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For example Year C 2010 is being replaced week by week with Year C 2013, and so on.

Friday, 31 March 2017

Fifth Sunday of Lent Year A 2017

 Fifth Sunday of Lent, Year A

(Ezekiel 37:12-14; St. Paul to the Romans 8:8-11; St. John’s Gospel 11:1-45)
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Today’s Gospel, dear People of God, is both dramatic and deeply consoling, revealing Jesus to us in the power of His divinity and the tenderness of His humanity, and also – indeed, most wonderfully -- in the ineffable beauty of His Personal commitment to and communion with His heavenly Father.   And that St. John was well aware of all this is shown by the fact that the raising of Lazarus is the last of Jesus’ Son of Man miracles in his Gospel and, for that reason, of special significance and worthy of our close attention.
First of all we should note that the intention of Jesus to establish, confirm, and fulfil faith is paramount in all aspects of the Gospel account:
Jesus said to (His disciples) clearly, “Lazarus has died, and I am glad for you that I was not there, that you may believe. Let us go to him.”
Jesus told Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in Me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?”
Martha said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that You are the Christ, the Son of God, the One who is coming into the world.”
Jesus raised His eyes and said, “Father, I thank You for hearing Me.  I know that You always hear Me; but because of the crowd here I have said this, that they may believe that You sent Me.”
Six times Jesus uses or calls forth the word ‘believe’ in our Gospel passage, before St. John himself ultimately tells us:
Now many of the Jews who had come to Mary and seen what He had done began to believe in Him.
All is indeed directed towards faith, first of all in Jesus’ chosen disciples through whom and upon whom He will build His future Church; in those very dear friends of His, Martha, Mary, and their risen-brother Lazarus whom He loved and whose home in the village of Bethany was ever open to Him, serving, when needed, as a place of refuge for Him; and then in the ‘crowd’ who had come to commiserate with Martha and Mary over their brother’s death.
When Jesus arrived in Bethany He found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days.
Jesus had prepared His disciples for that but He had not been able to calm their anxiety for His safety since He was now back in Judea where the Jews had tried to stone Him.  The disciples were -- as Thomas said -- prepared to die with Jesus such was the hostility they had only recently experienced in Judea, but God’s agenda was quite different  from those their very real fears.   They would witness the glorification of God with Martha, Mary, and the Jewish visitors, and when their former oppressive fears for Jesus’ and indeed their own safety melted away into such a glorious dénouement, they would never ever forget --- as it behoved future apostles --- what they had seen.  The Gospel proclamation was about to be indelibly imprinted in them.
It is not easy to assess just what Martha believed about Jesus; as you have seen she did most certainly believe in Him, but somehow she seems always to have had too much to do, too much to say, too much to occupy her mind, for such belief to slow down her active involvement in whatever might be going on or being said around her, let alone to ‘stop her in her tracks’.   Perhaps her relationship with Jesus might be described as one of religious admiration befitting an awaited-super-prophet and miracle worker, a vaguely understood Messianic figure with, of course, a generous measure of personal ‘affection’; on the whole, a somewhat loosely co-ordinated relationship, very real indeed, but so very different from Mary’s simple and most humble self-demission before One Who was awesome in His power, but above all, mysterious in His Person.  Martha would do anything for Jesus, but she was not one to slow down, let alone stop, her ever-pressing and important work so as to be able to sit and listen intently at the feet of the Person of Jesus.
When Mary came to where Jesus was and saw Him, she fell at His feet and said to Him, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.”  
All is now ready for Jesus to publicly reveal -- by a most remarkable miracle -- His divine power, first of all to His disciples and friends, to anchor their faith and reward their devotion and courage and to the Jews present awaiting the Messiah of God; but also to afford us modern Catholics and Christians, together with all those so very dear to Him who were present on that day in Bethany, a deeply comforting awareness of the beauty and integrity of His human nature by a most privileged -- almost secret -- glimpse into the depth and tenderness of His sympathy and compassion: 
When Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who had come with her weeping … He (Himself) wept.
He did that, however, in no foppish manner; for in line with the Vulgate translation we learn that when He saw their weeping:
 Jesus became perturbed -- not just upset, not merely distressed, but with a certain mixture of anger and indignation -- and deeply troubled.
It was in pursuance of such indignation that He asked to be shown where the body of Lazarus had been placed that there He might make manifest His determination to destroy the abusive power of Satan in the human lives of all who would believe in Him and learn to walk in His ways.
So Jesus, perturbed again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay across it.  Jesus said, “Take away the stone.”
Martha could now no longer control herself and she gave agitated expression to her own thoughts and feelings and surely those of all the Jews around, saying:
“Lord, by now there will be a stench; he has been dead for four days.”   Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believe you will see the glory of God?”    So they took away the stone. 
Martha’s ‘belief’ needed to be both deepened and purified; for the moment, though, her undoubted commitment would allow her to see and appreciate something of the glory promised by Jesus as she managed to take hold of herself for a very short while and wait for whatever Jesus would choose to do.
Saint Paul gives us a clue to the nature of that glory of God she was about to witness when he writes to his converts at Corinth (2 Corinthians 4:6):
God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to bring to light the knowledge of the glory of God on the face of Christ.  
And indeed, what unutterable beauty, what other-worldly glory, was now to be seen on the face of Jesus as He:
Raised His eyes and said, “Father, I thank You for hearing Me.  I know that You always hear Me; but because of the crowd here I have said this, that they may believe that You sent Me.” 
He was actually allowing the ‘crowd’ to overhear/see, and hopefully learn from, His Personal relationship with His heavenly Father!!
And then, suddenly breaking off such tranquil intimacy:
He cried out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”  The dead man came out, tied hand and foot with burial bands, and his face was wrapped in a cloth. So Jesus said to them, “Untie him and let him go.” 
We are surely not erring if we allow ourselves to think that what was to be seen on Jesus’ up-turned face and echoed in His short prayer, was a transcendence expressive of the wondrous beauty of Jesus’ total oneness with and undying presence to His Father, of His unconditional obedience to and love for His Father ever seeking not His own will but the will of His Father and the glory of His Name … all that was, surely, even more glorious than the divine power so wondrously manifested when Lazarus came out -- still bound in all his burial bands -- from the tomb where he had lain for four days.  And again, dear friends, notice that, as we began so here at the end, all is for love of His Father and of us:
That they may believe. 
‘Believe’ what?
Jesus had told His disciples on His first hearing of Lazarus’ death:
I am glad for you that I was not there, that you may believe. Let us go to him.
That was further clarified when, standing before the tomb of Lazarus and surrounded by the accompanying crowd, Jesus prayed:
Father, I thank You for hearing Me … because of the crowd here I have said this, that they may believe that You sent Me.” 
Belief in Jesus as the One sent by the Father; that is the kernel of our faith in, and the true glory of, the Son of Man.  He is God the Son become flesh of the Virgin by the Holy Spirit; and His glory on earth lies in the self-sacrificing love of His proclamation and manifestation of the ultimate Glory of the eternal God:  the sublime oneness and goodness of the most Holy Trinity, Father and Son -- begetting and begotten -- in the unity of the Most Holy Spirit of Truth and Love. 
Dear People of God, we are most surely meant to draw strength for our faith, consolation, comfort, and joy, for our heart, as we ponder today’s readings.  For, in and through the temptations and trials, the difficulties and griefs, of living and ultimately, of dying, the most important question we will all have to answer is, ‘Do you trust in My love, do you believe in My power, to save you?’   And if in such a moment of crisis we can say with Martha, ‘Yes Lord, I believe’; if indeed, with Mary, we can trustfully allow any stone blocking, or ever-so-slightly impeding, the entrance to our heart to be fully rolled away and thus -- despite any fear, great or small, of what might be hidden there -- leaving the way to our innermost self being opened up wide to the saving power and healing love of Jesus, then, undoubtedly, we shall, as Jesus promised, see the glory of God and rejoice whole-heartedly and most gratefully for His Church our Mother who has taught us so firmly, so clearly, and so beautifully that,
                JESUS CHRIST is indeed for us PERFECT GOD AND PERFECT MAN.


               
               

                 


Friday, 24 March 2017

4th Sunday of Lent Year A 2017

 4th. Sunday of Lent (A)
(1 Samuel 16:1, 6-7, 10-13; Ephesians 5:8-14; John 9:1-41)

 

In the first reading David, the ‘baby’ of his family, was chosen by God to be anointed King by the prophet Samuel in preference to his stronger and more experienced brothers.
And, in our second reading St. Paul says, You were darkness once.
Thus we can see that God at times chooses men and women for His servants not because of their social standing, natural ability, or personal merits, but rather because He wills to manifest His own mighty power in and/or through them; and that was expressly acknowledged by Our Blessed Lord in the Gospel reading:
(The man’s being blind from birth) is so that the works of God might be made visible (manifest) through him.
God uses human beings!   Isn’t that an awful thing to say and even more awful to do!  Use people for your own purposes!!
Dear People of God, there are so many today with no love for God who are yet so given to speaking out about what God should have done, what he (he since he is no God for them) should do or, in today’s case, what he should not do!
Our God is good and He made us originally and gave His only-begotten Son up for our salvation because He loves us; and because He loves us He can and does use us for His own good purposes and our own better good.
Notice how Jesus was most urgent about showing God’s good purposes in and through this born-blind man; without pausing even to ask the man whether or not he wanted to see, or if he had faith in Jesus’ power, He willed to begin His work – a fact which showed that Jesus’ main intention was to do something for His Father’s work plan, not something primarily of His own choosing or for the man himself:
We (Himself and the blind man!) have to do the works of the One Who sent Me while it is day.  Night is coming when no one can work.
He set about curing the man, not as so often on other occasions with exhortations to faith and words of healing, but by relatively well-known actions (used by local healers etc.) now intended by Jesus to gradually draw the man along with and into His own purposes.  He made clay with the help of His spittle from the dust of the earth.
Now God had originally made man from the dust of the earth and Jesus was wanting to show that He – His whole life, indeed, not just this one occasion – was completing God’s creative activity:
                My Father is at work until now, so I am at work. (John 5:17)
He then smeared the clay over the man’s eyes to give him hope of healing; and then, to test his faithful obedience, told him– still unseeing! – to go and wash in the pool of Siloam; thereupon his cure would be completed, and God’s work would be completed and most fully manifested in him and through him to all the Jews and Pharisees, themselves so wilfully blind in spirit.
The pool of Siloam recalls for us the waters of baptism; St. John, himself, interprets Siloam as ‘Sent’, referring to Jesus, sent as the Christ for the salvation of the world; and, in Isaias (8:6) we are told that the Jews refused the waters of Siloam, just as they would later reject Christ Himself:
                Because this people has rejected the waters of Shiloah that flow gently …
The pool of Siloam (Sent) can still be seen today, filled with water from the Virgin’s Spring. 
The man-born-blind obeyed:
                He went and washed and came back able to see!
‘He came back’ like the Samaritan cured of leprosy, to see and give thanks to Jesus, but Jesus had gone for the moment, and now was the time for the cured-man to give witness to his Healer. 
The Jewish officials repeatedly asked him how Jesus had cured him.  At first, not being suspicious of such authoritative and reputedly ‘holy’ people, he thought they wanted to hear again what he had already fully described, in order to rejoice in the wonderful work that had been done:
                I told you already and you did not listen,
instead you went and troubled my parents:
                Why do you want to hear it again?  Do you also want to become His disciples?’
It would seem that this man born blind had been regularly taken to the synagogue for worship there and for instruction in the traditions of Israel, since he was in no way overawed by his questioners now, but spoke in reply as one confident in and well aware  of his Jewish upbringing and privileges.  Now, however, he was beginning and indeed learning fast to see into what he had always before unquestioningly assumed, that is, the authority and holiness of these men addressing him:
The man answered and said to them, “This is what is so amazing, that you do not know where He is from, yet He opened my eyes.  We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if one is devout and does His will, He listens to him.

Now, in the power of the Spirit of Jesus, he was beginning to show authentic ‘Christian’ credentials, and was indeed risking a great deal by thus standing up for his healer:
They answered and said to him, ‘You were born totally (blind) in sin, and are you trying to teach us?’  Then they threw him out.
Out of the synagogue and out of Jewish fellowship.
Whereupon,
When Jesus heard that they had thrown him out, He found him and said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”  He answered and said, “Who is he sir, that I may believe in him?”  Jesus said to him, “You have seen Him and the One speaking with you is He.”  He said, “I do believe, Lord,” and he worshipped Him.

Dear People of God, notice how God quite amazingly brings the blind man into a measure of co-operation with His own purposes, for the born-blind man actually recognizes why he has been specially chosen by God the Father to witness to the Son He has sent among men:
It is unheard of that anyone ever opened the eyes of a person born blind.  If this Man were not from God, He would not be able to do anything!
And what was that most important work of God for which the blind-from-birth man was being used?   The manifestation of this sublime truth about Jesus:
                While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.
This ‘unfortunate, ill-used, abused’ (according to modern supremely self-righteous critics of God!), this born-blind-man had actually, in fact, had his eyes, as it were lit for the first time, by Him Who was the true Light of the World!!  Oh happy man, blessed far more than all those Pharisees and Jews around who could only see things of earth!  For his eyes, opened for the first time by Jesus, the Light of the World, were truly seeing eyes, and had led him, to see, recognize, believe in, and worship, the Son of Man and Saviour of the world!
Later God would use the death of Lazarus, Jesus’ friend, likewise (John 11: 4):
                This is for the glory of God that the Son of God may be glorified through it!
However, our man-born-blind was yet more blessed than Lazarus, even though he, Lazarus, Jesus’ friend, would be raised from the dead; because our man-born-blind was led to actually co-operate in some positive manner with the glorification of Him Who was the Light of the World! 
Dear People of God, let God, ask God, to USE you!    Many in our Western societies today are so very much aware of their human and personal rights in society … and are thereby often made far too proud and self-centred in their relations with God to ever allow themselves to be used for His purposes.   And there are others, of timid spirit, who cannot trust themselves to God’s purposes because they are ever-and-over fearful for themselves.
Both types are so wrapped up in themselves, be it for pride or for fear, that they cannot conceive our central Catholic and Christian truth that God is so good and does so love us that His very using us for His own glory and purposes always and -- humanly speaking one might say, inevitably -- brings us known (now) and unknown (as yet) personal blessings, for our having been humble and brave enough to have allowed and committed ourselves to thus being of use to Him.
Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name; Thy will be done in me for Thy purposes and for Thy glory; and -- of Thine infinite and unquestionable goodness -- for our blessing in Jesus Thy Son, our Lord and Saviour, by Thy most Holy Spirit of Truth and Love.  Amen, amen.


Friday, 17 March 2017

3rd Sunday of Lent Year A 2017

 3rd. Sunday of Lent (A)
(Exodus 17:3-7; Romans 5:1-2, 5-8; St. John 4:5-15, 19-26, 39-42)
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It was a long Gospel reading today, People of God, and I don’t want to distract you from what you have heard nor to overburden you by myself ‘talking’ too long.  Let me, therefore, just bring to your attention two points in particular. 
In these days you can often hear from over-enthusiastic Ecumenists and from former Catholics seeking to justify their betrayal of the Faith, “All that matters is to do good to your neighbour.”  Sorry, I have made a mistake there!  Those words ‘to your neighbour’ are not acceptable, they are too Christian, too reminiscent of the Bible.  You are more likely to hear over-enthusiastic Ecumenists and former Catholics saying, ‘All that matters is to do good!!’
That sort of attitude is, indeed, very prevalent today because our modern Western societies, having rejected Christianity, are striving to justify themselves by doing good, that is, good as they see it: marriage is for everybody, sexuality is not to be regarded as being determined by our birth but is to be subject to whatever might be our personal will or preference; all sorts of operations or treatments can help anyone finding it too difficult to practice self-discipline!! Yes, our modern Western societies are seeking ‘good’ independent of religion, totally freed from any sort of obedience to or dependence upon a transcendent God.  Now the main criterion for what is thus to be the desired good, useful for their purposes, is that it be popularly justifiable and even more popularly acceptable.   And that is not sarcasm but absolute truth … no ‘democratic’ government, party, or caucus, will readily take up and ‘faithfully’ support what is unpopular.
Well, in answer to such an attitude, notice Our Blessed Lord’s words to the Samaritan woman:
You (Samaritans) worship what you do not know; we (Jews) worship what we do know; for salvation comes from the Jews.
Jesus had much fault to find with Jewish practice, but He did not hesitate to tell this Samaritan woman that ‘We’, the Jews, know the truth about God and His offer of salvation.  Jesus had respect for Samaritans, as His parable about the ‘Good Samaritan’ shows, and as also does His delicate reticence when answering His Jewish opponents:
The Jews answered and said to Him, “Are we not right in saying that You are a Samaritan and are possessed?”  Jesus answered, “I am not possessed; I honor my Father, but you dishonor Me.  (John 8:48–49)

Nevertheless, He did not flinch from making it quite clear to the Samaritan woman-at-the-well that they, the Samaritans – as distinct from the Jews -- did not have the fullness of God’s truth in their teaching.  As one commentator (Saunders) writes concerning this part of St. John’s Gospel, ‘By rejecting all of the O.T. but the Pentateuch, the Samaritans had wilfully denied themselves of access to the revelation of  God and shown themselves prone to error…. The old Covenant (with the Jews) may have been incomplete, but it was -- unlike the Samaritan schism -- on the right lines.’
The same can be said of the Catholic Church today.  The old, enduring Church, our Mother, has made many human mistakes, and she is still slow in advancing towards the youthful beauty and perfection her Lord requires of her, but, nevertheless, she is still on the right lines, and salvation still comes -- despite all the attacks of her, usually so self-righteous, critics -- through her uniquely authoritative proclamation of Jesus’ Gospel truth and through her sacraments which are the inimitable channels of His heavenly-bestowed saving grace.
The truth – not religiosity, not sentimental love -- was of supreme importance in Jesus’ eyes.  Why was this?  Because the proof that He was the Son of God was His knowledge of the Father:
                Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know You.    (John 17:25)
Truly, truly, the Son can do nothing of His own accord but only what He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does the Son does likewise. (John 5:19)
As the Father knows Me and I know the Father … For this reason the Father loves Me because I lay down My life … this charge I have received from My Father.  (John 10:15-18)
People of God, Jesus came to give us a share in His own sonship, to make us children of God in Him; do then strive to know your Father, to know your Faith.   Sentimental feelings are not enough as Jesus Himself said to His disciples:
The Father Himself loves you because you have loved Me and have come to believe that I came from God.  (John 16:27)
Jesus was, as a young boy-cum-man, found by His anxious parents in the Temple:
Sitting in the midst of the teachers listening to them and asking them questions.
What an example for us!!   How few, even among devout Catholics , ask simple questions today; how few find the Faith beautiful and ‘interesting’ enough to want, indeed to need, to know it better, understand it more, and just love it!   For doctrine is there for us (objectively, so to speak), faithfully given us by ‘Old’ Mother Church, to be known and loved first of all, even before we prayerfully ask God and calmly consult our own conscience, or even perhaps humbly consult others for help and/or advice, how best to respond to it.
There are many today, however, who will only pose (not really ‘ask’) a question in order to open up a field for their own opinions and ideas; Jesus, on the other hand, was humble, and we are told that He just listened to the teachers and asked them questions …. with no subsequent ‘but’s, or, ‘it seems to me’, ‘wouldn’t it be better’ etc. etc.
The second point I would like to make is, observe carefully the sort of knowledge of God we should seek: knowledge, and ultimately worship, in Spirit and in Truth.
We receive the truth in the faith which Mother Church hands on to us; but we have then, in our turn, to live that faith for ourselves, that truth, in Spirit, under the guidance, the impulse and protection, of the Holy Spirit of Jesus dwelling in our hearts nourished by the Eucharist.  As I have just mentioned, it is not a faith for our heads alone … we are meant to treasure it also in our hearts, as did our Blessed Lady, until the warmth of the Holy Spirit dwelling there gradually ignites it and makes it glow, before ultimately causing it to burst into flames – reminiscent of the Spirit Himself -- giving new light and new warmth to all around.
Like the Samaritan villagers in today’s Gospel reading, we believe on hearing the message of salvation, but, in our case, from one deliberately chosen, publicly endowed, and sent by Jesus Himself, that is, Mother Church’s preaching and teaching.  However, it is not meant to stop there, we are called to then live (stay) with Jesus (Who stayed two days with those Samaritans; Who invited Andrew and his companion to go and see, stay a while, with Him).  We in our turn are meant (in our measure) to hold and treasure His teaching in our hearts, and thus come to know Him from our own experience … a person-to-Person knowledge, nourished above all from our closeness to and with Him here at Mass where He sacrifices Himself for us and gives Himself to us in Communion.  That is how we too can say with those Samaritan villagers:
We believe and we have heard (learned, experienced) for ourselves, and we know that this (Jesus) is truly the Saviour of the world.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, may our Blessed Saviour draw us as we proceed with Holy Mass to an ever deeper awareness and appreciation of Himself, and in Him, with Him, by His Spirit, to a truly filial trust of and self-commitment to Him Who is indeed our Father and our fulfilment.  

That love, that appreciation of Our Lord, His Spirit, and the Father is way above what the writer of an 'apologia' (in a famous Catholic Journal just received by me) for what he chooses to call 'de facto' marriages as distinct from 'de iure', Church approved, marriages, is able to appreciate, for he writes, 'For the individuals concerned, their marriage -- 'de facto' or whatever we choose to call it -- is the most important, valuable, and wonderful thing they knew of.'    And that, dear People of God, is the point ... so many are willing put the Faith second in their lives and want us to admire their choice and acknowledge the beauty of their resultant lives.  They may be good human lives, but they are definitely not, as such, Christian lives, lives lived by the Spirit of Jesus, for love of Jesus, and for the glory of the Father.