Gospel Reflection: 6th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year C

This Sunday’s Gospel is Luke’s version of the Beatitudes. These are the teachings of Jesus on what it truly means to be blessed. From a human perspective, they seem backwards. How can we find blessedness or joy in suffering? The Lord’s ways of operating a very different from our own. We tend to reduce happiness to worldly power, money, possessions, relationships, and all manner of things here on earth. The Lord flips that tendency upside down. He is showing us that the only way to find true happiness is to give our entire lives to Him. To follow Him no matter the cost.

The only way we can find true blessedness and happiness is through Him. He has made us for and by love, but love requires sacrifice. It is not simply a feeling. Feelings are fleeting. It is a choice to will the good of others. It is to seek to sacrifice everything to follow Christ. This is good news because it means that our happiness is not dependent upon the fleeting things of this world. It is totally dependent upon the Lord who “is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.”

The early Church martyrs were filled with great joy as they went to die in the Roman circus because they shared in the promises of Christ’s death and resurrection. They fully lived the Beatitudes especially:

Blessed are you when people hate you,

and when they exclude and insult you,

and denounce your name as evil

on account of the Son of Man.

Rejoice and leap for joy on that day!

Behold, your reward will be great in heaven.

Luke 6:22-23

The Lord never promises that being a Christian will be easy, but He does promise that it is the only path to true joy.