Easter Sunday Year A 2020

 Easter Sunday (Year A)

(Acts 10:34, 37-43; Colossians 3:1-4; Saint John’s Gospel 20:1-9)

My dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, on this glorious day let us look at one verse in our Gospel passage which is rarely noted and which speaks volumes about our Risen Lord.

You heard how John and Peter ran to the tomb and how John glanced inside and saw that there was no corpse there:

He bent down and saw the burial cloths there but did not go in.

Next Peter came up and, characteristically, went straight into the empty tomb and, we are told:

He saw the burial cloths there, and the cloth that had covered Jesus' head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up (folded up) in a separate place.

John, the author of John’s Gospel that is, tells us that John looked in at the strips of linen lying in the tomb and that is all.  He does not say that John believed then, at that moment.  It was only after he entered the tomb after Peter that he saw the face-cloth that had been around Jesus' head folded up by itself and separate from the linen, that we are told that he believed.

Notice that fact dear people: John only believed after seeing the burial face-cloth neatly rolled up, folded, and separate from the much larger cloth that had covered Jesus’ body.  Peter, on the other hand, running more slowly and arriving after the younger John, directly entered the tomb and saw, immediately, that the face-cloth was placed apart from the other cloths.

Now Peter, an older and much more humanly-experienced and emotionally-developed man than John, and the disciple the one who loved Jesus most, coming up, straightway entered the tomb and saw ... and what he saw caused him thoughts so intensely personal that he did not open his mouth to chat with, indeed not even to comment to, his younger companion, fellow-disciple though he was; no, he just slowly left the tomb and walked away quietly, lost in deep, absorbing, thought -- in some likeness to Mary’s own behaviour – treasuring in his heart what his eyes had just seen: Why had his Lord so carefully folded the face-cloth which had been placed around His head to preserve His human dignity -- though that of a corpse -- and prevent His jaw from sagging in death?  Why had Jesus so lovingly rolled up what He had just so decisively and carefully removed from around His head?

Jesus had, at His trial, told Pilate (John 19:27):

For this was I born, for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.  Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to My voice.

and now He was risen from the dead His mouth had to be most obviously free in order to symbolise His enduring proclamation of that truth through the Church, His Church, that will carry on His work -- in His Name and by His authority -- to the end of time!  How gently He folded that cloth which His mother (who else??), with the help of Mary Magdalen, Mary the mother of James, and Salome -- had put round His head with such love and reverence. Never again would He be silenced, and His lovingly detaching and folding the face-cloth from His head and mouth was His first symbolic-statement on rising from the dead: His faithful disciples throughout the ages would continue to proclaim HIS truth, under the guidance and protection of HIS Spirit,  to all mankind, in and through His Church!  

Do we need, People of God, the author of John’s Gospel to tell us that Peter also had believed along with John??

Just recently we read the Gospel passage about Jesus’ miraculously bringing Lazarus back from the dead and from the tomb:

Jesus called in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!"  The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, "Take off the grave clothes and let him go."  (John 11:43-44)

There you see, Lazarus did indeed come out at Jesus’ command but with:

His hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.

He was not able to free himself; Jesus had to authoritatively tell those around:

Take off the grave clothes and let him go.

As you can see there was a big difference between Lazarus’ being raised from the dead and Jesus’ resurrection.  When Jesus Himself rose to life, He simply left the linen cloths behind, though giving special and most meaningful attention to the face-cloth so lovingly placed in position to retain His human dignity, but now yielding place to serve His proclamation of saving truth for the whole world.

Recall now how Jesus appeared to His disciples for the first time:

On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you!" (John 20:19)

Those strips of linen binding His hands and feet in the tomb, in common with the solid, locked doors of the upper room in Jerusalem, could neither restrain nor obstruct the risen Lord of Life because the Risen Lord was glorious.  Lazarus had been called back to ordinary, human, earthly life; Jesus, however, had risen to a new LIFE, not of this creation, but rather of that heavenly Kingdom which He had said was close at hand.

Why then did He not just leave the stones covering the entrance to the tomb?  He could have done that, but just think, who would have known then that the body was no longer in the tomb?  Had He done that and then appeared to His disciples, they would indeed, and for good reason, have thought they were seeing a ghost!

We should now turn our attention to the Resurrection no longer from the point of view of Jesus the Son of Man but from that of Jesus the Son of God, and glimpse something of the supreme Christian mystery: the most Holy Trinity.  God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit: three divine Persons, one God.  How are we to think of our Risen Lord in that respect?   God the Father, to be Father, must have a Son.  God the Father eternally begets His beloved Son Who is like Him in all things save that the Father begets and the Son is the only-Begotten.  The Father from all eternity loves and most intimately knows the Son He begets, and the Holy Spirit is that power of begetting, that power of infinite knowledge and love, uniting Father and Son.  That is why the Holy Spirit is called Gift, for in and through Him the Father and the Son give themselves to each other in total love.

Therefore, you will understand that when God determined that the Son should become man, the Son sent by the Father was conceived of the Holy Spirit; and that is why when the Son -- after His Passion and Death -- was raised to new and eternal life, we read in the Scriptures that both the Father and the Spirit raised Him.

We hear Paul preaching the Gospel to the Jews at Perga saying:

We tell you the good news: What God promised our fathers He has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm: 'You are my Son; today I have become your Father.'  (Acts 13:32-33)

Yet when writing his letter to the Romans (8:10-11) the same Paul says:

But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.   And if the Spirit of Him Who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He Who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, Who lives in you.

And in the letter to the Hebrews (9:14) we see the Holy Spirit again uniting the Son to His Father in Jesus’ very act of dying:

Christ, through the eternal Spirit offered Himself unblemished to God, to cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!

Jesus rose from the dead because He was glorified by the eternal Spirit of glory, love, and power, Who is One with the Father and the Son, the eternal Bond in the one living God.  The human flesh of Jesus had been brought to perfect Sonship through His Passion and Death as the letter to the Hebrews (5:8-9) tells us:

Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from what He suffered and, once made perfect, He became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him.

Jesus, learned that obedience as Man for our sake, for our example and consolation, and His human flesh now glorified in the Spirit, is the channel through which we can in full confidence and hope receive the divine Spirit into our poor, sinful, lives.  In the power of the Spirit, the Bond of love and power uniting Father and Son, the humanity of Jesus Itself becomes a bond, uniting us sinners -- as adopted children in Jesus -- with the All Holy God.  Jesus comes to us now, and offers us His Body and Blood in the Eucharist so that, by receiving His glorious flesh and blood we -- who are of His flesh and blood -- might receive, and hopefully be filled with, His most Holy Spirit, so that Spirit of holiness --  abiding in Mother Church and now given to us -- might begin to form us in the likeness of our beloved Lord and Saviour as children of God, by recalling to Mother Church all that Jesus taught us, and leading her into all truth and grace, so that we, in her and as her faithful children, might be formed into true adopted Children of the heavenly Father.

Dear People of God, glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit in holy mother Church for ever and ever; and may these Easter joys fill and delight your minds and hearts through the faith -- the Catholic and Christian faith -- which has been bestowed on us, which we have received and now embrace with most loving and grateful hearts.  Amen.

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Maundy Thursday 2020

 Maundy Thursday

                 (Exodus 12:1-8, 11-14; 1^st. Corinthians 11:23-26; John 13:1-15)  
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The disciples, even though their time with Jesus was coming to its end, were still far from perfect in their following of Jesus and, apparently -- according to St. Luke -- they had just been quarrelling about who was the greatest among them.  It would seem that for the Supper Judas Iscariot had taken the highest position to the left of Our Lord around the table, while John who, as we know, leant back on the breast of Jesus to ask Him a personal question, would have been reclining on Our Lord’s right.  Peter meanwhile, having taken to heart Jesus’ words chiding them for their lack of humility had, typically, responded whole-heartedly and taken the lowest place, opposite John.  In that way Peter was able to speak directly to John telling him to ask Jesus whom He had in mind when He said that one of them was to betray Him.  This arrangement also explains how Judas could ask Jesus “Lord, not me surely” and Jesus could answer him affirmatively without any of the other disciples hearing His words. 

In the Gospel reading we have heard how Jesus washed the feet of His disciples, exemplifying the humility He wanted them to learn.  He would seem to have begun with Peter seated in the lowest place.  Peter’s loving impetuosity would not allow him to see Jesus humbled before him:

"No," said Peter, "you shall never wash my feet." Jesus answered, "Unless I wash you, you have no part with me."

Why was this washing of the disciple’s feet so important?  Obviously, it was of symbolic importance: “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me” were Jesus’ stern words.  He then went on to explain:

A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.

“And you are clean” Jesus had said, but still the feet had to be washed, or else Peter would have no share with Jesus.

How had the disciples, apart from Judas Iscariot, been made clean?  We are told, by Jesus Himself (John 15:3):

You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.

Clean already in mind and heart by the receiving and believing the truth of Jesus.  That faith, however, had to be translated into works:

I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener.  He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.  You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.  Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me... If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.  If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you.  This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.  (John 15:1-8)

We can perhaps recognize a reference to Judas in the branch that is thrown away and which then withers before being thrown into the fire.  On the other hand, those who remained true to Jesus, who treasured and believed the words He had spoken to them, would now have to let those words bring forth fruit in their lives.  That is why their feet had to be washed, even though they were clean in mind and heart.

We can think of the words of a modern hymn: “Walk with me, oh my Lord, through the darkest night and brightest day, be at my side o Lord, hold my hand and guide me on my way.”  There we describe the course of our lives, the way we respond to all of life’s circumstances, the aims we set for ourselves, as a walking with the Lord.  So it is with the disciples whose feet Jesus must wash if they are to have a share with Him in the Kingdom of God which is now beginning and will ultimately triumph.  What they have received from Him is meant to make them the light of the world and the salt of the earth; their light must shine because it has to enlighten the whole of God’s house:

You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.  Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. (Matthew 5:14-16)

In this movingly memorable scene Jesus gives His disciples -- that includes you and me -- strong teaching to match His strong words to Peter: teaching which not only tells us but also warns us that to have heart and mind washed clean in Christ is not enough if the feet are not daily consecrated by sincere endeavours to walk further along His way and in His service.  That is not all, however, for by so humbly and lovingly washing their feet Jesus indelibly prints on their minds the manner in which they must serve Him: wherever they walk and in all that they do they must seek always to give humble service to each other and to their neighbour.  This attitude will first of all establish unity among the disciples, above all among these future apostles.  No more arguing about who might be the greatest, they must all be willing to humbly serve each other; and then serve with each other the greater good of the flock of Jesus which He has chosen them to lead (Ephesians 4:3):

Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.

Never again would these chosen ones who had seen their Lord and Master humble Himself by washing their feet, allow personal pride to break their apostolic witness to Jesus; on this St. Paul most insistent in his teaching for the churches he established:

There is one body and one Spirit-- just as you were called to one hope when you were called -- one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

We are called, People of God, to be apostles of Christ in our degree.  The teaching and the example so lovingly given by the Lord are for all of us.  Let us aspire more and more to walk along the paths of the Lord in the power of His Spirit: let us not try to kid ourselves into thinking that nice thoughts about Jesus and the Church are enough.  We have to bring forth fruit for the Father’s glory by seriously try to serve Jesus by doing His work with His attitude: finding strength from our unity in the faith of Mother Church and cherishing the joy of true charity in our parish and personal life.

Palm Sunday Year A 2020

 Sermon 172: Palm Sunday (Year A)

(Isaiah 50:4-7; Philippians 2:6-11; Matthew 26:14 – 27:66

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In Matthew's account of the Passion of Our Lord we heard the High Priest say to Jesus:

I adjure You by the living God, that You tell us whether You are the Christ, the Son of God.  

The supreme representative of Judaism in that way expressed both his animosity towards Jesus and his contempt for Him, using the very same words with which Peter had earlier expressed his own deepest faith and heartfelt love for Jesus:

Jesus said to (His disciples), "But who do you say that I am?"  Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." (Matthew 16:16)

Those words, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God", are the embryonic source of all that the Scriptures, the Church's proclamation, and the faith and wisdom of the saints and doctors of succeeding ages, can tell us about Jesus; and they were echoed once again in the simple confession of the pagan Roman soldiers who had witnessed the crucifixion and death of Jesus:

Now the centurion, and those who were with him keeping guard over Jesus, when they saw the earthquake and the things that were happening, became very frightened and said, "Truly this was the Son of God!"  (Matthew 27:54)

Let us, therefore, look more carefully into those words of faith, "Jesus, the Christ, the Son of the living God".

St. Paul leads us along the way:

Although He existed in the form of God, Jesus did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.  Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Jesus, setting aside the glory that was His as Son of God, lived most of His years in humble obscurity before entering upon His public ministry.  There He quickly encountered such mounting opposition and deepening enmity, that ultimately, He was led to embrace the disgrace, torment and emptiness, of the Cross out of love for His Father and for us.  In the course of His short life He thus experienced all the sufferings foretold by the prophet Isaiah for the One who was to come, the Suffering Servant of the Lord:

I gave My back to those who strike Me, and My cheeks to those who pluck out the beard; I did not cover My face from humiliation and spitting.  For the Lord GOD helps Me, therefore, I am not disgraced; therefore, I have set My face like flint.  And I know that I will not be ashamed, He who vindicates Me is near.

There is, however, yet more for us to appreciate about Jesus' sacrificial love, more even than what was apparently involved in dying on the Cross; because the Gospel tells us of the last few audible words spoken by Jesus in His agony, words which introduce us into the secret drama of His sublime love and crucial prayer.

The agony was terrible, His strength was well-nigh gone; therefore, the spoken words were few, but the prayer continued to the very end of His life in the depths of His Personal communion with His heavenly Father:

            MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?

By summoning up His last dregs of energy in order to utter those few audible words He wanted us to know not only the words of His final prayer but also to appreciate aright the attitude of His soul going into death.   Taking upon Himself the ultimate burden of our sins, Jesus willed to experience  what was totally alien and absolutely abhorrent to His personal Self and very being, He chose to embrace for us the ultimate human agony resulting from sin: the human feeling of being abandoned by God; and for that ultimate humiliation of Himself for us men He also prepared His ultimate healing by choosing a prayer taken from Scripture, it was Psalm 22.

After those few audible, opening, words, the psalm, as I said, is continued in Jesus' heart and mind as He was hanging in silence on the Cross before His Father: a heartfelt prayer, recounting and embracing the sufferings He was enduring, then going on to express His prayer for deliverance, before finally exploding into praise of God and prayer for His brethren in the great assembly:

I will declare Your name to My brethren; in the midst of the assembly I will praise You.   My praise shall be of You in the great assembly. Let the humble eat and be satisfied; let those who seek the LORD praise Him.  May your hearts live forever!  All the ends of the world shall remember and turn to the LORD, and all the families of the nations shall worship before Him.  For the kingdom is the LORD's, and He rules over the nations.  All who sleep in the earth will bow low before Him; all who have gone down into the dust will kneel in homage; and I shall live for Him. A posterity shall serve Him. Future generations will be told about the Lord and proclaim His deliverance to a people yet unborn, saying that He has done this.

So, Jesus on the Cross prayed that, beyond His imminent death on that instrument of torture and shame, He might be able to humbly serve His disciples yet further, even to the end of time.  It was not His will to rest totally in that glory which was His with the Father before time began, and which would be His again in His Resurrection and Ascension.  He willed also to continue His self-oblation, self-emptying, and self-giving, in and through His Church: His word in her proclamation; His Blessing in her ministry; His food, indeed His very own Body and Blood, by the hands of her Apostles and priests chosen and ordained to offer His most Personal act of love and self-sacrifice for her nourishment and fulfilment: Jesus to the end of time humbling Himself in her and for  her in order to win and lead His earthly brethren back to the Father of all Glory! 

Dear People of God, all you who are called to be true disciples of Jesus, never forget that even in the utmost depths of apparent abandonment prayer is still possible for you, Jesus says; even at the very threshold of feared retribution, your prayer can still be acceptable to the God Whose love is pledged and unending.

Jesus continued His saving work even on the Cross, even t-h-r-o-u-g-h His agony, even into the peace of His total abandonment to, and complete trust in, His Father; and the letter to the Hebrews tells us that He was heard in this His prayer:

In the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His reverence.  Although He was Son, He learned obedience from what He suffered; and having been made perfect, He became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him. (5:7-9)

And so, to this very day, Jesus the Christ, the Son of the living God, is present to His Church in His Word and in His Eucharist, be it for honour, or neglect, for love or despising; and He continues to work in us and in our world, by His Spirit, through you and me, and through countless others like us.  And even though our inadequacy, our weakness, and at times our sinfulness, continue to humble Him; nevertheless -- and this is His supreme desire -- His love will never fail to invite, to support, and to inspire us.

Let us therefore pray that we may sincerely and whole heartedly revere Him at Mass, both in His Word and in His Eucharistic Sacrifice and Presence;  and let us beg  that we may thereby be so freed from sin as to allow the Spirit He gives us to work  ever more fully in us and through us, for the greater glory of His and our Father, and for the salvation of all men and women of good will in our suffering world.