27th. Sunday of Year (A)
(Isaiah 5:1-7; Paul to the Philippians 4:6-9;
Matthew 21: 33-43)
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Our first reading from the prophet Isaiah foretold the destruction of
the Temple of Solomon and the kingdoms of Israel and Judah; in the Gospel we
heard of Jesus directly warning the Jews of their ultimate rejection as Chosen
People called to bring in the Kingdom of God and -- as subsequent history would
show -- indirectly that the Romans would raze Jerusalem to the ground and
destroy Israel’s Temple, the glory of Jerusalem. In both cases the
destruction was a punishment for the nation's sin, continued and deliberate
sin: the vineyard itself – the house of Israel and the people of Judah --failed
to produce fruit in the parable of Isaiah, and in Jesus' parable the tenants –
vide. the chief priests and religious elders --repeatedly and deliberately,
withheld the produce, the fruit, to which the landowner, the God of Israel and
Judah, had a right, and ultimately killed his most beloved son.
But of course, God is not concerned about grapes for Himself.
What 'fruit' does He expect of us who are now disciples and members of Jesus
called to serve and usher in God’s Kingdom world-wide?
Through Him then, let us continually offer up a
sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His
name.
(Heb. 13:5)
We, disciples following Jesus their Lord, are called to offer up His
uniquely supreme and eternal sacrifice, with our own accompanying 'sacrifice of
praise', 'the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name'; thanks, indeed, to
God for the many personal blessings we have received throughout our lives from
Him in the name of Jesus and through His Spirit.
In order to give thanks, however, we have to be able to recognize and
appreciate our blessings; and since many people in our modern, western
and affluent, society, though constantly relating themselves to the material
and physical world around us for what pleasures or riches they can get from
it, do not regard it as God’s generous gift to us, His truly beautiful
and wise creation for us, and they do not, consequently, feel gratitude
to God so much as praise for themselves when having been able to grasp
something of what they wanted for themselves.. And if such people,
wanting much, then envy others who seem better at getting than themselves, how
can they appreciate as blessings the things they themselves have already taken
from an unacknowledged God? How can young adults appreciate the blessing
of a good home with loving parents if they are all the time wanting to live it
up, so to speak, with the wildest and most foolish of their peers around?
Can those who have developed a lust for pleasures a-plenty take in even the
wisest words of their parents or teachers about the benefits and joys of a good
education?
I am the vine, you are the branches; he who
abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, (but) apart from Me you can do
nothing. (John 15:5)
What, among the multitude of gifts that God gives, are the blessings
for which we Catholics and Christians should most particularly bring forth the
fruit of lips giving thanks to Him? In that regard, the Christian
tradition, in its Jewish-Christian origins or its Gentile-Christian development
is unanimous in its teaching, as is witnessed in the letter of St. James from
Jerusalem:
The wisdom that is from above is first pure, then
peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without
partiality and without hypocrisy. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown
in peace by those who make peace (3:17-18);
and by those of St. Paul, writing to the Gentile Church at Rome (15:13):
Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and
peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy
Spirit;
and again, to his own converts in Galatia (5:22):
The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness.
Joy and peace in believing, hope based on the power of God's Spirit,
such, St. Paul tells us, are the better gifts that God gives those who truly
believe in, and faithfully follow, His beloved Son.
Let us listen, however, as St. Paul tells us what can threaten that
tradition:
The kingdom of God is not eating and drinking,
but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.
(Romans 14:17)
Apparently, there were, even in the earliest Christian communities
some who were beginning to appreciate immediate worldly pleasures more than
heavenly blessings. Now this switch from the heavenly to what is earthly
begins first of all with the earthly imitating the heavenly: pleasure
being paraded as joy; sexual and passionate love-making being thought of as an
ideal expression of Christian love/charity; indifference and indulgence being
accepted as substitutes for patience, kindness, and goodness. In other
cases, however, the heavenly blessings are regarded as no longer suited
to more modern situations and so are blatantly substituted by worldly
counterfeits: righteousness before God cannot be seen by others, and so,
for the spread of the faith, the disciples of Jesus should aim at popularity
and public appeal. Again the gift of peace, which is rooted in God's
Spirit ruling our mind and heart, is popularly supplanted by a carefree
ignoring of the claims and commands of conscience; after all, a life-style
uncluttered by self-discipline or examination of conscience is much more easy
to sell on the doorstep or promote in the street, so to speak: just as an
invitation to assemblies promising a communal good time will be accepted with
far greater alacrity than one to a gathering for true worship and serious
prayer.
That is why our Gospel message today, supported by the age-old
experience of God's dealings with His People, is so important for us. It
shows us with all clarity that we cannot turn our hearts to, nor indulge
ourselves in, the sin of the world and, at the same time, pretend to know God
or hope for His blessings. It also warns us that we should not allow
ourselves to be led into the inviting downward spiral – a truly horrific ‘black
hole’ -- which, going round and round, would comfort us, at one moment, by
offering what is worldly, and then, occasionally try to reassure us with what
might appear heavenly, for it is always and inevitably spiralling round and
down from heavenly to earthly according to the strength of one’s worldly
desires. Round and round, indeed, that spiral goes, but ever-more steeply
downwards, until, in the end, the worldly is found to be totally illusory while
the heavenly is no longer understood or forthcoming.
Through (Jesus) then, let us continually offer up
a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to
His name. (Hebrews 13:15)
To do this, our Catholic and Christian calling, we have to invite God
much more seriously into our lives: we need to prepare a welcome for Him by
suspending, warding off, holding in abeyance, the cares, anxieties, and fears
that can fill our hearts and weigh us down; we need to create a breathing space
in the multitude of our daily thoughts and imaginations, preoccupations and
fears, so that He might be able to speak with us and we hear Him. Oh, how such
interior silence and peace is feared and hated by people today! To encourage us
to give time to Him in our daily living God originally established the sabbath
rest day; today, interior silence and peace should, for truly Catholic people,
be part of the rhythmic routine and strength of our lives; we can never
tell Him, ‘I have only a few minutes, You must do all that both You and I want
in the only time I have available.’
Moreover, we need to give a truly personal welcome in our
hearts to God Who is sublimely Personal Himself: Father, Son and Holy
Spirit. First of all, a welcome for Jesus, God the Son made man,
our Brother and our Saviour; and in Him, for the Father, our Father and your
and my Father; and for the Holy Spirit, our Advocate and Guide, my comforter,
my strength, and my joy. For our Faith is more than our common bond and
identity, it has to become also, for each and every one of us, our total and
most personal, loving commitment.
God is infinitely, sublimely, Personal, and our capacity for a truly
personal relationship is a unique gift of God to mankind. However, it is
not a cheap gift, for it demands a foregoing sacrifice: a willingness to
open up self to Him and an on-going preparedness to hand over self, to
yield personal autonomy for love of Him and His.
Now self is also, in some respects, the great ‘forgettable’ of modern
times. Boy and girl, man and woman, meet, and instead of meeting someone
find themselves, already conditioned through social practices and pleasures, to being
immediately confronted with a body: a girl or woman displaying, or
drawing attention to, her body; or a man … or mannish boy … obsessed with her,
or embarrassed by his own, body. In such circumstances the essential
Christian relationship, a truly personal relationship is very difficult
if not impossible, and that is why our Faith demands that we must not let sex,
bodily gratification (please, don’t even think of the modern word of
self-justification, ‘love‘, in this respect!) rule in our lives, mar our
relationships.
Our Faith is meant to be far more than our common bond and
identity. We Catholics should be, in this increasingly pagan world, ever
more conscious of and gratefully thankful for our difference in the
world! We cannot tell people today how to live; fellow
Christians once could help each other by occasional, mutual, correction, but
today we can only give the worldlings around us -- some of them perhaps even of
our own family -- a humble and sincere witness to Jesus and His Christian
teaching by our open service to and love for Himself, and for all in their need
for Him. Our Catholic faith is today called to be, for each and every one
of us, our total and most personal commitment: to Jesus, to the
Father, and to the Holy Spirit; and that personal commitment, response, and
self-sacrifice should be reflected in the whole of our lives in Mother Church,
becoming far more influential than our ‘body’ commitment to the life and
culture of our modern society; indeed, it can and, hopefully and prayerfully,
will lead us to the fulfilment spoken of in those beautiful words of St. Paul:
Finally,
beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever
is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any
excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise —meditate on and practice
these things, and the God of peace will be with you.
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