Speak Well

A Reflection on the Psalm for October 3rd, 2021:
Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

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Psalm 128

R. May the Lord bless us all the days of our lives.

Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways. You shall eat the fruit of the labour of your hands; you shall be happy, and it shall go well with you. 

R. May the Lord bless us all the days of our lives.

Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table. 

R. May the Lord bless us all the days of our lives.

Thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord. The Lord bless you from Zion. May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem all the days of your life. 

R. May the Lord bless us all the days of our lives.

As a life-long Catholic, there are many aspects of my faith that I can take for granted. A good “litmus test” for whether I truly understand a concept is whether I can clearly and concisely explain it to a non-Christian friend. As I prayed with this psalm, I realized that I couldn’t easily describe a “blessing”. I recalled a time in university, as my faith was being newly awakened, when a more experienced Catholic friend of mine said, “God bless you” at the end of an interaction. I was confused, as I had only used this phrase as my automatic response to a sneeze. Since then, I have become comfortable receiving and offering blessings to others (e.g., by words, tracing the sign of the cross on the forehead). Yet, being familiar with the idea doesn’t mean I have a comprehensive understanding of it, so I sought clarification.

I turned to my favourite resource, the Catechism, as a first step. It turns out that there are many ways to describe “blessing” (context-dependent); I won’t delve into them all. While looking for a clear and simple answer, I was most interested in this paragraph on “Prayer in the Christian Life”:
“Blessing expresses the basic movement of Christian prayer: it is an encounter between God and man. In blessing, God's gift and man's acceptance of it are united in dialogue with each other. The prayer of blessing is man's response to God's gifts: because God blesses, the human heart can in return bless the One who is the source of every blessing.” (CCC 2626)

I also looked up the Latin translation, and saw that blessing, “Benedictio”, means to “speak well” of something, someone, or some action.

With this, I felt I could begin to formulate a response. I am reminded that, “[T]he Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14), and, what I hope I grasp correctly is that God the Father blesses us by “speaking” Jesus, the Word of God (Logos), to us. Christ, the Living Word, reveals God’s love for humanity. Unlike our human words, God’s Word fully accomplishes its intended purpose in truth, goodness, beauty, and healing (salvation). We say actions speak louder than words, and ours are limited — but when God speaks, His power is limitless, and He communicates His Love in the most active, dynamic, and life-giving ways.

To ask God to “bless us all the days of our lives” is to ask Him:

Please, give Yourself as gift to us, all the days of our lives. Help us encounter You, love You, and hear and respond to Your voice in mutual blessing and prayer.

He wants to bless us because He loves us so intimately and fully — even desiring us to return His blessing. Let us respond and work to fulfill the Church’s mission by blessing one another in and with the Love of God. Amen.




Kendra L.

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