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This Sunday, which can fall either before Lent or after the Easter season, is often not celebrated.

Readings
Deuteronomy 11:18.26-28
Romans 3:21-25.28
Matthew 7:21-27

IT HELPS IN OUR UNDERSTANDING of the gospel text today to realise that it forms the conclusion of Matthew’s first great discourse, the Sermon on the Mount.  So the references to hearing followed by doing are highly relevant to all that has gone before in the preceding three chapters.

Qualities of a disciple
The whole of the Sermon on the Mount has been about the essential qualities to be found in the disciple of Jesus.  He or she is not to be measured simply by what they do and say, however religious or "holy" they seem to be.  It is not enough, for instance, to keep saying "Lord, Lord…"  That by itself will not bring a person under the kingship of God.  Translating that into contemporary terms, it means that just spending a lot of time in church, being regularly at Sunday Mass, going on pilgrimages, joining in novenas, saying rosaries does not necessarily make one the kind of disciple that Jesus is looking for.  Church-going and discipleship are not synonymous.

    It will not be enough even to be able to perform wonders like exorcisms of demons, preaching brilliant sermons before huge crowds or working other miracles, even if these are all done in the name of Jesus.

    Something more is required of the true disciple.  He or she is someone who is totally united to God in heart, soul and mind.  We can say a lot of prayers and be very busy doing the Lord’s work and yet not be such a person.  The problem is that such persons do not really have "the mind of Christ", they do not think like Christ nor have they totally submitted themselves to his way of seeing and doing things.  They are not really in touch with his will because they are so busy talking (even to him) and doing that they have never really listened.  So much so that at the end of time when they come face to face with the Lord he will not recognise them.  "You did your (holy) thing but you were not doing mine."

A listening ear
The true disciple, Jesus tells us, is one who listens to Jesus’ words and carries them out.  What do we mean by "listening" to Jesus?  I suggest that it includes four interacting qualities, all of which must be present:

    First, we have to hear what Jesus is saying.  We can only do that by being in touch with the Word of God which we find above all in the scriptures, both the Old and New Testaments but especially the latter.  Many Christians, sadly many of them Catholics, have a very scant knowledge of God’s Word in the Bible.  They seldom, if ever, open the book, that is, if they have one at all.  They may feel that the "catechism" they were taught in school is all they need.  What they carry away consists mainly of various "truths" to be held and moral obligations to be observed.  Even otherwise highly educated people have only the scantiest awareness of the dynamics of the Gospel message.

    Secondly, we need to understand what we hear and read in the Word of God.  It is very possible to hear (e.g. during the Mass readings) or read (privately) and not understand the inner meaning.  This understanding does not come without some effort.  It is dangerous to read and interpret the Bible without guidance.  The Word of God has come to us through two millennia from a time and culture very different from our own.  Without someone to guide us, it is difficult for us to access the fuller meaning of what we are being told.  It is very easy to distort the meaning or to make the text say something it never intended. 
    There are now plenty of books and courses available to guide us and open the scriptures for us.  At the same time it must be emphasised that the scriptures provide a depth of meaning which is never exhausted.  A lifetime of reading and reflecting constantly reveals new insights.  It was what makes the Bible such an exciting book.

    Thirdly, we need to accept fully and to assimilate into our very being what we have come to understand.  It is possible to hear well, to understand clearly but not to accept or assimilate.  Children and teenagers do that all the time!  We have not reached full discipleship until the thinking of Christ becomes our own.  It was put marvellously by Paul when he said, "I live, no, it is not I, but Christ lives in me."  At the beginning of the Letter to the Philippians he also said, "For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain."  If he were to die, it would mean instant and total union with his beloved Lord; if he were to live on, he could continue sharing his experience of Christ with his brothers and sisters.

    Fourthly, when, like Paul, we have fully assimilated as part of our own thinking what we have heard and understood, we will naturally act accordingly.  It will not be possible to act otherwise.  His will and mine totally coincide; his vision and mine are exactly the same.  So, contrary to what many people feel, being a Christian and following the Gospel is not as difficult as it sometimes seems.  It is not a question of will power.  It is a question of seeing things in the same way as the Gospel.  As Fr Tony de Mello used to say, “It is all a question of attitude.”  When we see life and relationships the way the Gospel does, our behaviour is likely to follow quite naturally.  It is only when all this becomes a reality in our lives that we can say we are truly disciples of Jesus and, as he says, that is the only sure foundation on which to build our lives. 

Blessing and curse
The First Reading presents our choice as a blessing and a curse.  In the light of the New Covenant, we need to be aware that the "commandments" are not just the Ten Commandments of Mount Sinai.  Rather what we need to obey is the way of life, built on truth, justice and love, built on the inseparable link of love between God and those around us, which God in Jesus has presented to us. 
And the "blessing" and the "curse" are not simply divine decrees.  They follow out naturally from our response to Jesus’ call.  To hear and do brings built into it the happiness and peace that we long for; to refuse to hear and do is to bring anxiety and disharmony into our lives.  "You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you" (St Augustine).

A message for all
Paul in the Second Reading from the letter to the Romans raises another important element.  What was originally given to the Israelites through the Law and the Prophets is now extended to everyone without exception as a gift of love through the life, suffering, death and resurrection of Christ.  Under the old Law, it was believed that salvation came through one’s keeping of the Law’s requirements.  Under the New Law, we have all been saved through Christ who won reconciliation with God for us through his life, death and resurrection. 

    We become right with God by our total commitment in faith to Jesus Christ and not by our own efforts.  The good that we do is done only through God’s loving gift.  As one of the Weekday Prefaces puts it: "You have no need of our praise, yet our desire to thank you is itself your gift.  Our prayer of thanksgiving adds nothing to your greatness, but makes us grow in your grace through Jesus Christ our Lord."  Or, as Paul puts it today, "one is justified [that is, made right with God] by faith and trust in him and not by doing something the Law tells him to do".

    It is important for us to understand this in the context of today’s Gospel reading.  When we become disciples of Christ and live the life he calls us to, we do that, not on the basis of our own efforts, but in response to his coming into our lives.  All we do, we do "through him, with him and in him".

Sand or rock
To live a Christian life only on the surface, that is, only with words and externally conforming behaviour, is like building a house on sand.  Once we come under attack, we will collapse because we have no deep foundation inside.  We see that happening frequently when people who have lived in an outwardly Christian environment move to a purely secular situation.  They fall away very quickly.

    So let us be like that sensible man who builds his house on rock.  The Rock is the firm foundation that is Christ, together with the vision of Christ which becomes also the vision that guides our own life, a life built on truth and love.

+++
The word ‘faith’ translates the Greek word pistis which essentially implies trust or confidence in another person.  In the Church it carries also the meaning of accepting as true from God something we cannot verify by any human evidence. 
    Faith, in fact, is a reality of our daily lives.  We accept as true many things we have no way of verifying.  How often have we categorically made statements on the basis that "we saw it in the newspaper"? 
    At the time of the Reformation, the Reformers tended to emphasise the first meaning while what was to become the "Catholic" Church stressed the second.  In fact, both meanings are important and, in general, I would say that Paul is thinking more of the first meaning.  Faith is not just an act of belief that something is true but includes, as an essential element, total commitment to what that truth involves and especially to the Person who communicates it.

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This Sunday, which can fall either before Lent or after the Easter season, is not often celebrated.

Readings
Isaiah 49:14-15
1 Corinthians 4:1-5
Matthew 6:24-34

THE GOSPEL IS A STRONG CHALLENGE to the lifestyle that prevails in most of our cities in the so-called developed world and in many parts of the developing world too.  Jesus puts it very bluntly: "You cannot at the same time be the slave of God and money (and this includes all the things that equate to money, like property, cars, clothes, foreign holidays, etc.)"  As such, he does not criticise the having of things.  What is in question is our attitude towards them, our being in thrall to them, having our lives controlled by them and, above all, being unable to share them with those in real need.  Also in question is the false illusion that, if we have money and power, we have control of our lives.  We are secure.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  So ultimately Jesus is teaching us that our only real security is total trust in God’s love for us.

    Money primarily is a means of exchange by which we can provide for the needs of our life, whatever those needs are at any given time.  The problem begins when money and the pursuit of money becomes an end in itself, "I want to be rich."  Which soon becomes "I have to be rich".  And, when I am rich, when I have lots of things, I will go to any length to hold on to them.  It is amazing how very rich people keep being driven to make more till they have more than they could possible spend.  There was the case of a dollar billionaire in an Asian country who went to jail for insider trading on the stock exchange in order to make even more than he already had.  And, after he came out of jail, he was worth more than twice than when he went in.  When a very rich man died, someone asked how much he had left.  "Every red cent," was the answer.  "You can’t take it with you," as the cliche‚ goes. 

What will we bring with us?
And, in a way, that is what Jesus is asking us to consider.  When we come to the end of our lives what do we want to bring with us and what do we want to leave behind?  Would you want to die alone and desperately lonely and unlamented like billionaires Getty and Howard Hughes or be like a Mother Teresa and Mahatma Gandhi who just kept giving themselves to others and were mourned by millions? 

    Jesus is asking us today to reflect on what are our most basic values in life.  Is it just what we want to have or is it what we most want to be?  What is life about?  Is it a matter of getting what we have not got or sharing with others what we have, however little it may seem to be?  Is to be rich the only thing I want?  Or are there other values, other more precious qualities which no bank can evaluate?  What about things like happiness, peace, freedom, contentment, wonderful friends, a supportive family?  Does having money guarantee us these things?  Are they not available even to those who have little or no money?

Conflicting goals
We have to make a choice between the God’s vision of life and a preoccupation with money and possessions.  They are not compatible.  They involve conflicting goals in life and different visions of what is most important in life.  The truly materialistic person may have a veneer of Christian practice but cannot be a really committed Christian. 
 
    By definition, to be rich is to have more, a lot more than others.  To continue to live this way when in the same society there are many poor, that is, people who do not have enough cannot be equated with a following of the Christian Way.

    Jesus preaches something like what St Ignatius Loyola calls ‘indifference’ to material things.  Obviously some material things — like food and clothing and shelter — are necessary to daily living and everyone has a right to have these things.  At different times other things will be necessary too, such as basic medical care, education…
      The attitude of ‘indifference’ in this sense is not that one does not care; on the contrary, one cares very much.  But one cares to have things and to use things only in so far as they are needed to love and serve God and others for his sake.  This involves a very high level of inner freedom — the ability to say ‘Yes’ only to what I need.

Trust in God
Linked to our attitude to material things, Jesus further urges greater trust and confidence in God’s care for us.  Isaiah in the First Reading speaks of Israel as feeling abandoned and forgotten by God in its times of trial.  The response comes in one of the tenderest passages in the whole of the Bible: "Does a woman forget her baby at the breast, or fail to cherish the son of her womb?  Yet even if these forget, I will never forget you."

    For his part, Jesus points to nature.  Nature lives always in the present.  It never shows any anxiety about the future. Yet it is covered with a staggering beauty.  Solomon in all his glory cannot match the lilies of the field.  But, if God lavishes such beauty on things which quickly wither away, how much care will he not lavish on his own children?

    Jesus urges us to liberate ourselves from worry and anxiety about our body and material things such as food and clothing.  To be concerned about food because right now I am very hungry and do not have anything to eat is very different from worrying whether I will have food next month; to be anxious about what is happening when I am in intensive care is very different from wondering how long my health will hold up in the coming years; to be fretting because I have no money to pay my rent with the landlord knocking at the door is very different from wondering whether I will ever be rich.    Worry and anxiety about the future are a waste of time and energy yet we indulge in them so much.  They are a waste of time and energy because they are about things which do not exist and very possibly may never exist.  As Fr Tony de Mello used to say, quoting a Buddhist axiom: “Why worry?  If you don’t worry, you die; if you do worry, you die.  So, why worry?”    So we are invited to look at the birds of the air and the flowers in the field.  They do nothing except be themselves and God takes care of them.  And how beautiful they are!  When their time comes they pass away.  We are often so busy regretting the past or worrying about the future that we never get to enjoy life in the here and now.

Stewards
Paul in today’s Second Reading gives us another reason for not being obsessed with our future security.  Here in the present, we simply have too much to do.  We are, he says, Christ’s servants.  And as such, responsibilities have been entrusted to us, mainly to build up the Body of Christ in our Christian communities and to spread the Gospel message of God’s love far and wide.  "What is expected of stewards is that each one should be found worthy of [God’s] trust."  In other words, we are not being trustworthy stewards if, like the man in the parable, we take the gift that God has given us and bury it in the ground for fear it should be lost.  No.  If large sums of money or goods come our way, we are not to store them away.  Our gifts are to used here and now and every day.  We should simply be too busy doing God’s work to have time to worry about the non-existent future.  As the saying goes, "Let go and let God".

Be here
To be fully alive, Fr Tony de Mello also used to advise: "Be yourself.  Be here.  Be now."  Enjoyment and happiness are only in the present.  Nowhere else.  If we keep looking forward or looking back we will never find happiness.  It is right here in our grasp at every moment of every day.  Again as Fr Tony used to say, "You have everything you need right now to be happy." 

    Do we believe that?  How our lives would be transformed if only we could really believe it!  Jesus puts the same thing today in different words, "Do not worry about tomorrow: tomorrow will take care of itself."  God is only to be found in the here and now; he is always available.

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Frank Doyle SJ 1931 – 2011

Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever.

Daniel 12:3

The author of the Living Space commentaries, Frank Doyle, an Irish Jesuit priest of the Chinese Province, died on Saint Patrick’s Day 2011. After some years working in Ireland, Frank had returned to Asia in 2010, undertaking work as a spiritual director in Manila. His requiem took place in Saint Ignatius Oratory, Loyola House of Studies, Manila on 22 March. Ar dheis Dé go raibh sé. May he be on God’s righthand side.

Funeral homily

The text of the homily delivered at his funeral can be read here, courtesy of Mark Raper SJ, President of the Jesuit Conference of Asia Pacific.

The vocation of every human being, most especially of every Christian, is to reproduce the image of the Son of God, to be ‘conformed to the image of his Son’, who is to be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. This is the heart of the prophetic experience of being a religious. This is the life that Frank Doyle lived as a religious, a life of spirituality, a life of community and a life of mission. Read the full homily

On Christian death

We recall Frank’s commentary on Christian death, offered on Wisdom 2:23-3:9 – Tuesday of week 32 of Ordinary Time – First Reading:

In practice, when people die – even good people – it does not, on the surface, look like that. “To the unenlightened they appeared to die, their departure was regarded as a disaster, their leaving us like an annihilation”. Even when good and saintly people leave us, it is regarded as a tragedy and a blow not only to us but to them. “What did they do to be taken away like this?” But, where the truly good are concerned, the reality is quite different. In fact, in death “they are at peace.” It is not only that all negative elements have been removed from their life but that they are in a state of security and total happiness under the protection of and in their intimacy with God. As the Third Eucharistic Prayer reads in speaking of the dead: “There we hope to share in your glory when every tear will be wiped away. On that day we shall see you, our God, as you are.” Their death seemed like a form of punishment, the denial of the gift of life but, in fact, “their hope was rich with immortality”. For a Christian, faith is coupled with hope, a confident hope of being one day reunited forever with Christ our Lord. That hope is for immortality (in the Greek, athanasia).

Messages

The messages of appreciation below are testimonies to the help that Frank’s writings have been to so many. These comments were offered on the occasion of Frank’s stroke in February 2011.

We are glad to continue to make Living Space commentaries available on this part of Sacred Space, remembering the generosity with which Frank offered them.

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Commentary on Isaiah 11:1-10; Romans 15:4-9; Matthew 3:1-12

Last Sunday’s readings focused on the final goal and  meaning of our lives.  It is the reason for the coming of Christ among us.  Today we begin to look more directly at the coming of God’s Son in our midst as a preparation for that final coming.  The central figure in today’s Gospel is John the Baptist.

But first, we need to look at the powerful passage from Isaiah in the First Reading that is in two parts.

The first is a picture of the perfect King.  He is a descendant of Jesse, who was the father of King David, and clearly points to Jesus.  He is full of the Spirit of God and enjoys the special gifts of:

…the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the spirit of counsel and might,
the spirit of knowledge and the fear [reverence] of the Lord.

When Jesus is baptised we will see that Spirit coming down on him in all its fullness.

The second part is a picture of the age this King will inaugurate.  It is a regime of justice and peace, free from danger or fear.  This is the ultimate goal of the Reign of God, a goal we have not yet realised, but which, with the help of our King, we have great hope of reaching.

We read this, of course, in today’s Mass in the context of Advent and Christmas. There is a real challenge for us to identify with this programme in word and action.  Strange as it may seem, God expects our co-operation in carrying it out.

A true prophet
But now on to John the Baptist—he was a great figure in his own right and a true prophet in the Jewish tradition with a message from God.  We know he had a large following of disciples and many people came out to the desert to hear him speak. He performed a ritual in water by which people expressed sorrow for their sinful lives and turned back to God. That ritual was called baptism.

In some ways the role of John was not unlike that of Jesus. Yet, in other ways, it was very different. Like Jesus, John preached a message of repentance. ‘Repentance’ here, as elsewhere in the New Testament, translates from the Greek word metanoia. It is much more than just being sorry for the past. It involves a deep and radical change in one’s thinking and behaviour. ‘Radical conversion’ would be a better rendering than ‘repentance’, which somehow implies simply going back to one’s past, but without the sin.

Like Jesus, John will be rejected, persecuted, ‘handed over’ and finally executed for his courageous defence of truth and justice. But there are also clear differences between John and Jesus.  This was not least in their lifestyles.  John lived a severely ascetical life as a hermit in the desert.  People came out to him, he did not go to them.  Jesus, on the other hand, is seen as a socialiser living mainly in cities and towns.  He goes out of his way to mix with all kinds: rich and poor, religious and secular, good and bad.  Nor does he hesitate to enjoy the hospitality of their houses.  Yet through it all, Jesus enjoys a high level of personal freedom—at home with all, but manipulated by none.  He is totally in contact with the world, but not tainted or influenced by its weaknesses.

Not equals
John emphasises that Jesus outranks him completely.  John says:

I am not worthy to untie the strap of his sandals.
(Luke 3:16)

He is simply preparing the way for the Messiah, the Christ, the Saviour King.  Jesus, on the other hand, is the Way.

John’s baptism was an individual expression of a desire to come back from sin to God, to return to a faithful following of the Law.  On the other hand, the baptism of Jesus comes with the “Holy Spirit and fire”.  It inaugurates a special relationship with Jesus, through which the baptised person becomes incorporated into the very Body of Christ—becomes, as it were, a very extension of Christ himself.  It involves not just personal reformation, but becoming involved in the remaking of the whole world, bringing the whole world into the Reign of God.

Two kinds of people
Two kinds of people were coming out to see John.  There were ordinary people, genuine penitents, looking for reconciliation with God.  There were also Pharisees and Sadducees.  However, these came out, not to express sorrow for sin, but to test John’s orthodoxy and observance of the Law.

John has little time for them.  He sees them just as much in need of repentance and conversion as anyone else.  They are not to think that simply because they are descendants of Abraham, their salvation is assured.  It is not birth, race, religious affiliation, education, social status, or financial clout that makes us friends of God, but our awareness of our total dependence on him for everything we need.  Salvation only comes to those who give themselves totally into God’s hands and make his will their own.  No one is saved simply by being born a Law-abiding Jew, as the Pharisees seemed to think, any more than being baptised into the Christian Church alone brings salvation—much more is expected.  Jesus later on will say that those who presume they are God’s people, but without the actions to prove it, will have to give way:

Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you. (Matt 21:31)

Matthew is not just lashing out at some Jewish leaders.  The words of John today are primarily directed to us—to the Pharisee and Sadducee in each one of us.  Our most dangerous enemy is complacency. We think: “I’m a good enough Catholic.  I’m not perfect, of course, I’m not a religious fanatic, but I keep the basics of my religion.  I’m OK.”  Where our relationships with God are concerned, to stay in the same place is to go backwards.

More than history
If we have such a casual attitude to the demands of our faith, we may look on Advent and Christmas as merely memories of past historical events.  But Advent means “coming” and, if this season is to be meaningful, there has to be a genuine coming of Jesus into our lives both as individuals and as community.  It is a time to remind ourselves of our constant need for metanoia.

If John the Baptist were to come among us today, what would he tell us?  What would he warn us against?  As we come to the end of another calendar year (and at the beginning of this new Church year) where do we need conversion and change in our lives?  How can we and our families give better witness to the Christian message?  What changes are called for in the way our parish gives corporate witness to the gospel?  The celebration of Advent calls for a serious consideration of these questions.

We are probably well into preparations for the celebration of Christmas.  But what preparations have I made for the time afterwards, for the year that is ahead?  Will Jesus be really part of my life?  Will he really be entering my life in a special way at this time?  Are his concerns my concerns? That is, do I have a desire to be of service to others and to work with others to build a better society, founded on love and justice and an equitable sharing of resources? “Peace (and justice) on earth to those who are God’s friends” needs to become not just the song of the angels, but a programme for me and my community.

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Commentary on Isaiah 35:1-6; James 5:7-10; Matthew 11:2-11

Today used to be called “Gaudete Sunday” from the first word of the Entrance Song in Latin.  Gaudete means ‘Rejoice!’  Formerly, Advent was a much stricter penitential season.  At this earlier time in the Church, there was fast and abstinence for three days of this week.  This was known as “Quarter Tense” because it occurred four times in the year.  However, this Sunday was intended to be a relaxing break reminding us of the celebrations soon to come.  As a symbol of this, the penitential violet of the vestments are softened to a kind of pink or rose colour.  There is a similar Sunday in the middle of Lent.

On the one hand, a penitential mood is an appropriate way to prepare ourselves to welcome the coming of the Lord.  And, though we may not have fasting, many parishes will organise Penitential Services with the Sacrament of Reconciliation during the days leading up to Christmas.  At the same time, it is difficult not to feel some excitement as we anticipate the celebration of Jesus’ coming among us.

Full of joy
So, the Mass text and readings today are full of joy, especially the Entrance Song, the Opening Prayer and the First Reading from Isaiah. The cry of the Entrance Antiphon is:

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.
(Phil 4:4)

And why? Because:

The Lord is near! (Phil 4:5)

The Opening Prayer asks that we:

…who look forward to the birthday of Christ, experience the joy of salvation and celebrate that feast with love and thanksgiving.

In the First Reading, the prophet goes overboard with excitement and enthusiasm:

The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad;
the desert shall rejoice and blossom…
and rejoice with joy and shouting.

And the reason for all this?

They shall see the glory of the Lord,
the majesty of our God.

And is it just a matter of being able to see him?  No, because:

…your God….He will come and save you.

Salvation means bringing healing, wholeness and holiness as we become closely united to him.  This healing, wholeness and holiness is depicted graphically:

…the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
and the ears of the deaf shall be opened;
then the lame shall leap like a deer,
and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.

These words, as we will see below, will be applied explicitly to Jesus, who brought this healing and wholeness into so many people’s lives.

However, we should not confine this healing only to the physical.  It will also include healing on the emotional, social and spiritual levels.  We are not made whole until harmony and well-being flows through our whole self.

The One who is to come
All this is closely linked to today’s  Gospel.  We find ourselves, in Matthew’s Gospel, at the mid-point in Jesus’ ministry.  John the Baptist had already been arrested.  He had accused King Herod of doing something immoral, i.e. marrying his brother’s wife while his brother was still living.

While in prison, John hears about Jesus and sends some of his disciples with a question:

Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?

Whether John really wanted to know, or whether it was really for the benefit of his disciples is not clear.  After all, John had already proclaimed Jesus at the River Jordan, and said he was not worthy to unloose the thongs of Jesus’ sandals.  “The one who is to come” is, of course, the long-expected Messiah.

How does Jesus answer?  As so often happens, he does not respond directly to the question, but quotes the prophet Isaiah using the passage which is our First Reading for today:

Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, those with a skin disease are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news [gospel] brought to them.

This exactly describes what Jesus has been doing.  It also exactly conforms to what Isaiah said about the time of the Messiah.  Jesus in effect is saying “Yes, I am the one who is to come.  I am the Messiah, the Christ, the Saviour King of Israel.”

Still waiting
While the Gospel speaks of the Messiah already here, we at this very time are, in a sense, still waiting in anticipation.  Jesus, of course, is already present and working through his Body, the Christian community—the Church.  But he still has to come more fully into our own lives.  As the Opening Prayer suggests, we need to “experience the joy of salvation”—that power of healing and wholeness which Jesus can bring into our lives.  This is something each one of us has to do, and what we as a community also have to do.  I feel that there are still many, including Christians, who have not yet experienced the deep joy of becoming whole in Christ.

For most of us, the transformation into becoming “another Christ” takes time.  We need the advice of James in the Second Reading:

Be patient, therefore, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord.

And James says:

The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth, being patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains.

One of the greatest
John the Baptist is presented by Jesus as one of the greatest persons ever born.  Yet, he missed the privilege of being born into the age of Christ, a privilege that has been made available to us.  We could do well to emulate John in preparing ourselves for Jesus to become really part of our lives.

John was strong—he was a man of integrity. He was not one of the rich and famous, he was no pop star—all sound and no substance.  He would never have been a glamorous public icon.  Yet many people went out to hear him, to be challenged by him, to have their lives radically changed by his words.

Actually, our Christian vocation is similar to his.  We are called to prepare the way for Jesus to come into our own hearts, and also to prepare other people’s hearts so that they, too, may “experience the joy of salvation”—that healing, wholeness and holiness we all long for, and which alone gives real meaning to our lives.  Christmas is a time of gifts—both giving and receiving.  Let us make sure that among the gifts we offer to others is some of the Christian joy which we ourselves have received.

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Commentary on Isaiah 7:10-14; Romans 1:1-7; Matthew 1:18-24

We are now on the eve of the birth of Jesus.  In today’s Gospel, Matthew tells us how this came about.  His account is totally different from that of Luke.  The only thing in common with both accounts are the central ideas that:

—Jesus is conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, and
—Joseph and Mary are the parents of Jesus.

In both accounts there is an angelic appearance: in one case to Mary and in the other to Joseph.  Mary is told—in Luke’s Gospel—that she is to bear a son.  When she says that she is still a virgin, she is told that the Holy Spirit will come upon her and her child will be the Son of God.  In Joseph’s case, he is told—in Matthew’s Gospel—not to be afraid to take Mary home as his wife because the child with whom she is pregnant is from the Spirit of God.  The stories are different, but the central message is the same.  Mary is the mother of the Child, but Joseph is not the father.

Jewish weddings
Jewish weddings involved three stages. First, there was the engagement.  This was often prearranged by the parents or a matchmaker while the couple were still young children.  Marriages were primarily seen as the union of families and the continuing of the family line.  They were not primarily unions of love, as we expect today.  Of course, in the course of time husband and wife could become deeply bonded by a genuine love and caring for each other.  But it was procreation, especially the bearing of sons, that was the first priority.  So we see in Old Testament times how cursed women felt who could not bear sons for their husband and his family.

Love might or might not come later—it was secondary.  And it was only relatively recently that the Catholic Church itself put the two ends of marriage—love and procreation—as equally important.  It took quite a while in the Church for the idea that a deep Christian love could be expressed through sexual relations, that it involved a deep mutual giving of one’s whole self to the spouse and that it was not just a regrettable, but unavoidable means to procreate.

Joseph’s dilemma
Later came the betrothal.  This was a legally binding relationship lasting for one year.  During this period the couple lived apart and had no sexual relations.  If either party did not want at this stage to go through with the marriage, there had to be a divorce.  And the penalty for having sexual relations with a betrothed virgin was stoning to death for both.  The third stage was the marriage itself.

We can see then Joseph’s serious dilemma, not to mention his feeling of shock, when he found that his betrothed was already pregnant and not by him.  It seemed an open and shut case of adultery.

And imagine the feelings of Mary herself in this position!  How was she to explain that she was pregnant by the power of God?  Who would believe a story like that?  If Joseph felt outraged and betrayed, one would understand.  Most men would have planned vengeance at such an insult to their manliness and the possibility of becoming the laughing stock of the other men in the village.

But Joseph was not an ordinary person.  He was a “righteous” man.  And he must have seen Mary as more than an ordinary person too.  He did not want to expose her openly.  To do so would have made her liable to the severest punishment.  But at the very least, the Mosaic law required a man to divorce his wife under such circumstances.  This was Joseph’s duty and he was going to observe it.

But compassion for his bride (extraordinary in the circumstances and in that culture) led him to want to break off the engagement quietly that is, before a minimum of two witnesses and without pressing charges.

The angel’s message
Just then the angel appears to him telling  him to go through with the marriage.  The child has been conceived by the power of God’s Spirit.  No other man is involved.  The son is to be called ‘Jesus’, which means ‘Saviour’, because his mission is to save his people from their estrangement with God.

As a descendant of David, Joseph will become the legal father of Jesus the Messiah.  And Jesus will be called later in the Gospel, “Son of David”.  As Paul puts it in the Second Reading today: he, Paul, is preaching the gospel:

…concerning [God’s] Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord.

In many ways, Joseph is a reflection of Joseph in the Hebrew Old Testament, the son of Jacob who was sold into slavery by his jealous brothers.  He was also a righteous man, influenced by dreams and forced into exile in Egypt.

Fulfilment of scripture
Eleven times altogether in his Gospel, Matthew indicates how events in the life of Jesus are fulfilments of Old Testament promises.  Here he quotes the prophet Isaiah (using the Greek Septuagint text):

Look, the virgin [Greek parthenos; Hebrew alma, young girl of marriageable age] shall become pregnant and give birth to a son…

The child will be called Emmanuel, which Matthew explains as meaning “God with us”.  Jesus will be the very presence of God the Father in our world.  As John says in his Prologue:

And the Word became flesh and lived [literally, ‘pitched his tent’] among us, and we have seen his glory… (John 1:14)

God is with us and is one of us.  And this presence does not end with the Resurrection.

Before Jesus leaves his disciples at the Ascension, his last words in Matthew’s Gospel are:

…I am with you always, to the end of the age. (Matt 28:20)

Right down to the present, Jesus continues to be Emmanuel.  And that is why we continue to celebrate the birth of Jesus more than 2,000 years on.  Through his Body, the Church—the Christian community—Jesus continues to be visibly present in word and action.  This Eucharist is our sacramental celebration of that presence, a presence in every single one of us here.

The effectiveness of that presence depends on our conscious union with Jesus and with the vision of his gospel lived out in our daily lives.  Let Jesus be really re-born in each one of us this Christmas.

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Commentary on Luke 7:24-30

Today’s Gospel is a continuation of yesterday’s. Jesus had been asked by disciples of John the Baptist whether he was the One who was expected. And Jesus had given an indirect, but very clear answer in the affirmative. He was indeed the One. After the messengers of John had left, Jesus then began to comment about John to the people around him.

What, Jesus asked them, had they gone out to the desert to see? “A reed shaken by the wind?” Someone who shifted his position with every passing fashion, someone who just said what people wanted to hear? No. People went out to hear someone who spoke the truth without fear or favour, who was not afraid to say what needed to be said, even if people were not too happy with what they heard, even when it pointed directly at them.

Did they go out to see “a man clothed in fine garments”? Someone who was rich and famous, who lived in the lap of luxury? No, “those who are gorgeously apparelled and live in luxury are in kings’ courts”. They went out to see a prophet and, indeed, more than a prophet. A prophet is someone called to convey to the people a message from God. A prophet is someone who has a deeper insight into the way people should live their lives. His or her role is both to announce and denounce and call people back to their senses and to right living.

But, John is even more than that. His special role is to prepare the way for the coming of the Messiah. “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who shall prepare your way before your.” Among the long line of prophets his is a unique privilege. “I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John.”

And yet – “he who is the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he”. Jesus is the one who inaugurates the Reign of God among us in his own person and in all those who accept his Word as their way of life. This was a privilege that John was never to know.

But with privilege comes responsibility. Our fellowship with Christ is something for which to praise and thank God. It is humbling to think that we are, in a way, more privileged than John, who knew Jesus personally. This privilege also carries with it expectations and challenges touching on all our lives.

We can ask ourselves that when people look as us, do they see a reed shaking and bending with every breeze of fashion? Do they see people who set great store by status, luxury and an obsession with the material things of this world? Or, do they see people who fearlessly and consistently proclaim the Way of Christ in all they say and do?

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Commentary on Isaiah 54:1-10

This is our last reading from the ‘Book of Consolation’.

“Shout for joy, you barren women, who bore no children!” Words addressed to Jerusalem (representing Israel), especially during the exile. The Israelites, in exile, are apparently abandoned by their ‘husband’ God. Humanly speaking, they seem to have no future as a people. In the Near East, barrenness was considered a terrible disgrace. Now, however, they can shout for joy. They are going to be fertile again.

The passage brings a message of comfort to the Israelites in exile with the promise of Jerusalem’s restoration. The people are called on to prepare for great changes, changes for the better. Israel, personified in the feminine figure of its capital, Jerusalem, which had remained desolate and uninhabited during the exile, will soon overflow with a burgeoning population.

The people are called on to enlarge their tents to accommodate greater numbers of God’s people.

You will burst out to right and left. Your race will take possession of the nations and people the abandoned cities.

A promise that they are going to go back to their homeland and fill their cities and towns again with their people. The past can be left behind.

You will forget the shame of your youth and no longer remember the curse of your widowhood.

In describing the sufferings the Israelites have been through, the prophet uses traditional images – the barren wife who becomes fertile, the repudiated wife who is taken back. It is a more positive message than that found in some of the other prophets who often see only more punishments in store.

There is now no need to be afraid. God is a faithful spouse who will not abandon his people for ever. They can now forget the “shame of your youth”, a shame brought on by their exile, they can forget “the curse of their widowhood”, when God seemed to have abandoned them.

Your creator will be your husband, his name, the Lord of hosts.

God will be their new husband and the source of a new fruitfulness. “Like a forsaken wife” they are now being called back. This was no separation, only a brief estrangement.

I did forsake you for a brief moment, but with great love will I take you back. In excess of anger, for a moment I hid my face from you.

Was it God who had abandoned his people, or was it they who had, by their faithlessness, distanced themselves from him? For he has never been far from them.

With everlasting love I have taken compassion on you, says the Lord, your redeemer.

This is God’s unchanging and unchangeable love, the love of a good father for his children or of a loving husband for his wife. A love freely and unconditionally poured out as a free gift.

The promises made after the Flood in the time of Noah are recalled:

When I swore that Noah’s waters should never flood the world again.

Now, God repeats his promises and reminds his people of his unchanging love for them:

…for the mountains may depart, the hills be shaken, but my love you will never leave you and my covenant of peace with you will never be shaken.

The Israelites have attributed their sufferings to the anger of the Lord, but God is never angry. Their sufferings have been brought on themselves by their failure to remain faithful to the covenant God had made with them. In the Exile, they have paid the price, but now is coming a time of reconciliation with their return to the homeland they have so bitterly missed for so many years.

As we approach Christmas, we see the same covenant with our God renewed in the coming of the Incarnate Son of God in our midst. On the one hand, it is an occasion for us to leave behind our self-centred ways. In Jesus, we are given in the clearest possible terms, the Way our lives are to follow if we are to be truly one with our loving Lord and Creator.

Here we have the story of God’s love for us: the total love of God, our infidelity, our sin. The Bible describes the mistakes of men, and then the infidelity of the people loved by God. But the prophets announce the New Jerusalem, Yahweh’s bride which will never again be abandoned. We know that the Church is this new People united to God in an eternal covenant.

It is quite true there are wrinkles on the face of the Church: dull parishes, existing but not really alive; institutions where one would look in vain for the Spirit of Jesus; and leaders of the Church subservient to the powerful [including the powerful in the Church!]. Somehow the New Jerusalem is in the church of Christ, but it is also true that we continue to look for it. Therefore, we are open to hearing and meditating upon this proclamation of the merciful love of God. (Christian Community Bible, loc. cit.)

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Commentary on Isaiah 2:1-5; Romans 13:11-14; Matthew 24:37-44

A new year in the Church’s calendar begins today. Happy New Year to all!

This period is appropriately called ‘Advent’.  It comes from the Latin word adventus which simply means ‘coming’.  But whose coming are we talking about?  Obviously we are beginning to prepare to remember God’s coming to be a human being among us, with us and like us.  And yet, although the Scripture for today does speak of the coming of God, it makes no mention of the coming of Christ as Christmas.

Actually, at this time we can speak of three comings of God. The first is when Jesus, the Son of God came to be born in the stable at Bethlehem.  But today’s Mass also speaks of the final coming of Jesus at the end of the world. And, there is still a third kind of coming we need to be aware of, namely, when God enters our lives every day. Every single experience can be an opportunity to make contact with God. And we are reminded of that ongoing contact with God especially in the celebration of the sacraments, including the Eucharist.

Preparing for the end
Today’s Mass actually says very little about the first coming of Jesus, i.e. his birth in Bethlehem.  Rather, the Scripture readings emphasise our need to prepare for the final coming of Jesus, whether that means the end of the world as we know it, or the end of our own individual lives.

The First Reading invites us to go with God.  It says:

Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
to the house of the God of Jacob…

Of course, we know that for us, Jesus himself is the real “house [or temple] of God”. And because of that, the body of the Christian community united with Christ as its Head is also God’s Temple. And we go to him and with him:

…that he may teach us his ways
and that we may walk in his paths.

He will show us the way for us to follow on our pilgrimage through life, the way that will lead us to meet him on that last day on earth.

A final coming
The Second Reading and the Gospel emphasise that we must prepare for that final coming of Jesus, whatever form it is going to take.  The first coming of Jesus in Bethlehem is to help us prepare for this final coming.

We really need this warning.  On the one hand, we do not like to think too much about how or when we will leave this world, but it is a fact. It is the one future fact of our lives of which we can be absolutely certain. There are people who are very afraid to die and who do not even want the subject raised. Today’s Scripture wants to remind us of the final purpose of our lives.

Many of us are like the people mentioned in today’s Gospel:

…in the days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away…

These people were doing very ordinary things—exactly the same things that we do. But they were so busy doing them that they failed to give any thought to where their lives were ultimately leading, and what was the goal of those lives.

They were very busy, just like us. Maybe they were very successful, maybe they made a lot of money, maybe they made wonderful marriages and had lots of exciting experiences. But in the end, they were not ready for the most important appointment of their lives.  The question is: How ready am I right now?

Maybe you think: “I don’t have to worry. I had my medical check-up the other day and the doctor said I have the heart of a teenager.”  But how many end up as statistics on the death toll of our roads every year?  For them, death is something which happens to other people, to old and sick people.

We sometimes think that the busier we are, the  better. We even like to say, “The devil finds work for idle hands to do.”  We work for today, for tomorrow, for next month, for next year, for our future, for our children’s future. But what about our real future—our future with God?  What preparations are we making for that future?

One taken, one left
So the Gospel today says:

Then two will be in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken, and one will be left.

This could mean that one is taken away by a natural or personal disaster (an earthquake or a heart attack) and the other left untouched.  Or it could mean that God takes one away to himself and is left abandoned by the other.  In either event, the basic meaning is the same.  Two men and two women, on the outside apparently the same, doing the same work.  And yet there is an important difference between them.  One is prepared and one is not.

Of course, in our daily lives we have to work, cook food, earn our living and take care of our families. But we must also prepare for the final call. That is the most basic reality of our lives. If we forget that, all our other success is actually failure. Let us remember the story of Martha and Mary. Martha was so busy about good things and concerned about taking care of others, but it was Mary who had “chosen the better part”, in touch with the centre of meaning, the Word made flesh.

We do not know when the Lord will come:

…if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into.

And in many ways, it is a blessing that we do not know the day nor the hour.  On the one hand, if we did know, we could be filled with a terrible anxiety knowing what the final blow was going to be or, on the other hand, we would let our lives go completely to pot knowing that we could straighten everything out at the last minute.  In either case, our world would become a terrible place in which to live.  So it is a question of being ready for any eventuality:

…for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.

How to prepare?
The obvious question to ask is, How are we to prepare?  St Paul today in the Second Reading has some advice:

Let us then throw off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us walk decently as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in illicit sex and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy.

There are dark areas in all of our lives—things we do, things we say, things we think, the indulging of our lower and self-centred appetites. There are things which we would not like other people to know about because they are quite wrongful.  They do no good to me or to others.

Instead, we need to develop our relations with God and with our brothers and sisters based on a caring and unconditional love for all.  We need to learn how to find God, to find Jesus in every person, in every experience.  We need to respect every person as the image of God.  We are to love our neighbours as ourselves, to love everyone just as Jesus loves us.

If in our words and actions, our daily lives are full of the spirit of Jesus, then we have prepared.  We do not need to be anxious about the future or what will happen to us.  Concentrate on today, on the present hour, the present situation and respond to it in truth and love and the future will take care of itself.  Then we do not have to fear, no matter when Jesus makes his final call.  Because we know he is going to say:  “Come, my friend. I want to call you now; I want to share with you my life that never ends.”  And we will respond: “Yes, Lord, I am ready.  I have been waiting for you all this time.”  It will be an encounter, not of strangers, but of two old friends.

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Commentary on Revelation 14:1-5

In a passage immediately preceding today’s and not included in our liturgical readings (Rev 13:1-18), the followers of the Beast, an agent of Satan, were said to be branded on the right hand or the forehead with his name and number, just as slaves were branded with their owner’s sign or the way we brand cattle and sheep today. This was a sign of ownership. The Beast is also identified with the enigmatic number 666, said to be the sum of the numeric value given to the Hebrew letters making up the name Nero Caesar. (Because it is a document written during time of persecution, many references in Revelation are expressed in a code which would only be understood by those within the persecuted community.)

In today’s reading, the followers of the Beast (and branded with his name and number) are now contrasted with the followers of the Lamb marked with his name and the name of the Father. And just as there was a ‘remnant’ of Israel that returned to Jerusalem after the Babylonian exile, here we have the ‘remnant’ of the New Israel, the faithful Christians who have survived persecution and who will begin the restoration of God’s kingdom once its enemies have been destroyed.

John has a vision of Mount Zion. Originally, Mount Zion referred to the fortress of the pre-Israelite city of Jerusalem before it was taken over by David and made his capital. In time, the term became synonymous with Jerusalem itself and, in Revelation, it refers to the “heavenly Jerusalem”, the place where God lives for ever with his people. At the end of Revelation, it comes down to the “new earth”.

Here John sees the Lamb with 144,000 faithful followers, all of whom have the name of the Lamb and of the Father on their foreheads, again as a sign of ownership. The number 144,000 is a multiple of the perfect and complete number 12. These are the ones who have not compromised their faith and have persevered through times of persecution by being ready to give their lives for their faith in Christ. They are the martyrs (a Greek word meaning ‘witnesses’), those who gave the ultimate witness of their faith. They are, as it were, the nucleus of the final Kingdom.

And John hears:

…a voice from heaven like the sound of many waters and like the sound of loud thunder; the voice I heard was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps…

It was the accompaniment to a new song that the four creatures and the 24 elders were singing in the presence of God’s throne. Just as Moses celebrated the deliverance of God’s people from Egypt with a new song, so the 144,000 also celebrate the deliverance of God’s people and the new order which the Lamb has inaugurated with a song. It was a song only they who had been saved from the ‘world’, the pagan world of sin, by the Lamb were competent to sing.*

And so they are said to “follow the Lamb wherever he goes”, just as the Israelites followed Yahweh after the Exodus into the desert, where the marriage rite of the covenant was sealed and signed, and as the first disciples left everything and walked after Jesus.

They are called the “first fruits” of God and of the Lamb. Just as in Jewish tradition the first fruits of the crops were always offered to the Lord, so these martyrs are the choice offering of the community made to God and the Lamb. Elsewhere in the New Testament, the phrase applies to the first converts in a particular place, and to the first to rise from the dead.

The last line reads:

…in their mouth no lie was found; they are blameless.

That is, they never invoked the Beast (the emperor Nero, most likely) as their god. This is unlike the Gentiles mentioned by Paul in his Letter to the Romans who:

…exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator… (Rom 1:25)

Naturally, we all hope and pray that we too may be numbered among that host of martyr-witnesses with the Lamb, our Lord and Saviour. We too, have been marked in Baptism with God’s sign of ownership on us. But that still requires our total commitment and response to his call.

May we strive to follow the Lamb closely in our faithfulness to the Gospel at all times. Let our lives be lived in total integrity so that we always in fact are what we would like to be seen to be.

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*Although it is present in the NRSVue translation, in some Bible editions, the original text of a sentence (verse 4) is omitted at this point in the passage:

It is these who have not defiled themselves with women, for they are virgins; these follow the Lamb wherever he goes.

In this context, it is generally understood that John is speaking metaphorically. In the Old Testament, marital infidelity was often a metaphor for idolatry, and in this case, the worship of the Beast. But even after legitimate intercourse, the release of semen was regarded as rendering the man unclean and similarly for the release of menstrual blood in the woman. The only way to avoid such ‘uncleanness’, then, was total abstinence.

The “virgins” in this context are those who, even at the cost of their lives, have remained totally faithful to God and Christ, who have not been contaminated in the slightest way by a corrupt and immoral world—whether they were actually married or not. One wonders to what extent this verse had an influence on the future asceticism of the Church and the high esteem given to virginity and celibacy in the Christian life. There are far more ‘virgin’ saints, men and women, than married men or women in our liturgical calendar.