28th Sunday Year B 2015

 

 

28^th. SUNDAY of Year (B)

(Wisdom 7:7-11; Letter to the Hebrews 4:12-13; Gospel of St. Mark 10:17-30)

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As Jesus was setting out on a journey, a man ran up, knelt down before Him, and asked Him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”  Jesus answered him, “Why do you call Me good?  No one is good but God alone.”

Perhaps Jesus was gently telling the young man not to use flattery such as ‘Good Teacher’ even though well intended; again, perhaps the young man was thinking that a human being could acquire eternal life for himself and explain to another how to do it; whatever the case Jesus tells him:

No one is good but God alone.

The young man was not thinking aright and so Jesus began inciting him to do better:  ‘No one is good, save God alone; why then do you ask Me about your eternal life, about your eternal relationship with the God Who made you?  God made you, made you unique and for Himself; you know all that from the Scriptures, why then do you seek My help?  Who do you think I am?’

Thus Jesus, emphasizing His own humanity, provoked the young man to do some closer thinking.  It was, however, a very gentle process of correction for, as the Gospel says:

Jesus, looking at him, loved him.

He loved him because he had kept the commandments of the Law conscientiously from his earliest years, and Jesus could see the results of such obedience in him.  As a reward for that faithfulness in little things, Jesus sought to lead this young man to greater ones, that is, to a more explicit, direct, and personal love of the Personal God.  He answered him, though, in such a way that while not directly asserting His own divine Personality He did, nevertheless, respond to and acknowledge – and this time more favourably -- the young man’s  opening remark, ‘Good Master’:

You are lacking in one thing.  Go sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow Me.

Today Jesus still gives His Catholic disciples such advice directly in the Faith of His Church – her proclamation of faith in Him and in His teaching – which is a broad framework embracing all of us believers, and within which there are as many diversities possible as there are individuals created by God for an eternally unique relationship with Himself.  And the whole wonderful and mysterious fascination of the spiritual life, and the purpose of spiritual direction, is to find out, in the framework of that One, True, Faith, and under the guidance the Holy Spirit of Wisdom and Truth, how God’s perennial call of individuals to Jesus guides them along their way with Him to the Father.

For someone really seeking God those words – offering the opportunity to accompany and live with Jesus – should have brought intense joy to that young man.  In fact, however, we read:

At that statement his face fell, and he went away sad, for he had many possessions.

Dear People of God, indeed, dear fellow human beings, that is the great danger of possessions: they afford satisfactions and consolations in this life to people largely unaware of their own spiritual needs and weaknesses and their ‘natural’ inclination to sinful folly; and once having opened up before them such an ‘attractive’ byway, they can stifle any selfless appreciation of the Good News, and indeed block up any approach to whole-hearted love for, and abandonment to, God.  Such satisfactions and consolations take advantage of our weakness so very easily, making us afraid to experience that instant when we give up, lose hold of, what is so very gratifying to us for something we have not as yet got our hands on, or started tasting, for ourselves.  They can make us unwilling ever to entertain the thought of staking ALL, let alone embrace the possibility of giving ALL for the fulfilment which God indeed offers but for which we have still to prove ourselves.

The rich young man’s wealth could not lead him to clear wrong-doing, nor could it prevent him doing much that was good, but it did make it impossible for him to love God wholeheartedly, and it did prevent him from tasting the joy of living in Jesus’ company.  With his captive mind and heart he seems to have thought Jesus would perhaps tell him something extra, esoteric, as it were a further treasure which he could make his own and take delight in, put it to diligent use, and thereby assure himself of the holiness required for eternal life without ever having to risk his earthly comforts and securities.

Holiness, however, is not an object we can acquire, it is not a technique we can master; it is God’s loving and total gift of Himself to a soul which – in order to receive such a gift – can only do so by opening up its own ‘self’ in return, as a return gift to the God Who chooses thus to relate Personally with His chosen ones.

The danger of cherished riches of any sort in the world, be they tangible or intangible, is that they are spiritually impersonal and would enslave us by urging us to delight in them, consciously seek deep satisfaction from them, and ultimately trust in and rely on them so completely that we -- like the rich young man -- would then be unable to accept or opt for any deep and intimate personal relationship with God, just as he turned away from following Jesus as His disciple.  In such a situation we would then find ourselves clinging most tenaciously to lies which, having early-on promised fulfilment in this life -- such as friends, beauty, strength, power, influence, popularity, satisfaction, and the like – cannot ultimately fulfil even such feeble promises and, instead, leave us a legacy of disillusionment that grows ever deeper with the passing years.

I well remember a frail old lady telling me just how lonely she was finding it to be old, even though -- at the very moment she was thus explaining herself to me -- she was actually surrounded by members of her numerous family going down to the third generation.

Dear People of God, give yourselves exuberantly to pleasures and you will inevitably taste bitterness and pain; trust too much in riches and you will most certainly experience your personal poverty when least able to do anything about it; yes, embrace too ardently (which is not good) the joys of family life (which are good) and you will meet with sad frustration and come to know loneliness.

Only God is definitively good; anything, anyone, else promising salvation is a lie, and would only enslave us so that, with the rich man in the Gospel – because we hadn’t dared risk what we loved wrongly and too much – we could find ourselves rejecting our only true and most sublime destiny, namely, God’s offer of Personal love, abiding fulfilment, and peace beyond all telling.

We can say that the whole purpose of Christian teaching, the Church’s doctrine and dogma, is to give us the Truth; and the whole function of Christian asceticism -- of the Church’s sacraments and exercises of spiritual devotion -- is to make us free to embrace such Truth.  And the greatest truth of the Christian faith is:

For human beings salvation is impossible, but not for God.  All things are possible for God with those who believe in the One He has sent, Jesus Christ.

Only when we calmly realize and gratefully appreciate that God is all our hope can we then truly commit ourselves to Jesus, putting Him first in all the details and aspirations of our lives:

If anyone comes to Me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple.  (Luke 14:26)

Only when we have appreciated on the one hand something of the joy of His presence with us and in us, and delighted in the promises He brings, and on the other hand experienced and realized something of the hopelessness and meaninglessness of life without Him, only then are we free to begin to truly love Him.

And whole-hearted love for God doesn’t rule out love for others; indeed, it can help us love them better, because the greatest danger in human love is that we soon start seeking personal gratification instead of expressing love with and for the other.  When, however, having become aware of our own emptiness, selfishness, and folly, we hunger and thirst for the coming of God’s Kingdom in our lives and His love in our hearts, then we find ourselves free to love without -- some way or other – always seeking to get something back for ourselves in return.

People of God, pray to understand your need of God and His grace,  your need of Jesus and His companionship (= His most Holy Spirit); pray, indeed, for grace to appreciate with deep gratitude the good things of this life, but also beware of the satisfactions and pseudo-consolations, yes, especially the self-satisfaction, they can so easily inject into our psyche.   You are here on earth to learn that God is Good and Holy ... don’t sink to being satisfied with His earthly goods; rather, knowing that the heavenly Giver is infinitely better, beyond, and above all such earthly anticipations try, by the Spirit, to recognize the voice of Jesus as echoing that of His heavenly Father, when He says:

            Come, beloved of My Father, follow Me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

27th Sunday Year B 2015

             27^th Sunday (Year B)                                        

                                     (Genesis 2:18-24; Hebrews 2:9-11; Mark 10:2-12)     

Our readings today are clearly centred on the relationship between man and woman that we call marriage.  It is both a most natural yet deeply mysterious relationship --  involving passions which promise great joys but also occasion deep sorrows -- that it is understandable that there have been and still are many wrong ideas and false attitudes in its regard. However, by considering this difficult but fundamental relationship we can gain a deeper insight into the nature of our Catholic faith, so let us proceed.
 

Jesus told the Jews that they had, so to speak, twisted Moses’ arm into his giving them an inauthentic attitude to both the divine purpose and the human experience of ‘marriage’; an attitude which, by making it easier for men to get out of arising difficulties or even pursue fancied options, only served to prevent them from being able to appreciate and attain the true beauty and fulfilment of that relationship.
 

Note first of all that, as Jesus explains, Jewish ‘marriage’ was intended by God to bring about social benefit of women: affording them greater security and promoting a deeper appreciation of their dignity.  But for us Catholics and Christians, marriage is a sacramental union which a man and a woman – presuming the necessary freedom and knowledge -- bestow on each other before Jesus and His Church; and its supreme purpose is to ‘supernaturalize’ nature in man and woman that they may thus be enabled to adequately provide for and bring up their children as children of God and, for themselves, find marriage a social blessing and a divinely guided pedagogy in the ways of Jesus (e.g. humility, patience, love and commitment before self and satisfaction) leading to and preparing for their personal fulfilment and eternal happiness  before God.
 

According to Protestant teaching the fullness of Christian doctrine is to be found in the Bible expressed in the written words contained there; and because the words are there to be seen and read by all, a devout Protestant can appreciate the Scriptures as both the source of what is generally acceptable in faith and practice and also as the quarry where individual, personal, preferences can be diligently discovered and duly adopted.  Of course there are some difficult passages which might need explanation but, fundamentally, such difficulties do not affect the basic position which is, that what one can see and read in the Bible forms the basis of belief, and ‘my’ serious belief is as good as anyone else’s because it is ‘my’ personal and sincere response to what is written objectively in the Scriptures.
 

It has never been like that in the Catholic Church … and remember, the Christian body of believers in Jesus has always been called Catholic; indeed, before 1054 it had no other title whatsoever, being simply known as the Catholic Church.  And so it is today, to the extent that we always consider ourselves as Catholics, members of the Catholic Church, even though others in our Christian fraternity insist on referring to us as Roman Catholics.  We are not ashamed to be called Roman Catholics for, understood aright, it is quite true; nevertheless, we are most of all attached to that title which has always been ours, Catholic.
 

Now, Catholics are and always have been -- first and foremost -- hearers of the word of God, not readers of it:
 

But how can they call on Him in Whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in Him of Whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone to preach?  And how can people preach unless they are sent? As it is written, "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring (the) good news!"  But not everyone has heeded the good news; for Isaiah says, "Lord, who has believed what was heard from us?"  Thus faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the word of Christ.  (Romans 10:14-17)
 

It was ever so, even in the very founding structure of the Church: preachers, as you heard, had to be sent, and those originally sent by Jesus Himself were the Apostles proclaiming the ‘Gospel of Peace’; and as a consequence of that original Apostolic mission those Churches were called Apostolic Sees that had either received the Gospel from such an Apostle, or had developed a specially close and proven historical connection with one such See that other centres of Christianity did not have.  Such Apostolic Sees – having heard and received the Gospel from Apostolic preachers -- were accepted as the criterion for catholicity.  Churches not thus founded on or by an Apostle were regarded as members of the Catholic Body only if they were in communion with those Sees properly called Apostolic; and it was supremely the Church at Rome -- recognized as founded upon the two supreme Apostles, Peter and Paul -- that was regarded as the God-willed witness to Catholic Truth and ultimate criterion for membership of the authentic Catholic Communion.
 

In that Catholic Communion our initial Scriptures were the Jewish Scriptures in the Septuagint Greek translation which Mother Church subsequently termed the ‘Old Testament’, because she regarded them as God’s revealed word only as read and understood in the light of Jesus.  Those Jewish Scriptures of themselves, she believes, are an imperfect revelation because they are preparatory: they were preparing the way for the coming of Jesus and can only be understood aright when interpreted in the light of His Person, His Good News, and His history.  Our own New Testament Scriptures, on the other hand, are final; and apart from the fullness of Old and New Testaments together, there is no other divine revelation to be found or to be expected.
 

Nevertheless, though originally ours, those New Testament Scriptures also need to be understood, interpreted aright, for they are a witness to the original Gospel proclamation made by Mother Church before anything was written down, and as such they are always to be understood according to the Church’s Rule of Faith which gave them birth and which they were originally meant to express, preserve, and extend. 
 

Therefore, in our attitude to marriage, we Catholics cannot accept the Jewish  approach condemned by Jesus, nor can we adopt a Protestant attitude which allows an individual to read the Scriptures and ultimately form his own opinion about ‘my belief’.  As Catholics we receive our Christian identity and life by our faithful response to the Church’s Rule of Faith for, we are ‘hearers’ of the living Apostolic preaching not ‘readers’ of ancient and unchanging books.  For those books, supremely venerable though they are for the divine truths contained in them, are only infallible as guides when understood in accordance with, and as expounded by, the living Rule of Catholic and Church Faith.
 

Many today seem to assume for themselves the title ‘catholic’ while having but a minimal concern with faith.  They are not ‘hearers’ of the Church’s proclamation of the Gospel message to which they have obediently committed themselves in a response of faith.  Neither are they true ‘readers’ of that Gospel, who can, indeed, at times be  so devoted to what they read that they are willing to sacrifice all for it except that right to personally quarry their own beliefs from the Scriptures.  Rather, they are seekers of a message of pleasant and peaceful accommodation with the world around them offering the additional spin-off of a measure of personal spiritual comfort.  They don’t want to hear the Gospel, they don’t even want to read the Gospel, they prefer a gospel they can ‘feel’.  
 

There are, however, some staunch Catholics to be found in parishes today who, somewhat surprisingly, show themselves to be of this persuasion by their habit of giving their attention, first of all, to weighing up, assessing, the person of the messenger sent them and critically studying his style of presentation before attending to the message itself: they want first impressions to persuade them to like the person of the priest or find his presentation interesting and attractive  before they recognise his authority or attend to his message.  Only if those first and personal requirements are fulfilled will they seriously consider giving both hearing and a measure of commitment to the authoritative message proclaimed and presented to them by their ‘new’ priest.
 

However, for us Christians and Catholics who are hearers -- people called by God through the proclamation of messengers sent by Him -- it is the message of God’s Good News that counts.  That is precisely the nature of our vocation: we hear the word of God, and we recognize it as the word of God, thanks to the Spirit of God given to the Church and working within all whom the Father calls to faith in His Son.  And if -- once having been reborn through faith in baptism -- we are to go on and become mature children of God, we have to be able to recognize the message proclaimed by the Church as Jesus Himself addressing us through the words of her messengers:  He is the Speaker to Whom we attend, His alone is the message to which we respond; all that we can require of the messenger is that he has the necessary authority to back up his message, for Jesus Himself always spoke with authority.  Such required authority, however, is not to be accorded him by listeners who like his personality or his presentation, but by the Church of Christ which -- sure of his ability and knowing his sincerity -- guarantees the authenticity of his Catholic teaching: 
 

We are of God.  He who knows God hears us; he who is not of God does not hear us.  By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
 

 Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever receives the one I send receives Me, and whoever receives Me receives the One Who sent Me.  (1 Jn. 4:6; Jn. 13:20)
 

To put things very simply and somewhat bluntly, it is a matter of distinguishing between the provisional packaging and the contents which abide.  If the packaging is attractive it helps, but the contents, God’s gracious gift, are alone what matters.
 

The attitude of wanting, demanding even, to be superficially pleased before considering the message or receiving the gift, can have most serious repercussions even to the message of faith itself.  Take the example of the Pharisees questioning Jesus in the Gospel:
 

The Pharisees approached Jesus and asked, "Is it lawful for a husband to divorce his wife?" They were testing Him.  He said to them in reply, "What did Moses command you?"  They replied, "Moses permitted a man to write a bill of divorce, and dismiss her."  But Jesus told them, "Because of the hardness of your hearts he wrote you this commandment.”
 

Jesus, on the other hand, taught:
 

From the beginning of the creation, God 'made them male and female.  ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to ‘his wife and the two shall become one flesh'.  So they are no longer two but one flesh.

Then He went on to add the most solemn words of all:
 

Therefore what God has joined together, no human being must separate.
 

In modern society however, as the person and personality of either spouse becomes less pleasing over the years, when their mutual love is no longer felt so powerfully, and when difficulties inevitably surface in the course of their shared life, some -- who through selfishness and superficiality never recognized any call to regularly re-assert and confirm their original commitment -- abdicate their own, personal, responsibility for the permanence and beauty of the bond which they sealed before God and claim a totally pagan freedom to ‘start afresh’ and satisfy personal whim and pleasure rather than seek God’s good will, cultivate moral forgetfulness and ‘lots-of-work-to-do’ as a substitute for peace of mind and heart.
 

The Chosen People -- a people formed and prepared by the grace of God over two thousand years to enter into and maintain a unique relationship with Himself and thus to hear, recognize, and proclaim His Law of truth and love to all the nations -- likewise turned out to be an unfaithful spouse, entering into illicit relationships with the gods of the surrounding nations.  Having failed to hear and respond to the proclamation of God’s word by prophets raised up from their midst, they ultimately – contrary to their very being as His Chosen People – rejected the decisive proclamation of God’s word because the ultimate Messenger, the Son of God Himself, did not come up to expectations they had sinfully indulged for too long.
 

Dear People of God, in Mother Church we have to become children of the truth:
 

Assuredly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it.  (Mark 10:15)
 

As new-born babies, desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious. (1 Peter 2:2-3)
 

As children of God, we have to long for God’s truth, we cannot pick and choose,  even from such a quarry as the Scriptures, to form our own selection of items for belief; we must embrace the Apostolic Faith offered to us by the perennial proclamation and continued preaching of the living and universal Catholic Church. 
 

Mother Church, ever rejoicing in the divine truth of her Gospel message which is the word of God amongst us still, lives by the Word she proclaims, enabling us who are born of her proclamation to be born alive; let us therefore, endeavour -- in the power and beauty of that living truth -- to love the Lord at all times, to seek His blessing in all circumstances, and to praise and proclaim His glory before all peoples.

                           

26th Sunday Year B 2015

26^th Sunday of Year (B)

(Numbers 11:25-29; James 5:1-6; Mark 9:38-43, 45, 47-8)

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My dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ: in today’s Gospel reading we were offered a wonderfully comforting teaching, a sure promise, and a clear warning.  Which should we look at first?  As is usually the case with Jesus, let us consider the teaching first to which all else is related.

           He who is not against us is for us.

In the first reading from the book of Numbers we were told a remarkable story of helpers being enrolled and endowed for Moses.  What can possibly have prevented those two nominees Eldad and Medad from going with the seventy others chosen like themselves along with Moses, to meet the Lord at or in the Tent of Meeting?  Despite their absence, however, because they had been enrolled with the rest, we are told that:

The Spirit rested upon them, (since) they were among those listed, (and although they) had not gone out to the tabernacle, yet they prophesied in the camp.

All those chosen to help Moses were given the Spirit, and the sign of the bestowal of that Gift was that they all prophesied, even those not present at the Tent of Meeting.  However, since they were only to be helpers, not prophets like Moses:

When the Spirit rested upon them they prophesied, although they never did so again.

Perhaps those helpers of Moses were in Jesus’ mind when, in the Gospel reading, His disciple John told Him of a man performing miracles in His name:

Teacher, we saw someone who does not follow us casting out demons in Your name, and we forbade him because he does not follow us.

Whereupon, Jesus answered with those memorable words we are considering:

Do not prevent him.  There is no one who performs a mighty deed in My name who can soon afterward speak ill of Me.  For whoever is not against us is for us.

Let us concentrate our attention on those words, whoever is not against us is for us.

Notice that this man ‘who is for us’ is still not one of those to whom Jesus relates Himself when saying ‘us’.  If you remember, Jesus was walking through Galilee with His disciples and instructing them about His mission and their calling; they, this group walking together and bonding so closely together in order to face the future together, were the ‘us’ whom Jesus meant when He said:

          Whoever is not against us is for us.

‘For us’, indeed, but not ‘one of us’.  What a privilege it was for the Twelve, to hear Jesus speaking of Himself and of them as ‘us’!

The Spirit was given to the seventy-two to enable them to help the great prophet Moses; and therefore, as a public sign on their behalf before the people, they were allowed to prophesy; but only the once because they were only helpers of Moses, nothing more.  The stranger whom John the beloved disciple had noticed performing a miracle in the name of Jesus was, likewise, only one temporarily endowed by the Father to be of help to Jesus.  Although the Spirit had been given to enable him to perform a miracle in the name of Jesus, nevertheless, he was not one of the group Jesus called ‘us’, because the Spirit had not been given him in the like manner and same fullness as He was bestowed on the Twelve: making them one with, being conformed to, Jesus as members of His mystical Body and, in Him, adopted sons of God in the only-begotten Son. 

So, People of God, be well aware of what and where your treasure is: the pearl of great price that you have received is the Gift of the Spirit of Jesus Who makes you into a member of the Body of Christ, in Him and with Him a child of God the Father; that is the treasure you have to protect above all, and make full use of while you can.

So great is that dignity bestowed upon all made one with and in Christ, that Jesus went on to say, as you heard:

Anyone who gives you a cup of water to drink because you belong to Christ, amen, I say to you, will surely not lose his reward.

That is a measure of your dignity, People of God!  A dignity not given to enable you to boast before men, but one that should impel you to most humbly give thanks, constant thanks indeed, to God, whilst at the same time, moving you to wholeheartedly acknowledge before Him your unworthiness.

Such is your dignity; what then is your worth?  Listen again.

Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were put around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea.

One of these little ones who believe in Me: that is what I just mentioned when I spoke of the Gift received moving you to wholehearted awareness of your unworthiness; because, in that revelation, awareness, of personal unworthiness, believers become humble as little children before God and Jesus gives a most dire warning to any who would harm, bring down, such humble believers.  That, dear People of God and true disciples of Jesus, is your worth in His eyes.

Now, however, it is time to give attention to the warning given, not only to others, but to our own selves; because, as I said, this gift of the Spirit making you a member of the group whom Jesus addresses with the word ‘us’, is not simply a pearl bestowed on you, but a treasure entrusted to you, to be guarded, protected, and used for Him Who bestowed it.  Therefore, Jesus warns us, and all of His disciples, that each of us can become an obstacle to ourselves if we do not exercise proper self-discipline:

          If your hand, if your foot, causes you to sin, cut it off.

And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out.

And the reason He gives for this is well known: It is better to enter into life, into the Kingdom of God, maimed or lame, than to fail to enter there; because nothing could possibly compensate for such a failure, such a loss.

Notice, however, People of God, that here, Jesus does not speak directly about the joys or the blessings of heaven, He limits Himself to warnings against possible failure to attain such fulfilment.  Today, such personal warnings are frequently interpreted as degrading threats, and human pride is such that those thus afflicted are rarely willing to imagine themselves as being moved by any words other than what are admirable and capable of inspiring the highest and best of the natural endowments of those who hear them.  Jesus, however, we should note, is not interested in opinions, vanities, or imaginations of men, He is entirely centred on the facts of life, and the realities, involved: the facts of life, both earthly and eternal.  Therefore, He does not try to cajole with flowery words and attractive prospects; instead, Jesus speaks in the way that penetrates deepest into the psyche of all human beings, who, despite the vanity of their proclaimed aspirations, are weak, ignorant, and short-lived: He speaks of a supremely great threat to our well-being, one which cannot be ignored, hell.  And He does not just leave open the possibility of that which moderns so fear to mention or think about that they can only scoff whenever it might be forced upon their attention.  No, Jesus emphasises the nature of this threat -- not only once but twice -- with words that paint an indelibly powerful and fearsome image for all who consider them -- saying that it is indeed possible for us:

To go to Gehenna, into the unquenchable fire --- where 'Their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.' 

People of God, what the prophet at the distance of hundreds of years could lovingly, beautifully, and even opulently describe as:

A feast of choice pieces, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of well-refined wines on the lees (Isaiah 25:6),

has been set before us in today’s Gospel and it reads like an eve-of-battle dispatch from the front line.  Perhaps the consoling message of your dignity, of the treasure that has been given you whereby you are one with Christ, provokes heartfelt gratitude in you; or it might be the awesome message of the worth of all who are children of God that inspires you with a confidence and trust not naturally part of your human make-up. However, when battle starts and you find yourself undergoing trials and temptations of whatever sort, let the warning of Jesus rise uppermost in your mind and sink deepest into your heart; for though proud people of this world hate/fear such warnings and pretend to despise them, nevertheless, for a sincere Christian they can be a vital source of clear understanding and insurmountable strength, enabling us to walk securely and steadfastly along the ways of Jesus with calm trust and self- abandonment despite the threats of any powers of evil arrayed against us.

How blessed is the man who fears to do wrong!  But he who hardens his heart will fall into calamity.           (Proverbs 28:14)

                                                   

25th Sunday (Year B) 2015

 25^th. Sunday, Year (B)

(Wisdom 2:12, 17-20; James 3:16 – 4:3; Mark 9:30-37)

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If anyone wishes to be first he shall be last of all and servant of all.

One of the high points – perhaps the high point – of the O.T. revelation of God is to be found in the book of the prophet Isaiah, where we read (44:6 and 48:12):

Thus says the Lord: I am the first and I am the last; there is no God but Me.  

Listen to Me, Jacob, Israel: I am He, I am the first and I am the last.

Many most reputable modern translations of the Bible change the words specially chosen for our consideration today from:

If anyone wishes to be first he shall be last of all and servant of all;

to, ‘must be’, or even to ‘must make himself’:

“If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all”;

“If anyone wants to be first, he must make himself last of all and servant of all.”

Those changes are understandable but result in a translation that is not precisely correct.  The original Greek and the authoritative Latin translation are perfectly clear and, following them closely, our more literal Church translation gives us a truly accurate understanding in very close accordance with both traditional Catholic theology and Christian spiritual teaching.

The difficulty for some modern attempts to appreciate these words is Jesus Himself, so deeply loved but also reverentially feared; and in this instance we can appreciate why His disciples had such feelings in His regard.   The words of Jesus are, first of all, and most literally, a statement of sheer fact, and as such a warning for those He most specially loved: He was not commanding, yet neither was He merely offering teaching for their consideration and subsequent acceptance; His words were, first of all -- I repeat -- a warning for immediate attention, retention, and adoption:

‘Whoever, as My disciple, wills to become truly first, will be – that is, My Father will make him become in the achieving of his God-given aspiration -- last of all and servant of all.’

Jesus claimed to be first in the divine sense when He said to the Jews:

It is My Father Who glorifies Me, He of whom you say, ‘He is our God’.  Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham came to be, I AM.”  (John 8:54, 58)

But at the Last Supper (John 13:13), while asserting Himself to be -- humanly speaking-- first with regard to His disciples:

            You call me ‘teacher’ and ‘master,’ and rightly so, for indeed I am;

nevertheless showed Himself last in their regard by His ceremonial washing of their feet, before finally allowing Himself to be made last of all men when Isaiah’s prophecy (53:3) was fulfilled in Him on the Cross of Calvary:

He was spurned and avoided by men, a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity, one of those from whom men hide their faces, spurned, and we held Him in no esteem.

Notice People of God, the God of Heaven declared Himself to be the first and the last; Jesus, Son of God made man, knowing Himself to be first, showed His willingness to become last at His baptism by John in the Jordan and then, allowed Himself to be publicly made last by His heavenly Father in and throughout the course of His public ministry.   He did not, however, set out to make Himself last; He even prayed in the Garden that His Father would take the cross of suffering and death from Him if He so willed it.  What Jesus wanted, supremely and solely, was that His Father’s will be done in Him.   His own Personal will as Son was to obediently become such as His Father willed Him to be in His humanity.

All that God has made is good; sin makes nothing new and is only destructive.  And so, man’s desire to be like God was not evil in itself, it was only evil in Adam and Eve’s case, by their first receiving the suggestion dripping with venom from the Serpent’s mouth.

In the case of the Apostles arguing in today’s Gospel reading, they were behaving foolishly, indulging a spirit and using a word improper for them to use as Apostles of Jesus, because their childish (Jesus used a child to teach them) aspirations to be greatest were leaving out of consideration the divinely concomitant thought of ‘being last’ which they – as disciples, and above all, as Apostles of Jesus -- would have to appreciate most fully in their subsequent lives.

God is first and last; Jesus, knowing Himself to be One with His Father in Heaven, knew Himself to be first as God:

            I am the first and I am the last; there is no God but Me.  

As man, however, under the limitations of His assumed creatureliness, He willed Himself to be made ‘last’ by His Father in view of the purpose for which He had been sent, that is to save sinful mankind who, along with their chosen lord Satan, naturally will only to be first, embracing but one aspect of the divine truth whose fullness of divine meaning they needed both to learn quickly and appreciate deeply because they were at present flirting with death by childishly denying it.

Such is sin: ever parading itself under a banner of partial truths, ever seeking to break asunder what God has joined together.

And it often happens, People of God, that we are puzzled by, and at a loss how to answer, doctrines put forward with great energy, conviction, and more or less apparent sincerity by non-Christians and opponents of our faith, or simply by Christians in error.  When encountering such difficulties we should always remain calm and absolutely sure in our faith while showing human patience and deep trust in God, bearing in mind that often such troublesome statements are not so much wrong for what  they say as for the way they say it, and for what they fail to say.  Our Catholic faith is a divine gift and all-embracing for the guidance and fulfilment of those who embrace it.

Jesus knew what had been going on, literally behind His back, as He and His disciples had walked along, and:

Taking a child He placed it in their midst, and putting His arms around it He said to them, “Whoever receives one child such as this in My name, receives Me.”

In the ancient world children were thought little of and frequently much abused.  And at present the disciples -- superficially wanting to be ‘greatest’ seriously enough as to be willing to argue about it without embarrassment -- feared so very, very, much human disdain and perhaps contempt.  Therefore when Jesus took one such person, so insignificant and singularly unimportant in the eyes of the world, and said:

Whoever receives one child such as this in My name, receives Me,

He thereby gave His disciples a picture that was so surprising and yet familiar as to be unforgettable, one that offered them teaching of inexhaustible riches: possible shame in the world’s eyes but an actual promise by Jesus of loving esteem and approval.  Right now, the Apostles were learning how to aspire to being first in the true, divine, sense.

To be appreciated by the world one has to be endowed, either by outstanding talent and ability which is, of itself, a great gift of God given for the benefit of human society but so easily corrupted into self-service and forgetfulness of the Giver of such gifts; or one has to try to make oneself, noticed and significant by cravenly repeating what is politically correct and walking only along socially approved and well-trodden paths; or else by outrageously disregarding normal decency and defying customary opinions and practices.  Such endeavours for personal recognition and renown are, however, of no advantage whatsoever in the Christian life, for God exalts the lowly and humble of heart, while pride -- inevitably and invariably -- separates from the Lord those who pursue it. 

How utterly different, however, is the simple desire for renown before God!!  Why?  Because all self-seeking is ultimately totally excluded by the very sincerity of any such desire.  Renown before God can only be God’s gift – utterly free and un-determinable – given as Love in response to love.  The Apostles and indeed all modern disciples of Jesus must learn from Jesus one thing above all: how, in Jesus and by the power of His Spirit, to recognize and respond to His Father’s initiatives in our lives!

If anyone wishes to be first he shall be last of all and servant of all;

Thus says the Lord and Father of us all: I am the first and I am the last; there is no God but Me.

People of God, we have little time, so we must let Mass proceed with our loving devotion and self-commitment, for the only power that will ultimately change us for the better and for our fulfilment is not the clarity of our thinking nor even the sincerity of our desiring, but Jesus’ example sublimely manifest in the sacrifice, and the power of His Spirit so generously given us in the sacrament, we are pursuing.  May we then indeed be able to leave Church and go out in peace before the world to love and serve our neighbour as the Father wills.

           

             

           

24th Sunday Year B 2015

24^th. Sunday of Year B

(Isaiah 50:5-9; James 2:14-18; Mark 8:27-35)

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There was a special bond between Jesus and Peter, and St. Mark wishes to show in his Gospel the importance and indeed pre-eminence of Peter among the Apostles of Jesus and ultimately in the Church of Jesus.  So he  makes it clear that Simon (Peter) and Andrew were the first disciples Jesus called to follow Him and that the first miracle of Jesus he mentions in his Gospel – the healing of Simon’s mother-in-law – might be regarded in some measure as a personal favour for Simon:

Simon’s mother-in-law lay sick with a fever. They immediately told Him about her.  He approached, grasped her hand, and helped her up. Then the fever left her and she waited on them.            (Mark 1:30-31)

After that opening presentation of Simon’s importance as a disciple of Jesus Mark did not need to indulge in further special pleading because the outstanding facts concerning Peter’s life for, and witness to, Jesus are acknowledged by the whole of the  New Testament writings. 

Jesus specially chose and appointed Twelve disciples as Apostles to be most intimately one with Himself, to be sent out to preach in His name and cast out demons by the power of His Spirit, and the first of these, when their names are listed, is always Simon Peter.  Most significantly of all, however, it was Simon Peter who was chosen by the Father in heaven to recognize and confess for all the Apostles that Jesus was the Christ, that is the long-awaited Messiah from God for Israel, as you have just heard in today’s Gospel reading and more fully from St, Matthew: 

Jesus said to him in reply, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My heavenly Father.  And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.  I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”     (Mt. 16:17–19)

And Simon Peter responded whole-heartedly to that call; throughout the Gospels he is shown as the one disciple most impetuously responsive and ardently devoted to Jesus.

However, the true nature and full intensity of Peter’s love for Jesus is shown above all by the fact that the Father loved Peter pre-eminently because of Peter’s pre-eminent love for Jesus:

The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures but I will tell you clearly about the Father.   On that day you will ask in My name, and I do not tell you that I will ask the Father for you.  For the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me and have come to believe that I came from God. (John 16:25–27)

And Jesus Himself bore the clearest witness to Peter’s love for Him when fully re-instating him after his three-fold denial, as St. John (not Mark!) tells us:

After (the Risen) Jesus had revealed Himself to His disciples and eaten breakfast with them, He said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me more than these?”  Simon Peter answered Him, “Yes Lord, You know that I love You.”  Jesus said to him, “Feed My lambs.”  (John 21:15)

It was therefore, out of the heat and glow so to speak, of that intensely deep personal bond between Simon the disciple and Jesus the Master that Peter began to rebuke Jesus when He first told His disciples that:

The Son of Man must suffer greatly and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and rise after three days.

Peter wanted to avert such a nightmare, he wanted -- out of love and ardour -- to prevent that taking place, to turn his beloved Master aside from such a tragic course, and so he remonstrated with Jesus in words which St. Matthew (16:22) gives us:

Peter took Jesus aside and began to rebuke Him, “God forbid, Lord! No such thing shall ever happen to You.”

Jesus thereupon answered most deliberately; not from passion, for we are told that  He turned away from Simon and looked at His other disciples before then turning back to Peter and saying:

Get behind Me, Satan!  You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.”  

That contains an extraordinary wealth of teaching for us who want to follow Jesus as true disciples.

Why, dear People of God, did Jesus – as St. Mark alone tells us – on hearing Peter’s words, yet before answering him:

            Turn around and, looking at His disciples, then and only then rebuke Peter?

It could only have been that Jesus was fully aware of the hurt His words would cause Peter (and Himself) and of the puzzlement and amazement they would cause for the other disciples present.

Notice now the very Catholic issues involved here: Jesus overrides His own natural feelings and those of Peter in order to spiritually protect and guide His other disciples, and for that purpose He most emphatically teaches:

You are an obstacle to Me (because) you are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.”  

Our present-day Western-world and irreligious society mocks (and too many popularity-seeking Catholics are weakly following suit) the very idea of bad example causing spiritual, real, harm.  In our days weeping women are beyond any laws that may appear too severe for all who deny that spiritual harm can be a supremely serious reality; chaos is to be carelessly condoned (despite the protests of Hungarian, front line, Christian leaders and bishops) if pictures of suffering children can be invoked and brought into close focus.  

People of God, it is not enough to have good intentions, it is not enough even to have warm feelings of human affection in one’s heart, we have got to love and walk in and along God’s way; that is, to know God’s truth, God’s purpose, plan, and will, and to adapt ourselves to it.  For, if we do not seek His truth, His will, we become all too easily Satan’s useful, perhaps even favourite, tools.  Jesus Himself witnesses to that!

Notice, dear people, love is not affectionate feelings nor are such feelings a reliable guide or motive for our actions.  Peter was full of such feelings and full of zeal as well.  No!  We need to have mind, heart, and will united in the search for and service of God in order to have true love.   Jesus, to one addressing Himself as ‘Good Master’, once said, ‘God alone is good’.

Today we are bombarded on all sides by emotionalism: the Pope smiles and embraces a child, he is good!   Women weep for serious matters; if they weep, whatever the matters in question, they are obviously good!  Self-displaying young women and girls are so charming and pretty, and their parents can be so proud of their good looks, obviously they are, if not exactly good, at least they must be innocent.  Children can be badly behaved; after all they are still children and must be allowed their childhood pleasures and ‘mistakes’ (even through to 16yrs. old or more?).

People of God, Jesus could not have spoken harsher words than those He addressed to Simon Peter wanting to save Him, but He spoke them plainly and without the slightest apology.  Why?   Because of the reality, the dreadful reality, of spiritual harm arising from scandalous words and behaviour; and because His disciples must not think like men but as God does, they must not speak as men do but as God wills.

Where are we today, People of God?  Disciples are attacked for thinking and speaking to the best of their ability in line with the teaching of God and the Scriptures, and the traditional teaching of Mother Church in her Saints and doctors: that is too often considered as inhuman.  Today disciples are called upon to learn to please the multitude: to think as people think and speak only what comforts most.

To whom are those words of Jesus to be considered as being addressed today:

You are an obstacle to Me (because) you are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do?