Daily Gospel Reflection

Take Your Mini Sabbatical

Welcome back to Radical and Relevant, where each day we are exploring the genius of Jesus, the genius of the gospels, and looking for a word or a phrase or an idea that the Holy Spirit uses to get our attention, so that we can apply the gospels to our lives. Today's reading is from the Gospel of Luke chapter 6, verses 1 through 5. On a Sabbath, while Jesus was going through the grain fields, his disciples plucked and ate some ears of grain, rubbing them in their hands.

But some of the Pharisee said, "Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?" And Jesus answered, "Have you not read what David did when he was hungry? He and those who were with him? How he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priest to eat, and also gave it to those with him. And he said to them, 'The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.' What jumps out at you today? I think the word Sabbath, as you know, anytime a word is repeated over and over in a reading, it gets my attention.

And I was thinking recently, I bumped into a friend who's a college professor, and he's on sabbatical. And so he's been given a year off from teaching classes, and he's doing some writing. And I think most of us maybe think about that idea like, "Okay, we're going to give you a year off from your job with pay and benefits." And I think that probably really appeals to most of us the idea of, "Would you like a sabbatical?" I think a lot of people be putting their hands up really quick. And, of course, the idea of sabbatical comes from the Sabbath.

And not so often anymore, but traditionally, the seventh year, people would get the seventh year off to have this sort of sabbatical experience. Often now, maybe it's once every 10 years or 15 years for college professors, or the very few roles where it still even exists, but we're attracted to the idea of sabbatical. We say we would love to have a sabbatical, but we don't take advantage of the mini sabbatical that God invites us to take every week. This micro sabbatical, this mini sabbatical, the Sabbath day. And our Sabbath day has just gotten just so busy. There's just so many pressures on our Sabbath day. It's amazing.

Every week, it seems, Maggie and I are talking about the different things we're saying no to on the Sabbath, and the different things people want to force into the Sabbath. So what's your Sabbath look like? And what can you do to make your Sabbath a little simpler, so that you can experience that mini sabbatical that God wants to give you each week? Have a great day and remember, Be Bold, Be Catholic.