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Commentary on Deuteronomy 8:2-3.14b-16a; 1 Corinthians 10:16-17; John 6:51-58 Read Sunday of Week 10 of Easter »

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Commentary on Isaiah 60:1-6; Ephesians 3:2-3a,5-6; Matthew 2:1-12 Read Sunday 3 of Christmas – Cycle A »

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Commentary on Sirach 3:2-6,12-14; Colossians 3:12-21; Matthew 2:13-15,19-23

After Christmas, we traditionally celebrate the feast of the Holy Family. In some respects, it was very modern in being just a one-child family. We may be inclined to think that, with three such good people, life must have been very easy for them. But if we are to take the Incarnation seriously, there is no reason to believe that this family—living the lifestyle of a rural village in those times—did not have its share of hardships over the years.

In addition, there is the record of the child being lost for three days in a large and strange city. Imagine the anxiety of the parents in such a situation. Later, the mother will see her son become famous and then the object of great hostility. She will see him abused, arrested, tried, sentenced, scourged, crowned with thorns and finally die like a common criminal with two criminals before jeering crowds. Few mothers have to go through anything like that kind of experience.

Families in trouble
Today, in celebrating the Holy Family, we ask God’s blessings on our own families. It is cliché to say that family life today is in trouble. And it is a self-perpetuating problem.

Sadly, children from dysfunctional families themselves may be more likely to set up equally dysfunctional families. Never having experienced good family life, how can they themselves establish a good family? And it seems that very few couples go through any real formation process in becoming husband and wife and parents. Yet the skills needed do not come naturally—or easily.

Family and church
Jesus said that:

…where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them. (Matt 18:20)

This should be true of every Christian family. The Catholic family is the basic Christian community, through which Christ is present and reveals himself in this world. It has been called the domestic church.

Christian families not only belong to the Church, but their lifestyle is also a living out of the Christian vision: the vision of unconditional love in a truly sharing community.

Family life is not meant to be lived in isolation. The world around it is not just there for its benefit. It should be united with, supporting and supported by the other families in the parish community and with the wider Church.

The mission of the family is identical to that of the whole Church: to give tangible witness to the vision of Christ for the world.

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Commentary on Deuteronomy 8:2-3.14b-16a; 1 Corinthians 10:16-17; John 6:51-58 Read Sunday of week 10 of Easter »

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Commentary on Isaiah 60:1-6; Ephesians 3:2-3a.5-6; Matthew 2:1-12 Read Sunday of week 3 of Christmas – Cycle B »

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Commentary on Isaiah 52:7-10; Hebrews 1:1-15; John 1:1-18 Read Sunday of week 1 of Christmas – Cycle B »

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Commentary on Isaiah 60:1-6; Ephesians 3:2-3a.5-6; Matthew 2:1-12 Read Sunday of week 3 of Christmas – Cycle C »

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(Note: In many countries, this Mass is often supplanted by the Mass for the Epiphany of Our Lord, which is celebrated in Ireland on the traditional date of 6 January. For the Epiphany commentary, see 6 January.)

Commentary on Sirach 24:1-2,8-12; Ephesians 1:3-6,15-18; John 1:1-18

Today’s Gospel is the same as that of Christmas Day (Daytime Mass). In fact, this is the third time* this Gospel is being read during the Christmas season and with good reason. It is the Prologue which opens the Gospel of John and is a magnificent manifesto of the Incarnation, when God entered our world in a very special way. Of course, God has always been present in our world, but the Incarnation is an altogether new, more intimate and striking presence.

The coming of God’s Word
“In the beginning…”, that is, before any created thing existed, “the Word was with God, and the Word was God”. Through his Word (Greek, logos), God expresses—i.e reveals himself—just as we express and reveal ourselves by the words and signs by which we communicate with others.

God’s Word, however, is not just a spoken word. God’s Word is productive and creative:

All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.

Creation ranged from the 100-200 billion or so galaxies to the tiniest sub-atomic particle and everything in between. That creating Word also brings life:

What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.

Jesus later on will confirm that he is the Light of the world. Through that light we can penetrate the darkness which surrounds us, we have a vision of life and we can see the direction our lives need to follow. And indeed we ourselves, bathed in that light, are to be a light for others. Jesus told his followers in the Sermon on the Mount:

You are the light of the world. (Matt 5:14)

Nevertheless, the world which had its being through the Word did not know, recognise, or acknowledge his presence. Sadly, the people among whom he was born also, by and large, rejected him:

He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him.

But to those who did accept him, that is, put their trust in him and aligned themselves with him, he gave power to be in a special way God’s children.

Of course, by creation we are all—at least passively—children of God. Here, by our acceptance and commitment, a deeper relationship is set up, with Jesus as our Brother and, therefore, with us as Sons and Daughters of God.

Entering our world
The deep mystery of the Incarnation is then expressed by John. The Word in the world was:

…born, not of blood [two human parents],

…or of the will of the flesh [through sexual desire and physical intimacy],

…or of the will of man,

…but of God.

God is the direct Father of Jesus. Yet Jesus was also born of a woman, Mary. And so “the Word became flesh”. John does not actually say—as some modern translations put it—the Word was made ‘man’, or ‘became a human being’. No, “the Word” became flesh. In the original Greek, the word ‘flesh’ is sarx. It is a word with many negative connotations—a word, in Paul’s letters, meaning ‘opposed to the Spirit’.

John then is saying that the Word, in Jesus, entered fully and totally into our frail human condition. He was a real human person who could be seen and heard and touched, a person who had ideas and feelings (anger and fear as well as pity and compassion). Jesus the male human is no mirage, no mere appearance (as promulgated in the beliefs of the Gnostics and Docetists), but flesh and blood as we are. The Letter to the Hebrews tells us that Jesus is:

…one who in every respect has been tested [tempted] as we are, yet without sin. (Heb 4:15)

The Gospel says He “lived among us” or, as translated literally, “pitched his tent among us”. This throws us back to the time of the Exodus, reflected in today’s First Reading from the Book of Sirach (the first two verses not included), which very much echoes the Gospel:

I came forth from the mouth of the Most High
and covered the earth like a mist.
I encamped in the heights,
and my throne was in a pillar of cloud [the Word was with God and was God]….
Then the Creator of all things gave me a command,
and my Creator pitched my tent.
He said, ‘Encamp in Jacob,
and in Israel receive your inheritance.’

In the time of the Exodus, the presence of the Lord was with the wandering Israelites in the tent or tabernacle in which were kept the tablets of the Law and the Ark of the Covenant. John, then, is saying that the presence of God is now in a new tent, the human body of Jesus. And, like the Israelites’ tent in the desert, the ‘tent’, the human person of the Word, is right in our midst. (And Paul will go further and say that the Christian community is the ‘tent’ or ‘temple’ where the Risen Christ really lives and works in the world.)

The Word in the Child
All this is very symbolical and abstract in a way, but it is all expressed in more visible and accessible terms in the story of the stable at Bethlehem. The message is exactly the same in both, and we need both for our full understanding. For through the Word made flesh we are able to get a glimpse of the glory and beauty of God. Through him we get to know to some degree what our God is really like.

Again, from John’s Gospel:

No one has ever seen God. It is the only Son, himself God, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.

Jesus is the pontifex, the bridge builder, between God and ourselves. When we see the Child in the stable, we see God, but we may be tempted to stop at the humanity as the totality. We have always to keep before us the two poles: the Word that exists from all eternity and is totally beyond our understanding, and the Child born during a tiny window of time in history in a very small and obscure place.

The Word came for us
The Gospel says:

From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.

The Second Reading, from the Letter to the Ephesians, speaks of our close links to that Word, saying:

…just as he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love. He destined us for adoption as his children…

“Before the foundation of the world”—in the very beginning before all things came to be—God “chose us in Christ.” He chose us to be “holy and blameless”. And how is that to be done? By living:

…according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.

Because, Paul writes, God had “destined us for adoption as his children”.

That is our calling, our vocation. That is what Christmas is about. That is what Christianity is about: to live our lives in total faith and commitment to the Way of Jesus and to live in love for all our sisters and brothers.

__________________________________
*The Gospel of John 1:1-18 is read at the following Masses: Christmas Day, 7th day in the Octave of Christmas (31 December) and Sunday of Week 2 of Christmas.

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Commentary on Isaiah 52:7-10; Hebrews 1:1-15; John 1:1-18 Read Sunday of week 1 of Christmas – Cycle C »

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Commentary on 1 Samuel 26:2,7-9,12-13,22-23; 1 Corinthians 15:45-49; Luke 6:27-38

Many desire to have power:

• Power that having money gives
• Power of being influential, having prestige
• Power of office
• Power of having access to the inside track, ‘friends’ in high places
• Power of the blackmailer
• Power of bullying

In general, power is seen as the ability to force people to do what I want. However, the Gospel today speaks of another kind of power—the power of love and justice. In this power, both the giver and receiver benefit.

Hopelessly idealistic
At first sight, the Gospel seems downright silly or hopelessly idealistic. Jesus tells his disciples:

Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you pray for those who mistreat you.

But there is ‘worse’ to come:

If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also,
from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt [i.e. the rest of your clothes].

Give to everyone who asks of you, and if anyone takes away what is yours, do not ask for it back again.

Surely this is not to be taken seriously. Are we to invite people to trample on our basic rights? Yet, far from being wimpish, the implementation of this teaching requires tremendous inner strength and a strong sense of security. It calls for an overwhelming awareness of the inalienable dignity, value and rights of every other person irrespective of how they behave.

Hitting back
For many, it seems perfectly natural and justifiable to hit back when struck—justly or unjustly—to give as good as you get when someone uses abusive language against you. In our ‘macho’ world, you are only tough when, as in the movies, you are ready and able to hit back hard when abused, insulted or physically attacked. When the hero does it, it is even called ‘justice’. (But not when the ‘bad guy’ does it.)

In fact, it requires a great deal more strength and courage not to hit back—not because of fear, but because by doing so one lowers oneself to the same level of one’s opponent. By hitting back, where was originally one act of violence, now there are two. Where does it end?

Let’s look at some examples of today’s Gospel in practice:

In today’s First Reading, King Saul with 3,000 men went out to kill David, but at night David and Abishai got into Saul’s camp. Saul was asleep with his spear beside him. Abishai said to David:

God has given your enemy into your hand today; now, therefore, let me pin him to the ground with one stroke of the spear…

But David refused to kill the king chosen and anointed by God. However, he does quietly remove the spear and a pitcher of water. When Saul woke he realised how close he had been to being killed by the man he wanted to kill. David had made his point. He respected the dignity of Saul, wicked though Saul was. In doing so, David also revealed his own strength and greatness, and this is recognised by Saul, who says:

Blessed be you, my son David! You will do many things and will succeed in them. (1 Sam 26:25)

Hate in Saul turns to blessing. This is one of the desired effects of non-violence.

In another instance, when Jesus was brought before the Sanhedrin, (the ruling council of the Jews), he was struck on the face by a soldier and accused of insolence. Jesus did not retaliate, but simply asked:

If I have spoken wrongly, testify to the wrong. But if I have spoken rightly, why do you strike me? (John 18:23)

He speaks calmly and with dignity, respecting the soldier’s dignity. It is a perfect example of active non-violence. Significantly, Jesus was not struck again. His restraint was seen for what it was: courage, not weakness.

In the whole of his Passion, Jesus reveals his strength. He prayed for those battering him to death:

Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing. (Luke 23:34)

The prophet Ezekiel writes:

Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked, says the Lord God, and not rather that they should turn from their ways and live? (Ez 18:23)

Revenge wants to destroy. Love wants to restore life, truth, justice and right relationships between people.

Not so idealistic, not so difficult
What Jesus is saying in the Gospel is far from impossible or idealistic. It is really the only truly human, and not just the Christian, way to go. And, much of the time, it is not as difficult as it seems.

It is really a question of an attitude, a conviction. It is easy for the Christian to love enemies because the real Christian does not have any, in the sense of people against whom he or she feels deep-seated hatred or resentments.

Jesus’ words presume that, for the Christian, there are no outsiders. It is easy to love those who love us, to love ‘our own kind’ or ‘our own people’. But, as Jesus himself pointed out, even those who are evil may take care of their own. But we are called to be like God, of whom Jesus is the living, human image and in whose image we also are made. Jesus says:

…love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return…for he himself [God] is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

Of course, there may be people who are hostile to the Christian. Being a fully-fledged Christian calls on one to love all, but there is no guarantee of being loved by all in return. People wanted to kill Jesus, and they did.

It is also important to know that “love” here does not mean being “in love” or even feeling affection or a liking for those who want to destroy us. Loving those out to get us is obviously not the same love I have for my closest friends. Love here means genuinely wanting the good and the well-being of the other person. I hate the evil; I denounce murder, bodily violence, sexual abuse, exploitation and manipulation, but I am deeply concerned for the conversion and the healing of the perpetrator.

We have no real right to sit in judgment on others. (And yet, how often do we do that every day with a cup of coffee in our hand?) Jesus says:

Forgive, and you will be forgiven…

Can I forgive the murderer, the rapist, the abuser? But forgiveness in the Gospel is not just saying, “Forget it; let it pass; it’s no big deal.”

Forgiveness in the Gospel always implies reconciliation as well. It involves bringing people together again and the healing of wounds, but not the destruction of the wrongdoer. That is something very different. It can take time and a lot of effort, and a lot of real concern for people.

Loving one’s enemies is not being soppy about them. It is not about peace at any price, not a question of projecting a gentle, loving image, but a passion to restore justice, dignity and right relationships between people. How many wars, how many millions of deaths could have been avoided if we had followed this path? Like Jesus, there has to be a readiness to suffer and perhaps to lose much materially and socially.

Active non-violence involves campaigning, sticking one’s neck out and speaking out against injustice. At the same time, it always entails “speaking the truth in love” and seeking to heal, to save, to make whole, but never to hurt or destroy.

Jesus is not offering us an option today, but the only way that makes sense, the only way that is truly human. Jesus himself is our model. As he hangs naked, stripped of all dignity, the victim of unspeakable violence, this moment, contrary to all appearance, is the moment of his triumph—the triumph of love over hate, violence and murder. It is a message our violence-ridden cultures desperately need to hear and to learn.