NEWNESS

Titus 3:1-7; Ps 23; Luke 17:11-19

Here are few words from Pope Francis, "newness often makes us fearful, including the newness God brings us, the newness God asks of us...let us not be closed to the newness of God wants to bring into our lives..."

This newness is exactly what St Paul is describing in his letter to Titus, "for we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, deluded, slaves to various desires and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful ourselves and hating one another.  But when the kindness and generous love of God our savior appeared..."

But when the kindness and generous love of God our savior appeared.  Here is the newness that transforms.  Here is the newness that reeks havoc with our old selves.  Here is the newness that brings freshness into our lives.

The more we open to the kindness and generous love of God in our savior the more our lives take on a new direction, a quicker step, a more lively rhythm as w journey forth.

This newness with a power to transform is captured by the lepers in the gospel  for today.  They approach Jesus with a willingness to receive and in this attitude they find themselves transformed.  Yet, the newness is lost on all but 1.  Ten lepers experience God's kind an generous love and yet only one is aware of the newness that illumines their life.

How sad!  How sad to be so enriched by the newness of Christ and yet never bother to acknowledge it.  This is the sad reality of most of us.  We have all benefited from God's kind an generous love but how many of us actual live that newness daily in our life.


Today ponder the newness God wants to bring in to  your life?  How do we welcome it?  How do we close ourselves off to it?  Often times it comes in disguised or disfigured realities?  Look again!