32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, November 8, 2009

Scripture Readings
First 1 Kgs 17:10-16
Second Heb 9:24-28
Gospel Mk 12:38-44 or 12:41-44

Prepared by: Fr. Lawrence J. Donohoo, O.P.

1. Subject Matter
• First Reading: The one who sustains a prophet receives a prophet’s reward: the widow receives along
with Elijah the blessings of the One whom they trust.
• Second Reading: Christ is the total High Priest whose offering—his very life—is the once-and-for-all
sacrifice that enables our present salvation until we receive it fully upon his reappearance as Judge.
• Gospel: The hypocrisy of the scribes who devour the houses of widows is reversed by the widow
whose offering is devoured by the scribes but valued by Jesus as the lasting contribution of
unconditional love.

2. Exegetical Notes
• [The author of Hebrews’] acceptance of the Platonic conception of eternal heavenly reality contrasted
with temporal earthly shadow is modified by his strongly historical Christian faith. For him, the
heavenly sanctuary always existed, but the heavenly sacrifice, now eternally present there, entered into
the eternal order at a determined point of time.” (NJBC)
• “The kind of scribes criticized here were putting themselves on public display, esp. in religious
contexts. Their robes. . .probably were garments designed to enhance their prestige and honor.”
(NJBC)
• “Lawyers in antiquity could serve as trustees of a widow’s estate. A common way of receiving their
fee was to get a share of the estate. Lawyers with a reputation for piety had a good chance of
improving their prospects of participating in this process.” (NJBC)
• “The story of the poor widow is connected with the preceding incident by the term ‘widow’ and
provides a contrast to the conduct of the scribes. The woman’s inner dedication and generosity also
serve to introduce the passion narrative in which Jesus will display those same qualities.” (NJBC)
3. References to the Catechism of the Catholic Church
• 2583 After Elijah had learned mercy during his retreat at the Wadi Cherith, he teaches the widow of
Zarephath to believe in The Word of God.
• 519 All Christ’s riches “are for every individual and are everybody’s property.” Christ did not live his
life for himself but for us, from his Incarnation “for us men and for our salvation” to his death “for our
sins” and Resurrection “for our justification”. He is still “our advocate with the Father”, who “always
lives to make intercession” for us. He remains ever “in the presence of God on our behalf, bringing
before him all that he lived and suffered for us.”
• 662 There [in heaven] Christ permanently exercises his priesthood, for he “always lives to make
intercession” for “those who draw near to God through him”. As “high priest of the good things to
come” he is the center and the principal actor of the liturgy that honors the Father in heaven.
• 2741 Jesus also prays for us - in our place and on our behalf. All our petitions were gathered up, once
for all, in his cry on the Cross and, in his Resurrection, heard by the Father. This is why he never
ceases to intercede for us with the Father. If our prayer is resolutely united with that of Jesus, in trust
and boldness as children, we obtain all that we ask in his name, even more than any particular thing:
the Holy Spirit himself, who contains all gifts.
• 571 The Paschal mystery of Christ’s cross and Resurrection stands at the center of the Good News that
the apostles, and the Church following them, are to proclaim to the world. God’s saving plan was
accomplished “once for all” by the redemptive death of his Son Jesus Christ.
• 1021 Death puts an end to human life as the time open to either accepting or rejecting the divine grace
manifested in Christ. The New Testament speaks of judgment primarily in its aspect of the final
encounter with Christ in his second coming, but also repeatedly affirms that each will be rewarded
immediately after death in accordance with his works and faith.
• 2444 “The Church’s love for the poor . . . is a part of her constant tradition.” This love is inspired by
the Gospel of the Beatitudes, of the poverty of Jesus, and of his concern for the poor. Love for the poor
is even one of the motives for the duty of working so as to “be able to give to those in need.” It
extends not only to material poverty but also to the many forms of cultural and religious poverty.
• 305 Jesus asks for childlike abandonment to the providence of our heavenly Father who takes care of
his children’s smallest needs: “Therefore do not be anxious, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What
shall we drink?”. . . Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first his kingdom
and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.”
• 583 Like the prophets before him Jesus expressed the deepest respect for the Temple in Jerusalem. It
was in the Temple that Joseph and Mary presented him forty days after his birth. At the age of twelve
he decided to remain in the Temple to remind his parents that he must be about his Father’s business.
He went there each year during his hidden life at least for Passover. His public ministry itself was
patterned by his pilgrimages to Jerusalem for the great Jewish feasts.
4. Patristic Commentary
• “The Lord, who had warned [his disciples] to avoid the desire of high place and vain glory, now
distinguishes by a sure test those who brought in gifts. Thus it is said: ‘And Jesus sat over against the
treasury, and beheld how the people cast money into the treasury.’ In the Greek language phylassein
means to keep, and gaza is a Persian word for treasure, so the word gazophylacium used here means a
place where riches are kept, which name also was applied to the chest in which the offerings of the
 people were collected, for the necessary uses of the temple, and to the porch in which they were kept.”
(St. Bede the Venerable)
• “Now there was a praiseworthy custom amongst the Jews, that those who were able and willing should
put something into the treasury, for the maintenance of the priests, the poor, and the widows.”
(Theophylactus).
5. Examples from the Saints and Other Exemplars
• Every martyr imitates the poor widow in giving all that he or she has. The recent canonization of St.
Damian, who became one of the very people whom he loved to serve and served to love, understood
that in the deepest sense he could only fully give by first receiving.
6. Quotations of Pope Benedict XVI

• “With [Christ’s] Resurrection the new temple will begin: the living body of Jesus Christ, which will
now stand in the sight of God and be the place of all worship. Into this body he incorporates people. It
is the tabernacle that no human hands have made, the place of true worship of God, which casts out the
shadow and replaces it with reality.”
• “Only being loved is being saved, and only God’s love can purify damaged human love and radically
reestablish the network of relationships that have suffered from alienation. . .The One who is truly like
God does not hold graspingly to his autonomy, to the limitlessness of his ability and his willing. He
does the contrary: he becomes completely dependent, he becomes a slave.”
• “Humans are dependent. They cannot live except from others and by trust. But there is nothing
degrading about dependence when it takes the form of love, for then it is no longer dependence, the
diminishing of self through competition with others. Dependence in the form of love precisely
constitutes the self as self and sets it free.”
• Faith, hope and charity go together. Hope is practiced through the virtue of patience, which continues
to do good even in the face of apparent failure, and through the virtue of humility, which accepts
God’s mystery and trusts him even at times of darkness. Faith tells us that God has given his Son for
our sakes and gives us the victorious certainty that it is really true: God is love! It thus transforms our
impatience and our doubts into the sure hope that God holds the world in his hands and that, as the
dramatic imagery of the end of the Book of Revelation points out, in spite of all darkness he ultimately
triumphs in glory. Faith, which sees the love of God revealed in the pierced heart of Jesus on the
Cross, gives rise to love. Love is the light—and in the end, the only light—that can always illuminate a
world grown dim and give us the courage needed to keep living and working. Love is possible, and we
are able to practice it because we are created in the image of God. To experience love and in this way
to cause the light of God to enter into the world.”

7. Other Considerations
• “From his seated position, like a good pastor, Jesus oversees the collection. There Jesus takes note of
one poor widow. In instructing the rich man on the requirements for discipleship, Jesus alludes to the
poor: Go, sell what you have, and give to [the] poor” (Mk 10:21). A definite contrast is set up between
this poor widow and the rich man. The rich man fails to follow Jesus because there is one thing he
lacks; the poor widow stands as a true disciple because she gave from her need.” (Cameron)
• “The authenticity of her love and belief is demonstrated in her sacred desire to give totally of herself.
It is not the amount of her donation, but rather the ardor of her love that makes her offering the most
precious.” (Cameron)
• Today’s Gospel comes at the end of Jesus’ public ministry: this comment by Jesus, and the lesson of
the widow’s mite--may be said to sum up Jesus’ entire message. Just after this, he begins to speak of
the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the world. Between his ministry and his words on the end
of the world stands today’s Gospel. For that reason, it deserves our special attention.

• The hypocrisy of the scribes is to be contrasted with the authenticity of the widow. They appear to be
different from who they truly are; she is exactly as she appears. The scribes appear to be holy men
concerned with the things of God, but in fact devour the houses of widows by exploiting appearances
for their own gain. They offer one appearance in order to commit crimes, but offer quite another when
it is time to reap the rewards of their injustice. They can’t simply appear to be what they are because
their crimes require the darkness of deceit. People put money in the treasury because they think they
are contributing to God’s public temple, not to the private lives of dishonest, crooked individuals.
Hypocrisy is appearing to be other than one is in order to gain something that is not deserved. It’s the
lazy person’s way out—easier to change one’s appearances than to change one’s heart.

• While the hypocrite is intent on hiding behind appearances, he forgets that he is seen by Jesus—and
God: “Your eyes have seen all my actions; in your book they are all written.” The hypocrite, then, fails
to notice the one Observer who misses nothing. The hypocrite, in fact, is ourselves every time we
deliberately sin and imagine that God is looking in the other direction or has gone away.

• The widow is the anti-hypocrite, the one whose very money the scribes will take--in this case, all she
owns--in order to increase their wealth and the prestige which depends on it. The hypocrites devour
the savings of widows, beginning with the one who put in all she had. And Jesus, who misses nothing,
sees this. But the widow, who doesn’t know that she’s being cheated, sees what the hypocrites miss.
She sees that she is seen; she sees that God sees her. And there is nothing she possesses not under
God’s dominion. And so she returns to God all that he already has.

• The widow sees that God sees her, and so in some sense she sees God. She lives in his presence.
Totally aware that God is totally aware of her, she is totally in God’s presence. This means that she is
God’s problem. Since he sees her through and through, it’s his job to take care of her, especially when
she places herself completely under his care. The antidote to hypocrisy, the widow teaches us, is
awareness of God’s presence. Nothing that I have or am is hidden from the One who loves me, and so
I know he’ll care for me. No reason to hide, deceive, manipulate, or play games, not only because God
sees through all this charade, but because there’s no need to. And no need to hide from God or myself
who I really am--neither my evil nor my goodness. Not my evil since he means to redeem it; not my
goodness because he brings it to completion.

• The widow herself is an image of a more perfect model for us--the exact opposite, as it were, of the
scribes. One who appeared to be just like the rest of us, but in fact was also something more, who in
fact was the Just One. Who, instead of taking everything from everyone, gave everything He had to
everyone. Who, after observing the incredible generosity of the widow, went out to Calvary and did
the same.

Recommended Resources
Benedict XVI. Benedictus: Day by Day with Pope Benedict XVI. Edited by Peter John Cameron. Yonkers:
Magnificat, 2006.
____________. Deus caritas est.
Brown, Raymond A., Joseph A. Fitzmyer and Roland E. Murphy, eds. The New Jerome Biblical
Commentary. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: 1990.
Cameron, Peter John. To Praise, To Bless, To Preach - Cycle B. Huntington: Our Sunday Visitor, 1999.
Thomas Aquinas, St. Catena Aurea: Commentary on the Four Gospels. Works of the Fathers. Vol. 2.
London, 1843. Reprinted by The St. Austin Press, 1997.