Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time – Sister Liane Delsuc, SNDdeN

June 18, 2023

Matt. 9: 36 -10:8

As Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, we strive to proclaim the goodness of God with our lives, a goodness revealed in each of today’s readings. In the first reading, Moses goes ‘up the mountain’ where he can hear God’s voice. Through Moses, God chooses to call Israel back into relationship, embracing Israel in spite of its waywardness. God’s love is always unconditional. Like Moses, we all need to take the time to step away from the busy-ness of life to be able to listen deep within to that voice of God that yearns for us. Where do you go? How do you create a space where God can be heard? Where the message of the second reading, the example of Jesus’s gift of life, can guide you into a loving response to a hurting world?

The Gospel tells us that at the sight of the crowds, Jesus’s heart was moved to compassion. Out of that sense of compassion, Jesus acted. He approached those marginalized by society, crossed borders, responded to the needs of those made poor, those who were sick in any way. Then, he proceeded to call and mission his disciples to do the same. All were called. No judgement was made. Jesus did not create a closed system, an institution, a church, but modeled a dynamic way to deep peace and joy through Love, revealing God as good.

And so, as followers of Jesus, we reflect: what are we, what am I, called to do at this time and in this place? How am I to respond to the needs of those made poor, the sick, the outcast, those forced to flee their homes, those who have lost their way? For whom is my heart filled with compassion? What is mine to do now? How willing am I to give without cost, without expectation?

Matt. 9: 36 -10:8

When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” Jesus called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out impure spirits and to heal every disease and sickness.

These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.

These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Do not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel. As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy,[a] drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give.’

Meet Sister Liane Delsuc,  SNDdeN

Sister Liane Delsuc of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, originally from San Francisco, CA, served for eight years in inner city Los Angeles as a teacher of students with learning disabilities and then ministered at a Fe y Alegria School in a shantytown south of Lima, Peru for 16 years before returning to the Central Coast of California to create a resource room for students with special needs at an SND school. In 2019, Sister Liane moved to Phoenix, AZ where she taught ESL to adults and volunteered at the Phoenix Children’s Hospital. She presently serves migrants who are seeking asylum in our country and helps to coordinate a project to invite the U.S. SNDs, Associates, and friends for short-term service at the Welcome Center, sponsored by the International Rescue Committee.