddy told him to hold on tight, and slowly he pulled

out from under him… and left him hanging all by himself. . . He screamed in terror with his support gone … (Frank Mihalic, SUPPORTIVE PEOPLE) ++++

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My brothers and sisters in Christ, “Do not fear those who kill the body; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” [Mt. 10:28] This is a very powerful passage of the Holy Bible. In simple English, it means, “Bear your crosses and at the end, you shall be rewarded.” Those who deny their crosses, they shall be disowned by the Lord.