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Commentary on Matthew 7:15-20

Today’s reading continues from the Sermon on the Mount and contains a warning which must have been very relevant in the early Church, but has not lost its meaning in our own day.

Sadly, there are ‘prophets’ who are wolves in sheep’s clothing. On the outside, they seem to have the image of Jesus, his gentleness and love, but in fact they are religious predators, using people for their own ends. There have been unfortunate examples of this in some so-called ‘televangelists’ who, in the name of the Lord Jesus, ripped off countless numbers of trusting people, many of them elderly and not well-off, by making them pledge large sums of money they could not afford.

How can you recognise them? By their “fruits”, i.e. by the way they behave and not just by what they say or the claims they make. It is not that difficult to separate the genuine from the false. As Jesus says, it is not possible for a bad tree to consistently produce good fruit nor for a genuinely good tree to produce bad fruit. Very often we have to admit that we try to make a good impression on people and we often try to hide from others what we believe to be our weaknesses.

Integrity and transparency are precious qualities to be found in any person and they are not easy to achieve. Most of us wear masks of some kind. Yet people can often identify more easily with a person whose faults are admitted. They feel that they are dealing with the real person and not a phoney. This can apply very much to pastors and other religious leaders.

Jesus is calling on us today to be really genuine people. Take care of the inside and the outside will take care of itself.

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Commentary on Philippians 3:17—4:1

Today, Paul continues to warn the Philippians about not being led astray in the living of their Christian faith, and he urges them to follow Paul’s own example. This might sound arrogant, but Paul, who had been himself such a devout and observant Jew, is utterly convinced that his whole life has now been taken over by Christ. As such, he now sees life in a completely different way. He is equally convinced that the Way of Jesus goes far beyond what the Law demands, and that it is the only test of a true interior spirituality. He also urges them to use as models other members of the community who see things the same way as Paul does.

Once again he deplores the presence of some who “live as enemies of the cross of Christ”. Their lives are in glaring contrast to Paul’s own conduct and to the truth of the Gospel. They are behaving in a way which negates all that Jesus did for us by dying on the cross. Jesus’ death was our liberation, and these people want to go back to a stifling and arid observance of the Law.

Paul writes:

…their god is the belly…

This does not quite mean that they live to eat, but rather that they have given a quite irrational importance to dietary laws. They act as if a person who eats ‘clean’ food is good, and one who eats ‘unclean’ food is bad. Jesus had this accusation thrown at him more than once. He responded by saying it was not what went into the stomach that counted, but what came out of the mouth and the heart.

Paul continues:

…their glory is in their shame…

This is a veiled reference to the prominence that circumcision gives to the male sexual organ, something that in all modesty (‘shame’ in actual meaning) we normally keep out of sight.

Furthermore:

…their minds are set on earthly things.

The Law is something “earthly”. Although it was given by God on Mount Sinai, people’s goodness and virtue is being measured not by spiritual values, but by the external, physical observance of certain actions and rituals.

But it is different for the followers of Christ:

…our citizenship is in heaven…

That is, our eyes are focused not on the things we do in this world, including religious actions, but on God our Father, on Jesus his Son and our Brother, and on the Spirit that guides us into all truth and love. We live here, we “work on [our] own salvation” (Phil 2:12) here, but ultimately we do not belong here. We are on our way to a better home, where:

he will wipe every tear from their eyes… (Rev 21:4)

We look forward to the day when Christ Jesus, Saviour and Lord of the whole universe, will come to take us to himself and transform our corruptible selves into something glorious that shares the very life of God.

Jesus’ power, earned by his total obedience in accepting death and given to him in his resurrection-ascension, is total and absolute. He will “transform the body of our humiliation”, subject to weakness, decay and death, to be like his glorious Body. The resurrection body, received already by Christ, who is the “firstfruits”, will be shared by believers in the future resurrection ‘harvest’. Then, the glorified Christ, as Alpha and Omega, will draw all creation—us included—into total conformity with Himself, who is the image of the Creator God.

So hang in there, urges Paul:

…stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved.

They are not to be led astray by the “dogs” and “cutters” who do not understand the call of the Gospel and are creators of division.

Our communities, too, can be undermined by people who, perhaps with good intentions, actually act against the spirit of the Gospel. Sometimes they are those who want to turn the clock back and restore old customs which the Church sees as no longer relevant in our day. Sometimes they are those who neglect all tradition, and act in an individualistic and self-centred way, where freedom becomes licence.

It is only by constant listening to God’s Word, constant sharing and careful discernment of the signs of the times, that we can remain faithful to the true spirit of Jesus’ teaching and the Gospel.

In the last sentence today, Paul expresses his deep affection for the Philippians, arguably his favourite church community:

…my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown…

Once again the word “joy” comes in. And they are also his “crown”, the high point, as it were, of his evangelising work. This is great praise indeed for them.

How would Paul value our community or our local church, if he were to come among us today? Would we be his joy? Could we be seen as a crowning example of a Christian people?

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The scriptural commentaries in Living Space were written by Fr Frank Doyle SJ and are a wonderfully rich resource for us all. Sadly, we do not have a commentary for today’s readings.

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Commentary on Acts 2:14,22-33; 1 Peter 1:17-21

We continue reading from the Acts of the Apostles, and through Pentecost, all weekday and Sunday First Readings will be from Acts.

Today’s reading follows immediately on the account of the Pentecost experience. The result of that experience is Peter, now filled with the Spirit and as leader of the new community, begins proclaiming the message about Jesus Christ as Saviour to the people gathered in Jerusalem for the Jewish festival of Pentecost.

It is the first of six such kerygmas (from the Greek kerux, meaning a ‘herald’) or proclamations in Acts about Jesus as Risen Lord and Messiah-King. Five of them are attributed to Peter and the final one to Paul (to the Jews at Antioch in Pisidia, Acts 13:16-41). Peter’s address follows a pattern that became common in the early Church:

1. an explanation of what was happening;
2. the proclamation of the death, resurrection and glorification of Jesus the Christ;
3. an exhortation to repentance, a change of life and baptism.

Peter stood before the crowd, flanked by the Eleven (including Matthias, newly chosen to replace Judas as a witness who had been with Jesus “during all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us”). Peter spoke, then, not just in his own name, but in the name of the whole apostolic ‘college’. Right from the beginning, his special position in the group is recognised.

And he has ‘good news’ (i.e. gospel, Old English god-spell; Greek, euanggelion) to communicate to them. His words reflect the content of the earliest apostolic preaching. First, he gives witness of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and his being raised to glory.

Second, there are some general details of Christ’s ministry and how it was proclaimed in advance by John the Baptist, inaugurated by teaching and miracles, completed by appearances of the Risen Christ and the giving of the Spirit to his followers.

And third, the story of Jesus is put in the wider context of the Old Testament prophecies, while at the same time looking forward to a Messianic age. Everyone, Jew and Gentile alike, is called to a radical change of life in order to be ready for the Christ’s glorious return (believed then to be in the near future).

Peter, then, reminds them that Jesus had appeared among the people—as many of his hearers were well aware—and performed signs and wonders as the credentials of his real identity. But in the inscrutable plan of God, he was “handed over” (again we have that term which goes like a refrain through the New Testament).

Sad to say, those who handed Jesus over were from among his own people, perhaps including some of those listening to Peter, and they had even delivered him into the hands of the Romans (“those outside the law”) for crucifixion. There must surely have been some uneasy feelings among the crowd when he said that.

But Jesus was liberated from the pain of death, as death had no power over him. Peter sees in words spoken by King David their fulfilment in Jesus, his descendant. He then paraphrases the words spoken of David in Psalm 16:10):

He was not abandoned to Hades [the place of the dead],
nor did his flesh experience corruption.

He sees these words as applying more appropriately to Jesus because David died, was buried and the place of his tomb was known to his hearers. But Jesus did not experience the corruption of death. Instead:

This Jesus God raised up, and of that all of us are witnesses.

Today’s Second Reading acknowledges that by his death and resurrection, Jesus died that we might be saved. Peter says:

You know that you were ransomed from the futile conduct inherited from your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without defect or blemish.

We, too, are called to be witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection and his living presence among us by the way we live both individually and as a community.

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Commentary on Ecclesiasticus 27:33 – 28:7; Romans 14:7-9; Matthew 18:21-35

Forgiveness of wrongs done against us is something that many of us Christians find extremely difficult. We probably think Peter is extremely generous in suggesting that he should forgive his brother as many as seven times. Yet Jesus pushes it even further by saying:

Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.

In practice, this means an infinite number of times. It seems hopelessly idealistic and impractical. Yet, further reflection may help us realise that there is really no alternative for the Christian and the truly human person than to forgive – indefinitely.

The words of Jesus turn upside down the boast of Lamech in the book of Genesis. Lamech was the father of Noah, the man who built the ark and saved the human race and all the animals from the Flood. Lamech said to his wives:

Adah and Zillah, hear my voice;
you wives of Lamech, listen to what I say:
I have killed a man for wounding me,
a young man for striking me.
If Cain is avenged sevenfold,
truly Lamech seventy-sevenfold.

This is the philosophy behind such groupings as Asian triad societies as well as organized crime and terrorists organisations. It is clearly an approach which does nothing except produce death, pain, grief and the seeds for more of the same. It is a way we see portrayed night after night in movies and which our young people experience in the computer games they play.

But the words of Jesus also seem in conflict with the passage we had last Sunday about the “brother” in the Christian community who does wrong and refuses to reform. If he persists in his wrongdoing, he is not to be forgiven indefinitely. On the contrary, he is to be excluded from the community’s life. How are we to bring together this advice and Jesus’ urging to forgive “seventy-seven times”?

Jesus’ story
First, let us look at the parable which follows Jesus’ words. It is a parable about a senior official who has incurred a debt of 10,000 ‘talents’. One talent was already a very large amount of money. It is difficult to make a meaningful comparison in today’s currency but let us say, that, roughly, a talent was worth US$1,000. To say the servant owed 10,000 talents is to say, in other words, ‘without limit’. Jesus is saying this official owed a sky-high debt which he could never have any hope of paying back.

Yet this same official comes down heavily on a much lower official who owed him 100 denarii. A denarius was the equivalent of one day’s work for a labourer. Compared to what the senior official owed, 100 denarii was nothing. Yet, the lower official gets no mercy and is tossed, together with his whole family, into a debtor’s prison until the debt is paid (presumably by relatives or colleagues). When the king hears about this, the senior official himself gets thrown into prison. Given the amount of his debt, it is unlikely he would ever get out.

Gospel teaching
Both the words of Jesus and the parable linked with them throw us back to the Lord’s Prayer as it is presented in the Sermon on the Mount. In the ‘Our Father’ which we recite together in every Eucharist, we say:

…and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.

Further commenting on these words, Matthew has Jesus say:

For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. (Matt 6: 12,14-15)

There are two very clear messages from both the parable and the words from the Sermon on the Mount. The first is that we dare not hold back forgiveness from those God forgives. And we know, from the Gospel, God’s attitude towards wrongdoers and his penchant for forgiveness.

But the second message is that the divine patience is not infinite. God, as Jesus tells us to do, is ready to forgive 77 times. And, when it comes to the forgiveness of our own sins, we take this for granted. (Imagine if God were to say, “In your lifetime I will give you just five chances to repent and, after that you’ve had it.”) At the same time, there is a limit to the extent of God’s forgiveness in the sense that it is conditional. That condition is determined first, by our readiness to respond to his forgiveness through our repentance and conversion, and second, by our willingness to imitate him in practising forgiveness of those we feel have offended or hurt us.

Refusing forgiveness
Strange as it may seem, the all-powerful God does not fully forgive the person to whom pardon is offered but who refuses it. Because ultimately, the problem is not just one of ‘forgiveness’ but also of ‘reconciliation’. While we can ourselves forgive, reconciliation is not done alone. Without at least the hope of reconciliation, our forgiveness feels incomplete.

God cannot just say a million times over to the sinner, “I forgive you.” There is an incompleteness on our part just to say, “I know you did something terrible but, because I am a practising Christian, I forgive you.” You may feel very good about talking in that way, but it has not really solved the problem or healed the wound. My responsibility is not over by saying, “I forgive”, if the other person has not changed their attitude towards me in any way. One-sided forgiving can be a source of real smugness, “How good I am!”, or further hurt, “I forgave but he/she continued to hate/hurt me!” At the same time, even with the best will in the world I cannot force another person to be reconciled with me. Ultimately, reconciliation is a personal decision on each side.

Forgiving in the full Christian sense is a form of loving and caring. The problem is that people’s actions towards us are seen as attacks on our vulnerability, our self-esteem. We become completely obsessed by what is happening to us and do not take time to reflect on what is behind the other person’s behaviour.

A hating or angry person is nearly always a person who is more hurting to his- or herself than the object of the hatred or anger. But if on my part there is no effort to understand what is happening to the other person, forgiveness, reconciliation and healing can’t really get off the ground.

There is a saying in psychology, “People make the best choices available to them.” Sad to say, many have very poor choices available to them for one reason or another. People normally do not hate or hurt out of genuine malice for the most part. It can make a big difference to me and to them to try to understand why people act towards me in the way they do.

I may even come to be aware that I am partly responsible for their reactions. I can well ask myself, “What is it in me that makes this person act like this?” When I approach a mutual problem in this way, both forgiveness and reconciliation become so much easier. I am going to feel much less hurt much more of the time. I am going to reach out in compassion to the hurts and weaknesses of others.

Sin and sinner
A person who is fully secure in the knowledge of being totally loved by God and of their own lovableness is not going to find forgiveness and reconciliation too difficult. Forgiving 77 times will not seem idealistic, but simply the only reasonable thing to do. At the same time, like God and like the Christian community, forgiveness cannot be complete if it means indefinite tolerance of evil and unjust behaviour. The king was perfectly ready to forgive the senior official, but how could reconciliation take place when he behaved in such an abominable way to a brother? We can be ready to forgive the sinner indefinitely, but we must fight against sin without counting the cost.

God and the Church can forgive the repentant sinner but they cannot condone unrepentant behaviour that is a source of real evil and suffering. God cannot be reconciled with the sinner who chooses to stay in sin, nor can the Christian community fully incorporate a member who refuses reconciliation and healing by continuing with behaviour that offends against truth and love. It takes two to tango and also to effect a reconciliation.

With God in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, and with the individual Christian, forgiveness is infinitely available, but reconcilliation is only achieved when a mutual healing of wounds is sought. Only where there is a desire to have that change of mind and behaviour present is an end put to the sinful way.

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Commentary on Acts 18:23-28

Today we begin the third, and final, missionary journey of Paul. After leaving Corinth, Paul, accompanied by Priscilla and Aquila, crossed over to Ephesus on the west coast of present-day Turkey. He separated from them there and went to preach in the local synagogues. In spite of the unwelcome reception he so often got from his fellow-Jews, he always made a point of approaching them first when he arrived in a new place. He apparently did well there, because they asked him to stay longer. However, he was clearly anxious to get back to Syrian Antioch, but he promised that he would return—and he did.

On reaching Palestine, he landed at Caesarea where he greeted the local church before going on northwards to Antioch, and it is at that point that today’s reading begins.

He stayed in Antioch for an unspecified length of time before setting out on his third—and final—missionary journey. He began by revisiting the places where he had planted the church almost 10 years previously. He followed the same route he had taken when beginning his second journey, but in the reverse order. The only place mentioned is the “region of Galatia and Phrygia”, which is in the southern part of present-day central Turkey.

We are then introduced to Apollos, who had just arrived from Ephesus in Lydia, on the west coast. He was a Jew and a native of Alexandria, which was on the north coast of Egypt and, at the time, the second largest city of the Roman Empire. It also had a large Jewish population.

Apollos is spoken of very highly as a man of eloquence, well-versed both in the Hebrew Scriptures and:

…instructed in the Way of the Lord…

Apollos also:

…spoke with burning enthusiasm and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John.

He was clearly a deeply spiritual person. It is strange though, that in spite of all that Apollos knew about Jesus, he had not yet been properly baptised in the name of Jesus. Basically, like John the Baptist, he was still looking forward to the coming of the Messiah. His baptism was based on repentance for sin rather than full incorporation through the gift of the Spirit in the Christian community.

In Ephesus, he became an enthusiastic preacher and spoke fearlessly in the Jewish synagogue there. Here he drew the attention of Paul’s friends, Priscilla and Aquila, who took him to their house and gave him a deeper understanding of the new Way.

Perhaps because of what he had heard from Priscilla and Aquila, Apollos was anxious to go across to Achaia, in other words to Corinth, and letters were written to guarantee him a warm welcome. There he gave great encouragement to the believers while continuing to debate with his fellow-Jews, proving from the Scriptures that Jesus was indeed the Messiah.

It is clear that Apollos had a very special charism for evangelisation, so much so that cliques began to form in the community where some were for Paul and others for Apollos. These developed into quarrelling factions. Paul would later deplore this development in one of his letters (see 1 Cor 1:12 and 3:4-11).

These remarks about Apollos have something in common with the description of what we find in the next chapter (chap 19) that describes Paul’s arrival in Ephesus. Here, we are told that the disciples there were only baptised:

…into John’s baptism [and had] not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.

Paul had all these people baptised in the name of Jesus.

Despite the quarreling factions that arose, we should take inspiration from the insights and zeal of Apollos for the Way of Jesus in the context of evangelisation today.

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Note: The Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ—also known as Corpus Christi—is traditionally celebrated on the Thursday after Trinity Sunday. But in some countries and in some dioceses, it is celebrated on the following Sunday.

Commentary on Deuteronomy 8:2-3, 14-16; 1 Corinthians 10:16-17; John 6:51-58

Perhaps the greatest gift that Jesus left behind to his fledgling Church, apart from the example of his own teaching, life and death, was the Eucharist. With justification, the Eucharist is often spoken of as the very centre of Christian living. There is a very real danger for Christian communities of collapsing or degenerating when deprived of the Eucharist for any length of time. No one can in effect remain a committed Christian without participation in the Eucharist.

Every persecuted Church realises this and struggles to keep the Eucharist alive in its communities. We have seen that in countless examples over the centuries, including our own. We have seen how Catholics in numerous countries went to enormous lengths to celebrate the Eucharist in spite of appalling difficulties and threats.

In Ireland, people will point out lonely outcrops known as ‘Mass rocks’ in remote parts of the country where persecuted Catholics secretly celebrated the Eucharist at the risk of death. In England, there are the hiding places for priests on the run who went from house to house to provide the Eucharist for Catholics and who risked martyrdom if they were discovered celebrating the ‘Popish Mass’.

It is sad, then, to find in persecution-free societies (though certainly not all societies in our modern world are are persecution-free) how many have lost this sense of the centrality of the Eucharist in Christian living. However, it is not altogether their fault; the Church itself must take some of the blame.

What do we do?
What do we do at the Eucharist? Basically we do two things:

First, we remember and we give thanks. The word ‘Eucharist’ is derived from a Greek word for ‘thanks’. Above all, we remember with deep gratitude all that God has done for us in Jesus Christ, through his life, suffering, death and resurrection. We also remember and give thanks for all our own personal experiences of God’s love at work in our lives. It is a time to count our blessings. And we remember and give thanks not only for what happened a long time ago, but most especially for what is happening in our lives at this time.

Second, we come together to celebrate our being a community and a fellowship in Christ. The Mass, by itself, does not make community. It is the celebration of a community already existing. For, although the Eucharist is at the centre of our Christian life, it is not the totality of that life. It cannot survive in a vacuum. The Eucharist is a sacrament or sign of something which is bigger than itself—a living Christian community. In addition, the Eucharist is, by and large, the measure of a Christian community. From the way a congregation celebrates its Eucharist one can know immediately whether this is a living or a dying or dead community. A dead or non-existent community cannot have a living Eucharist.

Whose Body and whose Blood?
Today is the feast of the Body and Blood of Christ. But, whose Body and whose Blood? Is it the body that died on the Cross? The body that walked and talked and taught in Galilee? Not really. The Body we celebrate today is the Body of the Risen Jesus. All of us who are baptised are members, constituent parts of that Body. Some of those members are alive and healthy and contributing to the overall life of the Body. Others are sick or dropping off, and still others are in need of healing or nourishment.

When we approach the altar table to receive Communion, the priest or minister says, “The Body of Christ”. When we say our “Amen” of assent in faith, we need to be aware that the Body we are receiving is that Risen Body of Jesus, of which each one present is a part. We may even say that we are, in fact, eating each other! If that sounds shocking then it is not surprising that the Jews, including some of Jesus’ own disciples were shocked, when he told them to eat his body and drink his blood.

For we do not just ‘receive’ the Body of Christ. It would be better to say that we share it. Paul emphasises this in today’s Second Reading:

The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ?

‘Body’ here means the whole Body of the Risen Christ—Jesus and the community of followers. He continues by saying that the one loaf which is broken and distributed is a sign that,

…we who are many are one body…we all partake of the one bread.

It is unfortunate that nowadays the sense of sharing the one loaf has been lost by the small unbread-like discs that are now normally used.

‘Communion’ is not just with Jesus, but also with all those around us. That is why, before this ‘Communion’, we need to say the Lord’s Prayer in which we ask forgiveness of those we have offended. Wishing each other ‘Peace’ (sadly, less than enthusiastically at times) gives an opportunity for genuine reconciliation so that the unity expressed through ‘Communion’ may be genuine. It is truly unfortunate to see people, on occasion, deliberately avoid wishing each other ‘Peace’ and then piously approach the altar. In such a case, they have forgotten the instructions of Jesus to stay away from the altar until they have reconciled with a brother or sister.

Of course, it is difficult to have a sense of sharing in the one loaf as the sacrament of one Body, if, in fact, we are not one body. And we are not one body if, outside the church building, we are not united and caring for each other. One gets the impression that many come to Mass as a purely personal act. They come in and out as self-contained individuals. Some come late and leave early, apparently with no sense whatever that this could be construed as a lack of respect for the celebrating community. Many, needless to say, complain of their Sunday Mass as being highly boring, or too long, or too short an experience.

If we are not already a community before we enter the place where the Eucharist is being celebrated, we are not suddenly going to become a community after we come in. A parish where Mass-going is basically the only activity of its members is going to be a ‘dead’ parish and its Eucharist will also be ‘dead’. As was said above, the Eucharist is the measure of the life of the parish. And a parish gets the Eucharist it deserves—poor community, poor Eucharist. A vibrant Christian community cannot have a bad Eucharist. Maybe some of those who have stopped going to Mass are in fact acting more honestly because the Mass in their church no longer is a source of nourishment for them.

A cautionary tale
There is a story of a parish where the people complained that it had died, so the pastor organised a final requiem Mass with a coffin in front of the altar. At the end of the Eucharist(?) the people were invited to file past the open coffin. When they looked in they each saw an image of themselves in a large mirror placed at the bottom of the coffin. Stark, yes, but if our parish is dead, if our Eucharists are boring, it is not just because of bad sermons or poor singing. The problem is more basic and everyone is partially responsible. So, before we give up going to Sunday Eucharist, we might ask to what extent are we, each one of us, responsible for the situation about which we complain.

So our celebration of the Eucharist, of the Body and Blood of Christ, is not simply a commemoration of what happened to the ‘historical’ Jesus more than 2,000 years ago. It is—in a spirit of remembrance and thanksgiving—a celebration of what makes us what we are today. We today live, as Paul told the Philippians, sharing in the sufferings of Christ, becoming like him in his death and experiencing the power of his resurrection. The Eucharist is the celebration of a living Body, of which we are a part. It is up to us, with the help of Jesus—to use another image Jesus gave us—to decide whether we are living branches on the parent Vine or whether we are dying branches that need to be lopped off and thrown away as unfruitful.

We need to celebrate as a people who become daily more and more aware that we are constituent parts of the Body of Christ. If people are to know Christ, it can only be through us, his Risen Body, that they will come to know him. The more we grow in this awareness of Christ’s living and acting through each one of us, the more meaningful will be our gathering round his table to share together, to eat and drink together, the Body and Blood of the Risen Lord—which we are.

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Commentary on Exodus 34:4-6,8-9; 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; John 3:16-18

We have now come to the end of the many weeks which were taken up with the celebration of and reflection on the ‘Paschal Mystery’. It began with Ash Wednesday, went through Lent, the celebration of Holy Week and Easter, the weeks following Easter and culminating in Pentecost and the handing on of Jesus’ mission to his Church.

We return now for the rest of the liturgical year—the ‘Ordinary’ Sundays of the year—and they will bring us right up to Advent and the beginning of another liturgical cycle. But traditionally this transition is commemorated each year by our celebration of the Feast of the Holy Trinity.

The doctrine of the Trinity is one of the most fundamental in our Christian faith, but it is also a doctrine which many of us have difficulty coming to terms with. We often refer to it as a ‘mystery’ and therefore something which can be affirmed, but is not to be understood and need not be explained. “Just believe it,” is something people may be told.

In the New Testament, the word ‘mystery’ (Greek, mysterion) refers primarily to some truth which God has made known to us and which we otherwise would not have discovered. The Trinity, that in God there are three Persons, really is a mystery in this sense. It is also, of course, difficult for us to understand how one being can be three persons just as it is difficult for us to understand how Jesus can be both God and human (the mystery of the Incarnation).

Three possible reactions
We can react to this situation in three ways:

1. by saying it is all rubbish anyway;
2. by not thinking about these things at all;
3. by trying to reduce them to categories which are within our human comprehension.

None of these approaches is very helpful. Rather, we should try to understand as much as we can, and say as much as we can while acknowledging that we can only go a certain distance. However, we can go far enough to satisfy our hunger for truth and to have some understanding of our God. One thing we can say right at the beginning. We are not dealing with outright contradictions or trying to believe the impossible. We are not being asked to believe that 3=1.

We are asked to believe that in the one being we call God, there are three Persons, who are, in the words of today’s Preface to the Eucharistic Prayer,

…three Persons equal in majesty, undivided in splendour, yet one Lord, one God, ever to be adored.

Rather than getting ourselves tied up in theological knots, we would do far better by reading prayerfully over the beautiful Scripture readings of today’s Mass. Here there are no abstruse theological explanations or speculations. Rather the emphasis is not on what, or how, or why, but in very practical language, on the tangible way the Persons in the Trinity relate to us.

A God who is very close
The message coming loud and clear through these readings is that our God is not far away, that he is not ‘up there somewhere’, a kind of scary, long-bearded policeman in the sky. The message coming through is that our God is close by and he cares. In the First Reading (from Exodus) Moses is told that God is:

The Lord, the Lord,
a God merciful and gracious,
slow to anger,
and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness…

Oh, we really need to hear that and to become utterly convinced of it, especially when we find times rough and painful.

In Greek drama of classical times, one could recognise the character being played by the mask the actor wore. As well, in Chinese opera, there is something similar where the faces of the players are elaborately painted so that one can know which role is being played—a king, a general, a concubine, a soldier and such. The mask was called a prosopon. In Latin this word was translated as persona.

Even today in programmes of plays we may still see the actors listed under the heading dramatis personae, the characters or the roles in the drama. So in a certain sense, there are three personae or roles in our one God. The difference is that in a play, the role is assumed for the duration of the drama, while in God, the roles are permanently identified with God himself.

It might be helpful to us to look at these three roles of God as they are presented to us in Scripture.

God the Father*
While traditionally Scripture speaks of God as Father, we know that in God there can be no gender differences. We call God Father in the sense of the Parent who gives life and nurture. God as Father is the originator, the source, the conserver of all life, of all that exists. The Acts of the Apostles explains:

In him we live and move and have our being… (Acts 17:28)

God as Father is no puppet operator in the clouds, but an indwelling Lord. God is in all his creation, but is not identified with it. The Jesuit poet Gerard Manley Hopkins said that “the world is charged with the grandeur of God”. Through the Father, our God is to be sought and found in all things, which he has created and keeps in being. These go from the simplest minerals which are alive with atomic energy, to the most gifted and creative human being, to the outermost galaxy. And so we have the lovely prayer of Moses in today’s First Reading:

…I pray, let my Lord go with us.

God the Son*
If we can speak of God as Father or Mother, then the ‘only begotten son’ must equally be spoken of as Son or Daughter. The ‘only begotten’ as such, can be neither male nor female even though incarnation de facto took place in a male. However, the Creed which we will soon recite says of the Son or Daughter that homo factus est. This should be translated as “was made human” or “became human”. The word homo- in Latin, like anthropus in Greek, does not specify gender; both men and women are homo.

Of course, we know the Son best through Jesus, born of Mary in Bethlehem. In him, there was the mysterious combination of the divine and the human in one Person. Jesus was totally God and totally human—not half and half. This is a truth as far beyond our comprehension as the Trinity itself.

Jesus is the revelation—unveiled in human form—of our God. The message of this revelation is purely and simply to let us know that God, that the Father, loves us with an overwhelming love. John tells us in today’s Gospel passage:

For God [Father] so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God [Father] did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him.

In this manner, God is not concealed behind the humanity of Jesus, but is seen precisely in that humanity. When is Jesus most clearly revealing of the Father? In his miracles? Certainly, but surely Jesus is most clearly revealing the heart of the Father when he is at his most human. We see the Father God most clearly in Jesus in his compassion for the weak, the needy, the sinner; in forgiving the sinner and his enemies; in healing the physically and mentally sick; in integrating the social outcast back into the community; and in his unconditional acceptance of all irrespective of class, religion, or gender. Yes, our Father God really loves the world and that has been shown to us by the ‘Only Begotten’ in Jesus.

God the Spirit
Finally, we see God as indwelling Spirit. The Spirit is described first as the subsisting Love that is generated between the Father and the Son. Again, of course, we cannot speak of either ‘he’ or ‘she’, still less of this Love as ‘it’.

The meaning of the Spirit in practice means that God is indwelling in all creation and revealing himself through it. Wherever there is Truth or Love or Beauty, there is God. Every act of truth and integrity, every act of love and compassion, every act of human empathy, every act of solidarity, forgiveness, acceptance or justice in people is the Spirit of God working in and through us.

When such actions appear in us, they are a sign that we are open to the Spirit and that he is working in us and through us. Let us pray today with Paul in the Second Reading:

Try to grow perfect; help one another. Be united; live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you…

And Paul concludes with the lovely greeting we often use at the beginning of the Eucharist:

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God [Father], and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.

One last word
The two great mysteries of our faith are the Trinity and the Incarnation. They are combined in a marvellous simplicity in the Sign of the Cross with its accompanying words. Let us try to say this simple prayer with ever greater meaning and awareness and form the cross on our bodies with care and dignity.

St Ignatius of Loyola had such a love of the Trinity (as the result of some mystical experiences) that every time he began celebrating the Eucharist with the Sign of the Cross he broke down in tears and could hardly go on. Let us, too, rediscover the Sign of the Cross as a means of getting in touch with the God who loves us so much that he sent his Son and fills us with his Spirit.

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*There is no sexual differentiation in God, so we can speak with equal validity of the First Person as Father or Mother and of the Second as Son or Daughter. The Spirit, too, is both male and female. This is the language of the Scripture texts reflecting the times in which they were written. It is not the words that are important, but their meaning.

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Commentary on Acts 2:1-11; 1 Corinthians 12:3-7,12-13; John 20:19-23

Today we round off more than seven weeks of celebrating the Paschal Mystery: Passion and Death—Resurrection—Ascension, Exaltation—Coming of the Holy Spirit. Although in the liturgy it is spread over seven weeks, all the elements are actually there on the cross on Good Friday. At the moment of death, Jesus passes to life, is exalted to the Father and breathes forth his Spirit.

Today is also the birthday of the Church. What is the Church? The Church is basically that community and complex of communities spread all over the world which is continuing the visible presence of God and his work by living openly in the Spirit of Jesus and offering its experience of knowing Christ to the world.

…the Word became flesh and lived among us… (John 1:14)

These words apply not only to Jesus, but to all those who are now the visible Body of the Risen Jesus. It is for each of us, individually and in community, to incarnate the Word of God in our world.

Pentecost day
Today’s first reading from the Acts of the Apostles gives us one account, perhaps the most familiar one, of how the mission of Christ was transferred to his followers. The scene is full of biblical imagery. There was “a sound like the rush of a violent wind”. In Greek the words used here for “wind” and “Spirit” are very similar. The whole house was filled with the very Spirit of God.

Then “divided tongues, as of fire” were seen resting on each person present. Fire, again, speaks of the presence of God himself. God spoke to Moses from out of a burning bush. As the Israelites wandered through the desert on their way to the Promised Land, a pillar of cloud accompanied them by day, and a pillar of fire by night. God was with his people.

The fire here was in the form of tongues, as if to say that each one present was being given the gift and power to speak in the name of God. And in fact:

…all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.

Amazement
Because it was the Jewish feast of Pentecost, the city of Jerusalem was filled with pilgrim Jews from all over the Mediterranean area. They were amazed to hear the disciples speaking to them in their own languages:

And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.

In the Book of Genesis, men tried to build a tower to reach right up to heaven. For such arrogance, they were punished by being made to speak in different languages. No longer able to communicate, they could not finish their project.

Now the time of the Tower of Babel is reversed. The disciples have a message which is offered to and can be understood by people everywhere. People are being called to be united again as brothers and sisters under one common Father, revealed to them by his Son Jesus Christ.

A different account
The Gospel from John presents us with a different account of the coming of the Spirit. It is Easter Sunday. The disciples are locked into the house, terrified of the authorities coming to take them away as collaborators with the recently executed Jesus.

Suddenly the same Jesus is there among them and greets them:

Peace with you.

It is both a wish and a statement. Where Jesus is, there is peace. The presence of Jesus in our lives always brings peace and removes our anxieties and fears.

He shows them his hands and side to prove it is himself: the one who died on the cross and the one who is now alive. Then he gives them their mission:

As the Father has sent me, so I send you.

Their mission and his are exactly the same. Our mission and his are exactly the same.

He then breathes on them, just as God breathed on the earth and created the first human being. In Christ, we become a new creation. The breathing also symbolises the Spirit of God and of Jesus.

So he says,

Receive the Holy Spirit.

With the giving of the Spirit comes also the authority to speak and act in the name of Jesus.

If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.

This is not just a reference to the Sacrament of Reconciliation and the power to forgive sin. Forgiving sin and reconciling people with God is the very core of the work of Christ and the Christian mission. The disciples are now the Body of Christ, the ongoing visible presence of Christ in the world.

This Body will experience injuries and wounds and disease. It will wander at times far from God. It will need healing and forgiveness and reconciliation. It will also try to bring the same healing and reconciliation to a broken world.

A body with many parts
Finally, the Second Reading speaks of the effect of the Spirit on the Christian community. The Church and each community within it reflects unity and diversity. We are not called to uniformity. We are not clones of Christ or each other. Unity presumes diversity and a variety of gifts and talents and responsibilities.

So, on the one hand, we are called to be deeply united in our faith in Christ and in our love for each other. At the same time, each one of us has a unique gift. It is through this gift or gifts that we serve and build up the community. They are not just for ourselves, or for our families and friends.

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.

We are like a body. Each body has many members, each with its own particular function, yet they all are ordered to one purpose—the good functioning of the body as a whole. So it is with the Christian community, which is the Body of Christ. Each member is to be aware of his or her particular gift. This gift indicates the role the member has to play in building up the whole Body, the whole community.

Today let us ask God to send his Spirit into our hearts. Filled with that Spirit, may we each individually make our contribution to the community to which we belong. And, as a community, may we give clear and unmistakable witness to the Truth and Love of God, revealed to us in Jesus our Lord.