A Scriptural Reflection by Fr. Jim Sullivan on the Mass Readings for Sunday, February 1, the Fourth Sunday of Ordinary Time
Zephaniah 2:3, 3:12-13
Psalm 146:6-7, 8-10
1 Corinthians 1:26-31
Matthew 5:1-12
The Beatitudes appear in two of the Gospels, Matthew and Luke. This Sunday’s Gospel passage is Matthew’s version of this list of blessings. It is a set of blessings which might at first glance strike us as counter-intuitive. It can be difficult to see the blessing, for instance, in being poor in spirit or being in mourning.
When I have taught the Beatitudes to my sophomores at Bishop O’Dowd, I have emphasized the fact that it is precisely in the reality that something is missing that the blessing lies. The poor in spirit are not full of themselves. They are thereby available to be blessed, even to be filled, by grace.
Those who mourn are in touch with deep and essential realities of human existence — they are not distracted by ephemeral ambitions, pleasures and preoccupations. In their grief they are available to receive heavenly consolation. It is precisely this dynamic, in fact, that explains the counter-intuitive fact that many, if not most, priests would rather do a funeral than a wedding. At a funeral, people are open to grace, they are in need and they know they are in need. God can reach them.
In a dynamic that has strong repercussions for our national reality this winter of 2026, those who hunger and thirst for justice are also in need; their longing for things to be put right counters complacency. We can become complacent if enough of our own needs are met, if we are comfortable and satisfied. It does not necessarily follow that comfort breeds complacency, but it is a real possibility. When Mary says that God “fills the hungry with good things” while he “sends the rich away empty” (Luke 1:53) she is enunciating precisely this dynamic. It is not that God does not love the rich. It is that in their comfort they may fail to recognize their need for his love, their need for grace to be actively operating in their lives.
Making ourselves available to grace requires the practice of certain virtues, chief among them perhaps, humility. The other readings for this Sunday assure us of the importance of this foundational virtue. (Humility is understood to be the ground from which all the other virtues spring.)
The first reading extolls the humble, those who observe God’s law, and who “seek justice, seek humility” (vs. 3). They will be favored by God precisely because in their humility they have put themselves in a place where they are able to receive the good things God wants to give them; they are not full of themselves.
The psalm, similarly, assures us that God showers graces upon those in need. It specifically singles out “the oppressed…the hungry…the prisoners…the blind…those who are bowed down…the resident alien…the orphan and the widow” as being particularly beloved and cared for by God (vss. 7-9).
In the second reading, Paul reminds the Christians in Corinth of their favor with God despite the fact that they are not viewed as favored by society. Here we have an explicit example of the dynamic at work in the beatitudes. Corinth was the port city for Athens. It was the city of dock workers and sailors and the merchants who served what we would today refer to as a blue-collar or working class population. And it was in Corinth, not Athens, that Paul met with huge success in his efforts at evangelization.
The description of the reaction of the Athenians to Paul’s preaching is almost comical (Acts of the Apostles 17:16-34). Wealthy, educated, with high-status positions and rewarding careers, the Athenians were…comfortable; satisfied; complacent. They were so filled with the riches of the world that they did not recognize their need for the riches of God.
Different story with the dockworkers of Corinth. “I have many people in this city,” the Lord assures Paul (Acts 18:10). We may intuit that that happy reality was directly connected to the fact that the Corinthians, who had so much less than the Athenians to insulate them from life’s dangers, sorrows and difficulties, were naturally open to receiving the Good News; their lives predisposed them to the reception of grace.
That we are available to God when we are in need is the central dynamic in the message of the beatitudes. It is, as I say, a counter-intuitive set of blessings which Jesus lists in today’s Gospel. But to the extent that any need of ours opens us to the operation of grace in our lives, that need has, in fact, blessed us.
Think that will do it for this one. Take good care and God bless.
Love,
Fr. Jim
I was born in Marysville, in the Sacramento Valley, to a large and faith-filled Catholic family. I was named for my priest uncle, and as a little boy wanted to be a priest. I outgrew that ambition and by the time I was headed for my freshman year at the University of California at Berkeley was planning on a career in law.
