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17th Sunday in Ordinary Time (C)

July 27, 2025

Fr. John Colacino C.PP.S.

Introit

Collect

O God, protector of those who hope in you,
without whom nothing has firm foundation, nothing is holy,
bestow in abundance your mercy upon us
and grant that, with you as our ruler and guide,
we may use the good things that pass
in such a way as to hold fast even now
to those that ever endure.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever. Amen.

First Reading Gn 18:20-32

The Lord appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre 20 and said, “How great is the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah and how very grave their sin! 21 I must go down and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to me; and if not, I will know.” 23 Then Abraham came near and said, “Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? 24 Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will you then sweep away the place and not forgive it for the fifty righteous who are in it? 25 Far be it from you to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from you! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?” 26 And the Lord said, “If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will forgive the whole place for their sake.” 27 Abraham answered, “Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes. 28 Suppose five of the fifty righteous are lacking? Will you destroy the whole city for lack of five?” And the Lord said, “I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.” 29 Again Abraham spoke to the Lord, “Suppose forty are found there.” He answered, “For the sake of forty I will not do it.” Then Abraham said, “Oh do not let the Lord be angry if I speak. Suppose thirty are found there.” The Lord answered, “I will not do it, if I find thirty there.” 31 Abraham said, “Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord. Suppose twenty are found there.” The Lord answered, “For the sake of twenty I will not destroy it.” 32 Then Abraham said, “Oh do not let the Lord be angry if I speak just once more. Suppose ten are found there.” The Lord answered, “For the sake of ten I will not destroy it.”

Responsorial Psalm Ps 138:1-2, 2-3, 6-7, 7-8

R/. Lord, on the day I called for help, you answered me.

Second Reading Col 2:12-14

Brothers and sisters, 6 as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, 7 rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving. 9 For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, 10 and you have come to fullness in him, who is the head of every ruler and authority. 11 In him also you were circumcised with a spiritual circumcision, by putting off the body of flesh in the circumcision of Christ. 12 When you were buried with Christ in baptism, you were also raised with him through faith in the power of God, who raised Christ from the dead. 13 And when you were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive together with him, when he forgave us all our trespasses, 14 erasing the record that stood against us with its legal demands. He set this aside, nailing it to the cross.

Alleluia Rom 8:15bc

Gospel Lk 11:1-13

Jesus was praying in a certain place, and after he had finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.” He said to them, “When you pray, say: ‘Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. 3 Give us each day our daily bread. 4 And forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone indebted to us. And do not bring us to the time of trial.’” 5 And Jesus said to the disciples, “Suppose one of you has a friend, and you go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread; 6 for a friend of mine has arrived, and I have nothing to set before him.’ 7 And your friend answers from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been locked, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.’ 8 “I tell you, even though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, at least because of his persistence he will get up and give him whatever he needs. 9 “So I say to you: Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 10 For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 11 “Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for a fish, will give a snake instead of a fish? 12 Or if the child asks for an egg, will give a scorpion? 13 “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

Catena Nova

The Lord has given us many counsels and commandments to help us toward salvation. He has even given us a pattern of prayer, instructing us on how we are to pray. He has given us life, and with his accustomed generosity, he has also taught us how to pray. He has made it easy for us to be heard as we pray to the Father in the words taught us by the Son… What prayer could be more a prayer in the spirit than the one given us by Christ, by whom the Holy Spirit was sent upon us? What prayer could be more a prayer in the truth than the one spoken by the lips of the Son, who is truth himself? (St. Cyprian of Carthage)

Whether we pray for faith or hope or any other virtue that we long for we attain it only through the grace of the Holy Spirit. As we do our best, then, to follow in our Lord’s own footsteps, let’s ask God the Father for the grace of the Spirit to lead us along the path of the true faith—that faith which works through love. This is the way we become the kind of persons who are fit to receive what they have so longed and prayed for. We have to strive to live in a way that will make us the kind of persons fit to be children of such a Father. We must strive to preserve inviolate in body and spirit the sacramental rebirth of our baptism. It made us children of God! So if we keep Almighty God’s commandments then God will certainly gift us with eternal blessings. From the very beginning God has prepared these blessings as our heritage. God has done this through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Jesus himself, with the Holy Spirit, is not only our help but the gift we are to receive in everlasting joy and glory. (St. Bede the Venerable)

The gifts of the Holy Spirit are touched upon in the Lord’s Prayer. Those gifts are not had except from the Father of lights. For that reason Christ, wanting to teach us in what manner we can obtain them, teaches us to ask for them in the Lord’s Prayer. In the first part the gift of fear is asked for, when He says: “Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name.” Secondly piety is asked for, when He says: “May Thy Kingdom come.” Third the gift of knowledge is asked for, when He says: “Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.” Fourth the gift of fortitude is asked for, when He says: “Give us this day our daily bread.” Bread strengthens the heart of a man. Fifth the gift of counsel is asked for, when He says: “And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.” Sixth the gift of understanding is asked for, when He says: “And put us not to the test.” Seventh the gift of wisdom is asked for, when He says: “But free us from evil. Amen.” (St. Bonaventure)

Much more is accomplished by a single word of the Our Father said, now and then, from our heart, than by the whole prayer repeated many times in haste and without attention. (St. Teresa of Avila)

What is it, O Lord, that I am expressing in these words? I am expressing the whole object of my desires, the whole aim and purpose of my life. I want to hallow your name in all my thoughts, words, and actions. And this means that I want to imitate your son, Jesus, since he hallowed your name in his every thought, word, and action. In these simple words, I am asking that you reveal the fullness of your glory, and that you make all people holy. Your kingdom will come when all people acknowledge you as master, seeking with all their minds to obey you, with all their hearts to love you, and with all their energies to serve you. So in saying those words, I am committing myself to spread the knowledge of your glory to all humankind. (St. Charles de Foucauld)

[I]magine yourself as highly malleable, being stretched between two force fields, two patterns of desire. What the “Our Father” is doing is inducting you into a pattern of desire within which you may be found, one which will enable you to inhabit the “being stretched” which is how the desire of the Other other brings into being the daughter or son who is learning to pray….So a crucial petition is the one specifically about the Other other’s desire, “Your will be done, on earth as in heaven.”…. So, may Your pattern of desire be achieved, here in our midst, amongst all these things that we are so often quick to reject, to despise, to tire of, be bored of, made to despair by. Your pattern of desire which already has and is a huge rejoicing and delight, a huge benevolence and peaceful longing, a real reality upon which our small reality rests, and from which it so often seeks to cut itself off, incapable of perceiving itself as the symptom of so much glory. May we be taken onto the inside of this pattern of desire. Remind us that we are the slot machine, and you the delighted player, so happy and lucky to have found us, fine-tuning us into disgorging far more treasure than we ever knew we had. … The pattern of desire into which we are being inducted by the Lord’s Prayer recognizes evil, but only as that from which people can be delivered. Rather than its being a thing in itself, it is only known in its being left behind to curve down on itself, never to be given oxygen by being dignified with a concentrated gaze. But the real force in the universe is not evil, but love, and love really does want to rescue us, to bring us out of our tendency to enclose ourselves in smaller and smaller spaces, to bring us into being. (James Alison)

How to lift the heart to God, our first beginning and last end, except to say with the soldier about to go into battle—“Lord, I’ll have no time to think of Thee but do Thou think of me.” Of course, there is grace at meals, a hasty grace, what with Sue trying to climb out of her high chair on the table…. But there is that lull in the morning before the mailman comes when I can take out the missal and read the Epistle and Gospel for the day, and the collect, which is always pertinent. That is refreshment always….What do I talk to myself about? When I am truly alone, with no babies around, as when I am in church alone, I pray. I say the rosary, I read my Psalms, make the Acts: adoration, contrition, thanksgiving, supplication…. At home, kneeling by my bed, or in the bitter cold, saying my prayers in bed, they are brief, half-conscious, and the planning, the considering, the figuring of ways of “making ends meet” goes on. Until I catch myself and turn to God again. All these things shall be added unto you. He knoweth that ye have need of these things. (Dorothy Day)

Homily

"Much more is accomplished by a single word of the Our Father said, now and then, from our heart, than by the whole prayer repeated many times in haste and without attention." So says Doctor of the Church, the Sixteenth Century Carmelite St. Teresa of Avila. Now I confess that I say — note, not pray — the "Our Father" often enough without much thought, out of habit, in a rote fashion, almost as if it weren't the prayer Jesus taught his disciples. Such is the problem with overfamiliarity even in matters spiritual. So for this reason, I thought to let Teresa preach this homily with passages from one of her classic works, The Way of Perfection, in which she comments on the Our Father.

To start with, let's avoid the snootiness I sometimes hear from people who pooh pooh vocal prayer — as if this were an inferior way to pray. They sometimes forget the greatest prayer we can offer — the Sacred Liturgy — is almost entirely vocal except for recommended moments of silence. Against this, Teresa writes, "It is always a great thing to base your prayer on prayers which were uttered by the very lips of the Lord. People are quite right to say this, and, were it not for our great weakness and the lukewarmness of our devotion, there would be no need for any other systems of prayer or for any other books at all" (Ch. 21).

This does not mean, of course, that mere recitation is enough. She goes on to describe what she calls "mental prayer" — "thinking of what we are saying, understanding it, and realizing Whom we are addressing, and who we are that are daring to address so great a Lord" (Ch. 25). In other words, pay attention to what you are saying when it comes to prescribed prayers that make use of words. Such recollected prayer does not require us "to form numerous conceptions of Him, or to make long and subtle meditations with your understanding. I am, she says, asking you only to look at Him." (Ch. 26). This contemplative gaze, like Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus, is already a great advance in the spiritual life.

Now on to the Lord's Prayer in its traditional form following Matthew's version as distinct from Luke's in today's gospel. In the following passages taken from the Way of Perfection, I am reproducing, so to speak, the Our Father as Teresa might pray it in the recollected manner she describes:

"O my Lord, how you reveal yourself as the Father of such a Son, while your Son reveals Himself as the Son of such a Father! Blessed are you for ever and ever."

"God is everywhere; and this is a great truth, for, of course, wherever the king is, or so they say, the court is too: that is to say, wherever God is, there is Heaven."

"Grant me the grace of bestowing on me your Kingdom so that I may do your will…Dispose of me as that which is your own, in accordance with your will."

"In Heaven we shall have an intrinsic tranquillity and glory, a joy in the rejoicings of all, a perpetual peace, and a great interior satisfaction which will come to us when we see that all are hallowing and praising the Lord, and are blessing His name, and that none is offending Him."

"Those who will may worry about asking for earthly bread; let our own task be to beg the Eternal Father that we may merit our heavenly bread, so that, although our bodily eyes cannot feast themselves on the sight of Him since He is thus hidden from us, He may reveal Himself to the eyes of the soul and may make Himself known to us as another kind of food, full of delight and joy, which sustains our life."

"What can a poor creature like myself do, who has had so little to forgive others and has so much to be forgiven?….Grant us, my God, to understand how little we understand ourselves and how empty our hands are when we come to you so that you, of your mercy, may forgive us.
"May He not allow us to run into temptations which deceive us; may their poison be detected; and may light and truth not be hidden from us….What, then, Eternal Father, can we do but flee to you and beg you not to allow these enemies of ours to lead us into temptations? Show us, Lord, some way of recognizing them and guarding against them….Show us, then, O our good Master, some way in which we may live through this most dangerous warfare without frequent surprise."

"O my God and Lord, deliver me from all evil and be pleased to lead me to that place where all good things are to be found."

And finally, Teresa offers us this admonition: "For love of the Lord, accustom yourselves to saying the Our Father in this recollected way, and before long you will see how you gain by doing so. It is a method of prayer which establishes habits that prevent the soul from going astray and the faculties from becoming restless. This you will find out in time: I only beg you to test it, even at the cost of a little trouble, which always results when we try to form a new habit. I assure you, however, that before long you will have the great comfort of finding it unnecessary to tire yourselves with seeking this holy Father to Whom you pray, for you will discover Him within you. (Ch. 29). To which we might add our own, "Amen."

Intercessions (Joe Milner; The Sunday Web Site)

For persistence in prayer: that the Spirit will teach us how to authentically express our deepest needs to God in prayer and give us strength never to grow tired of calling upon God for assistance.

For all who are facing trial and difficulty: that God’s Spirit will strengthen the hearts of all Christians who are imprisoned or persecuted for their faith and fill them with courage.

For all who strive to help the poor and the forgotten of society: that God will strengthen them as they plead and call for justice for God's children.

For all who are fleeing violence: that God will lead them on their journey, protect them from harm and help them find a new home where they can grow and contribute to the common good.

For healing of racism and prejudice: that all people may look upon one another as sisters and brothers and work for the betterment of one another.

For government leaders: that God will guide them in addressing the issues of inflation, violence, and the care of creation so that all may live in safety, find housing, and have food.

For peace: that God turn hearts away from violence, bring an end to warfare in Ukraine and Syria, and protect the vulnerable from harm.

Provident Father, with the prayer your Son taught us always on our lips, we ask, we seek, we knock at your door. In our every need, grant us the first and best of all your gifts, the Spirit who makes us your children. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen. (ICEL; 1998)

Offertory Antiphon

Offertory Hymn

Petite et accipietis; quaerite et invenietis; pulsate et aperietur vobis. Alleluia!

Ask and you shall receive; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you. Alleluia!

Communion Antiphon

Closing Hymn (Text: Jim Cotter; A New Zealand Prayer Book: He Karakia Mihinare o Aotearoa)

Eternal Spirit, Earth-maker, Pain-bearer, Life (Love)-giver,
Source of all that is and that shall be,
Father and Mother of us all,
Loving God, in whom is heaven:
The hallowing of your name echo through the universe!
The way of your justice be followed by the peoples of the world!
Your heavenly will be done by all created beings!
Your commonwealth of peace and freedom sustain our hope and come on earth.
With the bread we need for today, feed us.
In the hurts we absorb from one another, forgive us.
In times of temptation and test, strengthen us.
From trials too great to endure, spare us.
From the grip of all that is evil, free us.
For you reign in the glory of the power that is love, now and for ever. Amen.

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