Readings for Daily Masses in Weeks 21 - 24 of Ordinary Time, Year I
Ruins of the Temple of Athena in Assos, modern-day Turkey (W. W. Thaler)
Over four weeks, we hear from three epistles traditionally attributed to St. Paul, for eight days each. Contemporary scholars categorize 1 Thessalonians as an Authentic Pauline epistle, Colossians as a Deutero-Pauline epistle, and 1 Timothy as a Pastoral epistle. Check out our guide to the authorship of the Epistles for an explanation of these terms.
To jump to a specific epistle, click on the links below.
Colossians (Wednesday of Week 22 - Thursday of Week 23)
1 Timothy (Friday of Week 23 - Saturday of Week 24)
1 THESSALONIANS (Monday of Week 21 - Tuesday of Week 22)
Thessalonica (or Thessaloniki) sits on the northwestern edge of the Aegean Sea in modern-day northern Greece, formerly southern Macedonia. Its strategic location made it a hub of commerce connecting several major trade routes. Acts 17:1-9 tells of Paul's time as a missionary in the city of Thessalonica. Paul spent no more than three weeks in Thessalonica, winning many people over to Christian discipleship. Unfortunately, he also raised enough anger from both Jews and Greeks that a mob ran him out of town.
Paul kept in contact with the Thessalonian Christians. When Timothy visited them the following year (probably 51 AD) and came to Corinth to report the news to Paul, Paul wrote 1 Thessalonians, which is likely the oldest book of the New Testament.
COLOSSIANS (Wednesday of 22 - Thursday of Week 23)
About half of contemporary biblical scholars believe that Paul wrote the letter to the Colossians in the early 60s AD. The other half believe this is a pseudepigraphic work, written by a follower of Paul 80 - 100 AD. There are several differences between Colossians and the 7 epistles that the consensus of biblical scholars believe were written by Paul:
Longer, more complex sentences
Use of the phrases "fullness of God" (1:19, 2:9) and "mystery of God (1:26 - 27, 2:2)
More emphasis on Christ's "cosmic" qualities (e.g. divinity, exaltation) and less on Christ's earthly qualities (e.g. humanity, suffering)
Emphasis on universal Church rather than local churches
Emphasis on forgiveness of sins rather than on freedom from sin
Emphasis on sharing in the resurrected life now, rather than at the second coming of Christ
These are all qualities that Colossians shares with Ephesians, which about 80% of contemporary scholars believe is pseudepigraphic. Because of the striking similarities in concepts, words, and phrases between Colossians and Ephesians, most scholars believe that the author of Ephesians was extremely familiar with Colossians.
Colossae is a city roughly 20 miles west of Ephesus. Even though Paul lived in Ephesus for several years and wrote a letter to a man named Philemon who lived in Colossae, Paul apparently never visited the city himself. The Letter to the Colossians claims to be Paul's response to an appeal from Epaphras, the founder of the Christian community in Colossae, when he ran into a dispute with other teachers about the nature of Christ.
There are two very well-known passages from Colossians. The first is the author quoting what is apparently an ancient hymn of the early Christians in 1:15 - 20:
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things were created through him and for him.
He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
He is the head of the body, the church.
He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he himself might be preeminent.
For in him all the fullness was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile all things for him, making peace by the blood of his cross, whether those on earth or those in heaven.
This is a remarkable statement on the identity of Jesus Christ! Colossians captures this testimony of the second or third generation of Christians identifying Jesus of Nazareth with the totality of the second person of God, with the personification of Lady Wisdom in the Jewish scriptures.
The second passage is the "household codes" (3:18 - 4:1), the instructions on how Christians should relate to one another: husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and slaves. (Most Christians are more familiar with the similar codes in Ephesians 5:21 - 6:9.) Today, many people find the household codes to uphold values that seem out of sync with the ideas of autonomy, independence, and the dignity of every human being. In the context of the society in which Colossians was written, these codes uphold the status quo. As Margaret Y. MacDonald points out in her commentary in the Sacra Pagina series, Aristotle had written that "there are by nature various classes of the rulers and ruled. For the free rules the slave, the male the female, and the man the child." What were these codes trying to accomplish? Perhaps the author was encouraging Christians not to bring unwanted attention to themselves in a society where the vast majority of people did not understand the tenets of Christianity.
1 TIMOTHY (Friday of Week 23 - Saturday of Week 24)
Since the late 19th century, 1 & 2 Timothy and Titus have been classified as the Pastoral epistles. They claim to be letters written by Paul to men who were entrusted with the leadership of Christian communities. Whereas 2 Timothy strikes a personal tone, 1 Timothy is more businesslike.