3rd Sunday of Easter Year B 2018

3^rd. SUNDAY of EASTER (B)

(Acts of the Apostles 3:13-15, 17-19; 1 John 2:1-5; Luke 24:35-48)

The two disciples whom Jesus had overtaken walking towards Emmaus, although their hearts had been burning within them as He spoke with them and opened the scriptures to them, had only finally recognized Him at the breaking of bread during a meal which they had invited Him to share with them.  On their receiving the bread He had blessed, He suddenly disappeared, whereupon they set off back to Jerusalem at once to inform the apostles that very hour.

Notice, however, that when Jesus appeared again to those same disciples together with the eleven apostles and others, all gathered together secretly in that upper room:

While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, He asked them, ‘Have you anything to eat?’  They gave Him a piece of fish, (which) He took and ate in front of them.

This time Jesus did not confirm His identity by sharing bread and wine with them, He simply confirmed that He was no ghost by eating some fish before them.  Why did He not break bread with them as He had done before?  It is true that unlike the two disciples on the way to Emmaus, the Eleven here in Jerusalem had indeed recognized Him from the beginning although they could hardly believe, as it was said, ‘for joy’.  Nevertheless, there is a more fundamental reason for Jesus’ behaviour in the private room at Jerusalem which is closely connected with our other readings today.

In the Gospel reading we heard first that Jesus took care to explain to His disciples the nature of His presence with them.  First of all, He was not with them as He had been previously:

He said to them, "These are My words that I spoke to you while I was still with you.”

In other words, He was saying, “I am here with you now, but not as I was with you when I spoke those words to you a short while ago.”  His new presence was different: previously He had been with them as any man is with his fellow men; however, things had changed and Jesus was no longer present to them in an ordinary, worldly, way.

Let us now note just how different was His new presence with them, and how He would make Himself present to His disciples in the future.

First, He took great care to explain His presence in the Scriptures:

“Everything written about Me in the Law of Moses and in the Prophets and Psalms must be fulfilled."  Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.

That presence in the Scriptures might be called His first mode of presence to His disciples after His Resurrection because it begins with the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms, as Jesus Himself said, ‘Moses wrote about Me’.

A new mode presence was recounted for us in the Gospel reading by the report brought by those two disciples who had been on the way to Emmaus telling:

            How Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of bread.

That new and second manner of presence -- His Eucharistic presence -- had been prepared for by Jesus in His teaching and miracles during the course of His public ministry, before being formally instituted at the Last Supper with His Apostles.

In our Gospel reading today, however, a third mode of His presence is drawn to our attention by His not celebrating the Eucharist with those assembled in the room on this occasion.  He was not present in that Jerusalem room by virtue of the Eucharist, instead He confirms the reality of a third mode of presence:

Look at My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Touch Me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have."

"Have you anything here to eat?"  They gave Him a piece of a baked fish; He took it and ate it in front of them.

This is the presence He had foretold with the words:

Where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them. (Matthew 18:20)

We can find Jesus, experience in varying measure His presence, in the Old Testament Scriptures, in the Eucharist, and in the Church gathered together in His name, as we are today, to hear and appropriate His Gospel.  He is not with us today as an ordinary human being, as was the case formerly with His disciples in Palestine; but He is always present for us foreshadowed in the ancient Scriptures; always spiritually present with and powerfully addressing those assembled together to hear and promote His Gospel; and supremely, always Personally present in His Eucharist sacrifice and feast.

As Peter explained to those who had witnessed his cure of the lame man:

By faith in His name, this man, whom you see and know, His Name has made strong, and the faith that comes through It has given him this perfect health, in the presence of all of you.  (Acts 3:16)

Living by ‘faith in His name’ is the supremely authentic way of responding with personal love to Jesus’ gracious Personal presence, and with a commitment of obedient and public witness to His word, as St. John told us in his letter for our second reading:

Whoever keeps His word, the love of God is truly perfected in him. By this we know that we are in Him.

The way that we may be sure that we know Him is to keep His commandments.

By signalling the various modes of His presence to and for His believers Jesus was preparing His Church for her great world-wide mission to proclaim:

            Repentance and forgiveness of sins in His name to all the nations.

The early Christians were still very closely bound up with their Jewish brethren in the synagogue; indeed, many still worshipped with them in the Temple and in the synagogue.  However, in our Gospel reading Jesus is preparing His Church for the future and it is essential that her proclamation be recognized as independent of her Jewish origins: those origins are never to be denied but they are not, henceforth, to be racially restrictive or spiritually definitive:

Repentance and forgiveness of sins are to be preached in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.  You are witnesses of these things.

For all disciples of Jesus, the Torah -- the unattainable perfection of prescriptive Law -- must yield to the Gospel, the Good News of God’s grace; Mother Church would replace the Temple as the ‘house’ where God is pleased to dwell and be found, to be praised and share His glory, to be invoked and give His blessing.   However, God Himself would no longer be glorified simply as the Lord of Creation, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Who formed Israel and rescued her from the slavery of Egypt and Who brought her back again from exile in Babylon.  He now wills to be recognized above all as the One God Who sent His only begotten Son to put on human flesh, and Who, on raising Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour in that human flesh from the bonds of death, has formed a new creation: a family of adopted children sharing in the glory of His only Son and being led from earthly exile back to their Father’s presence by His Gift of the Holy Spirit.   

He Who sat on the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new."    And He said to me, "Write, for these words are true and faithful." (Revelation 21:5)

And now, we can recognize and admire, indeed love, another mystery – God’s mysteries are always astoundingly beautiful, wondrously fulfilling, endlessly and intriguingly absorbing – which is Our Blessed Lady’s membership of the original Church; for that presence of Mary was surely the nearest thing to the presence of Jesus Himself for His nascent Church, for who could look at, listen to, her without thinking of Jesus?   It was a presence specially bestowed for the Church’s sufferings at her birth in this sinful world.

After the indescribable joy of her dear Son’s Resurrection; after the happiness she had known at His Ascension, what else remained for Mary on earth?  How could she possibly look forward to anything ahead of her here below; her Lord and Saviour, her Love, her only begotten Son, had gone.  She rejoiced for Him and recognized His disciples most gratefully, but for herself?  Why had she not been allowed … somehow ... to follow her Son, why did He not call her to Himself in, or after, His Ascension?   Happily, Mary had long ago learnt to die to herself, and so, if any thoughts such as these entered her mind she would most certainly never have entertained or dwelt on them in any way.

However, there was something she could never forget, nor try to set aside: her Son’s dying words to her:

            Woman, behold your son!

Those words, beginning with that portentous word ‘Woman’ meant so much on His lips, let alone on His dying lips!!  What did they mean for her??

There are but two facts we know that can illuminate this part of Mary’s life on earth after her Son’s Resurrection and Ascension: first of all, from the Church’s viewpoint, she was needed to be mother, the mother, for all the children Jesus had, from His Cross, committed to her loving care.  She understood easily her role with regard to John, Jesus’ youngest disciple … but were there others?   That address, ‘Woman’ seemed to suggest the possibility that perhaps there might be others??  She only knew that she would have to wait, pray about, listen for, and then follow Jesus’ Gift of the Holy Spirit to His Church.

To our great delight Mary’s subsequent experience of the Spirit in her heart, and in her life and work with and for her new children in Jesus’ Church, was such as to prepare her finally to follow, fully and uniquely, her beloved Son.  At the Father’s behest, and in the power of His Spirit, she would indeed follow Jesus, and thanks to her experience in His Church, she would be fully able and prepared to embrace and respond to her ultimate destiny and calling, as Queen of Heaven, leaving behind her such a blessed memory among her children on earth, that the Church Jesus had founded and endowed would henceforth be both gratefully and lovingly called Mother Church by her devoted children.

2nd Sunday of Easter Year B 2018

2^nd. Sunday of Easter (B)  

    (Acts of the Apostles 4:32-35; 1^st. Letter of John 5:1-6; John 20:19-31)


Jesus said to Thomas, "Have you come to believe because you have seen Me?  Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed."  Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples that are not written in this book.

What precisely was John’s meaning in that passage from today’s Gospel reading?

Having just reported Jesus as saying:

Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed;

he then himself added:

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples that are not written in this book.

It would seem that John is saying that he has omitted to tell us of many other signs  accomplished by Jesus in the presence His disciples because of the Risen Lord’s words of solemn admonition to Thomas:

          Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed,

which imply that many signs should really not be necessary. 

John seems to have thought that those believers to whom he was writing after the Resurrection of the Lord, were better placed than Thomas and himself, along with the other disciples, had been before Jesus’ Resurrection: ‘you shouldn’t need me to tell you now of all Jesus’ signs and miracles, whereas we – Thomas especially, myself, and the others -- loving disciples though we were, had been weak in those early days because we did not, at the time, have that fullness of faith which is now yours’.

In his letter John also says:

Who indeed is the victor over the world, but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

Here he is taking up again his Gospel teaching, saying that whoever believes that Jesus is the Son of God, that is, whoever is one of those praised by Jesus for believing without ‘seeing’, such a one has overcome the world; and his victory over the world is proved by the fact that he is spiritually alive and strong in Jesus without any requirement of worldly evidence.   Indeed, need for worldly corroboration could only signal a weakness in the spiritual life of a true Christian.

Now, why does John praise such an attitude in response to Jesus’ gospel?

Not, indeed, because he wants to signal out and laud any human being for his or her own individual spiritual strength, but rather to show us all how sublime and divinely spiritual is Christian faith, since, ultimately, only God the Father can introduce us to such faith, as John tells us in his Gospel (6:43-45):

Jesus said to the Jews, "Do not murmur among yourselves.  No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.  It is written in the prophets, 'And they shall all be taught by God.' Therefore, everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to Me.

Worldly evidence cannot establish the spiritual realities of our Christian faith, it can only help our faithful appreciation of them.  Acceptance of the Gospel message on the basis of worldly evidence is no authentic substitute for true faith given in response to God’s grace inspiring our heart, enlightening our mind, and moving our will.  John is not against us using our natural intelligence in response to the Gospel of Jesus, after all, he expressly tells us why he wrote his Gospel:

These (signs) are written that you may believe (that they may help you believe) that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.

Rather is it that, for St. John, the supreme function of the Gospel message is to provoke, awaken and promote our awareness of, our contact with and response to, God Himself; and that contact, that response, though based essentially on the Gospel message, is not to be limited to or constrained by the written words of the Gospel.   The truth about Jesus, and indeed about God, is broader, wider, goes deeper and higher, is more intimately personal than the inspired but human words of the Gospels; that is why we Catholics accept the Tradition of the Church and acknowledge development in the doctrine of Faith; all, however, on the basis of, and never in contradiction to, the original Gospel proclamation.  And that is also why the Catholic Church has always recognized, revered and delighted in, her authentic saints as shining beacons and inspiring examples of that possibility open to all her faithful children for wondrous personal communion with God and those closest to Him in our heavenly home.

And here we have come to the essential characteristic of our Christian, Resurrection, Faith.  It is not simply a faith to be learned, it is not even just a faith to be loved; it is a faith to be experienced, loved, and lived: not only in the sense of obeying its commands and fighting for its rights, but, above all, as a communion with the Father, in His Incarnate Son our Lord and Saviour, by God’s great Gift, His most Holy Spirit.   The Catholic Church, the Church which is the Body of Christ living by the Spirit of Christ, is able to receive God-given grace and guidance to appreciate -- and more appropriately, more fully, understand – the Good News of Jesus’ Gospel, through her living communion with God.  Mother Church today is still called to allow herself to be inspired by God, not indeed to write or proclaim a new revelation, but to understand more fully and appreciate more deeply the revelation originally and finally given to her by God.

This is why the Catholic Church can never be or become a university Church in which the teaching of God is subject to exclusively rational argument and justification, a Church where only that teaching which, having been sifted and given a majority vote of scholarly approval, is considered suitable for provisional acceptance as Church doctrine.  Nor, on the emotional side, can the Church of Jesus -- inspired by the Spirit for the ultimate glory of the Father’s inconceivable goodness and holiness – ever be subject to human pseudo-spiritual and/or emotional approval: that is, what modern men and women may regard as ‘nice’ or ‘not nice enough’ when predicated of God.  For example, some seem to think that the following words of Jesus Himself are ‘not suitable’ for people today:

Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in Gehenna.  (Mt. 10:28)

The true Church is a mystical Church where worldly perceptions and human reasoning -- whether merely rational or emotionally ‘spiritual’ -- are most certainly not the authentic ways of approaching and evaluating Jesus’ teaching and divine truths. In Mother Church scholarly techniques and attainments, though widely employed, gratefully used, and truly appreciated, are also necessarily subjected to the transcendent authority of the Good News and especially the very words of Our Lord Jesus Christ; subject, that is, to a spiritual and divine awareness, gleaned and received under the guidance of the Spirit, from communion with, and response to, the revealing and redeeming God.

All this is contained in those words of our Creed which say: ‘I believe in one, holy, CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC Church’, or put in another way, ‘I believe in one holy Church – Jesus’ Church -- because it is Catholic and Apostolic’.   Those words do not simply state that we believe the Catholic Church to have been founded by Jesus Christ and established on His Apostles, to be guided and preserved by His Spirit; they also mean that it is only in the Catholic Church -- only in her atmosphere, so to speak -- that we are able to breath fully as Christians, fully endowed and empowered to believe aright the fullness of truth  about God and His will for the salvation of mankind.

Whoever is begotten by God conquers the world.   And the victory that conquers the world is our faith.

         The Spirit is the One that testifies, and the Spirit is truth.

Oh, you believing Catholics, appreciate and be grateful for the treasure you have been given!  John, the Apostle whom Jesus loved particularly, accounts you as -- in some measure -- better placed in relation to Jesus than he himself was in the days of the Lord’s public ministry!!   What is more, your faith has been given to you at the instigation of heavenly Father Himself Who has P/personally called you and introduced you to Jesus; and that faith is being continually nourished and purified -- even to this very day, at this very hour – by the Holy Spirit of Truth and Love, in the womb of Mother Church, with a view to your sharing and living fully and eternally in the Body of Christ.    Amen.

Easter Sunday 2018

Easter Sunday 2018

           

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

  

 

     God raised (Jesus) on the third day and granted that He be visible to us.

Those words of St. Peter are the culmination of an age-long awareness and expectation in Israel, where the third day was of special significance for Jewish piety.  In the book of Genesis we are told that Abraham, in obedience to the voice of God, was taking his only son Isaac to offer him in sacrifice to the Lord on the mount which the Lord would show him.  Sorrowing father and innocent, unknowing son, were journeying on, together with some servants, when:

On the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you."   (Genesis 22:4-5)

On the third day Abraham had observed Mount Moriah where he believed his son had to be sacrificed to the Lord; in the event, however, it turned out to be the mount where the son was not only restored unharmed to his father, but restored as the sign of God’s enduring promise of blessing for Abraham and God’s chosen people (Gen. 22:16-17):

Because you have not withheld your only son – blessing I will bless you and multiply your descendants as the stars of heaven and as the sand on the seashore; and your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies.

Again, in the prophecy of Hosea (6:1-3) there is consolation for sinful, suffering, Israel:

Come, and let us return to the LORD; for He has torn, but He will heal us; He has stricken, but He will bind us up.   After two days He will revive us; on the third day He will raise us up, that we may live in His sight.   Let us know, let us pursue the knowledge of the LORD.  His going forth is established as the morning; He will come to us like the rain, like the latter and former rain to the earth.

You can understand, therefore, what Easter comfort and joy the disciples experienced on recalling such texts after having found the empty tomb and seen the Risen Lord!  The ultimate bearer of God’s promise, Jesus Whom they had known and loved, had risen on the third day: death could not hold Him!  Satan had been defeated, and his power over mankind forever broken and shattered!!  That is why Peter could so confidently proclaim to Cornelius and his family whom, under the command of the Holy Spirit, he was about to baptise (Acts 10:39-42):

We are witnesses of all things which He did both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, Whom they killed by hanging on a tree.  Him God raised up on the third day, and showed Him openly, not to all the people, but to witnesses chosen before by God, even to us who ate and drank with Him after He arose from the dead.  And He commanded us to preach to the people, and to testify that it is He Who was ordained by God to be Judge of the living and the dead.

Let us now turn to our reading from St. Paul and allow him to guide our thoughts:

If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.  Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.   For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
  

Paul thus extends this wondrous event of Jesus’ rising from the dead to include us:

You have died (with Christ), and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 

How can he say that we died with Christ?  Because Christ died as Lord and Saviour of all mankind; though sinless, He died a sinner’s death for our sake and on our behalf.  Moreover, when He had died to sin, what chance was there that anyone else could ever overcome the power and the horror of death which is the sting in the tail of sin?  When He died on Good Friday all our hopes seemed to die with Him; and on Holy Saturday His disciples experienced only the hopelessness, helplessness, and indeed the emptiness of our native, sinful, condition.

But now, Peter and Paul, together with all the apostles, bear witness that God has raised Jesus from the dead; and, since He is risen, Paul says, you -- you who believe in Him and in the God Who raised Him -- you too are risen with Him since you have the opportunity of sharing in His new, risen, Life: because of your faith in Him you are no longer subject to the frustrations and ultimate horror of earthly death, no longer bound by sin in your native pride and self-solicitude:

“O Death, where is your sting?  O Hades, where is your victory?"  The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the Law.  But thanks be to God, Who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Corinthians 15:55-58)

But Paul also said that we too are seated with Christ at the right hand of God.  Now, we firmly believe that Jesus, the Holy One of God, is seated at the right hand of the Father, and we also believe that He continually intercedes for us; but how are we seated with Him at the right hand of the Father?

The answer is that we are not, of course, physically seated with Him now in heaven; nevertheless, heaven is where the vital powers of our spiritual life originate and whither they are leading us.  Jesus is physically, in His glorious humanity -- our humanity received without sin from Mary and now glorified as Jesus’ Personal humanity in heaven -- at the right hand of the Father.  Moreover, He is also physically with us -- in a sacramental manner -- in the Eucharist, whereby He draws us up, into Himself through the Spirit.  Our heavenly food -- the driving force of supernatural life within us -- is the living Body of the One seated at the right hand of the Father in glory; and the more we live by that food, the more we live by His Gifted Spirit, the more He draws us closer and more intimately into Himself.  For the sake of all mankind He has taken our humanity into glory: none are barred from sharing His glory by reason of their humanity.

However, we have yet surer basis for hope than the mere fact that our human nature is no longer barred from heaven: for each of us has been called, drawn to Jesus -- personally and individually -- by the Father Himself, as Jesus most explicitly said:

No one can come to Me unless the Father Who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.  (John 6:44)

And so, having obediently answered the Father’s call, we have allowed ourselves to be drawn by the Father to Jesus, and we have come to believe in Jesus as the Son of God made man; and, having been baptised into Him as our Lord and Saviour, we have now been endowed with, and justified by, His Gift of the Holy Spirit, as St. Paul tells us:

Moreover, whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.  What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?  (Rom. 8:30-31)

Today Jesus is risen and we are potentially, no more than that, we who have faith in Him are already initially glorified in Him: for we who receive the Body and Blood of the Risen Lord in true faith are now assured that we are being actually guided by the Spirit of Jesus, the Holy Spirit of God, towards heaven – as both our destiny and our home -- because our food of life, the Eucharist is, sacramentally, the very same Body which is Jesus’ in heaven; and thus God’s Gift of the Holy Spirit, bestowed on us through the Eucharist, is now at work forming us ever more in Jesus’ likeness, so that we -- as living members, in Spirit and Truth, of His Mystical Body on earth -- might ultimately be able to share in the eternal glory which is His, in the Spirit, before His Father in heaven. 

For your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with Him in glory.

The Father has received His Beloved Son back and, living in the Father’s heavenly presence, His Son is the bearer of an eternal promise, that where He is, we -- who through faith and baptism are members of His mystical Body -- may be:

Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. (John 17:24)

Such is, indeed, the Lord Jesus’ prayer today in our regard; and what hope of glory and fulfilment it holds out for us in the future, what joy and peace it can bring us now, if we pray in unison with Jesus, and live in a way that makes such a prayer credibly ours!  Consequently, we who entertain such hopes surely cannot allow ourselves to live a life of worldly obsession, constantly searching and striving for what the world promises, whilst largely forgetting our heavenly vocation and future.  Even Jesus’ prayer that we ‘may be with Him where He is’ can only bear effect in the lives of those who are open to, and in tune with, such a prayer; that is, in the lives of those who seek communication and communion with Him more seriously and lovingly than they search for earthly success, earthly rewards, human sympathy and human companionship.  And so, let us never forget St. Paul’s admonition in today’s readings:

If you were raised with Christ, seek what is above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.  Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.

Let us, dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, follow such advice in the spirit of today’s wonderful celebration, taking very much to heart the words of the prophet Nehemiah:

Go your way, eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our LORD. Do not sorrow, for the joy of the LORD is your strength." (Nehemiah 8:10)

Maundy Thursday 2018

Maundy Thursday 

This is a most holy and a most joyful night: it is a night of family feasting in grateful remembrance of God’s wondrous blessings.  It is indeed a family night because the Passover feast was, from the times of Moses, not a temple feast celebrated according to minute details of ritual, but a family gathering in the privacy of the home, a celebration with family and friends.

On returning home for this celebration, and after prayer, the head of the family gathering had to consider himself a prince: decorating his table with the best food and the most acceptable wines.  In fact, it was his duty to prepare sumptuously according to the measure of his possibilities.   We are told in the Gospels that Jesus reclined at table with His disciples for the Last Supper as we call it today.  This was prescribed for faithful Jews; they would have been seated for an ordinary meal, but for this special Passover meal they had to eat reclining, stretched out on their left side with head towards the food; it was a symbol of the liberty they were celebrating, the liberty God had won for His Chosen People by the wonders He had worked in Egypt and throughout their desert wanderings, delivering them from slavery and bringing them to the freedom they now enjoyed.  They had much to be grateful for, and this was the night on which they gave whole-hearted expression to that gratitude, in accordance with the Lord’s command.  Each generation of faithful Israelites was taught to consider that they themselves had been brought out of Egypt, saved from slavery, by the Lord; they were not celebrating something that happened in the past to their fathers only; no, they had to realize that they themselves were among those that had been saved by the Lord.  The sages, the wise men, of Israel, when speaking of this night’s celebration, tell us that when it is celebrated with such dispositions, the God of Israel, the Holy One Himself, leaves His normal, familiar, entourage of angels and of the righteous in the Garden of Eden, and comes this night, to watch with delight the children of Israel here on earth rejoicing in the deliverance He won for them, gratefully singing His praises and loyally observing His commandments.

This was an occasion to which Jesus had really been looking forward:

I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. (Luke 22:15)

We must be quite clear about this: the Last Supper was no sad occasion for saying “Good-by”.  How on earth could Our Lord have “eagerly desired” to eat a sorrowful leave-taking meal with His disciples?  This was, on the contrary, something to be “eagerly desired”, something towards which His whole life’s work had been leading, something that would express the fulfilment of all His efforts and desires for His disciples and for us.  This was no sorrowful leave-taking anticipating the end of a lovely earthly relationship, it was the preparation for a new and heavenly future for believers in Jesus, and our memorial of it should be a festal gathering:

How eagerly I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.

Why so eagerly?  Because this meal was the symbol of, the ultimate preparation for, and above all, the decisive inauguration of that heavenly banquet celebrating and conferring the salvation brought by Jesus: freedom from sin, and membership -- as adopted children in Christ -- into the family of God, where all can call Him “Father” and have a share in His eternal blessedness, according to the words,

Blessed are those who are called to His Supper.

That was the blessing the Son had come to bring to a humanity which had long been in darkness, had long been alienated from true happiness and life: a humanity created by God and for God, but deceived by Satan and enchained by sin; a humanity which stirred such compassion in the Father that He sent His only Son to share in and to save the weakness of human flesh by dying sinless and rising again; and in the power of His Resurrection pouring out His Holy Spirit upon those who would believe in His name, the Spirit who would form those disciples in the likeness of their Lord for the glory of the Father.

It was now so near to fulfilment; this was no time for sad reminiscences of the past but for ardent longings for what was to come: Jesus was indeed to suffer and to die but that was for a purpose which would be surely achieved through His suffering and death.

Let us now just look at that suffering and death, which was so close at hand but which, Jesus refused to allow to deter Him:

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, Who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12:2)

It might have seemed that Jesus’ life was to be taken from Him by the superior power of death after having been betrayed by those to whom He had been sent and condemned by official fear and hatred.  Had that been the case, then indeed, Jesus’ death would have been the supreme tragedy and the Last Supper an occasion for agonizing farewells and deep-felt loss.  That was not what Jesus wanted and was not what Jesus was going to allow.  This meal and the morrow's crucifixion were to be occasions of deepest fulfilment, joy and love, because at this Supper Jesus deliberately offered His coming crucifixion and death to His Father, resolving to accept it and embrace it out of obedient love for His Father.  It would not be the power of sin and death which would take away His life from Him, but rather -- just as now He was offering it, to His Father -- so tomorrow He would be giving it in obedience to His Father’s will and purpose for His only-begotten Son made flesh for us.  His suffering and death would not be the tragic betrayal that Judas’ action would seem to signify; because that Passion and Death was being dedicated and offered by Jesus now to wipe away the sins and betrayals of men and women of all times.  The whole tenor of tomorrow’s crucifixion was being pre-determined now, at this meal, by Jesus.  He would die out of obedient and loving zeal for His Father, out of redeeming love for the whole human race.

At the Passover Meal the Jews celebrated God’s wonders in Egypt which saved the nation from physical slavery; how much more should we, the new People of God, celebrate the wonder of God’s love for us manifested in the gift of His Son to us and for us?  How much more should we rejoice in the love which Jesus had and has for us; that love which led Him to endure the Cross and to scorn its shame so that He might enable us to have access, in Him, to our heavenly home:

Who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Tonight, Jesus rejoices that by dying He is going to destroy death and turn betrayal into faithful love; He rejoices that soon He will meet up, once again, with His disciples in the great joy of a heavenly banquet shared among friends; friends to whom, in the meantime, He is going to leave this pledge and this food along with the loving request: Do this in memory of Me.

Palm Sunday Year B 2018

Palm Sunday (B) 2018

(The Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ according to Mark)

In the responsorial psalm today you repeated words that were horrendous, coming, as they once did, from the mouth of Jesus:

My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?

Such a cry can only have been forced out of Jesus by unimaginably intense suffering, for He was, on earth, the very Son of God made flesh: as a Child He had been loved and taught by Mary, protected by Joseph; He grew up in constant favour with God and man; and  His great delight was to learn from the Scriptures to recognize with His human mind and  respond with His human heart to His heavenly Father more and more, day by day; He had been sent and endowed to save Israel and, indeed, the whole of mankind; and in all that He did He sought only to please and give glory to His Father in Heaven.  How intense, therefore, must those sufferings have been which led Him to cry out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?  Listen to the psalm again (22:7-8):

All who see Me mock at Me; they mock Me with parted lips, they wag their heads: “He relied on the Lord; let Him deliver Him, let Him rescue Him, if He loves Him.”  

It is hard to suffer unjust, ignorant, derision; derision from those of no principles whose life-course bends with every prevailing wind, and whose only courage is to run with the hounds and share in the pleasures of the mob.

But even those who find themselves having to endure such derision -- when they have been finally brought low, and their suffering and agony is visible to all -- will hear, at times, individual voices being raised on their behalf, or perhaps find themselves being accorded some compassionate and sympathetic gestures from one or two onlookers more humane or tender-hearted than the others.  There were, indeed, some such who witnessed Jesus’ agony; but they were only tender-hearted, they had no understanding of Jesus’ P/person and character, no appreciation of His aims and purpose.  And they only lamented, since no one actually spoke up for Jesus personally, with the result that His persecutors were able to laugh at His loneliness.  Even worse, in their laughter they mocked at His very thread of life saying:

          He relied on the Lord, let Him rescue Him, if He loves Him!

Yes, Jesus had trusted in the Lord, His Father!  Throughout His life He had trusted totally in His Father and He knew that His Father was totally trustworthy.  Now, however, it seemed that, as His life was draining away, He was leaving a situation totally at variance with the ideal for which He had lived.  Jesus had wanted to lead His fellow Jews to recognise the Father He proclaimed as the one true God Whom they and their fathers had always worshiped: the one God and Father Whose wisdom and goodness could only be most fittingly learnt and most fully appreciated from the witness and teaching of His only-begotten Son now become man.  And here were those to whom He had been sent, and for whom He had laboured long and suffered much, mocking His Father and their God with their jibe: “let Him save this fellow if this fellow is His friend”.

Compared to this Personal agony the physical torment was as nothing; nevertheless, physical torment it was: He could count every one of His bones and was wracked by agonizing cramps as He hung there; breathing was so horribly difficult for Him, continually having to struggle to raise up His rib cage enough to experience but the slightest relief from the dreadful and continuous threat of being smothered; and then those holes in His hands and feet were pouring out His life-blood and leaving Him with such a terrible thirst!

The psalm which Jesus was reciting went on:

But You, O Lord, be not far from Me; O My help, hasten to aid Me;

witnessing to the fact that He trusted His Father to the end; indeed, the psalm closes with words of triumph:

I will proclaim Your name to My brethren; In the midst of the assembly I will praise You.  You who fear the LORD, praise Him!  All you descendants of Jacob, give glory to Him, revere Him, all you descendants of Israel!

However, granting such a final outcome, the question becomes all the more pressing: why did Jesus have to suffer so dreadfully in order to complete the work of our salvation?

It was not only to save us from our sins, His holiness and majesty were infinitely more than sufficient for that; but to restore and renew us individually so that each of us might be able to recognize and respond to the love of His Father, from Whose  loving approval we had all originally turned at the behest of the serpent … all that required and still requires our individual humble and loving co-operation!

And so, Jesus did not suffer horribly simply because it needed such suffering to free all of us from the weight of our sins; no, He suffered so much to show and hopefully convince us, His brethren, to just what extent He Himself would, and we, each and every one of us, could and should, trust the Father.  He willingly emptied Himself entirely of any Personal dignity, physical and emotional reserves of strength, of any hope of possible escape or deliverance other than His Father’s love and faithfulness which, however, He could no longer feel or imagine.   He suffered thus because He wanted to proclaim to suffering humankind that no matter what their situation – for no human suffering could possibly measure up to this – the Father was the One to trust.  He might have said this again in words, but words could in no way give the weight of conviction offered by the living example of this Man who, so totally forgetful of Himself, was relinquishing all that He had and was, and committing Himself into His Father’s loving arms while agonizing on the Cross, in order to make manifest to sinful men just how good, how totally admirable and absolutely trustworthy, the Father is.  Only by thus enduring and triumphing over the worst the devil might inflict would Jesus be able free us from fear of the devil by giving us an unquenchable hope in the Father’s goodness, and thereby empower us to follow wherever His Spirit might lead us for God’s glory and the salvation of the world. 
 

Hear now the words of St. Peter giving encouragement to a tiny flock of bewildered and persecuted Christians in Asia Minor, and recognize how your faith today, dear People of God, is indeed being offered the same nourishment as that which enabled those Christians of old to triumph over their sufferings and transform their world:

You were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot.   He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you who through Him believe in God, Who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. (1 Peter 1:18-21)

Glory and praise to you Lord Jesus Christ!  You are the Saviour of the world! 

5th Sunday of Lent Year B 2018

5th. Sunday of Lent (B)

(Jeremiah 31:31-34; Hebrews 5:7-9; Saint John 12:20-33)

The whole purpose of Our Blessed Lord’s life and death upon earth can be summed up in the words of His prayer:

            Father, glorify Your name!

In today’s Gospel account He was near the end of His life, He had performed many striking miracles, provoked much attention throughout the whole country, and healed countless sick and possessed persons (John 15: 24):

If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would have so sin; but now they have seen and also hated both Me and My Father. 

Nevertheless, because of the refusal of official Judaism and most of the people to repent He thirsted to do still more:

            Father, glorify Your name!

And now, He realized that the opportunity for Him to finally slake His thirst was at hand, for the climax of His life as God-made-man for God’s glory and man’s salvation was imminent; moreover, He had come to appreciate that it’s fulfilment would not be attained by His doing, so much as by His suffering – allowing – His Father to bring to fulfilment in Him and through Him that for which He had originally sent Him.  And to that end the devil himself would be permitted, in his overweening pride, to bring about his own downfall by doing to Jesus -- Who now appeared to be at His weakest -- what he had long desired to do since having being humiliated in their desert contest at the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry.  The renewal of that contest would be the decisive moment when the ignorance and hatred of sin would be cast out, and the beauty and truth of the Kingdom of God ushered in as the ruling power for the future formation, development, and fulfilment of a new People of God throughout the whole world; a people called to embrace a transformation of life, from that well-known earthly life inexorably enmeshed in sin, into the freedom of the children of God, a heavenly and eternal life to be bestowed upon all believers in Jesus as Son of God and only Saviour of mankind:

Now the prince of this world is to be overthrown.  And when I am lifted up from this earth, I shall draw all men to Myself.

When those around Jesus heard the voice from heaven proclaiming that the Father in heaven was about to be supremely glorified through the death of Jesus they were divided in their opinions, some were humbled by the mystery and said, ‘It was an angel speaking to Him’, while others -- probably the majority -- shrugged off what they could not immediately understand and said, ‘It was a clap of thunder!’  A like division still arises today, when Christian, even Catholic, people, are faced with personal suffering.

For there are certain truths in life, People of God, which can only be realized by living them.   The intellect alone does not, in the case of such truths, give us a satisfactory understanding and most certainly cannot give us an adequate appreciation of them.  For example, authorities in free societies try to carefully avoid making martyrs of opposing factions or individuals; somehow an ordinary course of punishment seems to strengthen, focus, such opposition, not destroy it.  Now such truths are especially prominent in matters of religion.   Our Blessed Lord Himself said earlier in St. John’s Gospel (7:17):

If any man’s will is to do God’s will, he shall know whether My teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on My own authority.

In other words, we can only truly recognize God’s will for us by our acting in conformity with His known and generally proclaimed will.  That is, we can only understand, appreciate, Divine Truth by humbly accepting It and trying to live It; such Truth cannot be sectioned off from our daily living and then, so to speak, digested on a pick-and-choose basis by some pseudo-specialist course of intellectual studies.  Divine truth, spiritual truth, can only be gradually assimilated into the whole of our self by being humbly received, deeply loved, and sincerely obeyed as an integral and indeed decisive aspect of our ongoing life.

Of all the Christian truths which can only be understood by living them, this is perhaps the supreme example:  that the Father’s name is glorified, that Jesus Himself is glorified, by Jesus’ death on the Cross.

As a result of that truth, Jesus’ subsequent words:

Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life,  (John 12:25)

which seem apparently contradictory and meaningless, in reality, are spiritually logical and redolent with divine wisdom, because:

            Whoever serves (Jesus) must follow (Him). (12:26)

Of course, the word ‘hate’ is not to be understood literally, we can’t hate our life in this world literally, any more than we can hate our father and mother, brother and sister as we read in one of Our Lord’s sayings; it is a figure of speech, a way of speaking current in Our Lord’s time in Palestine, meaning that, under certain conditions, we must be prepared to regard our life in this world, our love for father, mother, brothers and sisters, children and possessions, reputation and respect, as of secondary importance.  When, that is, their consideration would conflict with the absolute demands of the Supreme Good: God and eternal life.

This doctrine that suffering, relatively understood, humbly accepted, and fully embraced in faith, can be the gateway to a higher and better life, is one of the great lights and blessings of Christianity, and I can well remember the sense of purpose and worthwhileness which it gave to much of my life when I myself became a convert to the Catholic faith as a young man of 22.

It is, however, a light and a blessing we must cherish by putting it into practice, making it rule our attitude to the ever-recurring difficulties, sorrows and problems we come across in our experience of daily living.

People of God, do not think you have done anything for God if you have not suffered for Him, with Jesus Who, having spent his whole lifer in continuous prayer and praise, obedience and preaching, general healings and striking miracles, nevertheless, still felt a most urgent need to glorify His Father yet more; and that, He now realized, could only come about by His suffering.  For He had always used His earthly body to the full for His Father’s glory, and now He could only sate His burning thirst to glorify His Father still more by embracing bodily suffering, that is, by offering His Body as Israel’s ultimate sacrifice to God for the fulfilment of her covenant with God and for the salvation of all mankind, as was intended by God when He originally ‘covenanted’ Israel.

We Catholics need to be convinced of this, that God’s offer of suffering on earth to His servants can, in fact, be His loving offer of life, deeper, richer, yes, happier and more fulfilling life, if that suffering is embraced in faith.

Dear People of God, when grief, anxiety, pain, come your way, try to recall what our Faith teaches us: that in God alone is our fulness of life and being.  Because He made us out of nothing He alone knows us entirely through and through, and because He made us for Himself, He alone loves us for what we most truly are.  With such an awareness, in times of trial, short prayers – deeply intended -- are most fitting: ‘My God, You are my joy; You are my peace, my love, my hope, my strength, my trust.’

And when finished, don’t look for results from Him, but put your own words into practice, put yourself at peace and trust Him; and then, above all, THANK HIM.

That attitude well befits a true disciple of Jesus Who, when His own agony was beginning, took His suffering to His Father in prayer; and, indeed, it was by His persevering in such loving obedience and total trust, that what had long been lost by the old Adam in the Garden of Eden, was redeemed – as a treasure soon to be yet more gloriously embellished -- by the New Adam in the Garden of Gethsemane.  As we heard in our second reading:

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

Therefore, surely, we His disciples should endeavour to follow in His steps.  The greatest opportunity that can come our way is the moment when suffering comes -- unasked for, unsought, unprovoked – into our lives; the moment when it is no longer we ourselves who are acting, devising, seeking, to directly promote God’s glory (as we see it), but rather when God Himself is, as it were, knocking at the door of our will for permission to Himself glorify His own name in us and through us by means of the suffering He offers to share with us.

Jesus did not ask to understand His Cross, but He prayed most earnestly that He might have strength to embrace it.  We, for our part, cannot understand our crosses, but let us gratefully follow Our Blessed Lord’s example in His prayer, and in His YES to His Father and death to Himself.