Wednesday, July 10, 2019 >>
Genesis 41:55-57; 42:5-7, 17-24
View Readings Psalm 33:2-3, 10-11, 18-19 Matthew 10:1-7
Similar Reflections
“In fact, all the world came to Joseph to obtain rations of grain, for famine had gripped the whole world.” —Genesis 41:57
In Joseph’s time, there was a worldwide physical famine. Amos prophesied a spiritual famine: “Yes, days are coming, says the Lord God, when I will send famine upon the land: not a famine of bread, or thirst for water, but for hearing the word of the Lord” (Am 8:11). Today we have worse famines. While hundreds of millions starve to death physically, Chinese Communists and Muslim-dominated countries deny well over two billion people free access to the spiritual food of Christian community, the Bible, and the Sacraments. Even worse than this, hundreds of millions of Christians have a third famine and are spiritually anorexic. They have imposed spiritual starvation on themselves. This makes large sectors of the Church so weak that it becomes a doormat for the devil and lets him “get away with murder” as he destroys people through the other kinds of starvation (see Jn 8:44).