Wednesday 19 November 2025

Today’s readings give us two very different stories —
but they share one burning truth:
God has trusted us with life — so live it faithfully.

In Maccabees, a mother and her seven sons die for the Law of God.
In Luke, a nobleman gives his servants money and tells them to trade with it until he returns.
Both scenes are about trust — the trust God gives us, and how we respond.

The second Book of Maccabees tells one of the most extraordinary stories in the Bible —
a mother watching her seven sons tortured and killed before her eyes.
Each one refuses to break the Law of God.
Each one goes to death with words of faith on his lips.
And their mother — calm, courageous, unshaken — strengthens them one by one.

She tells them:

“It was not I who gave you life and breath.
It was the Creator of the world,
who in His mercy will give you life back again.”

That’s faith — not as theory, but as fire.

She knew something the world forgets:
that life is not ours to keep, it’s God’s to give.
That death isn’t the end, it’s the door.
That the body may fall, but the soul endures.

And that line — “The Creator will give you life back again” —
is one of the clearest Old Testament confessions of the resurrection.

This mother is the Old Covenant’s image of Mary.
She too watched her Son suffer and die;
she too believed in the resurrection;
she too teaches her children — us — to be faithful even when it costs everything.

Courage is not born from strength — it’s born from faith.
And this mother’s faith was strong enough to light a nation.

Then in the Gospel, Jesus tells the parable of the ten minas —
a nobleman who gives his servants money before leaving on a journey.
He returns and asks, “What have you done with what I gave you?”

One servant says, “I earned ten more!”
Another says, “I earned five!”
And one — afraid, lazy, or cynical — hides his coin in a napkin and does nothing.

The nobleman praises the first two —
“You’ve been faithful in little; I’ll trust you with much.”
But he condemns the last:
“You wicked servant — you knew what I expected, yet you did nothing.”

It’s a warning not against failure, but against wasted faith.
God doesn’t ask us to be successful — He asks us to be fruitful.
Faith that is buried, unused, or hidden out of fear — that’s the tragedy of the Gospel.

Every grace you’ve been given — your time, your talents, your faith —
was meant to grow, to multiply, to bless others.
To bury it is to tell God His gifts don’t matter.

When we put these two stories together, the message is powerful:
God trusts us more than we trust ourselves.

He trusted the mother of seven to show Israel what courage looks like.
He trusted the servants with His treasure.
And He trusts you — today — with something real:
the Gospel, your vocation, your family, your prayer, your witness.

He doesn’t ask for perfection — He asks for faithfulness.

If we’ve failed, we can repent like Zacchaeus.
If we’ve grown weary, we can pray like the widow.
But if we’ve buried our faith in fear,
we must hear the Lord say, “Unfold it again — trade with it — let it live.”

The worst sin isn’t weakness; it’s indifference.
The world doesn’t need hidden Catholics — it needs visible witnesses.

Think again of the mother in Maccabees.
She had no sword, no army, no influence —
but her faith multiplied across centuries.
Because of her, generations knew that God is worth dying for.

You and I may never face torture or persecution —
but we face a daily choice:
to live visibly as Christians, or quietly fade into the crowd.

And every small act of fidelity multiplies:

A parent teaching a child to pray.

A worker refusing to lie.

A parishioner showing mercy instead of gossip.
That’s how faith bears fruit.

Both readings end with the same reality: there will be an accounting.
For the mother’s sons, it was before the tyrant’s tribunal.
For the servants, it was before their returning master.
For us, it will be before Christ —
not to humiliate us, but to complete us.

On that day, He will ask, “What did you do with what I gave you?”
May we be able to answer:
“I prayed. I forgave. I used what You gave me. I didn’t bury it.”

Because faith, like a coin, only gains value when it’s spent.

So let’s not bury the Gospel in fear or comfort.
Let’s invest it — in love, in witness, in courage.

Then when the Master returns,
He will say the words we all long to hear:

“Well done, good and faithful servant —
enter into the joy of your Lord.”