5 February 2021 - Friday of the 4th week in Ordinary Time - Hebrews 13:1-8

      We come to our last reading from the letter to the Hebrews today.  We have been hearing from this letter for the past several weeks.  Next week, in our daily Masses, our first readings will come from the book of Genesis.  

       As I reflected upon our readings from the letter to the Hebrews, I thought about how letter writing has become a lost art in the modern world.  I guess things like Facebook, Instagram, texts, phone calls, and emails have taken the role that letters used to have in our lives.  Especially when I lived overseas as a missionary, I used to write letters a lot.  Now I rarely send a letter.  

        This last part of the letter to the Hebrews gives a lot of parting practical advice.  We could reflect upon each point, about how we live out that value in our lives.  Do we welcome the stranger?  Do we remember those who are in prison?  Are we thankful for what we have in life and not act greedy or too attached with respect to money and material possession? Do we reach out to those who are oppressed and marginalized?  Do we remember and give thanks for those who passed down the faith to us?  To that last point, a good friend of my mom’s contacted me several months ago during the pandemic.  She now lives in Texas and often watches our Masses on the internet.  She was my sponsor when I entered the Church back in 1991 in California.  She was a co-worker of my mom’s at the public library where she worked and was incredibly kind to my mom when my mom had breast cancer.  It is so wonderful to connect with someone who had a key role in my life of faith.  And I give thanks for her. 

       Speaking of those who passed down the faith to us, we celebrate St Agatha today, a virgin from the third century who commemorated in the Roman Canon of Mass, Eucharistic prayer number 1.  Like many of the saints of the early Church, not a lot of details are remembered about her.  Tradition holds that she was persecuted in Sicily under the Emperor Decius for having stood up for the faith.  Every year to this day, there is a large festival in her honor in Catania, the second largest city in Sicily.  As we honor St Agatha today, we honor all those saints who gave up their lives in order to be true to the values of their faith.