Honour the Sabbath

A Reflection on the First Reading for Sunday, September 21st, 2025:
Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

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Amos
​8.4-7

Hear this, you that trample on the needy, and bring to ruin the poor of the land, saying, “When will the new moon be over so that we may sell grain; and the Sabbath, so that we may offer wheat for sale? We will measure out less and charge more, and tamper with the scales, buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, and selling the sweepings of the wheat.”

The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob: “Surely I will never forget any of their deeds.”

Pause. Pray. Reflect.

The words of the prophet Amos, in today's First Reading can easily be overlooked as something that doesn’t really pertain to my life today. I don’t cheat the poor for my profit. In fact, I donate to the poor frequently. I’m good to go! 

Two things that stood out to me in this reading: the first is the waiting for the Sabbath to end so that I may get back to my own work. I live in a world that does not recognize the Sabbath as a day of rest and bringing myself back to the Lord. The world I live in is on the go 24/7, and it is easy to get caught up in that so that I give to the Lord only the “sweepings of the wheat,” the leftovers of my life, instead of the first fruits of my life. 

Despite the fact that the world has tried to do away with the Sabbath with 24-hour businesses and Sunday shopping, I am called to rest on the Sabbath – and not just my body but my soul as well. If I accept the fact that the weekdays can carry me away and cause me to lose sight of keeping the Lord centre of my life then I must fight to give Him this first day of the week. Of course, the Sabbath includes going to Mass but that cannot be the only thing I give him on this day. I need to consider prayerfully how I want to give Him this day in a particular way so that I may not leave Him behind during the rest of the week. 

In the midst of this call to keep the Sabbath holy, I also need to recall that Jesus healed on the Sabbath and did not keep it the way the Pharisees did. How do I keep the Sabbath? 

The second thing that stood out to me in this reading is the treatment of the poor. I am called to love the poor and to care justly for those I am able to help. In my opinion, St. Basil the Great offers the best response to this reading: “The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry; the coat unused in your closet belongs to the one who needs it; the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the one who has no shoes; the money which you hoard up belongs to the poor.” I can’t say it better than that, so I leave it there. 

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​Sr. Teresa MacDonald

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