December 2008

Liturgical Season	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thur	Fri	Sat
1st Week Advent I	Nov30	1	2	3	4	5	6
2nd Week Advent I	7	8	9	10	11	12	13
3rd Week Advent I	14	15	16	17	18	19	20
Christmastide	21	22	23	24	25 Xmas	26	27
Christmastide	28	29	30	31

Pope Benedict's general prayer intention for December 2008 is: "That, faced by the growing expansion of the culture of violence and death, the Church may courageously promote the culture of life through all her apostolic and missionary activities".

His mission intention is: "That, especially in mission countries, Christians may show through gestures of brotherliness that the Child born in the grotto in Bethlehem is the luminous Hope of the world".

Prayers this week: To you, my God, I lift my soul, I trust in you; let me never come to shame. Do not let my enemies laugh at me. No one who waits for you is ever put to shame. (Psalm 24:1-3)

All-powerful God, increase our strength of will for doing good that Christ may find an eager welcome at his coming and call us to his side in the kingdom of heaven where he lives and reigns. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

(November 30)   St. Andrew the Apostle
    Andrew was St. Peter’s brother, and was called with him. "As [Jesus] was walking by the sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon who is now called Peter, and his brother Andrew, casting a net into the sea; they were fishermen. He said to them, ‘Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.’ At once they left their nets and followed him" (Matthew 4:18-20). John the Evangelist presents Andrew as a disciple of John the Baptist. When Jesus walked by one day, John said, "Behold, the Lamb of God." Andrew and another disciple followed Jesus. "Jesus turned and saw them following him and said to them, ‘What are you looking for?’ They said to him, ‘Rabbi’ (which translated means Teacher), ‘where are you staying?’ He said to them, ‘Come, and you will see.’ So they went and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day" (John 1:38-39a). Little else is said about Andrew in the Gospels. Before the multiplication of the loaves, it was Andrew who spoke up about the boy who had the barley loaves and fishes (see John 6:8-9). When the Gentiles went to see Jesus, they came to Philip, but Philip then had recourse to Andrew (see John 12:20-22). Legend has it that Andrew preached the Good News in what is now modern Greece and Turkey and was crucified at Patras.
    As in the case of all the apostles except Peter and John, the Gospels give us little about the holiness of Andrew. He was an apostle. That is enough. He was called personally by Jesus to proclaim the Good News, to heal with Jesus' power and to share his life and death. Holiness today is no different. It is a gift that includes a call to be concerned about the Kingdom, an outgoing attitude that wants nothing more than to share the riches of Christ with all people.
    “...The Twelve called together the community of the disciples and said, ‘It is not right for us to neglect the word of God to serve at table. Brothers, select from among you seven reputable men, filled with the Spirit and wisdom, whom we shall appoint to this task, whereas we shall devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word’” (Acts 6:2-4). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Isaiah 63:16b-17, 19b; 64:2-7; Psalm 80:2-3, 15-16, 18-19; 1 Corinthians 1:3-9; Mark 13:33-37

Jesus said to his disciples, “Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. It's like

a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with his assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch. Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back— whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the cock crows, or at dawn. If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to everyone: 'Watch!'” (Mark 13:33-37)

I remember some time back a journalist covering a trouble spot where Islamic extremists were active was captured by the Islamists. He disappeared and subsequently a ransom was demanded for his release. A video was also released in which he pleaded that the ransom be met. As I remember it, the

ransom was provided and so he was set free. The interesting thing was that he told the public subsequently that he was forced to convert to Islam. By that he meant that he was threatened with death if he did not convert, so he converted. Of course, he would have abandoned Islam as soon as he gained his freedom, but his being forced to convert not only said things about the Islamists but also about himself. He was “forced” only in a certain sense. More exactly, he was threatened with consequences if he did not do as his captors demanded. He remained free to refuse and to suffer the results of bearing witness to the Christian Faith. He chose to save his life by avoiding to stand for what the Christian knows to be the truth. In our Gospel passage today our Lord solemnly warns his disciples to be on guard, to be alert, and, as we read, what he says to them he says to everyone: Watch! One application of our Lord’s directive is that we are to watch and be on guard lest in the face of difficulty we be found unready and not disposed to choose what is right. I remember hearing of a teenage girl in the United States some years ago. She found herself in a situation threatened by a crazed young man with a gun. He asked her if she was a Christian. She said that she was. He then said to her that if she did not renounce her faith he would shoot her dead. She said she would not renounce it, and he shot her. The young man was crazed, and perhaps scarcely responsible for what he was doing. But she chose to exercise her freedom in a supreme way when the moment suddenly came. Somehow she was on guard against the temptation not to make this noble and heroic act of personal choice. She was ready to choose the supreme good. She had true freedom and she exercised it.

Freedom is the power given by God to perform deliberate actions on one’s own responsibility. It is this which is distinctive to human acts, and freedom grows the more one does what is good. A high school student sees that the majority of pupils in her religious studies class are raising harsh objections against the religious stand of the teacher. She agrees with the teacher but fears to take a stand with her teacher against her peers. Out of human respect she keeps silent. She is not vigilant against the temptation of bowing to peer pressure and is ensnared into a sad and safe inactivity. The gift of freedom is the most precious gift we have and because of it we have a conscience, or a sense of duty. An animal has no freedom. It acts by instinct, an instinctive sense of what is best for itself. It will act by that instinct. It has no power to know and choose the objective good and so it has no sense of duty. It cannot be held responsible for its actions. If an animal kills a person it is put to death but its killing is not an execution. Its killing is simply the elimination of a danger to human life. But man has freedom, and by his freedom he can choose not only what is good, but the highest of all goods, namely God. Indeed, our freedom attains its proper perfection when it is directed towards God, and that is why our freedom is our greatest natural resource in the attainment of sanctity. A saint is the freest of persons, and the one with the greatest power of freedom in all of history was Jesus Christ. Of course, we who are fallen need the grace of God to attain union with God, but the natural foundation of our attaining God is our own freedom to choose God and to persevere in this free choice. For this to happen we must be on guard against all temptation to sin. We must be vigilant (Mark 13:33-37). Temptations come from within our fallen natures and from the enticements of the world and from the devil. We abuse our freedom when we choose to sin and this choice leads to the deepest slavery of all. We must be on constant guard against temptation. In warning us to watch, our Lord is warning us against sin.

One of the greatest values of the West is that of freedom. In many other parts of the world freedom is not highly valued. It is seriously restricted, including and especially religious freedom. But the West tends to equate freedom with licence to do as one pleases. True freedom is the power to choose the good and the more the good is chosen the more freedom grows. This applies to individuals and to societies. The good is what is true and the Christian knows that it is Christ who has revealed what is true and therefore what is good. Christ himself is the supreme good. The Christian exercises his freedom in choosing Christ and what Christ has revealed to be true, and in being on guard against anything that could tempt him to fail to exercise his freedom in this way.
(E.J.Tyler)

With that slowness, with that passivity, with that reluctance to obey, what damage you cause to the apostolate and what satisfaction you give to the enemy!

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's homily today at a Mass celebrated in Paris at the Esplanade des Invalides.

This appeal to shun idols, dear brothers and sisters, is also pertinent today. Has not our modern world created its own idols? Has it not imitated, perhaps inadvertently, the pagans of antiquity, by diverting man from his true end, from the joy of living eternally with God? This is a question that all people, if they are honest with themselves, cannot help but ask. What is important in my life? What is my first priority? The word "idol" comes from the Greek and means "image", "figure", "representation", but also "ghost", "phantom", "vain appearance". An idol is a delusion, for it turns its worshipper away from reality and places him in the kingdom of mere appearances. Now, is this not a temptation in our own day - the only one we can act upon effectively? The temptation to idolize a past that no longer exists, forgetting its shortcomings; the temptation to idolize a future which does not yet exist, in the belief that, by his efforts alone, man can bring about the kingdom of eternal joy on earth! Saint Paul explains to the Colossians that insatiable greed is a form of idolatry (cf. 3:5), and he reminds his disciple Timothy that love of money is the root of all evil. By yielding to it, he explains, "some have wandered away from the faith and pierced their hearts with many pangs" (1 Tim 6:10). Have not money, the thirst for possessions, for power and even for knowledge, diverted man from his true destiny, from the truth of himself?
(Continuing)

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(December 1)   Blessed John of Vercelli (c. 1205-1283)
        John was born near Vercelli in northwest Italy in the early 13th century. Little is known of his early life. He entered the Dominican Order in the 1240s and served in various leadership capacities over the years. Elected sixth master general of the Dominicans in 1264, he served for almost two decades. Known for his tireless energy and his commitment to simplicity, John made personal visits — typically on foot — to almost all the Dominican houses, urging his fellow friars to strictly observe the rules and constitutions of the Order. He was tapped by two popes for special tasks. Pope Gregory X enlisted the help of John and his fellow Dominicans in helping to pacify the States of Italy that were quarrelling with one another. John was also called upon to draw up a framework for the Second Council of Lyons in 1274. It was at that council that he met Jerome of Ascoli (the man who would later become Pope Nicholas IV), then serving as minister general of the Franciscans. Some time later the two men were sent by Rome to mediate a dispute involving King Philip III of France. Once again, John was able to draw on his negotiating and peacemaking skills. Following the Second Council of Lyons, Pope Gregory selected John to spread devotion to the name of Jesus. John took the task to heart, requiring that every Dominican church contain an altar of the Holy Name; groups were also formed to combat blasphemy and profanity. Toward the end of his life John was offered the role of patriarch of Jerusalem, but declined. He remained Dominican master general until his death.
      The need for peacemakers is certainly as keen today as in the 10th century! As followers of Jesus, John’s role falls to us. Each of us can do something to ease the tensions in our families, in the workplace, among people of different races and creeds. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Isaiah 2:1-5; Psalm 122:1-9; Matthew 8:5-11

When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. Lord, he said, my

servant lies at home paralysed and in terrible suffering. Jesus said to him, I will go and heal him. The centurion replied, Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, 'Go,' and he goes; and that one, 'Come,' and he comes. I say to my servant, 'Do this,' and he does it. When Jesus heard this, he was astonished and said to those following him, I tell you the truth, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith. I say to you that many will come from the east and the west, and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 8:5-11)

There is one feature of our Lord’s preaching and instruction which those who follow him ought bear in mind. It is the praise which at various times he accords those who are not of the faith. On one occasion he was asked by a scribe what the greatest commandment of the Law is, and having

answered that (by getting the scribe himself to answer it) he was asked by that scribe who one’s neighbour is. Our Lord proceeded to tell the parable of the Good Samaritan. The man attacked by robbers on the way to Jericho was left by the side of the road half dead. A priest and then a Levite passed by on the other side and did nothing. But a Samaritan - a foreigner and a religious heretic - came by and was filled with compassion for the man on the road. He took him up, carried him to shelter and paid for expenses till he returned. Our Lord took his example of what it means to be a real neighbour from a person who was despised for his religious errors and told his enquirer to imitate him. On another occasion ten lepers appeared appealing to our Lord for pity. Our Lord sent them off and on the way to the priests they were cured. One only returned to give thanks, and our Lord observed that he was a foreigner: he was a Samaritan. It must have been obvious from his dress, or his features, or his accent. He was acknowledge by our Lord for having given thanks and praise to God for his healing. The others did not. We remember that occasion when our Lord had left the regions of Galilee and Judea and had gone into pagan territory to be with his disciples alone. Out came a Canaanite woman appealing to him on behalf of her daughter. Her importunity won from him the praise that she had great faith. So too in our Gospel passage today. The profound respect of the centurion is manifest. He approaches our Lord on behalf of his servant and our Lord immediately offers to go and heal him. But the centurion feels unworthy of having Jesus in his home and asks him merely to say the word and his servant will be healed. His faith evokes high praise from our Lord, who says he has not seen its like.

These incidents in the Gospels ought remind the Christian of the respect and deep charity with which we ought regard and refer to those outside the Faith. In ways that may not be evident to us the implicit faith of some of them may even be greater than our own. The faith of the centurion in today’s Gospel was greater than very many of the children of Israel (Matthew 8:5-11). Charity and compassion for those in need - so decisive before the judgment seat of God - may be greater in many outside the Faith than in many of the Faith. Certainly the charity of the Good Samaritan was greater than that of the priest and the scribe on the way to Jericho. Not only could the faith and the charity of many outside the faith be greater than many who are blessed with the faith, but in their own way they can be models for those who have the faith. That is to say, we can learn from various ones among them. Who could not learn from Mahatma Ghandi and his insistence on not being violent in protesting against injustice? Who could not learn from Nelson Mandela in his willingness to put aside his past injuries and deal in a spirit of forgiveness with those who had incarcerated him? Ultimately it is a recognition of the good, though wounded and limited, which is to be found in human nature. Man is not radically and overwhelmingly corrupt, though he is greatly wounded because of the Fall and is in need of God’s grace if he is to be redeemed and sanctified. Good is present in human nature and our Lord’s words in today’s Gospel bears witness to this. It also means that because of the goodness that is there - even if it is wounded - the disciple of Christ ought with optimism bear witness to Jesus before natural man. There is goodness in the heart of natural man and the Spirit of God continues to hover - as he did at the beginning - over the waters of the world. He comes to the aid of natural man helping him to recognize in Jesus his Saviour and to place his faith in him, as did the centurion of today’s passage.

In short, the world can be looked at in two ways, both of which are true. The world is, from one point of view, the source of opposition to our Lord and his teachings. From this point of view it has a Prince. The Prince of this world hates Christ and the world follows suit. But there is another aspect of the world. It is the world which cries out for salvation and can recognize its Saviour. This yearning for Jesus involves the recognition of and aspiration for the Good. There is good and bad in the world, and our Lord spoke of both. In today’s Gospel we are presented with an instance of the good in the world, a goodness that seeks Christ and places its faith in him. Let us be Christ-like in all respects in our attitude to the world and all those outside the Faith.
(E.J.Tyler)

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Obey, as an instrument obeys in the hands of an artist, not stopping to consider the reasons for what it is doing, being sure that you will never be directed to do anything that is not good and for the glory of God.'

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's homily today at a Mass celebrated in Paris at the Esplanade des Invalides.

Dear brothers and sisters, the question that today's liturgy places before us finds an answer in the liturgy itself, which we have inherited from our fathers in faith, and notably from Saint Paul himself (cf. 1 Cor 11:23). In his commentary on this text, Saint John Chrysostom observes that Saint Paul severely condemns idolatry, which is a "grave fault", a "scandal", a real "plague" (Homily 24 on the First Letter to the Corinthians, 1). He immediately adds that this radical condemnation of idolatry is never a personal condemnation of the idolater. In our judgements, must we never confuse the sin, which is unacceptable, with the sinner, the state of whose conscience we cannot judge and who, in any case, is always capable of conversion and forgiveness. Saint Paul makes an appeal to the reason of his readers, to the reason of every human being - that powerful testimony to the presence of the Creator in the creature: "I speak as to sensible men; judge for yourselves what I say" (1 Cor 10:15). Never does God, of whom the Apostle is an authorized witness here, ask man to sacrifice his reason! Reason never enters into real contradiction with faith! The one God - Father, Son and Holy Spirit -- created our reason and gives us faith, proposing to our freedom that it be received as a precious gift. It is the worship of idols which diverts man from this perspective. Let us therefore ask God, who sees us and hears us, to help us purify ourselves from all idols, in order to arrive at the truth of our being, in order to arrive at the truth of his infinite being!
(Continuing)

(2 December)   Blessed Rafal Chylinski (1694-1741)
        Born near Buk in the Poznan region of Poland, Melchior showed early signs of religious devotion; family members nicknamed him "the little monk." After completing his studies at the Jesuit college in Poznan, Melchior joined the cavalry and was promoted to the rank of officer within three years. Against the urgings of his military comrades, in 1715 Melchior joined the Conventual Franciscans in Kraków, receiving the name Rafal, and was ordained two years later. After pastoral assignments in nine cities, he came to Lagiewniki (central Poland), where he spent the last 13 years of his life, except for 20 months ministering to flood and epidemic victims in Warsaw. In all these places, Rafal was known for his simple and candid sermons, for his generosity as well as his ministry in the confessional. People of all levels of society were drawn to the self-sacrificing way he lived out his religious profession and priestly ministry. Rafal played the harp, lute and mandolin to accompany liturgical hymns. In Lagiewniki he distributed food, supplies and clothing to the poor. After his death, the Conventual church in that city became a place of pilgrimage for people throughout Poland. He was beatified in Warsaw in 1991. The sermons preached by Rafal were powerfully reinforced by the living sermon of his life. The Sacrament of Reconciliation can help us bring our daily choices into harmony with our words about Jesus’ influence in our life.
    During the beatification homily, Pope John Paul II said, "May Blessed Rafal remind us that every one of us, even though we are sinners, has been called to love and to holiness" (L'Osservatore Romano, 1991, vol. 25, number 19).   (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Isaiah 11:1-10; Psalm 72:1-2, 7-8, 12-13, 17; Luke 10:21-24

At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and

earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure. All things have been committed to me by my Father. No-one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no-one knows who the Father is except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. Then he turned to his disciples and said privately, Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it. (Luke 10:21-24)

One of the most interesting and significant of historical developments has been the rise of democracy. It has had a long history and a gradual development, with its origins mainly in classical Greece. Indeed, a principal legacy of Greek society and culture is the democratic method of reaching decisions that

affect the society, the polity. It has been a great boon for the world and we see what can sadly happen when a great society is in the hands of a single person or small clique. History has seen its results in the Roman Empire and in so many regimes since. At the same time, this has to be said. There have been extremely worthy monarchs who have led their people wisely, such as Saint Louis king of France in the thirteenth century, and others in other eras. By the same token, democratic institutions have led to the worst of leaders being elected by the populace because of a skilful use of propaganda and a poor moral perception of the issues by the people. A great country can democratically elect a president who is deeply committed to abortion and who, true to form, proceeds to promote abortion when elected. So whatever about the merits of this or that institutional structure the critical issue is, what is the light by which people are living and being guided? The most educated can be blind to the right and the least educated and influential can have true moral perception. What is the light by which we are to be guided? We shall be led to life or to death according to the light by which we are travelling. On one occasion our Lord warned lest the light within us be darkness. Each person, no matter how obscure, has the duty to attain the true light. It is about this which our Lord prays to his Father with such feeling in today’s Gospel passage. We read, “At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.”

There is a light available to the world, a light that leads to life, and that light is the person and the teaching of Christ. Our Lord said, “I am the Light of the world”. He said that the one who follows him is walking in the light, whereas the one who does not follow him is in the dark. He is the light that has come from God and how great is the need of mankind for this light! Whether or not a country is democratic, it needs this light otherwise it will proceed in the darkness. The most educated and persuasive of persons will be in the darkness if he or she does not accept and follow the light of Christ. And so our Lord continues in today’s Gospel, “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No-one knows who the Son is except the Father, and no-one knows who the Father is except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. Then he turned to his disciples and said privately, Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.” (Luke 10:21-24) The Christian has an inestimable treasure in possessing Christ. The light of Christ’s person and teaching not only lights up his own life, but he has the means of lighting up the life of society around him. This is why he has an immense responsibility to bring that light to the world around him. There is an old saying that evil flourishes because good people do nothing. It is especially the lay Christian living in the world who has the responsibility to bring the light of Christ to all levels of society. How government needs this light! How business and commerce needs this light! How educational institutions, primary, secondary, and tertiary, need this light! How youth need this light! How all the world needs this light! If there is the opportunity, the responsibility of the Christian is great to bear witness to this light and assist others to receive it. As St Paul writes, woe betide me if I do not preach the Gospel!

As we look out on the world and see its numerous problems, we ought do so with the grand teaching of Christ in mind. Man has fallen. He needs the light and salvation of God. That light and salvation is present in the person and teaching of Christ. We who are baptized possess that light. We must resolutely live by it and bear witness to it before others. The world needs this light, so let us not let the world down by hiding it under a bushel, the bushel of our own fear.
(E.J.Tyler)

The enemy: Will you obey... even in this 'ridiculous' little detail? You, with God's grace: I will obey... even in this 'heroic' little detail.

PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's homily today at a Mass celebrated in Paris at the Esplanade des Invalides.

How do we reach God? How do we manage to discover or rediscover him whom man seeks at the deepest core of himself, even though he so often forgets him? Saint Paul asks us to make use not only of our reason, but above all our faith in order to discover him. Now, what does faith say to us? The bread that we break is a communion with the Body of Christ. The cup of blessing which we bless is a communion with the Blood of Christ. This extraordinary revelation comes to us from Christ and has been transmitted to us by the Apostles and by the whole Church for almost two thousand years: Christ instituted the sacrament of the Eucharist on the evening of Holy Thursday. He wanted his sacrifice to be presented anew, in an unbloody manner, every time a priest repeats the words of consecration over the bread and wine. Millions of times over the last twenty centuries, in the humblest chapels and in the most magnificent basilicas and cathedrals, the risen Lord has given himself to his people, thus becoming, in the famous expression of Saint Augustine, "more intimate to us than we are to ourselves" (cf. Confessions, III, 6, 11).
(Continuing)

(December 3) Saint Francis Xavier, priest (1506-1552)
Jesus asked, “What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life?” (Matthew 16:26a). The words were repeated to a young teacher of philosophy who had a highly

promising career in academics, with success and a life of prestige and honour before him. Francis Xavier, 24 at the time, and living and teaching in Paris, did not heed these words at once. They came from a good friend, Ignatius of Loyola, whose tireless persuasion finally won the young man to Christ. Francis then made the spiritual exercises under the direction of Ignatius, and in 1534 joined his little community (the infant Society of Jesus). Together at Montmartre they vowed poverty, chastity and apostolic service according to the directions of the pope. From Venice, where he was ordained priest in 1537, Francis Xavier went on to Lisbon and from there sailed to the East Indies, landing at Goa, on the west coast of India. For the next 10 years he laboured to bring the faith to such widely scattered peoples as the Hindus, the Malayans and the Japanese. He spent much of that time in India, and served as provincial of the newly established Jesuit province of India. Wherever he went, he lived with the poorest people, sharing their food and rough accommodations. He spent countless hours ministering to the sick and the poor, particularly to lepers. Very often he had no time to sleep or even to say his breviary but, as we know from his letters, he was filled always with joy. Francis went through the islands of Malaysia, then up to Japan. He learned enough Japanese to preach to simple folk, to instruct and to baptize, and to establish missions for those who were to follow him. From Japan he had dreams of going to China, but this plan was never realized. Before reaching the mainland he died. His remains are enshrined in the Church of Good Jesus in Goa.
All of us are called to “go and preach to all nations” (see Matthew 28:19). Our preaching is not necessarily on distant shores but to our families, our children, our husband or wife, our coworkers. And we are called to preach not with words, but by our everyday lives. Only by sacrifice, the giving up of all selfish gain, could Francis Xavier be free to bear the Good News to the world. Sacrifice is leaving yourself behind at times for a greater good, the good of prayer, the good of helping someone in need, the good of just listening to another. The greatest gift we have is our time. Francis gave his to others. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Isaiah 25:6-10a; Psalm 23:1-6; Matthew 15:29-37

Jesus left there and went along the Sea of Galilee. Then he went up on a mountainside and sat down. Great crowds came to him, bringing the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute and many others, and

laid them at his feet; and he healed them. The people were amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the crippled made well, the lame walking and the blind seeing. And they praised the God of Israel. Jesus called his disciples to him and said, I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to send them away hungry, or they may collapse on the way. His disciples answered, Where could we get enough bread in this remote place to feed such a crowd? How many loaves do you have? Jesus asked. Seven, they replied, and a few small fish. He told the crowd to sit down on the ground. Then he took the seven loaves and the fish, and when he had given thanks, he broke them and gave them to the disciples, and they in turn to the people. They all ate and were satisfied. Afterwards the disciples picked up seven basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. (Matthew 15: 29-37)

There have been many persons in history who have gained great power over others by winning public office, by commanding the military, by capturing the means of mass media, and so forth. Their power has largely derived from the positions they were able to occupy. What would Hitler have been had he not won (by dubious means) political power enabling him to impose his wishes on others? Deprived of his position he would have been nothing. He had no power of himself. Or again, what command over nature did Napoleon possess? Absolutely none.

Had he been transporting troops across the Mediterranean sea in the midst of a hurricane he would have been helpless in the face of it. Had his armies been struck with a terrible plague, he would have been helpless before the plague. He had no power of himself. But now, look at the power Jesus Christ had of himself. In our Gospel today we read that “Great crowds came to him, bringing the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute and many others, and laid them at his feet; and he healed them. The people were amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the crippled made well, the lame walking and the blind seeing. And they praised the God of Israel.” We tend to take Christ’s miracles for granted and forget the understandable amazement they evoked. Indeed, Christ showed that there was nothing he could not do. In himself he was almighty. He calmed a raging storm at sea with a mere word. In 1953 a famous British movie was produced, The Cruel Sea, portraying with accuracy and realism the war between the Royal Navy and Germany’s U-Boats during World War II. I saw it as a youth and I remember the images of the turbulent sea. The sea was vast and had enormous power. Christ showed he had far greater power than the sea and could pacify it at a word. Frequently on the news advances in medical science are reported and disease is shown to be a powerful enemy to man. But as we read in our Gospel today at a word Christ could heal a person of the greatest of physical diseases and disabilities. Christ showed he was almighty but he used his power strictly for the purposes of his redeeming mission.

The purpose of Christ’s miracles was not to win political and social power but to win disciples. That is to say, he wanted to reveal who he was and to draw all to himself that they might become his friends. He wanted people to enter into his company and to come after him. We ought contemplate the miracles of Christ as revealing his person, and contemplating his person we ought choose to be his loyal friend. In Christ the power of God was showing itself in loving mercy. This is especially evident in the miracle of the loaves and fish in our Gospel today. We read that “Jesus called his disciples to him and said, I have compassion for these people; they have already been with me three days and have nothing to eat. I do not want to send them away hungry, or they may collapse on the way. His disciples answered, Where could we get enough bread in this remote place to feed such a crowd? How many loaves do you have? Jesus asked. Seven, they replied, and a few small fish. He told the crowd to sit down on the ground. Then he took the seven loaves and the fish, and when he had given thanks, he broke them and gave them to the disciples, and they in turn to the people. They all ate and were satisfied.” (Matthew 15: 29-37) In placing ourselves in the scene of the miracle and observing the astonishing feeding of thousands with just a handful of food, we are led to think of Jesus himself. He is full of power, yes, but that power is at the service of human need. It reveals itself in compassion and mercy. The miracles of Christ show his sacred heart and invite us to trust him completely. The sight of the hungry crowds, the sight of the blind, the lame and the dumb ought also remind us of our own need for him. Most of all, we need Christ because of the greatest affliction of all, the affliction of sin of which physical debility is a kind of sign. We ought approach Christ presenting to him our sinful condition, knowing he has the power to heal.

Let us read the Gospels with the intention of coming to know and love Jesus Christ. He, the risen and glorious Jesus, is with us still and he abides in his body the Church of which he is the head. The Gospels enable us to know and love him. St Jerome wrote once that he who does not know the Scriptures does not know Christ. Christ showed by his miracles that he is almighty. At the Last Supper our Lord invited his disciples to consider the works he had done and to believe in him. Let us believe in him and nourish our belief by the contemplation of his works for man.
(E.J.Tyler)

Initiative. You must have it in your apostolate, within the terms of your instructions.

If it exceeds those limits or if you are in doubt, consult whoever is in charge, without telling anyone else of what you are thinking.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's homily today at a Mass celebrated in Paris at the Esplanade des Invalides.

Brothers and sisters, let us give the greatest veneration to the sacrament of the Body and Blood of the Lord, the Blessed Sacrament of the real presence of the Lord to his Church and to all humanity. Let us take every opportunity to show him our respect and our love! Let us give him the greatest marks of honour! Through our words, our silences, and our gestures, let us never allow our faith in the risen Christ, present in the Eucharist, to lose its savour in us or around us! As Saint John Chrysostom said magnificently, "Let us behold the ineffable generosity of God and all the good things that he enables us to enjoy, when we offer him this cup, when we receive communion, thanking him for having delivered the human race from error, for having brought close to him those who were far away, for having made, out of those who were without hope and without God in the world, a people of brothers, fellow heirs with the Son of God" (Homily 24 on the First Letter to the Corinthians, 1). "In fact", he continues, "what is in the cup is precisely what flowed from his side, and it is of this that we partake" (ibid.). There is not only partaking and sharing, there is "union", says the Doctor whose name means "golden mouth".
(Continuing)

(December 4)   St. John Damascene (676?-749)
    John spent most of his life in the monastery of St. Sabas, near Jerusalem, and all of his life under Muslim rule, indeed, protected by it. He was born in Damascus, received a classical and theological education, and followed his father in a government position under the Arabs. After a few years he resigned and went to the monastery of St. Sabas. He is famous in three areas. First, he is known for his writings against the iconoclasts, who opposed the veneration of images. Paradoxically, it was the Eastern Christian emperor Leo who forbade the practice, and it was because John lived in Muslim territory that his enemies could not silence him. Second, he is famous for his treatise, Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, a summary of the Greek Fathers (of which he became the last). It is said that this book is to Eastern schools what the Summa of Aquinas became to the West. Thirdly, he is known as a poet, one of the two greatest of the Eastern Church, the other being Romanus the Melodist. His devotion to the Blessed Mother and his sermons on her feasts are well known.
    John defended the Church’s understanding of the veneration of images and explained the faith of the Church in several other controversies. For over 30 years he combined a life of prayer with these defences and his other writings. His holiness expressed itself in putting his literary and preaching talents at the service of the Lord.
    “The saints must be honoured as friends of Christ and children and heirs of God, as John the theologian and evangelist says: ‘But as many as received him, he gave them the power to be made the sons of God....’ Let us carefully observe the manner of life of all the apostles, martyrs, ascetics and just men who announced the coming of the Lord. And let us emulate their faith, charity, hope, zeal, life, patience under suffering, and perseverance unto death, so that we may also share their crowns of glory” (Exposition of the Orthodox Faith). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Isaiah 26:1-6; Psalm 118:1 and 8-9, 19-21, 25-27a; Matthew 7:21, 24-27

Jesus said to his disciples, Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of

heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash. (Matthew 7:21, 24-27)

During the Last Supper our Lord said to his disciples that they called him Master and Lord, and they were right to do so. He went on to observe that if he, their Master and Lord, washed their feet, they then ought do the same to one another. Let us consider this, that our Lord told his disciples that they were

right to address him Master and Lord, for he is just that. Soon after his baptism in the Jordan our Lord was pointed out by John the Baptist as the Lamb of God. Two of his disciples followed our Lord and our Lord turned to them and asked what they wanted. They addressed him as Master and asked him where he lived. Throughout the Gospels we see the disciples addressing Jesus as Master or Teacher, and as Lord. After his resurrection the disciples were fishing on the Lake, and Jesus was on the shore. John, seeing him, said to Peter, it is the Lord. We might say that the climax of St John’s Gospel was when Thomas said to the risen Jesus, my Lord and my God. He addressed him as Lord, meaning that he was Yahweh God of the Old Testament. St Paul taught in his Letters that Jesus is Lord. However - and this is the point of what I have just been saying - in our Gospel today our Lord says to his disciples that it is not everyone who says to him, “Lord, Lord,” who will enter the kingdom of heaven. To address our Lord as the Master and the Lord is not sufficient to be regarded as his true disciple. The Pharisees themselves addressed Jesus as Rabbi, master. Presumably many of those disciples who left him following his proclamation of the doctrine of the Eucharist at Capernaum also had addressed him as Master. Judas would have too. Our Lord is saying in our passage today that while it is natural to address and consider him as Master and Lord, more is needed. “Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21, 24-27). The critical thing for his disciple is obedience to the will of God.

Indeed, obedience is the rock-like foundation of a secure religious and human life. It is the key to entry into the kingdom of heaven. Without it all is insecure, all is weak. With it, everything is safe. This one key can be taken up by anyone, be he well-endowed or poorly endowed, be he famous or unknown, be he anyone at all. Obedience is the way to God and his kingdom. Nothing else matters so much in life. So it is that there is such a variety of canonized saints. There is St Augustine, an intellectual giant of the first millennium. There is St Thomas Aquinas, an intellectual giant of the second millennium. Both are doctors of the Church. Both made the foundation of their lives knowing and doing the will of God. At the same time there is St Therese of Lisieux, a hidden Carmelite nun in France at the end of the nineteenth century who were it not for her autobiography would probably have been scarcely known. She is a canonised saint. She is also a doctor of the Church for the spiritual teaching expressed in her autobiography. The will of God was the foundation of her life. In October 2008 her two parents were beatified in Lisieux, France. The foundation of their lives together was the will of God. This is the key to the life of Jesus Christ himself. He did the will of his heavenly Father. My food, he told his disciples, is to do the will of the one who sent me. He challenged his enemies, Can any of you convict me of sin? I always do what pleases Him, he said on another occasion. So then, if every day in our prayers we address Jesus as our Master and our Lord (as we certainly should), what our Lord above all expects of us is that we hear his word and put it into practice. St Thomas Aquinas said that sanctity consists in the complete readiness to do the will of God. This is translated into fulfilling one’s daily duties as well as possible for love of and obedience to God. If we wish to build our house on rock, obedience is the foundation we must lay. Otherwise all is sand.

The wind will blow and the floods will rise. What then will happen to the house? The ultimate flood will be that of death. When death and the judgment that follows it come will the house that is our very person fall with a great crash, or will it stand? It will stand not only now in this life but forever hereafter if we have made as our constant basis obedience to the will of God. Let us then resolve every day to hear the word of Jesus and put it into practice.
(E.J.Tyler)

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's homily today at a Mass celebrated in Paris at the Esplanade des Invalides.

The Mass is the sacrifice of thanksgiving par excellence, the one which allows us to unite our own thanksgiving to that of the Saviour, the Eternal Son of the Father. It also makes its own appeal to us to shun idols, for, as Saint Paul insists, "you cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons" (1 Cor 10:21). The Mass invites us to discern what, in ourselves, is obedient to the Spirit of God and what, in ourselves, is attuned to the spirit of evil. In the Mass, we want to belong only to Christ and we take up with gratitude - with thanksgiving - the cry of the psalmist: "How shall I repay the Lord for his goodness to me?" (Ps 116:12). Yes, how can I give thanks to the Lord for the life he has given me? The answer to the psalmist's question is found in the psalm itself, since the word of God responds graciously to its own questions. How else could we render thanks to the Lord for all his goodness to us if not by attending to his own words: "I will raise the cup of salvation, I will call on the name of the Lord" (Ps 116:13)?
(Continuing)

(December 5)   St. Sabas (b. 439)
        Born in Cappadocia (modern-day Turkey), Sabas is one of the most highly regarded patriarchs among the monks of Palestine and is considered one of the founders of Eastern monasticism. After an unhappy childhood in which he was abused and ran away several times, Sabas finally sought refuge in a monastery. While family members tried to persuade him to return home, the young boy felt drawn to monastic life. Although the youngest monk in the house, he excelled in virtue. At age 18 he travelled to Jerusalem, seeking to learn more about living in solitude. Soon he asked to be accepted as a disciple of a well-known local solitary, though initially he was regarded as too young to live completely as a hermit. Initially, Sabas lived in a monastery, where he worked during the day and spent much of the night in prayer. At the age of 30 he was given permission to spend five days each week in a nearby remote cave, engaging in prayer and manual labour in the form of weaving baskets. Following the death of his mentor, St. Euthymius, Sabas moved farther into the desert near Jericho. There he lived for several years in a cave near the brook Cedron. A rope was his means of access. Wild herbs among the rocks were his food. Occasionally men brought him other food and items, while he had to go a distance for his water. Some of these men came to him desiring to join him in his solitude. At first he refused. But not long after relenting, his followers swelled to more than 150, all of them living in individual huts grouped around a church, called a laura. The bishop persuaded a reluctant Sabas, then in his early 50s, to prepare for the priesthood so that he could better serve his monastic community in leadership. While functioning as abbot among a large community of monks, he felt ever called to live the life of a hermit. Throughout each year —consistently in Lent—he left his monks for long periods of time, often to their distress. A group of 60 men left the monastery, settling at a nearby ruined facility. When Sabas learned of the difficulties they were facing, he generously gave them supplies and assisted in the repair of their church. Over the years Sabas travelled throughout Palestine, preaching the true faith and successfully bringing back many to the Church. At the age of 91, in response to a plea from the Patriarch of Jerusalem, Sabas undertook a journey to Constantinople in conjunction with the Samaritan revolt and its violent repression. He fell ill and, soon after his return, died at the monastery at Mar Saba. Today the monastery is still inhabited by monks of the Eastern Orthodox Church, and St. Sabas is regarded as one of the most noteworthy figures of early monasticism.
    Few of us share Sabas’s yearning for a cave in the desert, but most of us sometimes resent the demands others place on our time. Sabas understands that. When at last he gained the solitude for which he yearned, a community immediately began to gather around him and he was forced into a leadership role. He stands as a model of patient generosity for anyone whose time and energy are required by others—that is, for all of us. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Isaiah 29:17-24; Psalm 27:1, 4, 13-14; Matthew 9:27-31

As Jesus went on from there, two blind men followed him, calling out, Have mercy on us, Son of David! When he had gone indoors, the blind men came to him, and he asked them, Do you believe that I am able to do this? Yes, Lord, they replied. Then he touched their eyes and said, According to your faith will it be done to you; and their sight was restored. Jesus warned them sternly, See that no-one knows about this. But they went out and spread the news about him all over that region. (Matthew 9:27-31)

On one occasion our Lord was passing through a village with a great crowd following him and a blind man, Bar Timaeus (that is, the son of Timaeus), heard that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. He immediately began to shout to gain the attention of Jesus. He called out, Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me! He would not stop shouting despite the rebukes of others. The sound of his voice reached Jesus who then stopped and asked that the man be brought to him. When the blind man came he asked what he wanted him to do for him.

Lord, that I may see, he replied. Immediately our Lord healed him and he then followed our Lord along the road praising God. Inasmuch as his very name is recorded we may presume he became a disciple. In our Gospel today we notice a different sequence of events. We read that as Jesus went on two blind men followed him, calling out, Have mercy on us, Son of David! We do not read that our Lord stopped and healed them at that point. It seems that he allowed them to keep appealing to him while he continued on his way. They had to keep up their request with no response from our Lord at that point. It was only when our Lord had gone indoors that the blind men were able to come to him and speak to him directly. Then he asked them if they believed that he could do this for them. They said they did and he healed them according as they had faith. What does this tells us? At least it tells us that God answers our prayers in different ways. To one person he may answer a great wish and need without his even asking. For instance, when our Lord was approaching the village of Nain there was a funeral procession on the way out. He stopped the procession and proceeded to raise the young man back to life and gave him to his mother. On other occasions he immediately answered the request once presented. Bar Timaeus was healed as soon as he asked. In our passage today the blind men had to keep following our Lord asking all the while. It was after a little time that he answered their prayer.

The ways of God are not our ways. At times our prayer may not be answered in the form we present it. For instance, on one occasion two of the Twelve came to our Lord with their mother and asked that they be given places at his right and at his left at his coming in glory. Our Lord told them that they did not know what they were asking, and that in any case it was not for him to do this for them. Places as these were for those to whom they had been allotted. That is to say they were asking for what may not have been in accord with the divine plan. Often we may not know what we are asking, and in any case what we are asking for may be against the will of God. But God will answer our prayers in the way that is best for us. In the case of the two Apostles (James and John) our Lord immediately told them that they would indeed share in the cup he was to drink - and that was the important thing when it came to sharing in his glory. In respect to our two blind men of the Gospel passage of today, the important thing was that they persisted in their prayer. Their persistence gained them their request. On another occasion our Lord taught his disciples that they were to pray always and never to lose heart. Imagine the two blind men following our Lord along the road or even outside the house, continuing to call out for healing. Would our Lord have left them to continue appealing to him indefinitely and without any response? Of course not. The time of his response was not predictable, but that he would in due course respond was clear - and presumably the blind men were sure of this. God will answer our prayers if we but ask him humbly and persistently, never losing heart. Let us notice another aspect to the situation described in our Gospel today. When our Lord did heal the two blind men he “warned them sternly, See that no-one knows about this. But they went out and spread the news about him all over that region.” (Matthew 9:27-31) So they disregarded his command. They did not fall in with the plan of God and in this respect they caused complications - impediments - for our Lord in his work.

St Alphonsus Ligouri wrote that the prayer of petition is immensely important and one reason why we do not receive far more from God than we do is that we do not ask for more. We must ask with faith and persistence, and with a profound resolve to adhere to the will and plan of God. Let us fill up our days with prayer and service, all the while endeavouring to do only the will of God.
(E.J.Tyler)

What a pity that whoever is in charge doesn't give you good example! But, is it for his personal qualities that you obey him? Or do you conveniently interpret Saint Paul's 'obey your leaders' with a qualification of your own..., 'always provided they have virtues to my taste'?

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's homily today at a Mass celebrated in Paris at the Esplanade des Invalides.

To raise the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord, is that not the very best way of "shunning idols", as Saint Paul asks us to do? Every time the Mass is celebrated, every time Christ makes himself sacramentally present in his Church, the work of our salvation is accomplished. Hence to celebrate the Eucharist means to recognize that God alone has the power to grant us the fullness of joy and teach us true values, eternal values that will never pass away. God is present on the altar, but he is also present on the altar of our heart when, as we receive communion, we receive him in the sacrament of the Eucharist. He alone teaches us to shun idols, the illusions of our minds.

Now, dear brothers and sisters, who can raise the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord in the name of the entire people of God, except the priest, ordained for this purpose by his Bishop? At this point, dear inhabitants of Paris and the outlying regions, but also those of you who have come from the rest of France and from neighbouring countries, allow me to issue an appeal, confident in the faith and generosity of the young people who are considering a religious or priestly vocation: do not be afraid! Do not be afraid to give your life to Christ! Nothing will ever replace the ministry of priests at the heart of the Church! Nothing will ever replace a Mass for the salvation of the world! Dear young and not so young who are listening to me, do not leave Christ's call unanswered. Saint John Chrysostom, in his Treatise on the Priesthood, showed how sluggish man could be in responding, but he is nonetheless the living example of God's action at the heart of a human freedom that allows itself to be shaped by his grace.
(Continuing)

(December 6)   St. Nicholas (d. 350?)
        The absence of the “hard facts” of history is not necessarily an obstacle to the popularity of saints, as the devotion to St. Nicholas shows. Both the Eastern and Western Churches honour him, and it is claimed that, after the Blessed Virgin, he is the saint most pictured by Christian artists. And yet, historically, we can pinpoint only the fact that Nicholas was the fourth-century bishop of Myra, a city in Lycia, a province of Asia Minor. As with many of the saints, however, we are able to capture the relationship which Nicholas had with God through the admiration which Christians have had for him—an admiration expressed in the colourful stories which have been told and retold through the centuries. Perhaps the best-known story about Nicholas concerns his charity toward a poor man who was unable to provide dowries for his three daughters of marriageable age. Rather than see them forced into prostitution, Nicholas secretly tossed a bag of gold through the poor man’s window on three separate occasions, thus enabling the daughters to be married. Over the centuries, this particular legend evolved into the custom of gift-giving on the saint’s feast. In the English-speaking countries, St. Nicholas became, by a twist of the tongue, Santa Claus — further expanding the example of generosity portrayed by this holy bishop.
    The critical eye of modern history makes us take a deeper look at the legends surrounding St. Nicholas. But perhaps we can utilize the lesson taught by his legendary charity, look deeper at our approach to material goods in the Christmas season and seek ways to extend our sharing to those in real need.
    “In order to be able to consult more suitably the welfare of the faithful according to the condition of each one, a bishop should strive to become duly acquainted with their needs in the social circumstances in which they live.... He should manifest his concern for all, no matter what their age, condition, or nationality, be they natives, strangers, or foreigners” (Decree on the Bishops' Pastoral Office, 16). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion

on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. He called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out evil spirits and to heal every disease and sickness. These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel. As you go, preach this message: 'The kingdom of heaven is near.' Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give. (Matthew 9:35–10:1, 5a, 6-8)

One of the greatest autobiographies of the nineteenth century - indeed, of the English language - was the Apologia pro Vita Sua of John Henry Newman, published in 1864. It is a history of his religious opinions and is the story of the mind of a great Christian thinker. One of the many powerful pages in

his account is that in which he describes the tension between his utter certainty of the being of a God which he says is “as certain to me as the certainty of my own existence” and the sight of “the world of men” which “fills me with unspeakable distress.” The world comes forth from the creative hand of God and yet it is “no reflexion of its Creator.” The sight of the world, he writes, is “nothing else than the prophet’s scroll, full of ‘lamentation, and mourning, and woe’.” (World’s Classics, OUP, p.250) It can only mean that “either there is no Creator, or this living society of men is in a true sense discarded from his presence.” (P.251). Newman is referring to the great problem of evil which we know from Revelation has come from the sin of man. God’s creation has been profoundly spoilt. Now, we get a hint of this in our Gospel passage today. We read that “Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” (Matthew 9:35–10:1) Our Lord was travelling through the towns and through tiny villages. We read elsewhere that he visited the farms. He entered homes. We read in various parts of the Gospel how our Lord visited the private dwellings of all sorts of persons. He willingly got up to go to the home of a centurion to heal his servant. He entered the home of the Pharisee to dine there. He invited himself to the home of Zacchaeus the chief tax collector. When he saw the crowds he saw that they were harassed and dejected. He saw the power of evil in the world. At the tomb of Lazarus our Lord wept.

What was our Lord’s response to this? He came to the people and began to teach them at length. He gave them the signs that were his miracles, signs of his power and mercy. Above all he would take upon his own shoulders the sin of the world and expiate for it by his Passion and Death. He sent his disciples out to the lost sheep of the House of Israel and asked that they pray that the Lord of the harvest would send more labourers into his harvest. He himself would have been praying for this intention. We read that “He called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out evil spirits and to heal every disease and sickness. These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel. As you go, preach this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven is near.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.” Christ was getting ready to give to broken, fallen mankind, the mankind Newman describes with such pathos in his Apologia, the great gift that answers mankind’s need, the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit would be the means whereby Christ would live in the hearts of his Faithful through faith. Christ is the answer to the evil of the world, not in the sense of taking all evils away immediately, but rather in the sense that it is through Christ that we shall be able to live through all evils and transform them into seedbeds of good. This broken world has a glorious destiny in Christ. The cross was a great evil, but in his death at Calvary Christ transformed the cross into the source of man’s redemption. As we think of Christ’s disciples going out at his command to heal and even to raise the dead if necessary, let us think of both the evil of the world and the great hope that is offered to the world in Christ. He is the one and only Saviour of all mankind. He is the answer to the evil of the world.

The root of the world’s evil is sin. So we have sin on the one side and Christ filled with compassion on the other. “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” Let us take our stand with Jesus, and with a heart modelled on his let us join him in his mission to the world. The answer the Church offers for mankind is the love and knowledge and service of Christ. Therein lies our hope.
(E.J.Tyler)

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How well you understand obedience, when you write: 'To obey always is to be a martyr without dying'!

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's homily today at a Mass celebrated in Paris at the Esplanade des Invalides.

Finally, if we turn to the words that Christ left us in his Gospel, we shall see that he himself taught us to shun idolatry, by inviting us to build our house "on rock" (Luke 6:48). Who is this rock, if not he himself? Our thoughts, our words and our actions acquire their true dimension only if we refer them to the Gospel message: "Out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks" (Luke 6:45). When we speak, do we seek the good of our interlocutor? When we think, do we seek to harmonize our thinking with God's thinking? When we act, do we seek to spread the Love which gives us life? Saint John Chrysostom again says, "now, if we all partake of the same bread, and if we all become this same substance, why do we not show the same charity? Why, for the same reason, do we not become utterly one and the same? ... O man, it is Christ who has come to seek you, you who were so far from him, in order to unite himself to you; and you, do you not wish to be united to your brother?" (Homily 24 on the First Letter to the Corinthians, no. 2).
(Continuing)

Prayers this week: People of Zion, the Lord will come to save all nations, and your hearts will exult to hear his majestic voice. (Isaiah 30: 19.30)

God of power and mercy, open our hearts in welcome. Remove the things that hinder us from receiving Christ with joy, so that we may share his wisdom and become one with him when he comes in glory. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

(December 7) St. Ambrose (340?-397)
One of Ambrose’s biographers observed that at the Last Judgment people would still be divided

between those who admired Ambrose and those who heartily disliked him. He emerges as the man of action who cut a furrow through the lives of his contemporaries. Even royal personages were numbered among those who were to suffer crushing divine punishments for standing in Ambrose’s way. When the Empress Justina attempted to wrest two basilicas from Ambrose’s Catholics and give them to the Arians, he dared the eunuchs of the court to execute him. His own people rallied behind him in the face of imperial troops. In the midst of riots he both spurred and calmed his people with bewitching new hymns set to exciting Eastern melodies. In his disputes with the Emperor Auxentius, he coined the principle: “The emperor is in the Church, not above the Church.” He publicly admonished Emperor Theodosius for the massacre of 7,000 innocent people. The emperor did public penance for his crime. This was Ambrose, the fighter, sent to Milan as Roman governor and chosen while yet a catechumen to be the people’s bishop. There is yet another side of Ambrose—one which influenced Augustine, whom Ambrose converted. Ambrose was a passionate little man with a high forehead, a long melancholy face and great eyes. We can picture him as a frail figure clasping the codex of sacred Scripture. This was the Ambrose of aristocratic heritage and learning. Augustine found the oratory of Ambrose less soothing and entertaining but far more learned than that of other contemporaries. Ambrose’s sermons were often modelled on Cicero and his ideas betrayed the influence of contemporary thinkers and philosophers. He had no scruples in borrowing at length from pagan authors. He gloried in the pulpit in his ability to parade his spoils—“gold of the Egyptians”—taken over from the pagan philosophers. His sermons, his writings and his personal life reveal him as an otherworldly man involved in the great issues of his day. Humanity, for Ambrose, was, above all, spirit. In order to think rightly of God and the human soul, the closest thing to God, no material reality at all was to be dwelt upon. He was an enthusiastic champion of consecrated virginity. The influence of Ambrose on Augustine will always be open for discussion. The Confessions reveal some manly, brusque encounters between Ambrose and Augustine, but there can be no doubt of Augustine’s profound esteem for the learned bishop. Neither is there any doubt that Monica loved Ambrose as an angel of God who uprooted her son from his former ways and led him to his convictions about Christ. It was Ambrose, after all, who placed his hands on the shoulders of the naked Augustine as he descended into the baptismal fountain to put on Christ.
Ambrose exemplifies for us the truly catholic character of Christianity. He is a man steeped in the learning, law and culture of the ancients and of his contemporaries. Yet, in the midst of active involvement in this world, this thought runs through Ambrose’s life and preaching: The hidden meaning of the Scriptures calls our spirit to rise to another world.
“Women and men are not mistaken when they regard themselves as superior to mere bodily creatures and as more than mere particles of nature or nameless units in modern society. For by their power to know themselves in the depths of their being they rise above the entire universe of mere objects.... Endowed with wisdom, women and men are led through visible realities to those which are invisible” (Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, 14–15). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: Isaiah 40:1-5, 9-11; Psalm 85:9-10-11-12, 13-14; 2 Peter 3: 8-14; Mark 1:1-8

The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God. It is written in Isaiah the prophet: I

will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way — a voice of one calling in the desert, 'Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.' And so John came, baptising in the desert region and preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptised by him in the Jordan River. John wore clothing made of camel's hair, with a leather belt round his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. And this was his message: After me will come one more powerful than I, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I baptise you with water, but he will baptise you with the Holy Spirit. (Mark 1:1-8)

Various descriptions have been given of the character of the modern age. Not long ago it was often said that the modern age is distinguished by its anxiety and sense of futility: its angst. Some have said that even modern youth lacks the hope that is characteristic of their age. Let us consider the age of youth, for a moment. Most would think, looking at youth and also remembering their own experience, that youth is typically idealistic. A young person starts out in life with energy and gives himself over to what he thinks is worthwhile. Then as life progresses there are reversals, mistakes, disappointments, perhaps encounters with injustices. Gradually he finds

that he cannot easily attain the ideals he seeks. If he is growing in maturity he will see that a major problem is his lack of the inner freedom necessary to attain his goals. For instance, he finds that hey cannot bring himself to work as hard as he needs to if he is reach his goals. That is to say, there is a certain laziness. That moral fault lessens his freedom. Or again, perhaps he cannot control his anger and this in turn affects his progress. It would be a sign of a lack of maturity if a person were to fail to realize that there is much in him that limits his freedom. He has freedom but his freedom is greatly weakened and not just because of restraints imposed by external circumstances. Whatever be the circumstances, man knows he is free but only to a point, and society and civilization know this too. In most countries if a person breaks the law of his society he is detained and tried in a court of law for his crime. He is not treated as an animal and simply eliminated as a threat to order. An animal is understood to be driven by its instincts and so is not accountable. Man, though, is accountable, and the only issue to be determined is whether in a particular case of misdemeanour he was responsible. Was he free and did he know what he was doing? If he did not know what he was doing, should he have known it and to what extent?

Our Gospel today (Mark 1:1-8) presents us with the figure of John the Baptist, a shining example of upright freedom. Freedom is increased the more upright we choose to be, which is to say the more we choose what is right. Man knows he is free to a point and he knows that he can increase his freedom. The danger is that we shall delude ourselves into thinking either that we are not really free or that we are entirely free. It is important that at every stage of life we have a lively sense of the sinful tendencies we must face up to within ourselves if we are to attain real personal freedom. Real personal freedom is the freedom to choose what is true and good. The Christian knows Christ is the embodiment of the True and the Good. I remember a conversation I had with a fairly successful man. He told me his life changed when a friend asked him if he had ever invited Christ into his life. In a sense he was confronted with the fact his personal freedom. He was essentially free. He could make a decision: to welcome Jesus into his life with all that this might entail, or not. He did so, but then he had to work on it and that bought him up against sin. His freedom, he discovered, was weak and this was in large measure due to his own history of personal sin. And apart from this he knew he was born into the condition of original sin. This inherited weakness that is original sin is greatly magnified because of successive personal sins. In this lamentable condition we are faced with the call of conscience to be good and to love God with all our heart. Our great problem is that we are so wounded in our freedom. The Good News proclaimed by the Church is that Jesus Christ has set us free by his Death and Resurrection so that we should become free indeed, and remain free (Galatians 5:1). With his grace, the Holy Spirit leads us to cooperate with him in attaining the spiritual freedom to live a good and holy life and to be co-workers of Christ in the Church and in the world.

Our freedom is the greatest gift we have and we must use it by obeying the call of conscience to do what is right. Our freedom is deeply wounded, but Christ has won for us the grace to grow in the freedom to choose him as the love and the model of our life. By his grace we are able to take our stand with him, to work at letting his mind be in us, and in making him and his teaching the heart and soul of all we do. By his grace and our free cooperation we are able to attain sanctity and be a Christ-like force for good in the world.
(E.J.Tyler)

Further reading: The Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.1739-1742

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You've been told to do something which seems useless and difficult. Do it. And you will see that it is easy and fruitful.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Conclusion of Benedict XVI's homily today at a Mass celebrated in Paris at the Esplanade des Invalides.

Hope will always remain stronger than all else! The Church, built upon the rock of Christ, possesses the promises of eternal life, not because her members are holier than others, but because Christ made this promise to Peter: "You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it" (Matt 16:18). In this unfailing hope in God's eternal presence to the souls of each of us, in this joy of knowing that Christ is with us until the end of time, in this power that the Holy Spirit gives to all those who let themselves be filled with him, I entrust you, dear Christians of Paris and France, to the powerful and merciful action of the God of love who died for us upon the Cross and rose victorious on Easter morning. To all people of good will who are listening to me, I say once more, with Saint Paul: Shun the worship of idols, do not tire of doing good!

May God our Father bring you to himself and cause the splendour of his glory to shine upon you! May the only Son of God, our master and brother, reveal to you the beauty of his risen face! May the Holy Spirit fill you with his gifts and grant you the joy of knowing the peace and light of the Most Holy Trinity, now and for ever! Amen!
(Concluded)

The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
(Monday of the second week of Advent II)

(December 8) The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
A feast called the Conception of Mary arose in the Eastern Church in the seventh century. It came to the West in the eighth century. In the eleventh century it received its present name, the

Immaculate Conception. In the eighteenth century it became a feast of the universal Church. In 1854 Pius IX gave the infallible statement: “The most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instant of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin.” It took a long time for this doctrine to develop. While many Fathers and Doctors of the Church considered Mary the greatest and holiest of the saints, they often had difficulty in seeing Mary as sinless—either at her conception or throughout her life. This is one of the Church teachings that arose more from the piety of the faithful than from the insights of brilliant theologians. Even such champions of Mary as Bernard and Thomas Aquinas could not see theological justification for this teaching. Two Franciscans, William of Ware and Blessed John Duns Scotus, helped develop the theology. They point out that Mary’s Immaculate Conception enhances Jesus’ redemptive work. Other members of the human race are cleansed from original sin after birth. In Mary, Jesus’ work was so powerful as to prevent original sin at the outset.
In Luke 1:28 the angel Gabriel, speaking on God’s behalf, addresses Mary as “full of grace” (or “highly favoured”). In that context this phrase means that Mary is receiving all the special divine help necessary for the task ahead. However, the Church grows in understanding with the help of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit led the Church, especially non-theologians, to the insight that Mary had to be the most perfect work of God next to the Incarnation. Or rather, Mary’s intimate association with the Incarnation called for the special involvement of God in Mary’s whole life. The logic of piety helped God’s people to believe that Mary was full of grace and free of sin from the first moment of her existence. Moreover, this great privilege of Mary is the highlight of all that God has done in Jesus. Rightly understood, the incomparable holiness of Mary shows forth the incomparable goodness of God.
“[Mary] gave to the world the Life that renews all things, and she was enriched by God with gifts appropriate to such a role. “It is no wonder, then, that the usage prevailed among the holy Fathers whereby they called the mother of God entirely holy and free from all stain of sin, fashioned by the Holy Spirit into a kind of new substance and new creature. Adorned from the first instant of her conception with the splendors of an entirely unique holiness, the Virgin of Nazareth is, on God’s command, greeted by an angel messenger as ‘full of grace’ (cf. Luke 1:28). To the heavenly messenger she replies: ‘Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to me according to thy word’ (Luke 1:38)” (Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, 56). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Gen 3:9-15, 20; Ps 98:1, 2-3ab, 3cd-4; Eph 1:3-6, 11-12; Luke 1:26-38

In the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God into a city of Galilee, called Nazareth, to a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin's name was

Mary. The angel entered and said to her: "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women." When she heard this she was troubled at his words, and considered within herself what manner of salutation this was. And the angel said to her: "Fear not, Mary, for you have found grace with God. Behold you will conceive in thy womb and will bring forth a son; and you will call his name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God will give to him the throne of David his father. He will reign in the house of Jacob for ever, and of his kingdom there will be no end." Mary said to the angel, "How will this be, since I do not know man?" And the angel said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the most High will overshadow you. And so the Holy One who will be born of you will be called the Son of God. Behold your cousin Elizabeth has also conceived a son in her old age and she who has been called barren in now in her sixth month, because nothing is impossible with God." Mary said, "Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to your word." And the angel departed from her. (Luke 1:26-38)

It is scarcely to be imagined that the event narrated in our Gospel today came from any source other than Mary. The details are so vivid and the conversation so alive that one is drawn to presume that Luke, the author of the Gospel, interviewed Mary herself. It was from her that the infancy narratives

of the first two chapters of his Gospel mainly derived, and in particular the momentous yet hidden event of the coming of the Angel and his announcement to her. There were no other witnesses. Perhaps in due course Mary told her holy husband Joseph. The day came, with the early Church spreading and the convert Luke now before her, when she divulged the unforgettable event to be told to the world. The Angel had entered and stood before her. He was warm and courteous, addressing her in the words she narrates. He told her of the great Child and that in God’s plan she was to be his mother. This great Child was the one long promised, the Messiah himself. He was far more than anyone had expected. He was indeed, of course, the son of David and to him the throne of David would be given. As against all other kingdoms, his reign would be eternal, his kingdom would never end. There was and could be no other kingdom to be compared with his. But there was more and it had to do with his very person. Yes, he was a man, the true son of David his ancestor-father. But he was not merely a man. He, the Holy One to be born of her was the Son of God, conceived by her directly by the power of the Holy Spirit and the overshadowing of the most High God. Mary in effect told Luke that the Angel had given to her a clear intimation not only of the Incarnation but of the most Holy Trinity. On one occasion during our Lord’s public ministry our Lord said to his critics that inasmuch as his Father constantly worked, so he worked too. They picked up stones with which to stone him because, not content with merely breaking the Sabbath, he referred to God as his own Father and so made himself equal to God. The Angel was in similar fashion saying that the Child was God’s Son.

Not only was Luke saying that the proclamation by the Church of the Incarnation and the Trinity was first announced by the Angel Gabriel himself to Mary the mother of Jesus, but he was also in effect laying before the Christian reader the associated doctrine on Mary. The Angel referred to Elizabeth her kinswoman and she, Elizabeth, would proclaim to Mary that she was blessed beyond all women. The first and foremost blessing she enjoyed was that announced first by the Angel: she was full of grace. No sin had touched her. No sin would touch her. She was addressed by him in the first instance not as the future mother of the Son of the most High, but as filled with grace. On one occasion during our Lord’s public ministry a woman in the crowd, filled with admiration at his person, called out that his mother was so blessed. Rather, our Lord replied, blessed are those who hear the word of God and put it into practice. That was his and anyone’s truest glory. Mary was full of grace because in every respect she heard the word of God and put it into practice. So too in our passage today. Once she understood that it was by the power and intervention of God himself that she, a virgin, could become the mother of the Child, she humbly gave her total assent. "Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to your word." Her response here was characteristic of her response at every instant of her life. Indeed, as the Church would come to see, the grace that filled her at this announcement had filled her from the first instant of her own conception. She had been conceived full of grace. In her life of grace and obedience she was a perfect human reflection of her divine Son. Having gained what he came for, the angel departed. (Luke 1:26-38) At that point we gained a mother and model in all that it means to be a Christian. She, the mother of Christ was the first and foremost Christian, the one who would be intimately associated with him in his work of redeeming the world. As the early Church spread the characteristic icon of the Christian began to appear. It was of the mother holding her Child.

In the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary the Church formally teaches as a dogma of the Catholic Faith, a dogma to be counted as revealed by God, that from the first moment of her existence Mary was full of grace. The Lord was with her from the instant of her conception. Sin never touched her in any shape or form, neither original sin nor personal sin. She is the wonder of our fallen race and this inestimable privilege of personal sinlessness was the gift of God to her in virtue of her Son’s future sacrifice. This is the mother and the model we have been given. She is the help of Christians in our all-important work of following Jesus.
(E.J.Tyler)

Priority, order. Everything in its place. — What would be left of a Velasquez painting if each colour were to mingle with the next, if each thread of the canvas were to break apart, if each piece of the wooden frame were to separate itself from the others?

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Here is a Vatican translation of the brief and unscheduled discourse that Benedict XVI gave today upon his visit to the Institut de France. The institute groups five académies, the French Academy, the Academy of Fine Arts, the Academy of Humanities, the Academy of Science, and the Academy of Moral Sciences and Politics.

* * *

Mr Chancellor,
Dear Permanent Secretaries of the five Académies,
Dear Cardinals,
Dear brothers in the episcopate and the priesthood,
Dear friends from the Académies, Ladies and Gentlemen,

For me it is a very great honour to be received this morning under the Cupola. I thank you for the overwhelming expressions of kindness with which you have welcomed me, and for your gift of the medal. I could not come to Paris without greeting you personally. I am pleased to have this happy opportunity to emphasize my profound links with French culture, for which I have the greatest admiration. In my intellectual journey, contact with French culture has been particularly important. I therefore avail myself of this occasion to express my gratitude to it, both personally and as the successor of Peter. The plaque that we have just unveiled will preserve the memory of our meeting.

As Rabelais rightly asserted in his day, "Science without conscience brings only ruin to the soul!" (Pantagruel, 8). It was doubtless in order to contribute to avoiding the risk of such a dichotomy that, at the end of January of last year, and for the first time in three and a half centuries, two Académies of the Institut, two Pontifical Academies and the Institut Catholique in Paris organized a joint Colloquium on the changing identity of the individual. The Colloquium has illustrated the interest generated by broad interdisciplinary studies. This initiative could be taken further, in order to explore together the countless research possibilities in the human and experimental sciences. This wish is accompanied by my prayers to the Lord for you, for your loved ones and for all the members of the Académies, as well as all the staff of the Institut de France. May God bless you!

(December 9) St. Juan Diego (1474-1548)
Thousands of people gathered in the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe July 31, 2002, for the

canonization of Juan Diego, to whom the Blessed Mother appeared in the 16th century. Pope John Paul II celebrated the ceremony at which the poor Indian peasant became the Church’s first saint indigenous to the Americas. The Holy Father called the new saint “a simple, humble Indian” who accepted Christianity without giving up his identity as an Indian. “In praising the Indian Juan Diego, I want to express to all of you the closeness of the church and the pope, embracing you with love and encouraging you to overcome with hope the difficult times you are going through,” John Paul said. Among the thousands present for the event were members of Mexico’s 64 indigenous groups. First called Cuauhtlatohuac (“The eagle who speaks”), Juan Diego’s name is forever linked with Our Lady of Guadalupe because it was to him that she first appeared at Tepeyac hill on December 9, 1531. The most famous part of his story is told in connection with the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe (December 12). After the roses gathered in his tilma were transformed into the miraculous image of Our Lady of Guadalupe, however, little more is said about Juan Diego. In time he lived near the shrine

constructed at Tepeyac, revered as a holy, unselfish and compassionate catechist who taught by word and especially by example. During his 1990 pastoral visit to Mexico, Pope John Paul II confirmed the long-standing liturgical cult in honour of Juan Diego, beatifying him. Twelve years later he was proclaimed a saint.
God counted on Juan Diego to play a humble yet huge role in bringing the Good News to the peoples of Mexico. Overcoming his own fear and the doubts of Bishop Juan de Zumarraga, Juan Diego cooperated with God’s grace in showing his people that the Good News of Jesus is for everyone. Pope John Paul II used the occasion of this beatification to urge Mexican lay men and women to assume their responsibilities for passing on the Good News and witnessing to it.
“Similar to ancient biblical personages who were collective representations of all the people, we could say that Juan Diego represents all the indigenous peoples who accepted the Gospel of Jesus, thanks to the maternal aid of Mary, who is always inseparable from the manifestation of her Son and the spread of the Church, as was her presence among the Apostles on the day of Pentecost” (Pope John Paul II, beatification homily). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Isaiah 40:1-11; Psalm 96:1-3 and 10-13; Matthew 18:12-14

Jesus said to his disciples, What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost. (Matthew 18:12-14)

I have often thought that one point that characterizes the notion of God as obtaining in the history of philosophy and religion is that God is not very concerned for man. Consider the notion of the First Mover in Aristotle’s metaphysics. He causes movement by being the object of desire and love and is himself the pure act of thinking, with himself the object of thought. I do not think Aristotle understands God as being concerned for the world. The gods and goddesses of Greece and Rome lived in a world of their own. In many religions the highest power above appears to recede after having formed the world, and man is left to deal primarily with

secondary spirits. The highest god is a bit like Aristotle’s prime Mover in his remoteness or lack of direct concern for the beings he has set in motion or is causing to move. This tendency to imagine the Deity as distant and unconcerned with man - which is to say, the tendency to deny a strong and abiding particular providence - can be seen in whole periods even where the Christian revelation has been accepted. Although Deism as a philosophy held sway for a mere eighty years or so (rising to prominence in the eighteenth century) I tend to think that a considerable percentage of people are still deists without their realizing it. The deist does not deny the existence of God nor does he merge the world with God in a pantheist sense. He does not deny that God is personal and that he is the First Cause, but he emphasises the transcendence of God at the cost of his immanence and personal providence. The First Cause is very distant and unconcerned. Yes, he made man and the world, but he has receded and gone and leaves the world to fend for itself. Needless to say, a god such as this would scarcely inspire much religion. He would be a bit like someone who will never, no matter how hard one tries, show the slightest interest in having a personal relationship. However much we may admire such a person, we will probably give up on trying to relate to him.

And yet man yearns for the Absolute. This is why religion is everywhere and it is why man could almost be defined and distinguished as a religious being. Yes, he is a rational animal. He is a free animal. He is a responsible one. But he is also a religious one. He yearns for the Highest and has an intimation that this Highest One is his true Good and will bring him happiness. Yet how little is there that is certain and that can console him in his poverty and uncertainty! Into this void and morass God has made himself known. Contrary to the word of the philosophers, contrary to the images and notions prevailing in the religions of man, God is profoundly and actively concerned for man - and not just for man in general but for each individual man and woman. There is, in fact, much in creation that reflects this character of God. The animal, acting on mere instinct and which is quite unable to reason and freely select from a choice of goals, cares with energy for its young. It does so by a compulsion unless this compulsion is overtaken by another compulsion. This instinctive animal benevolence is the faint imprint of the infinite goodness of the Creator. But more than anything, it is God’s own revelation of himself that brings this home to man. Let us listen again to our Lord’s words in today’s Gospel: “Jesus said to his disciples, What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost” (Matthew 18:12-14). In modern terms, we might use the image of the well-trained sheep dog rounding up the strays. As one poet put it, God is the hound of heaven, bringing back the stray.

St Therese of Lisieux is a Doctor of the Church for her doctrine on the way - her "little way" - to holiness. She taught that we must have absolute confidence in God. He loves the sinner and so the sinner may with trust turn back to him in repentance. As our Lord explains, God is full of concern for each of us and if any of us strays from him he seeks us out to bring us back. God is very concerned indeed for each of us. He loves us. Let us make this the basis of our life.
(E.J.Tyler)

Your obedience is not worthy of the name unless you are ready to abandon your most flourishing personal work, whenever someone with authority so commands.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Here is the address Benedict XVI gave Friday to the young people gathered in the square in front of Notre Dame Cathedral.

* * *

Dear Young Friends,

After our prayerful celebration of Vespers in Notre-Dame, your enthusiastic greeting gives a warm and festive tone to our meeting this evening. It reminds me of that unforgettable gathering at World Youth Day in Sydney this past July -- at which some of you were present. This evening I would like to talk to you about two very closely related matters; they represent a real treasure to be stored up in your hearts (cf. Mt 6:21).

The first has to do with the theme which was chosen for Sydney. It is also the theme of the prayer vigil which is about to begin. I am referring to a passage taken from the Acts of the Apostles, a book which has most appropriately been called the Gospel of the Holy Spirit: "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you: and you will be my witnesses" (Acts 1:8). This is what the Lord tells you now. In Sydney, many young people rediscovered the importance of the Holy Spirit for our lives, for the life of every Christian. The Spirit gives us a deep relationship with God, who is the source of all authentic human good. All of you desire to love and to be loved! It is to God that you must turn, if you want to learn how to love, and to find the strength to love.
(Continuing)

(December 10) Blessed Adolph Kolping (1813-1865)
The rise of the factory system in 19th-century Germany brought many single men into cities where they faced new challenges to their faith. Father Adolph Kolping began a ministry to them,

hoping that they would not be lost to the Catholic faith as was happening to workers elsewhere in industrialized Europe. Born in the village of Kerpen, Adolph became a shoemaker at an early age because of his family’s economic situation. Ordained in 1845, he ministered to young workers in Cologne, establishing a choir, which by 1849 had grown into the Young Workmen’s Society. A branch of this began in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1856. Nine years later there were over 400 Gesellenvereine (workman’s societies) around the world. Today this group has over 400,000 members in 54 countries across the globe. More commonly called the Kolping Society, it emphasizes the sanctification of family life and the dignity of labor. Father Kolping worked to improve conditions for workers and greatly assisted those in need. He and St. John Bosco in Turin had similar interests in working with young men in big cities. He told his followers, “The needs of the times will teach you what to do.” Father Kolping once said, “The first thing that a person finds in life and the last to which he holds out his hand, and the most precious that he possess, even if he does not realize it, is family life.” He and Blessed John Duns Scotus are buried in Cologne’s Minoritenkirche, served by the Conventual Franciscans. The Kolping Society’s international headquarters is at this church. Kolping members journeyed to Rome from Europe, America, Africa, Asia and Oceania for Father Kolping’s beatification in 1991, the 100th anniversary of Pope Leo XIII’s revolutionary encyclical Rerum Novarum (On the Social Order). Father Kolping’s personal witness and apostolate helped prepare for that encyclical.
Some people thought that Father Kolping was wasting his time and talents on young working men in industrialized cities. In some countries, the Catholic Church was seen by many workers as the ally of owners and the enemy of workers. Men like Adolph Kolping showed that was not true.
“Adolph Kolping gathered skilled workers and factory laborers together. Thus he overcame their isolation and defeatism. A faith society gave them the strength to go out into their everyday lives as Christ’s witnesses before God and the world. To come together, to become strengthened in the assembly, and thus to scatter again is and still remains our duty today. We are not Christians for ourselves alone, but always for others too” (Pope John Paul II, beatification homily). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: Isaiah 40: 25-31; Psalm 103:1-4, 8 and 10; Matthew 11:28-30

At that time Jesus said, Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. (Matthew 11:28-30)

Many years ago a prominent Australian politician made the remark that “life wasn’t meant to be easy.” He was lampooned for having said that and the remark was reinterpreted to mean all sorts of things. But of course all he meant was that ordinary human experience shows

that all must expect difficulties in life. Life is often difficult and especially so (but not only) if we intend to live a good life. Now, man's sense of justice reacts to life's difficulties, many of which arise even if one has done little to deserve difficulties. At times troubles far outweigh joys and it can reach a point when the seeming unfairness of it all can cloud a person’s instinctive and normal sense of God. God is, so it seems, inexplicably silent and inactive in the face of injustice and insensitive blind forces. He seems incapable of doing what needs to be done or not sufficiently concerned, in which case can one really say that there is a God as we normally understand him to be? What is the point of bothering with him? Religious belief seems futile and irrelevant. Now, the important question arising from this is, Does God answer this sense of the futility of religious belief? Does he address the issue of suffering and evil? He does, and the entire historical Revelation is God’s answer to it at its deepest level. It is not a simple answer nor is it intended to meet all our intellectual difficulties springing from the fact of evil in the world. It is above all a practical answer: it tells us what we are to do when suffering in order to give it meaning and fruit. The practical step we are to take is to come to Jesus. In this sense our Gospel today is entirely relevant to the problem of evil and suffering We read that “At that time Jesus said, Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)

Our Lord says that the one who is burdened should come to him. God wants suffering mankind to come to Jesus. The healings and miracles of his public ministry were signs, as St John expresses it in his Gospel. The lame, the blind, the sick and the paralysed came to him and he healed them. He was not meaning to indicate that he had come to do this for the sick of every place and time, but he was meaning to show that all those who are weary and overburdened with life should come to him, place their trust in him and be part of his company. Above all, those conscious of their sins ought come to him for he is the Saviour. On one occasion he was passing through Jericho and he stopped near the sycamore tree and saw Zacchaeus the chief tax-collector there looking at him. Zacchaeus had run ahead to climb the tree so as to see Jesus as he was passing by. In his own way he yearned for Jesus. Jesus invited himself into Zacchaeus’s home and into his life. Zacchaeus had come to him with his burden of sin. We each of us should come to Jesus with all our burdens and sins. Where is Jesus to be found? Being God, he is everywhere and especially in our hearts. We can speak to him anywhere and at any time. He is above all present in his body the Church, of which he is the Head. He founded the Church to bring him to all the nations, promising that he would be with the Church till the end. He said to Simon Peter that he was the rock on which he would build his Church, and to him he was giving the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. Christ is present and available to us in the Church’s divinely-guided Tradition, sacraments, life and teaching. He is present in his written word, the inspired word of the Scriptures, the Church’s great Book which she offers to Christ’s Faithful while helping them to interpret it. So let us go to Christ and take upon ourselves his yoke which is his way, his teaching, his revelation. If we give ourselves over to Christ and his way, joy will be ours in the midst of whatever burdens life brings.

The Church has a great message for suffering mankind: Come to Christ and take up his yoke. Learn from him and the rest he promises for one’s soul will be found. There will be joy in carrying his yoke, for paradoxically his yoke is easy and his burden light. Pope John Paul II at the beginning of his pontificate in October 1978 said to the world, “Be not afraid! Open the doors to Christ.” That is what our Lord is inviting us to do in today’s Gospel. It is God’s answer to the world’s suffering.
(E.J.Tyler)

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Isn't it true, Lord, that you were greatly consoled by the childlike remark of that man who, when he felt the disconcerting effect of obedience in something unpleasant, whispered to you: 'Jesus, keep me smiling!'?

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing the address Benedict XVI gave Friday to the young people gathered in the square in front of Notre Dame Cathedral.

The Spirit, who is Love, can open your hearts to accept the gift of genuine love. All of you are seeking the truth; and all of you want to live in truth, to truly live in it! This truth is Christ. He is the only Way, the one Truth and the true Life. To follow Christ means truly to "put out to sea", as is said several times in the Psalms. The way of Truth is simultaneously one and manifold according to the variety of charisms, just as Truth is one while at the same time possessing an inexhaustible richness.

Surrender yourselves to the Holy Spirit in order to find Christ. The Spirit is our indispensable guide in prayer, he animates our hope and he is the source of true joy. To understand more deeply these truths of faith, I would encourage you to meditate on the importance of the sacrament of Confirmation which you have received and which leads you into a mature faith life. It is vital for you to understand this sacrament more and more in order to evaluate the quality and depth of your faith and to reinforce it. The Holy Spirit enables you to approach the Mystery of God; he makes you understand who God is. He invites you to see in your neighbours the brothers and sisters whom God has given you, in order to live with them in human and spiritual fellowship -- in other words, to live within the Church. By revealing who the crucified and risen Lord is for us, he impels you to bear witness to Christ. You are at an age marked by great generosity. You need to speak about Christ to all around you, to your families and friends, wherever you study, work and relax. Do not be afraid! Have "the courage to live the Gospel and the boldness to proclaim it" (Message to the Young People of the World, 20 July 2007). So I encourage you to find ways of proclaiming God to all around you, basing your testimony on the power of the Spirit, whom we ask for in prayer.
(Continuing)

(December 11) St. Damasus I (305?-384)
To his secretary St. Jerome, Damasus was “an incomparable person, learned in the Scriptures, a

virgin doctor of the virgin Church, who loved chastity and heard its praises with pleasure.” Damasus seldom heard such unrestrained praise. Internal political struggles, doctrinal heresies, uneasy relations with his fellow bishops and those of the Eastern Church marred the peace of his pontificate. Possibly of Spanish extraction, Damasus started as a deacon in his father’s church, and served as a priest in what later became the basilica of San Lorenzo in Rome. He served Pope Liberius (352-366) and followed him into exile. When Liberius died, Damasus was elected bishop of Rome; but a minority elected and consecrated another deacon, Ursinus, as pope. The controversy between Damasus and the antipope resulted in violent battles in two basilicas, scandalizing the bishops of Italy. At the synod Damasus called on the occasion of his birthday, he asked them to approve his actions. The bishops’ reply was curt: “We assembled for a birthday, not to condemn a man unheard.” Supporters of the antipope even managed to get Damasus accused of a grave crime as late as A.D. 378. He had to clear himself before both a civil court and a Church synod. As pope his lifestyle was simple in contrast to other ecclesiastics of Rome, and he was fierce in his denunciation of Arianism and other heresies. A misunderstanding of the Trinitarian terminology used by Rome threatened amicable relations with the Eastern Church, and Damasus was only moderately successful in dealing with the situation. During his pontificate Christianity was declared the official religion of the Roman state (380), and Latin became the principal liturgical language as part of the pope’s reforms. His encouragement of St. Jerome’s biblical studies led to the Vulgate, the Latin translation of Scripture which the Council of Trent (12 centuries later) declared to be “authentic in public readings, disputations, preachings.”
The history of the papacy and the Church is inextricably mixed with the personal biography of Damasus. In a troubled and pivotal period of Church history, he stands forth as a zealous defender of the faith who knew when to be progressive and when to entrench. Damasus makes us aware of two qualities of good leadership: alertness to the promptings of the Spirit and service. His struggles are a reminder that Jesus never promised his Rock protection from hurricane winds nor his followers immunity from difficulties. His only guarantee is final victory.
"He who walking on the sea could calm the bitter waves, who gives life to the dying seeds of the earth; he who was able to loose the mortal chains of death, and after three days' darkness could bring again to the upper world the brother for his sister Martha: he, I believe, will make Damasus rise again from the dust" (epitaph Damasus wrote for himself). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Let us notice the very high praise that our Lord accorded to John the Baptist. Just before this passage we read that as John’s disciples were leaving our Lord to give his message to their master who was in prison, our Lord spoke of John. “What did you go out into the desert to see? A reed swayed by the wind? If not, what did you go out to see? A man dressed in fine clothes? No, those who wear fine clothes are in kings' palaces. Then what did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is the one about whom it is written:

'I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you'” (Matthew 11:1-11). John was no ordinary prophet. He was the predicted messenger who would prepare the way for the Lord. Other prophets spoke obliquely of the Messiah to come, such as Deutero-Isaiah who described the Suffering Servant, or Daniel who described the Son of Man, or Moses in Deuteronomy predicting the future Prophet. But John’s announcement was very specific. He announced to the people that the Messiah was nigh. Indeed, he said, he was in their midst without their knowing. More than this, at least to some people he directly pointed to Jesus as the Messiah. For instance, he told this to two of his disciples, who immediately followed Jesus and became his disciples. They in turn told others of him and brought them to him. Again, on one occasion our Lord challenged his enemies to state whether John was from God or not. They knew that if they admitted he was from God, then Jesus would ask why they did not accept John’s testimony about him. So John had testified about Jesus to the leaders of the people also. John was the greatest of the prophets because his mission was the greatest: to introduce Jesus as the Messiah. And there is another reason for his greatness. He bore his sufferings with admirable faith. Though his passion was before that of Jesus, it was borne in the same spirit.

In our Gospel today, Jesus continues his praise of John the Baptist (Matthew 11: 11-15). He could hardly have given him higher praise, and he does so with solemnity. “I tell you the truth: Among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist.” Presumably our Lord was not thinking primarily of John's personal holiness, great as this was. After all, Christ's own mother Mary far exceeded John in sanctity. Our Lord would have been referring primarily to his greatness as a prophet and man of the Old Testament. He had no equal and as such his life and teaching pointed superbly to the Messiah who had now arrived. But then our Lord says that something far greater had now come, for “he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” That is to say, whatever the people had of the treasures of heaven in the Old Testament - of which John was the most illustrious prophet - is not to be compared with the treasures and grace available to them in Jesus. In him there is present the Kingdom of Heaven and every heavenly blessing. What Christ in his person and teaching brings far outstrips what John in his person and teaching brought. John was a prophet; indeed the greatest of the prophets. But Christ was no mere prophet. He was (and is) a divine person. There was a man in a particular place at a particular time and he lived out his very human life in a very particular context. He was born, he grew up, he worked and he died. This man was literally God. Nothing and no-one, then, can compare with him. The entire universe cannot be compared with him, and entry into the kingdom of heaven consists in entering into union with him. Our Lord is saying that union with him in discipleship is a far, far greater thing than the following of any prophet, and even than actually being the greatest of prophets, and far greater than the Old Testament itself. He, Jesus, is beyond compare. Nothing is to be compared with the priceless treasure of Jesus Christ and union with him.

Let us resolve to hold on to the person of Jesus and to guard his teaching, making it the guide of our entire life in all its aspects. Our Gospel passage today (Matthew 11:11-15) alludes to a passion that John was enduring in prison, a passion that would culminate in his death bearing witness to the truth of God. He points to Jesus, not only in his prophetic mission but in his own passion and death. Let us be led by his witness to take our stand with Jesus and be led entirely by his teaching, a teaching that leads us to take up our cross and carry it following in his footsteps.
(E.J.Tyler)

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing the address Benedict XVI gave Friday to the young people gathered in the square in front of Notre Dame Cathedral.

Bring the Good News to the young people of your age, and to others as well. They know what it means to experience difficulty in relationships, worry and uncertainty in the face of work and study. They have experienced suffering, but they have also known unique moments of joy. Be witnesses of God, for, as young people, you are fully a part of the Catholic community through your Baptism and our common profession of faith (cf. Eph 4:5). The Church has confidence in you, and I want to tell you so! In this year dedicated to Saint Paul, I would like to entrust you with a second treasure, which was at the centre of the life of this fascinating Apostle: I mean the mystery of the Cross. On Sunday, in Lourdes, I will celebrate the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross together with countless other pilgrims. Many of you wear a cross on a chain around your neck. I too wear one, as every Bishop does. It is not a mere decoration or a piece of jewelry. It is the precious symbol of our faith, the visible and material sign that we belong to Christ. Saint Paul explains the meaning of the Cross at the beginning of his First Letter to the Corinthians. The Christian community in Corinth was going through a turbulent period, exposed to the corrupting influences of the surrounding culture. Those dangers are similar to the ones we encounter today. I will mention only the following examples: quarrels and conflicts within the community of believers, the seductiveness of ersatz religious and philosophical doctrines, a superficial faith and a dissolute morality. Saint Paul begins his Letter by writing: "The word of the Cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God" (1 Cor 1:18). Then, the Apostle shows the clear contrast between wisdom and folly, in God's way of thinking and in our own. He speaks of this contrast in the context of the founding of the Church in Corinth and in connection with his own preaching. He ends by stressing the beauty of God's wisdom, which Christ and, in his footsteps, the Apostles, have come to impart to the world and to Christians. This wisdom, mysterious and hidden (cf. 1 Cor 2:7), has been revealed by the Spirit, because "those who are unspiritual do not receive the gifts of God's Spirit, for they are folly to them, and they are unable to understand them because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Cor 2:14).
(Continuing)

(December 12) Our Lady of Guadalupe (Mexico)
The feast in honour of Our Lady of Guadalupe goes back to the sixteenth century. Chronicles

of that period tell us the story. A poor Indian named Cuauhtlatohuac was baptized and given the name Juan Diego. He was a 57-year-old widower and lived in a small village near Mexico City. On Saturday morning, December 9, 1531, he was on his way to a nearby barrio to attend Mass in honour of Our Lady. He was walking by a hill called

Tepeyac when he heard beautiful music like the warbling of birds. A radiant cloud appeared and within it a young Native American maiden dressed like an Aztec princess. The lady spoke to him in his own language and sent him to the bishop of Mexico, a Franciscan named Juan de Zumarraga. The bishop was to build a chapel in the place where the lady appeared. Eventually the bishop told Juan Diego to have the lady give him a sign. About this same time Juan Diego’s uncle became seriously ill. This led poor Diego to try to avoid the lady. The lady found Diego, nevertheless, assured him that his uncle would recover and provided roses for Juan to carry to the bishop in his cape or tilma. When Juan Diego opened his tilma in the bishop’s presence, the roses fell to the ground and the bishop sank to his knees. On Juan Diego’s tilma appeared an image of Mary as she had appeared at the hill of Tepeyac. It was December 12, 1531. (click here for information about scientific studies on the eyes in the image)
Mary's appearance to Juan Diego as one of his people is a powerful reminder that Mary and the God who sent her accept all peoples. In the context of the sometimes rude and cruel treatment of the Indians by the Spaniards, the apparition was a rebuke to the Spaniards and an event of vast significance for Native Americans. While a number of them had converted before this incident, they now came in droves. According to a contemporary chronicler, nine million Indians became Catholic in a very short time. In these days when we hear so much about God's preferential option for the poor, Our Lady of Guadalupe cries out to us that God's love for and identification with the poor is an age-old truth that stems from the Gospel itself.
Mary to Juan Diego: “My dearest son, I am the eternal Virgin Mary, Mother of the true God, Author of Life, Creator of all and Lord of the Heavens and of the Earth...and it is my desire that a church be built here in this place for me, where, as your most merciful Mother and that of all your people, I may show my loving clemency and the compassion that I bear to the Indians, and to those who love and seek me...” (from an ancient chronicle). (American.Catholic.org) (click here for video)

Scripture: Zec 2:14-17 or Rev 11:19a; 12:1-6a, 10ab; Judith 13:18bcde, 19; Luke 1:26-38

In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel went

to her and said, Greetings, you who are highly favoured! The Lord is with you. Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favour with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; his kingdom will never end. How will this be, Mary asked the angel, since I am a virgin? The angel answered, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. For nothing is impossible with God. I am the Lord's servant, Mary answered. May it be to me as you have said. Then the angel left her. (Luke 1:26-38)

This Gospel passage is not that for Friday of the second week in Advent, but for the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe which is celebrated in the Americas. Because of the exceptional character of the historical events connected with our Lady’s appearances at Guadalupe, it is a good occasion to reflect

once again on Mary the mother of God. The shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico contains Juan Diego’s garment (made of a reed substance) on which there is imprinted the extraordinary and miraculous image of Mary. So it has been since 1531, the best part of five centuries. That miraculous image on a garment that itself ought to have disintegrated within several years is a sign from God confirming the special place of Mary in the life of the Christian. Why did not Christ himself appear to Juan Diego rather than his mother? We do not know, of course, but it does show that in the plan of God Mary is the great help of Christians in all their dealings with God and with her divine Son Jesus Christ. In the apparition and in the words which Mary is reported in a chronicle to have said to Juan Diego, she presents herself in terms of the fundamental dogma of the Church about Christ's mother. She is the mother of God, God the Son made man. She says to Juan Diego, “My dearest son, I am the eternal Virgin Mary, Mother of the true God, Author of Life, Creator of all and Lord of the Heavens and of the Earth”. She is the mother of the true God because she is the mother of Jesus, who is God the Son made man. How breathtaking is her dignity, then! She addresses Juan Diego as her “dearest son”. So she is not only the mother of God but our mother too. This was Christ’s gift to us at Calvary, when during his dying moments he turned to his mother and his beloved disciple and gave them one to the other as mother and son. In this final donation he was entrusting Mary to the Church and the Church to Mary. She is the mother and the model of all Christ’s Faithful, and in her words to Juan Diego this is what she is saying. As mother she invites him and all of us to love and seek her.

How could we possibly go astray in seeking and in loving Mary the mother of Jesus! She was and is incomparably the holiest of all God’s creatures and is unimaginably close to the heart of her divine Son. How close must their relationship be, and we who are so marred and disfigured by sin have in her an absolutely perfect mother and model. As we heard in the Gospel (Luke 1:26-38), the angel addressed her as the highly favoured one, the one who is full of God’s grace. The Lord is with her without the slightest qualification. The Lord is with her in all her thoughts, words and deeds. It is she who brought Jesus into the world and it is she who continues by her heavenly intercession to bring Jesus to the world. She is the first and foremost Christian and from her heavenly abode she spearheads the Church’s constant effort to bring Christ to the world. The Father almighty entrusted his divine Son to her and Christ entrusted his beloved disciple - and with him all of us - to her. We ought then entrust ourselves to her. This spiritual entrusting of oneself to Mary the mother of God is a form of consecration in which one promises to do her bidding. And what does she bid us do? The Gospel of St John provides us with precious words of Mary in his account of the wedding feast of Cana in Galilee. The wine had run out and Mary was there. She approached her Son and simply told him that they had no more wine. That was enough, even though it seems from our Lord’s response that he had not intended to act precisely at that point. Mary told the servants, “Do whatever he tells you” (John 2:5). She was confident not only in his power, of course, but that he would respond to her word. She knew he would answer her prayer. So too she knows he will answer her prayer on our behalf. She only asks us to do whatever he tells us, and all will be well. So entrusting ourselves to the care of Mary the mother of God the Son means promising to do whatever he, Jesus, tells us. She will help us in that great task.

There is a line of thought that has it that devotion to Mary is a distraction taking away from devotion to Christ. Nothing could be further from the truth. She is the Help of Christians aiding us by her prayers and her example, as do the other saints in heaven but she pre-eminently so. It undoubtedly gives great pleasure to her divine Son that we accept his gift of her to us and make of her our mother and our model in all that is entailed in the following of him.
(E.J.Tyler)

Now, when you find it hard to obey, remember your Lord: 'obedient even to accepting death, death on a cross!'

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing the address Benedict XVI gave Friday to the young people gathered in the square in front of Notre Dame Cathedral.

The Spirit opens to human intelligence new horizons which transcend it and enable to perceive that the only true wisdom is found in the grandeur of Christ. For Christians, the Cross signifies God's wisdom and his infinite love revealed in the saving gift of Christ, crucified and risen for the life of the world, and in particular for the life of each and every one of you. May this amazing realization that God was made man for love lead you to respect and venerate the Cross. It is not only the symbol of your life in God and your salvation, but also -- as you will understand -- the silent witness of human suffering and the unique and priceless expression of all our hopes. Dear young people, I know that venerating the Cross can sometimes bring mockery and even persecution. The Cross in some way seems to threaten our human security, yet above all else, it also proclaims God's grace and confirms our salvation. This evening, I entrust you with the Cross of Christ. The Holy Spirit will enable you to understand its mysteries of love. Then you will exclaim with Saint Paul: "May I never boast of anything, except the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world" (Gal 6:14). Paul had understood the seemingly paradoxical words of Jesus, who taught that it is only by giving ("losing") ones life that one finds it (cf. Mk 8:35; Jn 12:24), and Paul concluded from this that the Cross expresses the fundamental law of love, the perfect formula for real life. May a growing understanding of the mystery of the Cross lead some of you discover the call to serve Christ unreservedly in the priesthood and the religious life!
(Continuing)

(December 13) Saint Lucy, virgin and martyr (d. 304)
Every little girl named Lucy must bite her tongue in disappointment when she first tries to find

out what there is to know about her patron saint. The older books will have a lengthy paragraph detailing a small number of traditions. Newer books will have a lengthy paragraph showing that there is little basis in history for these traditions. The single fact survives that a disappointed suitor accused Lucy of being a Christian and she was executed in Syracuse (Sicily) in the year 304. But it is also true that her name is mentioned in the First Eucharistic Prayer, geographical places are named after her, a popular song has her name as its title and down through the centuries many thousands of little girls have been proud of the name Lucy. One can easily imagine what a young Christian woman had to contend with in pagan Sicily in the year 300. If you have trouble imagining, just glance at today’s pleasure-at-all-costs world and the barriers it presents against leading a good Christian life. Her friends must have wondered aloud about this hero of Lucy’s, an obscure itinerant preacher in a far-off captive nation that had been destroyed more than 200 years before. Once a carpenter, he had been crucified by the Roman soldiers after his own people turned him over to the Roman authorities. Lucy believed with her whole soul that this man had risen from the dead. Heaven had put a stamp on all he said and did. To give witness to her faith she had made a vow of virginity. What a hubbub this caused among her pagan friends! The kindlier ones just thought her a little strange. To be pure before marriage was an ancient Roman ideal, rarely found but not to be condemned. To exclude marriage altogether, however, was too much. She must have something sinister to hide, the tongues wagged. Lucy knew of the heroism of earlier virgin martyrs. She remained faithful to their example and to the example of the carpenter, whom she knew to be the Son of God. She is the patroness of eyesight.
    If you are a little girl named Lucy, you need not bite your tongue in disappointment. Your patron is a genuine, authentic heroine, first class, an abiding inspiration for you and for all Christians. The moral courage of the young Sicilian martyr shines forth as a guiding light, just as bright for today’s youth as it was in A.D. 304.
    “The Gospel tells us of all that Jesus suffered, of the insults that fell upon him. But, from Bethlehem to Calvary, the brilliance that radiates from his divine purity spread more and more and won over the crowds. So great was the austerity and the enchantment of his conduct....
    “So may it be with you, beloved daughters. Blessed be the discretion, the mortifications and the renouncements with which you seek to render this virtue more brilliant.... May your conduct prove to all that chastity is not only a possible virtue but a social virtue, which must be strongly defended through prayer, vigilance and the mortification of the senses” (Pope John XXIII, Letter to Women Religious). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: Sirach 48:1-4, 9-11; Psalm 80:2ac and 3b, 15-16, 18-19; Matthew 17:9a, 10-13

As they were coming down the mountain, the disciples asked him, Why then do the teachers of the law say that Elijah must come first? Jesus replied, To be sure, Elijah comes and will restore all things. But I tell you, Elijah has already come, and they did not recognise him, but have done to him everything they wished. In the same way the Son of Man is going to suffer at their hands. Then the disciples understood that he was talking to them about John the Baptist. (Matthew 17:9a, 10-13)

The scene of our Gospel passage today is that of our Lord and his three disciples (Peter, James and John, the future pillars of the infant Church and Peter its divinely appointed rock) coming down the mountain after the Transfiguration. The disciples ask our Lord “why then do the teachers of the law

say that Elijah must come first?” Our Lord confirms that he must come first, and that John the Baptist was the Elijah who was to come. In this question and answer we are reminded of the long preparation by God of his people for the coming of the Messiah. One may wonder why it was that God with all his might and wisdom could not have prepared his people much more rapidly and with greater success. Our Lord was the best part of two thousand years in the coming after the dim announcement of it to Abraham. Through you all the nations of the earth will be blessed, God had told Abraham. Through ups and downs, reversals on the small scale as on the large, the time was eventually fulfilled, and the Son of God became man. What was God doing in taking such a long time about it? Well of course we cannot say why God in his wisdom chooses to do things as he does, but it seems to me that one obvious reason was that he was gradually teaching his chosen people, and mankind too, and this pedagogy was deemed in the mind of the Almighty to require great time. In the life of each man and woman too, God seems to take his time. Yes, there are special moments when a sudden and significant advance is made, but normally God moves with care and seeming slowness. He does not attempt to rush us. He has made us free and he respects this. God does not push man around because he has given him the precious gift of freedom which makes man so much like himself. So God has, in a sense, bound himself to the limitations of man and human history. He suggests, he teaches, he intimates and he gently guides. Might we not say he treats us like adults? It is messy, it is slow, and the results might seem problematic.

Problematic indeed, for the result of all God’s efforts over nearly two thousand years of pedagogy, sending prophet after prophet and guiding the course of affairs in ways meant to teach his chosen people, was the rejection of the new Elijah and the nailing of the Messiah, his own Divine Son, on the Cross at Calvary. Our Lord refers to this in our Gospel today: “I tell you, Elijah has already come, and they did not recognise him, but have done to him everything they wished. In the same way the Son of Man is going to suffer at their hands. Then the disciples understood that he was talking to them about John the Baptist.” (Matthew 17:9a, 10-13) The disciples’ question and our Lord’s response point back to the endless patience of God in preparing his chosen people for the salvation he intended to offer the world. It was a long process and the culminating revelation had arrived in the person of Jesus. The response was, though, lamentable. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. He came unto his own but his own did not receive him. The dialogue of our Gospel today shows not only the infinite patience and sensitivity of God in history but also the power of sin in human history. God’s loving advances were too often rebuffed. Just as we are reminded of God’s respectful pedagogy not only in human history but in our individual lives, so too we are reminded of the power of sin not only in human history but in our individual lives. There is God and his saving action on the one hand, and there is sin and its stubborn resistance on the other. All this we are reminded of in our Lord’s references to salvation history in our Gospel passage today. We must learn from the actions of God as described in Scripture and strive to resist sin, opening ourselves to the loving grace and pedagogy of our Father in heaven. He wishes to prepare us to accept his Divine Son just as he sought to do with his chosen people.

Let us place ourselves in our Gospel scene today with Peter, James and John as they descended the mountain with their Master. They would be faithful until death, magnificent examples of those who received Jesus Christ the Word of God when he came among them. The pedagogy of God had great success in them as it had in others such as Mary the mother of Jesus and Joseph his foster-father. God is leading us on day by day. Let us take our stand with Jesus and allow ourselves to be led just as he himself was led and as all do who choose to follow him closely.
(E.J.Tyler)

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing the address Benedict XVI gave Friday to the young people gathered in the square in front of Notre Dame Cathedral.

We are about to begin the prayer vigil, for which you have gathered here this evening. Remember the two treasures which the Pope has presented to you this evening: the Holy Spirit and the Cross! As I conclude, I would like to tell you once more that I have confidence in you, dear young people, and I want you to experience, today and in the future, the esteem and affection of the whole Church, and the world will truly see a living Church! May God be at your side each day. May he bless you, your families and your friends.

I gladly grant my Apostolic Blessing to you, and to all the young people of France!
(Concluded)

Prayers this week: Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say rejoice! The Lord is near. (Ph 4: 4-5)

Lord God, may we, your people, who look forward to the birthday of Christ experience the joy of salvation and celebrate that feast with love and thanksgiving. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

(December 14) St. John of the Cross (1541-1591)
John is a saint because his life was a heroic effort to live up to his name: “of the Cross.” The folly

of the cross came to full realization in time. “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me” (Mark 8:34b) is the story of John’s life. The Paschal Mystery—through death to life—strongly marks John as reformer, mystic-poet and theologian-priest. Ordained a Carmelite priest at 25 (1567), John met Teresa of Jesus (Avila) and like her vowed himself to the primitive Rule of the Carmelites. As partner with Teresa and in his own right, John engaged in the work of reform, and came to experience the price of reform: increasing opposition, misunderstanding, persecution, imprisonment. He came to know the cross acutely—to experience the dying of Jesus—as he sat month after month in his dark, damp, narrow cell with only his God! Yet, the paradox! In this dying of imprisonment John came to life, uttering poetry. In the darkness of the dungeon, John’s spirit came into the Light. There are many mystics, many poets; John is unique as mystic-poet, expressing in his prison-cross the ecstasy of mystical union with God in the Spiritual Canticle. But as agony leads to ecstasy, so John had his Ascent to Mt. Carmel, as he named it in his prose masterpiece. As man-Christian-Carmelite, he experienced in himself this purifying ascent; as spiritual director, he sensed it in others; as psychologist-theologian, he described and analyzed it in his prose writings. His prose works are outstanding in underscoring the cost of discipleship, the path of union with God: rigorous discipline, abandonment, purification. Uniquely and strongly John underlines the gospel paradox: The cross leads to resurrection, agony to ecstasy, darkness to light, abandonment to possession, denial to self to union with God. If you want to save your life, you must lose it. John is truly “of the Cross.” He died at 49—a life short, but full.
    John in his life and writings has a crucial word for us today. We tend to be rich, soft, comfortable. We shrink even from words like self-denial, mortification, purification, asceticism, discipline. We run from the cross. John’s message—like the gospel—is loud and clear: Don’t—if you really want to live!
    Thomas Merton said of John: "Just as we can never separate asceticism from mysticism, so in St. John of the Cross we find darkness and light, suffering and joy, sacrifice and love united together so closely that they seem at times to be identified."
    In John's words:
    "Never was fount so clear,
    undimmed and bright;
    From it alone, I know proceeds all light
    although 'tis night."     (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: Is 61:1-2a, 10-11; Lk 1:46-48, 49-50, 53-54; 1 Thes 5:16-24; John 1:6-8, 19-28.

There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. He himself was not the light; he came

only as a witness to the light. Now this was John's testimony when the Jews of Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was. He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, I am not the Christ. They asked him, Then who are you? Are you Elijah? He said, I am not. Are you the Prophet? He answered, No. Finally they said, Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself? John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, I am the voice of one calling in the desert, 'Make straight the way for the Lord.' Now some Pharisees who had been sent questioned him, Why then do you baptise if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet? I baptise with water, John replied, but among you stands one you do not know. He is the one who comes after me, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. This all happened at Bethany on the other side of the Jordan, where John was baptising. (John 1:6-8, 19-28)

On this Sunday of Advent the Church places before us the grand figure of John the Baptist about whom elsewhere in the Gospel our Lord spoke so highly. We know he was a great saint because our Lord in effect said so while he, John, was still alive in prison. The leaders of the people also thought

he was great because in our Gospel today we see them asking him if he was the long awaited Messiah, or the Elijah who was to come, or the Prophet whom Moses had predicted. But what was John’s response? I am none of these, he said. I am a mere voice calling out in the desert, asking people to prepare for the Lord. My baptism is with mere water. But there is already one among you who is coming after me and I am nothing compared to him. I am not worthy to undo his very sandals. That indicates how highly he thought of Christ and how humbly he thought of himself. His whole life and mission was to point to the greatest of the great who had already arrived. He glorified Christ and abased himself. I would like to suggest that John the Baptist is a wonderful model for the Church and for every member of the Church. Just as John was part of the eternal plan of God prepared for in the Old Covenant, so is the Church. The Church is founded by the words and actions of Christ. The Church is not just an accidental development in history of what Christ said and did, as some tend to think. One of the great developments in Protestantism occurred in eighteenth century England with the rise of Evangelicalism. Perhaps its greatest preacher was George Whitefield. The important thing for him was that people have an experience of Christ and convert from sin to faith in Jesus as Saviour. He had little interest in the idea of the Church as such. But no. The Church from all eternity was planned by God and has an essential role to play in the work of Christ the Saviour. Her role is to be the locale, the body, the visible abode of Christ on earth bringing him to all the nations. John the Baptist pointed to the great One already present. The Church too points to the Saviour present in her midst.

The mission of the Church, and therefore of each and all of her members, is to share in our Lord’s mission to proclaim and establish among all peoples the Kingdom of God begun by Christ. The Church constitutes here on earth the beginning, the mustard seed we might say, of this Kingdom which is God’s lordship. If we enter this Kingdom and live worthily, by God’s grace we shall be saved. Where is this Kingdom? Our Lord said to Simon Peter, I give to you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. The Kingdom of Heaven is present in the Church which Christ built on the rock of Peter. He guaranteed that the gates of Hell would not prevail against it. Hell cannot prevail because Christ is the Church’s head. The Kingdom of Heaven in essence is none other than the person of Jesus and living in union with him. By coming to Jesus, by entering into friendship with him, by learning from him and by taking upon oneself his yoke, a person enters the Kingdom of God. Jesus is found above all in his body the Church. Now, inasmuch as the person of Christ and his heavenly grace is unseen, this great Reality within the Church makes of the Church what has been called a “mystery.” The Church is far more than what can be actually seen for Christ is the true spiritual reality present and active in the Church. He makes of the Church a divine Reality, a “mystery” which can be comprehended only with the eyes of faith. Furthermore, inasmuch as Christ is the one and only Saviour of mankind, the Church herself by virtue of Christ’s presence within her as her head is the sign and instrument of salvation for all humanity. Through the presence and action of Christ in her midst she is the means of communion of all humanity with God and with the entire human race. Christ is the great treasure of the Church, the real protagonist behind and within the Church’s action. The Church is effective to the extent that her members allow themselves to be true instruments of Christ, pointing to him as did John the Baptist in our Gospel passage today (John 1:6-8, 19-28). What John the Baptist was doing and saying is an image of what the Church is called to do from generation to generation. Christ is the important Reality within the Church, and by God’s plan it is the Church that announces him to the world.

Let us every day repeat in our hearts that we are unworthy to undo the very sandal straps of Jesus Christ. He is the Son of God made man, the image and revelation of the Father, God from God and Light from Light. He is the only way to the Father and the only means by which men can be saved. We as members of the Church have the vocation to bear witness to him and to give glory to him. Let us endeavour to do this every day of our lives.
(E.J.Tyler)

Further reading: The Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.759-769

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Here is a Vatican translation of Benedict XVI's address to the clergy and consecrated persons during vespers celebrated Friday in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

Blessed be God who has brought us together in a place so dear to the heart of every Parisian and all the people of France! Blessed be God, who grants us the grace of offering him our evening prayer and giving him due praise in the very words which the Church's liturgy inherited from the synagogue worship practised by Christ and his first disciples! Yes, blessed be God for coming to our assistance - in adiutorium nostrum - and helping us to offer him our sacrifice of praise!

We are gathered in the Mother Church of the Diocese of Paris, Notre-Dame Cathedral, which rises in the heart of the city as a living sign of God's presence in our midst. My predecessor, Pope Alexander III, laid its first stone, and Popes Pius VII and John Paul II honoured it by their presence. I am happy to follow in their footsteps, a quarter of a century after coming here to offer a conference on catechesis. It is hard not to give thanks to the Creator of both matter and spirit for the beauty of this edifice. The Christians of Lutetia had originally built a cathedral dedicated to Saint Stephen, the first martyr; as time went on it became too small, and was gradually replaced, between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries, by the great building we admire today. The faith of the Middle Ages built the cathedrals, and here your ancestors came to praise God, to entrust to him their hopes and to express their love for him. Great religious and civil events took place in this shrine, where architects, painters, sculptors and musicians have given the best of themselves. We need but recall, among so many others, the architect Jean de Chelles, the painter Charles Le Brun, the sculptor Nicolas Coustou and the organists Louis Vierne and Pierre Cochereau. Art, as a pathway to God, and choral prayer, the Church's praise of the Creator, helped Paul Claudel, who attended Vespers here on Christmas Day 1886, to find the way to a personal experience of God. It is significant that God filled his soul with light during the chanting of the Magnificat, in which the Church listens to the song of the Virgin Mary, the Patroness of this church, who reminds the world that the Almighty has lifted up the lowly (cf. Lk 1:52). As the scene of other conversions, less celebrated but no less real, and as the pulpit from which preachers of the Gospel like Fathers Lacordaire, Monsabré and Samson transmitted the flame of their passion to the most varied congregations, Notre-Dame Cathedral rightly remains one of the most celebrated monuments of your country's heritage. Following a tradition dating back to the time of Saint Louis, I have just venerated the relics of the True Cross and the Crown of Thorns, which have now found a worthy home here, a true offering of the human spirit to the power of creative Love.
(Continuing)

(December 15)   Blessed Mary Frances Schervier (1819-1876)
    This woman who once wanted to become a Trappistine nun was instead led by God to establish a community of sisters who care for the sick and aged in the United States and throughout the world. Born into a distinguished family in Aachen (then ruled by Prussia but formerly Aix-la-Chapelle, France), Frances ran the household after her mother’s death and established a reputation for generosity to the poor. In 1844 she became a Secular Franciscan. The next year she and four companions established a religious community devoted to caring for the poor. In 1851 the Sisters of the Poor of St. Francis (a variant of the original name) were approved by the local bishop; the community soon spread. The first U.S. foundation was made in 1858. Mother Frances visited the United States in 1863 and helped her sisters nurse soldiers wounded in the Civil War. She visited the United States again in 1868. When Philip Hoever was establishing the Brothers of the Poor of St. Francis, she encouraged him. When Mother Frances died, there were 2,500 members of her community worldwide. The number has kept growing. They are still engaged in operating hospitals and homes for the aged. Mother Mary Frances was beatified in 1974.
    The sick, the poor and the aged are constantly in danger of being considered "useless" members of society and therefore ignored—or worse. Women and men motivated by the ideals of Mother Frances are needed if the God-given dignity and destiny of all people are to be respected.
    In 1868, Mother Frances wrote to all her sisters, reminding them of Jesus’ words: “You are my friends if you do what I command you.... I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another” (John 15:14,17). She continued: “If we do this faithfully and zealously, we will experience the truth of the words of our father St. Francis who says that love lightens all difficulties and sweetens all bitterness. We will likewise partake of the blessing which St. Francis promised to all his children, both present and future, after having admonished them to love one another even as he had loved them and continues to love them.” (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: Numbers 24:2-7, 15-17a; Psalm 25:4-9; Matthew 21:23-27

Jesus entered the temple courts, and, while he was teaching, the chief priests and the elders of the

people came to him. By what authority are you doing these things? they asked. And who gave you this authority? Jesus replied, I will also ask you one question. If you answer me, I will tell you by what authority I am doing these things. John's baptism— where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or from men? They discussed it among themselves and said, If we say, 'From heaven', he will ask, 'Then why didn't you believe him?' But if we say, 'From men'— we are afraid of the people, for they all hold that John was a prophet. So they answered Jesus, We don't know. Then he said, Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things. (Matthew 21:23-27)

The Gospels tell us that on various occasions during our Lord’s public ministry the people marvelled at his works and at his teaching. They were astonished at the authority he showed, for instance in the way he could command the spirits to depart from a possessed man, in the way he could release a

person from this or that ailment, and the authority he displayed in his teaching. In respect to his teaching, they said that he spoke with authority and not like the scribes. The scribes would teach and support their teaching by appeals to various authorities, the authority of the Scriptures and to other authorities as well. They did not, of course, consider that an appeal to their own authority would suffice but bolstered their case by pointing to the support of others. So it is in most of human thought. Even where there may be no other authorities to which one may appeal, at least there is the authority of one’s own reasoning. The listener may examine the reasoning and see whether the reasons support what one is saying. But in some way Christ, while providing reasons and supporting what he said with miracles, and while pointing to the teaching of the Scriptures, nevertheless presented himself progressively as having complete and independent authority to teach and act in the name of God. In the sermon on the mount he referred to what had been handed down and then proceeded to expound his own teaching: Such and such has been said to you, but I say this to you. On his own authority he expelled demons and raised the dead to life. He taught breathtaking doctrines on his own authority, such as the doctrine of the Eucharist in the synagogue of Capernaum. He expected faith in him, not the weight of supporting authorities, to lead to assent to his word. The way he taught, the power he displayed, the authority he exercised, was beyond other authorities. Though he could point to authorities, he acted and taught as if he knew he had full authority in himself, needing absolutely no one to support him.

And this is exactly what the leaders of the Jews could see so very clearly and it went right against all they were familiar with and required. So it is that, as our Gospel shows, they came to demand from our Lord an explicit account of the authorization he had for his work and especially his teaching. Our Lord could point to many things that supported his authority, but on this occasion he obliquely pointed to one. That was the word of John the Baptist. Our Lord knew that those who were questioning him were entirely unwilling to accept his authority, no matter what the support for it might be. Whatever he said, it would become the occasion of further argument and rejection. So he simply asked them, where did John’s baptism and ministry come from? Was it of God or of man? Was John a true prophet and was his ministry divinely appointed? Of course the people knew John was a prophet, but the leaders would not acknowledge this. We remember how the leaders had sent representatives to ask John who he was and on that very occasion he, abasing himself before God and men, had pointed to the Messiah who was coming and who was already in their midst. Our Gospel passage today (Matthew 21:23-27) not only implies that the leaders of the Jews did not accept John as a prophet, but knew that John had pointed to Jesus as the promised Messiah. So the chief priests and elders, coming formally to ask our Lord for an account of his authority for all his activities, and undoubtedly intending to try to trap him in the process, found themselves trapped by our Lord’s quick and decisive question. They could either accept John as a prophet and so the authority of Jesus himself, or be condemned and rejected by the people. They withdrew, with Christ being once again triumphant in debate. Christ had, though, in effect pointed to one of many incontestible witnesses to his own supreme authority: John, and the prophets who were before him. Our Lord pointed to their testimony that he was the Messiah long foretold. He did not depend on them for his authorization but they did support his authority.

One of the most distinctive features of our Lord’s ministry right up to and during his Passion was his manifest authority. He was and is the ultimate authority upon which man can rely for truth and salvation. He is the rock on which we can depend. He is the invisible rock of the Church and he appointed Simon Peter as the visible rock who would represent him. To him he gave the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. The Church’s authority comes from Christ and depends on Christ. When he rose from the dead he told his disciples that to him had been given all authority in heaven and on earth. They, then, were to go to the whole world and make disciples of all the nations, baptising them teaching all that he had commanded. Christ’s authority is supreme.
(E.J.Tyler)

Detach yourself from the goods of the world. Love and practise poverty of spirit: be content with what enables you to live a simple and sober life.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's address to the clergy and consecrated persons during vespers celebrated Friday in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

Beneath the vaults of this historic Cathedral, which witnesses to the ceaseless dialogue that God wishes to establish with all men and women, his word has just now echoed to become the substance of our evening sacrifice, as expressed in the offering of incense, which makes visible our praise of God. Providentially, the words of the Psalmist describe the emotion filling our souls with an exactness we could hardly have dared to imagine: "I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!'" (Ps 121:1). Laetatus sum in his quae dicta sunt mihi: the Psalmist's joy, brimming over in the very words of the Psalm, penetrates our hearts and resonates deeply within them. We truly rejoice to enter the house of the Lord, since, as the Fathers of the Church have taught us, this house is nothing other than a concrete symbol of Jerusalem on high, which comes down to us (cf. Rev 21:2) to offer us the most beautiful of dwelling-places. "If we dwell therein", writes Saint Hilary of Poitiers, "we are fellow citizens of the saints and members of the household of God, for it is the house of God" (Tract. in Ps. 121:2). And Saint Augustine adds: "This is a psalm of longing for the heavenly Jerusalem ... It is a Song of Steps, not for going down but for going up ... On our pilgrimage we sigh, in our homeland we will rejoice; but during this exile, we meet companions who have already seen the holy city and urge us to run towards it" (En. in Ps. 121:2). Dear friends, during Vespers this evening, we are united in thought and prayer with the voices of the countless men and women who have chanted this psalm in this very place down the centuries. We are united with the pilgrims who went up to Jerusalem and to the steps of its Temple, and with the thousands of men and women who understood that their earthly pilgrimage was to end in heaven, in the eternal Jerusalem, trusting Christ to guide them there. What joy indeed, to know that we are invisibly surrounded by so great a crowd of witnesses!
(Continuing)

(December 16) Blessed Honoratus Kozminski (1825-1916)
       He was born in Biala Podlaska (Siedlce, Poland) and studied architecture at the School of Fine Arts in Warsaw. When Wenceslaus was almost sixteen, his father died. Suspected of participating in a rebellious conspiracy, the young man was imprisoned from April 1846 until the following March. In 1848 he received the Capuchin habit and a new name. Four years later he was ordained. In 1855 he helped Blessed Mary Angela Truszkowska establish the Felician Sisters. Honoratus served as guardian in a Warsaw friary already in 1860. He dedicated his energies to preaching, to giving spiritual direction and to hearing confessions. He worked tirelessly with the Secular Franciscan Order. The failed 1864 revolt against Czar Alexander III led to the suppression of all religious Orders in Poland. The Capuchins were expelled from Warsaw and forced to live in Zakroczym, where Honoratus continued his ministry and began founding twenty-six male and female religious congregations, whose members took vows but wore no religious habit and did not live in community. They operated much as today’s secular institutes do. Seventeen of these groups still exist as religious congregations. The writings of Father Honoratus are extensive: forty-two volumes of sermons, 21 volumes of letters as well as 52 printed works on ascetical theology, Marian devotion, historical writings, pastoral writings — not counting his many writings for the religious congregations he founded. In 1906, various bishops sought the reorganization of these groups under their authority; Honoratus defended their independence but was removed from their direction in 1908. He promptly urged the members of these congregations to obey the Church’s decisions regarding their future. He “always walked with God,” said a contemporary. In 1895 he was appointed Commissary General of the Capuchins in Poland. Three years before he had come to Nowe Miasto, where he died and was buried. He was beatified in 1988.
    The story is told that Francis and Brother Leo, his secretary, were once on a journey and Francis volunteered to tell Leo what perfect joy is. Francis began by saying what it was not: news that the kings of France, England, as well as all the world’s bishops and many university professors had decided to become friars, news that the friars had received the gift of tongues and miracles, or news that the friars had converted all the non-Christians in the world. No, perfect joy for them would be to arrive cold and hungry at St. Mary of the Angels, Francis’ headquarters outside Assisi, and be mistaken by the porter for thieves and beaten by the same porter and driven back into the cold and rain. Francis said that if, for the love of God, he and Leo could endure such treatment without losing their patience and charity, that would be perfect joy (cited in Regis Armstrong, O.F.M. Cap., and Ignatius Brady, O.F.M., Francis and Clare: The Complete Works, pages 165-166).
    Honoratus worked very zealously to serve the Church, partly by establishing a great variety of religious congregations adapted to the special circumstances of Poland in those years. He could have retreated into bitterness and self-pity when the direction of those congregations was taken away from him; that was certainly a “perfect joy” experience. He urged the members of these groups to obey willingly and gladly, placing their gifts at the service of the Good News of Jesus Christ.
    When the Church removed Honoratus from the direction of his religious congregations and changed their character, he wrote: “Christ’s Vicar himself has revealed God’s will to us, and I carry out this order with greatest faith.... Remember, dear brothers and sisters, that you are being given the opportunity to show heroic obedience to the holy Church.” (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Zep 3:1-2, 9-13; Ps 34:2-3, 6-7, 17-18, 19 and 23; Matt 21:28-32

What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, 'Son, go

and work today in the vineyard.' 'I will not,' he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, 'I will, sir,' but he did not go. Which of the two did what his father wanted? The first, they answered. Jesus said to them, I tell you the truth, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him. (Matthew 21:28-32)

A presidential election. One candidate is way ahead of the other and the result seems certain. But for some reason right to the very end the losing candidate refuses to give up. He just goes on and on, exuding enthusiasm for his cause all the while gaining ground. He does not believe things are

set in stone. The significant thing to notice is that he believes that people can change and the winning candidate does too because he urges his followers not to take anything for granted but to get to the polls and vote. Whatever actually does happen, the voters have free will. They can change and the difference that can result is momentous. This applies not only to an event such as a national election, but also to so many other things in life. A person begins badly, making so many mistakes and putting his life in disorder. He gradually comes out of the situation his wrong turns led him into and he begins achieving true results. He works well and his life turns around. How has this happened? It happened because he had the will to change. In our Gospel today (Matthew 21:28-32) our Lord contrasts what a person says he will do with what he actually does. What is all-important is not so much his words as his decision and his acting on that decision. There were two sons in our Lord’s brief story. The one said he would do his father’s will and the other said he would not. There are so many parallels to this in life. The one person grows up in a good family and receives all the help to lead a good, religious and productive life. He is drawn along in that good course and readily says, and gives the impression of saying, that he will continue to live in this fruitful way. He says he will do the right thing. But he coasts along, not really putting his mind to it. He does not really work at his moral and religious life. He remains or becomes mediocre and begins to become spiritually complacent. He becomes careless. His interest lessens. He even eventually falls away from his religious faith. He began by saying, I will, sir, but does not do it.

The other person begins poorly. Let us take a real life example. Matt Talbot (1856 - 1925) was born in the poverty of Dublin's inner city. He began drinking at twelve years of age and became a chronic alcoholic. It was the drug culture of the 19th century. Matt was an addict. After sixteen years he decided to get out of his hopeless predicament and kick his dreadful habit. A priest helped him, giving him a method of rehabilitation which included the future twelve step program of Alcoholics Anonymous founded some fifty years later. After a terrible struggle and through prayer and sacrifice he found himself again. What Alcoholics Anonymous later called the Higher Power was the God of his Catholic Faith. He placed his faith in our Lord and embarked on a tremendously serious Christian life far beyond the ordinary, remaining sober for forty years until his death. He had only a handful at his funeral but is now a candidate for canonisation. Some day he will be known as Saint Matthew Talbot. From being a hopeless case he became a man of heroic virtue, a very close follower of our Lord. He is an example of the son in our Lord’s parable who, when asked by his father to go and work in his vineyard, said no! But afterwards thought the better of it and went. He changed his mind. He had the power of freedom, even though through the self-abuse of excessive alcohol he greatly disabled himself. But he still had that freedom and by entrusting himself to the power and grace of God he changed his mind and embarked on the road which God all along wanted him to take, which was that of obedience to his will. He entered the kingdom of God which is union with Jesus, and did so with flying colours. He is a shining example of the younger son of our Lord’s parable, one whose conversion our Lord held up before the leaders for their emulation. If we do not convert from our sins and apathy, we shall be left behind by those who do. Let us learn from those who choose to change, those who convert, and take our cue from them.

At the end of every day we ought resolve to convert from the sins of that day. We ought recognize that we have (perhaps) said to our Lord that we will recognize his will and yet have not done it in this or that respect. Let those who have done the will of God be our inspiration. Let us resolve every day to recognize our sins, to repent, and to resume once again our daily effort to hear the will of God and to put it into practice.
(E.J.Tyler)

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Rather than in not having, true poverty consists in being detached, in voluntarily renouncing one's dominion over things.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's address to the clergy and consecrated persons during vespers celebrated Friday in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

Our pilgrimage to the holy city would not be possible if it were not made in the Church, the seed and the prefiguration of the heavenly Jerusalem. "Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labour in vain" (Ps 126:1). Who is this Lord, if not our Lord Jesus Christ? It is he who founded his Church and built it on rock, on the faith of the Apostle Peter. In the words of Saint Augustine, "It is Jesus Christ our Lord who himself builds his temple. Many indeed labour to build, yet unless the Lord intervenes to build, in vain do the builders labour" (Tract in Ps. 126:2). Dear friends, Augustine goes on to ask how we can know who these builders are, and his answer is this: "All those who preach God's word in the Church, all who are ministers of God's divine Sacraments. All of us run, all of us work, all of us build", yet it is God alone who, within us, "builds, exhorts, and inspires awe; who opens our understanding and guides our minds to faith" (ibid.). What marvels surround our work in the service of God's word! We are instruments of the Holy Spirit; God is so humble that he uses us to spread his word. We become his voice, once we have listened carefully to the word coming from his mouth. We place his word on our lips in order to bring it to the world. He accepts the offering of our prayer and through it he communicates himself to everyone we meet. Truly, as Paul tells the Ephesians, "he has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing" (1:3), for he has chosen us to be his witnesses to the ends of the earth, and he made us his elect, even before we came into existence, by a mysterious gift of his grace.
(Continuing)

(December 17)   Lazarus, brother of Martha and Mary
       Lazarus, the friend of Jesus, the brother of Martha and Mary, was the one of whom the Jews said, "See how much he loved him." In their sight Jesus raised his friend Lazarus from the dead. Legends abound about the life of Lazarus after the death and resurrection of Jesus. He is supposed to have left a written account of what he saw in the next world before he was called back to life. Some say he followed Peter into Syria. Another story is that despite being put into a leaking boat by the Jews at Jaffa, he, his sisters and others landed safely in Cyprus. There he died peacefully after serving as bishop for 30 years. A church was built in his honour in Constantinople and some of his reputed relics were transferred there in 890. A Western legend has the oarless boat arriving in Gaul. There he was bishop of Marseilles, was martyred after making a number of converts and was buried in a cave. His relics were transferred to the new cathedral in Autun in 1146.
           Whatever of the legends, it is certain there was early devotion to the saint. Around the year 390, the pilgrim lady Etheria talks of the procession that took place on the Saturday before Palm Sunday at the tomb where Lazarus had been raised from the dead. In the West, Passion Sunday was called Dominica de Lazaro, and Augustine tells us that in Africa the Gospel of the raising of Lazarus was read at the office of Palm Sunday.          (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: Genesis 49:2, 8-10; Psalm 72:1-4ab, 7-8, 17; Matthew 1:1-17

A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham: Abraham was the father of Isaac, Isaac the father of Jacob, Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, Judah the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar, Perez the father of Hezron, Hezron the father of

Ram, Ram the father of Amminadab, Amminadab the father of Nahshon, Nahshon the father of Salmon, Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab, Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth, Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of KingDavid. David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah's wife, Solomon the father of Rehoboam, Rehoboam the father of Abijah, Abijah the father of Asa, Asa the father of Jehoshaphat, Jehoshaphat the father of Jehoram, Jehoram the father of Uzziah, Uzziah the father of Jotham, Jotham the father of Ahaz, Ahaz the father of Hezekiah, Hezekiah the father of Manasseh, Manasseh the father of Amon, Amon the father of Josiah, and Josiah the father of Jeconiah and his brothers at the time of the exile to Babylon. After the exile to Babylon: Jeconiah was the father of Shealtiel, Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel, Zerubbabel the father of Abiud, Abiud the father of Eliakim, Eliakim the father of Azor, Azor the father of Zadok, Zadok the father of Akim, Akim the father of Eliud, Eliud the father of Eleazar, Eleazar the father of Matthan, Matthan the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ. Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Christ. (Matthew 1:1-17)

What are some of the thoughts that occur to us as we read St Matthew’s account of our Lord’s ancestry beginning from Abraham? Well, to begin with, St Matthew makes it clear that Christ was a Hebrew. He is, of course, God the Son, a divine person from all eternity. In the fulness of time he became man. He was not born a Roman, or a Greek. He was not born of any one of a number of

possible races. He was born a Hebrew, a direct descendant of Abraham to whom had been given the promise that through him - Abraham - all the nations would be blessed. Christ was that blessing that had come to the nations. That is to say, Matthew’s genealogy gives us a sense of the providence of God in history. God was guiding the affairs of his chosen people to bring about the great Result. Consider this providence of God. Christ’s birth occurred in the fulness of time and was the goal of the story encapsulated in Matthew’s genealogy. But think of the unimaginable number of circumstances involved in this long period from Abraham to the birth of Jesus. What might help us to appreciate this is the thought of the circumstances that combine to bring about a meeting between two spouses, their marriage and the conception and birth of their offspring. Each of us can easily realize that due to this or that circumstance our parents may never have met, in which case we who were born of our parents would not now exist. Due to numerous transient circumstances that were in no way necessary our parents met, married, and we now have the life we enjoy. That each of us exists at all we can attribute to the mighty, discrete and gentle providence of God, and the thought of the countless circumstances involved in this should help us appreciate the immensity of the providence of God in human history. Just extrapolate from the providence of God involved in one human life to that which must have been involved Christ’s genealogy spanning at least seventeen hundred years of countless circumstances from Abraham to Jesus. From Abraham to Christ God’s Providence was bringing his Blessing to the world.

The thought of the Providence of God as present in the genealogy of Christ ought give each of us a great hope that the providence and care of God will bring us to the knowledge, the love and the service of Christ. God will help us. The genealogy of Matthew (Matthew 1:1-17) illustrates another important point. Let us notice how ordinary was so much of the story contained in that genealogy. There were some saints and there were many sinners. There were some extraordinary events but most of it was ordinary. God was reaching his goals through and within the ups and downs of ordinary life from generation to generation. There were plenty of downs, plenty of reversals, plenty of sorrows, plenty of unforeseen turns of events. Consider one such event. The great king David had for his great grandmother Ruth, originally a pagan. She happened to remain with her mother-in-law when she chose to return to Israel. Ruth was a good though ordinary pagan woman and came from Moab to Bethlehem. She was an ancestor of Christ the redeemer of the world. God was working through and in ordinary events and persons to fulfil his divine plan. Is this not so very consoling? Not only is there a providence which is present and working in our life, but though our life be very ordinary, though we be limited and flawed, though there be many ups and downs in our life, many advances and perhaps even more reversals, the power of God is greater than the ordinariness of our life. It is precisely in and through the ordinary that God will do his work in and through us. What we need to do is ensure that our ordinary life be at his disposal. We ought aim every day to place in his hands all the ordinary things we are called to do. In all the ordinary duties that make up our life it is God whom we should be serving. There was a grandeur in the story that Matthew represents in his genealogy. That grandeur can be present in our ordinary life too. Let us make of the ordinary life God calls us to live something grand.

Our ordinary life will be grand if in everything we do we are striving to love and serve God. Day by day we ought be starting again and again with the sole intention of doing the will of God as it is present in the duties before us. The greatest persons in the long story of Christ’s genealogy are two that are mentioned at the end: Mary and her husband Joseph. They lived humble and hidden lives, very ordinary lives, but given over to one thing: doing the will of God in the fulfilment of their everyday work and duties. Let us take them as our model in following Christ.
(E.J.Tyler)

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If you are a man of God, you will seek to despise riches as intensely as men of the world seek to possess them.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's address to the clergy and consecrated persons during vespers celebrated Friday in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

God's Word, the Eternal Word, who was with him from the beginning (cf. .Jn 1:1), was born of a woman, born a subject of the law, in order to redeem the subjects of the law, "to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons" (cf. Gal 4:4-5). The Son of God took flesh in the womb of a woman, a virgin. Your cathedral is a living hymn of stone and light in praise of that act, unique in the annals of human history: the eternal Word of God entering our history in the fulness of time to redeem us by his self-offering in the sacrifice of the Cross. Our earthly liturgies, entirely ordered to the celebration of this unique act within history, will never fully express its infinite meaning. Certainly, the beauty of our celebrations can never be sufficiently cultivated, fostered and refined, for nothing can be too beautiful for God, who is himself infinite Beauty. Yet our earthly liturgies will never be more than a pale reflection of the liturgy celebrated in the Jerusalem on high, the goal of our pilgrimage on earth. May our own celebrations nonetheless resemble that liturgy as closely as possible and grant us a foretaste of it!
(Continuing)

(December 18)   Blessed Anthony Grassi (1592-1671)
        Anthony’s father died when his son was only 10 years old, but the young lad inherited his father’s devotion to Our Lady of Loreto. As a schoolboy he frequented the local church of the Oratorian Fathers, joining the religious order when he was 17. Already a fine student, he soon gained a reputation in his religious community as a "walking dictionary" who quickly grasped Scripture and theology. For some time he was tormented by scruples, but they reportedly left him at the very hour he celebrated his first Mass. From that day, serenity penetrated his very being. In 1621, at age 29, Anthony was struck by lightning while praying in the church of the Holy House at Loreto. He was carried paralyzed from the church, expecting to die. When he recovered in a few days he realized that he had been cured of acute indigestion. His scorched clothes were donated to the Loreto church as an offering of thanks for his new gift of life. More important, Anthony now felt that his life belonged entirely to God. Each year thereafter he made a pilgrimage to Loreto to express his thanks. He also began hearing confessions, and came to be regarded as an outstanding confessor. Simple and direct, he listened carefully to penitents, said a few words and gave a penance and absolution, frequently drawing on his gift of reading consciences. In 1635 he was elected superior of the Fermo Oratory. He was so well regarded that he was re-elected every three years until his death. He was a quiet person and a gentle superior who did not know how to be severe. At the same time he kept the Oratorian constitutions literally, encouraging the community to do likewise. He refused social or civic commitments and instead would go out day or night to visit the sick or dying or anyone else needing his services. As he grew older, he had a God-given awareness of the future, a gift which he frequently used to warn or to console. But age brought its challenges as well. He suffered the humility of having to give up his physical faculties one by one. First was his preaching, necessitated after he lost his teeth. Then he could no longer hear confessions. Finally, after a fall, he was confined to his room. The archbishop himself came each day to give him holy Communion. One of Anthony’s final acts was to reconcile two fiercely quarrelling brothers.
    Nothing provides a better reason for reassessing a life than a brush with death. Anthony’s life already seemed to be on track when he was struck by lightning; he was a brilliant priest blessed, at last, with serenity. But his experience softened him. He became a loving counsellor and a wise mediator. The same might be said of us if we put our hearts to it. We needn’t wait to be struck by lightning. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Jeremiah 23:5-8; Psalm 72:1-2, 12-13, 18-19; Matthew 1:18-25

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit.

Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins. All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel— which means, God with us. When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her before she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus. (Matthew 1:18-25)

There are two great accounts of the birth and infancy of Jesus: that of Matthew and that of Luke. Each has its own details and each its own perspective. That of Luke is the longer and it gives us more of Mary’s perspective, with Joseph, of course, playing his part. The account of the birth of Jesus

according to Matthew is the one before us today, and Joseph is the main protagonist in our passage. We ought be grateful that each evangelist took his own line and gave us these differing perspectives because it means that we are able to contemplate the birth and infancy of Christ with either Mary or Joseph, depending on the account we choose to use. So today let us think of Joseph, the foster-father of Jesus Christ and spouse of Mary his mother. The principal object of our prayerful contemplation is the person of Jesus Christ, whose birth this opening chapter of the Gospel narrates. St Matthew simply mentions in passing, as if understood by all, that before Mary and Joseph came to live together as husband and wife Mary was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. No account is given of this miraculous conception of Christ except to state clearly that it was the work of God the Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ had a mother but no earthly father. God himself, in miraculous fashion, effected his conception in the womb of the virgin Mary. While Luke tells us the circumstances of this, Matthew merely states the fact in passing. While Luke tells us that Mary was full of grace and that the Lord was with her, Matthew chooses to speak of the goodness of Joseph her intended spouse. He is a just man, a man of honour. The information is sparse because the focus is on the coming Child, but it is enough for us to gain an impression, and that impression will be meditated on by the Church during the millennia to come. Joseph is holy, and the Church will come to sense that his holiness, while hidden and humble, is very great indeed for he is the husband of Mary, and the foster-father of the Child.

If God had prepared for his divine Son a mother so holy and so full of grace, we may presume - and the Church has presumed - that he also prepared Joseph in an exceptional way. The brief word of Matthew that Joseph was just ought be understood as laden with significance. We see the deeply religious character of Joseph unfolding in the events of our Gospel passage (Matthew 1:18-25). Joseph was profoundly uncertain for he had no idea of the true origin of the newly conceived Child. He felt perplexed before God and resolved to act with the utmost sensitivity and discreetness. There is no thought of vindicating his own rights and honour. He is humble and charitable and the servant of God withal, doing his very best with the light he is granted. But then God intervenes sending his angel who enlightens him in a dream as to the true facts of the case. Somehow it is made utterly apparent to Joseph that what he sees and hears in his dream is no mere dream but the most real of communications from God himself. God has manifested his will and has apprised Joseph of the origin of the Child and his divine mission. Joseph understands that Mary his betrothed is the mother of the Messiah himself. The Messiah has Mary for his mother and God himself has brought about his conception in her. He will save his people from their sins. Joseph rises up and acts in obedience to the divine command. His action parallels that of Mary who responds to the Angel Gabriel with the words, I am the Lord’s servant. Be it done unto me according to your will. Joseph and Mary are united in their readiness to do God’s will. How great must have been their intimacy during their married life! It was founded on their desire to know the will of God and to put it into practice, with Jesus at the centre. Not only is the simple obedience of Joseph a model for every Christian, but his love for Mary the mother of Jesus is also a model for us. Jesus loved her and so did Joseph her spouse.

The Gospels provide us with an exemplary model in Joseph. He is the husband of Mary, the foster-father of Jesus, and he is shown in our passage today as entirely given over to doing whatever God wanted. Let us emulate him in his humble service of God and in his love for Mary. She, by Christ’s donation, is our Mother in the order of grace. Joseph gives us the lead in his love for her, and in this he but reflects the love Jesus himself had for her. But she, of course, is our model in her love for Jesus and in her love for Joseph. The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph is the model for humanity for all time.
(E.J.Tyler)

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What attachment to the things of the earth! Soon they will slip from your grasp, for the rich man cannot take his riches with him to the grave.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's address to the clergy and consecrated persons during vespers celebrated Friday in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

Even now the word of God is given to us as the soul of our apostolate, the soul of our priestly life. Each morning the word awakens us. Each morning the Lord himself "opens our ear" (cf. Is 50:5) through the psalms in the Office of Readings and Morning Prayer. Throughout the day, the word of God becomes the substance of the prayer of the whole Church, as she bears witness in this way to her fidelity to Christ. In the celebrated phrase of Saint Jerome, to be taken up in the XII Assembly of the Synod of Bishops next month: "Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ" (Prol. in Is.). Dear brother priests, do not be afraid to spend much time reading and meditating on the Scriptures and praying the Divine Office! Almost without your knowing it, God's word, read and pondered in the Church, acts upon you and transforms you. As the manifestation of divine Wisdom, if that word becomes your life "companion", it will be your "good counselor" and an "encouragement in cares and grief' (Wis 8:9).
(Continuing)

(December 19) Blessed Pope Urban V (1310-1370)
In 1362, the man elected pope declined the office. When the cardinals could not find another person among them for that important office, they turned to a relative stranger: the holy person we honour today. The new Pope Urban V proved a wise choice. A Benedictine monk and canon lawyer, he was deeply spiritual and brilliant. He lived simply and modestly, which did not always earn him friends among clergymen who had become used to comfort and privilege. Still, he pressed for reform and saw to the restoration of churches and monasteries. Except for a brief period he spent most of his eight years as pope living away from Rome at Avignon, seat of the papacy from 1309 until shortly after his death. He came close but was not able to achieve one of his biggest goals—reuniting the Eastern and Western churches. As pope, Urban continued to follow the Benedictine Rule. Shortly before his death in 1370 he asked to be moved from the papal palace to the nearby home of his brother so he could say goodbye to the ordinary people he had so often helped. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Judges 13:2-7, 24-25a; Psalm 71:3-4a, 5-6ab, 16-17; Luke 1:5-25

In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them were upright in the sight of God, observing all the Lord's commandments and regulations blamelessly.

But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren; and they were both well on in years. Once when Zechariah's division was on duty and he was serving as priest before God, he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to go into the temple of the Lord and burn incense. And when the time for the burning of incense came, all the assembled worshippers were praying outside. Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. But the angel said to him: Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to give him the name John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth. Many of the people of Israel will he bring back to the Lord their God. And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous— to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. Zechariah asked the angel, How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well on in years. The angel answered, I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their proper time. Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah and wondering why he stayed so long in the temple. When he came out, he could not speak to them. They realised he had seen a vision in the temple, for he kept making signs to them but remained unable to speak. When his time of service was completed, he returned home. After this his wife Elizabeth became pregnant and for five months remained in seclusion. The Lord has done this for me, she said. In these days he has shown his favour and taken away my disgrace among the people. (Luke 1:5-25)

Our beautiful passage today is taken from the Gospel of St Luke and it is celebratory of the great personage of John the Baptist, who himself was, we might say, celebratory of the greatest of the great, Jesus Christ. The entire Gospel is a proclamation of the Good News of Jesus Christ and every part of it serves to glorify him, and what Luke narrates of John in our passage today (Luke

1:5-25) ought be seen within that context. So let us contemplate this announcement by the angel Gabriel, which Luke undoubtedly learnt from the Virgin Mary during the years of the Church’s infancy following Pentecost. The scene opens with our gaze on two profoundly devout Hebrew spouses, the priest Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth, also of priestly descent. Their life was given to the service of God and Luke adds, “but they had no children”. They were happy in their life for God. But there was this one great sadness that despite their constant prayer they were not blessed with offspring. In this we are given a sense of their poverty before God. They loved him and served him and they experienced their poverty in what they had most desired. Within this scene of humble service, a service marked by poverty of spirit before God, a momentous intervention occurred. Zechariah was at his priestly duty which was his by lot, and lo! An angel of the Lord appeared to him at the very altar. It must have been a tremendous apparition conveying all the impression of a heavenly being for Zechariah was gripped with fear. The angel had to reassure him not to be afraid. He had come with a message: his prayer for a child had been answered, and what a child it would be! So great was the favour to come that an angel had been sent, Gabriel no less. He was Gabriel of the Scriptures, the Gabriel whom Zechariah would have read about in the inspired writings and perhaps even prayed to. Their child would be great in the sight of the Lord, a very great prophet, another Elijah, who would prepare the people for God’s coming.

There are many thoughts that this account suggests to us, beginning with the greatness of John. Luke would show the greatness of John later in his Gospel. He would have learnt of his greatness even if he had not known of John at the time of John’s ministry. Christ had expressed the utmost praise of John. Luke tells us here that his greatness was announced from heaven prior to his very conception. This angelic announcement was a manifestation of the power and the goodness of God. But let us revert to our earlier thought. This was announced to humble and obedient servants of God who were poor in spirit. God has a predilection for the poor in spirit, the lowly, the pure in heart. Zechariah and Elizabeth were such. Yes, Zechariah failed in believing the angel’s message but he accepted his penalty and continued in obedient service of God. He and his wife were excellent instances in Scripture of how God’s power works in human weakness. From their poverty they were lifted up by God to the dignity of being the parents of John, the forerunner of the Messiah. There is a lesson here for all the little ones of this world. Do not worry about your poverty in this or that respect and your lowliness. Just serve the Lord in gladness and faithfully. Pray to him for all your needs and trust in his power and mercy. If he does not grant the answer you are seeking at the time you seek it, trust him still. Trust him unfailingly and never lose heart, continuing to serve him in obedience and humility. He will answer in the way he knows to be best, if not in this life then marvellously in the next. Answer your prayer he will. We remember the words of St Thomas More as he approached the scaffold, bearing witness to the truth of Christ and his Church. “Though I lose my head, I’ll come to no harm.” God will use our poverty. He will work in and through our humility and our ordinariness. He will bestow on our lives a true if hidden fruitfulness, just as he did for Elizabeth and Zechariah.

Let us be content in the wisdom and the power of God. The impression we are given of Zechariah and Elizabeth is that their joy in life was to serve and love the Lord. They had their limitations and Zechariah failed in faith in this important instance. But they were pleasing in the sight of the Lord. Our truest joy is to serve the Lord in our ordinary and everyday duties. So much of life is frustrating and even bitter, and we have a hint of this in the disappointment of Zechariah and Elizabeth in having no child. But God is always near. So let us trust him and serve him, placing before him all our needs, knowing that his power is at work in human weakness.
(E.J.Tyler)

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You haven't got the spirit of poverty if, when you are able to choose in such a way that your choice is not noticed, you do not select for yourself what is worst.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's address to the clergy and consecrated persons during vespers celebrated Friday in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

"The word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword", as the author of the Letter to the Hebrews tells us (4:12). Dear seminarians, who are preparing to receive the sacrament of Holy Orders and thus to share in the threefold office of teaching, governing and sanctifying, this word is given to you as a precious treasure. By meditating on it daily, you will enter into the very life of Christ which you will be called to radiate all around you. By his word, the Lord Jesus instituted the Holy Sacrament of his Body and Blood; by his word, he healed the sick, cast out demons and forgave sins; by his word, he revealed to us the hidden mysteries of his Kingdom. You are called to become stewards of this word which accomplishes what it communicates. Always cultivate a thirst for the word of God! Thus you will learn to love everyone you meet along life's journey. In the Church everyone has a place, everyone! Every person can and must find a place in her.

And you, dear deacons, effective co-workers of the Bishops and priests, continue to love the word of God! You proclaim the Gospel at the heart of the Eucharistic celebration, and you expound it in the catechesis you offer to your brothers and sisters. Make the Gospel the centre of your lives, of your service to your neighbours, of your entire diakonia. Without seeking to take the place of priests, but assisting them with your friendship and your activity, may you be living witnesses to the infinite power of God's word!
(Continuing)

Scripture today: Isaiah 7:10-14; Psalm 24:1-2, 3-4ab, 5-6; Luke 1:26-38

In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The

angel went to her and said, Greetings, you who are highly favoured! The Lord is with you. Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favour with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; his kingdom will never end. How will this be, Mary asked the angel, since I am a virgin? The angel answered, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. For nothing is impossible with God. I am the Lord's servant, Mary answered. May it be to me as you have said. Then the angel left her. (Luke 1:26-38)

In our Gospel passage today the Holy Spirit, speaking to us in and through the words he inspired Luke to write, presents the Child and his mother for our contemplation and praise. The scene opens with the angel Gabriel once again being sent to make a momentous announcement. He had

already announced to Zechariah the birth of the forerunner and had wielded power over him as well, striking Zechariah dumb for his hesitation to believe. “I am Gabriel,” he had said in rebuke to Zechariah, “and I stand in the presence of God.” The angel Gabriel is one of the most prominent angels in the Old and New Testaments. He is chosen by God to act as his emissary for what might be counted as the greatest of divine announcements prior to the coming of the Messiah: the announcement of the coming Incarnation. In our scene this great angelic person presents himself to Mary to declare God’s plan to her. He stands before her, courteously greeting her and offering her unfeigned praise. There is a difference between the tone of his words to Zechariah and that of his address to Mary. His greetings to Mary bespeak not only cordiality but deep respect, as to one who is above himself. She is most highly favoured. The Lord is with her, without any qualification. This heavenly being evoked some species of fear in her for Gabriel immediately exhorted her not to be afraid. She had found favour with God. The entry of the angel on this occasion reminds us of the angelic world which serves God and us but it also reminds us of the honour God intends that there be paid to Mary. She is the mother of the Redeemer and the object of honour even by the angels. Let us then honour and love her as the Queen Mother, the mother of God the Son made man. An excellent devotional practice would be to repeat in our hearts all through life the words of the angel as he addressed Mary, and to do so together with the angel: Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you! (Luke 1:26-38)

But the angel also and primarily speaks of the Child. Mary is told the good news of the Gospel. The Child is to be her son. He is to be the son of the virgin Mary by the power and action of the Holy Spirit. He will have no earthly father, demonstrating in vivid fashion that God is his Father. He will be thus the Son of the Most High. He will be great without any qualification, great not only in the sight of God (as will be John) but simply great, great as God is great. Islam has the cry that God is great! The angel Gabriel said that Jesus would be great! He is the promised Messiah, the son of David and to him would be given the throne of his father David and his reign and his kingdom would never end. Such a kingdom is clearly God’s kingdom and it would be given to Jesus to lead, to establish and to bring to its final fulfilment. What a wonder this Child will be! But there is more. The angel stresses that the Child will be conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin his mother, and will be the Son of the Most High. He will be the Holy One. We have here in its basic if veiled outlines the first formal announcement from heaven of the doctrines of the Holy Trinity and the Incarnation, and Mary is the first to receive it. The angel announced it to her, and the Holy Spirit - overshadowing her to effect the conception of the holy Child - undoubtedly gave her further understanding of the words of the angel. Mary would treasure these words and ponder on them in her heart. She knew exactly who her Child was from the very beginning even though there was much that had not been revealed to her of the details of his redemptive mission. This Child is the Man of the ages, the Saviour, the centre of the world, the linchpin, we might say, of the universe. All depends on him and all the longings of humanity hang in the balance of what he will do. The angel receives Mary’s obedient acquiescence. At this reply the Child is conceived and the great work of salvation begins.

Let us remain in the room after the angel departs. There is the Virgin, the one blessed among women. Let us look ahead some nine months and there she is, holding her new-born Child. We stand in admiration and praise. Let us look ahead thirty three years, and there the Man Jesus is hanging on the Cross redeeming the world, and she is nearby sharing in his sufferings. Now she is with him in heaven, and together with him as his mother and foremost disciple she works to save us all. Let us place ourselves under her maternal care, for she is the Help of all Christians.
(E.J.Tyler)

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'Divitiae, si affluant, nolite cor apponere, though riches may increase keep your heart detached.' Strive to use them generously. And, if necessary, heroically.

Prayers this week: Let the clouds rain down the Just One, and the earth bring forth a Saviour. (Isaiah 45: 8)

Lord, fill our hearts with your love, and as you revealed to us by an angel the coming of your Son as man, so lead us through his suffering and death to the glory of his resurrection. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

(December 21) St. Peter Canisius (1521-1597)
The energetic life of Peter Canisius should demolish any stereotypes we may have of the life

of a saint as dull or routine. Peter lived his 76 years at a pace which must be considered heroic, even in our time of rapid change. A man blessed with many talents, Peter is an excellent example of the scriptural man who develops his talents for the sake of the Lord’s work. He was one of the most important figures in the Catholic Counter-Reformation in Germany. His was such a key role that he has often been called the “second apostle of Germany” in that his life parallels the earlier work of Boniface. Although Peter once accused himself of idleness in his youth, he could not have been idle too long, for at the age of 19 he received a master’s degree from the university at Cologne. Soon afterwards he met Peter Faber, the first disciple of Ignatius Loyola, who influenced Peter so much that he joined the recently formed Society of Jesus. At this early age Peter had already taken up a practice he continued throughout his life—a process of study, reflection, prayer and writing. After his ordination in 1546, he became widely known for his editions of the writings of St. Cyril of Alexandria and St. Leo the Great. Besides this reflective literary bent, Peter had a zeal for the apostolate. He could often be found visiting the sick or prisoners, even when his assigned duties in other areas were more than enough to keep most people fully occupied. In 1547 Peter attended several sessions of the Council of Trent, whose decrees he was later assigned to implement. After a brief teaching assignment at the Jesuit college at Messina, Peter was entrusted with the mission to Germany—from that point on his life’s work. He taught in several universities and was instrumental in establishing many colleges and seminaries. He wrote a catechism that explained the Catholic faith in a way which common people could understand—a great need of that age. Renowned as a popular preacher, Peter packed churches with those eager to hear his eloquent proclamation of the gospel. He had great diplomatic ability, often serving as a reconciler between disputing factions. In his letters (filling eight volumes) one finds words of wisdom and counsel to people in all walks of life. At times he wrote unprecedented letters of criticism to leaders of the Church—yet always in the context of a loving, sympathetic concern. At 70 Peter suffered a paralytic seizure, but he continued to preach and write with the aid of a secretary until his death in his hometown (Nijmegen, Netherlands) on December 21, 1597.
Peter’s untiring efforts are an apt example for those involved in the renewal of the Church or the growth of moral consciousness in business or government. He is regarded as one of the creators of the Catholic press, and can easily be a model for the Christian author or journalist. Teachers can see in his life a passion for the transmission of truth. Whether we have much to give, as Peter Canisius did, or whether we have only a little to give, as did the poor widow in the Gospel (see Luke 21:1–4), the important thing is to give our all. It is in this way that Peter is so exemplary for Christians in an age of rapid change when we are called to be in the world but not of the world. When asked if he felt overworked, Peter replied, "If you have too much to do, with God's help you will find time to do it all." (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: 2 Sam 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16; Ps 89:2-5, 27, 29; Rom 16:25-27; Luke 1:26-38

In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, Greetings, you who are highly favoured! The Lord is with you. Mary

was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favour with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; his kingdom will never end. How will this be, Mary asked the angel, since I am a virgin? The angel answered, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. For nothing is impossible with God. I am the Lord's servant, Mary answered. May it be to me as you have said. Then the angel left her. (Luke 1:26-38)

One of the foremost religious minds of England during the nineteenth century was John Henry Newman, the acknowledged leader of the Oxford Movement. For about three years prior to the beginning of the Oxford Movement in 1833 he had a close friendship with another member of Oriel

College, Blanco White. Blanco White was a former Catholic priest from Spain who hated the Catholic Church and who prior to his admission as a Fellow of Oriel College at Oxford had attacked the Catholic Church in his writings. The story of Blanco White’s life was not only the story of his falling away from the priesthood and the Catholic Church, but more fundamentally it was a falling away from the orthodox doctrine about Christ. He came to believe that Christ was not God. Not only was there one only God but there was only one divine person, so he thought. He died in May 1841 a Unitarian, thinking that Christ was no more than a very holy prophet. He was not divine. This is what the Moslem thinks, and I presume it is as much as many Jews would accept. With the rise of secularism in what has been the Christian West religious scepticism has become common and with it the common denial of Christ’s divinity. I tend to think that the more widespread problem is indifference to this doctrine. It should make all the difference to life, but so many simply do not give it any thought. They do not care. Life is lived as if God did not exist and as if Christ were just an historical figure and little more. I also suspect that if many such people were to suddenly understand what the doctrine of Christ’s divinity really means, they would reject it as untrue. It has always been the defining doctrine of the Christian religion. In the early Church there were Gnostic sects that denied the humanity of Christ, but the usual denial has been that of his divinity. It is obvious that Jesus was a man. It requires faith, and it is a very reasonable faith, to accept that he is God. Not only does the New Testament teach this, but it was taught by Council after Council in the early centuries of the Church in response to heresies. It is the basic Christian dogma. A person cannot be counted as a Christian if he denies that Christ is God.

In our Gospel passage today (Luke 1:26-38) the angel Gabriel announces to Mary the plan of God. She is to be the mother of the Messiah, and he will be no mere prophet, no mere king or priest. Nor will he be simply the very greatest of these. He, the Holy One, will be the Son of the Most High. He will be conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit. Mary his mother is being given a clear intimation of the doctrine that the one God is in three divine persons, and that her son is the eternal Son of the eternal Father. He is not just some mixture of the human and the divine, part God and part man. No, he is truly and completely man, just as much as any one of us. Indeed, he is more fully man than any one of us because being without sin his humanity is in no way deformed, depraved or spoilt. At the same time he is a divine person. He is the same divine person who from all eternity was generated by the Father. In his divine personhood he never began in time, but existed from all eternity just as the Father and the Holy Spirit were from all eternity. Each is the same one only God. He, though, the second divine person, God from God and Light from Light, became man at a certain point in time. He took to himself a human nature, a full human nature, a human intellect, a human will, a human soul no less. As a result in his divine self he could and did think, will, speak and act humanly while of course being able at will to act divinely. One minute he was sound asleep in a terrible storm, tired out. There he was, physically exhausted. The next minute, having been roused by his disciples from sleep, he stood up and at a single word calmed the terrible storm. At will he could act as God, for he was not a human person but a divine person who took to himself a human nature. Because he is man he is truly our brother, but what a brother we have! Our brother is the Lord God our Redeemer, through whom all things were made.

The danger for secular man is that he will be casual and off-hand about God his creator. He will be indifferent to the person of Christ and in particular to his divinity. He will find it hard to turn to Christ in prayer because he just doesn’t care very much. This world is what matters. The soul of such a person is in danger because we were made to know, love and serve God here on earth. Now, God is Jesus, just as God is the Father and just as God is the Holy Spirit. God is Jesus. The man Jesus is God. Let us place ourselves in his presence every day and resolve to consider him as the Lord in every sense. Jesus Christ is Lord! As Thomas said to him after the resurrection: My Lord and my God!
(E.J.Tyler)

Further reading: The Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.464-469

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing Benedict XVI's address to the clergy and consecrated persons during vespers celebrated Friday in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

With unfailing confidence in the power of God, who has saved us "in hope" (cf. Rom 8:24) and who wishes to make of us one flock under the guidance of one shepherd, Christ Jesus, I pray for the unity of the Church. I greet once again with respect and affection the representatives of the Christian Churches and ecclesial communities who, as our brothers and sisters, have come to pray Vespers together with us in this cathedral. So great is the power of God's word that we can all be entrusted to it, remembering what Saint Paul once did, our privileged intercessor during this year. As Paul took leave of the presbyters of Ephesus at Miletus, he did not hesitate to entrust them "to God and to the word of his grace" (Acts 20:32), while warning them against every form of division. I implore the Lord to increase within us the sense of this unity of the word of God, which is the sign, pledge and guarantee of the unity of the Church: there is no love in the Church without love of the word, no Church without unity around Christ the Redeemer, no fruits of redemption without love of God and neighbour, according to the two commandments which sum up all of Sacred Scripture!
(Continuing)

(December 22)   Blessed Jacopone da Todi (d. 1306)
    Jacomo, or James, was born a noble member of the Benedetti family in the northern Italian city of Todi. He became a successful lawyer and married a pious, generous lady named Vanna. His young wife took it upon herself to do penance for the worldly excesses of her husband. One day Vanna, at the insistence of Jacomo, attended a public tournament. She was sitting in the stands with the other noble ladies when the stands collapsed. Vanna was killed. Her shaken husband was even more disturbed when he realized that the penitential girdle she wore was for his sinfulness. On the spot, he vowed to radically change his life. He divided his possessions among the poor and entered the Third Order of St. Francis. Often dressed in penitential rags, he was mocked as a fool and called Jacopone, or "Crazy Jim," by his former associates. The name became dear to him. After 10 years of such humiliation, Jacopone asked to be a member of the Franciscan Order. Because of his reputation, his request was initially refused. He composed a beautiful poem on the vanities of the world, an act that eventually led to his admission into the Order in 1278. He continued to lead a life of strict penance, declining to be ordained a priest. Meanwhile he was writing popular hymns in the vernacular. Jacopone suddenly found himself a leader in a disturbing religious movement among the Franciscans. The Spirituals, as they were called, wanted a return to the strict poverty of Francis. They had on their side two cardinals of the Church and Pope Celestine V. These two cardinals, though, opposed Celestine’s successor, Boniface VIII. At the age of 68, Jacopone was excommunicated and imprisoned. Although he acknowledged his mistake, Jacopone was not absolved and released until Benedict XI became pope five years later. He had accepted his imprisonment as penance. He spent the final three years of his life more spiritual than ever, weeping "because Love is not loved." During this time he wrote the famous Latin hymn, Stabat Mater. On Christmas Eve in 1306 Jacopone felt that his end was near. He was in a convent of the Poor Clares with his friend, Blessed John of La Verna. Like Francis, Jacopone welcomed "Sister Death" with one of his favourite songs. It is said that he finished the song and died as the priest intoned the Gloria from the midnight Mass at Christmas. From the time of his death, Brother Jacopone has been venerated as a saint.
    “Crazy Jim,” his contemporaries called Jacopone. We might well echo their taunt, for what else can you say about a man who broke into song in the midst of all his troubles? We still sing Jacopone’s saddest song, the Stabat Mater, but we Christians claim another song as our own, even when the daily headlines resound with discordant notes. Jacopone’s whole life rang our song out: “Alleluia!” May he inspire us to keep singing. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: 1 Samuel 1:24-28; 1 Samuel 2:1, 4-8; Luke 1:46-56

And Mary said: My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, for he has

been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the Mighty One has done great things for me— holy is his name. His mercy extends to those who fear him, from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants for ever, even as he said to our fathers. Mary stayed with Elizabeth for about three months and then returned home. (Luke 1:46-56)

When a person prays genuinely, that person’s soul is laid bare before God. In our Gospel passage today Mary the mother of the Messiah speaks of God to her kinswoman Elizabeth and in doing so reflects her prayer, and so reveals her soul. In our text today we have a window to the soul of

Mary. Elizabeth has told her that she is blessed among women, and that the fruit of her womb is blessed. Mary replies, giving glory to God and rejoicing in God as her Saviour. She rejoices in God’s greatness and glorifies him, teaching us to rejoice in God. He is not to be feared as one who menaces man, rather we ought exult in him because he wishes to save man. Mary is profoundly imbued with the Scriptures and all that they reveal about God. God is her Saviour. He looks with love on her in all her lowliness. He is mindful of the lowliness of his servant, whom she is. She is the humble servant of the Lord. We remember her reply to the angel Gabriel when he revealed the plan of God to her and explained how it would be done. Behold the servant of the Lord, she said. Be it done to me according to your word. She is the servant of the Lord. God is the Mighty One, the one who can do anything. He has done great things for her. Holy is his name. So God, in the prayer and thought of Mary, is mighty. He is holy and he acts to save the lowly. Due to him, for the rest of human history she will be regarded as blessed, as the Blessed Virgin Mary. God is a God of mercy and his mercy is shown constantly, from generation to generation, to those who fear him. To those who do not fear him he shows himself to be mighty and irresistible. “He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble”(Luke 1:46-56). Mary’s prayer of praise uttered in response to Elizabeth’s praise of her is one of Scripture’s great descriptions of the God of revelation.

Mary now is glorious in heaven by the side of her glorious Son. By the merits of her Son she shares in his glory, body and soul. She is the mother of God the Son made man, and by the gift of Christ during the last moments of his life on the Cross she is our mother also. Behold your mother, he said to John. Behold your son, he said to her. The Church regards that donation by Christ of one to the other as applying to each of us. Christ gave her to each of his disciples, and each of his disciples to her. So she is the Help of Christians, the foremost Christian who, in union with her Son, assists each of us by her intercession and example. Let us remember that we each of us, and mankind all together need constant heavenly help. At times in history, Christian civilization has faced grave threats and the mother of God has been appealed to by the Church. One such instance was the immense threat coming from a militant Islam in the sixteenth century. The Church appealed to Mary and the Islamic forces were conquered at Lepanto. The Church saw this victory as very much due to the intercession of Mary Help of Christians. When we look at the prayer of Mary in today’s Gospel text, we see that she was very aware that God is a God who can grant great victories in times of peril. “He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty.” She may have been thinking of the great invasion of Sennacherib, and the promise of Isaiah that God would send him packing, which he did. God has been the help of the lowly in the face of overwhelming threats, and so he is now. Mary is the principal intercessor after Christ our High Priest, and she intercedes as one who shares in his priesthood as do all the Faithful. But she shares in it in supereminent fashion because of her exalted holiness. She can help us in our needs. Let us then ask her, holy Mary, mother of God, to pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.

Mary, ordinary woman, humble virgin, unnoticed at the time, immersed in the ordinary duties of an ordinary life, was the mother of the Redeemer, our God and brother. She is now our mother, and as Queen Mother is at the side of her divine Son on whom she depends for everything in the order of nature and of grace. Let us contemplate her often, and make her prayer, the prayer of our Gospel scene today, our own.
(E.J.Tyler)

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What holy resources poverty has! Do you remember? It was a time of financial distress for that apostolic undertaking and you had given without stint down to your last penny.

And he, a priest of God, said to you: 'I too will give you all that I have,' You knelt, and heard: 'May the blessing of almighty God, the Father, the Son and the holy Spirit, descend upon you and remain with you for ever'.

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Conclusion of Benedict XVI's address to the clergy and consecrated persons during vespers celebrated Friday in the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

Dear brothers and sisters, in Our Lady we have the finest example of fidelity to God's word. Her great fidelity found fulfilment in the Incarnation; with absolute confidence, Mary can say: "Behold the handmaid of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your word!" (Lk 1:38). Our evening prayer is about to take up the Magnificat, the song of her whom all generations will call blessed. Mary believed in the fulfilment of the words the Lord had spoken to her (cf. Lk 1:45); she hoped against all hope in the resurrection of her Son; and so great was her love for humanity that she was given to us as our Mother (cf. Jn 19:27). Thus we see that "Mary is completely at home with the word of God; with ease she moves in and out of it. She speaks and thinks with the word of God; the word of God becomes her word, and her word issues from the word of God" (Deus Caritas Est, 41). To her, then, we can say with confidence: "Holy Mary, Mother of God, our Mother, teach us to believe, to hope, to love with you. Show us the way to his Kingdom!" (Spe Salvi, 50). Amen.
(Concluded)

(December 23)   St. John of Kanty (1390?-1473)
    John was a country lad who made good in the big city and the big university of Kraków, Poland. After brilliant studies he was ordained a priest and became a professor of theology. The inevitable opposition which saints encounter led to his being ousted by rivals and sent to be a parish priest at Olkusz. An extremely humble man, he did his best, but his best was not to the liking of his parishioners. Besides, he was afraid of the responsibilities of his position. But in the end he won his people’s hearts. After some time he returned to Kraków and taught Scripture for the remainder of his life. He was a serious man, and humble, but known to all the poor of Kraków for his kindness. His goods and his money were always at their disposal, and time and again they took advantage of him. He kept only the money and clothes absolutely needed to support himself. He slept little, and then on the floor, ate sparingly, and took no meat. He made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, hoping to be martyred by the Turks. He made four pilgrimages to Rome, carrying his luggage on his back. When he was warned to look after his health, he was quick to point out that, for all their austerity, the fathers of the desert lived remarkably long lives.
    John of Kanty is a typical saint: He was kind, humble and generous, he suffered opposition and led an austere, penitential life. Most Christians in an affluent society can understand all the ingredients except the last: Anything more than mild self-discipline seems reserved for athletes and ballet dancers. Christmas is a good time at least to reject self-indulgence. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: Malachi 3:1-4, 23-24; Psalm 25:4-5ab, 8-10 and 14; Luke 1:57-66

When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. Her neighbours and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy, and they shared her joy. On the eighth

day they came to circumcise the child, and they were going to name him after his father Zechariah, but his mother spoke up and said, No! He is to be called John. They said to her, There is no-one among your relatives who has that name. Then they made signs to his father, to find out what he would like to name the child. He asked for a writing tablet, and to everyone's astonishment he wrote, His name is John. Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue was loosed, and he began to speak, praising God. The neighbours were all filled with awe, and throughout the hill country of Judea people were talking about all these things. Everyone who heard this wondered about it, asking, What then is this child going to be? For the Lord's hand was with him. (Luke 1:57-66)

In his book A Grammar of Assent John Henry Newman describes the religion of the day in the England of his time. He considered that by and large the religion of England consisted in a belief in the providence of God - meaning a belief that the hand of God was at work in the course of the world. Apart from identifying this positive feature in the religious life of the

English people of his time he was, I think, meaning to suggest that a great deal of positive dogmatic belief had drained away from the belief system of so many Englishmen. People were down to a belief in Providence. I suspect that the diminution of dogmatic belief has continued since his day, which was the nineteenth century, and that it has come to affect even the acceptance of a divine providence. Many people scarcely believe in anything. Recently I was in a large university library and the attendant (who was very helpful to me) told me that he was Polish. I assumed that he was Catholic, and probably a practising Catholic. But no. He explained to me that his religious belief had gone. Many factors combine to undermine the beliefs of people, including their belief in the providence of God. I suspect that the hardships of life play a large part. Be all that as it may, let that thought serve as an introduction to our Gospel passage today in which the hand of God is mentioned. The events portrayed showed the action of God in the life of the infant John who would become the great Baptizer, the forerunner of Christ. The providence of God was at work. Elizabeth spoke and indicated, to the surprise of the relatives, that the child would be called John. Then Zechariah, still dumb as punishment for his hesitation to believe the angel, indicated that his name would be John. His tongue was loosed and he spoke (Luke 1:57-66). God was present and active, indicating his will and also the special destiny of the child. The people sensed this and were filled with awe. What will this child turn out to be, they asked. And the Lord’s hand was with him.

The point we can take from this is that just as the Lord’s hand was with John, so the Lord’s hand is with each of us. In John’s case it was in view of a great mission. He was to announce the imminence of the Messiah and indeed to indicate who he was. Our Lord would appeal to the testimony of John against his enemies, the leaders of the people. John’s mission was great. But let us remember that our Lord said that the least in the Kingdom of God is greater than he. Our Lord is not meaning that the least in the Kingdom is greater in moral stature and sanctity than John but that membership in his Kingdom is of itself a greater thing than being part of that dispensation of which John too was part. John had a divine calling. So too does every disciple of Christ, everyone who has been baptized into him. Every baptized Christian not only has an exalted status and calling because he is in Christ, but a very particular providence is present and active in his life. If the hand of the Lord was with John, the same hand of the Lord is with each of us who are in Christ. The mission is different, John’s personal sanctity may well be greater, but there is no doubting the presence and action of God’s providence in the life of each and every baptized Christian. Moreover, the same question may be asked of each Christian, what will he turn out to be? That is the practical question. Will he turn out well, a good and generous disciple of Christ, adhering to and practising what has been revealed by God in Christ? Christ chose the Twelve. Undoubtedly he too asked, what will each turn out to be? Judas turned out very, very badly. The others turned out very well. We are chosen from all eternity, from before the world began, as St Paul writes. We are chosen in Christ to be holy and full of love in the sight of God. This vocation is confirmed and sealed at the instant of our baptism. What will this child turn out to be? That was the question for each of us, and the hand of the Lord is with us to complete the great work. Let us not disappoint God.

Life is a great work. We have something of immense significance to build, and that is our moral character and the perfection of love. Our daily work is central to the building. It will be the means of personal sanctification and the sanctification and good of others. The hand of the Lord will be with us as we resume and sustain our work in life every day. John brought it to a glorious conclusion bearing witness to the truth of Christ to the end. Let us follow suit.
(E.J.Tyler)

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Here is a translation of a 10-minute press conference Benedict XVI gave while en route to France.

Q: In 1980, during his first trip, John Paul II asked "France, are you faithful to your baptismal promises?" What is your message today for the French? Do you think France is losing its Christian identity because of laicism?

Benedict XVI: It seems evident to me today that laicism does not contradict the faith. I would even say that it is a fruit of the faith, since the Christian faith was a universal religion from the beginning. Therefore it did not identify itself with a state and it was present in all the states. It was always clear to the Christians that religion and faith were not political, but rather they formed part of another sphere of human life. ... Politics, the state, were not a religion but rather a secular reality with a specific mission, and the two of them should be open to each other.

In this sense, I would say today that for the French, and not only the French, but also for us, Christians of today in this secularized world, it is important to joyfully live the freedom of our faith, live the beauty of the faith, and show today's world that it is beautiful to be a believer, that it is beautiful to know God; God with a human face in Jesus Christ, show that it is possible to be a believer today, and even that society needs there to be people who know God and who, therefore, can live according to the great values that it has given us and contribute to the presence of these values that are fundamental for the building and survival of our states and societies.
(Continuing)

(December 24) Christmas at Greccio
What better way to prepare for the arrival of the Christ Child than to take a brief journey to Greccio, the spot in central Italy where St. Francis of Assisi created the first Christmas crib in the year 1223. Francis, recalling a visit he had made years before to Bethlehem, resolved to create the manger he had seen there. The ideal spot was a cave in nearby Greccio. He would find a baby (we’re not sure if it was a live infant or the carved image of a baby), hay upon which to lay him, an ox and an ass to stand beside the manger. Word went out to the people of the town. At the appointed time they arrived carrying torches and candles. One of the friars began celebrating Mass. Francis himself gave the sermon. His biographer, Thomas of Celano, recalls that Francis “stood before the manger…overcome with love and filled with a wonderful happiness…” For Francis, the simple celebration was meant to recall the hardships Jesus suffered even as an infant, a savior who chose to become poor for our sake, a truly human Jesus. Tonight, as we pray around the Christmas cribs in our homes, we welcome into our hearts that same Saviour. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: 2 Sam 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16; Ps 89:2-3, 4-5, 27 and 29; Luke 1:67-79

His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied: Praise be to the Lord, the God

of Israel, because he has come and has redeemed his people. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David (as he said through his holy prophets of long ago), salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us—to show mercy to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath he swore to our father Abraham: to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all our days. And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him, to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace. (Luke 1:67-79)

Our Gospel passage today presents us with Zechariah’s first spoken response to what God had done in giving him and his wife Elizabeth their great child. He had been told by the angel that his child would be a great prophet of the Lord, another Elijah who would go ahead preparing a people

for the Lord’s coming. Let us consider the teaching contained in Zechariah’s prayer of praise. Firstly, let us notice the authority of this prayer. It is not an ordinary utterance Luke chooses to report. It is a prophecy. Zechariah spoke as one filled with the Holy Spirit. He prophesied. He acted in this moment as a prophet, as would, for instance, Simeon when he took the child Jesus into his arms in the Temple. So in this respect Zechariah’s words are of the same class as the other prophets of the Scriptures. We may even choose to regard him as one of the (minor) prophets and his prophecy was about what God would do in and through his child. Just as John would prophesy about Jesus, here his father Zechariah was prophesying about him. The utterance from the mouth of Zechariah has the Holy Spirit for its author, and there must have been a notable grandeur about the declaration he made. It must have been obvious that he was being inspired to speak as he did, for his prayer is quoted by Luke which implies that it had been vividly remembered. Secondly, the words Zechariah uses, the content and character of his thought, portray one who is a man of the Old Testament. He thinks of the God of Israel, of his servant David and the holy prophets, and of “our father Abraham”. Zechariah is at the end of the Old Testament, at the very threshold of the New and is pointing to the New. His prophecy over his child ought be seen as being in the line of the prophets of the Old Testament, and is first and most of all a prophecy about God. The Lord whom he praises and blesses is the God of Israel. He is the God of Abraham and of David and of the prophets and he deals continuously with his people.

We might even say that Zechariah’s prayer of praise gives an overview of the teaching of the Old Testament on God. God is the Saviour and the Redeemer of his people. He saves his people from those who hate them. He is the Rescuer of his people and in this he remembers and honours the covenant he made with the fathers and in particular with Abraham. The purpose of this salvation is to enable his people to serve him in holiness and righteousness all their days. The holiness of his people is the purpose of his redeeming activity and this eminently points to the salvation that is coming. It will serve the holiness of his people. Above and beyond all, God is a God of mercy. His saving action on behalf of his people was “to show mercy to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath he swore to our father Abraham.” God is a God rich in mercy. Having spoken of God, Zechariah’s prophecy declares concerning the child. It is one of the few instances in the Scriptures of a prophet being foretold: the prophet being John his child, and the prediction concerning him is coming (under an inspiration of the Holy Spirit) from his father. It all adds to the enhancement of John as a prophet of the Most High. “And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him, to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace”(Luke 1:67-79). That was Zechariah’s prophecy, and it describes John’s mission. He will prepare the way for the Lord. The people will come to know “salvation through the forgiveness of their sins” (and not, say, through political liberation). It will all be due to the “tender mercy of our God.”

Let us ponder on Zechariah and his prophecy. In a certain sense, it is a summary of the Old Testament especially as pointing to the coming of the Messiah. John encapsulates in himself the Old Testament as preparing for the New, the New being Christ and his Kingdom. Let us pray for a profound appreciation of the person of Jesus Christ, the ultimate focus of our passage today.
(E.J.Tyler)

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How can you dare ask others to keep your secret, when that very request is a sign that you have not been able to keep it yourself?

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Continuing the 10-minute press conference Benedict XVI gave while en route to France.

Q: You love France. What unites you most especially to France, to its authors?

Benedict XVI: I would not dare say that I know France well. I know it a bit, but I love France, the great French culture, above all, of course, the great cathedrals, and also the great French art, the great theology beginning with St. Irenaeus of Lyons to the 13th century -- and I studied about the University of Paris in the 13th century-- St. Bonaventure, St. Thomas Aquinas. This theology has been decisive for the development of Western theology; and naturally the theology of the century of Vatican Council II. I have had the great honor and joy to be a friend of Fr. Lubac, one of the greatest figures of the last century, but I have also had a good working relationship with Fr. Congar, Jean Danielou and others. I have had very good personal relationships with Etienne Gilson, Henri-Irenee Maroux.

Therefore I have really had deep, personal and enriching contact with the great theological and philosophical culture of France. It has really been decisive in the development of my thought. As well the discovery of the original Gregorian Chant with Solesmes, the great monastic culture and naturally the poetry. Being such a baroque man, I very much like Paul Claudel, with his joy for living, as well as Bernanos and the great French poets of the last century. So it is a culture that has really shaped my personal, theological, philosophical and human development in a deep way.
(Continuing)

Prayers this week: A child is born for us, a son given to us; dominion is laid on his shoulder, and he shall be called Wonderful-Counsellor. (Isaiah 9: 6)

Lord God, we praise you for creating man, and still more for restoring him in Christ. Your Son shared our weakness: may we share his glory. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

(December 25) On this day the Church focuses especially on the newborn Child, God become human, who embodies for us all the hope and peace we seek. We need no other special saint today to lead us to Christ in the manger, although his mother Mary and Joseph, caring for his foster-Son, help round out the scene. But if we were to select a patron for today, perhaps it might be appropriate for us to imagine an anonymous shepherd, summoned to the birthplace by a wondrous and even disturbing vision in the night, a summons from an angelic choir, promising peace and goodwill. A shepherd willing to seek out something that might just be too unbelievable to chase after, and yet compelling enough to leave behind the flocks in the field and search for a mystery. On the day of the Lord’s birth, let’s let an unnamed, “un-celebrity” at the edge of the crowd model for us the way to discover Christ in our own hearts—somewhere between skepticism and wonder, between mystery and faith. And, like Mary and the shepherds, let us treasure that discovery in our hearts.
The precise dating in this passage sounds like a textbook on creationism. If we focus on the time frame, however, we miss the point. It lays out the story of a love affair: creation, the deliverance of the Hebrews from slavery in Egypt, the rise of Israel under David. It climaxes with the birth of Jesus. From the beginning, some scholars insist, God intended to enter the world as one of us, the beloved people. Praise God! (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture : Isaiah 9:1-6; Psalm 96: 1-3, 11-13; Titus 2:11-14; Luke 2:1-14

In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. (This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.) And

everyone went to his own town to register. So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. And there were shepherds living out in the fields near by, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rests. (Luke 2:1-14)

One of the fundamental principles of all human thought, and therefore of philosophy too, is what is called the principle of contradiction. Two statements that contradict one another in some respect cannot both be true in that same respect. This fundamental principle is important in respect to truth

in religion. Apart from the anomaly of Western secularism, one of the most consistent features of human culture is that it is religious. It looks to powers that are beyond the merely physical, and it regards these powers as heavenly. Throughout history man has looked to these powers above for aid in his various needs. He regards himself as subject to these powers, and generally has the sense that if he refuses them obedience, he will be punished. Now it is so very striking how little unanimity there is among the religions of mankind as to the nature of the powers above, how contrary are their teachings one to the other, and how sharply the religions of man diverge from Judaeo-Christian revelation. There are, as the early Christian fathers recognized, seeds of revealed truth present in the religions of man. But the contrariety among religions alone suggests a great deal of religious error among the religions of man in the course of history. There always have been so many contrary claims and beliefs in respect to the divine, and of himself man seems powerless to move beyond this state of religious confusion and error. St Paul says that this widespread religious error is fundamentally due to sin. The darkness of much of religious thought over the ages is due to the moral darkness stemming from original and personal sin. It is thus urgent that the light of truth be obtained because what is at stake is not only the possession of the truth, but salvation. Man can lose his way and can lose his soul. He needs to know the truth and he needs to know the way - the way to life.

Into this broken and dimly lit world, into this world all askew from man’s own sin, into this dysfunctional human condition, God has entered as one of us. The great God on whom the universe depends moment by moment, has entered the stream of history as a member of the family of man. He has done so in order to fix the problem at its root. The root cause of man’s darkness and tangled religious thought is sin. God took his place by our side, indeed at our head, in order to attack sin at its root and share with us his divine life. Today we celebrate his entry into our midst. God became man and dwelt among us. Just consider. The tiny Babe in the arms of Mary his mother (Luke 2:1-14) is the great God through whom all things were made. There have been various denials of this in the history of the Church, and these heresies spawned further heresies. In the early fourth century the priest Arius in Alexandria denied that the man Jesus was God the Son. Jesus was at the most a kind of demi-urge or higher being, but certainly not the One only God. His heresy caused great confusion and was only laid to rest when more than one Ecumenical council condemned him. But the heresy passed over to the conquering “barbarians” and was kept alive by them for a long time. So it has been ever since, the doctrine of the Incarnation has been denied in one form or another. It is the linchpin of the Christian faith. Jesus is a man, born at a certain date in history and at a certain spot. He was born at Bethlehem of the Virgin Mary with Joseph her husband as his foster-father. This Child was God, God the Son made man. He grew up and redeemed the world by his Passion, Death and Resurrection, sending the Holy Spirit from heaven following his ascension to the right hand of his heavenly Father. This great work of our redemption in Christ began in the stable of Bethlehem. Our hearts focus on Jesus in a special way today, just as his heart, his sacred heart, focuses constantly on each of us.

Today let us contemplate the Christmas scene. The divine child is in the arms of his holy mother. She was conceived sinless by the future merits of the child she now holds. She remained sinless through life by the grace of the Holy Spirit, won for her and for all by her Son. He, the divine Son of the heavenly Father, is newly born a man in every respect like us except for sin. Next to him and to her is Mary’s husband, Joseph. He is now the protector of Mary and the Child, and will be so for the rest of his life in profound intimacy with them both. Let us cherish the doctrine of the Incarnation and allow it to nourish our love for Jesus Christ.
(E.J.Tyler)

Scripture: Isaiah 52:7-10; Psalm 98:1-6; Hebrews 1:1-6; John 1:1-18 or 1:1-5, 9-14

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has

been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not overcome it. The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not know him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the power to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory as of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth. (John 1:1-5, 9-14)

Albert Einstein, one of the greatest scientists in the history of the discipline and himself a Jew, had the highest respect for Jesus of Nazareth. He rejected all talk of the Gospels being anything other than historical and factual. Mahatma Gandhi the great-souled icon of non-violent revolutions and of

the liberty of peoples also had a high regard for Jesus of Nazareth. Neither became Christians. They did not receive what the Christian calls the gift of faith. I once saw a television interview with a leading American scientist of the time and he was asked why he did not become a Christian. He said that it was because he had not received the gift of faith. The Christian religion claims to be divinely revealed, and part of that divine revelation is that faith in Jesus of Nazareth is a gift from God. Though this gift is readily given by God, it is beyond the capacity of fallen human nature to acquire this faith by itself. One reason for this is that fundamental to the Christian religion is the dogma that the man Jesus is God. The great God became man, and that man was and is Jesus. This astounding religious tenet is utterly beyond the mind of man to understand and it goes immeasurably beyond anything his eyes can see. Of himself he will not be able to work out the full reality that is behind what he sees. What is seen in Jesus of Nazareth is a man. When Jesus told the leaders of the people that Abraham rejoiced to see his day, they replied, you are not yet fifty, and you have seen Abraham? Our Lord replied, I say to you most solemnly, even before Abraham came to be, I AM. The man they beheld standing before them, so evidently human in every way, was claiming to be Yahweh God who revealed himself to Abraham, Moses and the Prophets, the One who IS and who had chosen his people and established his great covenant with them. The Creator and Bridegroom of Israel stood before them as a man. Such was the claim of Jesus. This revelation was rejected by many and has been rejected by many ever since. Christ died bearing witness to this truth that he is the redeeming Messiah and above all the Son of the living God.

On Christmas Day we place ourselves in the presence of Jesus, Mary and Joseph in the cave at Bethlehem. Jesus is in the arms of Mary his mother, with Joseph her husband standing by as the holy and humble protector of the holy family. That helpless child in the arms of his mother is the great God. How are we to conceive of this? It would appear to be a contradiction. God is pure, pure, personal Being. There is nothing in him that limits his being. How could we talk of the Divine Being becoming one who was limited as a man is limited? The Church has put it this way. There is one divine Being, God, and this divine Being is three divine Persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Each of these Persons is the one divine Being. This itself, of course, we cannot understand. But then the second divine Person while retaining his divine nature as God, took to himself a human nature and so became man. So while the Father and the Holy Spirit existed in their divine nature as God, the Son now existed not only in his divine nature as God but in his human nature as man. The child in his mother’s arms was a divine Person in two distinct natures, one divine the other human. We have a human nature. Jesus as man shared our human nature, but he, divine person as he is, also possessed his own divine nature. So the mystery of the man Jesus being God is presented in terms of a divine Person taking to himself in time a human nature, while of course not in any way forgoing his divine nature. As man he is fully and perfectly human composed of rational soul and body, while being fully and perfectly God just as the Father is God and the Holy Spirit is God. As man he is like us in all things but sin. He is begotten from the Father before all ages in respect to his divinity, and born of Mary his mother in respect to his humanity. This lowly child is the wonder of the universe, and even more so as he hung upon the cross at Calvary. God had come among us to save us from sin. On Christmas Day we are invited to contemplate with gratitude and praise the Incarnation (John 1:1-5, 9-14).

We have a great deal to celebrate today and it is well that Christmas Day is a day of celebration throughout the world. But the tragedy is that all too often Christ is forgotten amid the celebrations. Let us today bring Christ right back into the heart of the whole of our celebration. Let us make him the reason why we are happy and why we come together as families, as the Church and as a society. Let us also resolve to bring Christ our God and our Saviour into the heart of daily life and into the entire year ahead of us.
(E.J.Tyler)

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Discretion is... refinement of spirit. Do you not feel annoyed, uncomfortable deep down inside, when intimate and everyday details of your family life emerge from the warmth of the home to the indifference or curiosity of the public gaze?

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PARIS, SEPT. 13, 2008 - Conclusion of the 10-minute press conference Benedict XVI gave while en route to France on Friday.

Q: You are going on a pilgrimage to Lourdes. What does it mean for you? Have you been there before?

Benedict XVI: I was in Lourdes on the occasion of the Eucharistic Congress, in 1981, after the assassination attempt on the Holy Father (John Paul II). And Cardinal Gantin was the delegate of the Holy Father. It is a very beautiful memory for me.

The feast of St. Bernadette is also my birthday. Because of this, I feel very close to this small saint, this young, pure, humble woman that spoke with the Virgin Mary.

It is very important for me to experience this reality, this presence of the Virgin Mary in our lifetime, to see the path of this young person who was a friend of the Virgin Mary, and on the other hand to meet the Blessed Virgin, her mother. Naturally we are not going there to see miracles. I am going to find the love of the Mother, which is the true cure for every pain and to be united to those who suffer, in the love of the Blessed Mother. This seems to me an important sign for our times.
(Concluded)

December 26, Saint Stephen, first martyr (d. 36 A.D.?)
All we know of Stephen is found in Acts of the Apostles, chapters six and seven. It is enough to tell us what kind of man he was: At that time, as the number of disciples continued to grow, the Hellenist (Greek-speaking) Christians complained about the Hebrew-speaking Christians, saying that their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution. So the Twelve called together the community of the disciples and said, “It is not right for us to neglect the word of God to serve at table. Brothers, select from among you seven reputable men, filled with the Spirit and wisdom, whom we shall appoint to this task, whereas we shall devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.” The proposal was acceptable to the whole community, so they chose Stephen, a man filled with faith and the Holy Spirit.... (Acts 6:1-5) Acts says that Stephen was a man filled with grace and power, who worked great wonders among the people. Certain Jews, members of the Synagogue of Roman Freedmen, debated with Stephen but proved no match for the wisdom and spirit with which he spoke. They persuaded others to make the charge of blasphemy against him. He was seized and carried before the Sanhedrin. In his speech, Stephen recalled God’s guidance through Israel’s history, as well as Israel’s idolatry and disobedience. He then claimed that his persecutors were showing this same spirit. “You always oppose the holy Spirit; you are just like your ancestors” (Acts 7:51b). His speech brought anger from the crowd. “But [Stephen], filled with the holy Spirit, looked up intently to heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, and he said, ‘Behold, I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God....’ They threw him out of the city, and began to stone him....As they were stoning Stephen, he called out, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit....Lord, do not hold this sin against them’” (Acts 7:55-56, 58a, 59, 60b).
Stephen died as Jesus did: falsely accused, brought to unjust condemnation because he spoke the truth fearlessly. He died with his eyes trustfully fixed on God, and with a prayer of forgiveness on his lips. A “happy” death is one that finds us in the same spirit, whether our dying is as quiet as Joseph’s or as violent as Stephen’s: dying with courage, total trust and forgiving love. (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture: Acts 6:8-10; 7:54-59; Ps 31:3cd-4, 6 and 8ab, 16bc and 17; Matthew 10:17-22

Be on your guard against men; they will hand you over to the local councils and flog you in their synagogues. On my account you will be brought before governors and kings as witnesses to them and to the Gentiles. But when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child; children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. All men will hate you because of me, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. (Matthew 10:17-22)

In our passage today our Lord is addressing the Twelve. He has given them “authority over unclean spirits” and “to cure all kinds of diseases and sickness.” Then he instructs them in their mission in both the immediate and the long term. Our Lord is speaking to the Twelve, in other

words to those who are and who will be at the very forefront of sharing in his mission. Just as he met with great obstacles, obstacles that involved his very death, so too they must expect similar obstacles. To a greater or lesser extent every one of his disciples from generation to generation will share in his lot. The suffering and the opposition will vary enormously both in kind and degree, but it will be there. For this reason our Lord begins, “Be on your guard against men.” The entire activity of the Apostles (and those who follow them) will be one of service, but they must have a lively caution. Jesus Christ, the pearl of our race, one who was sinless, one with whom no other could really be compared, was rejected and condemned. How could the servant expect anything other than what was meted out to the master, at least in some sense? Fallen humanity is the same, and if men opposed Christ himself, how could his disciples who tread his path and share in his work expect a different lot? So, our Lord says, beware of men. They will in one way or another mistreat you and cause you suffering. They could even “hand you over to the local councils and flog you in their synagogues,” as it were. The parallels to this will vary, of course. The incomprehension can at times come even from one’s family. It can come from one’s workplace, one’s friends and acquaintances, from one’s superiors such as work employers and, of course, one’s political party if one is in politics. The Christian who resolves to be a generous follower of Christ, bearing witness to his person and teaching, must expect opposition.

But there is a great hope in the midst of this opposition, be it overt or subtle and hidden. It is that the Spirit of God accompanies the Christian on his way. And so our Lord assures them and us: “But when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you” (Matthew 10:17-22). We have the word of Christ himself for it, that the Holy Spirit will continue abiding in the heart of the Christian assisting him in the work of witnessing in the midst of opposition. A mother is deeply concerned for the religious life of her rebellious teenage son or daughter. She simply does not know what to do and sees the lack of interest in her husband and other children. She seems to have no one to assist her in bearing effective witness to Christ and his Church within the family and with her wayward teenage child. But she does have help. It comes from the Holy Spirit who abides within her. Our Lord assures her that the Holy Spirit will help. Numerous other examples could be given of burdensome situations where the work of witnessing to Jesus and his teaching evokes opposition of one kind or another. A person in the workplace is in the midst of daily ridicule of religion. His discrete and respectful resistance of this makes of him a marked man. He is alone with no one to help. But no. The Holy Spirit abides within him in this very situation. He will enlighten him as to how to bear witness to Jesus and what to say. What all this means is that every member of Christ’s Faithful ought cultivate a strong devotion to the Holy Spirit, a devotion which will lead him to evoke the assistance of the Holy Spirit. It is true that God acts without our asking, nevertheless he wants us to pray to him for all our needs. He answers our prayers. Let us then acquire the habit of asking the Holy Spirit to help us bear effective witness to Jesus in daily life.

There are many excellent prayers to the Holy Spirit. We ought pray that he will come. “Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and enkindle in them the fire of your divine love. Send forth your Spirit, O Lord, and we shall be made new.” Let us hang on to our Lord’s words in today’s Gospel, warning us that in one form or another opposition awaits the genuine Christian. At the same time, he assures us, the Holy Spirit will come to our aid in the work of witnessing to him.
(E.J.Tyler)

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Be slow to reveal the intimate details of your apostolate: don't you see that the world in its selfishness will fail to understand?

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On the occasion of the Pauline Year, Benedict XVI began (on July 2) a new cycle of catecheses dedicated to the figure and thought of St. Paul. The following is his beginning of this cycle.

Paul, as we know, was a Jew, and consequently a member of a distinct cultural minority in the Roman Empire. At the same time, he spoke Greek, the language of the wider Hellenistic culture, and was a Roman citizen. Paul's proclamation of the Risen Christ, while grounded in Judaism, was marked by a universalist vision and it was facilitated by his familiarity with three cultures. He was thus able to draw from the spiritual richness of contemporary philosophy, and Stoicism in particular, in his preaching of the Gospel. The crisis of traditional Greco-Roman religion in Paul's time had also fostered a greater concern for a personal experience of God. As we see from his sermon before the Areopagus in Athens (cf. Acts 17:22ff.), Paul was able to appeal to these currents of thought in his presentation of the Good News. Against this broad cultural background, Paul developed his teaching, which we will explore in the catecheses of this Pauline Year.
(Continuing)

St John the beloved disciple
It is God who calls; human beings answer. The vocation of John and his brother James is stated very simply in the Gospels, along with that of Peter and his brother Andrew: Jesus called them; they followed. The absoluteness of their response is indicated by the account. James and John “were in a boat, with their father Zebedee, mending their nets. He called them, and immediately they left their boat and their father and followed him” (Matthew 4:21b-22). For the three former fishermen—Peter, James and John—that faith was to be rewarded by a special friendship with Jesus. They alone were privileged to be present at the Transfiguration, the raising of the daughter of Jairus and the agony in Gethsemane. But John’s friendship was even more special. Tradition assigns to him the Fourth Gospel, although most modern Scripture scholars think it unlikely that the apostle and the evangelist are the same person. John’s own Gospel refers to him as “the disciple whom Jesus loved” (see John 13:23; 19:26; 20:2), the one who reclined next to Jesus at the Last Supper, and the one to whom he gave the exquisite honour, as he stood beneath the cross, of caring for his mother. “Woman, behold your son....Behold, your mother” (John 19:26b, 27b). Because of the depth of his Gospel, John is usually thought of as the eagle of theology, soaring in high regions that other writers did not enter. But the ever-frank Gospels reveal some very human traits. Jesus gave James and John the nickname, “sons of thunder.” While it is difficult to know exactly what this meant, a clue is given in two incidents. In the first, as Matthew tells it, their mother asked that they might sit in the places of honour in Jesus’ kingdom—one on his right hand, one on his left. When Jesus asked them if they could drink the cup he would drink and be baptized with his baptism of pain, they blithely answered, “We can!” Jesus said that they would indeed share his cup, but that sitting at his right hand was not his to give. It was for those to whom it had been reserved by the Father. The other apostles were indignant at the mistaken ambition of the brothers, and Jesus took the occasion to teach them the true nature of authority: “...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 20:27-28). On another occasion the “sons of thunder” asked Jesus if they should not call down fire from heaven upon the inhospitable Samaritans, who would not welcome Jesus because he was on his way to Jerusalem. But Jesus “turned and rebuked them” (see Luke 9:51-55). On the first Easter, Mary Magdalene “ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them, ‘They have taken the Lord from the tomb, and we don’t know where they put him’” (John 20:2). John recalls, perhaps with a smile, that he and Peter ran side by side, but then “the other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first” (John 20:4b). He did not enter, but waited for Peter and let him go in first. “Then the other disciple also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and he saw and believed” (John 20:8). John was with Peter when the first great miracle after the Resurrection took place—the cure of the man crippled from birth—which led to their spending the night in jail together. The mysterious experience of the Resurrection is perhaps best contained in the words of Acts: “Observing the boldness of Peter and John and perceiving them to be uneducated, ordinary men, they [the questioners] were amazed, and they recognized them as the companions of Jesus” (Acts 4:13).
The evangelist wrote the great Gospel, the letters and the Book of Revelation. His Gospel is a very personal account. He sees the glorious and divine Jesus already in the incidents of his mortal life. At the Last Supper, John’s Jesus speaks as if he were already in heaven. It is the Gospel of Jesus’ glory. It is a long way from being eager to sit on a throne of power or to call down fire from heaven to becoming the man who could write: “The way we came to know love was that he laid down his life for us; so we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers” (1 John 3:16). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Scripture today: 1 John 1:1-4; Psalm 97:1-2, 5-6, 11-12; John 20:1a and 2-8

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came running to Simon Peter and the

other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him! So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. Then Simon Peter, who was behind him, arrived and went into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, as well as the burial cloth that had been around Jesus' head. The cloth was folded up by itself, separate from the linen. Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. (John 20:1a and 2-8)

Today we think of Saint John the Apostle and Evangelist, one of the Twelve and the author of the fourth Gospel and probably the author of the book of Revelation and the Letters that bear his name. Of course, Scriptural scholarship is always advancing and so the theories as to authorship

are always in a state of slight flux. But let us contemplate the figure of John as an example to us of Christian discipleship. Our Gospel passage today presents us with John running ahead of Simon Peter to the tomb. Mary Magdalene had reported to them that the body of Jesus had gone. Neither she nor they remembered that the Lord had told them he would rise from the dead. So they ran, their running manifesting their love for him. John outran Peter, but waited for Peter to arrive and only entered the tomb after Peter. Peter entered and saw the empty tomb with the burial cloths “lying there, as well as the burial cloth that had been around Jesus’ head.” It was folded by itself, separate from the linen. Something about the arrangement of the cloths seems to have been most significant, for it was this which Peter especially noticed. John entered and he too saw. It was then that he believed. Love was driving faith, and faith driving love. John loved our Lord and this love enabled him to grasp the significance of what he saw. This love John had for Jesus was founded on Jesus’ love for him. John is described in his gospel as “the disciple Jesus loved.” This was the foundation of his life. He had come to discover the love of Christ. As St Paul would write later, Christ loved him and gave himself up for him. Our passage today (John 20:1a and 2-8) comes near the end of St John’s gospel. In the beginning of his gospel we read of his entry into his relationship with Jesus. It seems that John had been a disciple of John the Baptist, and when John pointed out Jesus to them he and Andrew left to follow Jesus. Jesus turned and asked them what they were seeking. They said, Master, where do you live? Come and see, our Lord replied. He was inviting them to be his friends and to associate with him in his life and mission.

Just as their running to the tomb was a manifestation of love for Jesus, so John is an example to us of the disciple who ardently loves Jesus and who is filled with an awareness of Jesus’ love for him. This is what is absolutely distinctive of Christianity as a religion. The Christian religion is essentially love for the person of Jesus, whom the Christian believes to be not merely man but God. He knows Jesus has risen from the dead and lives now in glory and in the life of the Church here on earth. John the beloved disciple never faulted in his adherence to Jesus. We see his following of Jesus from the moment John the Baptist pointed him out as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. We see during his public ministry his zeal and love for his Master when the Samaritans would not accept him - he wanted to call down fire from heaven! We see his love at the Last Supper, with his head reclining on Jesus’ breast. He stood at the foot of the cross in the company of Mary his mother and heard the words of our Lord entrusting his mother to him and him to his mother. In today’s gospel passage he runs to the tomb, enters it and sees, then believes that Jesus has risen. In the infant Church Paul describes him as one of the three pillars of the Church, together with Peter and James. He went on to live a very long life, the only one not to shed his blood as a martyr. He wrote his gospel and probably the other parts of the New Testament that bear his name. Through these inspired writings his influence on the Church and the world will be great until the end of time. It all sprang from his discovery of Christ’s love for him. He is the “beloved disciple”, beloved of Christ. It reminds us of what must be the foundation of our lives and of the life of the world. Christ is to be our life, Christ and his love for us. On this basis and on this basis alone shall we bear much fruit, fruit that will last.

John’s arrival at the empty tomb was a new beginning. Jesus was entering into his glory and would soon be back with them in his glory. He wishes to take us to where he has gone and to where he has prepared a place for us. A place awaits us there and we must do all we can to get there, bringing others with us. As he said at the Last Supper, we know the way to where he has gone. That way is him. He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Let us live in him then, and never allow ourselves to be separated from him.
(E.J.Tyler)

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Say nothing! Don't forget that your ideal is like a newly-lit flame. A single breath might suffice to quench it in your heart.

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August 22, 2008, Pope Benedict continues with the second of his Wednesday talks on St Paul

Today's catechesis presents the life of Saint Paul, the great missionary whom the Church honors in a special way this year. Born a Jew in Tarsus, he received the Hebrew name "Saul" and was trained as a "tent maker" (cf. Acts 18:3). Around the age of twelve he departed for Jerusalem to begin instruction in the strict Pharisaic tradition which instilled in him a great zeal for the Mosaic Law. On the basis of this training, Paul viewed the Christian movement as a threat to orthodox Judaism. He thus fiercely "persecuted the Church of God" (1 Corinthians 19:6; Galatians 1:13; Philippians 3:6) until a dramatic encounter on the road to Damascus radically changed his life. He subsequently undertook three missionary journeys, preaching Christ in Anatolia, Syria, Cilicia, Macedonia, Achaia, and throughout the Mediterranean. After his arrest and imprisonment in Jerusalem, Paul exercised his right as a Roman citizen to appeal his case to the Emperor. Though Luke makes no reference to Nero's decision, he tells us that Paul spent two years under house arrest in Rome (cf. Acts 28:30), after which -- according to tradition -- he suffered a martyr's death. Paul spared no energy and endured many trials in his "anxiety for all the Churches" (2 Corinthians 11:28). Indeed, he wrote: "I do everything for the sake of the Gospel" (1 Corinthians 9:23). May we strive to emulate him by doing the same.
(continuing)

Prayers this week: The shepherds hastened to Bethlehem, where they found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. (Luke 2:16)

Father, help us to live as the holy family, untied in respect and love. Bring us to the joy and peace of your eternal home. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

(December 28) the Holy Innocents
    Herod “the Great,” king of Judea, was unpopular with his people because of his connections with the Romans and his religious indifference. Hence he was insecure and fearful of any threat to his throne. He was a master politician and a tyrant capable of extreme brutality. He killed his wife, his brother and his sister’s two husbands, to name only a few. Matthew 2:1-18 tells this story: Herod was “greatly troubled” when astrologers from the east came asking the whereabouts of “the newborn king of the Jews,” whose star they had seen. They were told that the Jewish Scriptures named Bethlehem as the place where the Messiah would be born. Herod cunningly told them to report back to him so that he could also “do him homage.” They found Jesus, offered him their gifts and, warned by an angel, avoided Herod on their way home. Jesus escaped to Egypt. Herod became furious and “ordered the massacre of all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity two years old and under.” The horror of the massacre and the devastation of the mothers and fathers led Matthew to quote Jeremiah: “A voice was heard in Ramah,/sobbing and loud lamentation;/Rachel weeping for her children...” (Matthew 2:18). Rachel was the wife of Jacob/Israel. She is pictured as weeping at the place where the Israelites were herded together by the conquering Assyrians for their march into captivity.
    Twenty babies are few, in comparison to the genocide and abortion of our day. But even if there had been only one, we recognize the greatest treasure God put on the earth—a human person, destined for eternity and graced by Jesus’ death and resurrection.
    "Lord, you give us life even before we understand" (Prayer Over the Gifts, Feast of the Holy Innocents). (AmericanCatholic.org)

Sirach 3:2-6, 12-14 or Gn 15:1-6; 21:1-3; Ps 128:1-5; Col 3:12-21; Luke 2:22-40 or 2:22, 39-40

When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord. When Joseph and Mary had done everything required by the Law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee to their own town of Nazareth. And the child grew and became strong; he was filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him. (Luke 2:22, 39-40)

It is surely agreed by all that one’s own family is the most important reality in one’s life. If in any particular case this is not so, then all would understand that there is something deficient there. People long to have a good family life and where this is so it provides some of the greatest joys in

life. Sadly, all too often this is not so. As the years proceed, tensions and difficulties not only remain but increase and as the children grow up and disperse, perhaps the situation is gradually accepted with regret. Perhaps it is felt that nothing much can be done to redress and remedy the problem. But how they wish it were otherwise! Family life is profoundly rooted in the nature of man and is deeply connected with his earthly happiness. Inasmuch as God is the author of nature, the fact that nature bespeaks the importance of the family shows that he wills that family life be a central contributor to human happiness. Well now, let us notice this. At the dawn of history, God created Adam and then gave to him Eve his wife. That is to say he gave man family life which would be a principal source of his happiness. But what happened? Together the man and his wife turned away from God and thus sin entered the world, and with sin death. Out of the family life which God brought into the world to give to man his happiness came untold suffering flowing from deliberate sin. Ever since then, which is to say from the dawn of human history, family life has remained the source of man’s deepest joys and at the same time the source of man’s greatest sorrows. The spark of the divine imprint has remained in the family but the terrible presence of man’s sin and its results has also remained. So the cry arises from the heart of broken man: If only family life could be made new! If only there could be regained what had come from the hand of God at the beginning! If only something of this could appear on the earth, be manifested, and then shared with mankind! The good news is that this has indeed happened.

God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten Son not to condemn the world for its sin but to save it and to give to it life everlasting. This gift of grace and eternal life is intended by God to make man new and his family life new. The hope of mankind for a profound renewal and for a release from the bondage of sin has been answered in the coming and in the mission of Christ. At the heart of God’s answer to sin is his gift of grace to the family. God the Son in becoming man was born into a family. That family, so humble, so lowly, so hidden, so very ordinary, so immersed in the humdrum of life common to the vast family of man, was filled with grace and free of sin. At its centre was the holy child, the holy youth, the holy young man, Jesus Christ (Luke 2:22, 39-40). He, the fount of divine life and grace, was the heart of this holy family. In him was present God himself, God the Son made man. His mother Mary was, as the Angel had addressed her, full of grace. The Lord was with her without qualification. She was preserved free of sin from the instant of her very conception, and this by the power of grace won for her by her future son. And how holy must have been her spouse, Joseph the foster-father of the Christ-child! We have in that holy family the sparkling jewel of mankind, a great pearl hidden in the field. We must do all we can to gain that pearl, bringing Jesus, Mary and Joseph into our life. Jesus is the Lord of lords and King of kings. Mary is his mother, and Joseph is his foster-father. Both are now with Jesus in heaven. The inspiration of this holy family remains with the Church and all her members till the end of time and is celebrated every year. How the heart of our Lord must have been interwoven with theirs and how his happiness must have been nourished by the life of his holy family! As he hung on the cross, Mary his mother was with him to the end. His own family was a deep support, by then in the main out of sight but certainly not out of mind.

Today is the feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Out of this family came the Redeemer of the world and the gift of the Holy Spirit to mankind. It is the model family, the perfect family. There has been in history a perfect family. That family was the family of Jesus Christ - himself the son, Mary his earthly mother and Joseph her spouse and his foster father. Grace filled the life of that family. The same grace has come to each of the baptized, enabling each to aspire to a family life of holiness involving the conquest of sin. Let us then resolve to contemplate the Holy Family a great deal, to live by the grace that reigned in them, and to make our way gradually to holiness in Christ especially in our family life.
(E.J.Tyler)

Further reading: The Catechism of the Catholic Church, nos. 529, 2214-2233

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The fruitfulness of silence! All the energy I see you waste with those repeated indiscretions is energy taken from the effectiveness of your work.

September 3, 2008, Benedict XVI continues with the third of his Wednesday talks on St Paul

In the Acts of the Apostles, Saint Luke recounts for us the dramatic episode on the road to Damascus which transformed Paul from a fierce persecutor of the Church into a zealous evangelizer. In his own letters, Paul describes his experience not so much in terms of a conversion, but as a call to apostleship and a commission to preach the Gospel. In the first instance, this was an encounter not with concepts or ideas but with the person of Jesus himself. In fact, Paul met not only the historical Jesus of the past, but the living Christ who revealed himself as the one Saviour and Lord. Similarly, the ultimate source of our own conversion lies neither in esoteric philosophical theories nor abstract moral codes, but in Christ and his Gospel. He alone defines our identity as Christians, since in him we discover the ultimate meaning of our lives. Paul, because Christ had made him his own (cf. Phil 3:12), could not help but preach the Good News he had received (cf. 1 Cor 9:16). So it is with us. Transfixed by the greatness of our Saviour, we - like Saint Paul - cannot help but speak of him to others. May we always do so with joyful conviction!
(Continuing)

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The fifth day in the Octave of Christmas

(December 29) St. Thomas Becket (1118-1170)

A strong man who wavered for a moment, but then learned one cannot come to terms with evil and so became a strong churchman, a martyr and a saint—that was Thomas Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, murdered in his cathedral on December 29, 1170. His career had been a stormy one. While archdeacon of Canterbury, he was made chancellor of England at the age of 36 by his friend King Henry II. When Henry felt it advantageous to make his chancellor the archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas gave him fair warning: he might not accept all of Henry’s intrusions into Church affairs. Nevertheless, he was made archbishop (1162), resigned his chancellorship and reformed his whole way of life! Troubles began. Henry insisted upon usurping Church rights. At one time, supposing some conciliatory action possible, Thomas came close to compromise. He momentarily approved the Constitutions of Clarendon, which would have denied the clergy the right of trial by a Church court and prevented them from making direct appeal to Rome. But Thomas rejected the Constitutions, fled to France for safety and remained in exile for seven years. When he returned to England, he suspected it would mean certain death. Because Thomas refused to remit censures he had placed upon bishops favoured by the king, Henry cried out in a rage, “Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest!” Four knights, taking his words as his wish, slew Thomas in the Canterbury cathedral. Thomas Becket remains a hero-saint down to our own times.
No one becomes a saint without struggle, especially with himself. Thomas knew he must stand firm in defence of truth and right, even at the cost of his life. We also must take a stand in the face of pressures—against dishonesty, deceit, destruction of life—at the cost of popularity, convenience, promotion and even greater goods.
In T.S. Eliot's drama, Murder in the Cathedral, Becket faces a final temptation to seek martyrdom for earthly glory and revenge. With real insight into his life situation, Thomas responds: "The last temptation is the greatest treason: To do the right deed for the wrong reason." (AmericanCatholic.org)

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Scripture today:   1 John 2:3-11;   Psalm 96:1-3, 5b-6;   Luke 2:22-35

When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took the child Jesus to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, Every firstborn male is to be consecrated to the Lord), and to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord: a pair of doves or two young pigeons. Now there was a man in Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen the Lord's Christ. Moved by the Spirit, he went into the temple courts. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the custom of the Law required, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying: Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel. The child's father and mother marvelled at what was said about him. Then Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother: This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too. (Luke 2:22-35)

On one occasion during his public ministry our Lord turned to his disciples and said to them, how blessed the eyes that see what you see, for prophets and kings have longed to see what you see and never saw it! He was saying that he himself was the long awaited Object of the Old Testament and its prophecies. We may say that the elderly Simeon who features in our Gospel scene today and who, moved by the Holy Spirit went into the temple courts, was an example of those of the Old Testament our Lord referred to. Consider his holy life. Born many decades before our scene today, he grew up faithful to his calling as a child of Israel. He was profoundly united to Yahweh and he longed for the Messiah, and it had been revealed to him that this longing would be granted. He, then, is in the line of the prophets (such as Deutero-Isaiah and Daniel) pointing to the Messiah. In a real sense he is a forerunner of the Messiah in the way John the Baptist was a forerunner. That is to say, John announced the arrival of the Messiah and pointed him out. Some thirty years before, another minor prophet before him had done the same. That prophet was Simeon and his prophecy ought be situated among the Messianic prophecies. Simeon was led by the Holy Spirit into the temple courts. The Holy Spirit was upon him. He sought out the Child, approached his mother and her husband Joseph, took the Child into his arms and prophesied over him. This Child, he said, addressing God in the presence of Mary and Joseph, is “your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.” He is the salvation which God has prepared for all. He will be the light of the world, Gentiles and Israel alike. He would bring God’s revelation to them and would be the glory of his people. Mary and Joseph separately had been told by the angel that the Child was the Messiah, the Saviour. Simeon was now confirming this.

But Simeon’s prophecy was more explicit still. He reveals the main outlines of the Child’s redeeming course. “This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too” (Luke 2:22-35). The Child will suffer. It is interesting to compare the prophecy of Simeon with that of John thirty years later. John pointed out Jesus as the Messiah and announced that he would baptize with the Holy Spirit and as the Lamb of God would take away the sin of the world. The image of the Lamb may suggest the paschal Lamb but its connection with suffering and ultimately the cross is at the least not explicit. If John had a paschal lamb in mind it may merely have included the thought of a great deliverance, for the paschal Lamb commemorated a great past deliverance. Who knows! But there is little explicit evidence that John had been granted a sense of the overwhelming suffering, rejection and humiliation that would mark the Messiah’s path. Indeed, when our Lord was into his ministry, he received a message from John asking if indeed he was the Messiah. It looks as if John expected a very different path for the Messiah to be taking. But years before this Simeon had predicted the path of suffering and rejection. He told Mary and Joseph that the Child “will be spoken against.” He will be a sign of contradiction. So great will be the suffering and hostility that - prophesying now of Mary herself - “a sword will pierce your own soul too.” That is to say, when the time comes, the sight of her Son’s rejection and suffering will be for her a living death in her spirit. Simeon’s prophecy added to the words of the angel and the inspired words of Elizabeth. Simeon blessed both Mary and Joseph, and undoubtedly his prayer for them fortified their spirit amid the joy and the foreboding which, because of his solemn words, came upon them.

Let us place ourselves in the scene and look forward to the Child’s public ministry, his call of his disciples, the appointment of the Apostles with Peter at their head, his teaching, his witness unto death, his passion and death and resurrection, his ascension and the launch of the Church his body. Let us take our stand with him and hear his call, if anyone wishes to be a follower of mine, let him take up his cross daily and follow after me. The path predicted by Simeon is the path of every one of Christ’s disciples, to a great or lesser extent. Let us then resolve to follow him.
                                                                             (E.J.Tyler)

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If you were more discreet, you would not be troubled by the bad after-taste left by so many of your conversations.

(The Way, no.646)

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September 10, 2008, Benedict XVI continues with the fourth of his Wednesday talks on St Paul

We turn to Saint Paul’s view of what it means to be an apostle of Jesus Christ. Though he did not belong to the group of the Twelve, called by Jesus during his ministry, Paul nevertheless claims the title for himself because he was chosen and transformed by the grace of God, and shared the three principal characteristics of the true apostle. The first is to have seen the Lord (1 Cor 9:1) and to have been called by him. One becomes an apostle by divine vocation, not by personal choice. The second characteristic also underlines the divine initiative: an apostle is someone who is sent and therefore acts and speaks as a delegate of Christ, placed totally at his service. The third characteristic is dedication to the work of proclaiming the Gospel and founding Christian communities. Saint Paul can point to his many trials and sufferings that speak clearly of his courageous dedication to the mission (cf. 2 Cor 11:23-28). In this context he sees an identification between the life of the apostle and the Gospel that he preaches; the apostle himself is despised when the Gospel is rejected. Saint Paul was steadfast in his many difficulties and persecutions, sustained above all by the unfailing love of Christ (cf. Rom 8:35-39). May the example of his apostolic zeal inspire and encourage us today!
(Continuing)

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Sixth Day in the Octave of Christmas

(December 30) St. Egwin (d. 717)
You say you’re not familiar with today’s saint? Chances are you aren’t—unless you’re especially informed about Benedictine bishops who established monasteries in medieval England. Born of royal blood in the 7th century, Egwin entered a monastery and was enthusiastically received by royalty, clergy and the people as the bishop of Worcester, England. As a bishop he was known as a protector of orphans and the widowed and a fair judge. Who could argue with that? His popularity didn’t hold up among members of the clergy, however. They saw him as overly strict, while he felt he was simply trying to correct abuses and impose appropriate disciplines. Bitter resentments arose, and Egwin made his way to Rome to present his case to Pope Constantine. The case against Egwin was examined and annulled. Upon his return to England, he founded Evesham Abbey, which became one of the great Benedictine houses of medieval England. It was dedicated to Mary, who had reportedly made it known to Egwin just where a church should be built in her honour. He died at the abbey on December 30, in the year 717. Following his burial many miracles were attributed to him: The blind could see, the deaf could hear, the sick were healed. (AmericanCatholic.org)

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Scripture today: 1 John 2:12-17; Psalm 96:7-10; Luke 2:36-40

There was also a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was very old; she had lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, and then was a widow until she was eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshipped night and day, fasting and praying. Coming up to them at that very moment, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem. When Joseph and Mary had done everything required by the Law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee to their own town of Nazareth. And the child grew and became strong; he was filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him. (Luke 2:36-40)

Luke’s account of the infancy of Jesus situates him in the midst of some very holy persons whose moral perception, powerfully assisted by the action of the Holy Spirit, enables them to understand the identity and greatness of the Child Jesus. The Child has been brought to the Temple by Mary and Joseph. The elderly Simeon, filled with the Holy Spirit, has come to the couple and taken the Child into his arms and prophesied over him and over his mother. Now there appears a new personage, elderly as was Simeon. Simeon had spoken under the influence of the Holy Spirit and so at that moment had acted as a prophet. But Anna is explicitly referred to by Luke as a prophetess, implying that she had at various times spoken under the influence of the Holy Spirit and was characteristically led by the Spirit of God. She is led by the Spirit to come upon them at this point, the point at which Simeon had just finished speaking of the Child in his arms, and she too recognized in the Child the One who had been promised. She recognized in him the Redeemer, and she gave thanks to God for his arrival, and spoke of him to those who looked forward to the redemption of Israel. Those who heard her testimony were also looking forward to God’s saving action. It implies that there were in fact many holy persons in Israel and the providence of God connected some of them to Christ during the days following his birth. Today we think of Anna. All her long life she had loved and served God. Presumably in her mid-teens she had married and after seven years was left a widow. She was now in her mid-eighties, a very advanced age for the times, and, given over to God, was living constantly in the Temple. Perhaps the parents of Mary had known her well (and Simeon too), and had introduced their holy child to her. Simeon and Anna, Zachary and Elizabeth, each of whom had prophesied of the Child, all exemplify the holiness of the Old Testament at its best.

Yes indeed, we have in Anna a wonderful exemplification of the Old Testament, the dispensation prior to and preparing for that which would come in Christ. In Anna we have a truly holy person, possessed of and led by the Spirit of God. As a beautiful embodiment of the Old Testament, she was led by the Spirit of God to the Child Jesus and exulted in his presence. Her bearing witness to him before others who longed for the redemption of Israel illustrates the purpose of the Old Testament. It points to Jesus and Jesus is its fulfilment. Another would do the same. I refer to John the Baptist. While Simeon and Anna bore witness to Jesus, John had done so even before his birth. At Mary’s arrival, Luke tells us that John leapt within the womb of Elizabeth his mother, and she herself in the Spirit then spoke of Mary and her Child. Thirty years later, the same John, the last and greatest of the prophets, spoke of Jesus. We could say that he, his own parents and Simeon and Ann, all of whom spoke of Jesus, together made up a magnificent embodiment of the Old Testament and as such pointed to Jesus. But let us who have been baptized into Christ remember a further point. Our Lord said that no one born of woman had been greater than John the Baptist but that the least in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he. That is to say, great as was what God had done in the Old Testament prior to the coming of Jesus, much greater still was what he would do in Jesus. Great as were the gifts bestowed on the children of Israel, greater still are those bestowed on those who are in Christ. The Child in whom Anna exulted and about whom she spoke to those awaiting God’s salvation was the bearer of tremendous blessings for those to come. We are the beneficiaries of those blessings. The great blessing is the gift of the Holy Spirit. Blessed are the eyes that see what you see, our Lord told his disciples. We are blessed because we have the greatest of blessings, the knowledge and love of Jesus Christ. In him, as St Paul writes, is found every heavenly blessing. This is what Anna bore witness to in our Gospel scene today. (Luke 2:36-40)

As we think of Anna coming upon the Child Jesus and rejoicing in the wonder of him, let us share in that rejoicing. Let us ask God for a deep sense of the grandeur and unique treasure that is the person of Jesus. He came to give us life, life in abundance, as he said on one occasion. That life is none other than himself. Union with him gives a share in that life. It is God’s life, eternal life, and it is just what the world is hungering for. Christ is the answer to the need of man, and our Gospel scene today reminds us of this.
(E.J.Tyler)

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Don't seek to be 'understood'. That lack of understanding is providential: so that your sacrifice may pass unnoticed.

(The Way, no.647)

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September 24, 2008, Benedict XVI continues with the fifth of his Wednesday talks on St Paul

We turn again to the life of Saint Paul and consider his relationship with the Twelve Apostles. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul speaks of his visits to Jerusalem where he consulted Peter, James and John, reputed to be the "pillars" of the Church. Paul's mission to the Gentiles needed to be confirmed and guaranteed by those who had been disciples of Jesus during his earthly life, and they offered to him and to Barnabas the right hand of fellowship. Paul passed on the living tradition that he had received: the words of Jesus at the Last Supper, his death and resurrection, and his appearances to Peter and to the Twelve. Paul emphasizes that Jesus died "for our sins", he offered himself to the Father in order to deliver us from sin and death. And now that Jesus has risen from the dead, he is living in his Church and in the Eucharist, where we continue to encounter him. Just as Paul's teaching is rooted in his experience on the road to Damascus, and in his knowledge of Christ acquired through the Church, so too our faith is grounded, not on myths or pious legends, but on the words and deeds of Jesus of Nazareth, and on our encounter with the risen Lord, present in the life of his Church.
(Continuing)

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Seventh Day in the Octave of Christmas

(December 31)   St. Sylvester I (d. 335)
    When you think of this pope, you think of the Edict of Milan, the emergence of the Church from the catacombs, the building of the great basilicas, Saint John Lateran, Saint Peter’s and others, the Council of Nicaea and other critical events. But for the most part, these events were planned or brought about by Emperor Constantine. A great store of legends has grown up around the man who was pope at this most important time, but very little can be established historically. We know for sure that his papacy lasted from 314 until his death in 335. Reading between the lines of history, we are assured that only a very strong and wise man could have preserved the essential independence of the Church in the face of the overpowering figure of the Emperor Constantine. The bishops in general remained loyal to the Holy See and at times expressed apologies to Sylvester for undertaking important ecclesiastical projects at the urging of Constantine.
    It takes deep humility and courage in the face of criticism for a leader to stand aside and let events take their course, when asserting one’s authority would only lead to useless tension and strife. Sylvester teaches a valuable lesson for Church leaders, politicians, parents and others in authority.
    To emphasize the continuity of Holy Orders, the recent Roman breviary in its biographies of popes ends with important statistics. On the feast of Saint Sylvester it recounts: "He presided at seven December ordinations at which he created 42 priests, 25 deacons and 65 bishops for various sees." The Holy Father is indeed the heart of the Church's sacramental system, an essential element of its unity. (AmericanCatholic.org)

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Scripture today:   1 John 2: 18-21;    Psalm 96:1-2, 11-13;    John 1:1-18

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognise him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the power to become children of God — children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. John testifies concerning him. He cries out, saying, This was he of whom I said, 'He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.' From the fulness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No-one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known. (John 1:1-18)

In a way altogether distinct from the other three Gospels, St John begins his account of the life and teaching of Jesus Christ with a grand prologue. He situates the person of Jesus within the Trinity at the beginning. The “beginning” is wherever the reader cares to take as the beginning. Perhaps John had in mind the “beginning” as in the Book of Genesis. In the Book of Genesis both at the point of creation and prior to it, there was God. God was already there. The creation of the world is explained but there is no attempt to account for the presence of the Creator. He the Creator was simply there. That is all that can be said: at whatever point the reader of the inspired text wishes to begin, God was there. So, God was, God is, and God ever will be. St Paul writes in one of his Letters that before the world began, God chose us in Christ to be full of love in his sight. Again, God is simply a given. He was and ever is. A similar perspective is adopted at the beginning of John’s Gospel and yet now there is an altogether new revelation expanding the old. Another was with God in the beginning. He was with God in the beginning. He was the Word of God. He was with God, and at the same time he was God. As is well known, in English translation there is not preserved the subtlety of the Greek sentence that makes these solemn assertions. In Greek, “theos” means God, and John writes that the Word was with “ton Theon” - the accusative of “ho Theos” - which contains the definite article. We might translate it as “the” God, meaning “the one only God”. So the Word was with the one only God. At the same time the Word was “Theos” (without the article), indicating that the Word was God - divine. So there is the one only God but a distinction of persons. The Word was God but not the Person of “ho Theos”, the Father. Christ is identified as the Word of God, as with God from all eternity, and as himself God. As the Gospel will reveal, God is one being, but three persons: the Father, his Son the Word, and the Spirit of them both.

The grand scene unfolds (John 1:1-18). It is through his divine Word - the divine Expression or Image of God - that God creates everything. Through his Word everything came to be and in him was life, and that life was the light of men. An amazing thing was about to occur. The Word of God in whom was life and light was coming into the world. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. St John is stating this as sober fact, a fact that was seen, observed, heard and touched. We saw his glory, he writes, the glory of the only begotten Son of the Father, full of grace and truth. No other event in the story of the world can compare with it. The Creator of the universe became man and dwelt among men. He lived in a certain place, spoke a certain language, lived a certain life in a certain way. God walked the earth as a real man. He came among us for a definite purpose. It was to save the entire world from sin by taking on himself the sin of the world and expiating for it himself. He did this for you and for me, for every single man and woman who has ever lived and who will live. As St Paul writes, Christ loved me and gave himself up for me. He was the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. But, mystery of mysteries, he came among his own and many of his own would not accept him. He bore witness to his person and his mission and many did not accept him and this witness and rejection involved his sacrificial death. He willingly and obediently embraced this rejection as being the divine plan, but to those who did accept him in faith he gave the power to be God’s children, sharing the divine life. He, Jesus Christ, is the gift of God to the world. In him is to be found every heavenly blessing, the fulness of the Godhead, all grace and all truth. Salvation is found in him and in him alone. He is the only way to the Father. He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. The Church points and directs the world to him as the Saviour of the world. As Peter said before the Sanhedrin in the Acts of the Apostles, there is no other name by which men may be saved. If anyone reaches heaven, whatever be his religion or belief, it has only been through the person and work of Jesus Christ.

The prologue of St John’s Gospel presents us with the mystery of the one and only God who is Father and Son, and as the rest of the Gospel will show, the Holy Spirit also. The Word became flesh by the power of the Holy Spirit and it is by the power of the Holy Spirit that we are made adopted children of God. It is by the grace of the Holy Spirit too that we are able to believe in the name of Jesus. May I recommend an excellent prayer and gesture we could daily repeat. It is the sign of the cross: In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
(E.J.Tyler)

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If you keep a check on your tongue, you will work more effectively in your apostolic undertakings — so many people let their 'strength' slip through their mouths! — and you will avoid many dangers of vainglory.

(The Way, no.648)

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October 1, 2008, Benedict XVI continues with the sixth of his Wednesday talks on St Paul

We now consider two events which illustrate Paul’s relationship to the Twelve, which combined respect for their authority with frankness in the service of the Gospel. At the Council of Jerusalem Paul defended before the Twelve his conviction that the grace of Christ had freed the Gentiles from the obligations of the Mosaic Law. Significantly, the Church’s decision in this matter of faith was accompanied by a gesture of concrete concern for the needs of the poor (cf. Gal 2:10). By endorsing Paul’s collections among the Gentiles, the Council thus set its teaching on Christian freedom within the context of the Church’s communion in charity. Later, in Antioch, when Peter, to avoid scandalizing Jewish Christians, abstained from eating with the Gentiles, Paul rebuked him for compromising the freedom brought by Christ (cf. Gal 2:11-14). Yet, writing to the Romans years later, Paul himself insisted that our freedom in Christ must not become a source of scandal for others (cf. Rom 14:21). Paul’s example shows us that, led by the Spirit and within the communion of the Church, Christians are called to live in a freedom which finds its highest expression in service to others.
(Continuing)

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