The Good Word for Sunday February 28th ~ for the complete readings click here.

If you have kids you’ve probably been asked this question, “Do you really ‘need’ that thing, or do you ‘want’ it?” If you have a 3 year old, the answer is usually absolutely I need this candy bar and lip gloss and ninja PEZ dispenser. Duh.

But what do we really need?

Psychologist Abraham Maslow created what he called the “Hierarchy of Needs.” The basic premise is that one needs to have their most basic needs met before the next set of needs matter. For example, what we are going to eat for lunch in 2 hours doesn’t matter much if we can’t breath. And what we are going to wear to work the next day doesn’t matter much if we haven’t eaten in 3 days.

Maslow theory states that our most basic needs are physiological. We need air, then water, then food. Without these we can’t go on to care about things like which fonts to use on our blog. Everyone needs air and water and food, if they want to survive.

In the gospel this weekend Jesus explains that there is something that everyone needs: Mercy.

Jesus comments on two different “news” stories of the day in which people were killed. He asks the audience if the victims deserved death because of their sin. You probably already know that if Jesus had let crowd answer they would have said, “Of course their sin was greater; they died didn’t they?”

Instead Jesus says this, “But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did!” Jesus is trying to explain that those poor souls who died violently either in the temple or because of the building collapse weren’t any worse sinner than us, not because they weren’t sinners, but because we are! Everyone is a sinner. You. Me. Pope Francis. Mother Teresa. And if we are sinners, then we all need God’s mercy.

I recently heard in a funeral homily the priest say that when there is a funeral of a really good and admirable person it is easy to just spend the whole time talking about how amazing they are. It is easy to forget that they were also a sinner in need of God’s mercy, just like us. In other words, every saint was a sinner in need of God’s mercy.

The good news is that God is ready to give you and I all the mercy we need. God can’t wait to pour his mercy upon us. He won’t hesitate to show us mercy when we don’t hesitate to ask for it.

Live it:
Go to Confession. If you haven’t gone in a while or don’t see the point or don’t feel comfortable telling a priest, I really encourage you to pray about it first. Want to check out a sweet talk about Confession? Check out “The Healing Power of Confession” By Dr. Scott Hahn by visiting formed.org, use our parish code, log in and then check out the talk. How to do all that can be found here.