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With what authority is the priestly
ministry exercised?
Ordained priests in the
exercise of their sacred ministry speak and act
not on their own authority, nor even by mandate or delegation of the
community, but rather in the Person of Christ the Head and in the name
of the Church. Therefore, the ministerial priesthood differs
essentially and not just in degree from the priesthood common to all
the faithful for whose service Christ instituted it. (CCC 1547-1553,
1592)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.336)
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Tuesday
of the Second Week of Lent II
(March 6) Today let us think of
St. Colette (Saints) See
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Scripture today: Isaiah 1:10,
16-20; Psalm 50:8-9, 16bc-17, 21 and
23; Matthew 23:1-12
Jesus spoke to the
crowds and to his disciples, saying, “The scribes
and the Pharisees have taken their seat on the chair of Moses.
Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you, but do
not follow their example. For they preach but they do not practice.
They tie up heavy burdens hard to carry and lay them on people’s
shoulders, but they will not lift a finger to move them. All their
works are performed to be seen. They widen their phylacteries and
lengthen their tassels. They love places of honour at banquets, seats
of honour in synagogues, greetings in marketplaces, and the salutation
‘Rabbi.’ As for you, do not be called ‘Rabbi.’ You have but one
teacher, and you are all brothers. Call no one on earth your father;
you have but one Father in heaven. Do not be called ‘Master’; you have
but one master, the Christ. The greatest among you must be your
servant. Whoever exalts himself will be humbled; but whoever humbles
himself will be exalted.” (Matthew 23:1-12)
If a person
discovers Christ as a real person, makes him the object of
his love and chooses to follow him closely, the question for that
person will then be, what is it to follow Jesus Christ closely?
Numerous answers have been and are given to this question, and it is
indeed a multi-faceted matter. However, there is one path that is
essential if one is to follow the path that Christ takes. It is the
path of humility. It is always helpful to
turn to the teaching of the
saints, especially those who succeeded in helping many people take the
path of following
Christ closely. One such master was St Ignatius
Loyola, the great Spanish founder of the Jesuits in the sixteenth
century, and the author of the famous little manual called The
Spiritual Exercises. These Exercises take
the one doing them
through a
series of considerations which invite him to choose to love Christ and
to follow his example. One such consideration is called the "Meditation
on Two Standards" (no.136), the first being the "Standard of Satan" and
the second being the "Standard of Christ". In presenting the "Standard
of
Satan", Ignatius describes how Satan instructs his demons to tempt men
“to covet riches (as Satan himself is accustomed to do in most cases)
that they may the more easily attain the empty honours of this world,
and then come to overweening pride. The first step, then, will be
riches, the second honour, the third pride. From these three steps the
evil one leads to all other vices.” So in Ignatius’s system of
spiritual thought, pride is the heart of our problem. Turning to the
Standard of Christ, he describes Christ inviting his followers to
poverty, then the deprivation of honours, then humility. That is his
path and it is the opposite of the path of Satan. Now, are we prepared
to follow him along this path?
In our Gospel
passage today our Lord directs both the crowds and his
disciples not to be influenced by the example of the scribes and the
Pharisees, while respecting, however, their due religious authority. So
the crowds and the disciples had before them on the one hand the
example of Christ and on the other hand the example of the scribes and
the Pharisees. We are told elsewhere in the Gospel that they loved
money and that at least on one occasion they laughed at our Lord’s
teaching on money. In our passage today, our Lord describes them by
saying that “they preach but they do not practice. They tie up heavy
burdens hard to carry and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they will
not lift a finger to move them.” They loved the power, then, that came
with their religious standing and authority. Our Lord continues, “All
their works are performed to be seen. They widen their phylacteries and
lengthen their tassels. They love places of honour at banquets, seats
of honour in synagogues, greetings in marketplaces, and the salutation
‘Rabbi’.” (Matthew 23:1-12)
So their wealth, their
position, their power and influence
over others were all feeding their pride and desire for exaltation.
Anyone who aspires to live the Christian life in union with the living
Jesus must recognize the profound tendency within us to follow this
path so diametrically opposed to that of Jesus. That is our tendency,
and we need to be very much alive to it because it is very easy for us
to put it out of our own sight, let alone out of the sight of others.
Our ingrained fallen propensity is towards riches leading to
self-exaltation whereas the path Jesus trod was that of poverty and
humiliation. Satan’s heart is utterly filled with pride, while the
heart of Christ is profoundly humble. We have a choice to make.
Let us make that
choice between Christ and Satan, between Christ and
all those influences which are contrary to the path of Christ. Our Lord
finishes his words today by this warning: “Whoever exalts himself will
be humbled; but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”
(Matthew
23:1-12)
Satan who exalted himself has been and will be humbled. Christ
who humbled himself has been and is exalted. Let us take our place with
Christ and live out this decision in the options of everyday life.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Whoever
humbles himself shall be exalted.” (Matthew 23:1-12)
Saint [Padre] Pio de
Pietrelcina (1887-1968), Capuchin (T. 54)
Do not cease to do acts of
humility and love towards God and human
beings. For God speaks to the person who keeps his heart humble before
him, and God enriches him with his gifts.
If God has the sufferings of
his Son in store for you and wants to let
you touch with your finger your own weakness, it is better to make an
act of humility than to lose courage. Let a prayer of surrender and
hope rise up to God when your fragility causes you to fall, and thank
the Lord for all the graces with which he enriches you.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Desire ardently that, when that
unavoidable good sister of yours,
death, comes to render you the service of taking you to God, she will
not find you attached to anything on this earth!
(The Forge,
no.1042)
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What is the plan of
God regarding man and woman?
God who is love and who created
man and woman for love has called them
to love. By creating man and woman he called them to an intimate
communion of life and of love in marriage: “So that they are no longer
two, but one flesh” (Matthew 19:6). God said to them in blessing “Be
fruitful and multiply” (Genesis 1:28). (CCC 1601-1605)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.337)
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Wednesday
of the Second Week of Lent II
(March 7) Saint
Perpetua and Saint Felicity, martyrs. Perpetua was a young
mother of Carthaginian nobility and Felicity was a slave girl. These
two martyrs were thrown to the wild beasts in the persecution of
Septimus Severus in the year 203 at Carthage. Perpetua was still
nursing her newly born baby boy. There is an impressive narrative of
their martyrdom in existence, partially written by the saints
themselves and partly by a contemporary writer. (Saints)See also this
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of Saints for Any Particular Day
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Scripture today:
Jeremiah
18:18-20; Psalm 31:5-6, 14,
15-16; Matthew 20:17-28
As Jesus was going
up to Jerusalem, he took the Twelve disciples aside by themselves, and
said to them on the way, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the
Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes,
and they will condemn him to death, and hand him over to the Gentiles
to be mocked and scourged and crucified, and he will be raised on the
third day.” Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee approached Jesus
with her sons and did him homage, wishing to ask him for something. He
said to her, “What do you wish?” She answered him, “Command that these
two sons of mine sit, one at your right and the other at your left, in
your kingdom.” Jesus said in reply, “You do not know what you are
asking. Can you drink the chalice that I am going to drink?” They said
to him, “We can.” He replied, “My chalice you will indeed drink, but to
sit at my right and at my left, this is not mine to give but is for
those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.” When the ten heard
this, they became indignant at the two brothers. But Jesus summoned
them and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over
them, and the great ones make their authority over them felt. But it
shall not be so among you. Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you
shall be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you shall be
your slave. Just so, the Son of Man did not come to be served but to
serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:17-28)
There were various
stages in Christ’s initiation of his disciples into discipleship. The
first stage was, of course, the very call which he addressed to them.
We remember how even before his public ministry began, John the Baptist
pointed our Lord out to two of his own disciples and they followed him.
He turned and asked them, “What do you want? They answered “Rabbi,”
— which means Teacher —
“where do you live?” “Come and see” he
replied; so they went and saw where he lived, and stayed with him the
rest of that day. He invited them to come with him. Later he called
them more formally and definitively. At various times in his public
ministry our Lord took his disciples along further stages of this call,
and indeed many left him. When, for instance, our Lord announced
the doctrine of the Eucharist (John 6), many of his disciples left him
saying that what he was teaching was too much. In our Gospel passage
today, our Lord this time takes them a further and most significant
step along this path. He tells them that he will be handed over to his
enemies, condemned to death, and then delivered into the power of the
Romans who will mock, scourge and crucify him, and then he will rise on
the third day (Matthew 20:17-28). Their expectations of
a great and holy Messiah of temporal glory were not to be fulfilled.
His path was to be that of the Suffering Servant of Yahweh. But his
disciples had real difficulty in comprehending all this and despite our
Lord’s clarity they still clung to their preconceptions of him and of
what it meant to be his disciples. For instance, having told them
of the suffering that awaited him, he was approached by the mother of
the sons of Zebedee with her sons James and John. He said to her, “What
do you wish?” She answered him, “Command that these two sons of mine
sit, one at your right and the other at your left, in your kingdom.”
So then, what was
it to be a disciple of Jesus Christ? Being a true follower of Jesus
Christ means especially accompanying him as he carries the Cross and as
he is nailed upon it. The crunch point comes when in the little duties
of everyday life, in the daily work of bearing witness to Jesus, and in
the occasional crisis moments, we are called to stand with Jesus when
real suffering comes. James and John in our Gospel text today became
(together with Simon Peter) pillars of the infant Church — such is St
Paul’s testimony. Our Lord’s response to their request to share in his
glory at his right and at his left was as follows: “You do not know
what you are asking. Can you drink the chalice that I am going to
drink?” They said to him, “We can.” He replied, “My chalice you will
indeed drink, but to sit at my right and at my left, this is not mine
to give but is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.”
(Matthew
20:17-28)
Glory is the fruit of discipleship, but the path to that glory is the
one that leads through Calvary in company with Jesus. Christ’s chalice
has to be drunk. Our Lord himself prayed to the Father while in the
Garden that he would take this cup from him, but such was not the will
of the Father. Mysteriously, obedient suffering is the path to untold
good. We must pray to be able to realize at true depth that the Christ
of glory is the Suffering Servant of Yahwah. Christ blazed this trail
and by reaching its term he saved the world and empowered his disciples
to reach the term of suffering in him. Christ predicts in our passage
today that James and John would do this, and at the end of the Gospel
of St John he predicts that Simon Peter will too. Let us pray for the
grace to be counted among those who stay the course with Christ and who
persevere when difficulties come. We cannot count on our own strength
but must pray for the gift of perseverance and then trust in Christ
when the Cross that most certainly will come does come.
We who are baptized
are called by God to be disciples of Christ. The question is whether we
are prepared to advance to true maturity in the following of him. If
this is our desire, our Gospel passage today is one of those we must
take especially to heart because in it our Lord lays down the ultimate
test. Are we prepared to drink the cup he would drink? Let us answer
that by the grace of God we can, and then pray that Christ’s response
will be that we shall indeed drink it, just as James and John did.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Command
that these two sons of mine sit,
one at your right and the other at your left, in your kingdom”
(Matthew
20:17-28)
Saint Basil of Seleucid
(?-about 468), bishop (Sermon 24)
Would you like to know the
faith of this woman? Well, just think at the
time she does such a request...The cross was ready, the Passion
immanent, the crowd of enemies already in place. The Teacher talks
about his death and the disciples are worried: even before the Passion,
they tremble at the simple mention of it; what they hear startles them,
they are overcome by agitation and fear. At this same moment, this
mother leaves the group of the apostles and comes ask for the kingdom
and a throne for her sons.
Would you like to know the
faith of this woman? Well, just think at the
time she does such a request...The cross was ready, the Passion
immanent, the crowd of enemies already in place. The Teacher talks
about his death and the disciples are worried: even before the Passion,
they tremble at the simple mention of it; what they hear startles them,
they are overcome by agitation and fear. At this same moment, this
mother leaves the group of the apostles and comes ask for the kingdom
and a throne for her sons.
What did you say, woman? You
hear him talking about the cross and you
ask for a throne? It is a matter of Passion and you wish for the
Kingdom? Leave then the disciples with all their fears and worries of
danger. But how could you think of asking such dignity? What– of what
has been said or done- makes you think about the kingdom?
I see – she says – the Passion,
but I foresee the Resurrection. I see
the cross set up and I contemplate the open skies. I see the nails, but
I also see the throne...I heard the Lord himself say: “you shall
likewise take your places on twelve thrones” (Mt 19,28). I see the
future with the eyes of faith.
This woman anticipates – it
seems to me – the words of the good
criminal. He, on the cross, made this prayer: “Jesus, remember me when
you come into your kingdom" (Lk 23,42). Before the cross, she made the
kingdom an object of her supplication...What a desire plunged in the
vision of the future! What time hid, faith revealed.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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If you
long to have life — eternal life and happiness —you must not leave the
barque of Holy Mother Church. Look, if you go beyond the confines of
the ship you end up in the waves of the sea, heading for death, drowned
in the ocean. You cease to be with Christ. You lose that friendship of
his which you freely chose when you realised that it was he who was
offering it to you.
(The Forge,
no.1043)
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For what ends has God instituted Matrimony?
The marital union of man and
woman, which is founded and endowed with
its own proper laws by the Creator, is by its very nature ordered to
the communion and good of the couple and to the generation and
education of children. According to the original divine plan this
conjugal union is indissoluble, as Jesus Christ affirmed: “What God has
joined together, let no man put asunder” (Mark 10:9). (CCC 1659-1660)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.338)
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Thursday
of the Second Week of Lent II
(March 8) St
John of God, religious (1495-1550). He heeded the word of God
when he was already forty years old and from then on lived at the
service of the sick in Granada (Spain). Before that, he was
successively a farmer, a soldier, and merchant. He founded his Order of
Brothers Hospitallers of Saint John of God, devoting themselves to the
infirm in body and soul. (Saints)
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Scripture
today: Jeremiah
17:5-10; Psalm 1:1-2, 3, 4 and
6; Luke 16:19-31
Jesus said to the
Pharisees: “There was a rich man who dressed in purple garments and
fine linen and dined sumptuously each day. And lying at his door was a
poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who would gladly have eaten
his fill of the scraps that fell from the rich man’s table. Dogs even
used to come and lick his sores. When the poor man died, he was carried
away by angels to the bosom of Abraham. The rich man also died and was
buried, and from the netherworld, where he was in torment, he raised
his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. And he cried
out, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me. Send Lazarus to dip the tip of
his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am suffering torment in
these flames.’ Abraham replied, ‘My child, remember that you received
what was good during your lifetime while Lazarus likewise received what
was bad; but now he is comforted here, whereas you are tormented.
Moreover, between us and you a great chasm is established to prevent
anyone from crossing who might wish to go from our side to yours or
from your side to ours.’ He said, ‘Then I beg you, father, send him to
my father’s house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them,
lest they too come to this place of torment.’ But Abraham replied,
‘They have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them.’ He said,
‘Oh no, father Abraham, but if someone from the dead goes to them, they
will repent.’ Then Abraham said, ‘If they will not listen to Moses and
the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise
from the dead.’” (Luke 16:19-31)
This Gospel passage
today presents one of the parables that have passed into what we might
call world literature. The poor man Lazarus and the rich man who
entirely neglected him are figures that have embedded in Christian
culture as encapsulating the spirit of Christianity. At various points
in the Gospels our Lord makes it clear that our judgment will depend on
how we treat others. In the Gospel of St
Matthew (Chapter 25)
our Lord describes
the general judgment of all the nations, gathered in the presence of
the King. To those on the right and to those on his left he will say
that whatever they did to the least of his brothers they did to him.
Christ our judge will take it very personally if we treat others
unjustly, unkindly, or unmercifully. Here in a different Gospel,
the
Gospel of St Luke, our Lord teaches the seriousness of any disregard
for the unfortunate and the needy. In our Lord’s story, Lazarus is
poor, hopelessly sick and very hungry. He did not even have the dignity
of being protected from the dogs. He lay continually at the door of the
rich man, and “would gladly have eaten his fill of the scraps that fell
from the rich man’s table.” (Luke 16:19-31)
But it was not to be.
The rich man utterly disregarded him. He saw him constantly, but his
heart was entirely hardened against helping him at all. Now, all this
had eternal consequences. When each died, the situation was totally
reversed. The rich man went to hell, and the poor man went to happiness
in the arms of Abraham. God had taken the rich man’s utter neglect of
the poor man personally, and regarded it as an immense offence meriting
eternity in hell. The seriousness of injuring others or failing to
assist them in their injuries would perhaps not have dawned on fallen
man had it not been revealed by God.
But revealed to us
it has been, and even in our parable Abraham tells the rich man buried
in hell that all this had been taught by Moses and the prophets, and
that this teaching should have been sufficient for him. So central is
this point to Christianity that in the constant stress on assisting
those in need Christ himself has at times been forgotten. By this I
mean that at times Christianity — or “being a Christian” — has taken on
the connotation of being virtually a philanthropist. That is to say, it
has often been forgotten that we serve Christ when we serve the needy.
Furthermore, the love of Christ and the acceptance of his revelation
that he identifies with the poor provides a tremendous motive for
loving and serving the needy. Thus it is that the saints have been
distinguished for their love for the poor, which was a constant
expression of their love for Christ whom they knew to be present
especially in the poor. They knew that to neglect the needy was to
direct an affront to Christ. We think of St Vincent de Paul. We think
of Frederick Ozanam, the founder of the St Vincent de Paul Society. We
think too of Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, known throughout the world as
“Mother Teresa” — almost a contemporary byword for Christian sanctity.
All this stands to reason because what is it that God himself has done?
He who was divinely rich made himself poor in order that we who are
poor might be rich in him. St Paul tells us that Christ was in the
“form” of God, but did not cling to his equality with God. He divested
himself of his glory and made himself as men are and humbler still,
even to death on a cross. God served us who are needy to the point of
impoverishing himself utterly. His children who aspire to be like him
must also love and serve the needy. That is the message of our Gospel
passage today, and our eternity depends on it.
Let us take to
heart God’s love for all his children, especially the neediest. Christ
commands us to love them with the love with which we should love him.
Let us pray for the spiritual insight and the persevering love to be
able to do this.
(E.J.Tyler)
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«I
am suffering torment in these
flames» (Luke 16:19-31)
Saint Isaac the Syrian
(7th Century), monk at Nineveh (Discourse, 1st
series, n̊.84)
As for me, I believe that those
who are tormented in hell are tormented
because of love. Is there anything bitterer or more violent than the
torments of love? Those who feel they have sinned against love bear
inside them a much bigger condemnation than any other punishment. The
suffering caused by sin against love is the most heartbreaking torment.
It is absurd to think that
sinners in hell are deprived of God's love.
Love is the child of truth that is given to everyone. By its own power,
love acts in two ways. It torments sinners, as here on earth a friend
may torment another friend. And it gives joy to those who have done
what they were supposed to. Such is, in my opinion, the torment in
hell: regret. But the souls of those who are up high are in the ecstasy
of delights.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Jesus came down to this earth
to suffer... and so that others might avoid sufferings, even earthly
ones.
(The Forge,
no.1044)
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How does sin threaten marriage?
Because of original sin, which
caused a rupture in the God-given
communion between man and woman, the union of marriage is very often
threatened by discord and infidelity. However, God in his infinite
mercy gives to man and woman the grace to bring the union of their
lives into accord with the original divine plan. (CCC 1606-1608)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.339)
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Friday
of the Second Week of Lent II
(March 9)
St Frances of Rome, religious (1384-1440). A married woman, she
brought up her three children in the love and fear of God. She was
zealous in the performance of every household duty, saying, “A married
woman must often love God at the altar to find him in her household
care.” She founded an Order of Oblates. (Saints)
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Particular Day
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Scripture today:
Genesis
37:3-4, 12-13a, 17b-28a; Psalm
105:16-21; Matthew 21:33-43, 45-46
Jesus said to
the chief priests and the elders of the people: “Hear another parable.
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a hedge around it,
dug a wine press in it, and built a tower. Then he leased it to tenants
and went on a journey. When vintage time drew near, he sent his
servants to the tenants to obtain his produce. But the tenants seized
the servants and one they beat, another they killed, and a third they
stoned. Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first
ones, but they treated them in the same way. Finally, he sent his son
to them, thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw
the son, they said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill
him and acquire his inheritance.’ They seized him, threw him out of the
vineyard, and killed him. What will the owner of the vineyard do to
those tenants when he comes?” They answered him, “He will put those
wretched men to a wretched death and lease his vineyard to other
tenants who will give him the produce at the proper times.” Jesus said
to them, “Did you never read in the Scriptures: The stone that the
builders rejected has become the cornerstone; by the Lord has this been
done, and it is wonderful in our eyes? Therefore, I say to you, the
Kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that
will produce its fruit.” When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard
his parables, they knew that he was speaking about them. And although
they were attempting to arrest him, they feared the crowds, for they
regarded him as a prophet. (Matthew
21:33-43, 45-46)
In everyday life if
we do not take certain things into account we shall simply fail to
acquire those things we have set our hearts on or which we know we
need. A young person omits to take the necessary means to do well in
his studies and has to bear the consequences of this neglect for the
rest of his life. So too there are some fundamental issues around which
pivot our entire eternity and we must, we simply must, bear them
clearly in mind. We shall bear responsibility for our eternal prospects
if we fail to take the steps that are necessary to attain our ultimate
and everlasting good. Our Lord makes it clear that in him are to be
found all the blessings of eternity. If God had left us to our devices
there is so much we probably would never have intuited or come to
understand in any sense. How many of us would have understood that life
hereafter involves an eternity? How many of us would have understood
that the hereafter involves not only an eternity, but an eternity of
either incalculable suffering or incalculable happiness, and that there
is no alternative to these two options? How many of us would have
understood that there is actually one only God, that all comes from
him, that he will be our Judge, and that our judgment will depend on
the moral goodness of our lives? God’s revelation has shed an immensely
powerful, illuminating and decisive light on all the fundamental issues
we must take into account during the brief span allotted to us. The
greatest challenge facing every generation is to pass on to the next
the importance of these basic questions and the divinely revealed
answers to them.
But there is a
further and even more significant revelation. It is that all these
fundamental truths that have been revealed and which are so decisive
for the direction which our hearts take are encapsulated in our
attitude to a particular historical person who lives now. That person
is the living risen Jesus. The one who believes in him and who lives
accordingly will be saved, whereas the one who knowingly and
deliberately rejects him will be lost forever. In the parable which our
Lord tells the chief priests and the elders of the people in our Gospel
today, he makes this very clear. The turning point in the story comes
when our Lord narrates that “Finally, he sent his son to them,
thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son,
they said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and
acquire his inheritance.’ They seized him, threw him out of the
vineyard, and killed him”
(Matthew
21:33-43, 45-46). The tenants knew that
it was the son who had been sent to them and yet they “seized him,
threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.” There was no excuse for
their treatment of the son, let alone for the other servants who had
preceded him — and those servants had been the prophets. The fate of
the tenants followed on their rejection of the son. So salvation
depends on our acceptance or rejection of Christ. As St Paul writes in
one of his Letters, in Christ is to be found every heavenly blessing.
If we find and accept him we gain everything that matters. If after
hearing the Church’s proclamation we knowingly and deliberately reject
him then we lose everything that matters. In God’s plan our eternity
hinges on our response, be it explicit or implicit, to the person of
Christ.
Let us make this
sobering thought the inspiration of our lives and of our daily service
to others. We ought shape every aspect of our lives according to the
requirements of Christ who is our Redeemer and our Judge. Let us make
this truth the reason for our loving service of others, knowing that
everything we do to bring the knowledge and love of Christ to others
will contribute to their eternal salvation.
(E.J.Tyler)
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God’s
vineyard (Matthew
21:33-43, 45-46)
St Irenaeus of Lyons
(130-208), bishop, theologian and martyr (Against heresies,
IV 36, 2-3)
God planted the vineyard of the
human race when at first He formed Adam
and chose the fathers; then He let it out to husbandmen when He
established the Mosaic dispensation: He hedged it round about, that is,
He gave particular instructions with regard to their worship: He built
a tower, [that is], He chose Jerusalem: He dug a winepress, that is, He
prepared a receptacle of the prophetic Spirit. And thus did He send
prophets prior to the transmigration to Babylon, and after that event
others again in greater number than the former, to seek the fruits,
saying thus to them (the Jews): "Thus saith the Lord, cleanse your ways
and your doings” ((Jer 7,3); “execute just judgment, and look each one
with pity and compassion on his brother: oppress not the widow nor the
orphan, the proselyte nor the poor, and let none of you treasure up
evil against his brother in your hearts” (Zec 7,19)...; “Put away evil
from your hearts, learn to do well, seek judgment, protect the
oppressed” (Is 1,16)...
In preaching these things, the
prophets sought the fruits of
righteousness. But last of all He sent to those unbelievers His own
Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, whom the wicked husbandmen cast out of the
vineyard when they had slain Him. Wherefore the Lord God did even give
it up (no longer hedged around, but thrown open throughout all the
world) to other husbandmen, who render the fruits in their seasons --
the beautiful elect tower being also raised everywhere. For the
illustrious Church is [now] everywhere, and everywhere is the winepress
dug: because those who do receive the Spirit are everywhere...
And therefore did the Lord say
to His disciples, to make us become good
workmen: "Take heed to yourselves, and watch continually upon every
occasion, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting
and drunkenness, and cares of this life" (Lk21,34). "Let your loins,
therefore, be girded about, and your lights burning, and ye like to men
who wait for their lord, when he shall return from the wedding."
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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There is
no greater self-mastery than to make oneself a servant, the willing
servant of all souls!
This is how to gain the
greatest honours, both on earth and in Heaven.
(The Forge,
no.1045)
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What does the Old Testament teach
about marriage?
God helped his people above all
through the teaching of the Law and the
Prophets to deepen progressively their understanding of the unity and
indissolubility of marriage. The nuptial covenant of God with Israel
prepared for and prefigured the new covenant established by Jesus
Christ the Son of God, with his spouse, the Church. (CCC 1609-1611)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.340)
--------------------------------(Back
to Liturgical Day Index)--------------------------------
Saturday
of the Second Week of Lent II
(March 10) Today let us think
of St. Macarius
(Saints) See
also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Micah
7:14-15, 18-20; Psalm 103:1-4,
9-12; Luke 15:1-3, 11-32
Tax collectors and
sinners were all drawing near to listen to Jesus, but the Pharisees and
scribes began to complain, saying, “This man welcomes sinners and eats
with them.” So to them Jesus addressed this parable. “A man had two
sons, and the younger son said to his father, ‘Father, give me the
share of your estate that should come to me.’ So the father divided the
property between them. After a few days, the younger son collected all
his belongings and set off to a distant country where he squandered his
inheritance on a life of dissipation. When he had freely spent
everything, a severe famine struck that country, and he found himself
in dire need. So he hired himself out to one of the local citizens who
sent him to his farm to tend the swine. And he longed to eat his fill
of the pods on which the swine fed, but nobody gave him any. Coming to
his senses he thought, ‘How many of my father’s hired workers have more
than enough food to eat, but here am I, dying from hunger. I shall get
up and go to my father and I shall say to him, “Father, I have sinned
against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your
son; treat me as you would treat one of your hired workers.”’ So he got
up and went back to his father. While he was still a long way off, his
father caught sight of him, and was filled with compassion. He ran to
his son, embraced him and kissed him. His son said to him, ‘Father, I
have sinned against heaven and against you; I no longer deserve to be
called your son.’ But his father ordered his servants, ‘Quickly, bring
the finest robe and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals
on his feet. Take the fattened calf and slaughter it. Then let us
celebrate with a feast, because this son of mine was dead, and has come
to life again; he was lost, and has been found.’ Then the celebration
began. Now the older son had been out in the field and, on his way
back, as he neared the house, he heard the sound of music and dancing.
He called one of the servants and asked what this might mean. The
servant said to him, ‘Your brother has returned and your father has
slaughtered the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’
He became angry, and when he refused to enter the house, his father
came out and pleaded with him. He said to his father in reply, ‘Look,
all these years I served you and not once did I disobey your orders;
yet you never gave me even a young goat to feast on with my friends.
But when your son returns who swallowed up your property with
prostitutes, for him you slaughter the fattened calf.’ He said to him,
‘My son, you are here with me always; everything I have is yours. But
now we must celebrate and rejoice, because your brother was dead and
has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.’” (Luke 15:1-3,
11-32)
This famous parable
our Lord told is commonly called the parable of the prodigal son, the
son who was prodigal with all he had been given by his indulgent
father. It is true that the bulk of the text of the story is given over
to describing the story of the son, but we must begin our reading of it
by noticing what St Luke says at the beginning. At the very beginning
he gives the context and this context provides us with the point of the story. We are
told that “Tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to listen
to Jesus, but the Pharisees and
scribes began to complain, saying,
‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.’ So to them Jesus
addressed this parable. ‘A man had two sons, and the younger son said
to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of your estate that should
come to me.’ So the father divided the property between them.” (Luke 15:1-3,
11-32)
So the parable was
occasioned by the complaints of the Pharisees and the scribes about
Jesus himself. They were complaining about his choosing to welcome
sinners and eat with them, and so he told the parable to explain his
actions. He was welcoming sinners in the way the father in the parable
welcomed his wayward and repentant son, and this father was obviously
an image of the divine Father of all. Our Lord is correcting a
false image of God and presenting for our full acceptance the true
image. God is a loving, indulgent Father who receives back into his
overflowing friendship all who return to him in repentance. All that is
needed is genuine repentance and the desire to return to his father’s
love and the life of his family. Our Lord in his ministry is acting as
does his heavenly Father, whereas the Pharisees and the scribes who
would keep “the tax collectors and sinners” at a distance from the
divine friendship were acting as did the elder brother in our Lord’s
parable. The elder brother had been respectable, dependable, externally
moral. But what was going on in his heart? The return of his younger
and dissolute brother showed him up as being jealous, proud and without
much love. How poorly in love did he compare with his own father, and
how little a reflection of him he was!
So the first point
that our Lord was making refers to God. His welcome of sinners
reflected the heart of the true God. God is a God rich in mercy to the
point of extravagance, provided the sinner returns to him. The second
point refers to us. If the sinner is to regain the love of God, like
the wayward son he must gain a sense of his own sinfulness and where it
is taking him. The sense of sin and of its consequences usually prompts
a renewed discovery of God. What would have happened if the younger son
had not realized his sin, had not repented in some sense (and his
reason for repentance seems to have been primarily concern for
himself), and returned to his father? Realizing his sin, he then
thought of his father and his father ‘s kindness. He thought of
the liberality his father showed to his servants and what he could
expect if he came back simply as a servant. God is a God rich in mercy
to the point of extravagance. His love is everlasting and bountiful.
The Pharisees and the scribes needed to repent of their attitudes and
hardness of heart, but they would not. They needed a sense of sin and
where their sins were taking them. In the parable there was little
prospect of the elder son repenting of his petulance and jealousy and
we are left with his saying that he absolutely would not welcome his
younger brother. And so the elder brother is left in the story
unreconciled with his father and his brother, and indeed the scene
leaves him in anger remaining outside the house. The younger son
repented, and the elder son did not. The younger son returned to his
father with a real sense of sin and a new discovery of the goodness and
love of his father, while the elder son failed to recognize his own
sinful heart, and failed to discover in a new way the goodness and love
of his father. Our parable today tells us what God is like and what we
must be like. We must start by recognizing that we are sinners and
where our sins are leading us.
Our Lord came to
reveal the true God. In himself he reveals the love of the Father. He
who sees me, he told his disciples, sees the Father. God is a God rich
in mercy, and our Lord told us that we are to be compassionate as our
heavenly Father is compassionate. But equally, we must understand that
we are sinners. Characteristically, we in our day have lost the sense
of sin. Our Lord holds up the example not only of his heavenly Father,
but of the repentance of the wayward son. He recognized his sinfulness
and returned to the love of his Father. Let us live our Christian lives
with a lively sense of these two sides of our Lord’s great lesson.
(E.J.Tyler)
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«
I shall get up and go to my father
» (Luke 15:1-3, 11-32)
Jack of Saroug (about
449-521), Syrian monk and bishop (Poem)
As the prodigal son, I will
return to my father's house and I will be
welcomed back home. I will do the same, as he did: won't the father
grant my prayer too? O forgiving Father, here I am at your door and I
knock; open to me, let me enter, so that I may not ruin myself, go away
and die! You made me your heir and I neglected my inheritance and
squandered my goods; from now on, may I be as a mercenary and as a
servant to you.
As of the tax collector, have
mercy on me and I shall live by your
grace! O Son of God, forgive my sins as you did with the adulteress.
Save me from the waves, as you did with Peter. Have mercy on my
lowness, as you did for the good criminal, and remember me! O Lord,
come search for me, like the lost sheep, and you will find me; carry me
on your shoulders, Lord, to the house of your Father.
As you did with the blind man,
open my eyes, that I may see your light!
As for the deaf, open my ears, that I may hear your voice! As for the
paralytic, heal my disability so that I may praise your name. As for
the leper, cleanse me of my sin with your hyssop (cf. Ps 50,9). As the
young girl, the daughter of Jairus, make me live, our Lord. As Peter's
mother-in-law, heal me, for I am sick. As the young boy, the widow's
son, raise me up, that I may stand up again. As you did with Lazarus,
cry out to me with your own voice and undo my bandages. For I am dead
because of sin, like as for a sickness; raise me up from my ruin, that
I may praise your name!
I beg you, Lord of heaven and
earth, come save me and show me your way
so that I may come towards you. Bring me back to you, Son of the Good
Lord, and fill me with your mercy. I will come to you and then will I
be filled with joy.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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In the face of suffering and
persecution, a certain soul with supernatural sense said, ``I prefer to
take a beating down here rather than get it in purgatory.''
(The Forge,
no.1046)
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What new element did Christ give to
Matrimony?
Christ not only restored the
original order of matrimony but raised it
to the dignity of a sacrament, giving spouses a special grace to live
out their marriage as a symbol of Christ’s love for his bride the
Church: “Husbands, love your wives as Christ loves the Church”
(Ephesians 5:25). (CCC 1612-1617, 1661)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.341)
--------------------------------(Back
to Liturgical Day Index)--------------------------------
Third Sunday of Lent C
(March 11) Today let us think
of St Oengus (Saints)
See also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture:
Exodus
3:1-8a, 13-15; Psalm 103: 1-4, 6-8,
11; 1 Corinth 10:1-6,
10-12; Luke 13:1-9
Some people told
Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with the blood
of their sacrifices. Jesus said to them in reply, “Do you think that
because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners
than all other Galileans? By no means! But I tell you, if you do not
repent, you will all perish as they did! Or those eighteen people who
were killed when the tower at Siloam fell on them— do you think they
were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem? By no
means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as
they did!” And he told them this parable: “There once was a person who
had a fig tree planted in his orchard, and when he came in search of
fruit on it but found none, he said to the gardener, ‘For three years
now I have come in search of fruit on this fig tree but have found
none. So cut it down. Why should it exhaust the soil?’ He said to him
in reply, ‘Sir, leave it for this year also, and I shall cultivate the
ground around it and fertilize it; it may bear fruit in the future. If
not you can cut it down.’” (Luke 13:1-9)
I remember watching
a movie years ago and in one scene a mother was shown holding her small
child. The child asked her puzzled mother, “why isn’t there nothing?”
It is a very good question that would never occur to the majority of
people. It immediately suggests that the things of our experience are
not necessary and so it prompts the thought of a creator. It also
revealed an attitude of wonder in that small child, and shows
how the cultivation of a child-like sense of wonder opens some of the
deepest philosophical questions. But there is
another question which
has occurred to many people: why do we suffer so much? Why is it that
in the span of life that has been allotted to me so much suffering
comes my way, while to all appearances relatively little suffering
comes to this or that other person? What am I to do about suffering?
There have been various answers to these persistent questions and one
of the defining elements of any particular religion is the way it
addresses this problem. I can think of at least one anthropologist of
primal religions who wrote that the way the problem of suffering is
dealt with is the key to interpreting the
religions of indigenous peoples. Whatever about that generalization, it
is obvious that suffering and death is a central issue in the religion
revealed by the God of Abraham, Moses and Jesus Christ his divine Son.
It was precisely because his chosen people were suffering in Egypt that
God revealed himself to Moses and sent him to lead his people out of
their enslaving situation. It was precisely because of the universal
hold of death that God sent his Son, not to condemn the world but to
save the world from sin by his death and resurrection. It is the
problem of suffering and death that sparks the exchange in today’s
Gospel.
St Paul writes in
the Letter to the Romans that sin entered the world through one man and
with sin death, and thus death has spread through the whole human race
because everyone has sinned. So the deepest cause of the world’s
suffering is the sin of man — in the first instance of man at the
beginning, and then of every man since then. But while all suffering
ultimately finds its origin in sin, our Lord makes it clear that we
cannot interpret the scale of any one individual’s suffering as
indicative of the degree of his sinfulness. His own case shows that
suffering can come to the innocent, and his overwhelming sufferings
came upon him from the sins of others — including our own sins. Our
Lord poses the question of today’s Gospel: “Do you think that
because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners
than all other Galileans? By no means! But I tell you, if you do not
repent, you will all perish as they did! Or those eighteen people who
were killed when the tower at Siloam fell on them— do you think they
were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem? By no
means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as
they did!” (Luke 13:1-9)
Of course the only ones
who have been entirely innocent have been Christ himself, and by the
grace merited by Christ, his own Blessed Mother the Virgin Mary. But
the point here is, as our Lord states very clearly, that “ if you do
not repent, you will all perish as they did!” Every time we see
suffering and death we ought be reminded that unless we repent of our
sins, in some sense those sins we choose to commit will reap the
whirlwind of suffering and death. The sight of suffering and death — even the suffering of the relatively innocent
— can and should,
therefore, be an occasion of repentance from sin.
The coming of
suffering can also be a moment of deeper identification with Christ our
Lord who, though innocent, suffered for the guilty. When suffering
comes, therefore, let us resolve to repent from our sins. Let us also
resolve to unite ourselves with Christ who suffered for us, and in this
way our sufferings will contribute towards the repentance of others.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“I tell
you, if you do not repent, you will
all perish as they did!” (Luke 13:1-9)
St Leo the Great (? –
461),
Pope and Doctor of the Church (20th Sermon on the
Passion)
To work, brothers! Let us make
an effort so as to be found associated
with Christ’s resurrection and to pass from death to life while we are
still in this body. All who go through a conversion of whatever kind,
all who pass from one state to another, experience an end: they are no
longer what they were. And they also experience a beginning: they
become what they were not. But it is important to know for whom one is
dying and for whom one lives, for there is a death that gives life and
a life that gives death.
Nowhere other than in this
fleeting world does a person seek both, so
that the difference in the eternal retributions will depend on the
quality of our actions here below. So let us die to the devil and let
us live for God; let us die to sin in order to rise to righteousness.
May the former being disappear so that the new being might rise up.
Since, according to the word of Truth, “No one can serve two masters”
(Mt 6:24), let us take as our master not the one who causes those who
are standing to fall so as to lead them to ruin, but rather the one who
raises up those who have fallen in order to lead them to glory.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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f I love,
there will be no hell for me.
(The Forge,
no.1047)
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Are all obliged to get married?
Matrimony is not an obligation
for everyone, especially since God calls
some men and women to follow the Lord Jesus in a life of virginity or
of celibacy for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven. These renounce the
great good of Matrimony to concentrate on the things of the Lord and
seek to please him. They become a sign of the absolute supremacy of
Christ’s love and of the ardent expectation of his glorious return.
(CCC 1618-1620)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.342)
--------------------------------(Back
to Liturgical Day Index)--------------------------------
Monday
of the Third Week of Lent II
(March 12) Today let us think
of St Maximilian
(Saints) See
also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today: 2 Kings
5:1-15ab; Psalm 42:2, 3; 43:3,
4; Luke 4:24-30
Jesus said to the
people in the synagogue at Nazareth: “Amen, I say to you, no prophet is
accepted in his own native place. Indeed, I tell you, there were many
widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the sky was closed for
three and a half years and a severe famine spread over the entire land.
It was to none of these that Elijah was sent, but only to a widow in
Zarephath in the land of Sidon. Again, there were many lepers in Israel
during the time of Elisha the prophet; yet not one of them was
cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.” When the people in the synagogue
heard this, they were all filled with fury. They rose up, drove him out
of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town
had been built, to hurl him down headlong. But he passed through the
midst of them and went away. (Luke 4:24-30)
As we think of the
progress of human thought, of the flow of human affairs, and of each
individual life, the question occurs to us as to the key to all human
endeavour. We think of the numerous philosophical systems with their
proposals, we think of the great works of literature such as those
of Dante, Shakespeare, Dostoevsky and others, as we think of the
unending discourse among men ranging over
so many matters, is
there anything that can be pointed to as being the heart and the hub of
the matter? Is there anything around which ultimately everything pivots
and which determines the prospects of each man and woman, and of the
whole of humanity?
There is indeed. We can attain the key to
everything, even though the mere possession of that key does not
immediately illumine every possible question that may occur to us. The
key to human life, to the vast flow of human history, the key to the
world and the universe is a Person. That Person is Jesus Christ, and
everything pivots around our acceptance or non acceptance of him.
Mankind’s prospects revolve around faith and trust in him and in what
he revealed. Christianity cannot be described as a very simple
religion, and indeed as Pope Paul VI wrote many years ago it is
immensely rich and complex. But inasmuch as God has revealed the key to
life and the universe — and that key is Jesus his beloved Son — we are
able to simplify man’s perennial search for meaning. The whole of
mankind searches for meaning and happiness generation after generation,
and that meaning, that key is to be found in a simple act which must be
brought to bear on the whole of life. That simple act is faith in the
person of Jesus Christ and the full acceptance of his teaching. Our
Lord himself put it another way. He said to his disciples that they
were to go to the whole world and preach him, making disciples of all
the nations.
In our Gospel
passage today our Lord returns to the town where he had grown up and
where so many knew him very well — or at least so they themselves
thought. They had lived with him, seen him grow up and had grown up
with him. He had attended synagogue with them, had repaired and built
their homes, their furniture and their implements of work. He returned
after having begun his public ministry and declared that he was the
promised one, but warned them that they were in danger of failing to
recognize and accept the immensely important moment that had arrived in
his own person. The events fulfilled our Lord’s prediction. They “rose
up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on
which their town had been built, to hurl him down headlong. But he
passed through the midst of them and went away”
(Luke
4:24-30).
Presumably there were very many who never again gave our Lord a hearing
and so their divinely sent opportunity for salvation and holiness
passed. Their rejection of our Lord is a constant lesson to each of us.
To a greater or lesser extent we can fail to give our Lord our full
assent, and it is precisely this which is the pivotal point in human
life and in all human history. The pivotal point, the hinge around
which revolves everything, is faith in Jesus Christ. If that is not
given then the heart of all reality is missed for the sake of shadows.
Christ is the substance, and all else gains substance in him. It can be
difficult seeing intellectually how this is so, but it has been
revealed. Through him all things came to be, and all that came to be
had life in him, and that life is the light of men. That light shines
in the dark, a light that darkness cannot overcome. We must, therefore,
place ourselves in the presence of the living Jesus and give our hearts
to him. If we do this, we have passed through the door that leads to
everything of value.
As we think of our
Gospel scene today (Luke 4:24-30) let us be reminded that the crisis
point for all human life lies in the decision about the person of Jesus
of Nazareth. The Nazarenes rejected him. How awful was this step! Let
us learn from it and take our stand with Jesus, promising him that we
shall follow him withersoever he chooses to take us in life. In this
will lie our salvation.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Faith of Sarepta widow, who welcomes the
one sent by God (Luke 4:24-30)
St
Ambrose (340-397), Bishop of Milan and Doctor of the Church (Concerning Widows
1, 3)
And what is the teaching of the
fact that at that time when the whole
human race was afflicted by famine and Elias was sent to the widow? And
see how for each is reserved her own special grace. An angel is sent to
a virgin, a prophet to a widow. Notice, farther, that in one case it is
Gabriel, in the other Elias. The most excellent chiefs of the number of
angels and prophets are seen to be chosen. But there is no praise
simply in widowhood, unless there be added the virtues of widowhood.
For, indeed, there were many widows, but one is distinct and being thus
helps and encourages the rest by the example of virtue... The Lord
notices and appreciates particularly the virtue of hospitality he
himself related in the Gospel, rewards a glass of cold water with the
exceeding recompense of eternity (Mt 10:42), and compensates the small
measure of meal and oil by an unfailing abundance of plenty ever coming
in…
Why do you consider the fruits
of the earth are private, when the earth
itself is common property?... But we turn aside the warnings of a
general utterance to our private advantage, God says: "Every tree which
has in it the fruit of a tree yielding seed shall be to you for food
and to every beast, and to every bird, and to everything that creeps
upon the earth." (Gn 1:29-30). By gathering we end by wanting more and
more; by gathering we become empty. For we cannot hope for the promise,
who keep not the saying. It is also good for us to attend to the
precept of hospitality, to be ready to give to strangers, for we, too,
are strangers in the world.
But how holy was that widow,
who, when suffering from extreme hunger,
observed the reverence due to God, and was not using the food for
herself alone, but was dividing it with her son, that she might not
outlive her dear offspring. Great is the duty of affection, but that of
religion brings more return. For as no one ought to be set before her
son, so the prophet of God ought to be set before her son and her
preservation. For she is to be believed to have given to him not a
little food, but the whole support of her life, who left nothing for
herself. So hospitable was she that she gave the whole, so full of
faith that she believed at once.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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How good it is to live on God's
bounty! How good it is to desire nothing other than his Glory.
(The Forge,
no.1048)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How is the sacrament of Matrimony
celebrated?
Since Matrimony establishes
spouses in a public state of life in the
Church, its liturgical celebration is public, taking place in the
presence of a priest (or of a witness authorized by the Church) and
other witnesses. (CCC 1621-1624)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.343)
--------------------------------(Back
to Liturgical Day Index)--------------------------------
Tuesday
of the Third Week of Lent II
(March 13) Today let us
think of St Euphrasia
(Saints) See
also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Daniel 3:25,
34-43; Psalm 25:4-5ab, 6 and 7bc,
8-9; Matthew 18:21-35
Peter approached
Jesus and asked him, “Lord, if my brother sins against me, how often
must I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus answered, “I say to
you, not seven times but seventy-seven times. That is why the Kingdom
of heaven may be likened to a king who decided to settle accounts with
his servants. When he began the accounting, a debtor was brought before
him who owed him ten thousand talents. Since he had no way of paying it
back, his master ordered him to be sold, along with his wife, his
children, and all his property, in payment of the debt. At that, the
servant fell down, did him homage, and said, ‘Be patient with me, and I
will pay you back in full.’ Moved with compassion the master of that
servant let him go and forgave him the loan. When that servant had
left, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him one hundred
denarii. He seized him and started to choke him, demanding, ‘Pay back
what you owe.’ Falling to his knees, his fellow servant begged him, ‘Be
patient with me, and I will pay you back.’ But he refused. Instead, he
had him put in prison until he paid back the debt. Now when his fellow
servants saw what had happened, they were deeply disturbed, and went to
their master and reported the whole affair. His master summoned him and
said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you your entire debt
because you begged me to. Should you not have had pity on your fellow
servant, as I had pity on you?’ Then in anger his master handed him
over to the torturers until he should pay back the whole debt. So will
my heavenly Father do to you, unless each of you forgives your brother
from your heart.” (Matthew 18:21-35)
One wonders what
the course of human history would be like were all men ready to forgive
injuries done to them. Consider the life of so many families and how
they are rent with bitterness due to injuries and the inability to
forgive. Consider the wars that have characterized human society, and
the conflicts that will not go away even now. Consider the Middle East,
the many conflicts of Africa, and wherever
conflicts are, injuries
are inflicted on others and retaliation follows. It is the common
experience of human beings that one of the hardest things of all is to
forgive, yet at the same time ordinary reflection shows what a boon to
society and to human happiness it is to be able to do this. Very many
people pass their entire lives harbouring resentments and the
desire
for revenge. Those who did them an injury — whether real or merely
perceived — pass on from this life, and still the resentment remains.
So, ordinary experience shows that forgiveness is one of the
fundamental issues in the life of every person and in the life of
humanity. What does Christ say of this? He is uncompromising and very
demanding. We must forgive and forgive from the heart, no matter what
the injury might have been. Of course our Lord is not saying that
injury ought go unchecked and unpunished, but he is saying that the
refusal to forgive must never be a factor in our response to injustice
and injury. In our Gospel passage today our Lord addresses this very
question, a question put to him by the chief of his Apostles, Simon
Peter. It is as if our Lord is being asked about this matter by the
entire body of his disciples. His parable that follows makes clear that
God will regard with the utmost severity a deliberate refusal to
forgive. “Then in anger his master handed him over to the
torturers until he should pay back the whole debt. So will my heavenly
Father do to you, unless each of you forgives your brother from your
heart”
(Matthew
18:21-35).
The question
remains, though, how are we to do this? How can we possibly forgive
injuries done to us from the heart? Our Lord’s very parable provides us
with the answer. The example of the king should have inspired the
servant to forgive the debt of his fellow servant. “ That is why the
Kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who decided to settle
accounts with his servants. When he began the accounting, a debtor was
brought before him who owed him ten thousand talents. Since he had no
way of paying it back, his master ordered him to be sold, along with
his wife, his children, and all his property, in payment of the debt.
At that, the servant fell down, did him homage, and said, ‘Be patient
with me, and I will pay you back in full.’ Moved with compassion the
master of that servant let him go and forgave him the loan”
(Matthew 18:21-35). The king was moved
with compassion, and even though he stood to lose an astronomical
amount (which the “ten thousand talents” represents), he forgave him
his entire debt. That is the situation that exists between each of us
and God. God sent his Son to the world to free the world from sin at
incalculable cost to himself, a far greater personal cost than the king
incurred in our Lord’s parable. We are indebted to God the Holy Trinity
in ways we can only contemplate and never hope to repay. That is the
God on whom we depend and who loves us. He our God ought be our
inspiration leading us to forgive others. If only we had a lively sense
of our sinfulness and of the affront it is to God! This is why the loss
of the sense of sin is such a significant lack in modern man. If we do
not understand ourselves as being sinners, if we have little sense of
our having offended a good and holy God, how will we be able to
appreciate the forgiveness of God and the work of redemption? How will
God’s example of forgiving us be able to inspire us to forgive others
in turn?
Sooner or later
every man and woman must face up to the question of the response to
injury. Every person has to deal with the matter of forgiveness. Many
never forgive. Our Lord tells us that we must forgive from the heart
and that our judgment will depend on the extent to which we have done
this. What a wonderful thing if we spend our life forgiving injury from
the heart, and at our deathbed we are able to go before the Judgment of
God having forgiven everyone. Our inspiration for this ought be the
loving forgiveness of God whom we have offended so constantly and of
all he has done to take away our debts. Let us pray for the grace to be
true children of our heavenly Father.
(E.J.Tyler)
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To have
mercy on our neighbour as God had
mercy on us
Prayer of Saint Ephraim the
Syrian (Orthodox
Liturgy of the Great Lent)
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If you really want to attain
eternal life and honour, you must learn in many cases to put aside your
own noble ambitions.
(The Forge,
no.1049)
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What is matrimonial consent?
Matrimonial consent is given
when a man and a woman manifest the will
to give themselves to each other irrevocably in order to live a
covenant of faithful and fruitful love. Since consent constitutes
Matrimony, it is indispensable and irreplaceable. For a valid marriage
the consent must have as its object true Matrimony, and be a human act
which is conscious and free and not determined by duress or
coercion. (CCC 1625-1632, 1662-1663)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.344)
--------------------------------(Back
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Wednesday
of the Third Week of Lent II
(March 14) Today let us
think of St Leobinus,
St Matilde (Saints)
See also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Deuteronomy
4:1, 5-9; Psalm 147:12-13, 15-16,
19-20; Matthew 5:17-19
Jesus said to his
disciples: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the
prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfil. Amen, I say to
you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the
smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have
taken place. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these
commandments and teaches others to do so will be called least in the
Kingdom of heaven. But whoever obeys and teaches these commandments
will be called greatest in the Kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:17-19)
There are various
ways of differentiating man from man in an ultimate sense. We can
distinguish men one from another according to their work and careers,
according to their accomplishments, according to their popularity and
influence among others, according to their physical or
intellectual prowess, or whatever. None of these are ultimately
important differences because of themselves they do not touch the true worth of an
individual. For instance, one person may be of a very impressive
appearance because of his height, his looks and generally confident
bearing, enabling him to impose himself on a gathering far more than
another
who is diminutive and hesitant. But the impressive one could be
vain and the other one humble. So is there an ultimately important
quality which even before God will be decisively significant in
determining the value of this man or that? There is, and it is
obedience to God. St Thomas Aquinas writes somewhere that holiness
consists in the constant readiness to do the will of God. That is to
say, whatever a person may lack, if he has this quality he is
ultimately rich. He may lack money and possessions, he may lack
physical wellbeing, he may not be able to point to what others would
call success in life, he may not be intellectually highly endowed, he
may never have had positions of power and influence, but if he has
reached the point of being obedient to God then as a man he has
attained a true height. At the only assessment that finally matters — God’s judgment
— he will be placed far ahead of those who were regarded
by the world as his betters. So whatever it is that we are aiming at in
life to
attain the best for ourselves, the one thing necessary is that we aim
to subject ourselves entirely to the will of God.
It is obedience to
God and to his holy will that our Lord is referring to in today’s
Gospel. It is clear from the Gospels that our Lord was constantly
criticized by his enemies the Scribes, the Pharisees and the Sadducees
for not observing the traditions handed down. He flouted various
prescriptions insisted on by the leaders of the people. The people were
not to work on the Sabbath day, and yet he healed on the Sabbath and
did so even in the synagogue itself! He allowed his disciples to pick
ears of corn on the Sabbath when they and he were passing through the
cornfields. And so our Lord said to his disciples, “Do not think
that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to
abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass
away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will
pass from the law, until all things have taken place.” (Matthew 5:17-19)
Our Lord had come to
fulfill the law and the prophets in a way that had never been done
before. He was the fulfiller of the law and the prophets par
excellence, and by his life, death and resurrection he made up for the
lack of fulfillment of the divine law by his own people and by the
entire human race. All those who profess to be his disciples — and our Lord in our Gospel here is addressing his disciples
— must be
most careful about obedience to the commands of God. Our Lord told the
scribes and the Pharisees that they neglected the commands of God and
in their place observed their own human traditions. Christ’s disciples
are to be distinguished by obedience to God. Our foremost example of
obedience is the Mother of Christ who is our mother and model. She
constantly and from the core of her soul gave herself over to
obeying God. “Behold the handmaid of the Lord. Be it done to me
according to your word”, she told the Angel.
As we think of our
Lord’s uncompromising words insisting on obedience to the commands of
God, let us resolve to make our life’s goal the fulfilment of the will
of God. God’s will as expressed to us in the dictates of a prudent and
well-formed conscience, as expressed in the Scriptures understood and
explained by the Church, and in the Church’s teaching and guidance.
This is the true aim of life and it is the message we are called to
bring to the world.
(E.J.Tyler)
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The
fulfilment of the Law: love into
action (Matthew 5:17-19)
St Cyprian (200-258),
bishop of Carthage and martyr (Treatise on jealousy
and envy, 12-13)
To put on the name of Christ,
and not to go in the way of Christ, what
else is it but a mockery of the divine name, but a desertion of the way
of salvation; since He Himself teaches and says that he shall come unto
life who keeps His commandments (Mt 19,17), and that he is wise who
hears and does His words (Mt 7,24); that he, moreover, is called the
greatest doctor in the kingdom of heaven who thus does and teaches;
that, then, will be of advantage to the preacher what has been well and
usefully preached, if what is uttered by his mouth is fulfilled by
deeds following?
But what did the Lord more
frequently instil into His disciples, what
did He more charge to be guarded and observed among His saving counsels
and heavenly precepts, than that with the same love wherewith He
Himself loved the disciples, we also should love one another? And in
what manner does he keep either the peace or the love of the Lord, who,
when jealousy intrudes, can neither be peaceable nor loving?
Thus also the Apostle Paul,
when he was urging the merits of peace and
charity, and when he was strongly asserting and teaching that neither
faith nor alms, nor even the passion itself of the confessor and the
martyr, would avail him, unless he kept the requirements of charity
entire and inviolate (1Cor 13,1-3).
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Don't keep
on talking about your health, your family name, your career, your work,
or your next step|... How annoying this can be! It would seem you have
forgotten that you don't have anything, that everything is His.
When you feel sometimes —
perhaps without reason — that you have been
humiliated; when you think your opinion should prevail; when you notice
that at every moment your ``self'' keeps cropping up: your this, your
that, your something else|... convince yourself that you are wasting,
killing time, and that what you should be doing is killing your
selfishness.
(The Forge,
no.1050)
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What is required when one of the
spouses is not a Catholic?
A mixed marriage (between a Catholic and
a baptized non-Catholic) needs for liceity the permission of
ecclesiastical authority. In a case of disparity of cult (between a
Catholic and a non-baptized person) a dispensation is required for
validity. In both cases, it is essential that the spouses do not
exclude the acceptance of the essential ends and properties of
marriage. It is also necessary for the Catholic party to accept the
obligation, of which the non-Catholic party has been advised, to
persevere in the faith and to assure the baptism and Catholic education
of their children. (CCC 1633-1637)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.345)
--------------------------------(Back
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Thursday
of the Third Week of Lent II
(March 15) Today let us
think of St. Louise de
Marcillac
(Saints) See
also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture
today: Jeremiah
7:23-28;
Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9; Luke 11:14-23
Jesus was driving
out a demon that was mute, and when the demon had
gone out, the mute man spoke and the crowds were amazed. Some of them
said, “By the power of Beelzebul, the prince of demons, he drives out
demons.” Others, to test him, asked him for a sign from heaven. But he
knew their thoughts and said to them, “Every kingdom divided against
itself will be laid waste and house will fall against house. And if
Satan is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? For you
say that it is by Beelzebul that I drive out demons. If I, then, drive
out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your own people drive them out?
Therefore they will be your judges. But if it is by the finger of God
that I drive out demons, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you.
When a strong man fully armed guards his palace, his possessions are
safe. But when one stronger than he attacks and overcomes him, he takes
away the armour on which he relied and distributes the spoils. Whoever
is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me
scatters.” (Luke 11:14-23)
One of the most
powerful ideas that suddenly appeared in mid nineteenth
century England was that which had been germinating in the mind of Karl
Marx, and published in his book “Das
Kapital” in
1848. It led to the
disasters of Communism in the following century, and still has
something of a following. One still sees
devotees manning their Marxist
stalls at some of our Australian universities. Marx drew on
aspects of the
thought of his fellow
German, Hegel. Hegel understood
reality in terms of an ultimate conflict between what we might call the
thesis and its antithesis, leading to a synthesis which is again
negated, and so the struggle goes on and on. Endemic conflict is at the
root of the universe. Marx translated this into a class struggle which
he saw as resolved in the final triumph of the proletariat in a
classless society. All of this can be dismissed as a futile waste of
time, and typical of the convolutions of much of German philosophy of
the Enlightenment and its aftermath. But I mention it here to show that
conflict and struggle has been seen in modern philosophical thought as
a fundamental key to the world. Now, conflict and struggle is indeed a
fundamental key to understanding life and the world. We know this
because our Lord has revealed it to be so, but in a sense that too many
of our German philosophical friends of the past sadly failed to
appreciate. When God the Son became man he revealed that there are two
kingdoms in profound conflict. He also revealed that victory is assured
for the one, and utter defeat is coming for the other. The conflict
which lies at the heart of the universe is that between the kingdom of
God and the kingdom of Satan.
In our Gospel today
our Lord drives out a demon from a mute person, and
his enemies among the crowds insinuated that he was able to do this
because he was actually in collusion with Satan. The absurdity of this
(even from a tactical point of view) was pointed out by our Lord, but a
significant element in his reply is his revelation about what is
ultimately going on. Our Lord describes his action against Satan as
action against a kingdom. “Every kingdom divided against itself will be
laid waste and house will fall against house. And if Satan is divided
against himself, how will his kingdom stand? For you say that it is by
Beelzebul that I drive out demons.”
(Luke 11:14-23). So Satan’s is a
kingdom. It is a kingdom that is being attacked by Christ in whom is
present another Kingdom, that of God: “But if it is by the finger of
God that I drive out demons, then the Kingdom of God has come upon
you.” That the Kingdom of God is far the stronger is also made clear:
“When a strong man fully armed guards his palace, his possessions are
safe. But when one stronger than he attacks and overcomes him, he takes
away the armor on which he relied and distributes the spoils. Whoever
is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me
scatters” (Luke 11:14-23). So every day whether we are aware of it or
not, we are in the midst of a cosmic struggle involving powers visible
and invisible, and that struggle is between two armies in battle array.
There are two great standards held aloft and flying. The one is the
Standard of Christ, the other the Standard of Satan. Christ has entered
the lists to save every soul, and Satan is determined to thwart this
aim. Christ is the Truth, Satan the father of lies. Christ is our life,
Satan is a murderer from the beginning.
Let us take our
stand with Christ and fight with him in the hidden and
ordinary duties of everyday life, which though hidden and ordinary are
filled with eternal significance and consequences. Our weapons are the
weapons which Christ used, and our path is the path he chose to tread.
That path is the path to Calvary and its result is the Resurrection and
glory in heaven. That is the upshot of the struggle that is at the
heart of the world.
(E.J.Tyler)
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The
Spiritual Battle
(Luke
11:14-23)
Origen (about
185-253), priest and theologian (Homilies on Joshua,
15,1-4)
If the wars of the Old
Testament were not the symbol of spiritual
battles, I think that the historical books of the Jews would never have
been transmitted to Christ's disciples, he who came to teach us peace.
The Apostles would never have transmitted them as a reading to be done
in the assemblies. What use would such descriptions of wars have to
those who listen Jesus tell them “Peace I leave with you; my peace I
give to you” (Jn 14,27), or for those to whom Paul orders: “do not look
for revenge” (Rom 12,19) and “Why not rather put up with injustice? Why
not rather let yourselves be cheated?” (1 Cor 6,7).
Paul knows well enough that we
are not supposed to do war anymore – not
in a physical way – but that we are supposed to fight a great battle in
our soul, against our spiritual enemies. As a commander in chief, he
gives out his orders to Christ's soldiers: “Put on the armor of God so
that you may be able to stand firm against the tactics of the devil”
(Eph 6,11). And so that we may find in the acts of our ancestors the
models of spiritual wars, he wished that we were read in assembly the
story of their achievements. Since we are spiritual — we who learn that
“the law is spiritual” (Rom 7,14) — we then may approach this reading
by “describing spiritual realities in spiritual terms” (1 Cor 2,13). In
this way we may consider, through these nations that have visibly
attacked Israel, what is the power of these nations of spiritual
enemies, of these “evil spirits in the heavens” (Eph 6,12), who start
wars against the Church of the Lord, the new Israel.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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I advise you not to look for praise, even
when you deserve it. It is
better to pass unnoticed, and to let the most beautiful and noble
aspects of our actions, of our lives, remain hidden. What a great thing
it is to become little! Deo omnis gloria! —All the glory to God.
(The Forge,
no.1051)
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What are the effects of the
sacrament of Matrimony?
The sacrament of Matrimony establishes a
perpetual and exclusive bond
between the spouses. God himself seals the consent of the spouses.
Therefore, a marriage which is ratified and consummated between
baptized persons can never be dissolved. Furthermore, this sacrament
bestows upon the spouses the grace necessary to attain holiness in
their married life and to accept responsibly the gift of children and
provide for their education. (CCC 1638-1642)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.346)
--------------------------------(Back
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Friday
of the Third Week of Lent II
(March 16) Today the
Church celebrates St Finnian,
St Agapito (Saints)
Scripture today: Hosea
14:2-10; Psalm 81:6c-8a, 8bc-9, 10-11ab, 14 and 17;
Mark 12:28-34
Click centre arrow to start video
One of the scribes
came to Jesus and asked him, “Which is the first of all the
commandments?” Jesus replied, “The first is this: Hear, O Israel! The
Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all
your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your
strength. The second is this: You shall love your neighbour as yourself.
There is no other commandment greater than these.” The scribe said to
him, “Well said, teacher. You are right in saying, He is One and there
is no other than he. And to love him with all your heart, with all your
understanding, with all your strength, and to love your neighbour as
yourself is worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” And
when Jesus saw that he answered with understanding, he said to him,
“You are not far from the Kingdom of God.” And no one dared to ask him
any more questions. (Mark 12:28-34)
This is a beautiful
and powerful passage. In it we have the words of our Lord giving us the
essence of what revealed religion requires of man. Perhaps without it
having been revealed, man would not have realized that his attitude to
God is to be one of total love. At the root of this is the revelation
about God’s
love for him. It is hard
to imagine that he would have realized that God loves him with a
total love. In the history of religions
and of human thought there have
been various images of God. He has been imagined as distant, aloof, as
threatening, as useful, as near and as one to be propitiated and
petitioned, but rarely has be been considered as boundlessly loving
with a disinterested love. God’s love is disinterested in the sense
that he will love us whatever be our response,
but in another sense it
is intensely interested. That is to say, God has a personal interest in
our love for him. He wants us to love him totally, and it is this
command that our Lord refers to in today’s Gospel passage. Pope
Benedict XIV has pointed out in his first Encyclical and on other
occasions that there is a sense in which God’s love is eros. He wants
our love, but of course if we do not give it he still will love us and
in this sense his love is agape, or disinterested love. Because God
loves us so much, as a perfect husband loves his spouse he wants us to
love him as perfectly as we can in return. That is to say, the first of
all the commands revealed by God, the one that is the greatest, is
“Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the
Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your
mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: You shall love
your neighbour as yourself.” That is our Lord’s teaching.
Let us admire
the sublimity of our Lord’s teaching and contemplate his Person as the
embodiment of it. He is asked in our passage today what is the first
commandment of the Law, and he gives the answer — and he is the One who
has come to fulfill the Law. But let us consider another aspect of our
Lord’s response to the question, an aspect that so impressed the one
who posed it. It is our Lord’s knowledge and wisdom. The scribe who
presented this question to him was asking something that puzzled so
many of the best scribes of the Law. Among the plethora of commands
that filled the Old Testament, which was the greatest and the first?
The question was asked of our Lord, and his answer came immediately and
with such clarity that it could not but impress the scribe who asked
it. “The scribe said to him, ‘Well said, teacher. You are right in
saying, He is One and there is no other than he. And to love him with
all your heart, with all your understanding, with all your strength,
and to love your neighbour as yourself is worth more than all burnt
offerings and sacrifices’.” This scene is yet another instance of what
the crowds said of our Lord, that he taught with authority and not like
the scribes. He was full of wisdom and truth. St John writes at the
beginning of his Gospel that the Law came through Moses but grace and
truth came through Jesus Christ. We see how calmly and with full
authority our Lord commends the scribe for his comment on the answer he
had given. “And when Jesus saw that he answered with understanding, he
said to him, ‘You are not far from the Kingdom of God.’ And no one
dared to ask him any more questions” (Mark 12:28-34). Our Lord is the
Master of all, the fount of wisdom, the embodiment and the source of
all truth.
Let us place
ourselves in the presence of Jesus in a spirit of prayer, hearing his
words and contemplating the grandeur of his person. He is the perfect
Man, the one in whom the Father is well pleased. He loves the Father
with all his mind, heart and soul, and he understands all there is to
know. He is the perfect Man, and he is God. He gives to those who ask
him all that is needed to attain the holiness planned for us by God.
(E.J.Tyler)
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The
Commandment of Love (Mark 12:28-34)
Blessed Mother Teresa of
Calcutta
(1910-1997), founder of the Missionaries of Charity
(A Gift for God,
p.81)
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy
God with thy whole heart, with thy whole
soul, and with thy whole mind”. This is the commandment of the great
God, and he cannot command the impossible. Love is a fruit in season at
all times, and within the reach of every hand. Anyone may gather it and
no limit is set. Everyone can reach this love through meditation,
spirit of prayer, and sacrifice, by an intense inner life.
There is no limit, because God
is love and (1Jn 4,8) and love is God,
and so you are really in love with God. And then, God's love is
infinite. But part is to love and to give until it hurts. And that's
why it's not how much you do, but how much love you put into the
action. How much love we put in our presents. That's why people – maybe
they are very rich people – who have not got a capacity to give and to
receive lover are the poorest of the poor.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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In moments
of disappointment, that soul said to Our Lord: ``My Jesus, what else
could I give you apart from my honour, if I had nothing else? If I had
had a fortune I would have given it to you. If I had had virtues, I
would have built up each one to serve you better. The only thing I had
was my honour and I have given it to you. May you be blessed! It's
clear that it was safe in your hands!''
(The Forge,
no.1052)
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What sins are gravely opposed to the sacrament of Matrimony?
Adultery and polygamy are opposed to the
sacrament of matrimony because they contradict the equal dignity of man
and woman and the unity and exclusivity of married love. Other sins
include the deliberate refusal of one’s procreative potential which
deprives conjugal love of the gift of children and divorce which goes
against the indissolubility of marriage. (CCC 1645-1648)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.347)
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Saturday
of the Third Week of Lent II
(March 17) St Patrick, bishop
(about 385-361) Born in Great Britain (or perhaps Scotland), as
a youth he was taken captive to Ireland as a slave and worked as a
herdsman. After making his escape he wished to become a priest and
after being made Bishop for Ireland he was untiring in preaching the
Gospel and he converted many to the Catholic Faith. In addition he
organized the Church throughout Ireland. It is believed that he died in
461, and was buried at Downpatrick. He would have been a contemporary
of Pope Leo the Great. (Saints)
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Scripture today:
Hosea
6:1-6; Psalm 51:3-4, 18-21ab; Luke
18:9-14
Jesus addressed
this parable to those who were convinced of their own righteousness and
despised everyone else. “Two people went up to the temple area to pray;
one was a Pharisee and the other was a tax collector. The Pharisee took
up his position and spoke this prayer to himself, ‘O God, I thank you
that I am not like the rest of humanity— greedy, dishonest, adulterous
( or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, and I pay
tithes on my whole income.’ But the tax collector stood off at a
distance and would not even raise his eyes to heaven but beat his
breast and prayed, ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner.’ I tell you, the
latter went home justified, not the former; for everyone who exalts
himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be
exalted.” (Luke 18:9-14)
In the collection
of his
Sermon
Notes — which is a book of sermon points preached during his Catholic years
— Cardinal Newman states that the prayer of the publican in this parable
of today expresses the essence of religion. In various of his other
writings Newman makes the point that the best expression
of
the religion of a person enlightened as
to his sinfulness is an acknowledgement of sinfulness and an
appeal to God for mercy. It is this faith in God’s loving mercy and not
in his own deeds that will save him. So in Newman’s account man is
saved by faith, and this faith involves a sense of personal sin and
trust in the mercy of God. Our
Gospel passage today (Luke 18:9-14) is important because in
its parable our Lord tells us that the publican “went home justified,
and not the former”. The one went away saved, the other remained in his
sins. The Pharisee placed his faith in himself and in doing so had no
contact with God. He, a blind sinner, thus remained alienated from God.
The publican cast himself on the mercy of God and in doing so went
beyond himself and was reconciled with God. The wonderful good news of
the Gospel is that in his mercy God will and does pardon us if we turn
back to him. God is revealed as rich in mercy, and so our appeal for
mercy is not just a leap of blind trust. Revelation teaches us that we
have every reason to entrust our selves to God even though we are
sinners. The message of the Church is, be reconciled with God even
though you are a sinner. If you go to him acknowledging your sins and
asking for reconciliation, he will indeed embrace you. The faith of the
sinner who asks God for mercy is well founded because it is based on
actual revelation.
The whole of our
Lord’s person and ministry revealed this fundamental pattern. He
continually showed forth the mercy of God, healing the sick, casting
out demons from those possessed, raising the dead, calling sinners to
friendship with God and with him, and preaching the good news of the
Kingdom to those desirous of receiving it. It was a vast errand of
mercy, and such is the God who revealed himself to sinful man. God
shows his almighty power in being merciful. But the special
object of the divine mercy is not just the afflicted, but especially
the sinner because sin is the greatest affliction of all. God sent his
Son to take away the sin of the world, and John the Baptist pointed out
our Lord to his disciples as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of
the world. There was no length God was not prepared to go to do this,
and the Passion and Death of Jesus his Son is the great ikon and
evidence of God’s merciful love. The publican in our Lord’s parable was
not uttering a Christian prayer, for he did not know Christ. But we do.
We know the full extent of God’s mercy by knowing Christ and so we can
with even greater reason appeal to the mercy of God. So then, one of
our most favourite prayers ought be that of the publican, but said with
a new and higher meaning: “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” (Luke 18:9-14)
If the publican had
reason to be conscious of his sins, how much more do we have reason to
be conscious of our sins, we who have come to know the love of the
Father in Christ. If the publican appealed to the mercy of God, how
much more have we reason to appeal to the divine mercy.
How wonderful it is
that so much of our Lord’s teaching is contained in stories! The story
our Lord told of the Pharisee and the Publican both praying in the
temple shows us what brings us to God and what does not. St Paul writes
in one of his Letters: “Be reconciled to God!” The publican was
reconciled to God, while the pharisee was not. Let our prayer be like
that of the publican, full of a contrite sense of sin and yet full of
trust in the divine mercy.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Never go to bed before having
first examined your conscience to
consider how you spent your day. Turn all your thoughts towards the
Lord and consecrate your person to him as well as all the Christians.
Then offer to his glory the sleep you will get, without ever forgetting
your guardian angel, who is always at your side.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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It is from
clay I come and the earth is the inheritance of all my lineage.
Who but God deserves praise?
(The Forge,
no.1053)
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When does the Church allow the physical
separation of spouses?
The Church permits the physical
separation of spouses when for serious reasons their living together
becomes practically impossible, even though there may be hope for their
reconciliation. As long as one’s spouse lives, however, one is not free
to contract a new union, except if the marriage be null and be declared
so by ecclesiastical authority. (CCC 1629, 1649)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.348)
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Fourth Sunday of Lent C
(March 18) St
Cyril of Jerusalem, bishop and doctor of the Church (315-386).
He is mainly known for his Catecheses. His instructions, which are
still extant, show conclusively that Catholic doctrine is the same then
as now. Arian heretics exiled him three times.(Saints)
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Scripture today: Joshua 5:9a,
10-12; Psalm 34:2-7; 2
Corinthians 5:17-21; Luke 15:1-3, 11-32
Tax collectors and
sinners were all drawing near to listen to Jesus, but the Pharisees and
scribes began to complain, saying, “This man welcomes sinners and eats
with them.” So to them Jesus addressed this parable: “A man had two
sons, and the younger son said to his father, ‘Father give me the share
of your estate that should come to me.’ So the father divided the
property between them. After a few days, the younger son collected all
his belongings and set off to a distant country where he squandered his
inheritance on a life of dissipation. When he had freely spent
everything, a severe famine struck that country, and he found himself
in dire need. So he hired himself out to one of the local citizens who
sent him to his farm to tend the swine. And he longed to eat his fill
of the pods on which the swine fed, but nobody gave him any. Coming to
his senses he thought, ‘How many of my father’s hired workers have more
than enough food to eat, but here am I, dying from hunger. I shall get
up and go to my father and I shall say to him, “Father, I have sinned
against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your
son; treat me as you would treat one of your hired workers.”’ So he got
up and went back to his father. While he was still a long way off, his
father caught sight of him, and was filled with compassion. He ran to
his son, embraced him and kissed him. His son said to him, ‘Father, I
have sinned against heaven and against you; I no longer deserve to be
called your son.’ But his father ordered his servants, ‘Quickly bring
the finest robe and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals
on his feet. Take the fattened calf and slaughter it. Then let us
celebrate with a feast, because this son of mine was dead, and has come
to life again; he was lost, and has been found.’ Then the celebration
began. Now the older son had been out in the field and, on his way
back, as he neared the house, he heard the sound of music and dancing.
He called one of the servants and asked what this might mean. The
servant said to him, ‘Your brother has returned and your father has
slaughtered the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’
He became angry, and when he refused to enter the house, his father
came out and pleaded with him. He said to his father in reply, ‘Look,
all these years I served you and not once did I disobey your orders;
yet you never gave me even a young goat to feast on with my friends.
But when your son returns who swallowed up your property with
prostitutes, for him you slaughter the fattened calf.’ He said to him,
‘My son, you are here with me always; everything I have is yours. But
now we must celebrate and rejoice, because your brother was dead and
has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.’” (Luke 15:1-3,
11-32)
The parable which
makes up today’s Gospel is usually called the parable of the prodigal
son. This stands to reason because most of the focus is on the younger
dissolute son who finally returned to his very indulgent father. This
focus reflects that of our Lord in the actual
Gospel scene. His focus
was on the tax collectors and sinners who “were all drawing near to
listen to Jesus”. Moreover, they do not just happen to draw near
to
him, but, as the scribes and Pharisees complain, Jesus “welcomes
sinners and eats with them.” Our Lord was preoccupied with the tax
collectors and sinners and he loved to have them come to him and be
with him. Hence it is that the focus of the parable is on the sinful
and dissolute son who squandered all that his father in his goodness
gave him. But of course the parable is occasioned by the
complaint of the Pharisees and scribes not about the tax collectors and
the sinners, but about Jesus himself. They complained about his
attitude to sinners. He welcomed them and associated with them, the
implication being that what he was doing was most unlike the attitude
of the all-holy God. Perhaps part of the hostility they felt was due to
the fact that our Lord was not courting them — rather, he was courting
the “sinners.” We have here at play two very different images of the
all-holy God who requires that we seek holiness. “Be holy, for I am
holy”, God says in the Old Testament. The surprise of the New Testament
is that God is revealed as a God who seeks out to save those who are
lost. He does not simply command and then condemn the blameworthy. He
is not simply all holy in his distant transcendence, near indeed but
altogether beyond. No, he hastens in love to the
afflicted.
The holiness of God
is not the holiness of a Master but rather of a Father. The
characteristic image of holiness we ought have is that of the father in
the parable running to his son to embrace him. That is what holiness is
like: it is a running in love to embrace the afflicted person. The
greatest affliction in the universe is the universal affliction of sin,
and it has brought death and mayhem to every nook and cranny of the
human condition. God has come running to help us and to take away our
sin. He has been like the father in the parable who, while his son was
still a long way off, “caught sight of him, and was filled with
compassion. He ran to his son, embraced him and kissed him.” (Luke 15:1-3,
11-32)That is the pattern
played out in salvation history. God called Abraham and his plan was
that through him all the nations of the earth would be blessed. He
revealed himself to Moses and sent him to bring the children of Israel
out of slavery to the promised land. He established a unique covenant
with his people. As the prophets taught, he was a husband to his
people. Finally he sent his Son to take upon his shoulders the burden
of the world’s sin and by his death and resurrection expiated for it
and opened the gates of heaven to sinful man. This is the one true God,
the God who stands revealed in the person of Jesus Christ his divine
Son made man. All those who wish to be his children, all those who wish
to participate in the work that God has done and continues to do, must
join with Christ in loving sinful humanity and endeavouring in him to
reclaim man from his sin. If we wish to belong to Christ we too must be
found welcoming sinners and eating with them, knowing that we are to be
counted among them.
What our parable
today teaches us is that God is love. The world and its religions may
well concur with this, while at the same time failing to realize it. If
we say that God is love, a love that is compassionate and merciful, we
shall be found conducting a jihad not against those we consider to be
“tax collectors and sinners”, but against our own sinfulness. Our jihad
will be against the tendency in ourselves to be like the elder son.
Christ is the image of the unseen God, and he who sees him sees the
Father. Christ welcoming sinners and eating with them is the revelation
of what the Father has done to us, and of what he wants us to do to
others.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“We had
to celebrate… This brother of yours
was dead, and has come back to life.” (Luke 15:1-3, 11-32)
St Romanos the
Melodious (?
– 560), Composer of hymns (Hymn 28, The Prodigal Child)
The older son said to his father
in anger: “I constantly obeyed your orders, without disobeying a single
one… and the prodigal one comes back to you, and you make more of him
than of me!”
The father had only just heard his son
speak in this way, when he gently answered: “Listen to your father. You
are with me, for you never distanced yourself from me; you did not
separate yourself from the Church; you are always present at my side
together with all my angels. But this one has come covered with shame,
naked and with no beauty, crying: “Have mercy on me! I have sinned,
Father, and as one who is guilty, I implore you. Accept me as a day
laborer and feed me, for you love human beings, Lord and master of the
ages.”
“Your brother cried out: ‘Save me, holy
Father!’… How could I not have mercy, not save my son who was moaning
and sobbing? … Judge me, you who blame me… At all times, it is my joy
to love human beings… They are my creatures: how could I not have mercy
on them? How could I not have compassion when they repent? My entrails
have brought forth this child on whom I had mercy, I who am the Lord
and master of the ages.
“Everything I have is yours, my son… The
fortune you have has not been diminished by this, for I don’t take away
from it when I give your brother gifts… I am the one and only creator
of both of you, the one and only father who is good, loving and
merciful. I honor you, my son, for you have always loved and served me.
And on him I have compassion, for he is surrendering entirely to his
repentance. So you should share the joy of all whom I have invited, I,
the Lord and master of the ages.
“Thus, my son, rejoice with all who have
been invited to the banquet, and mingle your songs with those of all
the angels, for your brother was lost and now he has been found again,
he was dead and contrary to all expectations, he has risen.” The older
son let himself be persuaded by these words, and he sang: “Everyone,
cry out with joy! ‘Happy is he whose fault is taken away, whose sin is
covered.’ (Ps 32:1) I praise you, O friend of humankind, you who also
saved my brother, you, the Lord and master of the ages.”
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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When you
feel self-love — pride! — stirring within you, making you out to be a
superman, it is time to cry out: No! In this way you will savour the
joy of the good son of God who goes through life with not a few faults,
but doing good.
(The Forge,
no.1054)
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What is the attitude of the Church toward those people who are divorced
and then remarried?
The Church, since she
is faithful to her Lord, cannot recognize the union of people who are
civilly divorced and remarried. “Whoever divorces his wife and marries
another, commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband
and marries another, she commits adultery” (Mark 10:11-12). The Church
manifests an attentive solicitude toward such people and encourages
them to a life of faith, prayer, works of charity and the Christian
education of their children. However, they cannot receive sacramental
absolution, take Holy Communion, or exercise certain ecclesial
responsibilities as long as their situation, which objectively
contravenes God's law, persists. (CCC 1650-1651, 1665)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.349)
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Solemnity
of Saint Joseph, husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary
(March 19) St
Joseph is considered as the second greatest saint, next
to the blessed Virgin Mary, because of his humility and his closeness
to Jesus as the foster father of our Lord. Scripture tells us that
Joseph was just, pure, gentle, prudent and unfailingly obedient to the
divine will. He died in the presence of Jesus and Mary. We wish to
imitate him by renewing our desire to be faithful. We know that the
only meaning of our life is to be faithful to the Lord till the last as
Joseph was. Pope Pius IX named him as Patron of the Universal Church
and Pope John XXIII included his name in the Roman Canon.(Saints)
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Scripture today: 2 Samuel 7:4-5a,
12-14a,
16; Psalm 89:2-5, 27 and 29;
Rom 4:13,
16-18,
22;
Matt 1:16, 18-21, 24a
Jacob was the
father of Joseph, the husband of Mary. Of her was born
Jesus who is called the Christ. 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.” When
Joseph awoke, he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him and
took his wife into his home. (Matthew 1:16,
18-21, 24a)
One of the
perennial problems of ordinary man is his recurring sense of
the seeming insignificance of his life. So much of his life is
small-time, as it were. There seems to be so little in his life that is
of note. He has one short life, and he longs to make the best of it. He
is uncertain how this is to
be done and as life proceeds there is so
much failure and seeming mediocrity in what he is doing and in those
around him. He is surrounded by circumstances that deal with him
inconsiderately, and perhaps he never gets the break that he needs and
that others seem to get. There is so much that is puzzling and so many
things happen to him that are not fair. And sohis life never looks
like gaining the grandeur he feels he is called to in some obscure way.
What is the sense of it? It is not hard to understand why in our
Western society and culture in which the certitudes of religion have
been eroded, a fundamental cynicism and scepticism has shaped much of
modern philosophy. Relativism and doubt have sapped the strength of the
modern secular mind, rendering it very vulnerable to doubt-free world
views such as the Islamic one. Now, in fact, the Christian message
brings wonderful good news to the Everyman of each generation. His
ordinary life is capable of attaining a great grandeur and that
grandeur is holiness in Christ. The Church points to the two shining
jewels of our race as proof of the greatness of the ordinary, proof
that the small can be beautiful. Those two shining gems are Mary the
mother of Christ, and Joseph her husband and his foster-father. Their
lives were buried in obscurity and yet their holiness was greater than
that of any others under God.
Today we celebrate
the life of Joseph the husband of Mary. Our Gospel
passage today
(Matthew 1:16, 18-21, 24a), together with its
alternative
(Luke
2:41-51a),
describe a man in an obscure village in a backwater of
the world, a man and a setting which would never have made the halls of
fame were it not for God’s intervention. He was an ordinary carpenter
betrothed to and in due course married to an ordinary young woman — ordinary in the world’s sense of the word. They did not do
extraordinary things, nor were the circumstances of their lives out of
the ordinary. He was a working man and a husband-to-be. His village was
not regarded particularly well, and he lived out his life doing what
his own community regarded as very ordinary things. When Jesus returned
to his native town after having begun his public ministry, his
townspeople said of him, “Is not this the carpenter’s son and are not
his (relatives) here with us?” Yes, Joseph lived a very “ordinary” life
with all its frustrations, disappointments and trials. But in the midst
of this ordinariness there was a great and extraordinary Presence, the
presence of the Son of God made man. Moreover, in the midst of all the
ordinariness, Joseph was growing in an extraordinary way. He was
fulfilling all his ordinary duties in an extraordinarily holy fashion.
He was doing all things well, such that were God his Father to have
made his judgment known, he would have said of him that in him he was
well pleased. We know this because of the mind and the judgment of the
Church which holds Joseph in the highest veneration. After Mary the
Church has held Joseph to be the holiest of saints, great before God.
While we are the
children of Mary the Mother of God, he is her husband.
Joseph the husband of Mary is the protector of the Universal Church,
and the lesson of his humble and ordinary life ought be an inspiration
especially to modern secular man. He surely teaches the potential
grandeur of the ordinary life. By living our ordinary life in the
service of the unseen God in our midst we can attain true holiness.
That holiness gives to life its grandeur. Let us go to Joseph and ask
him to teach us how to live a life of dedication to God the holy
Trinity and to Mary our Mother.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Saint
Joseph, Patron of the Church Leo XIII,
pope from 1878 to 1903 (Quanquam pluries)
Joseph became the guardian, the
administrator, and the legal defender of the divine house whose chief
he was. And during the whole course of his life he fulfilled those
charges and those duties. He set himself to protect with a mighty love
and a daily solicitude his spouse and the Divine Infant; regularly by
his work he earned what was necessary for the one and the other for
nourishment and clothing; he guarded from death the Child threatened by
a monarch's jealousy…; in the miseries of the journey and in the
bitternesses of exile he was ever the companion, the assistance, and
the upholder of the Virgin and of Jesus.
Now the divine house which Joseph ruled
with the authority of a father, contained within its limits the
scarce-born Church. From the same fact that the most holy Virgin is the
mother of Jesus Christ is she the mother of all Christians whom she
bore on Mount Calvary amid the supreme throes of the Redemption; Jesus
Christ is, in a manner, the first-born of Christians, who by the
adoption and Redemption are his brothers. (Rm 8:29)
And for such reasons the Blessed
Patriarch looks upon the multitude of Christians who make up the Church
as confided specially to his trust — this limitless family spread over
the earth, over which, because he is the spouse of Mary and the Father
of Jesus Christ he holds, as it were, a paternal authority. It is,
then, natural and worthy that as the Blessed Joseph ministered to all
the needs of the family at Nazareth and girt it about with his
protection, he should now cover with the cloak of his heavenly
patronage and defend the Church of Jesus Christ.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Sancta
Maria, Stella maris — Holy Mary, Star of the sea, be our guide.
Make this firm request, because
there is no storm which can shipwreck
the most Sweet Heart of Mary. When you see the storm coming, if you
seek safety in that firm Refuge which is Mary, there will be no danger
of your wavering or going down.
(The Forge,
no.1055)
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Why is the Christian family called a
domestic church?
The Christian family is called the
domestic church because the family
manifests and lives out the communal and familial nature of the Church
as the family of God. Each family member, in accord with their own
role, exercises the baptismal priesthood and contributes toward making
the family a community of grace and of prayer, a school of human and
Christian virtue and the place where the faith is first proclaimed to
children. (CCC 1655-1658, 1666)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.350)
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Tuesday
of the Fourth Week of Lent II
(March 20) Today let us think
of St Cuthbert (Saints) See
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Scripture today: Ezechiel 47:1-9,
12; Psalm 46:2-3, 5-6, 8-9;
John 5:1-16
There was a feast
of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem
at the Sheep Gate a pool called in Hebrew Bethesda, with five
porticoes. In these lay a large number of ill, blind, lame, and
crippled. One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years.
When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been ill for a long
time, he said to him, “Do you want to be well?” The sick man answered
him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is
stirred up; while I am on my way, someone else gets down there before
me.” Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your mat, and walk.” Immediately
the man became well, took up his mat, and walked. Now that day was a
sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who was cured, “It is the sabbath,
and it is not lawful for you to carry your mat.” He answered them, “The
man who made me well told me, ‘Take up your mat and walk.’” They asked
him, “Who is the man who told you, ‘Take it up and walk’?” The man who
was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had slipped away, since
there was a crowd there. After this Jesus found him in the temple area
and said to him, “Look, you are well; do not sin any more, so that
nothing worse may happen to you.” The man went and told the Jews that
Jesus was the one who had made him well. Therefore, the Jews began to
persecute Jesus because he did this on a sabbath. (John 5:1-16)
There is a detail
in our Gospel passage today that repays some reflection. Our scene
places us with Jesus and the crippled man at the Sheep Gate in
Jerusalem. Our Lord saw him lying there and St John tells us that he
knew he had been ill for a long time. Let us fill out
the scene by speculating a little.
Perhaps St John was in our Lord’s company while this was happening, and
perhaps our Lord told him
that the crippled man
had been ill there for thirty eight years. Perhaps too our Lord had
seen the crippled man at the Sheep Gate as a boy when he
began to
accompany his parents every year to the Temple in Jerusalem. Maybe Mary
or Joseph had told him that the man had been there for many years
already. Who knows! In any case our Lord shows his interest in him and
is familiar with his history, even though prior to this they had not
met. The detail we ought notice, though, is that our Lord stopped in
front of him and asked him an important question. It was, “Do you want
to be well?” Why did our Lord ask him this? It may be that the
man had by then given up on being well, and had lost his instinctive
desire to do anything much with his life. The answer he gave our Lord
looks like an excuse for making little effort. Whatever about that
speculation, our Lord asked the question, and so the question is
important. Having asked the question and having received something of
an affirmative answer our Lord proceeds to cure him. Our Lord need not
have stopped to cure this man, but he did. It was a spontaneous act of
compassion and power for an individual in need which transformed the
man’s physical life. We do not get the impression that it led to any
particular loyalty towards Jesus on the man’s part, and he seems even
to have helped the Jewish authorities a little. Having been helped by
Jesus, he vanishes from the story. But the detail that is worth
considering is that our Lord’s contact with him began with his very
specific question.
“When Jesus
saw him lying there and knew that he had been ill for a long time, he
said to him, ‘Do you want to be well?’”
(John
5:1-16). The
living risen Jesus notices each one of us too. In fact, he is
constantly observing each of us every moment of our lives, for we are
in his hands. The same Jesus who addressed himself to this sick person
whom he knew to have been ill for a long time and who perhaps lacked
much of the will to be in full health, addresses himself to each of us.
This same Jesus who is the Saviour of the world, the one Redeemer of
man, the only way to the Father and the source of the gift of the
Spirit of God to sinful and broken humanity, this Jesus directs the
same question to each of us: “Do you want to be well?”. St Paul tells
us in one of his Letters that before the foundation of the world, God
chose each of us in Christ to be holy and full of love in his sight. He
sent his Son to become man like us and to redeem us from our fallen and
wounded condition. He offers each of us the riches of what he has done,
and he sees each of us lying in our spiritually debilitated condition.
The question is, do we want what God has to offer? Do we want to drink
of the living water, the water which St John in his Gospel tells us is
the Holy Spirit, that water which when we receive it will become a
spring inside us welling up to eternal life? As our Lord said to the
Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well, “If you only knew what God is
offering”. It is said that the sister of St Thomas Aquinas once
asked him what is required for a person to be a saint. He is
reputed to have said, “You need to want it!” We need to want what God
wants to give us. Our Lord never forced his benefits on others — a
reading of the Gospels suggests that he generally waited to be
asked.
The great blessing
which the Holy Spirit brings us is the real possibility of personal
sanctity in Christ. But we must want it. We must want to make Christ
our Lord and Master, our true Friend. That has to be the choice of our
life, and Christ when he passes by will not force himself on us. Let us
then hear his question as directed to us, “do you want to be well, well
in the way God wants you to be well?” Let us hear that question every
day, and let us resolve to answer it with vigour, choosing to make
Christ our life.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Saint Maxim of Turin
(?-about 420), bishop (Sermon for Lent;
Sermon 50, p.202-204)
In the Old Testament we read that
at the time of Noah, since the entire human race was corrupt and full
of lawlessness, the floodgates of the sky were opened and for forty
days heavy rain poured down on the earth; symbolically, the earth
received the water for forty days. It is more a baptism that it
received rather than a flood: a baptism that washed away the sinners'
iniquity and saved Noah's justice. In the same way then the Lord
today, as at that time, gives us this time of Lent so that during the
same number of days, the floodgates may open and flood us with the
flood waters of God's mercy. And once washed by the salutary waters of
baptism, the sacrament will illuminate us; as in the past, the waters
will take away the iniquity of our sins and confirm the justice of our
virtues.
The situation of today is similar to the
one at the time of Noah. The baptism is a flood for the sinner and a
consecration for those who are faithful. In baptism the Lord saves
justice and destroys injustice. We see this clearly through the
example of the apostle Paul: before being purified by the spiritual
precepts, he was a persecutor and blasphemer. Once washed by the
heavenly rain of baptism, the blasphemer died as well as the persecutor
and Saul too; only then did Paul, the apostle, the just one, come to
life ...Anybody who lives Lent religiously and respects the Lord's
commandments, will see sin die in him and grace live; he will die as a
sinner and live as a just man, just as if one succeeded the other.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Read these counsels slowly. Pause to
meditate their meaning. They are things that I whisper in your ear, as
a friend, as a brother, as a father. We shall speak intimately; and God
will be listening to us. I am going to tell you nothing new. I shall
only stir your memory so that some thought may arise and strike you:
and so your life will improve and you will set out along the way of
prayer and of Love. And in the end you will become a soul of worth.
(Preface to The
Way, by St Jose Maria Escriva)
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What are the main moments in
funerals?
Usually, funeral rites consist
of four principal parts: welcoming the
body of the deceased by the community with words of comfort and hope,
the liturgy of the Word, the Eucharistic Sacrifice, and the farewell in
which the soul of the departed is entrusted to God, the Source of
eternal life, while the body is buried in the hope of the resurrection.
(CCC 1686-1690)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.356)
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Wednesday
of the Fourth Week of Lent II
(March 21) Today let us think
of St Euda (Saints) See
also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Isaiah
49:8-15; Psalm 145:8-9, 13cd-14,
17-18; John 5:17-30
Jesus answered the
Jews: “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.” For this
reason they tried all the more to kill him, because he not only broke
the sabbath but he also called God his own father, making himself equal
to God. Jesus answered and said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, the
Son cannot do anything on his own, but only what he sees the Father
doing; for what he does, the Son will do also. For the Father loves the
Son and shows him everything that he himself does, and he will show him
greater works than these, so that you may be amazed. For just as the
Father raises the dead and gives life, so also does the Son give life
to whomever he wishes. Nor does the Father judge anyone, but he has
given all judgment to the Son, so that all may honor the Son just as
they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor
the Father who sent him. Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever hears my
word and believes in the one who sent me has eternal life and will not
come to condemnation, but has passed from death to life. Amen, amen, I
say to you, the hour is coming and is now here when the dead will hear
the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. For just as
the Father has life in himself, so also he gave to the Son the
possession of life in himself. And he gave him power to exercise
judgment, because he is the Son of Man. Do not be amazed at this,
because the hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs will hear
his voice and will come out, those who have done good deeds to the
resurrection of life, but those who have done wicked deeds to the
resurrection of condemnation. “I cannot do anything on my own; I judge
as I hear, and my judgment is just, because I do not seek my own will
but the will of the one who sent me.” (John 5:17-30)
I think we could
say that Christ is all but universally respected. No one in the world
would say that Christ was a bad person, and were anyone to say that he
was anything but good that person’s common sense would be dismissed as
beyond consideration. Christ is regarded as sinless, although the true
significance of this would be contested. Now, if Christ’s moral stature
is accepted, what is to be made of his
claims? Islam accepts
Jesus as being a holy prophet (though not as great a prophet as
Mahomet), yet certainly not the Son of God nor as divine. But Christ
claimed precisely to be divine and he was clearly understood as
claiming this. In our Gospel passage today from the Gospel of St John
our Lord answered the Jews, “..’My Father is at work until now,
so
I am at work.’ For this reason they tried all the more to kill him,
because he not only broke the sabbath but he also called God his own
father, making himself equal to God.” If God his Father was doing
certain things, he too did them. He did the things God did. “For
just as the Father raises the dead and gives life, so also does the Son
give life to whomever he wishes. Nor does the Father judge anyone, but
he has given all judgment to the Son, so that all may honor the Son
just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not
honor the Father who sent him”
(John
5:17-30).
The way he spoke of God, the things he said he would do and had every
right to do, made it very clear to the leaders of the Jews that he was
“making himself equal to God.” No other prophet before him made such
claims, and it was for this that he was sentenced to death. His death
was a bearing witness to the truth about himself as the Son of God made
man and the Redeemer of the world. As far as I am aware no other
religious leader in the history of the world who commands the respect
of the peoples made the claims about his own person that Christ made — and certainly not Mahomet. Yet despite Christ’s moral stature, so many
do not take his extraordinary claims seriously.
But the authentic
Christian takes Christ’s claims with the utmost seriousness. This
acceptance of his teaching is the expression of faith in his person. It
means that there once walked the earth a man who was not merely a man
but was at the same time God. Oh, the wonder of the Incarnation! I
remember when I watched the movie produced by Mel Gibson — The Passion
of the Christ — I thought not primarily of the terrible character of
Christ’s passion, but of the fact that the one enduring it was the very
Son of God. In the scene following Christ’s scourging, he lay collapsed
on the pavement where he had been scourged. His body was beaten beyond
belief. The stunning aspect of this was that there was God lying on the
ground, God exhausted in his human nature. It is an extraordinary claim
and it is repeated by the Church generation after generation as she
invites the world to faith in him who by his death redeemed the
world. For this reason day after day the Christian comes before
the living Christ in prayer, and the Catholic regularly approaches him
in the Sacraments of Penance and the Eucharist as well, knowing that
there is no treasure to compare with him. As our Lord said at the Last
Supper, to know him and the Father who sent him is eternal life.
We ought spend quality time each day simply with our Lord contemplating
him in his humanity and in his divinity. He is one divine person who
lives forever now in two distinct natures, the divine and the human. He
is God and he is man. He is the Son of the Father and he is the Son of
Mary. Does it not stand to reason that he asked of his disciples that
they leave all to follow him? And how sad it was that cases occurred in
the Scriptures, to be repeated in every generation, of those who
refused to do so, even to the point of betraying him.
Let us allow the
truth of the Incarnation of the Son of God sink deeply into our minds
and our hearts, and shape every nook and cranny of our life. Our life
is to be lived on the basis that the Incarnation is a fact, and a fact
to be brought to the attention of every man and woman on the face of
the earth. Nothing is more important than that it be accepted. Our
Lord’s final charge to his disciples was that they preach the Good News
to all creation, making disciples of all. Let that be the work of our
life.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Jesus
called loudly, "Lazarus, come out!"
(Jn 11,43)
Saint Augustine
(354-430), bishop of Hippo (North Africa) and doctor of the Church
(Tractate 49 on
the Gospel of John, 1-3)
Among all the miracles wrought by our
Lord Jesus Christ, the resurrection of Lazarus holds a foremost place
in preaching. But if we consider attentively who did it, our duty is to
rejoice rather than to wonder. A man was raised up by Him who made man:
for He is the only One of the Father, by whom, as you know, all things
were made. And if all things were made by Him, what wonder is it that
one was raised by Him, when so many are daily brought into the world by
His power?...
Thou hast just heard that the Lord Jesus
raised a dead man to life; and that is sufficient to let thee know
that, were He so pleased, He might raise all the dead to life. And,
indeed this very work has He reserved in His own hands till the end of
the world. For while you have heard that by a great miracle He raised
one from the tomb who had been dead four days, "the hour is coming," as
He Himself saith, "in the which all that are in the graves shall hear
His voice, and shall come forth." He raised one who was putrid, and yet
in that putrid carcase there was still the form of limbs; but at the
last day He will by a word reconstitute ashes into human flesh. But it
was needful then to do only some such deeds, that we, receiving them as
tokens of His power, may put our trust in Him, and be preparing for
that resurrection which shall be to life and not to judgment. So,
indeed, He saith, "The hour is coming, in the which all that are in the
graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done
good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto
the resurrection of damnation."...
If we turn our thoughts to the still
more wonderful works of Christ, every one that believeth riseth again:
if we all consider, and understand that more horrifying kind of death,
every one who sinneth dies. But every man is afraid of the death of the
flesh; few, of the death of the soul. In regard to the death of the
flesh, which must certainly come some time, all are on their guard
against its approach: this is the source of all their labor. Man,
destined to die, labors to avert his dying; and yet man, destined to
live for ever, labors not to cease from sinning. And when he labors to
avoid dying, he labors to no purpose, for its only result will be to
put off death for a while, not to escape it; but if he refrain from
sinning, his toil will cease, and he shall live for ever. Oh that we
could arouse men, and be ourselves aroused along with them, to be as
great lovers of the life that abideth, as men are of that which passeth
away!
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Don't let your life be barren. Be useful.
Make yourself felt. Shine forth with the torch of your faith and your
love.
With your apostolic life, wipe
out the trail of filth and slime left by
the corrupt sowers of hatred. And set aflame all the ways of the earth
with the fire of Christ that you bear in your heart.
(The Way,
no.1)
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How is the Christian moral life bound up with faith and the
sacraments?
What the symbol of faith
professes, the sacraments communicate. Indeed,
through them the faithful receive the grace of Christ and the gifts of
the Holy Spirit which give them the capability of living a new life as
children of God in Christ whom they have received in faith.
“O Christian,
recognize your dignity.” (Saint Leo the Great) (CCC 1691-1698)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.357)
--------------------------------(Back
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Thursday
of the Fourth Week of Lent II
(March 22) Today let us
think of St Nicholas Owen,
St Lea (Saints)
See also this Website's
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Particular Day
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Scripture today:
Exodus
32:7-14; Psalm
106:19-23; John 5:31-47
Jesus said to the
Jews: “If I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is not true. But
there is another who testifies on my behalf, and I know that the
testimony he gives on my behalf is true. You sent emissaries to John,
and he testified to the truth. I do not accept human testimony, but I
say this so that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining lamp,
and for a while you were content to rejoice in his light. But I have
testimony greater than John’s. The works that the Father gave me to
accomplish, these works that I perform testify on my behalf that the
Father has sent me. Moreover, the Father who sent me has testified on
my behalf. But you have never heard his voice nor seen his form, and
you do not have his word remaining in you, because you do not believe
in the one whom he has sent. You search the Scriptures, because you
think you have eternal life through them; even they testify on my
behalf. But you do not want to come to me to have life. I do not accept
human praise; moreover, I know that you do not have the love of God in
you. I came in the name of my Father, but you do not accept me; yet if
another comes in his own name, you will accept him. How can you
believe, when you accept praise from one another and do not seek the
praise that comes from the only God? Do not think that I will accuse
you before the Father: the one who will accuse you is Moses, in whom
you have placed your hope. For if you had believed Moses, you would
have believed me, because he wrote about me. But if you do not believe
his writings, how will you believe my words?” (John 5:31-47)
The Gospel passage
today, as with very many other passages in the Gospel of St John, gives
us a shining testimony of the relationship between Jesus and the
Father. In simple and very sure language our Lord describes the
interaction between himself and the almighty Father. His relationship
with the Father is utterly unique, and great as was the testimony given
by the Father to John the Baptist, that given to Jesus is far the
greater. The Father has testified
to him: “The works that the Father gave me to accomplish, these works
that I perform testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me.
Moreover, the Father who sent me has testified on my behalf.” (John 5:31-47) We should try to enter
the
mind of Christ by contemplating his person and the words he utters, and
entering into that utterance, to sense the intimacy between him and the
Father. Christ has seen the Father’s “form”, and “heard his voice.”
Whereas, our Lord tells the leaders of the Jews who were hostile to
him, they have “never heard his voice nor seen his form, and you do
not have his word remaining in you.” Christ knows the Father directly,
face to face. He knows him through and through. There is nothing of the
Father which the Son does not know, nor of the Son which the Father
does not know. The Son knows all that the Father has to say, and is the
fount of all knowledge of God. His knowledge of God is not deduced,
worked
out, demonstrated, or received from any other authority visible or
invisible. His knowledge of the Father comes from direct personal
knowledge of the Father's person. All the books ever written about God,
about the divine, about the powers above, cannot remotely compare with
the knowledge Jesus Christ has of the Father. It is direct, immediate,
concrete and it is revealed in direct, immediate and concrete language.
By means of baptism
the Christian is drawn into the life of the Blessed Trinity. We gain a
glimpse of this life, this intimate relationship between the Father and
the Son in the Holy Spirit, by means of passages such as the one
assigned by the Church for the Gospel of today. It would be a very good
thing to slowly read the entire Gospel of St John with a view to
entering into this unique relationship which by the power of the Holy
Spirit binds the Father with the Son. We have been given the gift of
that same Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit when he comes to us with his
grace immerses us in this divine life and these divine relationships.
The Father becomes our
Father by divine adoption. The Son becomes our brother, and the Holy
Spirit becomes our Friend, Guide and Sustainer. Everything, though,
hinges on one thing. We must come to Jesus if we are to have this
life. He came, he tells us, to give life, life in abundance and that
life is the life he lives by. It is the life of God the most holy
Trinity. Our access to it comes from going to Jesus. We must go to hm,
accept his testimony, believe in him and choose to belong to him. We
must never leave him. By God’s choice of us, we belong to him but we
must ratify by our free decision this choice God has made of us from
before the foundation of the world. Before the world began, God chose
us in Christ to be holy and full of love in his sight. We must accept
this vocation and live according to it. Our Lord tells his
interlocutors that “You search the Scriptures, because you think you
have eternal life through them; even they testify on my behalf. But you
do not want to come to me to have life.” (John 5:31-47)
Let us, then, come to
Jesus in order to have life. As St John writes in his Prologue, in him
there was life, and that life was the light of men.
We read elsewhere
in the Gospel our Lord’s invitation: “Come to me all you who labour and
are heavy burdened and I will give you rest.” Christ is our happiness
and that happiness is the joy of God. In being immersed in Christ, we
are immersed in the most holy Trinity. Let us look on Christ as our
treasure and our glory for as St Paul writes, in him we receive every
heavenly blessing.
(E.J.Tyler)
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"If
you had believed Moses, you would have believed me" (John 5:31-47)
St Aphrahate
(?-345), Monk and Bishop in Nineveh, in present-day Iraq (Demonstrations,
n̊21)
Moses was persecuted, as Jesus was
persecuted. When Moses was born, they concealed him so that he might
not be slain by his persecutors. When Jesus was born they carried him
off in flight into Egypt so that Herod, his persecutor, might not slay
him. In the days when Moses was born, children used to be drowned in
the river; and at the birth of Jesus the children of Bethlehem and in
the area were slain. To Moses God said: "Those who were seeking your
life are dead " (Ex 4:19), and to Joseph the angel said in Egypt:
"Arise, take up the child, and go into the land of Israel, for those
who were seeking the life of the child are dead" (Mt 2:20). Moses
brought out his people from slavery to Pharaoh; and Jesus delivered all
nations from slavery to Satan… When Moses sacrificed the lamb, the
firstborn of Egypt were slain; and when they crucified him, Jesus
became the true lamb… Moses brought down manna for his people; and
Jesus gave his body to the nations. Moses sweetened the bitter waters
by wood; and Jesus sweetened our bitterness by his cross, by the wood
of the tree of his crucifixion. Moses brought the Law down to his
people; and Jesus gave his covenants to the nations. Moses conquered
Amalek by the spreading out of his hands; and Jesus conquered Satan by
the sign of his cross.
Moses brought out water from the rock
for his people; and Jesus sent Simon Peter (the rock) to carry his
doctrine among the nations. Moses lifted up the veil from his face and
spoke with God; and Jesus lifted up the veil from the face of the
nations, that they might hear and receive his doctrine (2 Co 3:16).
Moses laid his hand upon his messengers and they received priesthood;
and Jesus laid his hands upon his apostles, and they received the Holy
Spirit. Moses ascended the mountain and died there; and Jesus ascended
into heaven and took his seat at the right hand of his Father.
(Selected by "The
Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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How I wish your bearing and
conversation were such that, on seeing or hearing you, people would
say: This man reads the life of Jesus Christ.
(The Way,
no.2)
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What is the root of human dignity?
The dignity of the human person
is rooted in his or her creation in the
image and likeness of God. Endowed with a spiritual and immortal soul,
intelligence and free will, the human person is ordered to God and
called in soul and in body to eternal beatitude. (CCC 1699-1715)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.358)
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Friday
of the Fourth Week of Lent II
(March 23) Saint
Turibio of Mongrovejo, bishop (1538-1606). Born in Leon, Spain.
He studied law in Salamanca and in 1580 was chosen to be Bishop of Lima
and went to South America. He was on fire with apostolic zeal and
called together synods and councils for the purpose of reforming
religion in the whole country. He strenuously defended the rights of
the Church and looked after the flock committed to his care by going
among them on visitation, as well as spending much time and labour for
the good of the native Indian population. St Rose of Lima, St Francis
Solano and St Martin de Porres were his contemporaries in Lima. (Saints)
See also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any
Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Wisdom 2:1a,
12-22; Psalm 34:17-21 and
23; John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30
Jesus moved about
within Galilee; he did not wish to travel in Judea, because the Jews
were trying to kill him. But the Jewish feast of Tabernacles was near.
But when his brothers had gone up to the feast, he himself also went
up, not openly but as it were in secret. Some of the inhabitants of
Jerusalem said, “Is he not the one they are trying to kill? And look,
he is speaking openly and they say nothing to him. Could the
authorities have realized that he is the Christ? But we know where he
is from. When the Christ comes, no one will know where he is from.” So
Jesus cried out in the temple area as he was teaching and said, “You
know me and also know where I am from. Yet I did not come on my own,
but the one who sent me, whom you do not know, is true. I know him,
because I am from him, and he sent me.” So they tried to arrest him,
but no one laid a hand upon him, because his hour had not yet come.
(John 7:1-2,
10, 25-30)
A distinguishing
feature of the Gospel of St John, from which our Gospel passage today
is taken, is its focus on what Jesus explicitly revealed about his own
person. We can see from various passages that during his public
ministry our Lord was the object of much controversy and debate. Was he
the Messiah or not? John the Baptist was asked by the religious leaders
if he claimed to be the
Messiah, and he stated that he did not. We see from one interchange in
the Gospels between our Lord and the Pharisees and scribes that they
knew that John had pointed to our Lord as being the promised Messiah,
but they did not accept this testimony. We read in our Gospel passage
today that “some of the inhabitants of Jerusalem said, ‘Is he not the
one they are trying to kill? And look, he is speaking openly and they
say nothing to him. Could the authorities have realized that he is the
Christ? But we know where he is from. When the Christ comes, no one
will know where he is from’.” So one stumbling block among at least
some of the people was that our Lord’s very ordinary background was
well known. He grew up at Nazareth, whereas the Messiah would have a
high and mysterious origin. Many could not get beyond our Lord’s very
humanity. He was a man whom they knew, with his family, relatives, home
town, personal history and however holy and impressive in his deeds he
may have been, nevertheless basically he was no more than an ordinary
man, a mere prophet. This seems to have been the problem of our Lord’s
own townspeople when he returned to them and claimed in their synagogue
to be the promised One. They threw him out of their town with the
intention of doing away with him. So too down through the ages, the
challenge of religious faith has been to perceive that our Lord is not
merely man.
Our Lord is indeed
a man like each of us, but he is not merely man. He shares our human
nature, but this is not the limit to his mode of being. Our Lord in our
passage today tells the people that “You know me and also know where I
am from. Yet I did not come on my own, but the one who sent me, whom
you do not know, is true. I know him, because I am from him, and he
sent me.”
(John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30). While he was a child
of Israel, a son of David and of Abraham, while he grew up in a
particular village and came out of a particular family circle, his
origin is far higher and greater than that. He comes from God who sent
him. Our Lord does not mean that God sent him on a mission in the same
sense that he sent any one of the prophets who were taken from their
family and livelihood and given a prophetic mission to the people. He
was not called from his profession as a carpenter in the way this or
that prophet was called from his work of tending sheep and sent to the
people. No, our Lord actually came from God with whom he was in the
beginning. Our Lord was with God in the beginning, and was sent to the
people from the bosom of the Father. For this reason our Lord told
them, “I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me.” Our Lord is
conveying to the people in veiled fashion, in the measure of their
capacity, that his person is divine, sharing not only in man’s human
nature, but possessing the nature of the Father who sent him. What a
phenomenon of human history is this Christ! In his human nature he is a
man like us in all things but sin, but his person is divine. The
promised Messiah does indeed have a high and mysterious origin because
it turns out that the Messiah is not just man but God.
Let us ask the Holy
Spirit to give us the grace to appreciate and accept the truth about
Jesus, that truth which he revealed and which is handed on by the
Church in her Scriptures and in her living Tradition. This truth will
save us because the acceptance of it unites us with Jesus. As our Lord
said to Pontius Pilate, it was to bear witness to this truth that he
came into the world, and it is our mission too to bear witness to the
truth of Jesus.
(E.J.Tyler)
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«They
tried to arrest him, but no one laid a hand upon him, because his hour
had not yet come»
(John 7:30)
Origen (about
185-253), priest and theologian (Commentary of Saint John,
XIX, 12)
To look for Jesus is most of the time a
good thing, for it is the same as to look for the Word, the Truth and
Wisdom. But at times, you will say, these same words “looking for
Jesus” are used for those who were ill-disposed towards him. For
example: “So they tried to arrest him, but no one laid a hand upon him,
because his hour had not yet come”. “I know that you are the
descendants of Abraham. But you are trying to kill me, because my word
has no room among you” (Jn 8,37). “But now you are trying to kill me, a
man who has told you the truth that I have heard from God” (Jn 8,40).
These words...are not in contrast with
this other word: “everyone who asks, receives” (Mt 7,8). There are
always some differences amongst those who look for Jesus: not everybody
looks for him sincerely, to be saved and obtain his help. There are
some men who look for him for many other reasons that are far from
being good. This is why only those who have searched him in all
honesty, those who seek the Word who is God, so that He may lead them
to his Father, only these find peace...
He threatens to leave if he is not
received: “I am going away and you will look for me” (Jn 8,21)...He
knows who he draws away from and he knows with whom he stays without
being yet found, so that if they look for him they will find him at the
right time.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Maturity. Stop acting the
child; drop that affectation that only suits a silly girl. Let your
outward conduct reflect the peace and order of your soul.
(The Way,
no.3)
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How do we attain beatitude?
We attain beatitude by virtue
of the grace of Christ which makes us
participants in the divine life. Christ in the Gospel points out to his
followers the way that leads to eternal happiness: the beatitudes. The
grace of Christ also is operative in every person who, following a
correct conscience, seeks and loves the true and the good and avoids
evil. (CCC 1716)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.359)
--------------------------------(Back
to Liturgical Day Index)--------------------------------
Saturday
of the Fourth Week of Lent II
(March 24) Today let us
think of St. Catherine of
Sweden (Saints)
See also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any
Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Jeremiah
11:18-20; Psalm 7:2-3, 9bc-10,
11-12; John 7:40-53
Some in the crowd
who heard these words of Jesus said, “This is truly the Prophet.”
Others said, “This is the Christ.” But others said, “The Christ will
not come from Galilee, will he? Does not Scripture say that the Christ
will be of David’s family and come from Bethlehem, the village where
David lived?” So a division occurred in the crowd because of him. Some
of them even wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him. So the
guards went to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why
did you not bring him?” The guards answered, “Never before has anyone
spoken like this man.” So the Pharisees answered them, “Have you also
been deceived? Have any of the authorities or the Pharisees believed in
him? But this crowd, which does not know the law, is accursed.”
Nicodemus, one of their members who had come to him earlier, said to
them, “Does our law condemn a man before it first hears him and finds
out what he is doing?” They answered and said to him, “You are
not from Galilee also, are you? Look and see that no prophet arises
from Galilee.” Then each went to his own house. (John 7:40-53)
At one point in the
Gospel of St John, the high priest Caiaphas is portrayed stating in the
Sanhedrin that it was better for one man to die for the people than for
all to suffer. St John observes that he made this declaration in his
capacity as high priest without knowing the fuller significance of the
words. His words were true indeed, but they signified the salvific
benefit of the death of Christ not only for the
children of
Israel, but
for all God’s children who were scattered everywhere. Christ would die
for the world. Well, in like manner, the words of the guards about our
Lord in today’s Gospel had a significance they themselves did not
appreciate.
We read, “So the guards went to the chief priests and
Pharisees, who asked them, ‘Why did you not bring him?’ The guards
answered, ‘Never before has anyone spoken like this man.’ So the
Pharisees answered them, ‘Have you also been deceived?’”
(John
7:40-53).
Never before has anyone spoken like this man. This statement stands as
applicable for all time and all history. None of the great
philosophers, none of the founders of the world’s religions, none of
the world’s greatest writers or wise men have ever spoken as Jesus has
spoken. This is so for a simple reason, that Jesus was and is the Son
of God. Who could compare with him as Teacher? While a knowledge of the
wisdom of the world’s greatest minds and teachers will contribute to
one’s own wisdom, the knowledge of Christ alone will suffice. He is the
light of the world, and hence it is of the utmost importance that at
some point in life his light be accepted and followed by each. If one
refuses to follow his light, one will be in the darkness.
That is exactly
what the Pharisees mentioned in today’s passage did. They refused the
light of Christ because of their dispositions. This point is symbolized
by St John’s remark that after the Pharisees rejected the defence of
Christ by Nicodemus “each went to his own home.” They turned their
backs on Christ and his teaching, even though it was clear to all that
no one spoke as he spoke. Each of us is faced with this very choice, to
be open to the words of Christ, or to be closed to them. Years after
our Lord’s ascension into heaven St Peter in his Letter referred to the
transfiguration of Christ on the Mount. At that event the Father spoke
from the cloud, saying “This is my Son, the Beloved. Listen to him.”
Those words were addressed to the three chief apostles, and through
them to the Church down the ages, and through the Church to the entire
world. The world is to listen to Jesus Christ, the Christ brought to
the world by the apostles who are authorized to explain his teaching
and its true meaning. The world has a Teacher. There are many teachers
that have come and gone in the course of history, but one Teacher, one
Master came and lives still. He lives in his body the Church, and his
teaching is the Church’s teaching. The challenge facing the
Church’s faithful in each generation is to bring to everyone the news
that no one has ever spoken, and no one will ever speak, as does Jesus.
He speaks still — not a new teaching, but re-presenting the teaching he
gave. That teaching reaches us now by means of the Church. The living
Church is the oracle of the living Christ who speaks to us by means of
her.
Let each of
us allow the testimony of the guards about Christ to touch our hearts
and enliven our appreciation of the person and the teaching of Christ.
Let each of us be like the guards in bringing their words about Jesus
to those around us. Every day we ought, explicitly or implicitly, be
saying to others, “Never before has anyone spoken like this man.”
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
«Never
before has anyone spoken like
this one» (John 7:40-53)
Saint John of the Cross
(1542-1591), Carmelite, doctor of the Church
(Ascent of Mount
Carmel, II, ch.22)
And God might answer him
after this manner, saying: If I have spoken all things to thee in my
Word, Which is My Son, and I have no other word, what answer can I now
make to thee, or what can I reveal to thee which is greater than
this?...”This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased, hear ye
Him” (Mt 17,5)...Here Him; for I have no more faith to reveal, neither
have I any more things to declare...
If you desire me to answer you
with any word of consolation, consider my son, Who is subject to
me, and bound by love of me, and afflicted, and you shall see how fully
he answers you. If you desire me to expound to you secret things, or
happenings, set thine eyes on Him alone, and thou shalt find the most
secret mysteries, and the wisdom and wondrous things of God, which are
hidden in him, even as my apostle says: “In him, who is the Son of God,
every treasure of wisdom and knowledge of God is hidden” (Col 2,3).
These treasures of wisdom shall be very much more sublime and
delectable and profitable for thee than the things that thou desiredst
to know. Here the same Apostle gloried in saying: that he had not
declared to them that he knew anything, save Jesus Christ and him
crucified (1 Cor 2,2). And if thou shouldst still desire other Divine
or bodily revelations and visions, look also at Him made man, and thou
shalt find there in more than thou thinkest, for the Apostle says
likewise: “In Christ the fullness of deity resides in bodily form” (Col
2,9).
It is not fitting, then, to
enquire of God by supernatural means, nor
is it now necessary that He should answer; since all the faith has been
given us in Christ, and there is therefore no more of it to be
revealed, nor will there ever be.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Don't say: 'That's the way I'm
made... it's my character'. It's your lack of character: Be a man.
(The Way,
no.4)
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Why are the beatitudes important for
us?
The beatitudes are at the heart
of Jesus’ preaching and they take up
and fulfill the promises that God made starting with Abraham. They
depict the very countenance of Jesus and they characterize authentic
Christian life. They reveal the ultimate goal of human activity, which
is eternal happiness. (CCC 1716-1717, 1725-1726)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.360)
--------------------------------(Back
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Fifth
Sunday of Lent C
(March 25) The
Annunciation is on this date, but because this
year it is a Sunday, the feast will be celebrated tomorrow.
See also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any
Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Isaiah
43:16-21; Psalm 126:1-6;
Philippians 3:8-14; John 8:1-11
Jesus went to the
Mount of Olives. But early in the morning he arrived again in the
temple area, and all the people started coming to him, and he sat down
and taught them. Then the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who
had been caught in adultery and made her stand in the middle. They said
to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing
adultery. Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So
what do you say?” They said this to test him, so that they could have
some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and began to write on
the ground with his finger. But when they continued asking him, he
straightened up and said to them, “Let the one among you who is without
sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Again he bent down and wrote
on the ground. And in response, they went away one by one, beginning
with the elders. So he was left alone with the woman before him. Then
Jesus straightened up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no
one condemned you?” She replied, “No one, sir.” Then Jesus said,
“Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin any more.”
(John 8:1-11)
Many comments about
the modern world have been made over several past decades by recent
popes. One of them, that has been repeated and developed by his
successors, is that by (the Servant of God) Pope Pius XII. Pope Pius
XII wrote that the sin of the modern age is the loss of the sense of
sin. This matter of the modern loss of the sense of sin is something
that has been discussed by various
religious writers over
the past few centuries. For instance, John Henry Newman as a young
Anglican clergyman during the second decade of the nineteenth century
commented on it in his sermons, and as a young Anglican evangelical he
had learnt the importance of the sense of sin from various of his
predecessors who had been an influence on him. Newman
went on to give
the evident fact of sin and the sense of it a central place in his
philosophy of religion. But of course he and others ultimately draw on
revelation. So then, let us notice a few things which our Lord said
about the sense of sin. We remember his story comparing the prayer of
the Pharisee with that of the Publican, both praying in the Temple at
the same time. The Pharisee in his prayer listed in the presence of God
the good things he had been doing and how different he was from the
publican who was praying some distance behind him. The publican, by
contrast, could only entrust himself to the mercy of God, saying, “have
mercy on me, God, a sinner.” His sense of sin prompted a prayer which
our Lord said justified him, whereas the Pharisee went home without
being right with God. So for the sinful publican, his humble
acknowledgment of sin was the prompt for entrusting himself to the
mercy of God. In this sense the consciousness of being a sinner is a
foundation for religion. If one has little or no sense of sin, apart
from this itself being sinful (as in the case of the Pharisee), one of
the foundations for religion will be lacking. Typically, modern man
lacks this foundation. As children of our age if we are not on guard we
can be infected by the tendency to disregard and even deny sin and its
seriousness. If that happens our very relationship with God will be
profoundly weakened.
But
the sense of sin not only affects our relationship with God. It also
affects our relationship with others. We remember another parable of
our Lord in which he describes the master who summoned his servant to
repay an astronomical debt of ten thousand talents. The servant was
utterly unable to pay, so the king ordered him to be sold with his wife
and possessions so that at least some of the debt might be recovered.
The servant pleaded with him to give him time, and the master felt so
sorry for him that he forgave the entire debt and let his servant go.
But what happened then? The servant, without the slightest regard for
his indebtedness to his master, proceeded to punish a fellow servant
who owed him a substantial debt but nothing remotely comparable to the
debt he himself had been freed from. He lacked, we might say, a sense
of personal sin and this resulted in a harshness towards others. This
was particularly serious because our Lord ends that parable by saying
that our heavenly Father will deal with us severely if we do not
forgive others from the heart. Now then, let us consider our Gospel
event of today (John 8:1-11). The Pharisees come to
our Lord dragging into his presence a sinner and ask our Lord if she is
to be condemned. Our Lord’s response? “Jesus bent down and began to
write on the ground with his finger. But when they continued asking him
he straightened up and said to them, ‘Let the one among you who is
without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’ Again he bent down
and wrote on the ground. And in response, they went away one by one,
beginning with the elders.” They came to our Lord with little or no
sense of personal sin and as a result they were very harsh and
unforgiving. When their sins were brought before their conscience, they
retired in shame.
The
foundation of authentic religion is humility. Humility involves a
recognition of our true position before God. We are not only his
creatures, utterly dependent on him in every way, but we are also
sinners and so we have even more reason to abase ourselves before him — and before others. We have no grounds for pride before God, nor before
others. Whenever we observe the sin in others, let us be forgiving,
knowing that we too are sinners and have an account to render before
God.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
«Neither do I condemn you. Go, and
from now on do not sin any more» (John
8:1-11)
St Augustine
(354-430), bishop of Hippo (North Africa) and doctor of the Church
(Tractate 33 on
the Gospel of John, 5-8)
"One after another all
withdrew." The two were left alone, the wretched
woman and Mercy. But the Lord, having struck them through with that
dart of justice, deigned not to heed their fall, but, turning away His
look from them, "again He wrote with His finger on the ground."
But when that woman was left
alone, and all they were gone out, He
raised His eyes to the woman. We have heard the voice of justice; let
us also hear the voice of clemency...she expected to be punished by Him
in whom sin could not be found. But He, who had driven back her
adversaries with the tongue of justice, raising the eyes of clemency
towards her, asked her, "Hath no man condemned thee?" She answered, "No
man, Lord." And He said, "Neither do I condemn thee;" by whom, perhaps,
thou didst fear to be condemned, because in me thou hast not found sin.
"Neither will I condemn thee."
What is this, O Lord? Dost Thou
therefore favour sins? Not so,
evidently. Mark what follows: "Go, henceforth sin no more." Therefore
the Lord did also condemn, but condemned sins, not man...Let them take
heed, then, who love His gentleness in the Lord, and let them fear His
truth...The Lord is gentle, the Lord is long-suffering, the Lord is
pitiful; but the Lord is also just, the Lord is also true (Ps 85,15).
He bestows on thee space for correction; but thou lovest the delay of
judgment more than the amendment of thy ways. Hast thou been a bad man
yesterday? Today be a good man. Hast thou gone on in thy wickedness
today? At any rate change tomorrow.
Thus therefore said He to the
woman, "Neither will I condemn thee;"
but, being made secure concerning the past, beware of the future.
"Neither will I condemn thee:" I have blotted out what thou hast done;
keep what I have commanded thee, that thou mayest find what I have
promised.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Get used to saying
No. (The Way, no.5)
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What is the relationship between the
beatitudes and our desire for happiness?
The beatitudes respond to the
innate desire for happiness that God has
placed in the human heart in order to draw us to himself. God alone can
satisfy this desire. (CCC 1718-1719)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.361)
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Solemnity
of the Annunciation of the Lord
(March 26), 2007 The Annunciation was
the moment when Gabriel the Archangel communicated to Mary that in
God’s plan she was to be the Mother of the Son of God. He came to ask
her consent. Mary gave her “Fiat” (be it done) by which she conceived
the Saviour by the Working of the Holy Spirit. In the dialogue between
her and the angel she appears so great and yet so humble. Through her
consent she participated in the redemptive work of her Son, Jesus.
Today let us also think of St.
Margaret Clitherow (Saints)
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today: Isaiah
7:10-14; 8:10; Psalm 40:7-8a, 8b-11;
Hebrews 10:4-10; 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)
One of the
most
common institutions of societies and cultures is that of the birthday.
On a person’s birthday, we celebrate the life and presence of one who
is loved or venerated, be he a member of the family, a work colleague,
a leader, or whatever. It affords the opportunity to express in a
special way
appreciation for a
person, and on the day something of the origins and story of his life
are remembered. And so it is altogether natural that both Matthew
and Luke in their respective fashions narrate the birth of Jesus
Christ. Their perspectives are different, but in each case an angel of
the Lord is sent to announce the coming of the Child — in Matthew the
angel speaks to Joseph, in Luke the angel speaks to Mary. Our Gospel
passage from Luke on this feast of the Annunciation today describes the
dramatic appearance of the angel Gabriel before the virgin Mary to tell
her with the utmost respect what God wished of her. There could hardly
be greater or more wonderful news than what he was sent to announce.
The angel’s words offer an exalted description of the Child who in
God’s plan was about to be conceived. Undoubtedly his utterances — and
he may have said even more than are given here — sank deeply into the
mind and memory of Mary, and were transmitted years later to Luke as he
investigated the history of Christ’s infancy. Let us often read the
words of the angel as if they are being told us by Mary, the one to
whom they were addressed. Let us think of what the angel says of
Christ, and let us pray to be able to contemplate him with love and
understanding.
Firstly, the
angel
states, the Child will be great. There is no qualification to this, no
limit given to the word. It is a term of boundless implication. He is
not simply to be great before men, nor even simply great before God.
No, all that needs to be said is that he will be great, and it reminds
us of how God is great. Mary during her visit to Elizabeth shortly
after prays a prayer in which she proclaims the “greatness” of the
Lord. The Lord is great, and so is the Child being heralded here. He is
great, and he is to be “the Son of the Most High”. Reading these words
of the angel in Luke’s text years later any Christian would have known
what they signified. They conveyed the revelation that God the Son was
about to become man. He will be David’s descendant and the inheritor of
his throne, and in him the prophecy given to David about his
everlasting kingdom would be fulfilled. The great Son of David was soon
to be born “and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of
his Kingdom there will be no end.” (Luke 1:26-38).
God’s eternal Kingdom was on the horizon, and the King who would rule
over it was near at hand. So as we read these simple and stirring words
of the angel, let us like Mary allow them to sink deeply into our
hearts, giving fruit to a profound faith and appreciation for Christ.
But let us also contemplate the one to whom those words were addressed,
for the angel himself would have contemplated her with respect and
wonder. She was full of grace, and the Lord held her in utter favour.
Such is the one who is Christ’s mother and our mother too.
Let us ask the
Holy
Spirit to help us appreciate and love each of the protagonists in our
Gospel scene today: the Christ-child, in the first instance, and then
Mary our all-holy mother. Let us also learn to love and venerate the
angels, and in particular our own guardian angel whom the Church
assures us we have at our side as God’s gift. Above all, let us resolve
to live out our lives following in the footsteps of Jesus and his first
and greatest disciple, Mary.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"When the fullness of time had
come,
God sent his Son, born of a woman" (Galatians 4:4)
Pope John-Paul II (Mulieris
dignitatem)
[In reply] to the aspirations of the human spirit in search of
God… the
"fullness of time" emphasizes the response of God himself… The sending
of this Son, one in substance with the Father, as a man "born of woman"
(Ga 4:4), constitutes the culminating and definitive point of God's
self-revelation to humanity… A woman is to be found at the centre of
this salvific event. The self-revelation of God, who is the inscrutable
unity of the Trinity, is outlined in the Annunciation at Nazareth.
"Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall
call his name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of
the Most High" — "How shall this be, since I have no husband?" — "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... For with God nothing will be impossible".
It may be easy to think of this event in the setting of the
history of
Israel, the chosen people of which Mary is a daughter, but it is also
easy to think of it in the context of all the different ways in which
humanity has always sought to answer the fundamental and definitive
questions which most beset it. Do we not find in the Annunciation at
Nazareth the beginning of that definitive answer by which God himself
"attempts to calm people's hearts"? It is not just a matter here of
God's words revealed through the Prophets; rather with this response
"the Word is truly made flesh" (Jn 1:14). Hence Mary attains a union
with God that exceeds all the expectations of the human spirit. It even
exceeds the expectations of all Israel, in particular the daughters of
this chosen people, who, on the basis of the promise, could hope that
one of their number would one day become the mother of the Messiah. Who
among them, however, could have imagined that the promised Messiah
would be "the Son of the Most High"? On the basis of the Old
Testament's monotheistic faith such a thing was difficult to imagine.
Only by the power of the Holy Spirit, who "overshadowed" her, was Mary
able to accept what is "impossible with men, but not with God" (Mk 10:
27).
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Turn your back on the tempter when he whispers in your ear: 'Why
make
life difficult for yourself?'
(The Way,
no.6)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is eternal happiness?
It is the vision of God in eternal life in which we are fully
“partakers of the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4), of the glory of Christ
and of the joy of the trinitarian life. This happiness surpasses human
capabilities. It is a supernatural and gratuitous gift of God just as
is the grace which leads to it. This promised happiness confronts us
with decisive moral choices concerning earthly goods and urges us to
love God above all things. (CCC 1720-1724, 1727-1729)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.362)
--------------------------------(Back
to Liturgical Day Index)--------------------------------
Tuesday
of the Fifth Week of Lent II
(March 27) Today let us think of St. Rupert of Salzburg (Saints)
See also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any
Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today: Numbers
21:4-9; Psalm 102:2-3, 16-18,
19-21; John 8:21-30
Jesus said to
the
Pharisees: “I am going away and you will look for me, but you will die
in your sin. Where I am going you cannot come.” So the Jews said, “He
is not going to kill himself, is he, because he said, ‘Where I am going
you cannot come’?” He said to them, “You belong to what is below, I
belong to what is above. You belong to this world, but I do not belong
to this world. That is why I told you that you will die in your sins.
For if you do not believe that I AM, you will die in your sins.” So
they said to him, “Who are you?” Jesus said to them, “What I told you
from the beginning. I have much to say about you in condemnation. But
the one who sent me is true, and what I heard from him I tell the
world.” They did not realize that he was speaking to them of the
Father. So Jesus said to them, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then
you will realize that I AM, and that I do nothing on my own, but I say
only what the Father taught me. The one who sent me is with me. He has
not left me alone, because I always do what is pleasing to him.”
Because he spoke this way, many came to believe in him. (John 8:21-30)
It is obvious
from
a reading from the Gospel of St John that our Lord met with great
incomprehension. His words evoked much controversy and as is shown in
our passage today this incomprehension and controversy, leading in turn
to rejection, applied in a special way to many — and perhaps most — of
the Pharisees. Their incomprehension and hostility arose especially in
relation to what our Lord said about himself. If we wish to
draw near to Jesus of Nazareth and come to know him as his disciples
(and what better could we do in life?) then we must ponder his words
about himself with a special attention of the heart. There was no issue
with his being man — that was obvious. He was a man like others. The
Pharisees had to recognize too that he was a great and holy master of
the things of God: “the one who sent me is true, and what I heard from
him I tell the world.”. The people accepted that he was a prophet. He
not only claimed to be a prophet, but he claimed to be holy and
sinless, for in our passage today he tells the Pharisees “that I do
nothing on my own, but I say only what the Father taught me. The one
who sent me is with me. He has not left me alone, because I always do
what is pleasing to him.” Jesus always, always did what pleased the
Father. Never did he do anything, whether of thought or word or deed,
which displeased the Father. At the beginning of his public ministry
after having been baptized, the voice of the Father pointed to him as
the one in whom he was well pleased, and the same revelation was
uttered at the end of his public ministry during his transfiguration.
Our Lord knew he was entirely united to God his Father. He is the Holy
One of our race, and even the demons he expelled often angrily gave
witness to this, crying out in false bravado “I know who you are, the
Holy One of God!” To be the disciple of one filled with such
incomparable holiness is the greatest of privileges.
But there is
more.
Not only is Christ holy beyond compare and uniquely close to the
Father. Not only does he announce to the world what he hears the Father
tell him. St John makes it clear that our Lord at times explicitly and
at other times in veiled manner claimed also to be God. This was the
most astounding of his many claims and makes him so unique. Elsewhere
in St John’s Gospel our Lord is attacked for violating the tradition of
the Sabbath rest as the scribes and Pharisees taught it, and he replied
that “the Father continues to work, and so do I.” St John observes that
the leaders persecuted our Lord the more because he spoke of God as his
own father, thus making himself equal to God. Here in our passage
today, our Lord speaks as one who is divine, sharing in the very nature
and name of God. He is the great “I AM” who gave his name to Moses when
it was requested. “He said to them, ‘You belong to what is below, I
belong to what is above. You belong to this world, but I do not belong
to this world. That is why I told you that you will die in your sins.
For if you do not believe that I AM, you will die in your sins’.” The
Christian reading St John’s text would understand what our Lord was
claiming to be, and that he was saying that belief in his divinity is
what brings salvation: “if you do not believe that I AM, you will die
in your sins.” (John 8: 21-30)
He is the Yahweh of the Old Testament, though he is not the Father who
is also Yahweh. Moreover, it would be his death that would especially
reveal his divinity in the sense that the boundless mercy of God and
his love for all mankind would be shown to be in him. “When you lift up
the Son of Man, then you will realize that I AM, and that I do nothing
on my own, but I say only what the Father taught me.” After Christ rose
from the dead, Thomas bowed before him and said, “My Lord and my God!”.
As St Paul wrote, in Christ is present the fullness of the godhead
bodily.
Let us read
our
Gospel passage today allowing the living Jesus to speak to us about
himself, telling us where he is from, who and what he really is, and
what he has come among us to do. Let us accept his word and entrust
ourselves to him and to his service. Our life has been given to us in
order that we might give glory and honour to Jesus. God chose us in him
to be holy and full of love in his sight. Let us make this the goal of
all our days.
(E.J.Tyler)
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« When you lift up the Son
of
Man, then you will realize that I am » (John 8:21-30)
St Augustine
(354-430), bishop of Hippo (North Africa) and doctor of the Church
(Tractate 12 on
the Gospel of John, 11)
He endured death, then; but death He hanged on the cross, and
mortal
men are delivered from death. The Lord calls to mind a great matter,
which was done in a figure with them of old: "And as Moses," saith He,
"lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be
lifted up; that every one who believeth on Him may not perish, but have
everlasting life" (Jn 3,14). A great mystery is here, as they who read
know...Now Moses was ordered by the Lord to make a brazen serpent, and
to raise it on a pole in the wilderness, and to admonish the people
Israel, that, when any had been bitten by a serpent, he should look to
that serpent raised up on the pole. This was done: men were bitten;
they looked and were healed (Nm 21,6-9).
What are the biting serpents? Sins, from the mortality of the
flesh.
What is the serpent lifted up? The Lord's death on the cross. For as
death came by the serpent, it was figured by the image of a serpent.
The serpent's bite was deadly, the Lord's death is life-giving. A
serpent is gazed on that the serpent may have no power. What is this? A
death is gazed on, that death may have no power. But whose death? The
death of life: if it may be said, the death of life; ay, for it may be
said, but said wonderfully. But should it not be spoken, seeing it was
a thing to be done? Shall I hesitate to utter that which the Lord has
deigned to do for me? Is not Christ the life? And yet Christ hung on
the cross. Is not Christ life? And yet Christ was dead. But in Christ's
death, death died...; the fullness of life swallowed up death; death
was absorbed in the body of Christ. So also shall we say in the
resurrection, when now triumphant we shall sing, "Where, O death, is
thy contest? Where, O death, is thy sting?" (1 Cor 15,55).
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Get rid of that 'small-town' outlook. Enlarge your heart
till it becomes universal, 'catholic'.
Don't flutter about like a hen, when you can soar to the heights
of an
eagle.
(The Way,
no.7)
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What is freedom?
Freedom is the power
given by God to act or not to act, to do this or to do that, and so to
perform deliberate actions on one's own responsibility. Freedom
characterizes properly human acts. The more one does what is good, the
freer one becomes. Freedom attains its proper perfection when it is
directed toward God, the highest good and our beatitude. Freedom
implies also the possibility of choosing between good and evil. The
choice of evil is an abuse of freedom and leads to the slavery of sin.
(CCC 1730-1733, 1743-1744)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.363)
--------------------------------(Back
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Wednesday
of the Fifth Week of Lent
(March 28) Today let us think of St. Guntramnus (Saints)
See also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Daniel
3:14-20, 91-92, 95; Daniel
3:52-56; John 8:31-42
Jesus said to
those
Jews who believed in him, “If you remain in my word, you will truly be
my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you
free.” They answered him, “We are descendants of Abraham and have never
been enslaved to anyone. How can you say, ‘You will become free’?”
Jesus answered them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, everyone who commits
sin is a slave of sin. A slave does not remain in a household forever,
but a son always remains. So if the Son frees you, then you will truly
be free. I know that you are descendants of Abraham. But you are trying
to kill me, because my word has no room among you. I tell you what I
have seen in the Father’s presence; but you do what you have heard from
your father.” They answered and said to him, “Our father is Abraham.”
Jesus said to them, “If you were Abraham’s children, you would be doing
the works of Abraham. But now you are trying to kill me, a man who has
told you the truth that I heard from God; Abraham did not do this. You
are doing the works of your father!” So they said to him, “We were not
born of fornication. We have one Father, God.” Jesus said to them, “If
God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and am
here; I did not come on my own, but he sent me.” (John 8:31-42)
If we situate
our
own contemporary Western culture within the broad sweep of cultures in
human history, there are some great positives that stand out. Let one
or two be mentioned — our Western culture is strikingly scientific and
technological. This has resulted in enormous advances in so many
fields. Another
positive is the professed commitment to seeking the
truth rather than simply accepting received myths or customs.
We could go on, but in view of our Gospel text today let us take
up a point suggested by our Lord’s words: “If you remain in my word,
you will truly be my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the
truth will set you free.”
(John
8:31-32).
In the history of man, religious belief and practice has been so
constant and universal that many scholars have proposed that man be
defined as a “religious” animal, rather than simply as a “rational”
one. There is, however, a danger in placing the emphasis on being
“religious”. In our passage today our Lord offers to his disciples the
benefit not simply of being “religious” but of knowing the truth: “If
you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples, and you will
know the truth”. It is not a great thing simply to be “religious”,
which is to say to have religious beliefs and to follow religious
practices and customs (though this is better than to be devoid of
them). After all, this is almost universal. Rather, the issue is
whether in all of this one knows the truth. Our Lord tells us that it
is the truth which will set us free. Therefore religion alone will not
set us free unless religion is true, and the freedom it brings is
proportionate to its truth. Now, the yardstick of truth in religion is
what Christ has revealed, for it is he who brings the truth from God.
He is the light of the world.
The critical
issue
facing every man and woman is his or her attitude to the truth and
inasmuch as Christ brings to man the truth of God, the critical issue
is each person’s attitude to Christ. There are very serious factors at
play here. In our passage today, our Lord confronts his critics and
enemies with a charge that is very ominous. He tells them that “you are
trying to kill me, because my word has no room among you. I tell you
what I have seen in the Father’s presence; but you do what you have
heard from your father.” In the response to the truth there are two
ultimate personalities to whom people give allegiance. There is God and
there is Satan. Of course we ourselves cannot be sure which of these
two commands the allegiance of specific persons who contest revealed
truth because we ourselves cannot read their souls. But Christ is able
to read them, and in our passage he is reading the minds and hearts of
the ones to whom he is speaking. His words reveal the ultimates. As
just said, the ultimates are God and Satan. Two flags are flying and
the one is that of God and his truth as revealed by Christ, while the
other is that of Satan and the rejection of the truth. The answer to
the human dilemma of finding and adhering to the truth is to find and
adhere to the person of Christ. Our Lord puts it very unambiguously:
“If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and am
here; I did not come on my own, but he sent me.” (John 8:31-42).
Let us pray for the grace to see the ultimate issues clearly so as to
be able to make the choices which will bring true freedom and
happiness, not only here but hereafter.
Many “cradle
Catholics” (that is, Catholics from the cradle) have a profound sense
of the truth of Catholicism as the religion revealed by Christ. But
there are many who do not appreciate its truth. Rather it is the
religion of their custom and the custom of their family or their
society. Converts who come into the Church with a deep sense of the
truth of the Catholic religion can have much to offer in bearing
witness precisely to this. Our Lord said to Pontius Pilate that he had
come into the world to bear witness to the truth, and we are called to
accept his truth and in union with him to bear witness to it to the
world around us.
(E.J.Tyler)
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The truth that makes you free
(John
8:31-42) Pope John Paul II (Redemptor hominis,
§12)
Jesus Christ meets the man of every age, including our own, with
the
same words: "You will know the truth, and the truth will make you
free". These words contain both a fundamental requirement and a
warning: the requirement of an honest relationship with regard to truth
as a condition for authentic freedom, and the warning to avoid every
kind of illusory freedom, every superficial unilateral freedom, every
freedom that fails to enter into the whole truth about man and the
world.
Today also, even after two thousand years, we see Christ as the
one who
brings man freedom based on truth, frees man from what curtails,
diminishes and as it were breaks off this freedom at its root, in man's
soul, his heart and his conscience. What a stupendous confirmation of
this has been given and is still being given by those who, thanks to
Christ and in Christ, have reached true freedom and have manifested it
even in situations of external constraint!
When Jesus Christ himself appeared as a prisoner before Pilate's
tribunal...did he not answer: "For this I was born, and for this I have
come into the world, to bear witness to the truth" (Jn 18,37)? It was
as if with these words spoken before the judge at the decisive moment
he was once more confirming what he had said earlier: "You will know
the truth, and the truth will make you free". In the course of so many
centuries, of so many generations, from the time of the Apostles on, is
it not often Jesus Christ himself that has made an appearance at the
side of people judged for the sake of the truth? And has he not gone to
death with people condemned for the sake of the truth? Does he ever
cease to be the continuous spokesman and advocate for the person who
lives "in spirit and truth"?
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Serenity. Why lose your temper if by doing so you offend God,
annoy other people, upset yourself... and have to find it again in the
end?
(The Way,
no.8)
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What is the
relationship between freedom and responsibility?
Freedom makes people responsible for their actions to the extent
that
they are voluntary, even if the imputability and responsibility for an
action can be diminished or sometimes cancelled by ignorance,
inadvertence, duress, fear, inordinate attachments, or habit. (CCC
1734-1737, 1745-1746)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.364)
--------------------------------(Back
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Thursday
of the Fifth Week of Lent II
(March 29) Today let us think of St. Joseph of Arimathea
(Saints)
See also this Website's
Details of Saints for Any Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture today:
Genesis
17:3-9; Psalm 105:4-9;
John 8:51-59
Jesus said to
the
Jews: “Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever keeps my word will never see
death.” So the Jews said to him, “Now we are sure that you are
possessed. Abraham died, as did the prophets, yet you say, ‘Whoever
keeps my word will never taste death.’ Are you greater than our father
Abraham, who died? Or the prophets, who died? Who do you make yourself
out to be?” Jesus answered, “If I glorify myself, my glory is worth
nothing; but it is my Father who glorifies me, of whom you say, ‘He is
our God.’ You do not know him, but I know him. And if I should say that
I do not know him, I would be like you a liar. But I do know him and I
keep his word. Abraham your father rejoiced to see my day; he saw it
and was glad.” So the Jews said to him, “You are not yet fifty years
old and you have seen Abraham?” Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say
to you, before Abraham came to be, I AM.” So they picked up stones to
throw at him; but Jesus hid and went out of the temple area. (John 8:51-59)
The great pall
that
hangs age after age over humanity is the fact of death and all that can
lead to death. It is a great tidal wave that eventually sweeps all
away, an irresistible monster that grasps and swallows all. Death is
the oncoming crisis that every individual must face, and yet we take
for granted in
a semi-casual way the blows it delivers snuffing out
persons ceaselessly. We hear of sixty persons destroyed by a suicide bomber, eighty persons
who died in a plane crash, thousands who die in an ocean tidal wave.
Death is man’s enemy and it is everywhere. It always has been
everywhere. No matter how striking the advances of science death
can at
most be delayed or its pain mitigated, but it cannot be overcome. Its
meaning is a mystery to the natural man, and the myths and rituals of
the various religions attempt to provide an explanation and an answer
to it. Into this scene of anguish and mystery has stepped the living
God, and he has come with the ultimate answer. That answer is to be
found in the person of Christ, and in today’s Gospel our Lord speaks of
what we must do to avail ourselves of this divine remedy for the
perennial problem of mankind. “Jesus said to the Jews: ‘Amen, amen, I
say to you, whoever keeps my word will never see death’.” The answer to
death is to accept Christ for who he claims to be and to keep his word
as the expression of this acceptance. If we do this we shall not die — die in the sense of a true destruction of our life and our person. Our
physical death will be a mere “sleep” as our Lord often referred to it.
A
living obedient faith in the person of Jesus is the goal and the key to
the life God wants us to share, life in abundance.
But this faith
in
Jesus means accepting his testimony about himself, and our Gospel text
today is a key text in terms of Christ’s claims about himself. As I
have pointed out already, in our passage today our Lord claims to be
the source of life. He gives life to those who keep his word, and
whoever keeps his word “will never taste death.” But of course God is
the giver of all life, and our Lord goes on to make this implication
even more explicit in his answer to the question, “Who do you make
yourself out to be?” Our Lord makes himself out to be Yahweh God: “So
the Jews said to him, ‘You are not yet fifty years old and you have
seen Abraham?’ Jesus said to them, ‘Amen, amen, I say to you, before
Abraham came to be, I AM.’ So they picked up stones to throw at him;
but Jesus hid and went out of the temple area”
(John
8:51-59). He
is applying to himself the name of Yahweh and stating that he is the
God of Abraham and Moses who preceded them both from eternity, though
he is not the Father. These are extraordinary claims, and it is
difficult to think of any figure in human history who made comparable
ones. Christ is either a brazen deceiver without equal, or he is the
pride and glory of our race, a wondrous phenomenon in human history.
The best way to determine which of these he is, is to draw near to him
repeatedly in prayer and contemplate his person with an openness of
heart. His goodness, his holiness and his beauty will vindicate the
truth of his teaching about himself. Christ could not lie nor deceive.
Let us throughout our lives gaze in prayerful wonder at this man who is
God.
St Paul writes
that
his life is Christ. Christ is his life. We can know so much and have so
much but if we do not know Christ, and if we do not possess him, then
we are poor in the sight of God. Let us make ourselves rich unto
eternity by making the person of Jesus our treasure.
(E.J.Tyler)
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« Abraham your father
rejoiced to see my day; he saw it and was glad » (John 8:51-59)
Origen
(about 185-253), priest and theologian (Homilies on the Book of
Genesis, VIII, 6,8,9)
“Thereupon Abraham took the wood for the holocaust and laid it on
his
son Isaac's shoulders, while he himself carried the fire and the knife.
As the two walked on together, Isaac spoke to his father Abraham.
“Father!” he said. “Yes, son”, he replied. Isaac continued, “Here are
the fire and wood, but where is the sheep for the holocaust?”. “Son”,
Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the sheep for the
holocaust” (Gn 22,6-8). This answer of Abraham, at once correct and
cautious, amazes me. I wonder what he had in mind, because when he
says: “God will provide”, he is not speaking about the present but
about the future. To his son who questions him about the present, he
talks about the future. It is because the Lord himself was going to
provide the lamb in the person of Christ...
“Abraham reached out and took the knife to slaughter his son”. Let
us
compare these words with those of the apostle Paul when he says, “God
did not spare his own Son but handed him over for us all” (Rom 8,32).
See the great generosity with which God competes with man: Abraham
offered a mortal son who in fact was not going to die, while God handed
over to death his immortal Son for all men...
“As Abraham looked about, he spied a ram caught by its horns in
the
thicket”. Christ is the Word of God but “the Word became flesh” (Jn
1,14)...Christ suffers, but in his flesh; he undergoes death, but it is
in his flesh that he dies, and the ram here is the symbol of this. As
John said: ”Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the
world” (Jn 1,29). Instead the Word remained incorruptible: he is Christ
in spirit, the one that Isaac represents. This is why he is at once
victim and priest. For, in spirit, he offers the victim to his father
and, in the flesh, he himself is offered on the altar of the cross.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Say what you have just said, but in a different tone, without
anger, and your argument will gain in strength and, above all, you
won't offend God.
(The Way,
no.9)
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Why does
everyone have a right to exercise freedom?
The right to the exercise of freedom belongs to everyone because
it is
inseparable from his or her dignity as a human person. Therefore this
right must always be respected, especially in moral and religious
matters, and it must be recognized and protected by civil authority
within the limits of the common good and a just public order. (CCC
1738, 1747)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.365)
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Friday
of the Fifth Week of Lent II
(March 30) Today let us think of St. John Climacus
(Saints)
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Scripture today:
Jeremiah
20:10-13; Psalm 18:2-3a,
3bc-4-7; John 10:31-42
The Jews
picked up
rocks to stone Jesus. Jesus answered them, “I have shown you many good
works from my Father. For which of these are you trying to stone me?”
The Jews answered him, “We are not stoning you for a good work but for
blasphemy. You, a man, are making yourself God.” Jesus answered them,
“Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, “You are gods”’? If it calls
them gods to whom the word of God came, and Scripture cannot be set
aside, can you say that the one whom the Father has consecrated and
sent into the world blasphemes because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’?
If I do not perform my Father’s works, do not believe me; but if I
perform them, even if you do not believe me, believe the works, so that
you may realize and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the
Father.” Then they tried again to arrest him; but he escaped from their
power. He went back across the Jordan to the place where John first
baptized, and there he remained. Many came to him and said, “John
performed no sign, but everything John said about this man was true.”
And many there began to believe in him. (John 10:31-42)
In the history
of
both Christianity and thought that has responded to Christianity, the
sticking point has been one outstanding thing: Christ’s claim to be
divine. He was a man and that was clear to all. People knew his mother,
they had known his “father” Joseph, they
knew his relatives, they
had seen him grow into adulthood, they knew his history. He was of a
certain height, weight and proportion. He
had certain features,
a
definite accent in his speech, a certain manner. He grew tired, he
laughed and smiled in a certain way. He had a certain approach in his
teaching, making use not of abstractions (like various Greek
philosophers) but of concrete stories
and analogies. He was a certain
man of a certain locality and a certain age. He was great as a prophet — no other prophet had performed the works he so effortlessly did
— nevertheless he was a man. But there was something more, and it was
astounding. As is clear from the passage before the one of today, our
Lord claimed to be the Yahweh who had called and commissioned the
patriarchs, the great I AM. The leaders of the Jews knew exactly that
our Lord was claiming this, and so they “picked up rocks to stone
Jesus. Jesus answered them, 'I have shown you many good works from my
Father. For which of these are you trying to stone me?' The Jews
answered him, 'We are not stoning you for a good work but for
blasphemy. You, a man, are making yourself God'.”
(John
10:31-42).
His utter goodness and holiness should have been the greatest
vindication of his claims, but the leaders were so consumed with
hostility that they were unable to give them a hearing.
Of course, our
Lord
goes on in this passage to state that he is not divine in the sense of
being the same person as the Father. The Father is distinct from
himself as a
person. He is the Father’s Son, and the Father sent him into the world.
He does the Father’s works, and these works ought vindicate him. He is
in the Father and the Father is in him. But he is the same God as is
the Father. All of this shows that our Lord
broached and revealed the doctrine of the Trinity during his public
ministry, not only to his chosen disciples but even to his enemies.
They wanted to stone him for it, and it was a principal factor in his
condemnation to death. That he taught the doctrine of the Trinity to
his chosen disciples is shown by the fact that after his resurrection
from the dead he commissioned his disciples to go to the whole world
and baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit. John had baptized in the name of the one God, but our Lord
charges his Church to baptize in the name of the Holy Trinity. So
then, being a Christian involves being a Trinitarian. Islam accepts
that Jesus was a prophet, but rejects his divine claims and all notion
of their being three divine persons in one God. The priest Arius in the
early years of the fourth century rejected that Christ was divine, and
his heresy spawned a religion that lasted for centuries. The doctrine
of the Trinity is the key teaching of Christ, and we ought love to
pray prayers that express this teaching. One such prayer is the Creed,
either the Nicene of the Apostles. We ought pray it over and
over privately, and not just on Sundays together. Another such prayer
is the Glory Be, in which we give glory to
the Father, to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
Our destiny is
to
be caught up in the life of the Holy Trinity forever, and this destiny
begins now. When we finally arrive in heaven due to the mercy of God,
we shall see the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. We shall be given
the vision of God. Let us begin this now by a full acceptance of the
person of Jesus and his teaching.
(E.J.Tyler)
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« Is it not written in your
law, 'I said, you are gods »? Pope John Paul II (General Audience
6/12/1979)
“Then God said: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness”
(Gn
1,26). As if the Creator himself retracted to create man; as if, in
creating him, not only he called him to existence by saying: “May it
be!” but, in a particular way, he drew man from the mystery of his own
being. This is comprehensible because it does not concern only the
being, but the image. The image must reflect, it must reproduce, in a
certain way, the substance of its prototype...It is obvious that this
resemblance is not meant as a portrait, but in the sense that the life
of a human being is similar to that of God...
By defining man the “image of God”, the book of Genesis reveals
what is
peculiar to man, what distinguishes him from all other creatures of the
visible world. Science, we know, has tried and continues trying to show
in different ways the bonds of man with the natural world, to show his
dependence on this world, so as to insert him in the history of
evolution of the different species.
With all our respect for this type of research, we cannot limit
ourselves to this. If we analyse man in the depths of his being we see
that he differs from the natural world more than he resembles it.
Anthropology and philosophy too proceed in this same way, as they try
to analyse and understand the intelligence, freedom, conscience and
spirituality of man.
The book of Genesisseems to go beyond all these experiences of
science
and, by saying that man is the image of God, it makes us understand
that the answers to the mystery of his humanity must not be sought in
his resemblance with the world. Man resembles God more than nature. It
is in this sense that the psalm could say, “You are gods” (Ps 82,6),
words that Jesus will repeat.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Never correct anyone while you are still indignant about a fault
committed. Wait until the next day, or even longer. And then, calmly,
and with a purer intention, make your reprimand. You will gain more by
one friendly word than by a three-hour quarrel. Control your temper.
(The Way,
no.10)
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What place does human freedom have in the
plan of salvation?
Our freedom is weakened because of original sin. This weakness is
intensified because of successive sins. Christ, however, set us free
“so that we should remain free” (Galatians 5:1). With his grace, the
Holy Spirit leads us to spiritual freedom to make us free co-workers
with him in the Church and in the world. (CCC 1739-1742, 1748)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.366)
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Saturday
of the Fifth Week of Lent II
(March 31) Today let us think of St. Benjamin (Saints)
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Details of Saints for Any
Particular Day
Click centre arrow to start video
Scripture
today: Ezechiel
37:21-28; Jeremiah 31:10, 11-12abcd, 13;
John 11:45-56
Many of the
Jews
who had come to Mary and seen what Jesus had done began to believe in
him. But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus
had done. So the chief priests and the Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin
and said, “What are we going to do? This man is performing many signs.
If we leave him alone, all will believe in him, and the Romans will
come and take away both our land and our nation.” But one of them,
Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, “You know
nothing, nor do you consider that it is better for you that one man
should die instead of the people, so that the whole nation may not
perish.” He did not say this on his own, but since he was high priest
for that year, he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the
nation, and not only for the nation, but also to gather into one the
dispersed children of God. So from that day on they planned to kill
him. So Jesus no longer walked about in public among the Jews, but he
left for the region near the desert, to a town called Ephraim, and
there he remained with his disciples. Now the Passover of the Jews was
near, and many went up from the country to Jerusalem before Passover to
purify themselves. They looked for Jesus and said to one another as
they were in the temple area, “What do you think? That he will not come
to the feast?” (John 11:45-56)
A few
important
things strike us as we ponder on our Gospel passage today. Our Lord’s
great power is evident, and the course of events narrated in the
passage was occasioned by his spectacular raising of Lazarus from the
dead. At a word, Christ had called his friend Lazarus forth from the
tomb where his body had lain for four days. There was nothing that he
could not do, and so we read that “Many of the Jews who had
come
to Mary and seen what Jesus had done began to believe in him. But some
of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. So the
chief priests and the Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin and said, ‘What
are we going to do? This man is performing many signs. If we leave him
alone, all will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away
both our land and our nation’.” (John 11:45-56)
Our Lord’s holiness and authority over both the natural elements and
the things of God was leaving the nation’s religious leaders confused
and in a state of panic. They felt their privileged position was
falling away from under them, and they clutched at pretexts of a
political order to justify their desire to do away with him. The
unworthy and devious Caiaphas uttered his prophecy that “You know
nothing, nor do you consider that it is better for you that one man
should die instead of the people, so that the whole nation may not
perish.” Caipahas was serving as an unwitting instrument of Satan, and
providing for himself a pretext to assuage his conscience: it is better
that one die rather than the entire people. Little did he know how
truly he spoke in a higher sense. Jesus would die not only for his own
people but for the world.
As we think of
our
Lord allowing the net gradually to close around him, let us think of
the genuineness of the Incarnation. The great God truly became man and
took unto himself the weaknesses and limitations of the human
condition. He assumed a human nature and immersed himself in our
condition. While he had the power ultimately he did not use it to
protect himself. But the power of God was at work within these
limitations, and especially within the most crushing of them — his
death. He would
allow himself to be crushed in bearing witness to his true nature and
mission, and his submitting to death would be his greatest work. The
greatest negative in his life became the greatest positive. There is
nothing more negative in life than death, and so much good seems to
come to nothing precisely by the arrival of death. But Christ reversed
this pattern in his death. His death, planned and orchestrated by his
enemies — with Satan behind it all — was the means whereby he attained
the goal of his life and his mission. There is nothing he did during
his life that could compare with what he did by means of his obedient
death. The Pharisees who plotted against him, Caiaphas the high priest,
and others of the Sanhedrin, thought they were solving their problem of
having to endure the person of Jesus. In their evil way they were,
instead, serving our
Lord’s mission. The providence of God is all-powerful and
all-encompassing. It will not lose out. So let us resolve to follow
Christ in his path of trust in the plan of the Father. Whatever may
happen, all things will come together for the good of those who love
God, and for the good of mankind.
Life is
complex and
full of surprises, both good and bad. The important thing is the final
upshot. The final upshot is determined — as with our Lord himself — most especially by our death and the way we die. This in turn will
depend on how we have lived. Let us resolve to live in union with
Christ so as to be able to die with him. If we die with him we shall
rise with him.
(E.J.Tyler)
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"It is
better that one man should die instead of the people" (John 11:45-56)
St Bernard
(1091-1153), Cistercian monk and doctor of the Church
(28th Homily on
the Song of Songs)
The darkening of one makes many bright…
"It is
better," said Caiaphas, "for one man to die for the people, than for
the whole nation to be destroyed.” It is better that one be darkened
"in the likeness of sinful flesh," (Rm 8:3) for the sake of all than
for the whole of mankind to be lost by the darkness of sin; that the
splendor and image of the substance of God should be shrouded in the
form of a slave, in order that a slave might live; that the brightness
of eternal light should become dimmed in the flesh for the purifying of
the flesh; that he who surpasses all mankind in beauty (Ps 44:2) should
be eclipsed by the darkness of the Passion for the enlightening of
mankind; that he should suffer the ignominy of the cross, grow pale in
death, be totally deprived of beauty and comeliness that he might gain
the Church as a beautiful and comely bride, without spot or wrinkle (Ep
5:27).
But under his dark covering
(Sg
1:5) I recognize the King…; I recognize him and I embrace him. For
though he presents this dark exterior… within is the brightness of
divine life, the beauty of his strength, the splendor of grace, the
purity of innocence. But covering it all is the abject hue of
infirmity, his face as it were hidden and despised: "one tempted in
every respect as we are, yet without sinning" (He 4:15).
I recognize here
the
image of our sin-darkened nature; I recognize the garments that clothed
our first parents after their sin (Gn 3:21). My God has clothed himself
in them by assuming the condition of a slave, and becoming as men are,
he was seen in their likeness (Ph 2:7). Under the skin that Jacob wore
(Gn 27:16), symbol of sin, I recognize both the hand that committed no
sin and the neck which never bowed to evil; no word of treachery was
found in his mouth. I know, Lord, that you are gentle by nature, meek
and humble of heart, pleasing in appearance and loveable in your ways,
"anointed with the oil of gladness above your companions" (Mt 11:29; Ps
44:8). Why then this disfigured likeness to Esau? Whose haggard image
this?... Ah! It is mine. He has taken my likeness, taken on my sin… And
beneath the rough skin of my sinfulness I recognize my God and my
Saviour.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
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Will-power. Energy. Example. What has to be
done, is done... without hesitation, without more worrying.
Otherwise, Teresa of Avila would not have been Saint Teresa: nor
Iñigo of Loyola, Saint Ignatius.
God and daring! 'We want Christ to reign!'
(The Way,
no.11)
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What are the sources of the morality of
human acts?
The morality of human acts depends on three sources: the object
chosen,
either a true or apparent good; the intention of the subject who acts,
that is, the purpose for which the subject performs the act; and the
circumstances of the act, which include its consequences. (CCC
1749-1754, 1757-1758)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.367)
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catechists, organizers and lay people,
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