Fifth Sunday of Lent Year A 2023

 

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 both in the majesty of His divine power and in the depths of His human sympathy.  And yet, most wonderfully of all, we are privileged to learn something of the ineffable beauty of His Personal commitment to, and communion with, His heavenly Father.   This account of the raising of Lazarus is the last of Jesus’ miracles in St. John’s Gospel and, as such, is worthy of our closest 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 Messiah, 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 short 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, and ultimately above all, the faith of Jesus’ chosen disciples upon whom and through whom He will build His future Church; and then, the faith of those very dear friends of His, Martha and Mary and their brother Lazarus.  Their home, in the village of Bethany, was always open to Him and, when needed, served as a place of refuge for Him; as, for example, when - after His triumphal entry into Jerusalem and subsequent cleansing of the Temple -- He left the city, its fickle crowds, and the ever-more critical and threatening plots of the Pharisees and Temple authorities.  The Pharisees were so intent on keeping their human traditions rather than the God-given Law handed down to them by Moses; and the Temple authorities, were outraged that their money-raising on the sacred Temple property had been scuppered by Jesus.

Leaving them, He went out of the city to Bethany, and there He spent the night.   (Matthew 21:16-17)

Everything in this miraculous event is, I say, directed towards faith-in-the-Person of Jesus, here revealing Himself in the full beauty and power of His unique being: Perfect God and Perfect Man.

Jesus reveals not just the reality of His human nature, but also, its divine beauty by the depth of His understanding, and the tenderness of His compassion:

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.”   When Jesus saw her weeping and the Jews who had come with her weeping … He (Himself) wept.

And this He did 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  deeply troubled with a mixture of anger and indignation.

It was in pursuance of such indignation that He asked to be shown the place  where Lazarus had been placed, that there He might make manifest His determination to overthrow 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 came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay across it.  Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the dead man’s sister, said to Him, “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. 

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 keep in mind, for such belief to slow her down.  Her relationship with Jesus was a loosely-binding relationship, in which she recognized One Who was indeed mighty in His power and imposing in His Person as the Christ foretold by the prophets, but not One Who could for long impinge upon Martha’s work-ethic.  Martha would do anything  on this earth for Jesus, but she was not one to sit down and listen intently at the feet of Jesus that she might learn something of the heavenly wisdom so redolent, for Mary, in every word of Jesus   Thus, Martha most probably expressed the thoughts of all the visiting Jews present when she exclaimed, ‘Lord, by now there will be a stench; he has been dead for four days.’

To that Jesus replied, somewhat reprovingly indeed, but again and above all, mysteriously:

            Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?  

Martha’s ‘belief’ needed to be both purified and deepened; for the moment,  though, her undoubted commitment would allow her to see the glory of God as her brother, Lazarus walked out of the tomb – bound though he was by his burial wrappings – at Jesus’ express command!

However, Saint Paul gives us a clue to the yet holier vision of God’s glory to be seen outside that tomb, a glory more likely to be seen by Mary than her sister Martha so thrilled by the re-appearance of Lazarus,  a holiness of which he spoke when writing to his converts at Corinth:

God Who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of (Jesus the) Christ.  (2 Corinthians 4:6)

And indeed, what beauty, what 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.” 

Jesus had undoubtedly spoken to Martha of the glory to be made manifest by the life-giving, life-restoring, miracle He was now about to perform when:

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.”  

Nevertheless, we are surely not erring if, in this case, we allow ourselves to think that the glory of God,  of which St. Paul speaks, the glory visible on Jesus’ up-turned face and which we can still find reflected  in His prayer, was a deeper glory than Martha could ever appreciate, a glory which Mary could perhaps have glimpsed and been totally overwhelmed thereby, indeed a truly divine glory,  expressive of the beauty of Jesus’ total love of His Father and of us; His oneness with and undying presence to His Father; the glory of His absolute selflessness, seeking not His own will, not His own renown, but that of His Father; the glory of His unconditional obedience to and love for His Father.

And again, dear friends, notice that, as we began, so here at the end, this wondrous miracle was entered upon and carried through to fulfilment:

That they may believe. 

‘Believe’ what? 

That is fully clarified when, standing before the tomb of Lazarus and surrounded by the accompanying crowd, Jesus prayed, audibly, saying:

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 Catholic and Christian faith, dear People of God.  Jesus is the Word of God, 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 the difficulties and griefs, in the temptations and trials, of living and dying, the most important question we all will have to answer sometime is, ‘Do you trust in My love, do you believe in My power, to save you?’   And if, in such a moment of  decision, we can say with Martha, ‘Yes Lord, I believe’; and if indeed, we can go further with Mary, trustfully allowing any stone partially blocking the ready entrance to our heart to be fully rolled away,  thus leaving the way to our innermost 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.

 

 

 

           

           

 

           

4th Sunday of Lent Year A 2023

 

4th. Sunday of Lent (A)

(1 Samuel 16:1, 6-7, 10-13; Ephesians 5:8-14; St. John 9:1-41)

 

There is an important, indeed extremely important, Christian truth heard in all three readings at Mass today.

In the first reading David, the ‘baby’ of his family, was chosen by God to be anointed King of Israel by the prophet Samuel in preference to his older, stronger, and more experienced brothers.

In our second reading St. Paul said:

You were darkness once, but now you are Light in the Lord; walk as children of Light, trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord.

And elsewhere, the same Apostle wrote to his converts in Corinth (1 Cor. 1:26-28):

Consider your own calling, brothers. Not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.  Rather, God chose the foolish of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to shame the strong,  and God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are something.

But above all, in the Gospel reading we heard Our Blessed Lord Himself say:

(The man) was born blind so that the works of God might be made visible (manifest) through him. 

God sent His only Son to become Man in order to save all mankind; and He uses certain human individuals to continue and help further that Messianic work of salvation, just as He had used the Israelites, His Chosen People, that they, through their divinely faultless exemplar and most beautiful human embodiment, Mary of Nazareth, and through their inspired prophets and holy, priestly, members might provide a home for the birth and early formation of His supremely Chosen One, His Messiah, His only-begotten Son,  sent by Him to become Man for the salvation of mankind.

But, isn’t that an awful thing to do: use people for your own purposes?

Of course it is wrong for any human being to use others in such a way, but that is not case with God, because He is our Creator, because He is Goodness, Truth, and Life itself, and, as Jesus once said:

I know that His command is eternal life.

 

Dear People of God, there are so many today with no love for God – their personal pride cannot countenance even the thought of obedience on their part – there are so many who are much given to speaking about what God should have done, what he (he, since he is no God for them) ought to do, or, in today’s case, what he should not do!

Our God, however, is a Father we are privileged and proud to obey, and He made us originally in His own image and likeness as the crown of His creation.  When Adam and Eve, using their God-given freedom of will, sinned against God through the deceits of the serpent, God allowed His only-begotten Son, Who was uniquely aware of His Father’s enduring love for us sinners, to become a Man for our salvation.  And, dear People of God, it is  because He loves us so very much, that God can and does use us for His own good purposes which are, precisely, most wisely intended for our own better being and ultimate salvation.

Notice how Jesus was most urgent about showing God’s good purposes in and through this born-blind man: for, without even pausing to ask the man if he had enough faith in Jesus’ power, He willed to begin His work; a  fact which showed that Jesus’ main intention was to do something urgently necessary for His Father’s loving plan of salvation, not something primarily of His (Jesus’) own immediate choosing:

We 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 for the restoration and perfection of 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 to go  – still unseeing! – and wash himself in the pool of Siloam, whereupon, his cure would be completed, and God’s work would be most fully manifested in him and through him to all the Jews and Pharisees around, themselves so wilfully blind in spirit.

The pool of Siloam recalls for us the waters of baptism.   St. John, himself, interprets Siloam as ‘Sent’(9:7) 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:

            These people have rejected the gently flowing waters of Shiloah.

And that pool of Siloam (Sent), dear People of God, 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; but at their repeated questioning, and manifesting a more independent attitude than his fearful parents, he retorted:

            ‘I told you already and you did not listen,

and 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, because he was in no way overawed by his questioners now; indeed he spoke in reply to them as one confident in, and well aware of, his Jewish upbringing and privileges.  Now, moreover, he was beginning, and indeed learning fast, to see into what he had always before unquestioningly assumed; that is, the assumed authority and apparent holiness of these prominent figures now 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.

And now, dear People of God, we can perhaps be coming to understand perhaps why he had been ‘chosen’ by God; for, 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 in sins, and are you trying to teach us?’  Then they threw him out.

Out of the synagogue, that is, and out of official 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 that he had been specially chosen by God the Father to witness to this extraordinary Man 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 ‘ill-used and abused’ -- according to the modern supremely self-righteous critics of God, the ‘woke’ ones -- this unfortunate, born-blind man, had actually, in fact, had his eyes lit, as it were, 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 they led him, to recognize, believe in, and to 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, in a certain sense, even more blessed than Lazarus,  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 society today are so very much aware of their human and personal rights … and thereby have made themselves 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 fearful for themselves.

Both types are so wrapped up in themselves, be it for personal 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 enough, brave enough, to have allowed and committed ourselves to thus be of use to Him.

Our Father Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy will be done in us, for Thy glory and our blessing in Jesus our Lord and Saviour, by Thy most Holy Spirit of Truth and Love.  Amen, amen.

 

3rd Sunday of Lent Year A 2023

 

3^rd. 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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The supreme aspiration of ‘former Christians’ who no longer believe in any God is to be THEMSELVES:  A ‘themselves’ that brings them success?  A ‘themselves’ that wins them the admiration of others?  A ‘themselves’,  perhaps more commonly aspired to, is a ‘themselves’ they can enjoy being?

Above all -- however they aspire to ‘being themselves’ – they want to feel free, FREE of any overseeing, conscience-like, presence, making itself known in their personal lives by claiming some authority over the most important decisions and intimate moments of their lives.

And today you can often hear such people saying, ‘All that matters is to do good’. However, the good they mean is,  good as they see it: marriage is for everybody regardless of child-begetting; sexuality is not to be determined by our birth but is to be subject to whatever might be our personal will or preference; the practice self-discipline can be made much easier for anyone finding it too difficult, by all sorts of ‘life adapting’ operations or treatments.

Yes, modern Western societies are seeking to do various ideas of ‘good’ independent of religion; but – after having rid themselves of any God -- the most important thing is to justify themselves before those remnants of ‘conscience' from which they cannot, as yet, deliver themselves.  Therefore, the ultimate criterion for whatever type of good they adopt is that it be popular; for promoting popularity enables those post-Christianity do-gooders to forget themselves and their remnants of individual conscience, by getting fully involved in promoting, spreading, whipping up, what is popular.  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, dear friends in Christ, in no way should we wilt before such wide-spread and publicly approved attitudes and opinions; rather, let us today notice Our Blessed Lord speaking -- very much as a man, as a Jewish man, of His times -- 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: and ignoring their reference to ‘a Samaritan’

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 honour My Father, but you dishonour 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, dear People of God, and we should assert aright our Christian pride before all modern, godless, do-gooders.

Our old, enduring Catholic Church, our Mother, has made many human mistakes; some of her supposedly faithful priests and children have made many, much worse, human ‘mistakes’; and she, Mother Church, is still slow in advancing towards the youthful beauty and perfection her Lord requires of her.   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 unique and 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 ‘faith and morals’ questions today; how few find the Faith beautiful and ‘interesting’ enough to want, let alone need, to know it better, to understand it more, and to just love it!   Doctrine is there for us (objectively, so to speak), faithfully given us by ‘Old’ Mother Church, to be known and appreciated as God’s gift first of all, before we prayerfully ask God, and calmly consult our own conscience, or even perhaps humbly ask some others for help and/or advice, how best to love and live our Faith.

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; that is, 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 … it is a faith we are meant also to treasure 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; a message received, in our case, from Mother Church’s preaching and teaching.  However, it is not meant to stop there, we are called to then live, and stay, with Jesus (Who stayed two days with those Samaritans; Who invited Andrew and his companion to come and see, to stay a while, with Him).  We in our turn are meant -- in our measure -- to hold and treasure the message we have received, 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 confident self-commitment to, Him Who is indeed our Father and wills to be our eternal fulfilment.