Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle C
Reflecting on Luke 21: 5-19
It’s sobering to stand at the Western Wall in Jerusalem. It is an ancient retaining wall on the hill known as the Temple Mount. Visitors place prayers on tiny pieces of paper and press them into the crevices of the last remaining wall of King Herod’s Temple.
Even the great builder Herod couldn’t construct a complex strong enough to withstand the Roman assault on Jerusalem in 70AD. The Romans knew that destroying the Temple would break the Jewish will to fight. This was a devastating event for the Jewish people, leading to the scattering of survivors, and ending a key era in Judaism.
It’s precisely this terrifying event that Jesus is warning of in today’s gospel (Luke 21:5-19). “The days will come when there will not be left
a stone upon another stone that will not be thrown down.” Imagine standing there today and seeing these huge boulders, still broken and scattered from the terrible Roman-Jewish War of 70AD.
We know so little of what became of those disciples to whom Jesus spoke these eerily prophetic words. Tradition says that all but John were martyred, although scripture only tells of the deaths of the two men named James.
Was it troublesome to the early Church to witness the deaths of the eyewitnesses? Doesn’t Jesus promise that “not a hair on your head will be destroyed”? The earliest Christians knew that the Crucified One rose from the grave, and they understood that the martyrs would share the same victory.
No need to worry, though. This was all 2,000 years ago. Except that Jesus also says, “There will be powerful earthquakes, famines, and plagues from place to place.”
How do you live in joyful hope of the Kingdom of God?
Kathy McGovern ©2025