(For the audio version of this post, please visit https://brothersinchristcmf.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/Mass-Blog-for-the-22nd-Sunday-in-Ordinary-Time-2026.mp3)
September signals the start of another school year, or maybe even the beginning of the career for which one’s education prepared them. With that in mind, the readings for this 22nd Sunday in Ordinary time offer the raw materials for anyone to recall some of history’s most uplifting messages for a new commencement.
On its surface, the first reading from Jeremiah might seem like the opposite of uplift (Jeremiah 20:7-9). God called this prophet into service on the brink of Jerusalem’s destruction and the exile of its citizens. Life for such a prophet was a bittersweet combination of promise and suffering.
“You duped me, O LORD, and I let myself be duped,” Jeremiah prays. “All the day I am an object of laughter; everyone mocks me. … I say to myself, I will not mention him, I will speak in his name no more. But then it becomes like fire burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones.”
Jeremiah didn’t survive to see Jerusalem’s rebirth, but later in this prophet’s Book his passionate and inspired words would survive to encourage future prophets, as the best commencement speeches do.
“See, days are coming when the city shall be rebuilt as the Lord’s … Never again shall the city be uprooted or demolished.” (Jeremiah 31:38-40)
By spreading God’s word in speech and actions, Jeremiah acted as the kind of prophet Paul calls to service in Sunday’s second reading (Romans 12:1-2):
“Do not conform yourselves to this age,” Paul urges us graduates, “but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect.”
Jesus knew that for him a return to Jerusalem would mean sure death, but also sure resurrection and salvation for the fallen world Jerusalem represented. What is good and pleasing and perfect comes with sacrifice, and our own service will come with the kinds of difficulties foreseen in all three readings this Sunday. Peter wanted his Master to choose the easy way, but Jesus gives him and us the key to our graduation:
“Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 16:21-27)
We may not risk losing our lives as dramatically as Jeremiah, Paul and Jesus did in service to God, but for all three, the process of losing their lives was God using them so this fallen world might get back up and commence toward Him again.
–Tom Andel