Pope Benedict XVI's general prayer intention for the month of December is: "That Christ, meek and humble of heart, may inspire those responsible for nations to use power wisely and responsibly."
Pope Benedict XVI's missionary prayer intention for December is: "That in every part of the world missionaries may live out their vocation with joy and enthusiasm, faithfully following in Christ's footsteps."
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First Sunday of Advent C
(December 3) St Francis Xavier, Jesuit priest and missionary (1506-1552) Born in Spain he studied at Paris and there met and joined St Ignatius. He was ordained a priest at Rome in 1537. He spent himself in works of charity and in 1541 he went to the East where for ten years he preached the Gospel in India and Japan, and brought great numbers to the Catholic Faith. He died on the Chinese island of Shangchwan. (Saints)
Jeremiah
33:14-16; Psalm 25:4-5, 8-9, 10, 14; 1
Thessalonians 3:12-4:2; Luke 21:25-28, 34-36
Jesus said to
his disciples: “There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the
stars, and on earth nations will be in dismay,
perplexed by the roaring
of the sea and the waves. People will die of fright in anticipation of
what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be
shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with
power and great glory. But when these signs begin to happen, stand
erect and raise your heads because your redemption is at hand. “Beware
that your hearts do not become drowsy from carousing and drunkenness
and the anxieties of daily life, and that day catch you by surprise
like a trap. For that day will assault everyone who lives on the face
of the earth. Be vigilant at all times and pray that you have the
strength to escape the tribulations that are imminent and to stand
before the Son of Man.” (Luke 21:25-28,
34-36)
Today is the first
day and the first Sunday of the liturgical season of Advent marking the
beginning of the new liturgical year. We prepare for the celebration of
the coming of Christ at Bethlehem by thinking of his coming generally.
The understanding of time possessed by a non-believer or by, say, a
Buddhist
is necessarily different from that of one who expects the coming of the
One
who will save and who
will
judge. The
fundamental
stance of one who accepts divine Revelation is
that of expectation and preparation. Time is not just a
succession of events which are enjoyed or endured, or perhaps repeated
with little prospect of a final resolution or outcome. Time has
had a beginning and it will
have an end. It is this stance of memory and of expectation and
preparation which is
renewed during the liturgical season of Advent. We remember the many
centuries of expectation and preparation characterized by prophecies of
the promised Messiah. We remember the prophet Isaiah, the prophet
Malachi, and many others who pointed people in the direction of One who
would save and who would judge. We think of the moment of threshold
when, for instance, in the Temple and in the presence of Mary and Joseph Simeon’s expectation was fulfilled and he held in
his arms the One who had been promised. We think of John the Baptist
who announced the imminent arrival of the Messiah. The expectation of
this great future
event shaped the spiritual life of God’s chosen people. Now, what has
this
to do with us, because we know that the Messiah has already arrived?
The Church in our celebration today, and in particular in presenting to
us the Gospel of today, reminds us that expectation and preparation
still characterizes the stance of the Christian because the Messiah who
has come will come again. That is to say, while he has come, we must also prepare for his
final coming.
Our Lord’s words
today speak of his final coming (Luke 21:25-28,
34-36). He will come to save
and to redeem - he tells his disciples that “when these signs begin to
happen, stand erect and raise your heads because your redemption is at
hand.” At the same time, they are to live in such a way that they will
be able to do this with confidence. Therefore “beware that your
hearts do not become drowsy from carousing and drunkenness and the
anxieties of daily life”, for if they do, then that day when Christ
comes will “catch you by surprise like a trap.” Christ’s first coming
at Bethlehem was above all to save - to save his people from their
sins. He came to call sinners to repentance, and to take away the sin
of the world. When he comes again at the end he will save and redeem
those who have accepted his call, but those who have not will be judged
and
sentenced. The point, though, is that we are to live in the memory of
the past event and in preparation for the future event. But if we are
to do
this we must recover a profound sense of sin. The lack of this is, as
the Servant of God Pope Pius XII wrote, the sin of our
age. Characteristically we in our time do not consider sin as of much
importance. But sin is the world's greatest problem, and so the lack of
a sense of this is the most important lack in the world. This is the
issue on which life and the world
hinges. If the fact of sin is denied and the sense of sin neglected, our life and the life of
the world rests on a knife-edge. We are helped to see that the world is in a precarious
position
when we think of the final coming of Christ to
judge.
What would happen to us and to the world (of sin) were Christ to come
suddenly now? It is only if we are living in him and living a good life
in his sight that such a coming would be a “redemption”. If we are not,
it would be a “tribulation.”
Let us today renew
our attitude of expectation and preparation. Our life is meant by God
to be one of
remembering his first coming and preparing for his future coming. In
the
memory of the past and in the light of the future we live in a way that
pleases him. Let us meditate on what he has done, and think much of
what he will do. Within these great parameters we are called to live
generously our Christian life.
(E.J.Tyler)
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On Christ’s two comings by
St John Chrysostom
(345-407), Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Homily on Psalm 49)
At his first coming, God came without any brilliance, unknown by
most, prolonging the mystery of his hidden life by many years. When he
came down from the mountain of the Transfiguration, Jesus asked his
disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Christ. Then he came like
a shepherd to look for his lost sheep, and in order to get hold of the
unruly animal, he had to remain hidden. Like a doctor who is careful
not to frighten his patient right from the start, in the same way, the
Lord avoids making himself known right from the beginning of his
mission: he only does so imperceptibly and little by little. The
prophet announced this event without brilliance with these words: “He
shall be like rain coming down on the meadow, like showers watering the
earth.” (Ps 72:6) He did not tear open the heavens so as to come on the
clouds, but rather, he came in silence into the womb of a virgin and
was carried by her for nine months. He was born in a manger as the son
of a humble craftsman… He went here and there like an ordinary man; his
clothing was simple, his table even more frugal. He walked without
resting to the point of being tired out. But his second coming
will not be like that. He will come with such brilliance that it won’t
be necessary to announce his coming: “As the lightning from the east
flashes to the west, so will the coming of the Son of Man be.” (Mt
24:27) It will be the time of judgment and of sentencing. And the Lord
will not appear as a doctor, but as a judge. The prophet Daniel saw his
throne, the river flowing at the base of the tribunal, and that device
made entirely of fire, the chariot and the wheels (7:9-10)…
David, the prophet-king, spoke only of splendour, of brilliance,
of fire flaming on all sides: “Before him is a devouring fire; around
him is a raging storm.” (Ps 50:3) All these comparisons aim at making
us understand God’s sovereignty, the brilliant light that surrounds
him, and his inaccessible nature.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel",
New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Don't look so alarmed. As a Christian you have the right and the duty
to provoke a wholesome crisis in souls so that they live their lives
with their eyes on God.
(The Forge,
no.948)
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What is the function of the liturgical
year?
In the liturgical year the Church celebrates the whole mystery of
Christ from his Incarnation to his return in glory. On set days the
Church venerates with special love the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother
of God. The Church also keeps the memorials of saints who lived for
Christ, who suffered with him, and who live with him in glory.
(CCC 1168-1173, 1194-1195)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.242)
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Monday
of the First Week of Advent I
(December 4) St
John Damascene, priest and doctor of the Church (8th
century). John was born in Damascus (hence, John the Damascene,
or John
Damascene), Syria. Learned in philosophy and theology, he wrote many
doctrinal works, particularly against iconoclasts who were destroying
sacred images and paintings. He became a monk in the monastery of St
Sabbas, near Jerusalem and is counted as the last of the Eastern
Fathers of the Church.
(Saints)
Let us also think of Saint
Barbara (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah
2:1-5; Psalm 122:1-2, 3-4b, 4cd-5, 6-7,
8-9: Matthew
8:5-11
When Jesus
entered Capernaum, a centurion approached him and appealed
to him, saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home
paralyzed, suffering
dreadfully.” He said to him, “I will come and cure him.” The centurion
said in reply, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof;
only say the word and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man
subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one,
‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes; and to my
slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” When Jesus heard this, he was amazed
and said to those following him, “Amen, I say to you, in no one in
Israel have I found such faith. I say to you, many will come from the
east and the west, and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob at
the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 8:5-11)
In our Gospel today
our Lord refers to faith. There is something
profoundly fascinating about the phenomenon of faith, and it can be the
object of long and intense study. Faith is obviously a normal part of
human life, for we see it operating throughout human history and among
all cultures. A wife has faith in her husband, and vice
versa. Children have a natural and enduring faith in their parents
unless their parents
prove themselves entirely unworthy of it. Faith
can be enlightened, and it can be blind. It can be moral, and it can be
immoral. It is the most natural thing in the world to have faith, but
this faith must be well placed and oriented to the good. Much the same
has to be said of religious faith. The terrorist who blindly believes
in a personal creed that takes little account of morality will wreak
evil precisely because of his faith. In a very real sense a person is
responsible for his choice of faith, and this choice is part of the
mystery of faith in human life. Consider our Gospel today, in which our
Lord praises so highly the faith of the centurion. “When Jesus heard
this, he was amazed and said to those following him, ‘Amen, I say to
you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I say to you, many
will come from the east and the west, and will recline with Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob at the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven’.”
(Matthew
8: 5-11) By
implication our Lord is saying that both the centurion and
those in Israel are responsible for their faith in him or their lack of
it. If a person finds himself unable to believe, then the question
remains as to whether he is responsible at least to some extent,
precisely for this inability.
That having been
said, at the same time we are to a far greater extent
dependent on God for our capacity to believe in him. We are reminded of
this in that pivotal scene in the Gospel when Simon Peter professes his
faith in our Lord as the Messiah and Son of God. Our Lord replies to
Simon that he is blessed because he has been enlightened by the Father
in heaven. His faith in our Lord is a gift from the Father, and he has
responded to the gift magnificently. At our baptism we received the
gift of the Holy Spirit and with him came the gift of faith in God and
in all he has revealed. It is a gift that inclines us to believe. By
this gift of God we
are inclined supernaturally to the person of Jesus, drawn to him
in the way certain others were in the Gospel. We remember how right at the
start of our Lord’s public ministry St John the Baptist directed
two of his disciples to our Lord and they willingly followed. They set
out after Jesus and were invited to where he was staying. They were
inclined to our Lord, and with this profoundly moral inclination came
the inclination to believe. It led to their salvation, their
sanctification, and to their sharing in our Lord’s mission. This
precious and saving inclination to believe in Jesus is freely given by God and it
comes with the gift of the Holy Spirit. With the coming of the Holy
Spirit at our Baptism and our Confirmation we receive the supernatural
inclination to come to Jesus, to believe him, to hope in him, to love
him, and so to follow him and to share in his mission of witnessing to
the truth revealed by him. The gift of faith inclining
us to believe in Jesus is the most precious gift imaginable, and it
leads to our
salvation and our sanctification. But it can be neglected, abused,
denied and
lost - through sin.
As we think of our Lord praising the
centurion for his faith let us renew our awareness of the gift of our faith
that came to us at our Baptism. It inclines us to welcome Jesus into our
hearts and to place our faith in him. Let us understand that it is the
foundation of our entire Christian life, and let us resolve to take all the
means offered by the Church to make it strong.
(E.J.Tyler)
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"Many will come from the east and the
west, and will recline… at the banquet in the kingdom of heaven" (Mt 8:5-11)
Vatican Council II:
Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the modern world (Gaudium et Spes)
§22
He Who is "the image of the invisible God" (Col.
1:15), is Himself the perfect man. To the sons of Adam He restores the
divine likeness which had been disfigured from the first sin onward.
Since human nature as He assumed it was not annulled, by that very fact
it has been raised up to a divine dignity in our respect too. For by
His incarnation the Son of God has united Himself in some fashion with
every man. He worked with human hands, He thought with a human mind,
acted by human choice and loved with a human heart. Born of the Virgin
Mary, He has truly been made one of us, like us in all things except
sin (Heb 4:15)
The Christian man, conformed to the likeness
of that Son Who is the firstborn of many brothers (Rom 8:29), received
"the first-fruits of the Spirit" (Rom. 8:23) by which he becomes
capable of discharging the new law of love. Through this Spirit, who is
"the pledge of our inheritance" (Eph. 1:14), the whole man is renewed
from within, even to the achievement of "the redemption of the body"
(Rom. 8:23)… Pressing upon the Christian to be sure, are the need and
the duty to battle against evil through manifold tribulations and even
to suffer death. But, linked with the paschal mystery and patterned on
the dying Christ, he will hasten forward to resurrection in the
strength which comes from hope.
All this holds true not only for
Christians, but for all men of good will in whose hearts grace works in
an unseen way. For, since Christ died for all men,(Rom 8:32) and since
the ultimate vocation of man is in fact one, and divine, we ought to
believe that the Holy Spirit in a manner known only to God offers to
every man the possibility of being associated with this paschal
mystery.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel",
New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Pray for everyone, for people of every race and tongue and of
every
creed, for those who have only a vague idea about religion and for
those who do not know the faith at all. This zeal for souls, which is a
sure and a clear sign that we love Jesus, will make Jesus come.
(The Forge,
no.949)
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What is the Liturgy of the Hours?
The Liturgy of the Hours, which is the public and common prayer of the
Church, is the prayer of Christ with his body, the Church. Through the
Liturgy of the Hours the mystery of Christ, which we celebrate in the
Eucharist, sanctifies and transforms the whole of each day. It is
composed mainly of psalms, other biblical texts, and readings from the
Fathers and spiritual masters. (CCC 1174-1178, 1196)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.243)
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Tuesday
of the First Week of Advent C
(December 5) Today let us think of Saint Gerald
(Saints)
(Please note. This video is for Tuesday of the first week of Advent, not Lent)
Scripture today: Isaiah
11:1-10; Psalm 72:1-2, 7-8, 12-13, 17;
Luke 10:21-24
Jesus rejoiced in
the Holy Spirit and said, “I give you praise, Father, Lord of heaven
and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and
the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. Yes, Father, such
has been your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by
my Father. No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the
Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal
him.” Turning to the disciples in private he said, “Blessed are the
eyes that see what you see. For I say to you, many prophets and kings
desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you
hear, but did not hear it.” (Luke 10:21-24)
If one were to ask
what are the greatest treasures in life, one would naturally get a
variety of
answers. I remember reading an Anglican
historian’s comments on the insistence of the Catholic Church on
celibacy for the priesthood in the Latin rite, and on celibacy for the
episcopacy in all rites. He made the comment that this venerable
discipline involved the renunciation of one
of the greatest of human
treasures. He was right, and it is a renunciation required and made for
very great
reasons. Another of life’s treasures is one’s very work in life, and it
is a
great renunciation to choose to leave to one’s (religious) superior the
choice of
what work one will do. This is done in the vow or promise of
obedience. Other great treasures in life could be mentioned. But
the greatest treasure of all is the one mentioned by our Lord in
today’s Gospel. It is to know him personally. “Turning to the disciples
in private he said, ‘Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I
say to you, many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but
did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it’.”
(Luke
10:21-24) What
the disciples were seeing and hearing was Jesus himself. The Old
Testament longed to see and hear the Messiah. At the Last Supper our
Lord
prayed to the Father, saying that “eternal life is this, to know you
Father, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” This is the reason for
being a Catholic, for living as a Catholic, for dying a Catholic, and
if necessary for laying down one’s very life: in order to know Christ
Jesus as he has revealed himself to us.
It is so very easy
for a member of Christ’s faithful to take the Catholic Faith and
membership in
the Church for granted. In the providence of God we who are in
the family of the Church have been granted the knowledge and the love
of Christ, or at least the means to come to this knowledge and love. It
need not have been like this. We could have been born into a
non-Catholic family and so have lacked access to the fullness of what
Christ has left us. We could have been born in a non-Christian family,
or in a non-religious family, or in a positively atheistic family. So
let us be profoundly grateful that Christ our Lord has called us to the
fullness of life in his
friendship. “I have not called you servants,” our Lord said to his
disciples, “I have called you friends.” He says this to each one of us.
So let us prize his friendship! Let us nourish it, protect it, and make
it all-consuming and strong. There is nothing more important, there is
no greater treasure in life than the friendship of Christ, neither
family, nor work, nor possessions, nothing can compare with the value
of knowing Christ Jesus. Most of us would fall into the category of the
little people, the nobodies, those who seem to make little mark on the
world. And yet we have been chosen by God from before the world began
to live in Christ and to be, in Christ, holy and full of love in his
sight. This friendship with Jesus gives to us our dignity. I remember
many years ago meeting a person in Jerusalem and asking him what was
his profession. He said, “Oh! I’m just a tailor, but I am a member of
Jesus Christ!” Being in Jesus and knowing him was his treasure
and the source of his dignity.
Let us resolve to
sell all, as it were, and buy the field that contains the treasure of
Christ. Let us be like the merchant who sold all to gain the pearl of
great price. That pearl is Christ and the knowledge and love of him. We
are
called to live in him and to make him our life. That is what our Lord
calls us to in today’s Gospel.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Many prophets and kings desired to
see what you see
but did not see it” (Luke 10:21-24)
Commentary by Saint
Irenaeus of Lyon (130-208), Bishop, Theologian and Martyr (Adversus Haereses
IV, 14,2)
Right from the beginning, God formed the human person in view of his
gifts. He chose the patriarchs in view of their salvation. He prepared
for himself a people and taught the ignorant to follow God’s path. Then
he taught the prophets so as to get the human person accustomed to
bearing his Spirit already on this earth and to entering into communion
with God. Certainly, he himself needed no one, but he offered communion
with himself to those who needed him. Like an architect, he made plans
of salvation’s edifice ahead of time through those “on whom his favor
rests” (Lk 2:14). In the darkness of Egypt, he himself became their
guide. In the desert where they were wandering, he gave them a very
appropriate Law; and to those who entered the good land, he offered a
chosen inheritance. Finally, for all who return to the Father, he
killed the fattened calf and he gives them the precious garment (Lk
15:22). Thus, God disposed the human race in many ways for the
“music and dancing” (Lk 15:25). That is why John wrote in the Book of
Revelation: “And his voice sounded like the roar of rushing waters.”
(Rev 1:15) For the waters of God’s Spirit are truly many, because the
Father is rich and great. And going by way of all that, the Word
generously gave his help to those who submitted themselves to him,
giving every creature the appropriate instruction.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel",
New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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When they heard of work with souls in far-off lands, how their eyes
sparkled! They seemed ready to cross the ocean in one leap. And indeed
the world is very small when Love is great.
(The Forge,
no.950)
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Does the Church need places in order
to celebrate the liturgy?
The worship “in spirit and truth” (John 4:24) of the New Covenant is
not tied exclusively to any place because Christ is the true temple of
God. Through him Christians and the whole Church become temples of the
living God by the action of the Holy Spirit. Nonetheless, the people of
God in their earthly condition need places in which the community can
gather to celebrate the liturgy.
(CCC 1179-1181, 1197-1198)
(Compendium
of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.244)
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Wednesday
of the First Week of Advent C
(December 6) St Nicholas (4th century). Bishop of
Myra (now in Turkey). His relics were brought to Bari,
Italy. Particularly after the tenth century he has been honoured by the
whole Church.
(Saints)
Scripture today: Isaiah
25:6-10a; Psalm 23:1-3a, 3b-4, 5,
6; Matthew 15:29-37
At that
time: Jesus
walked by the Sea of Galilee, went up on the mountain, and sat down
there. Great crowds came to him, having with them the lame, the blind,
the deformed, the mute, and many others. They placed them at his feet,
and he cured them. The
crowds were amazed when they saw the mute
speaking, the deformed made whole, the lame walking, and the
blind able to see, and they glorified the God of Israel. Jesus summoned
his disciples and said, “My heart is moved with pity for the crowd, for
they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat. I do
not want to send them away hungry, for fear they may collapse on the
way.” The disciples said to him, “Where could we ever get enough bread
in this deserted place to satisfy such a crowd?” Jesus said to them,
“How many loaves do you have?” “Seven,” they replied, “and a few fish.”
He ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground. Then he took the seven
loaves and the fish, gave thanks, broke the loaves, and gave them to
the disciples, who in turn gave them to the crowds. They all ate and
were satisfied. They picked up the fragments left over – seven baskets
full. (Matthew
15:29-37)
At various points
in the New Testament our Lord’s miracles are referred to as “mighty
works”. Our Lord did great things during his public ministry, a brief
span of time lasting about two and a half years. We have a sample of
them reported in our Gospel passage today: “Great crowds came to him,
having with them the lame, the blind, the deformed, the mute, and many
others. They placed them at his
feet,
and he cured them.
The crowds were amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the deformed
made whole, the lame walking, and the blind able to see, and they
glorified the God of Israel.” (Matthew
15:29-37) He
raised the dead (the son of the widow of Nain, the daughter of Jairus,
Lazarus the brother of Martha and Mary, and possibly others). He cast
out numerous demons, including ones that had defied all exorcisms to
that point. He was invincible in debate, and those who were sent to
arrest him reported that no one had ever spoken as he spoke. Even the
Roman Procurator could see that he was above reproach and that the
leaders wanted to be rid of him because of jealousy. He walked on a
turbulent sea, and calmed a raging storm at a word. In the Garden at
the moment of his arrest the guards and soldiers fell back at his word.
So one very striking feature of Jesus’ person was his very power. He
could do so much and do it at a word. In our Gospel passage today after
restoring so many who were sick and physically afflicted, he went on to
feed thousands of people with a pittance of food. There was nothing he
could not do if he chose.
Now this divine
power manifested the compassion of Jesus and of the God whom Jesus
embodied,
personified and revealed. His almighty power showed forth his holiness
and compassion. His holiness was sheer love. It is this which we are
given a glimpse of in today's Gospel passage:
“My heart is moved with pity for the crowd, for they have been with me
now for three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to send them
away hungry, for fear they may collapse on the way.” (Matthew
15:29-37) Our Lord in his works
revealed
a God of pure love and mercy, and were this not revealed man would
hardly have discovered it. It means that all we see, this immensely
vast universe, which reveals so much power is a revelation of his
almighty love. What he does he does out of love, a holy love for us. At
various stages in modern history there has been discussion of the
likelihood or otherwise of persons living in other planetary systems -
a speculation fuelled by claims of flying saucers appearing in the ambit
of our planet. Whatever of that, the mere fact that God became one of us
shows the extraordinary love that the Creator has for us here on earth. God
became one of us and died for us. In this sense we are the centre of the
universe, and this is an implication of the first chapter of Genesis in
which the sun and moon and stars which God creates are all seen as the
framework for man. The religious point is that man is the object of the one
almighty Creator’s special affection. God’s almighty power manifests itself
in his loving compassion. This is the meaning of life and the universe, even
though that meaning can only be discovered by recourse to divine Revelation.
Our Lord in today’s Gospel shows what God is like. He is full of compassion
and looks on our difficulties with love and mercy.
Let us place
ourselves in the Gospel scene, viewing with love the abundant power of
Christ, a power which he exercises in compassion for man in need.
Christ our Lord is the revelation of almighty God who is rich in mercy.
His might manifests itself in mercy. God
is love, and our Gospel passage today is one instance of the revelation
of this in the ministry of Christ our Lord.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Not a single soul — not one — can be a matter of indifference to
you.
(The Forge,
no.951)
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What are sacred buildings?
They are the houses of God, a symbol of the Church that lives in that
place as well as of the heavenly Jerusalem. Above all they are places
of prayer in which the Church celebrates the Eucharist and worships
Christ who is truly present in the tabernacle.
(CCC 1181,
1198-1199)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.245)
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Thursday
of the first week of Advent C
(December7) Saint Ambrose,
bishop and doctor of the Church (340-397). While living in
Milan, serving the imperial government, he was elected bishop of the
city by popular acclaim, and then baptised. He distinguished himself by
his apostolic zeal, service to the poor, and effective care of the
faithful. He defended the doctrine of the Church against the Arians
with his actions and his writings. He converted and baptised
Augustine.
(Saints)
Scripture today: Isaiah
26:1-6; Psalm 118:1 and 8-9, 19-21, 25-27a;
Matthew 7:21, 24-27
Jesus said to his
disciples: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the
Kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in
heaven. “Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them
will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the
floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. But it did not
collapse; it had been set solidly on rock. And everyone who listens to
these words of mine but does not act on them will be like a fool who
built his house on sand. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds
blew and buffeted the house. And it collapsed and was completely
ruined.” (Matthew 7:21,
24-27)
One of the greatest
joys of life comes with marriage. A young man or woman naturally looks
forward to finding a spouse, marrying and having a family. A young
couple meet, come to know one another, and make the decision to marry.
The wedding day is a day of joy to them and to their families. They
naturally consider how to build a secure, good and happy
life. They plan future employment,
they plan to have their children, and
they consider many other aspects of their life. The question for them
is how to
live, how to build on rock, as it were, so that if difficulties come
their house will stand. And so it is across the board. Life is
uncertain and transient and so much can cut across our plans and hopes
and bring disruption and sorrow. This applies not only to the life of
individuals but to the life of whole societies. How will the house
stand? What foundations must we lay to ensure the future? This is the
very question our Lord answers in today’s Gospel passage (Matthew 7:21,
24-27). He speaks of the wise
and prudent man who, foreseeing the wind and the rain and the floods,
choses to build his house not on sand but on rock. The house remained
secure when the elements beat against it. Now, what is it to build our
house on rock? It is to listen to the words of our Lord and to put them
into practice, to act on them. Every parent who aspires to give
his or her child a true start in life, every couple that intends to
build a good marriage, must take to heart this teaching of our Lord, a
simple teaching so easy to comprehend and so demanding to implement.
They must hear the word of Christ and put it into practice.
So then, if we wish
to build our life and the lives of those who depend on us on a truly
secure foundation, we must look to the words and the teaching of our
Lord, and be truly committed to putting that teaching into practice.
Let us interrogate ourselves, to what extent are we giving heartfelt
consideration to the words
and the teaching of our Lord? Are our children learning this point at
all? It is the most important point of all to be learnt in the ongoing
education of life. The time will inevitably come when all else will
fail -
especially at the point of death. I once knew a person
very closely whose whole life was lived with little thought for God.
Well on in life he suffered a stroke and his last days were a continual
and helpless protest against his situation. But nothing and no one
could
help him. There was nothing he could lean on, nothing to support him.
All that remained was God on whom he continually depended, but he
had never learnt that God alone was his rock and his stay. His life
ended tragically and angrily. By contrast consider the person whose
life is lived in a constantly growing desire to depend on God and
on his holy will. The time for the end finally comes and he entrusts
himself into the keeping of the One who has been his support and
constant
foundation. The rain, the wind and the floods arrive in his sickness
and in the final tribulation of his last moments but he is happy
because the house stands. It is founded on rock. That rock is God and
the determination to know the will of God and to put it into practice.
Let us learn the
lesson of our Lord’s words of today while we have time in our hands.
Life is short, eternity long. Life is fragile and transient, and the
wind, the rain and the floods will surely come. Let us build our house
on rock and not on sand. That rock is the teaching of Christ and
obedience to it.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Everyone who listens to these words of
mine” (Matthew 7:21,
24-27)
Blessed Teresa of Calcutta
(1910-1997), founder
of the Missionaries of Charity (A Simple Path,
1995, p.7-8)
We all must take the time to be silent and to contemplate, especially
those who live in big cities like London and New York, where everything
moves so fast. This is why I decided to open our first home for
contemplative sisters (whose vocation is to pray most of the day) in
New York instead of the Himalayas: I felt silence and contemplation
were needed more in the cities of the world.
I always begin my prayer in silence, for it is in the silence of the
heart that God speaks. God is the friend of silence – we need to listen
to God because it's not what we say but what He says to us and through
us that matters. Prayer feeds the soul – as blood is to the body,
prayer is to the soul – and it brings you closer to God. It also gives
you a clean and pure heart. A clean heart can see God, can speak to
God, and can see the love of God in others. When you have a clean heart
it means you are open and honest with God, you are not hiding anything
from Him, and this lets Him take what He wants from you.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel",
New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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A disciple of Christ can never
think as follows: ``I try to be good; as for others, if that's what
they want|... let them go to hell.'' Such an attitude is not human. Nor
is it in keeping with the love of God, or with the charity we owe our
neighbour.
(The Forge,
no.952)
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What are the privileged places
inside sacred buildings?
They are: the altar, the tabernacle, the place where the sacred Chrism
and other holy oils are kept, the chair of the bishop (cathedra) or the
chair of the priest, the ambo, the baptismal font, and the
confessional. (CCC 1182-1186)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.246)
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Solemnity
of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
(December 8) Pope Pius IX instituted this celebration when he
proclaimed the dogma on December 8, 1854. In that definition he
expressed the exact meaning of the truth of Mary’s Immaculate
Conception. He affirmed that it is a dogma of the Catholic Faith and
part of divine revelation that Mary was conceived free from original
sin. This feast has been celebrated in the East since the eighth
century and one century later also in many places in the West. This
privilege of Mary is the most beautiful fruit of her Son’s Redemption.
Chosen as Mother of the Saviour Mary received the benefits of salvation
from the first instance of her conception. Christ came to take away the
sin of the world; he did not allow it to contaminate his earthly
mother.
(Saints)
Scripture: Genesis 3:9-15,
20; Psalm 98:1, 2-3ab, 3cd-4; Ephesians
1:3-6, 11-12; Luke 1:26-38
The angel Gabriel
was sent from God to a town of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin
betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin’s
name was Mary. And coming to her, he said, “Hail, full of grace! The
Lord is with you.” But she
was greatly troubled at what was said and
pondered what sort of greeting this might be. Then the angel said to
her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.
Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall
name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most
High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father,
and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his Kingdom
there will be no end.” But Mary said to the angel, “How can this be,
since I have no relations with a man?” And the angel said to her in
reply, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most
High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called
holy, the Son of God. And behold, Elizabeth, your relative, has also
conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month for her who
was called barren; for nothing will be impossible for God.” Mary said,
“Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according
to your word.” Then the angel departed from her. (Luke 1:26-38)
Every so often
archaeologists announce that they have discovered evidence that pushes
the earliest human beings ever
further back into the remote past. Whatever of that very hypothetical
discussion, God has revealed to us certain things about the very first
man and woman, our first ancestors. He has told us of the most
important thing they did, and it was catastrophic.
They sinned. They
deliberately refused to do what God told them to do, and they did it
because they wanted to be, as we might put it, like gods deciding for
themselves what was to be regarded as good and evil. This was the most
terrible thing that has ever happened because it spawned sin and death
throughout the entire human race for all time. It opened the floodgates
and there was no stopping unless God himself did the stopping. Many
things can be said about sin and its effects and aftermath, but one of
the distinguishing things about modern sin is that it is in denial: the very reality of
sin tends to be denied. This too is a tragedy and it is itself sinful. The greatest of crimes are
accepted as crimes, of course, but they are not viewed as sins. This is
because God is not regarded as a Fact but as a personal opinion. He is
not an objective Person but a private notion, and therefore offences
against him are viewed as subjective attitudes. This modern dismissal
of sin is surely one reason why the Church’s teaching about the
original sin of our first parents is regarded so readily as purely
mythical. It is looked on as a myth not only in the sense that in the
form of story it encapsulates and accounts for man’s religion but also
in the sense that as pure imagery it is ultimately just a figment of
pre-scientific imagination. So what God has revealed as the greatest
tragedy of human history - man’s original disobedience - is with a
knowing smile pushed out of view.
Wrongdoing is not
just a moral matter, but a religious matter too. We must avoid this
modern blindness in respect to sin. It is a fundamental tenet of divine
Revelation that sin exists and that it arose at the very origin of
human history. Man himself brought it into the world. The result is
that the tide of sin flows over every human soul that enters our world.
At the first moment of conception that tide immediately covers the soul
just as the tide flows over the shore of the sea. The soul remains
immersed till it is freed by the power of God. Not so Mary, for God had
a saving answer to sin, and in her case that answer applied at her very
conception. By the power of God in view of the merits of
her Son our Lord Jesus Christ, she was preserved from the tide. The waters
of that original sin which flow over every son and daughter of Adam were held
back and prevented from so much as touching the soul of Mary at her
conception. She was conceived utterly free from the slightest taint of
original sin. That is to say, she was the Second Eve. The First Eve
sinned and lost the gifts of grace and the full integrity and harmony
of her moral nature with which she was endowed at her creation. The same
happened to Adam following on his sin. Adam and Eve
fell, and their fallen nature so inclined now to sin is handed on to us
all. Not so Mary. She was conceived and born into the world full of
grace and moral goodness. Her conception and birth and life is the
wonder of mankind because in her we have a human person simply free
from all sin. There are several things to be said to the lack of the sense of
sin. The first is the revelation that man at the very beginning chose
to sin, and mankind was ruined as a result. A second is the
what we celebrate today: the doctrine that Mary the mother of the
Lord was conceived immaculate
and never sinned thereafter. As the angel said to her, she was in every
respect, due to the goodness of God, full of grace (Luke 1:26-38). What a mother we have
in her! In respect to sin, she is beyond compare. She was granted this
gift in view of her divine motherhood, her being the mother of the One
who would take away the sin of the world.
On this feast of
the Immaculate Conception let us place ourselves in the hands of our
most holy mother and ask her for the grace to fight against sin and to
advance towards the holiness which her Son endowed upon her and in
which he means us to have a share.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you.”
(Luke 1:26-38) The Catechism of the
Catholic Church (§ 490-493)
To become the mother of the Saviour, Mary "was enriched by God with
gifts appropriate to such a role." (LG 56.) The angel Gabriel at the
moment of the annunciation salutes her as "full of grace". In fact, in
order for Mary to be able to give the free assent of her faith to the
announcement of her vocation, it was necessary that she be wholly borne
by God's grace.
Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary,
"full of grace" through God, was redeemed from the moment of her
conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception
confesses, as Pope Pius IX proclaimed in 1854: "The most Blessed Virgin
Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace
and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus
Christ, Saviour of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of
original sin.
The "splendour of an entirely unique holiness" by which Mary is
"enriched from the first instant of her conception"(LG 56.) comes
wholly from Christ: she is "redeemed, in a more exalted fashion, by
reason of the merits of her Son"(LG 53.). The Father blessed Mary more
than any other created person "in Christ with every spiritual blessing
in the heavenly places" and chose her "in Christ before the foundation
of the world, to be holy and blameless before him in love" (Eph 1:3-4).
The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God "the
All-Holy" (Panagia), and celebrate her as "free from any stain of sin,
as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature".
By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole
life long.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel",
New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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When a Christian understands
what catholicity means and practises it, and he realises the urgent
need to proclaim the Good News of salvation to all creatures, he knows
that as the Apostle teaches, he has to make himself "all things to all
men, that all may be saved."'
(The Forge,
no.953)
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Why is the one Mystery of Christ celebrated by the Church according to
various liturgical traditions?
The answer is that the unfathomable richness of the mystery of Christ
cannot be exhausted by any single liturgical tradition. From the very
beginning, therefore, this richness found expression among various
peoples and cultures in ways that are characterized by a wonderful
diversity and complementarity. (CCC 1200-1204, 1207-1209)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.247)
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Saturday
of the First Week of Advent C
(December 9) Let us think of the first apparition of Our
Lady of Guadalupe to St Juan Diego (Saints)
website for Our Lady of Guadalupe
(http://www.sancta.org)
Scripture today: Isaiah
30:19-21, 23-26; Psalm 147:1-2, 3-4, 5-6;
Matthew 9:35—10:1, 5a, 6-8
Jesus went around to all
the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the
Gospel of the Kingdom, and curing
every disease and illness. At the
sight of the crowds, his heart was moved with pity for them because
they were troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd. Then
he said to his disciples, “The harvest is abundant but the labourers are
few; so ask the master of the harvest to send out labourers for his
harvest.” Then he summoned his Twelve disciples and gave them authority
over unclean spirits to drive them out and to cure every disease and
every illness. Jesus sent out these Twelve after instructing them thus,
“Go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, make this
proclamation: ‘The Kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Cure the sick, raise
the dead, cleanse lepers, drive out demons. Without cost you have
received; without cost you are to give.” (Matthew
9:35-10:1, 5a, 6-8)
Two things we
notice very clearly about our Lord in today’s Gospel passage. Firstly,
we cannot help but observe his compassion for “the crowds.” His “heart
was moved with pity for them because they were troubled and abandoned,
like sheep without a shepherd”
(Matthew
9:35-10:1).
Our Lord’s heart is the heart of God, and this is the
whole point of devotion to the (sacred) heart of Jesus. The
Gospels tell us what
moves the heart of Christ and how greatly moved his heart was and is.
It is sin, understood in the broadest sense, which caused
“the trouble
and abandonment” of the crowds. Their personal sins caused it, their
dislocation from God caused it, the world so affected by sin caused it,
the entire fallen condition into which man is born caused it. As a
result of sin man is troubled and abandoned, and the response of God is
one of pity. God became man because of his pity, his holy compassion
which resolved to enter the lists to combat all that troubles and ruins
man. We remember
how when our Lord arrived at the grave of Lazarus he wept. Many who saw
this said, Look how he loved him! Our Lord was moved by the
tragedy of mankind so much under the power of death, which is the wage
of sin. As we consider not only the spectacle of the world which
confronted our Lord, but the world as it is in every age, how ruined is
the handiwork of God! Consider the history of wars during the last
couple of centuries since the outbreak of the French Revolution.
Consider the mayhem and unleashing of furies in various parts of our
world today. Consider the situation in parts of Africa and in the
Middle
East. What is the response of God? It is one holy horror at sin, and
compassion for “the crowds”, because they are “troubled and abandoned.”
The second point we
may well notice is that our Lord directed his Twelve to “go to the lost
sheep of the house of Israel.” He himself was sent to the lost sheep of
the house of Israel, as he told the pleading Canaanite woman in another
part of the Gospel. Of course
just before he ascended into heaven he instructed his disciples to go
to the whole world and make disciples of every nation. But the very
fact that our Lord himself was sent to the lost sheep of the house of
Israel
shows us the special place which reclaiming the vast numbers of
non-practising members of the Church’s faithful ought have in the
efforts of the serious Christian. The majority of Catholic people
in the world do not practise their Catholic Faith very much, and
considerable numbers not at all. Consider Australia, consider Britain,
consider Spain or France, consider Italy and, say, the predominantly
Catholic countries of South America. What percentage of Catholic people
attend Mass each Sunday and receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation
regularly?
There is a vast mission ahead of the Church to reach out to evangelize
“the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” There are wonderfully
promising things happening in the life of the Church at this juncture
of history. We need only think of the past century of outstanding modern popes,
the blossoming of movements and communities of spiritual life and
evangelization, the marvelous harvest of vocations in countries such as
Mexico and Poland. But the “house of Israel” - the Church herself -
requires much Christlike compassion, the compassion which Christ felt
for “the crowds”.
Our Lord said to his disciples that “The harvest is
abundant but the labourers are few; so ask the master of the harvest to
send out labourers for his harvest.” We ought
pray for vocations, we ought pray for our parishes, we ought pray that the
Lord of the harvest will bring a springtime to the Church, the new Pentecost
so hoped-for by the popes of our time. One of the earliest Encyclicals
written by Pope John Paul II was on the mercy of God. In that Encyclical he
invited the Church’s faithful to meditate on the mercy of God and to embody
it and make it present in their activity. Let us prayerfully consider the
compassionate mercy of our Lord in today’s Gospel and ask for the grace to
make Christ present in our persons in our daily life.
(E.J.Tyler)
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"At the sight of the crowds, his heart
was moved with pity because they were troubled and
abandoned" (Matt
9:35—10:1)
Saint (Padre) Pio of
Pietralcina (1887-1968), Capuchin (GF 171,169; Buona Giornata)
Hope in God's everlasting mercy supports us in the tumult of passions
and the flood of annoyances; it is with this confidence that we hasten
to the sacrament of penance where the Lord is always there, waiting for
us as a Father of mercy. In front of him, of course, we are well aware
of not deserving his forgiveness; but we may have no doubts as to his
unlimited mercy. So let us forget our sins, as God has done with us,
long time before us.
And we must not come back, in thought or in confession, to sins already
confessed in previous confessions. Because of our sincere repentance,
God has already forgiven us once and for all. To want to go back over
sins already pardoned only to be once more absolved from these, or only
because we doubt whether they have been really and fully forgiven,
isn't this a lack of faith in God's goodness?
If this may comfort you, you may think over the offences you committed
against God's justice, against his wisdom, his mercy, but just to shed
tears of repentance and of love.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel",
New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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You have to love your fellow
men to the point where even their defects, as long as they do not
constitute an offence against God, hardly seem to you to be defects at
all. If you love only the good qualities you see in others — if you do
not know how to be understanding, to make allowances for them and
forgive them — you are an egoist.
(The Forge,
no.954)
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What is the criterion that assures
unity in the midst of plurality?
It is fidelity to the Apostolic Tradition, that is, the communion in
the faith and in the sacraments received from the apostles, a communion
that is both signified and guaranteed by apostolic succession. The
Church is Catholic and therefore can integrate into her unity all the
authentic riches of cultures. (CCC 1209)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.248)
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Second
Sunday of Advent C
(December 10) Today
let us also think of Our
Lady of Loretto and Saint
Gregory III
(Saints)
Scripture
today: Baruch
5:1-9; Psalm 126:1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 6;
Philippians 1:4-6, 8-11; Luke 3:1-6
In the fifteenth
year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor
of Judea, and Herod was tetrarch of
Galilee, and his brother Philip
tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias was
tetrarch of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas,
the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the desert. John
went throughout the whole region of the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism
of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book
of the words of the prophet Isaiah: A voice of one crying out in the
desert: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths. Every
valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill shall be made low.
The winding roads shall be made straight, and the rough ways made
smooth, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” (Luke 3:1-6)
One of the striking
features of man’s religious life is the presence of myth. It is
particularly evident in traditional indigenous religions which feature
many myths about the beginnings, about how the world came to be what it
is, and about other matters that impinge on man’s condition. An
enormous amount of investigation has been conducted into Australian
aboriginal myths, into African and Melanesian myths
and many others. Myth is very prominent
in classical Greek and Roman religion, in Hinduism and perhaps
Buddhism, and in other religions as well. Myths have great meaning, and
they encapsulate in stories the perceptions of peoples about themselves and the
world in which they live. Especially important in myth is what it says
of evil and its solution. That having been said, the myth is an
imaginative construct.
Myths are not factual narrations but stories created by the religious and
philosophical imagination expressing insights into life and the world’s
beginnings and meaning.
Now, when we turn to the Christian religion the first thing we notice
(especially if we set it in the context of ancient religious myths) is
that its spokesmen claim in absolutely unambiguous terms to be speaking
formally of facts. In our Gospel today Saint Luke situates his account in very
precise dates. He tells us that John the Baptist began his prophetic
ministry in a certain year: it was the fifteenth year of the reign of
Tiberius Caesar. He tells us who was the governor of Judea, who were
the tetrarchs of other nearby regions, and who were the chief priests
of the nation. We have dates, names and places (Luke 3:1-6). That is to say, the
Christian religion involves not simply myth (though there is a place
for myth in revealed religion) but hard, cold facts. The Gospels are narrations
of facts. There were and are
real people, and they said and did definite things. In this very
factual setting the salvation which God had long promised made its
appearance. It was not just a sacred and venerable dreamtime. Revealed
religion is a matter of fact.
Many
anthropologists of primal religions understand ritual as a recurring
action which makes the mythical event present and renews what was done in the
mythical beginning. It is this renewal which is - in its own proper
order - saving and beneficial, just as it was in the beginning. There
is much in this that is common to
ritual in revealed religion. But one outstanding difference is that in the case
of revealed religion we are speaking of actual facts. The salvation
brought by God to man “in the beginning” of the era of redemption is a
factual matter. Hard realities constitute what a comparative religionist might call the
"myths" of revealed
religion. It is these realities which are made
present in the practice of revealed religion and in its ritual down
through the ages. The
sacraments are those ever-recurring events in the life of the Church
when the Christ who came to save us, the real Christ who did actual
things at a certain point of history, makes himself present together
with the salvation he brought and won for us. John the Baptist appeared
in the
wilderness announcing that the time had come and God’s salvation was
near at hand. In the person of Jesus of Nazareth the kingdom of God
arrived and was established on earth. That kingdom - to be definitively
and fully established when Christ comes again - is made present and
continues down the ages into our own day in the life of the Church, in
her ministry and sacraments. What John the Baptist
announced (Luke 3:1-6) the Church announces to
her children in every epoch. The
salvation that was coming and which arrived then is just as truly
coming to each of us and arrives now. The point I am making here is
that we are speaking of actual facts, saving realities. This is why it
is often said that a distinctive feature of Catholic Christianity is
its concern for the truth. Only the truth satisfies the person with a
truly Catholic mind and outlook. It is not what satisfies personal
anxieties, but the truth, actual facts, which Catholic Christianity
looks to. Cardinal Newman in his writings often stated that true
Christianity has in mind the uppermost importance of Objects - divinely
revealed Objects - rather than the subject’s reaction to them.
As we ponder on the
Gospel of today in which Saint Luke goes to special lengths to insist
on the historical context of the announcement of the Gospel, let us
renew our appreciation of a most notable feature of revealed religion.
It is that we constantly live in the light of hard facts that are
saving
realities. In this sense our house is built on solid rock.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Prepare
the way of the Lord, make straight his paths” (Luke 3:1-6)
Commentary by Blessed
Guerric of Igny (1080 – 1157), Cistercian abbot (Sermon 5 for
Advent)
“Prepare the way of the Lord.” Brothers, even if you have advanced
greatly on this way, you still have to prepare it, so that from the
point where you have already arrived, you might always go forward,
always stretched out towards what is beyond. Thus, since the way has
been prepared for his coming, with every step that you take, the Lord
will come to meet you, always new, always greater. So the righteous
person is right to pray thus: “Instruct me, O Lord, in the way of your
statutes, that I may exactly observe them.” (Ps 119:33) And this way is
called “the path of eternity” (Ps 139:24) … because the goodness of him
towards whom we are advancing is unlimited.
That is why the wise and determined traveler, even though he has
arrived at the goal, will think of beginning. “Giving no thought to
what lies behind,” (Phil 3:13), he will tell himself every day: “Now I
begin (Ps 76:11 Vulgata) … May it please heaven that we who talk about
advancing on this path might at least have set out! To my
understanding, whoever has set out is already on the good way. However,
we must really begin, find “the way to an inhabited city” (Ps 107:4).
For Truth says: “How few there are who find it!” (Mt 7:14) And many are
those “who go astray in the desert.” (Ps 107:4)
And you, Lord, have prepared a path for us, if we only agree to go on
it… Through your Law, you have taught us the path of your will by
saying: “This is the way; walk in it, when you would turn to the right
or to the left.” (Isa 30:21) It is the path that the prophet had
promised: “A highway will be there… No fools go astray on it.” (Isa
35:8)… I have never seen a fool going astray when following your path,
Lord… But woe to you who are wise in your own sight (Isa 5:21). Your
wisdom has taken you away from the path of salvation and has not
allowed you to follow the Saviour’s folly… A desirable folly, which at
the time of God’s judgment will be called wisdom and which does not let
us go astray, away from his path.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel",
New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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You must not destroy the souls
of your fellow human beings through your neglect or your bad example.
In spite of your passions, you have a responsibility for the Christian
life of your neighbour, for the spiritual effectiveness of everyone,
indeed for their very sanctity.
(The Forge,
no.955)
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Is everything immutable in the
liturgy?
In the liturgy, particularly in that of the sacraments, there are
unchangeable elements because they are of divine institution. The
Church is the faithful guardian of them. There are also, however,
elements subject to change which the Church has the power and on
occasion also the duty to adapt to the cultures of diverse peoples.
(CCC 1205-1206)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.249)
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Monday
of the Second Week of Advent C
(December 11) Saint
Damasus I, pope. Born about the year 305, of Spanish descent. He
became a cleric in Rome, and in the year 366 during very troublesome
times he was ordained bishop of Rome. He called together a number of
synods against the heretics and schismatics, and he did much to promote
the veneration of the martyrs, whose tombs he embellished with sacred
verse. He died in 384. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah
35:1-10; Psalm 85:9ab and 10, 11-12,
13-14; Luke 5:17-26
One day as Jesus was teaching, Pharisees
and teachers of the law, who had come from every village of Galilee and
Judea and Jerusalem, were sitting there, and
the power of the Lord was with him for healing. And some men brought on
a stretcher a man
who was paralyzed; they were trying to bring him in
and set him in his presence. But not finding a way to bring him in
because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and lowered him on the
stretcher through the tiles into the middle in front of Jesus. When
Jesus saw their faith, he said, “As for you, your sins are forgiven.”
Then the scribes and Pharisees began to ask themselves, “Who is this
who speaks blasphemies? Who but God alone can forgive sins?” Jesus knew
their thoughts and said to them in reply, “What are you thinking in
your hearts? Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to
say, ‘Rise and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has
authority on earth to forgive sins”— he said to the one who was
paralyzed, “I say to you, rise, pick up your stretcher, and go home.”
He stood up immediately before them, picked up what he had been lying
on, and went home, glorifying God. Then astonishment seized them all
and they glorified God, and, struck with awe, they said, “We have seen
incredible things today.” (Luke 5:17-26)
Our Gospel scene
today describes an event of high drama. Our Lord is there teaching,
and “Pharisees and teachers of the law, who had come from every
village of Galilee and Judea and Jerusalem, were sitting there”. Our
Lord commanded the attention of the people,
and the nation’s
religious experts and authorities were assembled to listen to him and
watch. It looks like something of a formal examination, and we know
from other
passages in the Gospels that the examiners were on the watch for
anything that might permit them to fail and condemn him. The atmosphere
was
undoubtedly threatening, but that did not in the least hamper our Lord,
and in fact it was the occasion for acting on one of his most stunning
claims.
It was the claim to have authority to forgive sins. He was presented
with a paralyzed man on a stretcher and, in the presence of them all,
he forthwith proceeded - without any introductory
explanation - to summarily forgive the man’s sins. A worldly-wise
political strategist might have quietly advised our Lord to adopt a
more gradual approach, for it shocked the scribes and pharisees who
immediately “began to ask themselves, ‘Who is this who speaks
blasphemies? Who but God alone can forgive sins?’” But our Lord
serenely and publicly, not only in front of the crowds but in the
presence of the nation’s religious authorities, said what he said and
did what he did. It was one of the actions our Lord did - and there are
others recorded in the Gospels - which formed part of his claim to
be divine. He then proved his authority to forgive sins by raising the
man up out of his paralysis into perfect health. It was a double
display of confident divine power and teaching. It was this bearing
witness to his divinity which would lead finally to his death.
Let us
contemplate the person of Jesus, both
man and God, and the mercy he extended to the paralyzed man. But let us
also notice how the whole sequence of events began. It began when “some
men
brought on a stretcher a man who was paralyzed; they were trying to
bring him in and set him in his presence. But not finding a way to
bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and lowered
him on the stretcher through the tiles into the middle in front of
Jesus”
(Luke
5:17-26). It
was the men who brought the paralyzed man who started all this and who
in effect occasioned our Lord’s witness to the truth of his divine
person. Furthermore, the text suggests that it was the faith not only
of the sick man but of his friends too that led to the healing. For the
inspired text continues: “When Jesus saw their faith, he said, “As for
you, your sins are forgiven.” That is to say, it was "their faith" and
not just his, which our Lord saw. Indeed, the text just might imply
that it was primarily the faith of the paralyzed man’s friends rather
than his faith which our Lord saw. It could have been that it was they
and not he who had the faith which our Lord observed. This surely
reminds us of the solidarity which ought exist between all of us and
the sick who depend so much on the help of others. This applies not
only to the physically sick, for the paralyzed man was spiritually sick
too and his being brought to Jesus by his friends led
to his spiritual restoration by means of the forgiveness of sins. Those
friends of the paralyzed man were of major importance in our Lord’s
saving entry into the paralized man's life, and in God being thereupon
glorified. Both the sick
man and the crowds who witnessed the event glorified God for what had
transpired: “He stood up immediately before them, picked up what he had
been lying on, and went home, glorifying God. Then astonishment seized
them all and they glorified God, and, struck with awe, they said, “We
have seen incredible things today.”
(Luke
5:17-26)
Let us ponder on
the person of our Lord, man and God. Let us think of his power being
manifest in his works and words of mercy. Thinking also of the friends
of the paralyzed man, let us appreciate the
importance we all have in bringing those who are sick and afflicted in
any sense into the saving presence of
Jesus. If we succeed in bringing those in the world
around us into the presence of Jesus, we can hope that he will - seeing
our faith, especially if it is accompanied with prayer and penance -
bring his salvation into their lives. Thus will God be given the glory.
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Struck
with awe, they said,
today we
have seen some extraordinary things..." (Luke 5:17-26)
Comment by St Irenaeus of Lyons (130-
208), bishop, theologian and martyr (Against heresies,
III, 2,2)
He is the Word of God who dwelt with man and became the Son of Man to
open the way for man to receive God, for God to dwell with man,
according to the will of the Father. (...) For this reason the Lord
himself gave as the sign of our salvation, the one who was born of the
Virgin, Emmanuel (Is 7,14).
It was the Lord himself who saved them, for of themselves they had no
power to be saved. (...)
Isaiah says the same: “Hands that are feeble grow strong! Knees that
are week, take courage! Hearts that are faint grow strong! Fear not –
see, our God is judgment and he will repay. He himself will come and
save us (Is 35,3-4). He means that we could not be saved of ourselves
but only with God's help.
Here is another text where Isaiah had predicted that he who saves us is
not simply a man, nor an incorporeal being: “It was not a messenger or
an angel, but he himself who saved them. Because of his love and pity
he redeemed them himself” (Is 63,9). But this Savior is also really and
truly a man, one our eyes will see: “Look on Zion, your eyes will see
our Savior” (see Is 33,20). (...)
Another prophet said: “(He) will again have compassion on us...(he)
will cast into the depths of the sea all our sins” (Mi 7,19). (...) It
is from Bethlehem of Judea(Mi 5,1)that the Son of God, who is also God,
was supposed to come to spread his praise all over the world (...) God
really became man and the Lord himself saved us while giving us the
sign of the Virgin.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel",
New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Physically far away and yet
feeling very close to them all, "very close to them all'' you
cheerfully repeated. You were happy thanks to that communion of charity
which I spoke to you about, and which you must not get tired of keeping
alive.
(The Forge,
no.956)
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How
are the sacraments of the Church
divided?
The sacraments are divided into: the sacraments of Christian initiation
(Baptism, Confirmation, and Holy Eucharist); the sacraments of healing
(Penance and Anointing of the Sick); and the sacraments at the service
of communion and mission (Holy Orders and Matrimony). The sacraments
touch all the important moments of Christian life. All of the
sacraments are ordered to the Holy Eucharist “as to their end” (Saint
Thomas Aquinas). (CCC 1210-1211)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.250)
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Tuesday
of the second week of Advent C
(December 12) St
Jane Frances de Chantal, religious. Born in Dijon in France in
the year 1572. She was married to a nobleman named de Chantal, by whom
she had six children whom she brought up religiously. After the death
of her husband she placed herself under the direction of St Francis de
Sales and made great progress along the way of perfection, performing
many works of charity especially among the poor and the sick.
She founded and wisely directed the Visitation Order, and died in the
year 1641.
(Saints)
Today is also the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe
(celebrated in America) Guadalupe
Scripture
today: Revelation
11:19a; 12:1-6a, 10ab; Judith 13:18bcde,
19; Matthew 18:12-14
What is your
opinion? If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them goes astray, will
he not leave the ninety-nine in the hills and go in search of the
stray? And if he finds it, amen, I say to you, he rejoices more over it
than over the ninety-nine that did not stray. In just the same way, it
is not the will of your heavenly Father that one of these little ones
be lost. (Matthew 18,12-14)
One book in the
field of the philosophy of religion which was influential among certain
religious circles in the nineteenth century is that written in the
eighteenth century by Bishop Butler, called the Analogy of Religion.
One of the main theses of this work is that there is a likeness between
the course and the constitution of the world and natural and revealed
religion. Whether there is this analogy in the sense that Butler claimed is a
matter for philosophical discussion, but we ought note how constantly
our Lord makes use of parables drawn from the world and everyday life
to describe the things of God, and of his kingdom. He is constantly
pointing to this likeness and making use of it to teach about God and
his plan. In our Gospel today our Lord is teaching about the love with
which God our Father seeks out each and all of us sinners. Indeed,
our Lord tells us, it gives our heavenly Father immense joy to reclaim
a sinner from his sinful ways and unite him to himself in a holy
friendship. He says that our heavenly Father is like the shepherd who
seeks out the straying sheep and when he finds it “he rejoices more
over it than over the ninety-nine that did not stray. In just the same
way, it is not the will of your heavenly Father that one of these
little ones be lost”
(Matthew
18,12-14).
Our Lord could have used and indeed did use other analogies to make the
same point, and so we are surely justified in seeing as many indicators
of God’s personal love for us and his desire to save us from sin as are
present in the course and constitution of the world. Indeed, we ought
have a policy of searching for these likenesses.
We need to focus our minds resolutely
on this fundamental revelation of what God is like. He loves us. It is easy
to lose sight of this because there are so many things in our broken and
fallen world that indicate not love but cruelty, disinterest,
thoughtlessness and, at most, love of a very limited kind. It is so easy to
focus on what has been unkind in life because there is in fact so much that
is unkind in life - even if it is mingled with love. We ought therefore have
a resolute policy of trying to discern the loving providence of God at work
in our life and in the world, even despite the appearances. After all, our
Lord himself constantly pointed to the world for indicators and parallels.
There may be much that has been tragic in our life, much that has been and
is immensely painful, and so the danger will be that we might easily allow
this gradually to flood our imagination, including our religious
imagination. It could gradually become very difficult to believe that we are
loved. We might pay lip service to this doctrine, but because of a failure
of the will to persist in contemplating what God has done and in viewing our
life in its light we could lose our belief in the revelation that God has
made of himself, that he loves us. Even more, we could lose the very
capacity to notice the presence of a loving God in our life. So we need
actively and perseveringly to meditate on the love of God for us, on what
God has indisputably done as shown in the Scriptures and as spoken of in the
Church’s teaching, and on the basis of this to attempt to see his loving
hand in our life. It is a grace to be prayed for, to see the loving hand of
God in our life. Mary our Mother is spoken of by Luke as pondering on the
things she saw and heard and then treasuring them in her heart. She was
discerning the loving providence of God in the events of life.
Let us contemplate our Lord as he
refers to the shepherd going off to search for the stray, and let us resolve
to focus our minds, our memories, and our religious imaginations on whatever
indicates and manifests God’s love for us. Let us fill our memory and
imagination with the thought of love, God’s love.
(E.J.Tyler)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Your Father who is in heaven doesn't
want any of these little ones to be lost” (Matthew 18,12-14)
St John Damascene
(about 675-749), monk, theologian, doctor of the Church
(The Statement of
Faith, 1; PG 95, 417-419)
O Lord, you led me from father's loins and formed me in my mother's
womb (Ps 138,13). You brought me, a naked babe, into the light of day,
for nature's laws always obey your commands. By the blessing of the
Holy Spirit, you prepared my creation and my existence, not because man
willed it or flesh desired it (Jn 1,13), but by your ineffable grace.
The birth you prepared for me was such that it surpassed the laws of
our nature. You sent me forth into the light by adopting me as your son
(Gal 4,5) and you enrolled me among the children of your holy and
spotless Church.
You nursed me with the spiritual milk of your divine utterances. You
kept me alive with the solid food of the body of Jesus Christ, your
only begotten Son and our God, and you let me drink from the chalice of
his life-giving blood, poured out to save the whole world.
You loved us, O Lord, and gave up your only-begotten Son for our
redemption. And he undertook the task willingly and did not shrink it.
(...) In this way you have humbled yourself, Christ my God, so that you
might carry me, your stray sheep, on your shoulders. You let me graze
in green pastures, refreshing me with the waters of orthodox teaching
at the hands of your shepherds. You pastured these shepherds, and now
they in turn tend your chosen and special flock.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY
40052. USA.)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You asked me what
you could do to prevent
the loneliness of that friend of yours. I will tell you what I always
say, because we have at our disposal a marvelous weapon which is the
answer to everything: prayer. In the first place, you must pray. And
then you must do for him what you would like others to do for you if
you were in similar circumstances. Without humiliating him, you must
help him in such a way that the things he finds difficult can be made
easy for him.
(The
Forge, no.957)
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How is Christian initiation brought about?
Christian initiation is accomplished by means of the sacraments which
establish the foundations of Christian life. The faithful born anew by
Baptism are strengthened by Confirmation and are then nourished by the
Eucharist. (CCC 1212, 1275)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.251)
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Wednesday
of the second week of Advent C
(December 13) Saint
Lucy, virgin and martyr (4th century). She died at Syracuse
(Sicily) probably during the persecution of Diocletian. From antiquity her cult
spread throughout the Church. Her name is in the Roman Canon.
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah
40:25-31; Psalm 103:1-2, 3-4, 8 and
10; Matthew 11:28-30
Jesus said to the
crowds: “Come to me, all you who labour and are burdened, and I will
give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek
and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke
is easy, and my burden light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)
There have been
influential thinkers in history who underwent what we might call a
“conversion”. The “conversion” of those I am thinking of involved a change in their thought,
with the emphasis on their “thought”. That is to say, they discovered
what they believed to be an answer to a tremendous set of problems. The
problems could have been philosophical, economic or whatever, but at
the heart of their change of
direction was the
discovery of a great idea. One instance of this that comes to mind is
the British philosopher of the nineteenth century, John Stuart Mill.
Another is Karl Marx, whose Communist Manifesto
of 1848 had such a profound influence on the course of history both
East and West for the next 150 years, and still has some influence. He
had an idea and his discovery of that idea profoundly changed his life
and the course of his disciples. Now, the distinctive feature of
conversion to Christianity is - or should be - the discovery of a
living Person. It is by meeting and accepting the Person of Jesus that
the life of the Christian is changed. In our Gospel today our Lord
invites all who “labour and are burdened” to come to him. He promises
to give them rest. He is the God-given answer to man’s burden and
sorrow. He invites all of us to learn from him and to take upon
ourselves the way of obedience that was his, his “yoke”
(Matthew
11:28-30). He asks us to come,
to come and learn from him for he is meek and humble of heart, and we shall
find rest. The Christian life arises from this meeting. It is inspired by a
Person and not primarily by an idea, even though the Person of Jesus has
inspired an unending fount of ideas.
So we must learn to
deal with and relate to Jesus as a real and living person. In his great
book A Grammar of
Assent, Cardinal Newman considers the question of how we can
come to know God as if we had seen him, because this is what is
virtually required of us if we are to have a real - as opposed to a
notional - assent to him. We need to apprehend God not as we would a
notion but as we would a reality. How can we do this if in fact it is
impossible to see him? We can do it through our religious imagination.
Newman is highlighting the critical importance of our religious
imagination in the life of faith and therefore in the life of sanctity.
In a “real” religion we make use of a heartfelt imagination to
apprehend realities which we do not actually see, and in this way the
unseen Persons who are the Objects of our faith are apprehended in a
real and not simply in a notional way. So then, we need to bring to
bear in our life of faith a real effort to meditate on God and on what
God has done, meditating not only with our reason but also with our
imagination. The masters and guides of the spiritual life propose to us
that every day we set aside a little time to contemplate the person of
Jesus and the Father and the Holy Spirit, and the other persons who are
in heaven and who are actively aiding our journey to there. Saint
Jerome writes that ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ,
suggesting to us that a marvellous way of attaining a personal
knowledge and love of Jesus is to take up the Scriptures daily,
especially the Gospels, and to place ourselves imaginatively in his
presence in the scene of the Gospels. We come to Jesus using a
faith-filled and disciplined imagination.
The Christian
religion entails involvement with a living Person. Our Lord invites us
in the Gospel today to come to him and to learn from him, especially to
learn from his meek and humble heart. Let us bring to bear a great gift
God has given to us for this purpose, our religious imagination. Let us
with the aid especially of the Gospels immerse ourselves imaginatively
in all that God has done for us, and in this way to grow in love for
him.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Take my yoke upon your shoulders…
Your souls will find rest.” (Matthew
11:28-30)
Comment by St Bede the Venerable
(673-735), Monk, Doctor of the Church (Homily 12 for Pentecost Eve)
The Holy Spirit will give the righteous perfect peace in eternity. But
already now, he gives them very great peace when he enkindles the
heavenly fire of love in their heart. For the apostle Paul said: “This
hope will not leave us disappointed, because the love of God has been
poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to
us.” (Rom 5:5) The true and even the only peace of souls in this world
consists in being filled with divine love and animated by the hope of
heaven to the point of coming to consider the successes and failures of
this world as unimportant, of being completely stripped of the desires
and lusts of this world, and of rejoicing in the offenses and
persecutions suffered for Christ, so that one can say with the apostle
Paul: “We boast of our hope for the glory of God. But not only that –
we even boast of our afflictions!” (Rom 5:2)
The person who imagines that he will find peace in the enjoyment of the
goods of this world, in riches, is mistaken. The frequent troubles here
below and even the end of this world should convince that person that
he has built the foundations of his peace on sand (Mt 7:26). On the
contrary, all who, touched by the breath of the Holy Spirit, have taken
upon themselves the very good yoke of God’s love and who, following his
example, have learned to be gentle and humble of heart, begin now to
enjoy a peace, which is already the image of eternal rest.
(Selected by "The Daily
Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Put yourself always in your
neighbour's shoes. You will then see the various issues or problems
calmly. You will not get annoyed. You will be more understanding. You
will be able to make allowances and will correct people when and as
required. And you will fill the world with charity.
(The Forge,
no.958)
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What names
are given to the first sacrament of initiation?
This sacrament is primarily called Baptism because of the central rite
with which it is celebrated. To baptize means to “immerse” in water.
The one who is baptized is immersed into the death of Christ and rises
with him as a “new creature” (2 Corinthians 5:17). This sacrament is
also called the “bath of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Spirit”
(Titus 3:5); and it is called “enlightenment” because the baptized
becomes “a son of light” (Ephesians 5:8). (CCC 1213-1216, 1276-1277)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.252)
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Thursday
of the second week of Advent C
(December 14) Saint
John of the Cross, priest and doctor of the Church (1542-1591).
Born in Spain. After a number of years as a Carmelite, he was persuaded
by St Teresa of Jesus to lead the reform of his Order. He suffered many
tribulations. A renowned mystic and poet, he wrote great works on the
spiritual
life and the mystery of the Cross.
(Saints)
Let us also think of Saint Venantius (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah 41:13-20; Psalm 145:1 and 9, 10-11,
12-13ab; Matthew 11:11-15
Jesus said to the
crowds: “Amen, I say to you, among those born of women there has been
none greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the Kingdom of
heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptist until now,
the Kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent are taking it
by force. All the prophets and the law prophesied up to the time of
John. And if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah, the one who is
to come. Whoever has ears ought to hear.” (Matthew 11:11-15)
Greatness can, I
suppose, be considered under two categories. Many are great primarily
because of their own achievements. Others are great primarily because
of their endowments. The two are interlinked in the sense that
generally it is those who are greatly endowed who manage to achieve
great things. Nevertheless there are those who are greatly endowed who
achieve little, and there are those who achieve a lot who are only
moderately endowed. Our Lord placed the poor widow much higher than the
many rich because, though she was endowed with very little, her
generosity was such that she gave to the Temple treasury all she had to
live on. By contrast the rich gave a great deal, but it was only what
they did not need. So then, the two senses of being great are clearly
distinct. Our Lord tells us that “among those born of women there has
been none greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the Kingdom
of heaven is greater than he” (Matthew 11:11-15).
Clearly our Lord in extolling the greatness of those in the Kingdom of
heaven that he had come to establish was referring to the greatness of their
endowments. He is referring to us. We are immensely blessed by God in our
possession of Christ, for as St Paul tells us in one of his Letters, in
Christ we have been endowed with every heavenly blessing. The question is,
how have we used the gifts, the blessings, the endowments that have been
entrusted to us? In this respect, how do we compare with John the Baptist,
to whom our Lord refers in our passage? One of the fruits of considering the
lives of the saints is that in contemplating their example we are urged on
to make greater use of the gifts God has given us. We can be great in gifts,
but poor in the use of them.
St Ignatius Loyola
in his famous
Spiritual
Exercises
invites us to ask ourselves this question: “What have I done for
Christ; what am I doing for him; what shall I do for him?” In our
Gospel today our Lord tells us that “From the days of John the Baptist
until now, the Kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent are
taking it by storm.” We must put great effort into our Christian
calling. We have been given so much, and God will be expecting much of
us. We have been given the supernatural gifts enabling us to know and
love Christ. We have been given the gift of membership in his Church.
We have been given many advantages of education in the faith together
with all the grace that comes in the Church’s ministry to us. We have,
hopefully, heard the call to holiness of life which comes with baptism.
What have we done with all this? Considering all that we have been
given and comparing it with what, say, John the Baptist himself was
given, the least of us is greater than he. But in terms of response, we
cannot compare with him! Again, let us consider the poor widow whom our
Lord pointed out to his disciples. Her greatness consisted in giving
her all, such as it was. Our Lord told a parable about the master going
away and he gave to his servants various amounts, depending on their
abilities. Their task was to make good with what they had been given.
What did the person with the most modest abilities do with his master’s
money? He did nothing with it. He hid it and when the master returned
all that the master got back was what he gave in the first place. The
master was no richer. The servant was “wicked and lazy” for doing
nothing with what he had been given.
There are many ways in which the
Christian can read with great profit the Old Testament, which ought be read
in the light of Christ. Our Lord today points to one lesson coming to us
from the holy figures of the Old Testament, such as John the Baptist. He was
the last of the Old Testament prophets and appears in the New. He and they
ought inspire us to give of our all because though they did not receive all
that we have received, they gave everything to God and to the work God had
given them to do. Let us do likewise so that the great heavenly gifts we
have been given will bear fruit.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“All the prophets, as well as the Law,
have spoken of him up to John” (Matthew
11:11-15)
Saint
Hilary (315-367), bishop of Poitiers, doctor of the Church
(Treatise on
Mysteries [SC 19 alt])
Just as the owner of the fig tree in Luke's Gospel visits his barren
tree three times, in the same way, each year the Holy Mother Church
marks the coming of the Lord with a distinct period of three weeks.
“The Son of Man comes to search out and save what was lost” (Luke
19:10). He has come before the Law, because by the means of natural
reasoning he revealed to everyone what they were supposed to do or
follow (Rom 1:20). He has come under the Law because, through the
example of the patriarchs and the voice of the prophets, he confirmed
to the descendants of Abraham the decrees of the Law. He has come a
third time after the Law, by grace, to call the pagans, so that from
East to West all children learn to praise the name of the Lord” (Ps
112:1-3), these children whom, till the end of the world, he will not
stop calling to the praise of his glory...
In fact, everything in the Holy Scriptures announces by words, reveals
through facts and establishes with examples the coming of Jesus Christ,
our Lord...By all these prefigurations, real and manifest – by the
sleeping of Adam, the Flood of Noah, the justification of Abraham, the
birth of Isaac, the servitude of Jacob – in the patriarchs, it is him
who generates, washes, sanctifies, chooses and redeems the Church. In
one word, all the prophecies, that together reveal progressively God's
secret plan, have been given to us so that we may learn about his
coming Incarnation...Each character, each time, each event projects
like into a mirror the image of his coming, of his preaching, of his
Passion, of his resurrection and of our gathering in the
Church...Beginning from Adam, starting point of our knowledge of the
human race, is announced since the origin of the world what finds in
the Lord its final accomplishment.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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We cannot give way in matters
of faith. But don't forget that in order to speak the truth there is no
need to ill-treat anyone.
(The Forge,
no.959)
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How is Baptism prefigured in the Old
Covenant?
In the Old Covenant Baptism was pre-figured in various ways: water,
seen as source of life and of death; in the Ark of Noah, which saved by
means of water; in the passing through the Red Sea, which liberated
Israel from Egyptian slavery; in the crossing of the Jordan River, that
brought Israel into the promised land which is the image of eternal
life. (CCC 1217-1222)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.253)
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Friday
of the Second Week of Advent C
(December 15) Today let us think of Saint Christiana
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah
48:17-19; Psalm 1:1-2, 3, 4 and
6; Matthew 11:16-19
Jesus said to the
crowds: “To what shall I compare this generation? It is like children
who sit in marketplaces and call to one another, ‘We played the flute
for you, but you did not dance, we sang a dirge but you did not mourn.’
For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they said, ‘He is
possessed by a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking and they
said, ‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors
and sinners.’ But wisdom is vindicated by her works.”
(Matthew 11:16-19)
A great figure whom
the Church places before us for our contemplation during Advent is that
of St John the Baptist. He came preaching the call to repent, and
administering a baptism signifying and facilitating repentance. So
important was repentance in the plan of God that our Lord himself took
sinful man’s part and stepped forward to receive John’s baptism. Then
our Lord began his own preaching with the
call to all to repent
for the Kingdom of God was at hand. God’s people had to change, they
had to recognize and renounce the sin in their lives that opposed the
coming of God and his saving grace. In our Gospel today our Lord is
lamenting the refusal of his generation to repent. No matter what
approach God took to call his people to repent it was not having its
effect. “For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they said, ‘He
is possessed by a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking and
they said, ‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax
collectors and sinners’”
(Matthew
11:16-19). Considered en masse,
the people did not take up the call and accept Jesus as the One whom the
Father had promised to send. At the heart of the problem was the essentially
spiritual task of turning away from sin and then believing the Good News,
and the critical step was that conversion. We see the refusal to do so early
in our Lord’s public ministry when he returned to his own townspeople of
Nazareth and announced that in his person the prophecy of Isaiah was being
fulfilled. They bundled him out of town with the intent to do away with him.
Our Lord lost the masses when he preached the doctrine of the Eucharist, and
finally the leaders condemned him to death when he bore witness in their
presence to his divinity. At root the issue was repentance.
So then, one of the fruits of this
special liturgical season of Advent ought be a renewed appreciation of the
fundamental importance in the spiritual life of the readiness to repent. We
see it constantly in the Church’s teaching and exhortation. Consider the
doctrine of Indulgences, for which the Catholic ought have a special love.
If a person is to gain a Plenary Indulgence - which takes away all the
temporal punishment still due to sins that have been forgiven - one of the
conditions is that one must be free from all attachment to sin, including
venial sin. That is to say, one must have thoroughly repented of all one’s
sins and not retain any lingering attachment to any sin. One can aspire to
gain a Plenary Indulgence every day, and part of this aspiration will be to
aim at thorough repentance from all one’s sins. Repentance is a daily and
lifelong spiritual project, and the result of it will be a growing
detestation of the slightest deliberate venial sin because of its offence
against the goodness and love of God and because of its inherent evil and
what it will lead to. The point here, though, is that repentance is at the
root of Christian holiness, and one cannot advance in holiness unless one is
advancing in repentance from sin and from all attachment to sin. In this,
one must pay special attention to attachment to deliberate venial sin. This
attachment has to be dealt with and eradicated root and branch, whatever it
might be. It could be an attachment to one’s own self-will, or any one of a
number of forms of pride and concupiscence. Whatever it be one will not have
repented unless this attachment is renounced and replaced with a detestation
for the sin to which one was attached. Repentance is not something that
happens once - which is the position of many forms of classic Protestantism
- rather it is something which is worked at every day of one’s life.
Our Lord in our
Gospel passage today tells us that “wisdom is vindicated by her works”
(Matthew
11:19). Let
us pray for wisdom from on high. St James in his letter urges us to
pray for wisdom. That wisdom will enable us to see the supreme ugliness
of sin. It is the one very ugly thing in the world and it is why the
devil is always portrayed as a most ugly spiritual being. Sin opposes
the beauty of God and of holiness. The one who has the supernatural
gift of wisdom will be “vindicated” by the works of repentance that are
shown in his life. Let us today and every day turn away from sin.
(E.J.Tyler)
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To reform our lives in
response to the repeated calls of the God who comes
(Conditor alme siderum)
Latin Liturgy, 9th century
Creator of the stars of night,
Your people's everlasting light,
O Christ, Redeemer of us all,
We pray you hear us when we
call.
In sorrow that the ancient curse
Should doom to death a universe,
You came, O Savior, to set free
Your own in glorious liberty.
When this old world drew on
toward night,
You came; but not in splendor
bright,
Not as a monarch, but the child
Of Mary, blameless mother mild.
At your great Name, O Jesus, now
All knees must bend, all hearts
must bow;
All things on earth with one
accord,
Like those in heaven, shall
call you Lord.
Come in your holy might, we
pray,
Redeem us for eternal day;
Defend us while we dwell below
From all assaults of our dread
foe.
To God the Father, God the Son,
And God the Spirit, Three in
One,
Praise, honor, might, and glory
be
From age to age eternally.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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When the good of your neighbour
is at stake you cannot remain silent. But speak in a kindly way, with
due moderation and without losing your temper.
(The Forge,
no.960)
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How is Baptism prefigured in the Old
Covenant?
In the Old Covenant Baptism was pre-figured in various ways: water,
seen as source of life and of death; in the Ark of Noah, which saved by
means of water; in the passing through the Red Sea, which liberated
Israel from Egyptian slavery; in the crossing of the Jordan River, that
brought Israel into the promised land which is the image of eternal
life. (CCC 1217-1222)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.253)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the Second Week of Advent C
(December 16) Today let us think of Saint Adelaide (Saints)
Scripture today: Sirach 48:1-4,
9-11; Psalm 80:2ac and 3b, 15-16,
18-19; Matthew
17:9a, 10-13
As they were coming
down from the mountain, the disciples asked Jesus, “Why do the scribes
say that Elijah must come first?” He said in reply, “Elijah will indeed
come and restore all things; but I tell you that Elijah has already
come, and they did not recognize him but did to him whatever they
pleased. So also will the Son of Man suffer at their hands.” Then the
disciples understood that he was speaking to them of John the Baptist. (Matthew 17:9a,
10-13)
In our brief Gospel
passage today our Lord alludes to a pattern in the response of God’s
chosen people. Our Lord’s remarks are prompted by a question from his
disciples referring to the teaching of the scribes that “Elijah must
come
first”. Our Lord tells them that the scribes are correct, that “Elijah
will indeed come and restore all things”. However, he continues,
“Elijah has already
come.” So there in our Lord's answer we have a divine
confirmation and
interpretation of the Old
Testament prophecy that Elijah would come again. Our Lord goes on to
tell his
disciples that the Elijah being predicted in the prophecy was John the
Baptist. The
Baptist was Elijah in the sense, then, that he wonderfully embodied the
spirit of Elijah. Our Lord's main point, though, is that they did not
recognize him,
and indeed they
caused him to suffer. Our Lord is referring especially to the Baptist’s
martyrdom, but also perhaps to the fact that his pointing to Jesus as
the Messiah was not accepted and taken up. Ultimately St John the
Baptist’s true mission was played out on deaf ears. There is the
even more important point that “so will the Son of Man suffer at their
hands”
(Matthew 17:9a, 10-13). The pattern, then, in
the response of God’s chosen people was that all too often God's
overtures and efforts
to reclaim and redeem from sin met with little response. Suspicion and
rejection was the pattern
and it would reach its climax in the sufferings and the passion of the
long-awaited Messiah. Now, this is a warning to us as we celebrate the
liturgical season of Advent. We celebrate the coming of the Messiah -
he has come already, he is ever coming in our daily lives, and he will
come again finally. But what is our response, and what will it be?
The whole history
of God’s chosen people as it is portrayed in the Old and New Testaments
warns us of the tendency of our own response to the coming
of Jesus into our lives. The tendency of man is a sinful one.
It will be towards disinterest, objection, hostility to Christ's
absolute claims.
Perhaps especially at this particular moment of our Western secular
culture is this danger acute for each of us, because we are children of
our culture and our society. The young person growing up even in a
religious family will, due to the influence of the surrounding secular
culture in school, community and media, tend to look on religious faith
and on the claims of the Church in respect to Christ with suspicion. A
culture distinguished by relativism in values (as is our own) has an
active dislike for absolute claims, such as the claim that Christ is
the truth and that the fullness of revealed truth is to be
found only in him and in his Church. That is to say, our Western
culture characteristically has a hostile suspicion of clear and
unambiguous Christianity, the Christianity that presents with utter
clarity Christ’s claim that no one can come to the Father except
through him, and that he is the Way, the Truth and the Life. It objects
to and dislikes the assertion that Catholic Christianity is true and
that the fulness of revealed truth lies within the Catholic Church
because the person of Christ is her Head. Catholic Christianity is
incompatible with the view that truth is ultimately relative to each
person, and that opposites can be liberally allowed as true. The great
nineteenth
century apologist for Catholic truth, Cardinal Newman, repeatedly
pointed out that a person’s assumptions are decisive in shaping the
direction along which he will go. We could add that the same applies to
a culture. The Cardinal said that all too often our philosophical
starting
points are hidden from our view. We must pray to God to give us the
right first principles that will facilitate our
acceptance of Christ and his Church as the fount and repository of
truth.
Let us ponder on
our Lord’s words in today’s Gospel, speaking of how both John the
Baptist and he himself were rejected by those to whom they had been
sent. Let us be alive with a prudent clarity to the presumption of
suspicion that pervades the
culture and society around us with respect to Christ and his Church. Let us be alert to the
sinful tendency within ourselves to resist
Christ’s divine and saving claims over our mind and heart. With this in mind let us
pray for the grace to give to Christ and the
Church his body a wholehearted acceptance and assent, an assent that
will be the foundation of ever-advancing holiness in our lives. What
have I done for Christ; what am I doing for Christ; what will I do for
him?
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Then the disciples understood that he
was speaking to them of John the Baptist" (Mattew 17:13)
St Aphrahate (?-around
345), monk and Bishop in Nineveh, in present-day Iraq (Demonstrations,
6, 13)
Our Lord testifies concerning John, that he is the greatest of the
Prophets. Yet he received the Spirit by limit, because in that
measure in which Elijah received the Spirit, (in the same) John
obtained it. And as Elijah used to dwell in the wilderness, so also the
Spirit of God led John into the wilderness, and he used to dwell in the
mountains and caves. The birds sustained Elijah, and John used to
eat locusts that fly. Elijah had his loins girded with a girdle
of leather; so John had his loins girded with a cincture of leather (Mt
3:4). Jezebel persecuted Elijah, and Herodias persecuted
John. Elijah reproved Ahab, and John reproved Herod. Elijah
divided the Jordan, and John opened up baptism. The spirit of
Elijah rested twofold upon Elisha, so John laid his hand on our
Redeemer, and he received the Spirit not by measure (Jn 3:34).
Elijah opened the heavens and ascended; and John saw the heavens
opened, and the Spirit of God which descended and rested upon our
Redeemer.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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It's not possible to comment on
events or doctrines without making personal references..., although
you are not judging anyone: qui judicat Dominus est — it is God who has
to judge. Don't worry, then, if now and again you come across someone
who lacks an upright conscience and — either in bad faith or through
lack of discernment — takes your words for gossip.
(The Forge,
no.961)
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Starting when and to whom has the Church
administered Baptism?
From the day of Pentecost, the Church has administered Baptism to
anyone who believes in Jesus Christ. (CCC 1226-1228)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.255)
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Third
Sunday of Advent C
(December 17) Today let us think of Our Lady of St. Olympias
(Saints)
Scripture today: Zephaniah
3:14-18a; Isaiah 12:2-3, 4, 5-6; Philippians
4:4-7; Luke 3:10-18
The crowds asked John
the Baptist, “What should we do?” He said to them in reply, “Whoever
has two cloaks should share with the person who has none. And whoever
has food should do likewise.”
Even tax collectors came to be baptized
and they said to him, “Teacher, what should we do?” He answered them,
“Stop collecting more than what is prescribed.” Soldiers also asked
him, “And what is it that we should do?” He told them, “Do not practice
extortion, do not falsely accuse anyone, and be satisfied with your
wages.” Now the people were filled with expectation, and all were
asking in their hearts whether John might be the Christ. John answered
them all, saying, “I am baptizing you with water, but one mightier than
I is coming. I am not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals. He
will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fan is in
his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his
barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” Exhorting
them in many other ways, he preached good news to the people. (Luke 3:10-18)
It is hardly needs
mentioning that one of the most obvious features of human society is
the
profound difference of opinion that exists among men. The most
important issues of life are viewed not only in contrary ways but often
in
ways radically hostile to one another. This fact alone implies that there is not only
truth in possession among men but a great degree of error, for
opposites cannot be
true. When one person asserts, for instance, that Christ is
not God and that therefore it is legitimate to be skeptical about his
teaching and that of the Church, and when someone else contradicts this
view and says that it is wrong, both cannot be correct. Some attain the
truth, others arrive at what seems true to them but is in fact false,
and both
groups are convinced they are right. Now, why is it that we do not all
apprehend the truth, and that many are in error about critically
important matters? Apart from the fact that man’s fallen moral
condition affects his entire constitution including his mind and
heart, what is surely a factor is where a person is coming from.
We all have fundamental principles, assumptions and attitudes that we
implicitly take to be true, and in the light of which we
make further judgments. If we are wrong in these starting points this
mistake will lead us into errors about critically important matters.
The
problem is that we are generally unaware of where we are coming from,
and the blindness that results remains until the right starting points
are gained. We could call them the foundations of our thought and life.
God knows where we are in fact coming from and where we ought be
coming from. He has the power to lay the right foundations, so we need
to pray for his grace.
Let us take
something that is simple but very fundamental indeed. It relates to
the question asked of John the Baptist by the crowds, the tax
collectors and the soldiers in our Gospel today: "What should we do?" (Luke
3:10-18). I refer to our
experience of the voice of conscience. A healthy sense of our
conscience as we experience it is that it is a voice of capital
importance leading us to truth and goodness. If a person in the secret
recesses of his heart fails to place the utmost importance on the voice
of conscience commanding that good be done and evil avoided, and
chooses instead to give more importance to other things - such as the
useful or the alluring - then the gradual effect of this hidden choice
will be very great. It will affect his readiness for the truth,
including revealed truth. Furthermore, inasmuch as the voice of
conscience is that of a good and holy authority, choosing to dislike
this voice and to prefer other voices will affect one's attitude to the
authority of God himself. This is because the authority of conscience
is experienced as echoing God’s authority. Conscience prompts us to
seek to know what we should do, because it tells us that truth must be
accepted and that good must be done. All this is to say that if a
person shows that he is reluctant to place a high value on
obedience to the will of God which is at the heart of a spirit of
religion, at root it may have to do with where he is coming from. He
may be coming from a refusal to respect and obey the voice of the
conscience pointing to the good and warning against the bad. The desire
to do God’s will can come
only from the right foundations, the right beginnings.
Whatever about this speculation as to
the roots of a religious spirit, today’s Gospel
(Luke
3:10-18)
opens with a commonplace but extraordinarily important human question.
It is put to John the Baptist by the crowds, the tax collectors and the
soldiers: “What should we do?” If
only human discourse, human thought, and all human decisions would
begin with
that question! "What should we do?" is perhaps the most authentic
and original question of all, giving expression to the voice of
conscience resounding in the human heart. It is a question which dimly
points to God as the source of both the question and the answer. If a
person, posing with a spirit of obedience this question arising from
his heart, looks to a true oracle of God for the answer, that person
will be on the way to sanctity and truth. The crowds looked to John for
the answer because he was a prophet of the Most High. Let us not bother
here with whether the crowds followed it through with obedience. Let us
rather take their question and John’s response as symbolic of the
paramount importance of having a heartfelt desire to know the will of
God and to put it into practice, and as symbolic also of the fact that
God has made his will known. Our
starting points ought be such as to lead us to have this attitude of
reverence to God and of wanting to obey his holy will. We ought
pray that God will guide us to make the fundamental choices and to have
the right spiritual foundations that
will lead us to his appointed Oracle, which is Jesus our Lord and the
Church his body. From this abiding Oracle we come to know God’s will.
God
has revealed that he has a plan for us that will lead to our salvation
and sanctification. He sent his Son to fulfill his will and plan, and
this he did perfectly. By his grace we are able to unite ourselves with
Jesus in hearing the will of the Father and putting it into practice.
Let us resolve to make the will of God supreme in our life, and in
union with our Lord never to count the cost in living it out in the
ordinary duties of everyday life. God’s will is supreme. By his grace,
let us make it the supreme priority in our life. That is where we ought
be coming from. With that priority as our starting
point, we shall be the good soil that receives the word of God and
produces a harvest.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: The Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no. 2822-2827
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“John testified to the truth…… He was
the lamp, set aflame and burning bright.” (John 5:33.35)
Blessed Guerric of Igny
(around 1080-1157), Cistercian abbot (Sermon 1 on Saint John the
Baptist, §§2)
This lamp, which is destined to give light to the world, brings me a
new joy, for thanks to it, I recognized the true Light which shines in
the darkness, but which the darkness did not accept (Jn 1:5)…… We can
admire you, John, who are the greatest of all the saints; but it is
impossible for us to imitate your sanctity. Since you hasten to prepare
for the Lord a perfect people with publicans and sinners, it is
extremely urgent that you speak to them in a way that is more
accessible to them than your life. Offer them a model of perfection
that is not only your way of living, but that is adapted to the
weakness of human strength.
““Give some evidence that you mean to reform.”” (Mt 3:8) But we,
Brothers, we take pride in speaking better than we live. John however,
whose life is more sublime than what human beings can understand, makes
his language available to their understanding. He says: ““Give some
evidence that you mean to reform.”” ““I am speaking to you in a human
way because of the weakness of the flesh. If you cannot yet entirely do
good, may there be in you at least a true desire to reform from what is
bad. If you cannot yet give evidence of perfect righteousness, may your
perfection at present consist in giving evidence of behavior that shows
that you desire to reform.””
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Some poor people seem to get
annoyed by
the good works you are doing, as if a thing ceases to be good when it
is not being carried out or organized by themselves. This lack of
understanding cannot be an excuse for you to slacken off in what you
are doing. Try to do it even better, right now. When you get no
applause on earth, your work will be all the more welcome in Heaven.
(The Forge,
no.962)
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In what does the
essential rite of Baptism consist?
The essential rite of this sacrament consists in immersing the
candidate in water or pouring water over his or her head while invoking
the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. (CCC 1229-1245,
1278)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.256)
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The Eighteenth day of December
(Christmas novena)
(December 18) Today let us think of Saint Gatian, and the Expectation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Saints)
Scripture today: Jeremiah
23:5-8; Psalm 72:1-2, 12-13, 18-19;
Matthew 1:18-25
Now this is how the
birth of Jesus Christ came about. When his mother Mary was betrothed to
Joseph, but before they lived
together, she was found with child
through the holy Spirit. Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous
man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame, decided to divorce her
quietly. Such was his intention when, behold, the angel of the Lord
appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph, son of David, do not be
afraid to take Mary your wife into your home. For it is through the
holy Spirit that this child has been conceived in her. She will bear a
son and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from
their sins." All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had said
through the prophet: Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a
son, and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means "God is with us."
When Joseph awoke, he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him
and took his wife into his home. He had no relations with her prior to the birth
of her son, and he named him Jesus. (Matthew 1,18-24)
If we consider the
prominent figures of the ancient world - let us say, Alexander the
Great
and his father Philip of Macedon, Darius the Great, the famous
philosophers Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, Hannibal, Scipio, Pompey,
the most famous of the Caesars, the founders of some
world religions such as
Zarathustra, Buddha, Confucius, Mahomet - what do we know of the
circumstances of their births? Not very much, it seems to me. It would
be an interesting study to compare what we know of the birth and
infancy of Jesus with what we know of the infancy of those other
figures. Now,
inasmuch as the Christian knows that there is no equal
to Jesus in all human history in terms of his person and what he has
done for mankind, how good a thing it is that the Gospels (of Matthew
and Luke) provide us with so much information about his infancy! If we
think of the paucity of information provided about the birth of other
great figures of that era, we are lucky indeed and we ought treasure
the inspired narratives we have. Let us treasure them in the way our
Lady treasured what she saw and heard at the time of our Lord’s birth.
She “treasured all these things and pondered them in her heart”, we are
told. Let us “treasure” this precious history in union with Mary, the
most privileged eye-witness of all, and undoubtedly the principal and
perhaps the ultimate source of the infancy narratives. Our infancy
accounts ought foster in our hearts a love for the holy persons at the
centre of the story. So then, let us ponder on what we are told in
today’s Gospel (Matthew
1,18-24)
about the birth of Jesus
Christ.
The first thing we
notice in our text today is that the events are narrated mainly from
Joseph’s perspective. He is the principal one considering the unfolding
drama before him, and the revelation he receives is the one we are
invited to contemplate. So let us go to Joseph, as Teresa of Avila used
to say, calling Joseph her father and her lord. One of the fruits of
the Christmas season ought be a rediscovery of the goodness and
greatness of Joseph. It was to him that God entrusted the Virgin and
her child. If because Mary’s vocation was to be the mother of the Son
of God made man she received such stupendous gifts of grace such that
the angel addressed her as “full of grace”, what are we to think of
Joseph? His vocation was to be Mary’s very husband and the fatherly
guardian of the Messiah her son. How greatly God must have prepared his
soul for this incomparable intimacy with these two most holy of
persons! The mind of the Church has progressively appreciated how high
would have been his sanctity, a sanctity buried in a commonplace
obscurity. How greatly he must have been loved by Mary his wife. He was
her husband. How greatly he must have been venerated and loved by Jesus
his foster-child. Mary referred to him as his father (Luke 2:48). It
all began with the events recounted in today’s
Gospel, when the perplexed and holy Joseph was enlightened by the angel
as to the plan of God. So, “when Joseph awoke, he did as the angel of
the Lord had commanded him and took his wife into his home”
(Matthew 1,18-24). Thereupon began the hidden marvel of the
Holy Family.
Let us today
contemplate “how Jesus Christ came to be born”, but from the
perspective of our father Joseph. He is the protector of the
universal Church because he was the protector and provider of the Holy
Family, so let us not neglect him. How could Mary neglect his
prayers on our behalf, how could Jesus? If Joseph has something to take
to God on our behalf, would not Mary join him in this petition? Would
not our great high priest and intercessor, Jesus Christ himself? So
then, let us learn
to go to Joseph!
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Joseph,
son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your
home” (Matthew 1,18-24)
Leo XIII, pope from 1878 to 1903 (Quanquam pluries)
(Picture: Pope Leo
XIII)
The reason why Saint Joseph is particularly the Church's patron and for
which the Church has high hopes in his protection and patronage, is
that Joseph was Mary's spouse and was reputed to be the father of Jesus
Christ. From this have followed his dignity, his favor, his holiness,
and his glory. Of course the dignity of the Mother of God is such that
nothing above her could be created. At the same time, since Joseph was
united to the Blessed virgin through marriage, undoubtedly, more than
any other, he came close to this most eminent dignity for which the
Mother of God surpasses all other creatures. Marriage in fact is of all
the most intimate union that entails by its own nature the communion of
goods between the husband and wife. Moreover, in giving Joseph to Mary
as her spouse, God gave her not only a companion for her life, a
witness of her virginity, a guardian of her honor, but also someone she
could share her sublime dignity with.
Similarly, Joseph stands out amongst all for his august dignity,
because he was, by God's will, the guardian of the Son of God, looked
upon by men as his father. This is also the reason why it is said that
the Word of God was humbly submitted to Joseph, that he would obey to
him and do all the duties children are asked to by their parents.
From this double dignity followed the responsibilities that nature
imposes on fathers: Joseph was the guardian, the administrator and the
legitimate and natural defender of the divine house, of which he was
the head...Now, the divine house that Joseph governed with the
authority of a father contained the beginnings of the newborn
Church...These are the reasons why the blessed Patriarch looks over the
Church since the multitude of Christians have been entrusted to him.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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At times, fifty
percent of the work is
lost because of in-fighting stemming from a lack of charity, and from
tales and back-biting among brothers. Furthermore, yet another
twenty-five per cent of the work is lost by constructing buildings
which are unnecessary for the apostolate. Gossip should never be
allowed and we shouldn't waste our time building so many houses. People
will then be apostles, one hundred per cent.
(The Forge,
no.963)
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Who can receive Baptism?
Every person not yet baptized is able to receive Baptism. (CCC
1246-1252)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.257)
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The
Nineteenth day of December
(Christmas
novena)
(December 19) Today let us think of Blessed (Pope) Urban V
(Saints)
Scripture today: Judges 13:2-7,
24-25a; Psalm 71:3-4a, 5-6ab, 16-17;
Luke 1:5-25
In the days of
Herod, King of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah of the
priestly division of Abijah; his wife was from the daughters of Aaron,
and her name was Elizabeth. Both were righteous in the eyes of God,
observing all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blamelessly.
But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren and both were
advanced in years. Once when he was serving as priest in his division's
turn before God, according to the practice of the priestly service, he
was chosen by
lot to enter the sanctuary of the
Lord to burn incense. Then, when the whole assembly of the people was
praying outside at the hour of the incense offering, the angel of the
Lord appeared to him, standing at the right of the altar of incense.
Zechariah was troubled by what he saw, and fear came upon him. But the
angel said to him, "Do not be afraid, Zechariah, because your prayer
has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall
name him John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will
rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the sight of (the) Lord.
He will drink neither wine nor strong drink. He will be filled with the
holy Spirit even from his mother's womb, and he will turn many of the
children of Israel to the Lord their God. He will go before him in the
spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of fathers toward
children and the disobedient to the understanding of the righteous, to
prepare a people fit for the Lord." Then Zechariah said to the angel,
"How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in
years." And the angel said to him in reply, "I am Gabriel, who stand
before God. I was sent to speak to you and to announce to you this good
news. But now you will be speechless and unable to talk until the day
these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which
will be fulfilled at their proper time." Meanwhile the people were
waiting for Zechariah and were amazed that he stayed so long in the
sanctuary. But when he came out, he was unable to speak to them, and
they realized that he had seen a vision in the sanctuary. He was
gesturing to them but remained mute. Then, when his days of ministry
were completed, he went home. After this time his wife Elizabeth
conceived, and she went into seclusion for five months, saying, So has
the Lord done for me at a time when he has seen fit to take away my
disgrace before others. (Luke 1:5-25)
St Luke begins his
account of the coming of the Messiah by stating that he means to be
presenting actual facts, real history. He opens his panorama with the
lens directed to the
priest Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth who was also descended from a
priestly line. “Both were righteous in the
eyes of God, observing
all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blamelessly”
(Luke
1:5-25).
Elizabeth was a relation of the Virgin Mary - perhaps a cousin or even
sister of one of her parents. They were a good and holy couple and one
gets the impression that their
entire lives had been lived in this profoundly religious spirit. “But
they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren and both were advanced
in years”, and so their lives had carried a burden of unfulfilled
hopes. We are given the angel’s words to Zechariah, and they include
the information
that they had prayed for a child, and not having received one they
continued in obedience to God. But how greatly did God reward them, for
the child to be theirs was to be a second Elijah come back. His
arrival would be their “joy and gladness” and his life would be the
cause of so much good in the sight of God. “He will be great in the
sight of the Lord” and “will be filled with the holy Spirit even from
his mother’s womb”, and will go before the Lord “in the spirit and
power of Elijah” to “prepare a people fit for the Lord.” Zechariah and
Elizabeth were not given to foresee the future and how this prediction
would unfold, but it was a spectacular answer to their humble and
obedient prayer, a great reward for their persevering fidelity despite
disappointment. After the Messiah himself what greater son could any
Old Testament couple hope to have been given? Their son was to be the
great Precursor.
So then, let us think of the mercy and
goodness of God towards this humble and holy couple. It was a manifestation of
the mercy of God, which is the principal feature of the revelation which the God
of both testaments made of himself. He is a God rich in mercy. But our story
contains a further twist of great relevance, because it sets before us the
response of Zechariah to the message of the Angel, and that response was not
pleasing to God. Good though he was, he doubted the word of the Angel. He asked
for proof “for I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years", manifesting
doubt as to the power of God to effect what had just been promised. All through
his public ministry years later Jesus was asking for faith that he could do what
he promised or what people asked of him. “Do you believe I can do this for you?”
our Lord was often asking his petitioners. “Unless you see signs and wonders you
will not believe!” our Lord stated to one person. When at the synagogue of
Capernaum he announced what was to be one of his greatest future miracles, the
miracle of the Eucharist, the majority of his disciples left him. It was too
much for them. On the occasion of the archangel Gabriel's announcement to
Zechariah of the coming birth of his son, Zechariah failed in this
fundamental requirement to believe what God promises. He lacked sufficient
faith. It was a moral failure and the Angel Gabriel showed forth God’s
displeasure and punished him accordingly. God did not take back his gift and
Zechariah dutifully submitted and went on in the love of God, but this sequence
of events in our Gospel today is very instructive to us as we get ready to
celebrate the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The annunciation of
the birth of John the Baptist tells us of the power of God and of our
call to believe in his power. The power of God is shown forth in his
mercy. At her annunciation Mary believed in the power of God to do what
he mercifully promised, while at his annunciation Zachariah failed to
believe. He went on in obedience to God together with his wife and
lived to see God’s mercy fulfilled. Let us learn from his momentary
failure to put our
faith in God, to live our life according to it and never to fail in
faith. It is the temptation of our time, to withhold faith.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“You have not trusted my words.”
(Luke 1:20) “Blest is she who trusted.” (Luke 1:45)
St Augustine (354-430),
Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Sermon 293, 1-2)
John the Baptist’s mother was an old and sterile woman; Christ’s mother
was a young girl in the fullness of her youth. John was the fruit of
sterility; Christ that of virginity… The one was announced through the
message of an angel; the other was conceived upon the angel’s
announcement. John’s father did not believe in the news of his birth
and he became mute; Christ’s mother believed in her son, and through
faith, she conceived him in her womb. The Virgin’s heart first welcomed
faith and then, becoming mother, Mary received a fruit in her womb.
The words spoken to the angel by Mary and Zechariah are, however, more
or less similar. When the angel announced the birth of John to him, the
priest answered: “How am I to know this? I am an old man; my wife too
is advanced in age.” Mary responded to the angel’s announcement: “How
can this be since I do not know man?” Yes, they are almost the same
words… Yet the former is reprimanded, the latter is enlightened.
Zechariah is told: “Because you have not trusted…” But Mary is told:
“This is the answer you demanded.” However again, the words of the one
and of the other are almost the same… But the one who heard the words
also saw the hearts; for him, nothing is hidden. Each one’s language
concealed what he thought; but if this thought was hidden from human
beings, it was not hidden from the angel, or rather, it was not
concealed from him who spoke through the angel’s mediation.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Pray for the priests of today,
and for those who are to come, that they may really love their fellow
men, every day more and without distinction, and that they may know
also how to make themselves loved by them.
(The Forge,
no.964)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why does the Church baptize infants?
The Church baptizes infants because they are born with original sin.
They need to be freed from the power of the Evil One and brought into
that realm of freedom which belongs to the children of God. (CCC
1250)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.258)
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The
Twentieth day of December
(Christmas
novena)
(December 20) Today let us think of (Saints) Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
(Saints)
Scripture today: Isaiah
7:10-14; Psalm 24:1-2, 3-4ab, 5-6;
Luke 1:26-38
In the sixth month,
the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee called
Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of
David, and the virgin's name was Mary. And coming to her, he said,
"Hail, favoured one! The
Lord is with you."
But she was greatly
troubled at what was said and pondered what sort of greeting this might
be. Then the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have
found favour with God. Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear
a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be
called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne
of David his father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever,
and of his kingdom there will be no end." But Mary said to the angel,
"How can this be, since I have no relations with a man?" And the angel
said to her in reply, "The holy Spirit will come upon you, and the
power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be
born will be called holy, the Son of God. And behold, Elizabeth, your
relative, has also conceived a son in her old age, and this is the
sixth month for her who was called barren; for nothing will be
impossible for God." Mary said, "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord.
May it be done to me according to your word." Then the angel departed
from her. (Luke 1:26-38).
Down through the
ages of the Christian era there has been a great icon common to the
Christian East and the Christian West: it is the icon of Mary and her
Child. Countless Christians contemplate Christ with his mother, and one
of the sad losses undergone by the Protestant
Reformation was that of
Mary. She was separated from the Child and lost from their religious
devotion. Indeed, the Child Jesus too tended to be lost in exclusive
favour
of the Man Jesus. In our Gospel passage today the archangel Gabriel is
“sent
by God to a town of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a
man named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin's name was
Mary” (Luke
1:26). Observe, though, the veneration he displays towards the
young woman to whom he has been sent. He addresses her as the favoured
one, or alternatively, as the one who is full of grace. Reading the
text carefully, one suspects that his expressions of respect and
veneration were not just momentary, because we are told that Mary “was
greatly troubled at what was said and pondered what sort of greeting
this might be.” It is as if the greeting was extended and fulsome, as
if the angel is in some sense bowing low before the Virgin he is
addressing. It looks to have been a singular and most striking greeting
involving more than what is so briefly reported, a
greeting which Mary is in no way used to. The angel is full of
admiration and unfeigned love for the one who is before him and this
profound regard he
manifests. Mary responds with a form of fear and wonderment at “what
sort of greeting this might be.” Thinking of the greeting of the angel,
how precious to us ought be his words every time we pray the “Hail
Mary”! Hail Mary, full of grace, we pray countless times over the
course of life. Let this repeated prayer be genuine!
Such was Mary in
the eyes of this great and holy spirit, the archangel Gabriel. He was
standing before the one who in a few moments would be the mother of God
made man, and he greets her as a creature beyond compare. But now, he
brings his message that God wishes her to be the mother of the Messiah.
Her child would be “great”, and we notice how this word has no
qualification. He is
not “great in the sight of the Lord” (that is, in the judgment of God)
as would be John the Baptist. No, her child will be simply and
absolutely “great”, great as God is great.
He will “be called Son of the
Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his
father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his
kingdom there will be no end." Taking the words as they stand, how
could we possibly consider any other son of Adam to compare with him?
These words about the Child come from heaven before his conception and
we
ought let them sink into our soul during this Advent and Christmas
season. The divine and human uniqueness of Jesus Christ ought be
impressed on our mind and religious imagination in such a way that any
study we make of other religions and their founders ought reinforce and
not weaken our sense of his exalted person and mission. Our danger
today is that of considering Christ as, admittedly, a very great figure
in the history of man, but nevertheless of the same order as Moses,
Buddha, Mahomet, Zarathustra, and others - even if greater than them
all. This is basically the position of the fourth century Arius, and
requires no special spiritual insight because the greatness of Christ
ought be obvious. The real challenge is to arrive at the knowledge of
him
that has been revealed by God. The words of the archangel Gabriel to
the virgin telling her about the Child will help us do this.
So let us be
instructed by the archangel Gabriel as to who Mary and her Child really
are. Let us place ourselves by his side as he gazes at the woman he so
highly venerates. Let us make his words of greeting our own as we bow
low in love and admiration before her. She is God’s perfect jewel.
Let us contemplate her great Child whom she now begins to
carry. “He will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his
kingdom there will be no end." Let us contemplate this Child
living and working with his mother together with Joseph in the years of
Nazareth.
Let us contemplate him on the Cross redeeming the world, and each of us
in it, including his all-holy mother. Let us never separate Christ from
Mary, for Jesus comes to us through and with his Mother.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Rejoice, you who are full of grace”
(Luke
1:26-38). Pope
John Paul II (Allocution Nov 27, 1983)
Joy is a basic component of the sacred time now beginning. Advent is a
time for being watchful, for prayer, for conversion, in addition to 
being one of fervent and joyful
expectation. The motive is clear: “The Lord is near.” (Phil 4:5)
The first thing that is said to Mary in the New Testament is a joyful
invitation: “Exult, rejoice!” (Lk 1:28 in Greek) Such a greeting is
linked to the Saviour’s coming. Mary is the first one to receive the
announcement of a joy, which will be proclaimed to the whole people in
what follows. She participates in it in an extraordinary way and
measure. In her, ancient Israel’s joy is concentrated and finds its
fullness; in her, the happiness of messianic times bursts forth
irrevocably. The Virgin Mary’s joy is in particular that of the “small
remnant” of Israel (Isa 10:20f.), of the poor who await God’s salvation
and who experience his fidelity.
So that we also might participate in this feast, it is necessary to
wait in humility and to welcome the Saviour with trust. “In considering
the ineffable love with which the Virgin Mother awaited the Son, all
the faithful who live the spirit of Advent through the liturgy,
‘vigilant in prayer and filled with gladness’, will be led to take her
as their model and to prepare to go out to meet the Lord who is
coming.” (Paul VI,
Marialis cultus)
(Selected by "The
Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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I have been thinking of all the
priests throughout the world. Help me to pray for the fruitfulness of
their apostolates. “My brother in the priesthood, please speak always
about God and, when you really do belong to him, your conversations
will never be monotonous.”
(The Forge,
no.965)
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What is required of one who is to be
baptized?
Everyone who is to be baptized is required to make a profession of
faith. This is done personally in the case of an adult or by the
parents and by the Church in the case of infants. Also the godfather or
the godmother and the whole ecclesial community share the
responsibility for baptismal preparation (catechumenate) as well as for
the development and safeguarding of the faith and grace given at
baptism. (CCC 1253-1255)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.259)
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The
Twenty-first day of December
(Christmas
novena)
(December 21) Saint Peter Canisius, priest and doctor of the Church (1521-1597) Born in Holland, he joined the Society of Jesus. He worked in Germany and Austria fighting for many years by his writings and teachings to safeguard the Catholic faith. Of his numerous books the Catechism is most renowned. (Saints)
Song of Songs
2:8-14 or Zephaniah
3:14-18a; Psalm 33:2-3, 11-12,
20-21; Luke 1:39-45
During those days
Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of
Judah, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth.
When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the infant leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth, filled with the holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice
and said, "Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit
of your womb. And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my
Lord should come to me? For at the moment the sound of your greeting
reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed are you
who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be
fulfilled." (Luke 1,39-45)
Saint Jerome wrote
that ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ. Of course, he
was not meaning to say that the inability to read the Scriptures or a
lack of access to the reading of the Scriptures will necessarily bring
with it
ignorance of Christ. Such a position would exclude all illiterates and
very poor readers from
union with our Lord. No, he is speaking of ignorance of the content of
the Scriptures. This content can be brought to
people in a variety of ways, and the
faithful can appropriate this content by different routes, the most
privileged (but not the only) way being their actual reading of the
Scriptures. That said, if we are to take our cue from the Gospel
accounts,
the Christian life is impoverished if it has little or no place for
Mary. Our Gospel of today is a case in point. Mary is the main
protagonist of our passage and the love and veneration shown her by
Elizabeth her kinswoman surely reflects both the attitude of the early
Church and the inspired teaching of the Gospels. Mary brings to
Elizabeth and the unborn John the person of the “Lord”, as Elizabeth
calls him. We think of Christ’s common title of “Lord” in the
Scriptures and the early Church, and we remember Thomas at the end of
the Gospel of St John addressing the risen Jesus as “my Lord and my
God.” So Mary brings “the Lord” to Elizabeth and to John. The effect is
immediate. With the coming of the Lord in the womb of the Virgin
Mary there comes the gift of the Holy Spirit, and John leaps in the
womb of Elizabeth. Thus was fulfilled the prophecy of the archangel to
Zechariah that his great son would be filled with the Holy Spirit from
his mother’s womb. It happened with the coming of Mary. Elizabeth too
is “filled with the Holy Spirit”, and in the Holy Spirit she gives
inspired utterance to the blessedness of the mother of her Lord. (Luke 1,39-45)
Christ came to
redeem man from his sins and to send the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Before he ascended into heaven he instructed his disciples to await the
Promise in Jerusalem. Then at Pentecost the Spirit came to the Church.
The Holy Spirit is our sanctifier, and he is the gift of Jesus our
Redeemer. But our Redeemer came to us through the Virgin Mary, who
herself was the greatest beneficiary of the redemptive work of her Son.
So when she comes bearing Christ with her the Holy Spirit comes to us.
All this is encapsulated in our scene today of the Visitation of the
Virgin Mary to her kinswoman Elizabeth. When Mary came, the Holy Spirit
was conferred on both the unborn John and his mother, because in Mary
and with her came the Saviour. If Mary comes to us, or if we draw near
to her in loving faith, we shall be drawing near to Jesus, and this
will bring us the gift and grace of the Holy Spirit. Thus is devotion
to our Lady a most powerful help to holiness. It was through the
presence of Mary that Elizabeth and her unborn child received the gift
of the Holy Spirit, because it was through the presence of Mary that
Christ was present. Undoubtedly in the early Church this was the common
experience. Wherever Mary was, the risen Christ would have been present
in an altogether special way in grace and power. If anyone approached
the mother of Jesus in the early Church, the Holy Spirit would have
been especially active. This is not to say that the Holy Spirit would
have been active only when Mary was physically present, but our Gospel
today reminds us of the exceptional role of Mary in Christ being
brought to the world, and in the Holy Spirit being conferred on the
faithful. She is the one who is “full of grace”, the “mother of my
Lord”, and therefore the mother of the Church.
Let us every day welcome Mary into our
home, the home of our hearts, in the way Elizabeth welcomed her. Let us place
ourselves at the foot of the cross with John and Mary, hearing the words of our
Lord to her that his beloved disciple was now her own son, and his words to him
that Mary was now his own mother. He then took her to his own home. Let us take
her to our own home too. Let us ask her to dwell with us constantly, and in
Jesus to fill us with the grace of the Holy Spirit, guiding us so that we do not
make the Holy Spirit sad, as St Paul expresses it in one of his Letters. Let us
entrust ourselves to Mary our Mother and Model, asking her to form us in the
image of her divine Son.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Hark! My lover-here he comes,
springing across the mountains, leaping across the hills” (Songs of Songs
2: 8)
Blessed Guerric of Igny
(about 1080-1157), Cistercian abbot (Sermon for Advent, 1-2)
“Here comes the King; let us hasten to meet our Savior”. Salomon
had
rightly said: “Like cool water to one faint from thirst is good news
from a far country” (Pr 25,25). Yes, he who announces the coming of the
Saviour, the reconciliation of the world, the goods of the world who is
to come, is a messenger of glad tidings. “How beautiful upon the
mountains are the feet of him who brings glad tidings, Announcing
peace, bearing good news” (Is 52,7)...
Such messengers are like refreshing water and a salutary drink of
wisdom for the soul that is thirsty for God. Actually, the one who
announces the coming of the Lord, or other mysteries of his, gives us
to drink “water drawn with joy at the fountain of salvation” (Is 12,3).
Also, to the one who brings this good news...it seems to me that the
soul answers with the same words of Elisabeth, because she too had
received the same Spirit: “And how does this happen to me, that the
mother of my Lord should come to me? For at the moment the sound of
your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy”
(Lk 1,43-44).
To tell the truth, my brothers, we must go meet the Lord who comes,
rejoicing in the Holy Spirit...“my saviour and my God!” (Ps 42,5). In
your condescension you greet your servants and save them...not only
with words of peace, but by the loving kiss: you join yourself to our
flesh; you save us by dying on the cross. May our spirit then rejoice,
may we hasten to see our Savior who comes from afar, by acclaiming him
with these words: “Save me, Lord, that I may be saved” (Jer 17,14)
“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” (Ps 117,26).
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052.
USA.)
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It made me very happy to hear
what they said about that priest: "He preaches with all his soul...and
with his body too.''
(The Forge,
no.967)
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Is Baptism necessary for salvation?
Baptism is necessary for salvation for all those to whom the Gospel has
been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this
sacrament. (CCC 1257)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.261)
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The
Twenty-second day of December
(Christmas
novena)
(December 22) Today let us think of Saints Chaeremon and Ishyrion (Saints)
Scripture today:
1 Samuel
1:24-28; 1 Samuel 2:1, 4-5, 6-7, 8abcd; Luke
1:46-56
And Mary said: "My
soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my
saviour. For he has looked upon his
handmaid's lowliness; behold, from
now on will all ages call me blessed. The Mighty One has done great
things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is from age to age to
those who fear him. He has shown might with his arm, dispersed the
arrogant of mind and heart. He has thrown down the rulers from their
thrones but lifted up the lowly. The hungry he has filled with good
things; the rich he has sent away empty. He has helped Israel his
servant, remembering his mercy, according to his promise to our
fathers, to Abraham and to his descendants forever." Mary remained with
her about three months and then returned to her home. (Luke 1:46-56)
The word
“spirituality” is a very commonly used word now, and that is good
provided it indicates a genuine interest in living a religious life
involving the mind, heart and soul. By the word “spirituality” we
usually mean
a person’s image and view of God and how this view of God shapes the
person’s life. As we approach the celebration of Christmas, the
inspired authors provide us with immensely helpful details of
Jesus at his birth and in his infancy,
and of Mary and Joseph who received him into their lives. Particularly
important is the figure of the Virgin Mary. There is an aspect of
Mary’s uniquely profound spirituality which is often overlooked, and it
is revealed to us in her famous prayer, the Magnificat, which we have
before us in today’s Gospel, and which is so often on the lips of
Christ’s faithful. Consider Mary’s view of God as “the Mighty One” (or
"the Almighty") who
has
done such “great things” for her (Luke 1:46-56). I have remarked in
past Daily Thoughts on how holiness and mercy feature prominently in
Mary's description of God her saviour in the Magnificat. But let us
note also how she
looks on God as an active power, a warrior defending and lifting up the
lowly. He is
“the Mighty One.” He has “might with his arm” and has shown this might
by scattering the arrogant and toppling rulers from their thrones. He
fills the hungry and sends the rich packing and empty. One
wonders whether Mary had her religious imagination nourished by the
historical books of the Bible with their battles, defeats and victories
such as the
Maccabees.
That is to say, Mary has a vivid sense of
the almighty power of God and how this power is the refuge of the defenceless
against the proud and brutal. It is part and parcel of Mary’s holiness to be a
warrior with God on behalf of the lowly and the hungry. She is our help and
defender, just as the Holy Spirit is our defender and our advocate against the
Accuser. The famous devotional title of our Lady as “Help of Christians” is very
appropriate and scriptural, and it refers especially to Mary being our helper
when under great threat from enemies. She is our warrior Queen, and in her
fighting spirit she reflects our warrior Lord and God who, though he may seem to
delay, is our true stay. Mary is, then, a very active Mother. I once saw a
nature film of a household cat fighting off a poisonous reptile advancing to
take one of her kittens. The cat knew well that the reptile could destroy her
but she attacked and jumped back, attacked again and jumped back, dodging the
lunges of the snake. She finally prevailed and the reptile turned away. She had
saved her kittens. Fighting off and defending against what is of danger to one’s
dependents is a manifestation of love, and in the animal kingdom this instinct
is one of the manifestations of the love that is at the heart of the universe.
God has revealed himself as our warrior defender and Mary shows herself in her
Magnificat to be profoundly aware of this. She then is our warrior Queen, the
Help of Christians. Time and again in the history of the Church, the pastors and
faithful have turned to their Queen in prayer to defend them in the hour of
peril. She has proved time and again to be their help and stay.
Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us
sinners now and at the hour of our death! Let us entrust ourselves to her
keeping. Mary our gentle and most holy mother is a fighter, a warrior like her
God, whom she calls here the Mighty One, the Almighty, her saviour. She will
defend us in the hour of our need, be it now or at the hour of our death. Let us
remember those words of Saint Thomas More the great chancellor, lawyer and
scholar of England as he walked to the scaffold: “Though I lose my head, I’ll
come to no harm.” Let us entrust ourselves entirely to the keeping of Mary our
mother and queen.
(E.J.Tyler)
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"He has lifted up the lowly" (Luke
1:46-56) Pope
Benedict XVI (General Audience, 15 February 2006)
The Magnificat is a canticle that reveals the spirituality of the
biblical "anawim," namely, of those faithful who acknowledged
themselves 
"poor" not only because of their
detachment from all idolatry of wealth and power, but also because of
their profound humility of heart, free from the temptation to pride,
open to saving divine grace. The whole Magnificat… is characterized by
this "humility which indicates a situation of concrete humility and
poverty…
The soul of the prayer is, therefore, the celebration of divine grace
that has come into Mary's heart and life, making her the Mother of the
Lord…: praise, thanksgiving, grateful joy. But this personal testimony
is not solitary and private, merely individualistic, as the Virgin Mary
is conscious that she has a mission to fulfill for humanity and that
her life is framed in the history of salvation… With this praise to the
Lord, the Virgin gives voice to all creatures redeemed after her
"fiat," who in the figure of Jesus, born of the Virgin, find the mercy
of God… It is as if to Mary's voice were joined that of the community
of the faithful, which celebrates God's amazing decisions…
Evident is the "style" in which the Lord of history inspires his
conduct: He places himself on the side of the least. Often, his plan is
hidden under the opaque terrain of human vicissitudes, in which the
"proud," the "mighty" and the "rich" triumph. However, in the end, his
secret strength is destined to manifest who God's real favorites are:
the "faithful" to his Word, "the humble," "the hungry," "his servant
Israel," namely, the community of the People of God that, as Mary, is
constituted by those who are "poor," pure and simple of heart.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Let this be your prayer,
apostolic soul: Lord, may I know how to lean on people and get them all
to burn like fires of Love, which will then become the driving force of
all our undertakings.
(The Forge,
no.968)
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Is it possible to be saved without Baptism?
Since Christ died for the salvation of all, those can be saved without
Baptism who die for the faith (Baptism of blood). Catechumens and all
those who, even without knowing Christ and the Church, still (under the
impulse of grace) sincerely seek God and strive to do his will can also
be saved without Baptism (Baptism of desire). The Church in her liturgy
entrusts children who die without Baptism to the mercy of God. (CCC
1258-1261, 1281-1283)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.262)
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The
Twenty-third day of December
(Christmas
novena)
(December 23) Saint
John of Kenty, priest. Born in Kenty, in the
diocese of Cracow in 1390. He became a priest and for many years taught
in the University of Cracow and then was parish priest of Olkusz.
Besides being an outstanding professor of the Catholic Faith, he
excelled in personal holiness and in charity to his neighbour, so that
he was a true example to his colleagues and to his students. He died in
1473. (Saints)
Scripture
today: Malachi 3:1-4,
23-24; Psalm 25: 4-5ab, 8-9, 10 and 14;
Luke 1: 57-66
When the time arrived
for Elizabeth to have her child she gave birth to a son. Her neighbours
and relatives heard that the Lord had
shown his great mercy toward her,
and they rejoiced with her. When they came on the eighth day to
circumcise the child, they were going to call him Zechariah after his
father, but his mother said in reply, "No. He will be called John." But
they answered her, "There is no one among your relatives who has this
name." So they made signs, asking his father what he wished him to be
called. He asked for a tablet and wrote, "John is his name," and all
were amazed. Immediately his mouth was opened, his tongue freed, and he
spoke blessing God. Then fear came upon all their neighbours, and all
these matters were discussed throughout the hill country of Judea. All
who heard these things took them to heart, saying, "What, then, will
this child be?" For surely the hand of the Lord was with him.
(Luke
1: 57-66)
For many years
during the past century there was the theological and philosophical fad
that God is dead. God was out of the equation. It was
thought that he made no difference, and that one could easily live as
if he did not exist. I remember watching a television debate nearly
forty years ago and a Christian participant said that he would believe
in the Devil only if the Devil would show himself
visibly. That was to say that the only real test
of reality was an empirical test. Years ago I met a deacon in Bolivia. He was
said to be one of the leading poets of his country, and he showed me a small
book of his poems. It was entitled “The Silence of God”, and God’s “silence” -
his seeming absence in terms of concrete action - was a principal theme of the
work. There is no doubt that because the things of God are not physically
tangible modern man has a problem with religious faith. I remember years ago
speaking to a person who told me that she had a
real difficulty with the whole idea of consecrated celibacy
because what she wanted was someone she could see and hear and touch.
Yes indeed, that is the difficulty if one has a weak faith in the
realities that are unseen. God is unseen, as is the risen Christ, as
are the angels and the saints, but that does not mean that these
heavenly realities are any the less real or active. The unseen God is
immensely active, and all we have to do is look around us and observe
the vast world in which we live. This universe that is our home is the
object of God’s constant imminent presence and creative action.
This divine action
is what we observe in today’s Gospel passage (Luke 1: 57-66). God is acting
silently, hiddenly and yet powerfully. He is preparing for the eventual
appearance of John the Precursor, and in our passage he makes his
presence
greatly felt. The naming of the boy arrives and both Elizabeth and her
silent husband Zechariah signal that his name is to be John. At that
point Zechariah’s “tongue is freed and he spoke blessing God.” The
people strongly sense that God is at work and “fear came upon all their
neighbours and these matters were discussed throughout the hill country
of Judea.” The hand of the Lord was seen to be present with the child,
and they
wondered what his future course would be. God was sensed
to be present and active, though of course unseen. So then, we are
reminded that
behind the ordinary course of everyday life, so filled with the
commonplace routine of daily service, there is a far, far greater
reality at work. God is present and active in our life, in the life of
every other person, in the life of our society and community, and in
the life of the world. He is pursuing his redemptive and sanctifying
plans, and if due to our
sins things go
wrong in our life and in human history he, as it were, starts again
like the potter. God is the master craftsman and he has the power to
achieve his
aims. Zechariah did not believe the word of the angel, but God’s
promise was fulfilled. Years later there would be so little cooperation
with the work of
our Lord himself, so much persecution, but his work of redemption
was fulfilled.
There is so much sin and failure in our life, but if we
trust and
always begin again, God will attain his ends. Let us be filled
with a sense of the silent, hidden, but almighty providence of God. The
hand of the Lord is with us. We
do not see him at work, but working he is. “My Father goes on working,”
our Lord once replied to his accusers, “and so I go on working.” He
brings all things together for the benefit of those who love him, St
Paul writes, and especially does he bring together those things that
appear to be inimical to
our best interests. God will see us through and achieve his plan, just
as he achieved his plan as narrated in our Gospel today.
(E.J.Tyler)
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"John is his name" (Luke 1: 57-66)
Pope John Paul II
[Homily (Kyiv, 24 June 2001)]
"The
Lord called me from the womb, from the body of my mother he named my
name" (Is 49:1). Today we celebrate the birth of Saint John the
Baptist… Today we can make our own these words. God knew and loved us
even before our eyes could contemplate the marvels of creation. At
birth all men and women receive a human name. But even before that,
each one has a divine name: the name by which God the Father knows and
loves them from eternity and for eternity. This is true for everyone,
with the exception of none. No one is nameless in God’s sight! All have
equal value in his eyes: all are different, yet all are equal, and all
are called to be sons and daughters in the Son.
"His name is John" (Lk 1:63). Before his astonished kinsmen, Zechariah
confirms that this is the name of his son, writing it on a tablet. God
himself, through his angel, had given that name, which in Hebrew means
"God is benevolent". God is benevolent to human beings: he wants them
to live; he wants them to be saved. God is benevolent to his people: he
wants to make of them a blessing for all the nations of the earth. God
is benevolent to humanity: he guides its pilgrim way towards the land
where peace and justice reign. All this is contained in that name: John!
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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We
Catholics have to go through life being apostles, with God's light and
God's salt. We should have no fear, and we should be quite natural; but
with so deep an interior life and such close union with Our Lord that
we may shine out, preserving ourselves from corruption and from
darkness, and spread around us the fruits of serenity and the
effectiveness of Christian doctrine.
(The Forge,
no.969)
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What
are the effects of Baptism?
Baptism takes away original sin, all
personal sins and all punishment due to sin. It makes the baptized
person a participant in the divine life of the Trinity through
sanctifying grace, the grace of justification which incorporates one
into Christ and into his Church. It gives one a share in the priesthood
of Christ and provides the basis for communion with all Christians. It
bestows the theological virtues and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. A
baptized person belongs forever to Christ. He is marked with the
indelible seal of Christ (character).
(CCC 1262-1274, 1279-1280)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.263)
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Fourth Sunday of
Advent C
(December 24) Today let us think of Saints Adam and Eve, Saint Adele
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Micah
5:1-4a; Psalm 80: 2-3, 15-16,
18-19; Hebrews
10:5-10; Luke 1:39-45
During those days
Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of
Judah, where she
entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth.
When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the infant leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth, filled with the holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice
and said, "Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit
of your womb. And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my
Lord should come to me? For at the moment the sound of your greeting
reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed are you
who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be
fulfilled." (Luke 1:39-45)
On this
last Sunday of Advent so near to our celebration of the coming of the
Redeemer, the Church invites us to contemplate Mary our mother and our
model. Our Gospel today places us in the scene of Mary visiting her
kinswoman Elizabeth. Elizabeth is preparing for her
son who will be the Precursor of the
Messiah, and Mary is preparing for her Son who is the Messiah himself.
Each child has been given his name from heaven. The unborn Redeemer is
the soul of our Gospel scene and the source of all the blessings
extolled there, but Mary is the one in our passage whom we are invited
especially to contemplate. It is she who arrives and greets Elizabeth,
occasioning a tremendous experience for both the unborn John who
“leaped” in
his mother’s womb and for his mother Elizabeth who was “filled with the
Holy Spirit.” (Luke 1:39-45) It is Mary whom
Elizabeth, moved by the Holy Spirit, praises so highly for her dignity
as mother of the Lord and her perfect faith in the word of God. Let
us then contemplate Mary, the grandest of all God’s creatures.
The marvelous thing about the people of Israel was that God dwelt
with them as his own chosen people. He was their God and they were his
people. They
knew him and he dwelt with them. While they were in the wilderness on
journey to the promised land, God moved with them as a pillar of cloud.
He was God with them. We remember how the prophet Isaiah predicted
the coming of a child who would be Emmanuel, God with them. In Mary
this is fulfilled. Before our Redeemer was born God had in hidden
fashion built himself a worthy and perfect abode. This abode was Mary.
In this she is the embodiment of Israel, the perfect daughter of the
chosen race, the one who represents all that God intended his people to
be as his dwelling place on earth. She is abode of God and carries the
Child who is both God and man. She is God’s temple and a pointer to the
indwelling of the Holy Trinity in the Church and in each of us who are
baptized and in the state of grace. In Mary we contemplate God’s living
home, his holy shrine, the ark of him who is the covenant, and in this
she is the beginning and the model
of the Church and of each one of us. We ought aspire every day to be a
worthy dwelling place of God the Holy Trinity. Our vocation is to be a
tabernacle of God. Let this be our prayer, a prayer we direct
constantly to Mary our mother and model, the one who is God’s perfect
tabernacle.
As well as
being the dwelling place of God the Son made man, Mary is the Temple of
the Holy Spirit. At the annunciation the angel told her that the Holy
Spirit would come upon her and by his power the holy Child would be
conceived. By the power of the Holy Spirit she herself had been
preserved from
original sin from the instant of her conception, and by his grace and
her cooperation she had been constantly kept from the slightest stain
of sin. Mary was full of grace and the Holy Spirit, and for this reason
she was addressed with such honour by the archangel Gabriel on the
occasion of the annunciation. She was all-holy and did nothing but grow
in an astounding holiness all her life. But all this was hidden in an
ordinary life, and manifested in everyday charity of which her visit
to Elizabeth is a typical example. Her sinless life was crowned by her
assumption body and soul into heaven at the end of her mortal life.
This sinlessness was the work of the Holy Spirit who constantly filled
her. As the temple of the Holy Spirit and bearing within her the Son of
God she was the instrument
whereby on this occasion (Luke 1:39-45) the Spirit of God was
conferred on the unborn John and on his mother Elizabeth. Let us
approach her to receive this same gift of the Spirit, and let us look
on her as the one most filled with the Spirit who is our sanctifier. In
the life of the Spirit she is our mother and model.
With Christmas nearly with us, let us
look on Mary the mother of the Lord. She is the dwelling place of God on earth,
and the perfect fulfilment of both Israel and the Church which her divine Son
would form. Where Mary is, there is Jesus too. In this she is our model because
where we are Jesus ought be too, for we are members of his body. Where Mary is,
there the Holy Spirit is present and active too. In this she is our model
because where we are the Holy Spirit ought be active too. Mary is a phenomenon
of unending fascination, beauty and love because, though entirely a creature
like us, she is utterly without sin. As the mother of God the Son made man, on
her has been conferred a dignity beyond compare. She is the masterpiece of God’s
redemptive work and yet one who lived out her beautiful life in the ordinary
humdrum round that is common to all of us. That ordinary life is well
represented in our Gospel scene today. Let us celebrate Christmas in Mary and
with Mary, entrusting ourselves to her keeping, asking her to make us like her
Son whose perfect image she is.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further Reading: Catechism of the
Catholic Church 721-726, Compendium of the
Catechism 142.
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“Who am I that the mother of my Lord
should come to me?” (Luke 1:39-45)
Saint John of Damascus
(around 675-749), Monk, Theologian, Doctor of the Church
(1st Sermon on the
Dormition)
“Blest are you among women and blest is
the fruit of your womb…” For all generations will call you blest, as
you said (Lk 1:48). The daughters of Jerusalem, that is to say, the
Church, saw you and proclaimed your happiness… For you are the royal
throne near which the angels stood contemplating their Master and
Creator, who was seated on it (Dan 7:9). You have become the spiritual
Eden, more sacred and more divine than the former one. The earthly Adam
lived in the former; in you lives the Lord who came from heaven (1 Cor
15:47). Noah’s ark was a prefiguration of you; it saved the seed of the
second creation, for you gave birth to Christ, the world’s salvation,
who submerged sin and pacified the floods.
It was you whom the burning bush described ahead of time, whom the
tables depicted, on which God wrote (Ex 31:18), which the ark of the
covenant told about; it is you whom the golden urn, the candelabra… and
Aaron’s staff that blossomed (Num 17:23) obviously prefigured… I almost
left out Jacob’s ladder. Just as Jacob saw heaven united with the earth
by means of the two ends of the ladder, and the angels descending and
ascending on it, and as the one who is really the strong and invincible
one engaged in a symbolic struggle with him, thus you yourself became
the mediator and ladder by which God came down to us and took upon
himself the weakness of our substance, embracing it and closely uniting
it to him.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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The sower went
out to sow, to scatter the
seed at all the crossroads of this earth. What a blessed task we have.
We have the job of making sure that in all the circumstances of time
and place the word of God takes root, springs up and bears fruit.
(The Forge,
no.970)
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What is the meaning of the Christian
name received at Baptism?
The name is important because God knows each of us by name, that is, in
our uniqueness as persons. In Baptism a Christian receives his or her
own name in the Church. It should preferably be the name of a saint who
might offer the baptized a model of sanctity and an assurance of his or
her intercession before God. (CCC 2156-2159, 2167)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.264)
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The Nativity of
the Lord (Christmas)
(December 25)
Jesus was born in a humble stable, into a poor family. Simple shepherds
were the first witnesses to this event. In this poverty heaven's glory
was made manifest. The Church never tires of singing the glory of this
night:
and the earth offers a cave to the Inaccessible.
The angels and shepherds praise him
and the magi advance with the star,
For you are born for us,
Little Child, God eternal!
(Kontakion of Romanos the Melodist)
To become a child in relation to God is the condition for entering the kingdom. For this, we must humble ourselves and become little. Even more: to become "children of God" we must be "born from above" or "born of God". Only when Christ is formed in us will the mystery of Christmas be fulfilled in us. Christmas is the mystery of this "marvellous exchange":
(LH, 1 January, Antiphon I of Evening Prayer)
When the angels
went away from them to heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let
us go, then, to Bethlehem to see this thing that has taken place, which
the Lord has made known to us.” So they went in haste and found Mary
and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. When they saw this,
they made known the message that had been told them about this child.
All who heard it were amazed by what had been told them by the
shepherds. And Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her
heart. Then the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all
they had heard and seen, just as it had been told to them. (Luke
2:15-20) (Gospel for Dawn Mass)When we think of the virtual universality of belief in God or at least in higher powers, it is a daring step indeed for someone to declare himself an out-and-out atheist, rejecting the possibility of all non-material reality. From ancient times to our own, man has been convinced of the reality of the divine, however varied and defective has been his
image
and conception of
it. But now, an intriguing feature of this phenomenon of religion is
that, at its most sophisticated, man’s conception of God is of One who
is
hidden. There are countless signs of God available for the one looking
for him,
but God is not manifest to us and so he can be ignored. God is
certainly not evident, and a
person who denies the very existence of God has taken a tragic step,
but it is not a blatantly self-contradictory one. He can make a case
for his position however unconvincing it is for mankind generally. A
serious problem appears when an entire culture becomes imbued with
agnostic and atheistic ideas because such a culture can lodge in
peoples’ minds assumptions that incline them to discount religion and
be suspicious of faith in God. That is the problem of our
contemporary public culture. I was recently talking to a young man and
he said to me that while he can see and touch and feel the
things he deals with every day, he cannot see and touch God. So he has
difficulty believing in him, especially inasmuch as he knows
others who do not believe in him. So this atheism seems to him to be
plausible. Now while it is not plausible and is indeed tragic, it is
not absurd. While God is a reality and is very
knowable he is nevertheless hidden. Modern man’s agnosticism and atheism is seen to be a tremendous anomaly when we set it against the history of civilizations and cultures. There are abundant reasons supporting an unshakeable belief in God and it is for this reason that belief in God and religion generally is so universal. For all sorts of reasons mankind is characteristically is quite convinced of the divine, however poorly he might imagine and conceive it. The most obvious sign of the divine is creation. Our world speaks of God. It speaks of his immensity, his pure power, his intelligence, his utter necessity, his perfection. If we look out on the stars, if we consider the earth and its immense fruitfulness, if we consider the panorama contained in the tiniest atom, all this signals the reality of a God we cannot adequately imagine. But let us, once again, note that the great being we know to be our Creator is hidden. We do not see or hear or touch him. How is this to be interpreted? If all we had was the world and the universe to go on, we could not tell. We would not know why God is so hidden. He can be ignored, but to our peril. He can be forgotten, flouted, disobeyed. He is ever so close, nearer to us than we are to ourselves, but he is hidden. We are constantly under his gaze, but he is hidden. Indeed, I tend to think that if all we had to go on was the world around us not many of us would come to a knowledge of the true God. So much points to him but nevertheless he is hidden.
God has not only given such striking signs of himself in creation. He has entered our history to redeem mankind from sin and to give him a share in his own divine life. He made himself known to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to Moses and the prophets, and through them to his chosen people Israel. He called them to himself to be his people and established a special covenant with them. They would be his people and he their God and he would dwell with them. But again, he was somewhat hidden. He made his presence manifest, but only rarely was it very manifest and those occasions were meant to be held in the memory of his people constantly, enabling them to interpret his strong but hidden action. He did not call to himself a famous and prominent people such as the Greeks or the Romans, rather he took to himself a backwater people, a nobody on the world stage. That is to say, he chose to be somewhat hidden. And now the high point of his saving action among men arrived when he became man. The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we read the story of his birth in the Gospel. But again he is hidden from the gaze of the world. He is born in a stable, away from the limelight, unknown to the great. He has come among us as a man, he the great God did not cling to his glory as God but became as men are and humbler still, even to death on a cross. Our God of glory is a hidden God and he remains hidden still in his most precious presence among us, his presence in the Eucharist. All this is to say that in the plan of God union with him will depend not on sight but on an active faith. Faith is the gift we have been given, and we must live according to it.
We are called to be like Mary and Joseph and the shepherds who recognized in the Child the great, the infinite, and yet the hidden God (Luke 2:15-20). Jesus our Lord invited us to come to him and to learn from him for he is meek and humble of heart. That is what God is like. He is meek and humble, and is content to give us abundant signs of his reality and his powerful action if we have the faith to see them, but he remains hidden. The humble Child in the unknown manger encapsulates this pattern of God’s dealings with us. He awaits our loving adoration and will not impose himself. Let us recognize in the Christ-child our God who has come to save us. Let us promise to give him our faith and never to take it back, though he remain hidden from sight. If we do this, he will come to us and in his own way show himself to us, making each of us his dwelling place both now and hereafter.
(E.J.Tyler)
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The hidden treasure St Bernard (1091-1153), Cistercian monk and doctor of the Church
(4th Sermon for Christmas Midnight Mass, § 6)
Today the wonders abound and the riches multiply, for the treasure is open: the one who gives birth to is mother and virgin, and he who is born is at once God and man...But this treasure has to be hidden in a field (Mt 13:44): may the wedding of the mother
conceal her virginal
conception from the eyes of the world, and may the tears of the newborn
baby keep this painless childbirth secret from the view of men. Hide, O
Mary, yes, hide the splendour of the rising sun! (Lk 1:78). Lay your
child into the manger; wrap him in swaddling clothes for these are all
our wealth. The swaddling clothes of the Saviour are more precious than
crimson; his crib is more glorious than the golden thrones of kings;
Christ's poverty surpasses in value all other fortunes and treasures.(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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"Lord God, we praise you for creating man, and still more for restoring him in Christ"
St Gregory of Nazianzus (330-390), bishop, doctor of the Church
(Sermon 38, on the Nativity of Christ)
Christ is born, glorify him. Christ from heaven, go out to meet him. Christ on earth; exalt him: "Sing to the Lord, all the earth. Let the heavens be glad and the earth rejoice !" (Ps 96:1.11), for him who is of heaven and now of earth. Christ has made his dwelling among the human race; rejoice with trembling and with joy: with trembling because of sin, with joy because of our hope… Today the darkness is over and light is made anew; as in Egypt once plunged into darkness, today a pillar of fire enlightens Israel. O people that sat in the darkness of ignorance, come and see the great light of full knowledge for "the old things are passed away, behold all things are become new". (2 Co 5:17) The letter gives way, the Spirit comes to the front. (Rm 7:6) The shadows flee away, the Truth comes in upon them. (Col 2:17)
The one who gives us our being today also gives us well-being, or rather restores us by his incarnation, for by wickedness we had fallen from wellbeing… Such is this great feast: it is this which we are celebrating today, the Coming of God to humankind, that we might go forth, or rather that we might go back to God— so that putting off the old man, we might put on the New (Col 3:9); and that as we died in Adam, so we might live in Christ (1 Co 15:22)… Therefore let us keep this Feast, not after the manner of a heathen festival, but after a godly sort; not after the way of the world, but in a fashion above the world; not as our own but as belonging to him who is ours, our Master's; not as of weakness, but of healing; not as of the old creation, but of our re-creation.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Dominus dabit benignitatem suam et terra nostra dabit fructum suum — the Lord will grant his blessing and the earth will bring forth its fruit. That blessing is indeed the source of all good fruit, the necessary climate for producing saints, men and women of God, for this world of ours. Dominus dabit benignitatem — the Lord will grant his blessing. Notice, however, that he goes on to point out that he awaits our fruit — yours and mine. Nor is this crop to be meagre or blighted because we have not really given ourselves completely. He expects abundant fruit since he fills us with his blessings.
(The Forge, no.971)
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What place does Confirmation have in the divine plan of salvation?
In the Old Testament the prophets announced that the Spirit of the Lord would rest on the awaited Messiah and on the entire messianic people. The whole life and mission of Jesus were carried out in total communion with the Holy Spirit. The apostles received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and proclaimed “the great works of God” (Acts 2:11). They gave the gift of the same Spirit to the newly baptized by the laying on of hands. Down through the centuries, the Church has continued to live by the Spirit and to impart him to her children. (CCC 1285-1288, 1315)
(Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.265)
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Feast of Saint Stephen, the risen Christ's first martyr
Lord, today we celebrate the entrance of St
Stephen into eternal glory. He died praying for those who killed him.
Help us to imitate his goodness and love our enemies.
(December 26) St Stephen is
one of the first deacons chosen by the early church in Acts of the
Apostles. Upon the death of Jesus, Stephen began to work hard to spread
what was then called The Way. He preached the teachings of Jesus and
participated in the conversion of Jews and Gentiles. The Acts of the
Apostles tells the
story of how Stephen was tried by the Sanhedrin for blasphemy and was
then stoned to death by an infuriated mob encouraged by Saul of Tarsus,
the future Saint Paul. He died praying for those who killed him :
"Lord, do not hold this sin against them". St Stephen's name is simply
derived from the Greek Stephanos, meaning "crown", which translated
into Aramaic as Kelil. Saint Stephen is traditionally invested with a
crown of martyrdom for Christ and is often depicted in art with three
stones and the martyrs' palm. In Eastern Christian iconography he is
shown as a young beardless man with a tonsure, wearing deacon's
vestments, and often holding a miniature church building and censer.
(Saints)
Scripture
today: Acts 6:8-10;
7:54-59; Psalm 31:3cd-4, 6 and 8ab, 16bc and
17; Matthew 10:17-22
But beware of people,
for they will hand you over to courts and scourge you in their
synagogues, and you will be led before governors and kings for my sake
as a witness before them and the pagans. When they hand you over, do
not worry about how you are to speak or what you are to say. You will
be given at that moment what you are to say. For it will not be you who
speak but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. Brother will
hand over brother to death, and the father his child; children will
rise up against parents and have them put to death. You will be hated
by all because of my name, but whoever endures to the end will be saved.
(Matthew
10:17-22)
Yesterday we
celebrated what may be called the feast of the Incarnation: God the Son
becoming man, the Word being made flesh and dwelling among us as one of
us. We shall live in the glow of this event for many days over the
season of Christmastide, contemplating with great love what one world
religion
mistakenly regards as a blasphemy. But today, the very next day after
the Nativity of our Lord, the
Church propels us into
the martyrdom of Saint Stephen, the risen Christ’s first martyr. This
liturgical circumstance is a great reminder of a fundamental feature of
Christian discipleship. Being a Christian is not just a matter of
coming to know Jesus and contemplating his love and grandeur from
his birth in the stable to his resurrection. It also includes as of its
essence
bearing witness to him before others. The Church has formally taught
that being apostolic and missionary is essential to the Christian life,
such that one cannot hope to attain Christian holiness nor to be living
the Catholic Faith truly well if there is little of an apostolic
dimension in one’s life. We must contemplate and grow in love for
Jesus, and we must also strive to bring the knowledge and the love of
him to
others. All great Christians live an apostolic life. Saint Therese of
the Child Jesus lived her humble life as an obscure Carmelite in
France. But her prayers and penances were very much directed to the
missionary work of the Church and now she is a patroness of the
Church’s foreign missions. Today, the day after our celebration of the
birth of our Lord at Bethlehem, we celebrate St Stephen’s bearing
witness to Jesus with his life. Let us draw inspiration from his
apostolic example.
Our first reading
today (Acts 6:8-10;
7:54-59) shows Stephen in his witness to Jesus
being led by the Holy Spirit. Our Gospel today (Matthew
10:17-22)
reminds us of our Lord's
teaching that in bearing witness to him in the midst of difficulty we
ought count on the powerful aid of the Holy Spirit. Christ came so that
we might have life and
have it in abundance. This abundant life is the life of God, which is
to say the
Holy Spirit. Our Lord came to do away with the power of sin and open
the heart of man to the gift of the Spirit of the Father and the Son.
This Spirit, the Third Person of the most holy Trinity, is our
sanctifier and our evangelizer. He came upon the Church at Pentecost to
sanctify the Church and to empower her to bear effective witness to the
Lord even to the point of shedding blood. Stephen is a shining instance
of the Church being led by the Holy Spirit to evangelize. A great early
Father of the
Church wrote that the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church, and
we see that in the life of Stephen. His blood was surely the seed from
which sprouted the ardent faith and missionary life of Paul, who
witnessed and "entirely approved of the killing." This fruit of
Stephen's witness was the work of the Holy
Spirit. In our Gospel our Lord refers to the action of the Spirit
during persecution. He says that “when they hand you over, do not worry
about how you are to speak or what you are to say. You will be given at
that moment what you are to say. For it will not be you who speak but
the Spirit of your Father speaking through you”
(Matthew
10:17-22). We must remember this
in whatever ambient we walk day by day, be it in our family, in our
workplace, among our friends, in our parish.
Whatever be the difficulty in bearing witness to Jesus - and Jesus does
not ask that our success be obvious - the Holy Spirit will be there
working in us. So we are not to worry ‘for it will not be you who speak
but
the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.” We are now in the
special season of Christmas. Let us think of Saint Stephen, the risen
Christ’s first martyr. He reminds us to use our life to fulfil our
special vocation of coming to know and love Jesus profoundly and to
bear
witness to him generously, no matter what the cost. In both coming to
know
Christ and in bearing witness to him we have the powerful help of the
Holy Spirit. Let us then entrust ourselves to the Spirit of God making
use of all the means which he gives us: daily prayer and spiritual
reading, the devout reception of the Sacraments, docility to the Church
our mother, and a constant desire to be apostolic.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Stephen and Paul: crowned
together by the lowly King of glory
St Fulgentius of Ruspe
(467-532), Bishop in North Africa (Sermon 3, 1-3,
5-6)
Yesterday we celebrated the birth
in time of our eternal King. Today we celebrate the triumphant
suffering of his soldier… Our king, despite his exalted majesty, came
in humility for our sake; yet he did not come empty-handed. He brought
his soldiers a great gift that not only enriched them but also made
them unconquerable in battle, for it was the gift of love, which was to
bring men to share in his divinity…
And so the love that brought
Christ from heaven to earth raised Stephen from earth to heaven… Love
was Stephen’s weapon by which he gained every battle, and so won the
crown signified by his name. His love of God kept him from yielding to
the ferocious mob; his love for his neighbour made him pray for those
who were stoning him. Love inspired him to reprove those who erred, to
make them amend; love led him to pray for those who stoned him, to save
them from punishment. Strengthened by the power of his love, he
overcame the raging cruelty of Saul and won his persecutor on earth as
his companion in heaven. In his holy and tireless love he longed to
gain by prayer those whom he could not convert by admonition.
Now at last, Paul rejoices with Stephen, with Stephen he delights in
the glory of Christ, with Stephen he exalts, with Stephen he reigns.
Stephen went first, slain by the stones thrown by Paul, but Paul
followed after, helped by the prayer of Stephen.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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You saw your vocation like one
of those pods that contain the seeds. The moment to expand will come
and then the seeds will spread out and take root all at once.
(The Forge,
no.972)
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Why is this
sacrament called Chrismation or Confirmation?
It is called Chrismation (in the Eastern Churches: Anointing with holy
myron or chrism) because the essential rite of the sacrament is
anointing with chrism. It is called Confirmation because it confirms
and strengthens baptismal grace.
(CCC 1289)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.266)
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Feast of Saint John,
Apostle and evangelist
(December 27) Saint John, Apostle
and evangelist The author of the Fourth Gospel, the
Apocalypse, and three Epistles, John was son of Zebedee, and one of the
three (with Peter and James) who were closest to the Lord, present at
the Transfiguration, the Agony in the Garden, the raising of the
daughter of Jairus. He is the 'beloved disciple' referred to the
gospels. (Saints)
Scripture today: 1 John
1:1-4; Psalm 97:1-2, 5-6, 11-12;
John 20:1a and 2-8
On the first day of the
week, Mary Magdalene ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other
disciple whom Jesus loved, and told
them, “They have taken the Lord
from the tomb, and we do not know where they put him.” So Peter and the
other disciple went out and came to the tomb. They both ran, but the
other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first; he
bent down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in. When
Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial
cloths there, and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the
burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place. Then the other
disciple also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and
he saw and believed. (John
20:1a and 2-8)
Christ had died and
was now buried. News came from Mary Magdalen that “they have taken the
Lord
from the tomb, and we do not know where they put him.” Immediately
Peter and John went running to the tomb, with John running faster and
arriving at the tomb first. He “saw the burial cloths there, but did
not go in.” What does this immediate haste speak to us of? It speaks
to us of the ardent love of John and Peter for the person of Jesus. They
truly loved him, despite their weaknesses. Today we think of John who
went on
to live a very long life of profound love and service of Jesus, and
became a major contributor to the New Testament writings with his
unique Gospel, with his Letters and, it is presumed, in being the
author of the
book of Revelation. Our Gospel scene today (John 20:1a and
2-8) tells us of the
enthusiastic love John had for Jesus. He had been one of
our Lord’s very first disciples, having being directed on to our Lord
by John
the Baptist.
He was the “beloved
disciple.” He
had a special intimacy with our Lord, shown in his leaning on our Lord
at the Last Supper and asking directly who was to betray him. He had
been given other signs of special favour: he was one of the three who
had
witnessed our Lord’s raising of the daughter of Jairus from the dead.
He had witnessed our Lord’s transfiguration and our Lord’s agony in the
garden together with his arrest. He had followed our Lord to
Calvary and was at the foot of the Cross together with Mary during our
Lord’s last agony. He heard our Lord give him Mary to be his mother,
and from that moment he had taken Mary to his own home. When we think
of
John we think of the special intimacy
which God wishes to have with us.
We are made to
love. The history of literature abounds with genres extolling human
love.
What is marriage but the answer God has implanted in human nature to
this desire to love and to be loved? A husband is called to love his
wife and the wife her husband, and in their love for one another they
are to
love their children. But let us notice that however much they love one
another they sense that there is a greater and more absolute love
beyond. Married love and indeed any human love is not the final
term of the human heart. There is a higher and more definitive love in
and beyond the persons we love in this life. It is this higher Love
which summons each of us to a complete and utter gift of our heart. We
are made and commanded to love this One with all our heart, all our
soul, all our mind and all our strength. Who is this absolute One? He
is Jesus.
Every person is called by God to discover in faith the love of Jesus.
Having found it, a person will then love others - his spouse and family
and all others - in Jesus. When we think of John the evangelist running
to the tomb we think of one who loved Jesus as the final and absolute
object of his heart and soul. Jesus occupied the place in his life
which God should occupy, and for this very good reason that the one God
is Jesus, just as the one God is the Father and the Holy Spirit too.
When
we think of John the evangelist going on to be a "pillar" of the infant
Church, as St Paul referred to him, and then on to his long life of
contemplation and apostolic service of the person of Jesus, we think of
a life of love for the one absolute Master and final term of mankind's
yearnings.
No other love is higher or more absolute or more deserving than that of
Jesus. Man’s vocation is to find, know, love and serve Jesus, and to
love all others in him. His search for love and meaning attains its end
when his
mind and heart rests in Jesus.
Today let us
contemplate the example of John the evangelist’s life of intimacy with
Jesus. There is no more ultimate stage for the human spirit than to
love
Jesus. This final term for which we have been created is not just an
idea or a philosophy or a vast project.
It is very particular
Person who lived once and lives now still. Everyone is called to make
Jesus the absolute object of his or her life. That is what “the beloved
disciple” did, and it is his vocation which is one of the great
exemplars for all of us who are in Christ Jesus by our baptism. The
life of John the evangelist stands for the Christian vocation which is
to belong to Jesus and to live in intimate friendship with him, and to
bear witness to this Love before others.
(E.J.Tyler)
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"What was from the beginning...what we
have seen and heard we proclaim in turn to you" (1John
1:1-3)
John Scot Erigena (?-870),
Irish Benedictine (Homily on the Prologue
of Saint John, §2)
Peter and John both run to the tomb. Christ's tomb is the Holy
Scripture, in which the most hidden mysteries of his divinity and of
his humanity are defended - if I am allowed to say, -by a wall of rock.
But John runs faster than Peter, for the power of contemplation, which
has been totally purified, penetrates the secrets of the divine works
with a more piercing and sharper eye than the power of action, that
still needs to be purified.
Nevertheless Peter is the first to enter; John follows. Both run and
both enter. Here Peter is the image of faith and John represents
intelligence...Faith then is the first one who must enter the tomb,
that is the image of the Holy Scripture, and intelligence must follow...
Peter, who also represents the practice of virtues, sees with the power
of faith and of action the Son of God enclosed, in a marvelous and
ineffable way, in the limits of flesh. John who represents the highest
contemplation of truth, admires the Word of God, perfect in himself and
unlimited in his origin, meaning in his Father. Peter, led by the
divine revelation, looks at once at the eternal things and at the
things of this world, united in Christ. John contemplates and announces
the eternity of the Word to make it known to the faithful.
This is why I say that John is a spiritual eagle who sees God; I call
him the theologian. He is above the whole creation, visible and
invisible; he goes beyond all intellectual faculties and he enters
deified in God who shares with him his own divine life.
(Selected
by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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You are to be yeast within the
great multitudes that make up humanity — remember we are interested in
all souls. In this way, with God's grace and your own correspondence to
it, you will act as leaven throughout the world, adding quality,
flavour and volume to the bread of Christ so that it can nourish the
souls of others.
(The Forge,
no.973)
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What is the essential rite of Confirmation?
The essential rite of Confirmation is the
anointing with Sacred Chrism (oil mixed with balsam and consecrated by
the bishop), which is done by the laying on of the hand of the minister
who pronounces the sacramental words proper to the rite. In the West
this anointing is done on the forehead of the baptized with the words,
“Be sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit”. In the Eastern Churches
of the Byzantine rite this anointing is also done on other parts of the
body with the words, “The seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit”.
(CCC 1290-1301, 1318, 1320-1321)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.267)
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Feast of the
Holy Innocents, martyrs
(December 28) The
Holy Innocents, martyrs.
The Church celebrates the memory of the children under the age of two
of the neighbourhood of Bethlehem who were put to death by Herod the
Great, who was seeking to kill Jesus. These innocent victims bore
witness to Christ in a world which would not receive him.
(Saints)
They follow the spotless Lamb,
and proclaim for ever :
Glory to you, Lord.
May our lives bear witness to the faith we profess with our lips.
Today let us also think of Saint Anthony the Hermit (Saints)
Scripture
today: 1 John
1:5—2:2; Psalm 124:2-3, 4-5,
7cd-8; Matthew 2:13-18
When the magi had departed, behold, the
angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his
mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. Herod is going
to search for the child to destroy him.” Joseph rose and took the child
and his mother by night and departed for Egypt. He stayed there until
the death of Herod, that what the Lord had said through the prophet
might be fulfilled, Out of Egypt I called my son. When Herod realized
that he had been deceived by the magi, he became furious. He ordered
the massacre of all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity two years
old and under, in accordance with the time he had ascertained from the
magi. Then was fulfilled what had been said through Jeremiah the
prophet: A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamentation;
Rachel weeping for her children, and she would
not be consoled, since they were no more. (Matthew
2:13-18)
When the Church
in her liturgical year celebrates the life and death of a martyr, we
think
of one who gave his or her life for Christ and in witness to him. Of
course, the
circumstances involved in this witness can vary immensely. The one who
is martyred may have no time to think of Christ at the point of death.
But he dies because of the hatred of others for Christ and because of his dedicated
personal
connection with Jesus. But let us consider the case of our
infant martyrs of today,
the Holy Innocents put to death by Herod the Great because he
considered that one of them could be the infant Messiah. The Church
celebrates each of them as a martyr. Therefore they are in heaven and
occupy a place of special honour in the presence of God and in the
veneration of the Church. Now, none of their names, families or
personal stories are
known. They were too young to realize the meaning of what was happening
to them, and because of the speed of events probably they scarcely even
knew that death was upon them.
They knew nothing of the Messiah in their midst. Their families would
not have known
the Messiah either, and the entire tragedy would have had no meaning
for them. The sorrow that engulfed them would be scarcely imaginable:
“Then was
fulfilled what had been said through Jeremiah the prophet: A voice was
heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamentation; Rachel weeping for her
children, and she would not be consoled, since they were no more”
(Matthew
2:13-18).
The evil they suffered was a mystery to them: why were they
slaughtered? they wondered. Their connection with the Christ was known
only to the obscure fleeing Holy Family and to Herod, for the Magi had
returned to the East. They died because of Christ, though they had no
personal acquaintance with him nor any idea that they had this
circumstancial connection with him.
Does this not throw some consoling
light on the mystery of evil? There are such terrible tragedies which strike
great numbers of people in the course of mankind’s history. These tragedies
are often man-made and often purely natural. There are plagues, there are
natural disasters, there are shocking acts of terror and massacre. As time
rolls on great numbers of good lives are cut off without any justifying
reason. Consider the millions of unborn lives that are snuffed out in the
constant practice of abortion. Is there any meaning in this? The Holy
Innocents died both in Christ and because of him, and their deaths occurred
simply because Herod chose to do away with them in the hope of killing the
Messiah. We know that their lives mysteriously bore witness to and served
the divine plan of redemption because the Church celebrates them as martyrs.
So in the plan of God souls may die for Christ without their or anyone else
at the time realizing it - at least that was the case for the Holy
Innocents. There is another great lesson these Innocents teach us, and it is
this, that the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church. Those countless
good souls who suffer helplessly and without blame may well be the seed
of so much good. Our Lord referred to the grain of wheat dying and bearing
much fruit. The same pattern may be present in the life and death of
countless souls who suffer so much evil, and who - like the Holy Innocents
and their families - see no meaning in it yet obscurely entrust themselves
to God according to their lights. All this is to say that the Feast of the
Holy Innocents throws meaning on the suffering and evil borne by the
innocent. Their unnecessary suffering and lost lives are not meaningless.
Innocent suffering is in some way part of God's providence and redemptive
plan, just as the innocent children of Bethlehem died because of their
unknowing and unchosen connection with God’s redemptive plan. Innocent
suffering is not a meaningless tragedy. It is sanctifying and redemptive and
somehow furthers the plans of God. God will draw good from the evil he
permits and those who serve his plan will be rewarded.
The rock of all
reality is the will of God and what God chooses to permit. From the
world’s
point of view, the saints are a little mad. They value suffering, and
value it highly. Why? They value it because the most innocent Man of
all time suffered
indescribably in his obedience to the will of the Father and his holy
and obedient suffering redeemed the world.
Right at the beginning of his life there occurred an event which sheds
the same light on innocent suffering, and we celebrate that event
today. It served the redemption: these infants
died while Christ escaped from their midst in order to live and suffer
for the redemption of the world. We have the good
fortune to be able to
live in the light of Christ’s message that by uniting ourselves with
Christ in his suffering we shall rise with him in life. If the seed
dies it bears fruit. Let us bring
this light on the mystery of human pain to our suffering world.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Martyrs incapable of confessing the
name of your Son, and yet glorified by his birth”
(Postcommunion)
Cardinal John Henry Newman
(1801-1890), priest, founder of English Oratorians, theologian
(Sermon 6: “The Mind of Little Children”; PPS II, 6)
It is surely right to celebrate the death
of the Holy Innocents: for it
was a blessed one. To be brought near to Christ, and to suffer for
Christ, is surely an unspeakable privilege; to suffer anyhow, even
unconsciously. The little children whom He took up in his arms, were
not conscious of His loving condescension; but was it no privilege when
He blessed them? Surely this massacre had in it the nature of a
Sacrament; it was a pledge of the love of the Son of God towards those
who were included in it. All who came near Him, more or less suffered
by approaching Him, just as if earthly pain and trouble went out of
Him, as some precious virtue for the good of their souls; —and these
infants in the number.
Surely His very presence was a Sacrament; every motion, look, and word
of His conveying grace to those who would receive it: and much more was
fellowship with Him. And hence in ancient times such barbarous murders
or Martyrdoms were considered as a kind of baptism, a baptism of blood,
with a sacramental charm in it, which stood in the place of the
appointed Laver of regeneration. Let us then take these little children
as in some sense Martyrs, and see what instruction we may gain from the
pattern of their innocence.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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The enemies of
Jesus — and even some who
call themselves his friends — come decked out in the armour of human
knowledge and wielding the sword of power. They laugh at us Christians, just as the Philistine
laughed at David and despised him. In our own days too, the Goliath of
hatred, the Goliath of falsehood,
of dominating power, of secularism and indifferentism, will also come
crashing to the ground. And then, once the giant of those false
ideologies has been struck down by the apparently feeble weapons of the
Christian spirit — prayer, expiation and action — we shall strip him of
his armour of erroneous doctrines, equipping our fellow men instead
with true knowledge, with Christian culture and the Christian way of
life.
(The Forge,
no.974)
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What is the effect of Confirmation?
The effect of Confirmation is a special outpouring of the Holy Spirit
like that of Pentecost. This outpouring impresses on the soul an
indelible character and produces a growth in the grace of Baptism. It
roots the recipient more deeply in divine sonship, binds him more
firmly to Christ and to the Church and reinvigorates the gifts of the
Holy Spirit in his soul. It gives a special strength to witness to the
Christian faith. (CCC 1302-1305, 1316-1317)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.268)
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The
Fifth Day in the Octave of Christmas
(December 29) St
Thomas a Becket, bishop and martyr (1118-1170). Born in London.
After studying in Paris he first became chancellor to the king and then
in 1162 was chosen Archbishop of Canterbury. He changed from being a
“patron of play-actors and a follower of hounds”, to being “a shepherd
of souls”. He threw himself into the duties of his new office,
defending the rights of the Church against Henry II. This prompted t he
king to exile him to France for six years. After returning to his
homeland, he endured many trials and was murdered by agents of the
king.
(Saints)
Scripture today: 1 John
2:3-11; Psalm 96:1-2a, 2b-3, 5b-6;
Luke 2:22-35
When the days were
completed for their purification according to the law of Moses, they
took him up to Jerusalem to present him to the
Lord, just as it is
written in the law of the Lord, "Every male that opens the womb shall
be consecrated to the Lord," and to offer the sacrifice of "a pair of
turtledoves or two young pigeons," in accordance with the dictate in
the law of the Lord. Now there was a
man in Jerusalem whose name was
Simeon. This man was righteous and devout, awaiting the consolation of
Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him
by the Holy Spirit that he should not see death before he had seen the
Messiah of the Lord. He came in the Spirit into the temple; and when
the parents brought in the child Jesus to perform the custom of the law
in regard to him, he took him into his arms and blessed God, saying:
Now, Master, you may let your servant go in peace, according to your
word, for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you prepared in sight
of all the peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and glory
for your people Israel." The child's father and mother were amazed at
what was said about him; and Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his
mother, "Behold, this child is destined for the fall and rise of many
in Israel, and to be a sign that will be contradicted (and you yourself
a sword will pierce) so that the thoughts of many hearts may be
revealed." (Luke 2:22-35)
There are many
things we could contemplate in our Gospel scene today, but I suggest
that we notice especially the presence and the activity of the Holy
Spirit. Mary and Joseph are taking the Child for presentation to God in
the Temple of Jerusalem. No creatures on
earth are so filled with the Holy Spirit
as they, and all this in the midst of the most ordinary of lives. Then
Luke
turns our gaze to Simeon. He is a wonderful specimen of the Old
Testament at its best, for he is “righteous and devout, awaiting the
consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.” He had been
granted this added favour that “it had been revealed to him by the Holy
Spirit that he should not see death before he had seen the Messiah of
the Lord.” (Luke 2:22-35) Moreover, he was now led
to utter a prophetic word to Mary and Joseph - particularly Mary, it
seems - about the mission of the Child. Gabriel had announced to Mary
that the Holy Spirit would come upon her empowering her to be the
virgin mother of the long-awaited Messiah. The Child would be great, he
would be the Son of God, and his kingdom would be eternal. Joseph had
been told things about the Child from an angel in a dream. But now,
through the words of Simeon, the Holy Spirit tells Mary and Joseph
more. Their Child will bring salvation and light to both Israel and to
the Gentiles, and ominously, that many in Israel would rise and fall
because of him. He would be a sign of rejection and contradiction and
hearts would stand revealed due to him. Simeon’s words pointed to grave
suffering for the Child which would tear at the heart of his mother
too.
St Luke tells us
that “the child's father and mother were amazed at what was said about
him”, implying perhaps that it was indeed a new insight for them. It
was given to them by the Holy Spirit through the words of Simeon who
was moved
to act prophetically at this moment. The mission of the Child would not
be an easy, all-conquering one but one involving great suffering and
rejection. It hints at the Isaian prophecies of
the Suffering Servant which may have been the object of Simeon’s long
contemplation. The point here, though, is that we see in this brief but
very significant event the activity of the Holy Spirit. The Father has
sent the Son into the world, and the Holy Spirit is already active
enlightening those who are part and parcel of the work of the Son.
Eventually the Father and the Son would together send the Holy Spirit
to move the entire Church, to enlighten and empower her to bring the
Messiah to all the peoples. Our scene today is an omen of what is to
come. So then, let us think especially of the presence and activity of
the Spirit of God during the presentation of the Child Jesus in the
Temple. Let us ask the Holy Spirit that he come into our lives as he
came into the life of Simeon so beautifully. Simeon was an embodiment
of the spirituality of the Old Testament and pointed to the life of the
Spirit
which would be imparted to Christ’s faithful much more generally.
Christ’s faithful would have holiness as one of its principal marks
precisely because of the gift of the Holy Spirit. That holiness would
be a prophetic holiness announcing the good tidings of the Redeemer to
the world.
Let us resolve to be lovingly devoted
to the Holy Spirit. Let us ask him to enlighten us as he enlightened Simeon,
and Mary and Joseph. Let us ask him for the grace to place Christ at the
centre of our lives, just as he was the centre of the life of Simeon, Mary
and Joseph. Let us strive to be fit instruments of the Spirit in the divine
work of the world’s redemption.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Now, Master, you may let your servant
go in peace, according to your word” (Luke 2:22-35)
Comment by
Origen (185-253),
priest and theologian (Homily 15 on St Luke)
Simeon knew that no one could release a man from the prison of the body
with hope of life to come, except the one whom he enfolded in his arms.
Hence, he also says to him, “Now you dismiss your servant, Lord, in
peace” (Lk 8,44). For, as long as I did not hold Christ, as long as my
arms did not enfold him, I was imprisoned, and unable to escape from my
bounds”. But this is true not only of Simeon, but of the whole human
race. Anyone who departs from this world, anyone who is released from
prison and the house of those in chains, to go forth and reign, should
take Jesus in his hands. He should enfold him with his arms, and fully
grasp him in his bosom. Then he will be able to go in joy where he
longs to go...
“For, as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God”
(Rom 8,14). Therefore the Holy Spirit led Simeon into the temple. If
you wish to hold Jesus, and to embrace him with your hands, and to be
made worthy of leaving prison, you too must struggle with every effort
to possess the guiding Spirit and come to God's temple. See, you stand
now in the temple of the Lord Jesus – that is, in his Church. This is
the temple “built from living stones” (1Pt 2,5)...
If you come “to the temple in the Spirit”, you will find the child
Jesus. You will lift him up in your arms and say, “Now you dismiss your
servant, Lord, in peace, according to your word” (Lk 2,29). At the same
time, notice that “peace” has been added to the dismissal and sending
forth. For he does not say, “I wish to be dismissed”, but to be
dismissed with the addition of “in peace”... Who is the one who dies
“in peace” if not he who has the peace of God, which surpasses every
perception and guards the heart of him who possesses it? (Phil 4,7).
Who is the one who departs “in peace” from this world if not he who
understands that “God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself”
(2Cor 5,19)?
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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In the campaigns against the
Church there
are many organizations which conspire together, sometimes going hand in
hand with those who call themselves good. They influence people through
newspapers, leaflets, satire, calumnies and spoken propaganda. They
then take people where they wish — to hell itself. They try to turn
people into an amorphous mass, as if they had no soul. They are a
pitiful sight. However, since people do have souls, we have to snatch
them out of the claws of these organizations of evil and place them at
the service of God.
(The Forge,
no.975)
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Who can receive this sacrament?
Only those already baptized can and should receive this sacrament which
can be received only once. To receive Confirmation efficaciously the
candidate must be in the state of grace. (CCC 1306-1311, 1319)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.269)
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The
Sixth Day in the Octave of Christmas
(December 30) Today let us think of Saint Anysius, and Jesus, Mary and Joseph
(Saints)
Scripture today:
1 John
2:12-17; Psalm 96:7-8a, 8b-9, 10; Luke 2:36-40
There was also a
prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She
was advanced in years, having lived seven years with her husband after
her marriage, and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She never
left the temple, but worshiped night and day with fasting and prayer.
And coming forward at that very time, she gave thanks to God and spoke
about the child to all who were awaiting the redemption of Jerusalem.
When they had fulfilled all the prescriptions of the law of the Lord,
they returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. The child grew
and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favour of God was upon
him.
(Luke
2:36-40)
Yesterday St Luke
presented us with the figure of Simeon who uttered prophetic words
about the Child. At that moment he acted as a prophet, moved by the
Holy
Spirit. In our Gospel passage today our gaze is drawn to to another
prophet - the prophetess Anna. So let us contemplate her. In
denoting Anna as “a prophetess” St Luke
would seem to be implying that often in the course of her long life and
especially during her days in the Temple she spoke under the inspiration of
the Holy Spirit. When people heard her what they were hearing were at times
the words of God. Her life and her figure is a very beautiful one, holy and
constant. Saint Luke’s information about her may have came from our Lady.
Perhaps our Lady had known Anna since childhood, and - who knows! - her
information about Anna's life may have come from her parents and
grandparents. Whatever be the source of information, St Luke’s account gives
exact years and definite information about her early and later life well
before our Lady herself had been born. Anna had been profoundly given to God
and the Holy Spirit led her constantly, often making her his prophetic
mouthpiece. And now, as with Simeon, the climax of her life arrived and she
beheld the Messiah. She gave thanks to God and spoke of him to all who like
her were awaiting what God had promised. In this she is a little like John
the Baptist years later. In this circle of faithful people we seem to have
before us a picture of what God expected of man for the years and centuries
to come, and which was all too often lacking. The Word came among his own
and very frequently his own did not receive him.
Having pointed to
Anna, St Luke invites us to contemplate the growing Child. The Holy
Family returns to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth and there the
Child grows. We are told that he became strong and was filled with
wisdom. Though hidden in the obscurity of this backwater town, a great
Man was emerging. He was strong and his strength would show itself
finally in his Passion and death when he would bear the sins of all
mankind. He was strong in mind, heart and soul, and undoubtedly
physically strong too. There was, indeed, no weakness in him and if
strength is characteristically a note of true manhood, the Child was
becoming the man par excellence. In the best sense of the word, he was
invincible. Furthermore, there have been strong men in history
but this strength has all too often not been accompanied with wisdom.
Not so Jesus of Nazareth. In his case we have a man of great strength
who was
“filled with wisdom.” He made no mistakes, his judgment was unerring,
and there was nothing he could not have done had he so chosen. He was a
perfect man, and “the favour of God was upon him”
(Luke
2:36-40). If
Mary his mother was a creature beyond compare in the sight of God, and
Joseph her husband a soul worthy of such a wife, what could we say of
the Man growing in their midst? He was simply a wonder, and yet ever so
humble and buried in a quiet and industrious obscurity. We cannot
adequately appreciate the circumstance of such a Holy
Family living in such an ordinary setting. There is no fanfare for
thirty years, none whatever. Anna the prophetess seems to have enjoyed
a certain though limited religious fame. Not so the three members of
the Holy Family. Our Lady is never referred to as a prophetess, nor is
Joseph called a prophet. Yet in holiness these two exceeded all of
them,
not to speak of their incomparable Son.
All of this surely speaks of the
powerful action of God at work in the ordinary life. Anna the prophetess was
a widow who spent her days and nights in the Temple. Her holiness was known
to some extent, but the round of her daily life was in no way spectacular.
With Jesus, Mary and Joseph this was even more so. Yet their holiness was
so, so very great. Let us learn from this the grandeur of the ordinary life
and how God can do his work no matter how limited seem our prospects.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“She talked about the child to all who
looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem” (Luke 2:36-40)
St Bernard
(1091-1153), Cistercian monk and doctor of the Church
(2nd Homily on the Song
of Songs, §8)
O Flower of Jesse's stem, you who are a signal for all nations (Is
11,10), how many kings and prophets have wished to see you but did not
see you (Lk 10,24). Blest is the one who in his old age was filled with
the divine gift of your sight! He trembled with desire of seeing the
sign; “he saw it and was glad” (Jn 8,56). Having received the kiss of
peace, he left this world in peace, not without having first proclaimed
that Jesus was born to be a sign that will be contradicted. And this is
what in fact happened: as soon as it appeared, the sign of peace was
contradicted – by those however who hate peace. For he is peace for
those on whom his favor rests (Lk 2,14), but for the ill-intentioned he
is a stumbling block (Lk 2, 34). When King Herod heard this, he was
greatly troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. The Lord came to what was
his own, "but his own people did not accept him” (Jn 1,11). Blessed are
the poor shepherds who, keeping the night watch, have been judged
worthy to see this sign!
At that time already, he was hidden from the wise and the learned, but
he revealed himself to the childlike (Mt 11,25). To the shepherds the
angel said: “This will be a sign for you” (Lk 2,12). It is for you, the
humble and obedient, who do not boast your science, but who are on
watch studying God's law day and night (Ps 1,2). Here is your sign! The
one whom the angels had promised, the one who the people called for,
the one who the prophets had predicted; now God has made him and he
shows him to you...
So here is your sign - sign of what? Of pardon, of grace, of peace, of
an everlasting peace (Is 9,6). “Here is your sign: a baby wrapped in
swaddling clothes and laid in a manger”. Though God is in Him,
reconciling the world with him...It is God's kiss, the mediator between
God and the human race (1Tm 2,5), Jesus man and Christ, who lives and
reigns for ever and ever.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Quite a considerable proportion of the people who go to Church read bad
publications...
Calmly and with love of God we
need to pray and teach them sound doctrine so that they don't go on
reading that diabolical stuff, which they claim their families buy —
for they are ashamed of it — though perhaps it is they themselves who
do so.
(The Forge,
no.976)
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Who is the minister of Confirmation?
The original minister of Confirmation is the bishop. In this way the
link between the confirmed and the Church in her apostolic dimension is
made manifest. When a priest confers this sacrament, as ordinarily
happens in the East and in special cases in the West, the link with the
bishop and with the Church is expressed by the priest who is the
collaborator of the bishop and by the Sacred Chrism, consecrated by the
bishop himself. (CCC 1312-1314)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.270)
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The
Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph
Sunday within the Octave of Christmas
(December
31) The Holy
Family The home of Nazareth is the school where we begin
to understand the life of Jesus—the school of the Gospel. First, then,
a lesson of silence. May esteem for silence, that admirable and
indispensable condition of mind, revive in us... A lesson on family
life. May Nazareth teach us what family life is, its communion of love,
its austere and simple beauty, and its sacred and inviolable
character... A lesson of work. Nazareth, home of the Carpenter's Son,"
in you I would choose to understand and proclaim the severe and
redeeming law of human work. (— Paul VI at Nazareth, January 5, 1964)
The Holy Family models for us what family life should exemplify. It is
a school of virtue for both parents and children. There we find God,
and learn how to connect with God and with others. The family is where
love is freely given without self-interest. It is where we learn to
love, to pray and to practice the gift of charity. Pope John Paul II
has said, “The family, more than any other human reality, is the place
in which the person is loved for himself and in which he learns to live
the sincere gift of self” (Nov. 27, 2002). (Saints)
help us to live as the holy family,
united in respect and love.
Bring us to the joy and peace of your eternal home.
Amen.
Let us also think of Pope Saint Sylvester I (died about 335). He ruled the Church during the reign of Constantine when the Arian heresy and the Donatist schism had provoked great discord. He convoked the first Ecumenical Council of Nicaea. (Saints)
Scripture today:
(The Holy Family)
Sirach
3:2-7, 12-14 or
1 Samuel 1:20-22, 24-28;
Psalm
128:1-2, 3, 4-5 or
Psalm 84:2-3, 5-6, 9-10;
Colossians 3:12-21 or 3:12-17;
Luke 2:41-52
Each year Jesus’ parents
went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, and when he was twelve
years old, they went up according to festival custom. After they had
completed its days, as they were returning, the boy Jesus remained
behind in Jerusalem, but his parents
did not know it. Thinking that he
was in the caravan, they journeyed for a day and looked for him among
their relatives and acquaintances, but not finding him, they returned
to Jerusalem to look for him. After three days they found him in the
temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, listening to them and
asking them questions, and all who heard him were astounded at his
understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were
astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you done this to
us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety.”
And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know
that I must be in my Father’s house?’ But they did not understand what
he said to them. He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was
obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart.
And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and favour before God and man. (Luke 2:41-52)
From our earliest
years we are accustomed to the thought of the Holy Family of Jesus,
Mary and Joseph. The great God on whom our vast universe constantly depends was born
into this world and lived most of his life in an obscure family. All too
often we think about these years of the Holy Family at Nazareth only
briefly. An image comes fleetingly to our mind of Mary at her household
tasks, of Jesus and Joseph at work as carpenters, of the Holy Family with
friends, in the synagogue, or whatever. We do not give sufficient time to
think about these details. We ought watch our Lord in these Gospel scenes
and allow the realization dawn on us that here is God the Son talking,
listening, working, praying, and living constantly with Mary and Joseph.
How, then, are we to describe the life of the Holy Family? This is a very
important question because the life of the Holy Family is clearly the
paradigm in history for the life of families, communities and societies.
Peace
is man’s aspiration. Well, when we think of those many years of Jesus
living with Mary and Joseph in the hiddenness of Nazareth, we surely
think of peace. Let us imagine the evenings of peace in the Holy Family
at the end of the day’s work: think of the
peace that marked the
conversation between them. Think of the prayers they said together, and
the life of prayer lived by each. Consider their work together, Joseph
working with Jesus during the day, and Mary and Joseph and Jesus
working around the house at other times. Their lives would have been
lives of work, of some rest and recreation with one another, of prayer
in the home and in the synagogue, and all this would have been
characterized by a divine peace. The God of peace dwelt in their midst.
In our Gospel passage today we contemplate three days of anxiety for
Mary and Joseph as they searched for the Child who had been led by his
heavenly Father to remain behind in the Temple
(Luke
2:41-52).
The very astonishment of Mary and Joseph at the Child remaining in the
Temple implies that such an occurrence was altogether out of the
ordinary, and St Luke’s description of the years subsequent to that
event confirms our impression of the profound peace reigning in the
Holy Family. This peace of the holy trio at Nazareth, then, ought be a
principal source of inspiration for all of us as we begin the New Year.
Let us begin the New Year in their midst, thinking of how they lived
each year. Our Lord referred at times to his peace. For instance, at
the Last Supper our
Lord told his disciples, “Peace I leave to you, my own peace I give
you”. Let us remember the peace that radiated from him and which was
reciprocated every day within the Holy Family. Have we failed too often
in peace? Let us then take our cue from the Holy Family for the year
ahead.
Let us go
on to ask what the wellspring of this peace that reigned in the Holy
Family was. Its
source was the profound respect and love each had for the other. How
greatly would Mary and Joseph have loved and venerated the person of
Jesus! Conversely, we can scarcely imagine the love and the veneration
our Lord would have shown towards the person of his mother and his
foster-father. Their mutual respect is the greatest example in the
history of mankind
of respect for the human person, which is at the heart of peace among
men. The thought of the Holy Family reminds us that peace is
God’s gift but it is also a responsibility we must fulfill, a God-given
task we must work at in accord with God’s plan for the human person.
What God intends for man is inscribed in the law of his nature, and it
is expressed in the rules for action among persons which the properly
formed conscience stipulates. At root, peace among men will depend
on having an adequate and proper understanding of the human person and
a respect for the natural law. The Christian will find constant
inspiration for this in the thought of the profound understanding of
and
respect for the human person that distinguished the
Holy Family. How profoundly each member of that Family understood and
respected the person of
the other! So too, our understanding of the person, an understanding
nourished by a right conscience and by what God has revealed, will be
the source of peace with others in our life.
The new year is almost with us, and its
first day is celebrated by the Church as a world day of prayer for peace.
Let the thought of the Holy Family inspire us to have a high notion of and
respect for each human person, for it is this which is the foundation of
peace among men. Let us live out our lives guided by the law of God
inscribed in our human nature and revealed by Christ. The profound peace of
the Holy Family ought be our inspiration in all our involvement with others
in family, work, parish, society and in the world.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading:
Message of
Benedict XVI for World Day of Peace, January 1, 2007
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Defend the truth with charity
and firmness when the things of God are at stake. Practise holy
shamelessness in denouncing errors, even though at times they are no
more than insinuations; at other times they will be odious utterances
of the most blatant ignorance, and, normally, a sign of man's
frustration at not being able to endure the fruitfulness of the word of
God.
(The Forge,
no.977)
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What is the Eucharist?
The Eucharist is the very sacrifice of the Body and Blood of the Lord
Jesus which he instituted to perpetuate the sacrifice of the cross
throughout the ages until his return in glory. Thus he entrusted to his
Church this memorial of his death and Resurrection. It is a sign of
unity, a bond of charity, a paschal banquet, in which Christ is
consumed, the mind is filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory
is given to us. (CCC 1322-1323, 1409)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.271)
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