The 21st Sunday of the Year
Is 66:18-21; Heb 12:5-7 & 11-13; Lk 13:22-30 (Year C)
The Book of Isaiah concludes with a vision of unsurpassed hope embracing all the nations of the earth: “The Lord says this: ‘I am coming to gather the nations of every language. They shall come to witness my glory. They will bring all your brothers from all the nations to my holy mountain in Jerusalem. And some of them I will make priests and Levites says the Lord.’ ”
Here a people who had lived through the tragedies of destruction and division were now raised to a new and all-inclusive hope for the future. The ancient boundaries dividing the peoples would be dissolved. Holiness would no longer be the preserve of any particular caste or nation. In the coming salvation, it would become an inheritance promised to all. May we always remember that salvation is a call to integration.
