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WEEKLY FELLOWSHIP! JOIN AROUND THE CAMPFIRE!
Sundays at 11:30 AM ET. Click here to join via Google Meet!
What’s the weekly mettle maker?
Training tips and educational info in support of our free programs, that’s what! What’s mettle? Mettle is, “The ability to meet a challenge or persevere under demanding circumstances; determination or resolve.”
What’s new?
Our program is now called HERITAGE ROUGH ‘N’ TUMBLE. To understand why we’ve made this change, read this post .
Skin in the game is now required. The program is still free if you can’t afford a donation of $1/month — but you have to at least hang out with the crew each week or volunteer to be a social media promoter, blogger, researcher, newsletter editor, fundraiser, mentor, artist, or even come up with your own idea.
Mettle maker #416: introducing feats!
CLICK THE PICTURE TO VIEW THE PDF
We have a ton of interest in the new unified Heritage Rough ‘n’ Tumble program (“HRnT” for short), both in person and via distance learning. We have everything from total newbies to guys with decades of martial arts experience. We’ve got young and old, the fat, the fit, and the in between. We’ve got the historically savvy and those who aren’t. How do we make the program works for everybody? How can we make the program as self-directed as possible so that I don’t have to spread myself too thin coming up with custom training plans for dozens of hard-working folks?
Introducing feats!
These were a part of the old, original program, and everyone liked them back in the day. They’re the perfect way to give people the flexibility they want and need while encouraging them to them to train wide rather than deep. Here’s a snippet from the rough draft of the forthcoming book — check it out!
Interested in a totally free program that incorporates self-defense, fitness, outdoor skills, and spiritual development? Sign up for our free Rough ‘n’ Tumble Distance Learning Program!
Holy Eucharist is LIVE on YouTube every Sunday at 10 am EASTERn. Click HERE to watch live. To view and print a copy of the program for holy Eucharist, CLICK HERE.
Homily for the Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time 7/28/24 – Father Mitch
Readings: 2 Kgs 4:42-44, Ps 145:10-11, 15-16, 17-18, Eph 4:1-6, Jn 6:1-15
John 6:1-15 World English Bible
1 After these things, Jesus went away to the other side of the sea of Galilee, which is also called the Sea of Tiberias. 2 A great multitude followed him, because they saw his signs which he did on those who were sick. 3 Jesus went up into the mountain, and he sat there with his disciples. 4 Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand. 5 Jesus therefore, lifting up his eyes and seeing that a great multitude was coming to him, said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, that these may eat?” 6 He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do.
7 Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii† worth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may receive a little.”
8 One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, 9 “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are these among so many?”
10 Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” Now there was much grass in that place. So the men sat down, in number about five thousand. 11 Jesus took the loaves, and having given thanks, he distributed to the disciples, and the disciples to those who were sitting down, likewise also of the fish as much as they desired. 12 When they were filled, he said to his disciples, “Gather up the broken pieces which are left over, that nothing be lost.” 13 So they gathered them up, and filled twelve baskets with broken pieces from the five barley loaves, which were left over by those who had eaten. 14 When therefore the people saw the sign which Jesus did, they said, “This is truly the prophet who comes into the world.” 15 Jesus therefore, perceiving that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, withdrew again to the mountain by himself.
In the Book of Exodus, the people are enslaved by the Egyptians. And even though Moses relays to them God's promise of freedom, the people are reluctant to go. Only after they see signs and wonders do they begin to follow. But escaping tyranny first means crossing the Red Sea, which God miraculously helps them achieve.
In today's Gospel reading, the people are not enslaved by the Egyptians, but rather enslaved by sin. And just as the people in Exodus follow Moses because of the miracles God performed through him, so do the people follow Jesus in search of freedom from sin, crossing not the Red Sea, but instead the Sea of Galilee.
There is always a sea that must be crossed when we want to escape tyranny -- whether it's a literal tyranny, or the tyranny of outdated or insufficient rules, laws, ideas or practices. It's not the Red Sea or the Sea of Galilee, but rather, it is the Sea of Confusion. Casting off the old order results in disorder until we establish a new order. And, after we cross the sea, the grass is often greener on the other side. We forget what it was really like on the side we just left. Like the Israelites in Exodus, we hunger for the safety of slavery. We are prone to cry out, as the people do in Exodus 16:3, “There [back in Egypt] we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.”
Responding to their urgent hunger, God through Moses miraculously feeds the people by sending manna from heaven. Jesus does a similar thing – he miraculously feeds five thousand starving people by multiplying five loves and two fish. The parallels do not stop there.
Next Jesus withdraws into the mountains because he knows that, very soon, the people will come to "carry him off to make him king." The same thing happened to Moses in Exodus 18. As soon as he has given them the law, the people make him their sole judge, forcing him to work from morning till evening, settling every dispute. Jesus knows us better than we know ourselves. He knows that we want simple rules to follow, and somebody to tell us what to do when there's the slightest bit of ambiguity or confusion. Jesus knows that the people are about to beg him put in place a new set of rules to replace the old ones.
But that's not what Jesus wants. He wants the rules and the judges, the laws and the courts, to be unnecessary because we love God with all our heart, mind, and spirit -- because we love one another as ourselves, even our enemies. He wants us to brave the waters and reach the true promised land – the promised land of love in Christ.