frmartinshomiliesandreflections

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

11th February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 7:1-13): ‘You make God’s word null and void’.

Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 7:1-13 You get round the commandment of God to preserve your own tradition.

The Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered round Jesus, and they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with unclean hands, that is, without washing them. For the Pharisees, and the Jews in general, follow the tradition of the elders and never eat without washing their arms as far as the elbow; and on returning from the market place they never eat without first sprinkling themselves. There are also many other observances which have been handed down to them concerning the washing of cups and pots and bronze dishes. So these Pharisees and scribes asked him, ‘Why do your disciples not respect the tradition of the elders but eat their food with unclean hands?’ He answered, ‘It was of you hypocrites that Isaiah so rightly prophesied in this passage of scripture:

This people honours me only with lip-service, while their hearts are far from me. The worship they offer me is worthless, the doctrines they teach are only human regulations.

You put aside the commandment of God to cling to human traditions.’ And he said to them, ‘How ingeniously you get round the commandment of God in order to preserve your own tradition! For Moses said: Do your duty to your father and your mother, and, Anyone who curses father or mother must be put to death. But you say, “If a man says to his father or mother: Anything I have that I might have used to help you is Corban (that is, dedicated to God), then he is forbidden from that moment to do anything for his father or mother.” In this way you make God’s word null and void for the sake of your tradition which you have handed down. And you do many other things like this.’

Gospel (GB) Mark 7:1-13 ‘You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.’

At that time: When the Pharisees gathered to Jesus, with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands properly, holding to the tradition of the elders, and when they come from the market-place, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels and dining couches. And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, ‘Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?’ And he said to them, ‘Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, “This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.” You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.’ And he said to them, ‘You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition! For Moses said, “Honour your father and your mother”; and, “Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.” But you say, “If a man tells his father or his mother, ‘Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban’ ” (that is, given to God) — then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And many such things you do.’

Gospel (USA) Mark 7:1-13 You disregard God’s commandment but cling to human tradition.

When the Pharisees with some scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus, they observed that some of his disciples ate their meals with unclean, that is, unwashed, hands. (For the Pharisees and, in fact, all Jews, do not eat without carefully washing their hands, keeping the tradition of the elders. And on coming from the marketplace they do not eat without purifying themselves. And there are many other things that they have traditionally observed, the purification of cups and jugs and kettles and beds.) So the Pharisees and scribes questioned him, “Why do your disciples not follow the tradition of the elders but instead eat a meal with unclean hands?” He responded, “Well did Isaiah prophesy about you hypocrites, as it is written:

This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines human precepts.

You disregard God’s commandment but cling to human tradition.” He went on to say, “How well you have set aside the commandment of God in order to uphold your tradition! For Moses said, Honor your father and your mother, and Whoever curses father or mother shall die. Yet you say, ‘If someone says to father or mother, “Any support you might have had from me is qorban”’ (meaning, dedicated to God), you allow him to do nothing more for his father or mother. You nullify the word of God in favor of your tradition that you have handed on. And you do many such things.”

Reflections (10)

(i) Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

We sometimes use the phrase ‘the dead weight of tradition’. This is when tradition is experienced as a burden that holds us back from forging new paths. However, tradition need not always be a dead weight. There are elements of any tradition which can be liberating and life giving. For us as Christians, it is a matter of discerning which elements of our religious tradition are worth drawing on and returning to and which elements we need to shed and move on from. In today’s gospel reading, the Pharisees and scribes want to know from Jesus why his disciples are not following what they call ‘the tradition of the elders’, when it comes to the usual ritual washings prior to eating. In his response to their criticism, Jesus does not reject the value of his own Jewish tradition. Indeed, he quotes from that tradition, from the prophet Isaiah who declared that human regulations do not always correspond to God’s will for his people, ‘the doctrines they teach are only human regulations’. Jesus quoted from the tradition to critique the elements of the tradition that the Pharisees and scribes were emphasizing. Jesus was saying that all the legal traditions that have grown up over the centuries have to be interpreted in the light of the more important tradition found in the writings of the prophets, in the word of God. That remains the task of the church, of all of us, today. The Scriptures, especially for us Christians the books of the New Testament, are the most authoritative expression of the church’s tradition and all other traditions have to be judged in their light. We have to keep returning to the word of God to get the true measure of all later church traditions. We have to keep asking, ‘Is this church, family or personal tradition serving God’s purpose for our world as revealed in his word, especially the word of Jesus in the gospels?’

And/Or

(ii) Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel the disciples of Jesus are criticized for not respecting the tradition of the elders. Jesus defends his disciples by declaring that what is more important than human religious tradition is the commandment of God or the word of God. Jesus seems to be saying that God can never be fully contained within any religious tradition no matter how revered. We need religious traditions to help us to give expression to our relationship with God, our faith. However, there comes at time when traditional ways of expressing are faith are in need of reform or renewal. Within the Roman Catholic Church the second Vatican Council was a moment when the church looked critically at its various religious traditions with a view to discerning which of them gave expression to God’s word, God’s commandment, and which did not. Just as in the gospel reading, Jesus declares that God cannot be contained within human traditions, so in the first reading King Solomon who was responsible for the building of the first Temple in Jerusalem recognizes that God cannot be contained within the Temple, ‘Why the heavens and their own heavens cannot contain you. How much less this house that I have built!’ Both readings remind us that God is always greater than anything the human religious spirit can create. God is always beyond us and we are always seekers in God’s regard. As Christians we believe that Jesus has revealed the face of God in a unique way and that the God whom we are seeking has sought us out in the person of Jesus, his Son.

And/Or

(iii) Tuesday, Fifth week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel reading, Jesus confronts the Pharisees because their various traditions, about which they are so zealous, are not always in harmony with the word of God. As Jesus says to them, ‘You make God’s word null and void for the sake of your tradition which you have handed down’. The words of Jesus remind us that not every religious tradition is worth holding on to. Every tradition has to be measured against the word of God. We have to keep asking if this or that tradition is really in keeping with God’s will for our lives as revealed in the Scriptures. That is why it is so important for us to keep listening to the word of God. Pope Francis is very keen that, in particular, we listen to the gospels on a regular basis. More than once he has encouraged people to keep a small copy of the gospels in their pocket and to read from it every day. It is above all in the gospels that we encounter the Word who was with God in the beginning and who became flesh and dwelt among us. Jesus not only speaks God’s word but he is God’s word in human flesh. In listening to God’s word, present in Jesus, we are helped to assess the value of our traditions, including our religious traditions.

And/Or

(iv) Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel reading Jesus makes a distinction between the commandment of God, the word of God, and human tradition. He accuses the Pharisees of giving more importance to their religious traditions than to the word of God. We all have traditions of one kind or another; we have traditional ways of doing things. The church too has its traditional ways of doing things. Today’s gospel reminds us that the word of God must take priority over all human traditions, including religious traditions. The purpose of tradition should be to give expression to the word of God, to allow that word to take root in our own particular age and culture. It can happen that traditions that once served that purpose in the past may cease to do so in the present. When that happens we have to allow the word of God to purify the traditions that have ceased to serve that word. We have to keep returning to the word of God, which is in fact the church’s most ancient and authoritative tradition. The word of God remains alive and active throughout time; it works to peel away what is no longer serving the Lord in our own personal lives and in the life of our communities and institutions.

And/Or

(v) Tuesday of Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading, Jesus criticizes the religious experts of the time for giving more importance to their own religious tradition that to the word of God. He says, ‘you put aside the commandment of God to cling to human tradition’. He is saying that they are not getting their priorities right. We always need to allow our religious traditions that have grown over the centuries to be critiqued by the word of God. The word of God is itself part of the church’s tradition, because it emerged from within the early church, but it is a privileged part of the church’s tradition. We give more importance to the word of God within the church’s tradition than to any other element of the church’s tradition. The word of God is at the source of the church’s tradition; it is the earliest and most privileged part of that tradition. We need to keep on returning to the source, to the word of God as it has come down to us in the Scriptures, especially in the New Testament. In returning to the source we are helped to keep all of our other religious traditions in their proper perspective.

And/Or

(vi) Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading, Jesus accuses the religious leaders of putting aside the commandments of God, the word of God, so as to cling to human traditions. Jesus recognized that the religious traditions of his time did not always correspond to God’s will as revealed in the Scriptures, and as revealed in a much fuller way now by Jesus himself. The church always has to be on the alert to ensure that its own traditions conform to God’s word to us, especially as spoken by Jesus. Every so often the church has to renew itself, with the help of the Holy Spirit, to purify its traditions so that they correspond more closely to the true spirit of the gospel. We can understand the second Vatican council as a significant attempt to do just that. In our own personal lives too we can get into traditional ways of doing things that are not in keeping with the core of God’s message to us in and through the Scriptures. Our own personal tradition, whether it is our religious tradition, or our tradition in the broader sense, is always in need of reform in the light of the gospel. We need to keep on hearing the word of the Lord afresh, and to invoke the Holy Spirit to help us to do so.

And/Or

(vii) Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

There are times in our lives as individuals and in the lives of our communities that we need to recover what is truly important. We can all lose sight of what really matters and give ourselves over to what is of much lesser value. This is true in the area of our faith as well as in every other area of life. In the gospel reading, Jesus accuses the religious leaders of his day of giving more importance to various human religious traditions than to the word of God. ‘You make God’s word null and void for the sake of your tradition which you have handed down’. By ‘God’s word’ Jesus meant what we would call today the Jewish Scriptures or the Old Testament. For us Christians, God’s word also includes the gospels, the letters of Paul and the other documents that make up the New Testament. As Christians, we too are prone to making God’s word null and void for the sake of our tradition. We can give greater importance to traditions that have emerged in the history of the church and have been handed down than to the word of God in the Scriptures. As people of faith, we can get very worked up about various church traditions, giving them an authority that they do not deserve. This was the failing of the Pharisees and scribes in today’s gospel reading. We all need to keep returning to the word of God, because it is the light generated by that word which allows us to see everything else, including our religious traditions, in proper perspective.

And/Or

(viii) Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

The expression, ‘the tradition of the elders’, is found twice in today’s gospel reading. The Pharisees speak to Jesus in critical terms about his disciples because they show disrespect for this tradition of the elders by failing to follow the Jewish law relating to washing hands before eating. Saint Paul refers to this tradition of the elders in one of his letters. He writes to the Galatians, ‘I advanced in Judaism beyond many among my people of the same age, for I was far more zealous for the traditions of my fathers’. For Jesus, however, there was something more important than religious tradition, no matter how ancient or hallowed, and that was God’s word. He accuses his critics of giving more importance to human traditions than to God’s word. He was asking them to reflect on what is really important and what is less important. When it comes to our faith, we need to keep discerning what is important and what is less so. Within the church, human traditions, human regulations, can acquire a significance that they don’t really have. Jesus suggests in the gospel reading that we need to keep holding up our traditions to the light of God’s word, especially the light of Jesus as found in the gospels and in the other documents of the New Testament. Attentive listening to the word of Jesus, the word of the Lord, helps us to keep everything else in its proper place, including long standing religious traditions.

And/Or

(ix) Tuesday of Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading Jesus places the commandment of God, the word of God, above what the Pharisees call the tradition of the elders, the various oral and written traditions that had developed over the centuries in an effort to apply the commandment of God, the word of God, to daily life. This body of tradition was a genuine effort to bring the word of God in Scripture to bear on the concrete details of people’s lives, such as how and what to eat, which is the issue in today’s gospel reading. There is always a danger that such religious traditions can assume an authority equivalent to or even greater than the authority of God’s word. Jesus is calling on the guardians of this tradition to return to the source of the tradition, the word of God. Every religion has to keep returning to its sources so as to ensure that the traditions that have grown up over the centuries do not become more important than those sources. For the church, the sources are the Scriptures, especially the New Testament, and the early tradition that emerged through reflecting upon and living out our faith in Jesus. The work of the second Vatican Council was a movement of returning to the sources. In the first reading, Solomon recognizes that the Temple he is building cannot contain the God whom the heavens cannot even contain. Similarly, the Lord can never be contained by the church’s traditions. Those traditions need to be constantly purified by exposure to the word of God, especially as found in the New Testament. As a community of faith, but also as individual believers, we need to keep returning to the source, to the well, the living and active word of the Lord.

And/Or

(x) Tuesday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

The beginning of today’s gospel reading has a contemporary feel to it. The Pharisees and scribes were complaining that Jesus’ disciples were eating with unclean hands, without washing them. We have all got used to washing our hands frequently since the onset of the pandemic. The hand washing that so preoccupied the Pharisees and scribes had to do not so much with physical cleanliness but ritual cleanliness, which is more difficult for us to understand today. The Bible prescribed hand washing rituals only for the priests who worked in the Temple in Jerusalem, but the Pharisees wanted to extend these hand washing rituals to daily life because they held that all Israel was a priestly people. These regulations of the Pharisees for daily life were not in the Bible but were part of what they called the ‘tradition of the elders’. In reply, Jesus criticizes the Pharisees for giving more importance to these human traditions than to the commandment of God. Jesus is reminding us that we can be overly preoccupied with non-essentials, in religious matters as much as in other areas of life. In the religious sphere, we can easily attribute the great importance to something that in God’s eyes is not so important, while failing to take seriously what really does matter to God. The life, death and resurrection of Jesus reveals what matters most to God, a way of life that reflects the love that is within the heart of God.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

10th February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 6:53-56): ‘All those who touched him were cured’.

Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 6:53-56 All those who touched him were cured.

Having made the crossing, Jesus and his disciples came to land at Gennesaret and tied up. No sooner had they stepped out of the boat than people recognised him, and started hurrying all through the countryside and brought the sick on stretchers to wherever they heard he was. And wherever he went, to village, or town, or farm, they laid down the sick in the open spaces, begging him to let them touch even the fringe of his cloak. And all those who touched him were cured.

Gospel (GB) Mark 6:53-56 ‘As many as touched it were made well.’

At that time: When they had crossed over, Jesus and his disciples came to land at Gennesaret and moored to the shore. And when they got out of the boat, the people immediately recognised him and ran about the whole region and began to bring the sick people on their beds to wherever they heard he was. And wherever he came, in villages, cities, or countryside, they laid the sick in the market-places and implored him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment. And as many as touched it were made well.

Gospel (USA) Mark 6:53-56 As many as touched it were healed.

After making the crossing to the other side of the sea, Jesus and his disciples came to land at Gennesaret and tied up there. As they were leaving the boat, people immediately recognized him. They scurried about the surrounding country and began to bring in the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was. Whatever villages or towns or countryside he entered, they laid the sick in the marketplaces and begged him that they might touch only the tassel on his cloak; and as many as touched it were healed.

Reflections (9)

(i) Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

We have a wonderful image in today’s gospel reading of people ‘hurrying’ to Jesus all through the countryside, bringing their sick on stretchers to him. He had no sooner stepped out of the boat with his disciples, having sailed through a storm on the Sea of Galilee, than people started hurrying towards him. We all have a sense today that people are much more in a hurry than they used to be. If you drive a car, you can see it especially on the roads. Where are we all hurrying to? Today’s gospel reading invites us to ask ourselves if we are hurrying to Jesus. Are we seeking him out with something of the energy and desire of the people in today’s gospel reading? Are we hurrying towards him with the same sense of urgency that those people showed? The Lord is always inviting us to come to him, to seek him out. He certainly comes to us, he seeks us out. He comes to us wherever we happen to find ourselves. The gospel reading speaks of Jesus going to village, town and farm. He met people where they were. The risen Lord continues to meet us where we are today, even if we are not in a good place, for whatever reason. He seeks us out with a sense of urgency. He waits for us to seek him out with the same urgency, like the people in the gospel reading. One of the ways we do that is by turning to him in prayer, whether it is the prayer of the Eucharist or other forms of communal prayer or our own personal prayer. At such moments of prayer, we touch the Lord, like the people in the gospel reading, and we open ourselves to his healing and life-giving presence.

And/Or

(ii) Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s gospel reading brings home to us the extent to which Jesus drew people to himself, especially those who were sick and broken. We are told that ‘people started hurrying all through the countryside’ and that they ‘brought the sick on stretchers to wherever they heard he was’. It was above all those in need of healing who reached out towards Jesus and sought to touch even the fringe of his cloak. They reached out to him because they recognized him as the source of life and healing. We ourselves very often reach out towards the Lord with greatest energy in those times when we experience our own need of healing, whether it is physical or emotional or spiritual healing. The struggles of life, the brokenness and suffering we experience in the course of our lives, can make us more aware of our need of the Lord and more open to his presence. It is often the cracks in our lives that allow the Lord’s light to enter and shine on us. It can sometimes be through our experience of the cross that we in grow in our relationship with the risen Lord. The darker times of our lives can leave us more spiritually aware by bringing home to us our need of the Lord. It is in such moments that we truly make our own that prayer which forms part of a well-know hymn ‘Help of the helpless, o abide with me’.

And/Or

(iii) Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel we are told that Jesus is surrounded by the sick everywhere he goes, whether it was village, town or farm. According to the gospels, the sick were one of the groups that were most open to Jesus. They flocked to him in large numbers. Those who were broken in body, mind or spirit wanted to draw upon God’s power that was at work in and through him. The path to the Lord today for many people is often through their brokenness. When we are desperate, for whatever reason, we tend to approach the Lord with the greatest earnestness and passion. It is in our brokenness that we recognize our poverty and our need of the one who came as strength in our weakness, life in our death, light in our darkness. In the gospel reading the sick wanted to touch the fringe of the Lord’s cloak; they wanted not only a personal contact with Jesus. For us today, it is above all in the Eucharist that we touch the Lord and the Lord touches us. It is there above all that we bring our brokenness before him for his healing touch.

And/Or

(iv) Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

The gospel reading today conveys a sense of the great popularity of Jesus among the ordinary people of Galilee. In particular, it was the sick and broken that he attracted, because God’s healing power was at work through him. People begged him to let him touch even the fringe of his cloak, as the woman had done who was healed of her flow of blood. It was above all the broken and needy who were desperate to get to him and to connect with him. In our own lives too, it is often in our brokenness that we seek out the Lord with the greatest urgency. Something happens to us that brings home to us our vulnerability, our weakness, our inability to manage. It is often in those situations when we come face to face with our limitations that we seek out the Lord with an energy and an urgency we don’t normally have. It is those moments when we experience life as a real struggle that bring home to us our need of the Lord and our dependence on him. It is often the darker and more painful experiences of life that open us up to the Lord. Saint Paul bears witness to that. When he was struggling with his ‘thorn in the flesh’, he said that he pleaded with the Lord three times to be rid of it, and he heard the Lord say to him, ‘My power is made perfect in weakness’. The Lord can come powerfully to us in our weakness if, like the people in this morning’s gospel reading, we hurry towards him.

And/Or

(v) Monday, Fifth week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s short gospel reading gives us a picture of the ordinary people of Galilee hurrying to Jesus, once they recognized him, with many of them bringing with them the sick on stretchers. They asked Jesus that the sick be allowed just to touch the fringe of his cloak. They believed that would be enough for them to be healed. The people’s determination to get to where Jesus was and their total trust in his healing presence is very striking. It generated tremendous energy in them. We all need to have something of that energy for the Lord for ourselves. Just as the crowds hurried to Jesus with a very clear focus on him, we too need something of their determination and focus when it comes to the Lord. We can all become a little lukewarm and indifferent in regard to our faith. Every so often we need to ask the Lord, in the words of Saint Paul, to fan into a living flame the gift that we have received, the gift of our relationship with the Lord that was given to us at our baptism.

And/Or

(vi) Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s gospel reading gives us a very vivid picture of people hurrying towards Jesus and his disciples in large numbers. We are told that people hurried through the countryside to get to him. It is striking that according to the gospel reading the people did not hurry to him alone. Rather, they brought the sick on stretchers to wherever he was and laid them down in open spaces. The sick having been brought to Jesus by their healthy neighbours and friends then begged Jesus to allow them to touch even the fringe of his cloak. That image of the healthy, those healthy enough to enough run, bringing the sick to Jesus, can speak powerfully to us today. There are times when we can do something for others that they cannot do for themselves. In many homes in our parishes, that is happening every day, as a healthier spouse looks after a more infirmed one, or a son or daughter looks after a frail or housebound parent, or parents care for a son or daughter who, even though younger, is not as healthy as the parent. Then there are neighbours who visit the housebound and the sick in their neighbourhood. There are parishioners who bring Holy Communion to the sick and housebound. In all of these ways today’s gospel reading is being re-enacted. The people in the gospel reading brought the sick to Jesus. We can bring Jesus to the sick by sharing the Lord with them in all sorts of simple, practical ways that are nonetheless truly life-giving for them, in the way that Jesus in the gospel reading was a life-giving presence for those who came to him or were brought to him.

And/Or

(vii) Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s first reading consists of the opening nineteen verses of the Bible. It is a poetic expression of the people of Israel’s understanding of God as Creator of the universe. There are a number of little refrains in that very poetic text. One of the refrains that has always struck me is ‘and God saw that it was good’. There is a conviction coming through in the author of this text that the created world is essentially good. In some way, all of created reality reflects the goodness of God. In these times when we can be so aware of and so preoccupied with evil, it is good to be reminded of that truth. When it comes to God’s creation of the human person on the sixth day, the author declares not only ‘it was good’ but ‘it was very good’. The human person has the potential to be a much fuller revelation of God’s goodness than anything else in all creation. Jesus was the fullest revelation of God’s goodness. In today’s gospel reading, Mark portrays great human goodness. It is said that in the countryside people brought the sick on stretchers to wherever they heard Jesus was present and that in the villages, towns and farms they laid down the sick in the open spaces, so that the sick could touch even the fringe of Jesus’ clock. The sick, who could not come to Jesus by themselves, were carried and brought to Jesus by the healthy. There is an image here of the goodness in human nature, with the strong looking out for the weak and the healthy for the sick. We are all capable of great good and with the help of the Holy Spirit we can live as that unique image of God’s goodness that we were created to be.

And/Or

(viii) Monday, Fifth week in Ordinary Time

Pilgrimage has always been part of our life of faith. People go on pilgrimage to places that are considered blest in some way because of their relationship to the Lord or to Our Lady or to one of the saints of the church. The primary place of pilgrimage for the people of Israel was Jerusalem and, in particular, the Temple in Jerusalem. Today’s first reading explains why the Temple was such an important place of pilgrimage. It was there that the Ark of the Covenant was placed, containing the two stone tablets of the covenant God make with Israel through Moses, the stone tablets on which were written the Ten Commandments. As a result, the Temple was understood to be the place where the Lord had chosen to dwell in a special way. People went on pilgrimage to the Temple in Jerusalem because they believed they were going on pilgrimage to the Lord. In the gospel reading, we find people going on pilgrimage to Jesus. When Jesus stepped out of the boat by the shore of the Sea of Galilee, they journeyed towards him from wherever they lived so as to touch him and be healed of their infirmities. We are all on a pilgrimage towards the Lord. Our lives is a pilgrimage towards the heavenly city of Jerusalem which is filled with the Lord’s presence. In the course of our earthly pilgrimage, we make smaller pilgrimages which express the essence of our earthly pilgrimage. We might go on pilgrimage to Rome, to Assisi, to Lourdes, to Knock or even to the Holy Land. In a sense, every time we come to Mass we are going on a little pilgrimage. Like the people in the gospel reading, we are journeying towards the Lord. These smaller pilgrimages help to keep us focused on the Lord as we travel our earthly pilgrimage towards the heavenly Jerusalem.

And/Or

(ix) Monday, Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

It is striking to me that the first book of the Bible, the beginning of the Bible, begins with the words, ‘In the beginning’. Today’s first reading gives us the opening nineteen verses of the Bible. It is a statement of faith, in highly elevated prose, almost poetry. It is not a scientific statement but a religious one. In these verses the people of Israel express their conviction that the created world in all its complexity and diversity is fundamentally good because it came from God who is supremely good. The sky, the earth, the seas, the earth’s vegetation, the two great lights of the heavens, the sun and the moon, reflect something of God’s goodness and beauty. Heaven and earth are full of God’s glory, as we say in one of the responses of the Mass. In the words of today’s responsorial psalm, ‘The earth is full of your riches’. God comes to us in and through his good creation, which is why we need to treat God’s creation with great reverence and respect. If the created world reveals God’s goodness and glory, the fullest expression of God’s goodness and glory is Jesus, God’s beloved Son. Jesus is the pinnacle of God’s creative work. If people were often drawn to God through God’s good creation, they are drawn to God more powerfully through his Son, Jesus. Today’s gospel reading portrays the extraordinary drawing power of Jesus. No sooner had Jesus stepped out of the boat with his disciples than people started hurrying towards him from all through the countryside. The sick, the broken, the weary, the excluded were especially drawn to him. According to the gospel reading, they begged him to let them touch even the fringe of his cloak. God continues to draw us all to himself through his good creation, but even more powerfully through his Son. Jesus once said, ‘when I am lifted up from the earth I will draw all people to myself’. Our calling is to allow ourselves to be drawn.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

9th February >> Fr. Martin's Homilies/Reflections on Today's Mass Readings for The Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time (C) (Luke 5:1-11): ‘Leave me, Lord, I am a sinful man’.

Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time (C)

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Luke 5:1-11 They left everything and followed him.

Jesus was standing one day by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the crowd pressing round him listening to the word of God, when he caught sight of two boats close to the bank. The fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats – it was Simon’s – and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, ‘Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.’ ‘Master,’ Simon replied, ‘we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I will pay out the nets.’ And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear, so they signalled to their companions in the other boat to come and help them; when these came, they filled the two boats to sinking point. When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, ‘Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.’ For he and all his companions were completely overcome by the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon’s partners. But Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid; from now on it is men you will catch.’ Then, bringing their boats back to land, they left everything and followed him.

Gospel (GB) Luke 5:1-11 ‘They left everything and followed him.’

At that time: The crowd was pressing in on Jesus to hear the word of God. He was standing by the lake of Gennesaret, and he saw two boats by the lake, but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, he asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat. And when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, ‘Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.’ And Simon answered, ‘Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.’ And when they had done this, they enclosed a large number of fish, and their nets were breaking. They signalled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both the boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.’ For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish that they had taken, and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men.’ And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him.

Gospel (USA) Luke 5:1–11 They left everything and followed Jesus.

While the crowd was pressing in on Jesus and listening to the word of God, he was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret. He saw two boats there alongside the lake; the fishermen had disembarked and were washing their nets. Getting into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, he asked him to put out a short distance from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. After he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into deep water and lower your nets for a catch.” Simon said in reply, “Master, we have worked hard all night and have caught nothing, but at your command I will lower the nets.” When they had done this, they caught a great number of fish and their nets were tearing. They signaled to their partners in the other boat to come to help them. They came and filled both boats so that the boats were in danger of sinking. When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at the knees of Jesus and said, “Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.” For astonishment at the catch of fish they had made seized him and all those with him, and likewise James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were partners of Simon. Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men.” When they brought their boats to the shore, they left everything and followed him.

Homilies (5)

(i) Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Our prayer can take many different forms. We probably all have our favourite prayers and our preferred way of praying. I like prayers that are short and simple. One such prayer is often associated with the season of Advent but can be prayed any time, ‘Come, Lord Jesus’. It is a very ancient prayer that goes back to the very early years of the church. It is a prayer that expresses our longing for the Lord to draw near to us, to be in communion with us, to enter into our lives. We can pray this prayer regardless of the situation in which we find ourselves.

I was reminded of that prayer by a verse in today’s gospel reading. When Peter was overwhelmed by the huge catch of fish that resulted from Jesus’ word to him, he prayed the reverse of that prayer, not ‘Come Lord’ but ‘Leave me Lord’. The Lord’s goodness towards him make him aware of the lack of goodness in his own life, ‘I am a sinful man’. In the presence of great human goodness and generosity of spirit, we can become more aware of what is lacking in our own lives. In the presence of God’s goodness we can certainly sense our own failings. Jesus did not do as Peter asked. He did not leave Peter. Jesus had come to journey into people’s lives, not away from them. He doesn’t wait for us to reach a certain moral level before coming into our lives. He comes to us as we are, with all our frailties and weaknesses. He wants to gift us, to grace us, as we are.

Each of today’s three readings shows how God entered the lives of three very imperfect people, blessing them in a very striking way. While Isaiah was at prayer in the Temple of Jerusalem, he was blessed with a vision of God’s majesty, of the Lord seated upon a high throne, even though Isaiah, on his own admission, was a person of unclean lips who lived among a people of unclean lips. On the road to Damascus, Paul was blessed with a vision of the risen Lord, even though at that very moment he persecuting the followers of the Lord. Peter the fisherman was blessed with the gift of an extraordinary catch of fish, even though, as he acknowledged, he was a sinful man. The way the Lord relates to each one of us is how he related to Isaiah, Paul and Peter. He bestows his favour upon us without waiting for us to do anything to deserve it. In our second reading Saint Paul says, ‘I hardly deserve the name apostle’. The Lord doesn’t relate to us on the basis of what we deserve but simply out of the abundance of his own goodness and his love for us. He doesn’t ask us to change for the better before giving us his favour. Rather, he bestows his favour on us to empower us to change for the better, to enable us to become the person he wants us to become and knows we can become. As a result of the Lord’s favour towards him, Paul the persecutor of the church became the great apostle to the pagans. Likewise, Peter the fisherman became the rock on which Jesus built his church and Isaiah became one of the greatest prophets of Israel.

When Peter said to Jesus, ‘Leave me, Lord’, he was speaking out of a sense of unworthiness at being so greatly blessed. Yet, Jesus wasn’t asking him to be worthy or deserving. It’s as if Jesus was saying to Peter, ‘I know you are unworthy, but I have blessed you abundantly anyway, and I have a job for you to do’. The Lord doesn’t ask any of us to be worthy or deserving. He wants to bless us with his presence, with his gifts, as we are, even if we are actively opposing him, as Paul was at the time. If we say to him, ‘Leave me, Lord, because I am sinful’, he will ignore us. He wants us, rather, to pray, ‘Come, Lord Jesus’. He wants us to open ourselves to the many ways that he can bless and grace us. He can do that whether we are at prayer in a place of worship as Isaiah was, or going about our day job, as Peter was, or actively opposing the Lord’s good work, as Paul was. The Lord wants to touch our lives with his gracious and generous presence, wherever we happen to be on our life’s journey, and he will find a way to do so, if we give him half a chance, if we can bring ourselves to say with all our heart, ‘Come, Lord Jesus’, rather than ‘Leave me, Lord’.

When we open ourselves to the Lord’s coming, he will often move us to take a direction we would never have taken if left to ourselves. If left to themselves, Isaiah would never have become the prophet he was, Paul would never have become the apostle to the pagans, and Peter would never have become the leader of the early church. The Lord has something important for each of us to do, some vital contribution to make to his own good work in our world, and he can work powerfully even through our weaknesses, if we allow him.

And/Or

(ii) Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

There are times in all our lives when we can suddenly become aware of our failings. We are hit between the eyes by the wrong we have done, or perhaps, more often than not, the good we have failed to do. This sense of our own frailty can strike us when we least expect it. Any number of factors can trigger this awareness in us. It may be something somebody says or something we read. It may be an experience of someone else’s goodness or generosity that reminds us of what we too are called to be but have failed to become. We can find a strong sense of regret descending upon us as a result.

This appears to have been the experience of two people in today’s readings. The prophet Isaiah exclaims aloud, ‘What a wretched state I am in! I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips’. It was not just his own weakness and failing that struck him but that of the whole community to which he belonged. In a similar vein, Simon Peter says to Jesus, ‘Leave me, Lord, for I am a sinful man’. For both Isaiah and Peter, what triggered their sense of themselves as sinners was their awareness that they were in the presence of God. They knew themselves to be in the presence of total goodness, of perfect love, and in that clear light they saw all that was lacking in their own lives. Simon Peter’s instinct was to step out of this light, to put distance between Jesus and himself. In a sense, he wanted to hide from the Lord. This too was Isaiah’s reaction. Neither of them really wanted to show their face.

This is a very human reaction, one that we can all identify with in some way. We know from our own experience that if we have done wrong to someone, if we have treated someone badly, we often hide away somewhere for a while. We can be somewhat ashamed to show our face. We keep a low profile, and, eventually we begin to surface in the hope that our failure will not be held against us. Just as that is how we are with each other at times, so it is also the way we can be with the Lord. We can feel that, in various ways, we have given the Lord far less than he is due, and so we keep our distance from him. Like Adam and Eve in the garden, we hide from him. We give up on relating to him, because we feel we have too much ground to make up.

The readings this morning remind us very powerfully that, whatever about our hiding from the Lord, the Lord certainly does not hide from us. If Simon Peter was uneasy at being in the presence of total goodness, Jesus was not in any sense uneasy about being in the presence of a sinner. The Lord clearly had no wish to depart from Peter, as Peter had strongly suggested. On the contrary, he wanted Peter to stay with him, because he had plans for him. It was Peter - and men and women like him - that the Lord wanted as his followers, as his helpers. ‘From now on, it is people you will catch’. The Lord does not give up on us, even though we may be strongly tempted to give up on ourselves. The Lord does not keep his distance from us, even though we may make every effort to keep our distance from him. The Lord always sees a role for us in his great work, even though we might think of ourselves as having nothing to offer him. In other words, the Lord’s vision of us is far more generous than our vision of ourselves. He is far more interested in our future than in our past, in the person we can be than in person we have been.

The Lord’s goodness is not so much a harsh light that exposes all our weaknesses and frailties, but a warm light that restores and renews us. He comes not to remind us of our sins but to take them away. As the Lord said to Isaiah, ‘your sin is taken away, your iniquity is purged’. Having declared that much, the Lord immediately asked, ‘Who will be our messenger?’, in the hope, no doubt, that Isaiah would respond to that question in the way that he did, ‘Here I am, send me’. That is really what the Lord wants to hear from us, not so much Peter’s ‘depart from me’, but Isaiah’s, ‘here I am’. The Lord is not looking for shrinking violets. You remember the parable of the prodigal son where the son had his speech prepared about what a wretch he was. When he started into it, the father would not let him finish. He was home. That was enough. It was time for a feast, not an inquisition.

In the second reading, Paul reminds the Corinthians of the gospel that he himself received and that he preached in Corinth, and the essence of that gospel is ‘Christ died for our sins’. Rather than departing from sinners, as Peter suggested he should do, the Lord lived for them, he died for them, he rose from the dead for them, and he continues to intercede for them, for us. Paul knew that and that is why, in spite of being the least of the apostles, having once persecuted God’s church, his whole being proclaimed, ‘Here I am, send me’. Every time we celebrate the Eucharist, we proclaim the Lord’s death; that same Christ who died for our sins is present among us, asking us, ‘Who will be our messenger?’, waiting for us to respond, ‘Here I am, send me’.

And/Or

(iii) Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

There are times in all our lives when we can suddenly become aware of our failings. This sense of our own weakness can strike us when we least expect it. Any number of factors can trigger this awareness in us. It may be something somebody says or something we read. It may be an experience of someone else’s goodness or generosity that reminds us of what we too are called to be but have failed to become. We can find a strong sense of regret descending upon us as a result.

This appears to have been the experience of two people in today’s readings. The prophet Isaiah exclaims aloud, ‘What a wretched state I am in! I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips’. It was not just his own weakness and failing that struck him but that of the whole community to which he belonged. In the gospel reading, Simon Peter says to Jesus, ‘Leave me, Lord, for I am a sinful man’. For both Isaiah and Peter, what triggered their sense of themselves as sinners was their awareness that they were in the presence of God. They knew themselves to be in the presence of total goodness, of perfect love, and in that clear light they saw all that was lacking in their own lives. Simon Peter’s instinct was to step out of this light, to put distance between Jesus and himself. In a sense, he wanted to hide from the Lord. This too was Isaiah’s reaction. Neither of them really wanted to show their face.

This is a very human reaction, one that we can all identify with in some way. We know from our own experience that if we have done wrong to someone, if we have treated someone badly, we often hide away somewhere for a while. We keep a low profile, and, eventually we begin to surface in the hope that our failure will not be held against us. Just as that is how we are with each other at times, so it is also the way we can be with the Lord. We can feel that, in various ways, we have given the Lord far less than he is due, and so we keep our distance from him. Like Adam and Eve in the garden, we hide from him. We cease relating to him, because we feel we have too much ground to make up.

The readings this morning remind us very powerfully that, whatever about our hiding from the Lord, the Lord certainly does not hide from us. If Simon Peter was uneasy at being in the presence of total goodness, Jesus was not in any sense uneasy about being in the presence of a sinner. The Lord had no wish to depart from Peter, as Peter had strongly suggested. On the contrary, he wanted Peter to stay with him, because he had plans for him. It was Peter - and men and women like him - that the Lord wanted as his follower, as his helper. ‘From now on, it is people you will catch’. The Lord does not give up on us, even though we may be strongly tempted to give up on ourselves. The Lord always sees a role for us in his great work, even though we might think of ourselves as having little to offer him. The Lord’s vision of us is often far more generous than our vision of ourselves. He is far more interested in our future than in our past, in the person we can be, than in person we have been.

The Lord’s goodness is not so much a harsh light that exposes all our weaknesses and frailties, but a warm light that restores and renews us. He comes not to remind us of our sins but to take them away. As the Lord said to Isaiah, ‘your sin is taken away, your iniquity is purged’. Having declared that much to Isaiah, the Lord immediately asked, ‘Who will be our messenger?’, in the hope, no doubt, that Isaiah would respond to that question in the way that he did, ‘Here I am, send me’. That is really what the Lord wants to hear from us, not so much Peter’s ‘depart from me’, but Isaiah’s, ‘here I am’. You remember the parable of the prodigal son where the son had his speech prepared about what a wretch he was. When he started into it, the father would not let him finish. In returning, the son was saying, ‘here I am’, and that was enough. It was time for a feast, not an inquisition.

In the second reading, Paul reminds the Corinthians of the gospel that he himself received and that he preached in Corinth, and the essence of that gospel is ‘Christ died for our sins’. Rather than departing from sinners, as Peter suggested he should do, the Lord lived for them, he died for them, he rose from the dead for them, and he continues to intercede for them, for us. Paul knew that and that is why, in spite of being the least of the apostles, having once persecuted God’s church, his whole being proclaimed, ‘Here I am, send me’. Every time we celebrate the Eucharist, the same Christ who died for our sins is present among us, asking us, ‘Who will be our messenger?’, waiting for us to respond, ‘Here I am, send me’.

And/Or

(iv) The Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

A person’s faith journey is very personal and, indeed, unique to each individual. There can come a time in our lives when the journey of faith seems almost to disappear. What had been a clearly visible path can become very faint; our faith seems to grow very week. For some people there can then come a time of spiritual awakening. They rediscover their faith. Having drifted from the community of faith, they begin to feel a call to return to it. There can be many factors in a person’s life that can contribute to such an awakening. Sometimes children have a way of awakening the faith of their parents. When the time comes for children to be baptized or to make their first communion or their confirmation, parents can feel a call to reflect anew on their own faith. Some painful experience in our lives, such as the onset of serious illness in ourselves or our loved ones, can also be a moment of spiritual awakening. The witness of someone else’s faith can touch us in some deep way and awaken our own dormant faith. We might find ourselves at some liturgical celebration, such as the funeral Mass of a friend, where we have an experience of the Lord’s presence that somehow calls us to a renewal of our faith. These experiences of spiritual awakening tend to be very ordinary and non-dramatic for most people. A seed is sown and it grows very gradually. Occasionally for some people such experiences can be more dramatic. They experience a sudden reawakening of their faith.

Each of the three readings for this Sunday describes a moment of spiritual awakening. While the three experiences have a great deal in common, each one is quite distinctive. In the first reading, Isaiah of Jerusalem has a moment of spiritual awakening in a setting of worship, while in the most sacred place for the people of Israel, the Temple in Jerusalem. Isaiah had a sense of the Lord’s presence filling not just the Temple but the whole earth, ‘heaven and earth are full of your glory’. In the second reading, Paul speaks of his moment of spiritual awakening while he was on the main road from Jerusalem to Damascus, close to the city of Damascus. He was engaged in what he considered at the time to be God’s work, persecuting the followers of Jesus. Suddenly the very Jesus whose followers he was persecuting appeared to him, ‘last of all, he appeared to me too’. In the gospel reading, Simon Peter had a moment of spiritual awakening, an experience of the powerful presence of the Lord, on the Sea of Galilee, while he was working at his trade as a fisherman. These were three very different people, Isaiah, Paul and Peter, and the Lord touched their lives in a way that was unique to each one of them. The Lord met them where they were and spoke to them in a way that was best suited to their own situation in life.

The Lord speaks to us too in and through our own unique experience of life. Some of us may have the strongest sense of the Lord’s presence when we are in a sacred place, like Isaiah. Yet, Paul and Simon Peter’s experience of the Lord as they went about their daily chores reminds us that the Lord does not confine himself to our sacred places. In the gospels there are other examples of people having a spiritual awakening in and through the ordinary experiences of their lives. The two disciples on the road to Emmaus encountered the Lord in a fellow traveller, although it took them a while to recognize him. The Lord often comes to us in and through the routine circumstances of our lives; it is above all there that we can be powerfully touched by his presence. The readings today also suggest that a significant spiritual experience is not the prerogative of some kind of spiritual elite. At the very moment when Isaiah, Simon Peter and Paul were overwhelmed by a sense of the Lord’s presence, they had a strong sense of themselves as sinners. Isaiah cried out, ‘I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips’. Peter exclaimed to Jesus, ‘Leave me Lord; I am a sinful man’. Looking back at his moment of spiritual awakening, Paul acknowledges that at the time he was ‘persecuting the church of God’. That is why he states publicly, ‘I hardly deserve the name apostle’. The Lord does not wait for us to be worthy to disclose his presence to us or to touch our lives in some significant way. All that is needed is for us to have an openness of heart and spirit to his presence.

When we experience a spiritual awakening it is never just for ourselves. When the Lord touches our lives in some deep way it is always for the sake of others; there will be some kind of a sending involved. Isaiah was sent to the people of Jerusalem, Simon Peter was sent to his fellow Jews and Paul was sent to the Gentiles. For most of us, the people to whom we will be sent will be those among whom we live and work, with whom we have daily contact. An experience of spiritual awakening is always both a gift to us and a gift for others.

And/Or

(v) Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

The Indian poet Tagore wrote this prayer, ‘I come to take your touch before I begin the day’. There is a long standing tradition in the church of prayer before we begin the day. Perhaps it is less common these days when people live such busy lives and there can be so much to be done early in the morning like getting the children to school. Yet, there is still a value in even a short moment of prayer before we begin our day. It might just be a line from one of the psalms, such as ‘I thank you for your faithfulness and love’, from today’s responsorial psalm. It could be the very short prayer which we associate with Advent but could be prayed at any time, ‘Come, Lord Jesus’. Opening ourselves up to the Lord’s touch through a moment’s prayer is a good way to begin our day.

The Lord, of course, can touch our lives at any time of the day, and he can do so even when we are not consciously seeking to be touched by the Lord’s presence. That was the experience of Peter in today’s gospel reading. He was washing his fishing nets alongside other fishermen when Jesus touched his life, stepping into his boat and asking him to put out a little from the shore so that he could teach the crowd. As Simon had been about his daily chores, he suddenly found himself listening to Jesus’ teaching. Jesus then addressed Peter personally, ‘Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch’. Having failed to catch fish at the most likely time, during the previous night, this request made little sense to him, and, yet, he responded to the Lord’s call and, to his amazement, found himself abundantly graced with a huge catch of fish. Peter sensed that not only had Jesus touched his life but God had touched his life through Jesus. Aware that he was in God’s presence, Peter became conscious of his unworthiness before God present in Jesus, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man’. However, Jesus had not finished touching the life of Peter, declaring that from now on it would be people he would be catching, sharing in Jesus’ mission of gathering all people into God’s kingdom. The gospel reading suggests that the Lord can touch any of our lives in a very striking way as we go about our day to day chores. The fact that we are not consciously thinking about the Lord, much less seeking him, does not mean that he cannot touch us in a very personal way. We just need to be open to this possibility.

If the story of Peter shows that the Lord can touch our lives as we go about our daily chores, the story of Paul in the second reading suggests that the Lord can touch our lives even when we are actively opposing him. Paul acknowledges in that reading, ‘I persecuted the church of God’. He saw this new movement within Judaism as a dangerous innovation that threatened what he once called the ‘traditions of the elders’. He violently opposed it. In doing so, he was, in reality, opposing God who was revealing himself through Jesus, his Son, and his followers. According to Paul himself, it was while he was opposing the Lord’s work in this violent way that the Lord touched his life. As he says, ‘last of all he (the Lord) appeared to me too’. Paul’s story, even more than Peter’s, shows us that the Lord can touch our lives at the most unexpected of times. Paul’s experience left him with a sense of being abundantly and undeservedly graced, ‘I hardly deserve the name apostle, but by God’s grace that is what I am’. He had a sense of the Lord’s gracious love, a love freely given, completely unmerited. Paul’s experience reminds us that the Lord wants to grace us with his loving touch, at all times of our lives, even at those time when, like Paul, we are distancing ourselves from him. We just need an openness to this possibility. Can we allow the Lord to touch us, to grace us, as we are? Peter and Paul, who allowed themselves to be touched by the Lord, were transformed by his touch. Peter, the fisherman, became the rock on which the church was built. Paul, the persecutor of the church, became the great apostle to the pagans. If we allow the Lord to touch us, he will transform us, so that we may better serve his purposes in the world.

There is a third person who is touched by the Lord in today’s readings, and that is Isaiah in our first reading. The setting for his experience of the Lord’s touch was more conventional. It happened while at prayer in the Temple. As with Peter, his sense of the Lord’s presence made him aware of himself as a sinner, but, as with Peter, the Lord simply continued to touch his life, entrusting him with a mission. For many people of faith, it is while at prayer, in a religious setting, that they are most likely to experience the Lord’s transforming touch. Yet, the experience of Peter and Paul reminds that the Lord who fills a place of prayer like the Temple or a parish church, also fills the whole earth.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

8th February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 6:30-34): ‘He took pity on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd’.

Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 6:30-34 They were like sheep without a shepherd.

The apostles rejoined Jesus and told him all they had done and taught. Then he said to them, ‘You must come away to some lonely place all by yourselves and rest for a while’; for there were so many coming and going that the apostles had no time even to eat. So they went off in a boat to a lonely place where they could be by themselves. But people saw them going, and many could guess where; and from every town they all hurried to the place on foot and reached it before them. So as he stepped ashore he saw a large crowd; and he took pity on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd, and he set himself to teach them at some length.

Gospel (GB) Mark 6:30-34 ‘They were like sheep without a shepherd.’

At that time: The Apostles returned to Jesus and told him all that they had done and taught. And he said to them, ‘Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while.’ For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. And they went away in the boat to a desolate place by themselves. Now many saw them going and recognised them, and they ran there on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. And he began to teach them many things.

Gospel (USA) Mark 6:30-34 They were like sheep without a shepherd.

The Apostles gathered together with Jesus and reported all they had done and taught. He said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.” People were coming and going in great numbers, and they had no opportunity even to eat. So they went off in the boat by themselves to a deserted place. People saw them leaving and many came to know about it. They hastened there on foot from all the towns and arrived at the place before them. When Jesus disembarked and saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things.

Reflections (9)

(i) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

You are familiar with the line from Robert Byrne’s poem, ‘To a Mouse’, ‘The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men Gang aft agley’ or, in more standard English, ‘often go awry’. We can plan carefully for something, but it doesn’t necessarily happen according to plan. The unforeseen event can knock our plans on the head. Jesus and his disciples seem to have had a similar experience in today’s gospel reading. The disciples had just returned from a successful period of mission. They returned to more ministry. The gospel says that there were so many coming and going that they had no time even to eat. Jesus knew they needed to be by themselves with himself in a lonely place. As the good shepherd, Jesus planned to lead them to restful waters to revive their drooping spirits. However, this very laudable plan came to nothing. Word got out as to where they were going and, upon arriving, the normally lonely place was full of people. We might have expected Jesus to react angrily. On the contrary, the gospel says he had compassion on the crowd because they were like sheep without a shepherd. The good shepherd discovered that he had a bigger flock to care for than the little flock of his twelve disciples. Jesus understood that God was in the disappointment of plans not working out. God was calling to him through the spiritual hunger of the crowd. When our plans don’t work out, it’s not always the disaster we think it is at the time. God can be calling to us through the unexpected and unwelcome event. The collapse of our plans can create a space for the Lord to serve us in ways we had never anticipated. When plans don’t work out, a compassionate, accepting, response, in the spirit of Jesus, is often what is called for.

And/Or

(ii) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

The gospel reading this morning suggests that Jesus knew the value of rest. After the disciples had engaged in a period of mission Jesus took them off to some lonely place so that they could rest for a while. There was plenty of work to be done. Jesus and his disciples could have been busy twenty four hours a day. Yet, every so often Jesus and his disciples stood back from their work. Jesus was teaching us that there is more to our lives than work. That value of rest is proclaimed in the very first page of the Bible, the first chapter of the Book of Genesis, according to which God rested on the seventh day having engaged in the work of creation for six days. As people made in God’s image, we need to rest as well as work. A time of rest is an opportunity to look around and appreciate what we have been given; it is a time to take in God’s work, in our own lives, in the lives of others, in our world. In the gospel reading, Jesus’ time of rest with his disciples was interrupted by people who sought him out, and Jesus adjusted to that with great grace. Sometimes our plans for times of rest will be interrupted too and we have to adjust. Yet, we continue to seek out times and places of rest in the course of our lives, times when we hand over the initiative to the Lord.

And/Or

(iii) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading this morning Jesus’ plans for himself and his disciples don’t work out. He had intended taking his disciples away to a lonely place where they could rest for a while. However, he had no sooner arrived in this lonely place that it was full of people who were seeking him out. Jesus did not get upset or annoyed that his plans had not worked out; he simply adjusted himself to the new situation. He recognized that the needs of the crowds were greater than his disciples’ need for rest, and, so, he immediately addressed himself to the spiritual hunger of the crowd, teaching them at great length. The gospel reading suggests that it is good to have plans but not to hold on to them too tightly. The failure of our plans to materialize can create an opening for something worthwhile to happen that we had not planned. The Lord can work powerfully in the openings that the failure of our plans creates. We need the freedom to let go of our plans when a greater good, a greater purpose, beckons to us.

And/Or

(iv) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

We are all familiar with the experience of our plans not working out. In the course of our day we might plan to get something done and our plans come to nothing. On a grander scale, some plan we might have had for our life does not materialize. We can respond in different ways to our plans not working out. In this morning’s gospel reading, Jesus’ plans for himself and his disciples did not work out. He intended taking his disciples away to a lonely place to be all by themselves, because they were so busy they had no time even to eat. However, when Jesus got to the lonely place, he discovered to his surprise that it had become a crowded place; the crowd had got there ahead of him. He didn’t respond with annoyance to this unexpected interruption; instead, according to the gospel, he had compassion on the crowd and set himself to teach them. Jesus’ plans did not work out, but something else happened that served God’s purpose. When our own plans fail to materialize, sometimes something better can come to pass, which would never have happened if our plans had worked out. The Lord’s purpose is always greater than our plans. Whenever we have to let of our plans, the Lord’s life-giving purpose for our lives will always prevails.

And/Or

(v) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary time

At the beginning of this morning’s gospel reading, the disciples return to Jesus after the period of mission on which Jesus had sent them. They were keen to share with him all they had done and taught. The response of Jesus was to take them away to a deserted place where they could rest. Jesus thereby affirms the value of rest and recreation. He consecrates this time of rest. According to the first chapter of the Bible, even God rested after working for six days. We all need a regular time of rest and recreation. ‘Recreation’ suggests new creation, renewal. We all need to be created anew on a regular basis. Very often when we stop to rest it gives the Lord the opportunity to renew us, in mind, body and spirit. On this occasion, however, the plans of Jesus for a time of rest and recreation for himself and his disciples were derailed by a large crowd who had guessed where Jesus was heading and got there before him. The line of a poem by Robert Burns comes to mind, ‘the best laid plans of mice and men...’. If our plans for some rest and recreation were suddenly interrupted we might find ourselves getting quite annoyed. Jesus, however, responded to this interruption with compassion for the large crowd. I am reminded of that phrase, ‘the grace of the present moment’. The ‘present moment’ had thrown up this crowd who were like sheep looking for a shepherd. Jesus experienced them not as an interruption but as a grace and he responded out of his compassion. We are being reminded that the Lord can be in the interruptions of life as much as in the quiet moments. What we might initially experience as an inconvenience, because it cuts across our plans, can turn out to be a moment of grace.

And/Or

(vi) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus proclaims the value of rest from our labours. The apostles had been on a very busy period of mission and when they returned, Jesus insisted that they come away to a lonely place to rest awhile. However, this plan that Jesus had for himself and his disciples did not materialize. When they arrived at their destination, the hoped-for lonely place was full of people looking for Jesus and his disciples. Jesus responded to this interruption with compassion. He abandoned his plan for a quiet time with his disciples away from everybody and set himself to teach the people ‘at some length’. It is often the case in our own lives that our plans do not work out. People have a way of scuppering our plans. We have something worked out in our head, but the unpredictability of life means it doesn’t come to pass. Like Jesus, we can find ourselves helpless before a set of circumstances we had not anticipated. The question then becomes, ‘How are to going to react to this demise of our plans and purposes?’ We can react with annoyance or even anger. We can be tempted to get very discouraged. Jesus reacted to the experience of his plans not working out with compassion. He didn’t turn away from the new and unexpected situation, but engaged with it compassionately. He heard God’s call in this unexpected situation and responded generously. We too have to keep listening to the Lord’s call even in those situations that are not of our making and that leave us feeling, initially at least, very put out. The unexpected interruptions can be moments of grace.

And/Or

(vii) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

The image of the shepherd links this morning’s first reading, responsorial psalm and gospel reading. The first reading speaks of God raising our Lord Jesus from the dead to become the great Shepherd of the sheep. The Responsorial Psalm is the much-loved Psalm, ‘the Lord is my shepherd’. On the lips of the Jewish people who prayed that Psalm ‘the Lord’ referred to the God of Israel. As Christians, we instinctively think of Jesus when we say ‘the Lord is my shepherd’. He is, in the words of the first reading, ‘our Lord, Jesus’. In the gospel reading, Jesus looks out upon the crowd who have so unexpectedly disrupted his plans for rest with the eyes of a shepherd. He had compassion for them, because he recognized that they were like sheep without a shepherd. Jesus would become their shepherd, which is why he immediately set himself to teach them at some length. He went on to feed them with bread and fish as a shepherd feeds his flock. The risen Lord continues to look upon us with the eyes of a shepherd. He feeds us with his teaching, with his word, which we hear in the Scriptures. He feeds us with the bread of life, his body, in the Eucharist. He looks to us to feed the physically and spiritually hungry, as he did. Jesus was not disturbed by the crowd who interrupted his plans for some rest for himself and his disciples, because his instinct was always that of the shepherd. It remains his instinct as risen Lord. His deepest desire is to feed and nourish us. He has no times that are out of bounds for us. It is always timely for us to turn to him in our hunger and allow him to feed us with his presence, so that we can be good shepherds to each other.

And/Or

(viii) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

In taking his disciples away to a lonely place after their period of missionary work, Jesus highlights the value of rest and the importance of space in the midst of a busy schedule. There was much to be done, both for Jesus and his disciples. Yet, Jesus recognized that there were other values alongside the value of activity, even activity in the service of God. There was the value of being, of stepping back to spend time with oneself, with others and with God. Stepping back from what we do can help to ensure that our doing, our work, is shaped by God’s purpose and desire. In the first reading, Solomon had just become king of Israel. There was much to be done for the young king. Yet, in that reading, we find Solomon stepping back from his work as king to spend time with the Lord in prayer, asking the Lord for the gift of the wisdom and discernment he would need for his work as king. He recognized that if he was to rule in the way the Lord wanted, he would need the Lord’s help.  We all need to get that balance right in our lives between being and doing, between, on the one hand, being really present to others and to the Lord in prayer and, on the other hand, the many activities we are engaged in, some of them essential. In the gospel reading, the prayerful rest that Jesus sought out for himself and his disciples didn’t actually materialize. When they arrived at the lonely place, people were there waiting for them and, as the compassionate shepherd, Jesus set himself to teach them at great length. Thereby, Jesus was showing his disciples and us the importance of another value, the value of serving in love even those who unexpectedly disrupt our legitimate search for space, rest and prayer.

And/Or

(ix) Saturday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Jesus had sent out the twelve to share in his mission. According to today’s gospel reading, after returning to him from that mission, he insists that they come away with him to a lonely place all by themselves to rest. Jesus knew that the harvest was great and that the labourers were few, but he also appreciated the need for the labourers to rest from time to time. There was a time to be active in God’s service and there was a time to step back from activity and rest. In this gospel reading, Jesus is consecrating the value of rest. God can speak to us when we rest in ways he cannot speak to us when we are active. For many of us there are less opportunities to be active in these Covid days, as so many options have been closed off to us. These days can be an opportunity to listen more attentively to what the Lord may want to say to us. If we have a tendency to be more of a Martha person, this time may be a call to become a little more like her sister Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to him speaking. Jesus’ planned time of rest for himself and his disciples never materialized because the crowd, guessing where they were heading, got there ahead of them. The gospel reading says that when Jesus saw the crowd, far from being annoyed at this unexpected interruption to his plans, he had compassion on them. The word ‘compassion’ in the Bible is from the same root as the word ‘womb’. Jesus is portrayed as responding to the crowd with a mother’s anguished love for her struggling children. The Lord remains a compassionate presence in all our lives today. Often it is when we step back from our various activities to spend quiet time with the Lord that we come to experience more fully his compassionate presence towards us.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

7th February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 6:14-29): ‘When he heard him speak he was greatly perplexed’.

Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 6:14-29 The beheading of John the Baptist.

King Herod had heard about Jesus, since by now his name was well known. Some were saying, ‘John the Baptist has risen from the dead, and that is why miraculous powers are at work in him.’ Others said, ‘He is Elijah’; others again, ‘He is a prophet, like the prophets we used to have.’ But when Herod heard this he said, ‘It is John whose head I cut off; he has risen from the dead.’ Now it was this same Herod who had sent to have John arrested, and had him chained up in prison because of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife whom he had married. For John had told Herod, ‘It is against the law for you to have your brother’s wife.’ As for Herodias, she was furious with him and wanted to kill him; but she was not able to, because Herod was afraid of John, knowing him to be a good and holy man, and gave him his protection. When he had heard him speak he was greatly perplexed, and yet he liked to listen to him. An opportunity came on Herod’s birthday when he gave a banquet for the nobles of his court, for his army officers and for the leading figures in Galilee. When the daughter of this same Herodias came in and danced, she delighted Herod and his guests; so the king said to the girl, ‘Ask me anything you like and I will give it you.’ And he swore her an oath, ‘I will give you anything you ask, even half my kingdom.’ She went out and said to her mother, ‘What shall I ask for?’ She replied, ‘The head of John the Baptist.’ The girl hurried straight back to the king and made her request, ‘I want you to give me John the Baptist’s head, here and now, on a dish.’ The king was deeply distressed but, thinking of the oaths he had sworn and of his guests, he was reluctant to break his word to her. So the king at once sent one of the bodyguard with orders to bring John’s head. The man went off and beheaded him in prison; then he brought the head on a dish and gave it to the girl, and the girl gave it to her mother. When John’s disciples heard about this, they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb.

Gospel (GB) Mark 6:14-29 ‘John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.’

At that time: King Herod heard of Jesus, for his name had become known. Some said, ‘John the Baptist has been raised from the dead. That is why these miraculous powers are at work in him.’ But others said, ‘He is Elijah.’ And others said, ‘He is a prophet, like one of the prophets of old.’ But when Herod heard of it, he said, ‘John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.’ For it was Herod who had sent and seized John and bound him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, because he had married her. For John had been saying to Herod, ‘It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.’ And Herodias had a grudge against him and wanted to put him to death. But she could not, for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he kept him safe. When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed, and yet he heard him gladly. But an opportunity came when Herod on his birthday gave a banquet for his nobles and military commanders and the leading men of Galilee. For when Herodias’s daughter came in and danced, she pleased Herod and his guests. And the king said to the girl, ‘Ask me for whatever you wish, and I will give it to you.’ And he vowed to her, ‘Whatever you ask me, I will give you, up to half of my kingdom.’ And she went out and said to her mother, ‘For what should I ask?’ And she said, ‘The head of John the Baptist.’ And she came in immediately with haste to the king and asked, saying, ‘I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter.’ And the king was exceedingly sorry, but because of his oaths and his guests he did not want to break his word to her. And immediately the king sent an executioner with orders to bring John’s head. He went and beheaded him in the prison and brought his head on a platter and gave it to the girl, and the girl gave it to her mother. When his disciples heard of it, they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb.

Gospel (USA) Mark 6:14-29 It is John whom I beheaded. He has been raised up.

King Herod heard about Jesus, for his fame had become widespread, and people were saying, “John the Baptist has been raised from the dead; That is why mighty powers are at work in him.” Others were saying, “He is Elijah”; still others, “He is a prophet like any of the prophets.” But when Herod learned of it, he said, “It is John whom I beheaded. He has been raised up.” Herod was the one who had John arrested and bound in prison on account of Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip, whom he had married. John had said to Herod, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.” Herodias harbored a grudge against him and wanted to kill him but was unable to do so. Herod feared John, knowing him to be a righteous and holy man, and kept him in custody. When he heard him speak he was very much perplexed, yet he liked to listen to him. Herodias had an opportunity one day when Herod, on his birthday, gave a banquet for his courtiers, his military officers, and the leading men of Galilee. His own daughter came in and performed a dance that delighted Herod and his guests. The king said to the girl, “Ask of me whatever you wish and I will grant it to you.” He even swore many things to her, “I will grant you whatever you ask of me, even to half of my kingdom.” She went out and said to her mother, “What shall I ask for?” Her mother replied, “The head of John the Baptist.” The girl hurried back to the king’s presence and made her request, “I want you to give me at once on a platter the head of John the Baptist.” The king was deeply distressed, but because of his oaths and the guests he did not wish to break his word to her. So he promptly dispatched an executioner with orders to bring back his head. He went off and beheaded him in the prison. He brought in the head on a platter and gave it to the girl. The girl in turn gave it to her mother. When his disciples heard about it, they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb.

Reflections (12)

(i) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

It is clear from today’s gospel reading that John the Baptist had an unsettling effect on Herod Antipas, the tetrarch of Galilee. It is said that Herod knew John to be a good and holy man, and protected him against the murderous schemes of Herodias, his wife. Herod liked to listen to John, even though he was greatly perplexed by what John said. He was both drawn to John’s message and disturbed by it. His wife’s reaction to John wasn’t so ambivalent. She just wanted him dead. When Herod made a rash promise to Herodias’ dancing daughter that she could have anything she wished, her mother seized the moment and prompted her daughter to ask Herod for the head of John the Baptist. According to the gospel reading, Herod was deeply distressed by his step daughter’s request but having made her a promise in public on oath, he felt honour bound to keep it. Going against his better nature, he ordered the beheading of someone he knew to be a good and holy man. There were good instincts in Herod but he couldn’t follow them because saving face was more pressing for him at that moment. He wasn’t true to what was best within him, what we would call the voice of God or the voice of the Spirit. He listened to other voices and allowed himself to be led by other spirits. We can all find ourselves in situations where what is best and deepest in us is put to the test. It can be a struggle to remain true to the promptings of the Spirit coming from deep within us. However, at such moments we are not left to ourselves. The Lord is always with us to help us to stay true to his word and to his desire for our lives. As Saint Paul says in one of his letters, ‘with the testing God will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it’. At such testing moments, we can turn to the Lord for help, knowing that his help will always be forthcoming.

And/Or

(ii) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

In the days running up to the feast of Christmas, we heard Luke’s account of the birth of John the Baptist. In this morning’s gospel reading, we hear Mark’s account of the death of John the Baptist. As we read that story, John is off stage, as it were, languishing in Herod Antipas’ prison. There are three characters who are centre stage, Herod Antipas, his wife Herodias and her daughter from her marriage to Herod’s brother, Philip. Of those three characters Herod Antipas comes across as the most complex. Whereas Herodias clearly hated John the Baptist, Herod’s attitude to John was more ambivalent. It is said that Herod knew John to be a good and holy man and gave him his protection, and that he liked to listen to John even though he was greatly perplexed by what he said. There was something about John that spoke to Herod; John appealed to Herod’s better nature. Yet, Herod ordered John’s execution. He had made a very public but very rash promise to Herodias’ daughter, and to protect his own honour before others he felt obliged to keep his promise, even though it meant beheading the man whom he knew to be good and holy. Herod, in the end, acted against his better nature, to which John the Baptist had appealed so strongly. Perhaps there is something of Herod in all of us. We hear a call that appeals to what is best in us, but we don’t always follow through on it for reasons of self-interest. Herod was not prepared to lose his honour to save John. Responding to the Lord’s call will often entail some loss for us. Being true to what is deepest and best in ourselves will sometimes mean having to die to ourselves in some way. Yet, we have the promise of Jesus that, if we lose our life for his sake, we will ultimately find it.

And/Or

(iii) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

According to this morning’s gospel reading, some people thought that Jesus was John the Baptist come back to life, after he had been beheaded by Herod. The fact that some people thought that Jesus was John the Baptist come back to life suggests just how much both had in common. John was a prophet who proclaimed God’s word, even when that word was unpopular. It is because some found his word very unpopular that John was executed. Jesus, too, spoke of himself as a prophet; he proclaimed God’s word, even when that word was experienced as threatening by those in positions of power and influence. Like John, it was because of his faithfulness to proclaiming and living God’s word that Jesus was put to death. John and Jesus had a great deal in common, and yet, as John said, he was unworthy to untie the sandals of Jesus. Jesus was not only God’s prophet; he was God’s Son. He not only spoke God’s word, he was God’s word; he was the Word become flesh. Even though John came before Jesus, and was not strictly speaking a follower of Jesus, he has a great deal to teach us about what it means to be a follower of Jesus. He teaches us that we follow Jesus by basing our lives on God’s word, especially as spoken and lived by Jesus. We are to allow that word to take root in our heart, so that it shapes our lives. We are to hear the Lord’s word and to keep it, as Mary did. Her words to Gabriel, ‘Let it be to me according to your word’ could easily be the foundation of our lives as disciples of Jesus.

And/Or

(iv) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

The scene in the gospel reading is one that has inspired artists and play writers throughout the centuries. The sumptuous banquet in Herod’s palace for his birthday turns out to be a banquet of death. Mark the evangelist follows this scene with the feeding by Jesus of the multitude in the wilderness. It is as if the evangelist wants to set Herod’s banquet of death over against Jesus’ banquet of life. John the Baptist is described in the gospel reading as a ‘good and holy man’. He courageously spoke God’s truth, God’s way, and that is why he was beheaded. Jesus was crucified for the same reason, because he proclaimed God’s ways, God’s purposes, by what he said and did. We are all called to proclaim the ways of God as revealed to us by Jesus. That will call for courage at times, the courage displayed by John the Baptist and Jesus. One of the traditional seven gifts of the Holy Spirit is courage. Today, more than in the past, we need a courageous faith; we need the courage of the Holy Spirit to witness to the values of the gospel, as John and Jesus did. A courageous faith is not an arrogant faith, but it is a firm faith, an enduring faith, a faith that holds firm when the storms come because its roots are deep. We pray this morning for the gift of such a faith, the kind of faithfulness that shaped John’s life and death.

And/Or

(v) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

John the Baptist was the innocent victim of the irresponsible use of power. The gospel reading this morning suggests that Herod had John executed because he wanted to save face. Having made a reckless promise to his step daughter, he would not go back on it, as to do so would have meant a loss of honour. There have always been and still are innocent victims of the irresponsible use of power. Jesus was the supreme example of a victim of the irresponsible use of power. It was the religiously and politically powerful who had Jesus crucified. Whenever anyone is victimized in this way, it is always a terrible tragedy. Such a travesty of justice is never God’s will. Yet, both the death of John the Baptist and of Jesus show us that God can bring good out of such tragedies, out of such travesties of justice. God can work powerfully through the weakness of such innocent victims, even though it is never God’s will that such victimization should ever happen. It is Jesus and John, not Pilate or Caiaphas or Herod, who continue to shine as a light for all who seek the path of life today.

And/Or

(vi) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

The gospel reading that we have just heard has inspired artists and playwrights down the centuries. It is a scene that is full of drama and tragedy. Herod’s birthday party turns out to be a banquet of death. The boasting and moral cowardice of Herod, the vengefulness of his wife Herodias and the compliance of her daughter all combined to bring about the execution of John the Baptist of whom Jesus said ‘among those born of women, no one is greater’. According to the gospel reading, Herod recognized John as a good and holy man and was anxious to protect him. Yet, rather than lose face before his guests he went against his better judgement and agreed to his wife’s request. He gave in to the social pressure rather than be true to his best instincts. In that sense, Herod is every man and woman. We can all find ourselves in situations where remaining true to our values, the values of the gospel, will involve some loss or other. The temptation can be to comprise so as to avoid the loss, like Herod. John the Baptist certainly resisted that temptation. He remained true to the values of God’s kingdom even though it meant the loss of his freedom and, ultimately, the loss of his life. He remains an inspiration to us in our struggle to be true to the call of the gospel, even though it may mean some loss for us in the short term.

And/Or

(vii) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s gospel reading from Mark is one of the more gruesome stories in the gospels, outside of the story of the passion and death of Jesus. A banquet celebrating the birthday of Herod Antipas becomes the occasion for the summary execution of someone Jesus described as ‘more than a prophet’. Herod comes across as a person who acts contrary to his own better judgement and better instincts. He knew John to be a good and holy man and liked to listen to him. Yet, he had John thrown into prison because it is what his wife, Herodias, wanted. Then at his birthday celebration he ordered the beheading of John even though it left him deeply distressed. Having made a rash promise to his step daughter, he felt obliged to keep his promise because it was what his guests would have expected of him. His honour was at stake. Neither action, throwing John into prison and ordering his execution, came from deep within Herod. He did both under pressure, from his wife and from his guests. The portrait of Herod in today’s gospel reading reminds us that we can all do things under pressure from others that we are not at peace about. Like Herod, we can take paths that are not true to what is best in us, to please someone or to protect our position in the eyes of others. The gospel calls on us to be true to our deepest and best values, to the Lord’s call which resounds through them. There may be some loss for us in doing so, but, as Jesus says elsewhere in the gospels, ‘those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it’.

And/Or

(viii) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

We often hear the expression nowadays, ‘speaking truth to power’. It could certainly be said of John the Baptist that he spoke truth to power. He told Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee, that it was against the law of God for him to have married his brother’s wife, Herodias. In certain parts of the world today, speaking truth to power is a very dangerous business. Many people have ended up in prison or even killed for doing so. John the Baptist’s speaking truth to power initially landed him in prison. Herodias considered prison too good for John and wanted him killed immediately. However, Herod had a certain respect for John, considering him a good and holy man. The gospel reading suggests that there were good instincts in Herod which he initially listened to, against the wishes of his wife. However, he abandoned those good instincts at his birthday banquet when he made a rash promise to Herodias’ daughter to give her anything she wanted. When, at the prompting of her mother, she said she wanted the head of John the Baptist on a platter, Herod acted against his better instincts to save face and ordered John to be beheaded. John the Baptist ended up paying the ultimate price for speaking truth to power. In the end Herod listened to the voice of Herodias rather than the voice of his better self. We can all find ourselves caught between conflicting voices. The voice of our better self, the voice of the Holy Spirit, that prompts us to take the Lord’s way can be opposed by a very different voice that prompts us to take a very contrary way. Jesus was aware that his followers would all find themselves facing this fundamental conflict, which is why he taught us to pray, ‘Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil’. He encourages us to turn to God for strength when we are tempted to take a path that is not in keeping with God’s will for our lives, with that voice of the Holy Spirit within us.

And/Or

(ix) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

At the beginning of today’s gospel reading, people express their views as to who Jesus really is. Some say that Jesus is a prophet, like the prophets of old. Others are more specific and say that he is Elijah the prophet, whose return was expected at some time. Herod Antipas, the ruler of Galilee, thought that Jesus might be John the Baptist risen from the dead. If this is what Herod Antipas actually thought, it may have sprung from a sense of guilt over ordering the execution of John the Baptist. The gospel reading goes on to say that Herod was afraid of John, knowing him to be a good and holy man and that Herod liked to listen to John even though he was often perplexed by what John had to say. It seems that Herod had John beheaded against his better judgement. He felt bound by a rather rash public oath he had made to his step daughter. Herod’s wife, Herodias, took advantage of Herod’s rash promise by getting her daughter to ask for the head of John the Baptist. Rather than follow his better instincts, Herod gave in to his wife’s request, to protect his honour. He couldn’t be seen not to keep an oath he had publicly made. Preserving his honour was more important than preserving the life of a man whom he knew to be good and holy. The dilemma of Herod is the dilemma of us all, at some time in our lives. We sense a call from deep within us to do what is good and noble and honourable, what is generous and life-giving. At the same time, we feel pressures of various kinds to ignore that call and act in a more self-serving way. At such moments, we need help from beyond ourselves, the help of the Holy Spirit, so that we can take the path the Lord is calling us to take, even though it is the more difficult path, the one that will demand more of us.

And/Or

(x) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

It could be said that some of the worst traits of human nature are on display in today’s gospel reading. There is Herod who, contrary to the Jewish Law, married his brother Philip’s wife. Herod knew John the Baptist to be a good and holy man and, yet, to save face he succumbed to his wife’s request to have John beheaded. Herodias, Herod’s wife, had wanted to kill John the Baptist for a long time for objecting to her marriage and she seized her opportunity when it came. Herodias’ daughter coolly brought the head of John the Baptist on a dish to her mother. Herod’s birthday feast turned into a grisly celebration of the death of a man of God. There is a moral darkness at the core of today’s gospel story. Yet, if the three people in the foreground of this gospel story exemplify some of the worst of human nature, the light of God’s goodness was there as well, even if in the background, off stage, as it were. There was the good and holy John the Baptist in Herod’s dungeon. He had been faithful to his mission to preach God’s word, even to the powerful like Herod, although that meant risking his life. Then, there were the disciples of John the Baptist, who, as soon as they heard of John’s cruel fate, made haste to give him a dignified burial, even if he hadn’t had a dignified death. At the heart of sin and moral darkness, goodness and holiness are always to be found, sometimes in the background, away from the main stage. Saint Paul assures us that where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. In his letter to them, he called on the church in Philippi to shine like stars in the world. Therein lies the calling of each one of us. We are to let the light of the Lord’s goodness, love and beauty shine in our sometimes dark world, holding firm to the conviction that the darkness will never overcome the light.

And/Or

(xi) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

There is a lot of darkness in the gospel reading. Some of the worst human instincts are on display. There is Herod who had chained up in prison an innocent man because he challenged Herod on the morality of marrying his brother's wife, Herodias. There is Herodias who wanted Herod not just to imprison John but to kill him, for the same reason. At Herod’s birthday feast, Herodias seized her opportunity when her daughter beguiled Herod into making a rash promise. Herod displayed moral weakness in submitting to his wife’s request for the head of John the Baptist, even though he knew John to be a good and holy man and wanted to protect him. Herod’s birthday feast turned out to be a very grisly affair. Is there any light there in the darkness? The one great light is John the Baptist himself. He courageously proclaimed God’s word, even though he must have known it could have deadly consequences for him. He was a man of integrity, of courage and of deep faith. Then there are the disciples of John the Baptist who took his body and laid it in a tomb, ensuring that, even if his death was undignified, he would have a dignified burial. There is always some light at the heart of darkness, some goodness at the heart of evil. You have heard the expression, ‘it is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness’. We can be tempted to get very discouraged by the various expressions of moral darkness of our time. However, our calling as followers of the risen Lord, who declared himself to be the light of the world, is to reflect the light of his goodness and love by our lives. Every good and loving act is a protest against the darkness, and we can be assured that if we are faithful to our calling, in the end the darkness will not overcome the light.

And/Or

(xii) Friday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s first reading calls on us to ‘keep in mind those who are in prison, as those you were in prison with them’. I am reminded of the words of Jesus in the gospels, ‘I was in prison and you came to see me’. He doesn’t say, ‘I was unjustly imprisoned and you came to see me’. Jesus identifies himself with all prisoners; those who visit them visit him. In caring for those in prison, we care for the Lord himself; in rejecting or ignoring those in prison we reject and ignore the Lord. In the gospel reading, John the Baptist is in the prison of Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee. His treatment in prison is in stark contrast to the call of Jesus in the gospels and the call of today’s first reading. He had challenged Herod for breaking God’s law by marrying Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife. It seems that it was Herodias who put pressure on Herod to put John in prison. Nothing has changed much. In our own time, many people find themselves in prison because they challenged those in power. It was also Herodias who was directly responsible for having John beheaded. When Herod offered to give her daughter whatever she wanted, after she danced for him, Herodias prompted her daughter to ask for the head of John the Baptist. Herod was too morally weak to refuse her request. Jesus would suffer a similar fate at the hands of powerful people, because they found his message too disturbing. How do we respond when we hear a word addressed to us that leaves us feeling uncomfortable? We can be tempted to make little of the messenger rather than being open to the possibility that the Lord may be saying something important to us through this message that we find so unsettling. It is always worth asking, ‘Is the Lord trying to show me something here?’

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

6th February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 6:7-13): ‘He summoned the Twelve and began to send them out’.

Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 6:7-13 'Take nothing with you'.

Jesus made a tour round the villages, teaching. Then he summoned the Twelve and began to send them out in pairs giving them authority over the unclean spirits. And he instructed them to take nothing for the journey except a staff – no bread, no haversack, no coppers for their purses. They were to wear sandals but, he added, ‘Do not take a spare tunic.’ And he said to them, ‘If you enter a house anywhere, stay there until you leave the district. And if any place does not welcome you and people refuse to listen to you, as you walk away shake off the dust from under your feet as a sign to them.’ So they set off to preach repentance; and they cast out many devils, and anointed many sick people with oil and cured them.

Gospel (GB) Mark 6:7-13 ‘He began to send them out.’

At that time: Jesus called the Twelve and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He charged them to take nothing for their journey except a staff — no bread, no bag, no money in their belts — but to wear sandals and not put on two tunics. And he said to them, ‘Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you depart from there. And if any place will not receive you and they will not listen to you, when you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them.’ So they went out and proclaimed that people should repent. And they cast out many demons and anointed with oil many who were sick and healed them.

Gospel (USA) Mark 6:7-13 Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out.

Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over unclean spirits. He instructed them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick –no food, no sack, no money in their belts. They were, however, to wear sandals but not a second tunic. He said to them, “Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave from there. Whatever place does not welcome you or listen to you, leave there and shake the dust off your feet in testimony against them.” So they went off and preached repentance. The Twelve drove out many demons, and they anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.

Reflections (9)

(i) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s gospel reading says that Jesus ‘began’ to send out the Twelve to share in his mission. The word ‘began’ suggests that it was the beginning of a process. Jesus would continue to send out his disciples to share in his mission. The risen Lord today continues to send out his disciples to share in his mission. Each one of us, in virtue of our baptism, is called to share in the Lord’s mission. We are called to be missionary disciples. According to the gospel reading, one of the ways the Twelve were to share in Jesus’ mission was by caring for the sick and disturbed. Jesus’ mission was to bring God’s healing and life-giving love to all, and especially to those who were broken in body, mind or spirit. This is the mission he sent out the Twelve to continue, and it is the mission he calls on all of his disciples, the whole church, to continue today. Whenever we journey in a caring way with those who are vulnerable and broken in some way, we are sharing in the Lord’s mission. We are allowing the Lord to continue his mission through our lives today. The Lord who sends us out to share in his mission in this way always journeys with us. It is his mission and he will always engage in it through us. Each day we can invite the Lord to come alive within us and to work through us, so that his mission can continue to touch the lives of others in a healing and life-giving way in our own time and place.

And/Or

(ii) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

We tend to attach a lot of importance to preparing for every eventuality. We like to feel that we are in control and that if anything unexpected happens we will have the resources to deal with it. In this morning’s gospel reading Jesus sends out the twelve remarkably unprepared by today’s standards. They were to take nothing for their journey except a staff, no bread, no haversack, no coppers for their purses. They can wear sandals but they were not to bring a spare tunic. As he sent them out, they were certainly not in control; they were not self-sufficient. Rather, they were to depend on the generosity and hospitality of those who welcomed their ministry. Perhaps Jesus was trying to teach them that, in reality, they are not in control; God was ultimately in control and they would have to learn to trust in God more than in themselves. There is a message there that we all need to keep on learning. The reality is that we are not in control of our lives, not matter how well we prepare ourselves for unexpected eventualities. A brush with serious illness can bring that home to us. Suddenly, all our plans and preparations have to be put to one side. The realization that we are not in control of our lives, that we are not Lord of our lives, frees us to surrender ourselves more fully to God, the real Lord of our lives.

And/Or

(iii) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading this morning Mark shows how early into his ministry Jesus sent out the twelve that he had chosen to share in his work. He sent them out to do what he has been doing, to preach the gospel and to heal the sick. Jesus understood that he needed the help of others to do the work he had been sent to do. He continues to need us today to do his work. We are to be his eyes, his ears, his hands, his feet and his voice. As risen Lord he wants to work in and through us. Paul understood this very clearly. He understood the church to be the body of Christ in the world. He was very clear that every member of Christ’s body had a vital role to play. The body of Christ could not be all Christ wants it to be unless everyone plays the role they are called and equipped to play through their baptism. Each one of us has a unique contribution to make to the life of Christ’s body, the church, and, thereby, to the work of the Lord in the world today. Each one of us is indispensable and necessary. The first reading from the letter to the Hebrews puts it very simply. In the church everyone is a ‘first-born child’ and a ‘citizen of heaven’. There are to be no second class citizens in the church. Each of us is a vital member of Christ’s body uniquely graced by the Lord for his work and mission in the world.

And/Or

(iv) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

When Jesus sends out the twelve to share in his mission in this morning’s gospel reading, he anticipates that not everyone will welcome their words or their works. Jesus had just been rejected by the people of Nazareth in the passage immediately preceding our gospel reading. His disciples can expect something similar at times. In the words of the gospel reading, Jesus anticipates that the disciples will enter places which do not welcome them and where people refuse to listen to them. Yet, that experience of failure is not to discourage them, just as it did not discourage Jesus. They are to be faithful to their calling to share in Jesus’ mission, in season and out of season, regardless of how they are received. In spite of the experience of failure and rejection, the disciples did great good, proclaiming the gospel and healing the sick. The Lord encourages us to keep being faithful to our baptismal calling, in spite of the setbacks along the way, whether they are failings in ourselves or failings in others. We are to be more attentive to the Lord’s call and promise than to the negative voices that come to us from others or from within ourselves.

And/Or

(v) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

When Jesus chose a group of twelve from among the larger group of disciples, he chose the number twelve very deliberately, as an echo of the twelve tribes of Israel. He seems to have seen the group of twelve as the nucleus of a renewed Israel. They were to have a special role in Jesus’ mission of renewing God’s people. In this morning’s gospel reading, we have Mark’s account of Jesus sending out the twelve for the first time to share in his mission. It is noteworthy that Jesus sends them out in pairs. Rather than twelve individuals going off in twelve different directions, there are six groups of two going off in six different directions. Some might think that it would have been more effective to send out the twelve individually; in that way twice the area could have been covered. However, Jesus clearly saw a greater value in sending out the twelve in twos. No one was to work alone; each would have someone else to work alongside. As disciples of the Lord today, we still need to work together, rather than as individuals or loners. When we work together we learn to receive from and give to each other and, thereby, the Lord is more fully present to others. He did say that where two or three are gathered he would be there in their midst. Even Paul, the great apostle to the Gentiles, was very aware of the debt he owed to what he called his co-workers. The Lord needs us to work together if his work is to be done in today’s world. As members of the Lord’s body, we are interdependent. In the life of faith, we never go it alone.

And/Or

(vi) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

In the instructions that Jesus gives to the twelve as he sends them out on mission, he takes it for granted that their message and ministry will not be well received everywhere. He makes reference to places that do not welcome them and to people who do not listen to them. In such situations, all they can do is walk away. Yet, the prospect of their message not being welcomed and listened to by some should not deter them. They are to preach the gospel and give expression to the gospel in their works of healing. Jesus himself knew that his message and mission would not be welcomed by everyone but would be rejected by some in the most violent way possible. The situation with regard to preaching the gospel today is not any different to how it was for Jesus and his first disciples. We are called to be people of faith in a context that is not always supportive of faith. When we come up against a lack of openness to faith, or indifference or even hostility, it can easily unsettle our own faith. Today, more than even, we need a faith that is not dependent on the approval of others. Ultimately, our faith needs to be rooted in the Lord; it is a response to his faith in us, his faithfulness to us. It is the Lord’s faithful presence to us that keeps us faithful, regardless of how are faith is received by others. One of the ways we experience the Lord’s faithful presence is in and through the community of faith, the family of his follower. The first reading speaks of the church is which everyone is a first born and a citizen of heaven. We need to belong there, to be grounded there, if we are to experience the Lord’s faithful presence to the full, so as to witness to our faith even in settings that have little appreciation for it.

And/Or

(vii) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

There comes a time in life when we need to let others do what we have been doing. We have to let go so that others can take on. None of us can keep doing what we have been doing forever. We need the wisdom to know when to entrust some of our responsibility, some of our work, to others. We find that happening in both of today’s readings. As David comes towards the end of his life, he passes on his role as king, his responsibilities to God’s people, to his son Solomon. In the gospel reading, Jesus entrusts the twelve whom he had earlier chosen with a share in his mission. They had spent time with him and now he is ready to send them out as his ambassadors to preach what he has been preaching and to engage in his healing ministry. This happened reasonably early on in Jesus’ public ministry. We might be tempted to think that, like David, Jesus would have waited until nearer the end of his life before entrusting a share in his mission to others. However, it seems, for Jesus, this task of entrusting to others a share in his work couldn’t wait any longer than was absolutely necessary. The Lord desperately needs us to share in his work today. As members of his body the church, we are his feet, his arms, his legs, his eyes, his ears, his mouth, his heart and mind. As the Lord once expressed himself through his physical body, he now expresses himself through all of us, his ecclesial body. The Lord needs us all if his work is to continue today, and just as he sent out the twelve in pairs, in six groups of two, he does sends us out not as individuals but with others. He can work through us most effectively when we work together, pooling our gifts and resources.

And/Or

(viii) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s first reading portrays in striking language the goal of our earthly journey. It speaks of ‘the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem… in which everyone is a ‘first born’ and a citizen of heaven’. In this heavenly city, the distinction between citizens and non-citizens will not apply. All will have equal access to God and to his Son. Jesus’ mission was to make something of this heavenly city a reality on earth. This is what he meant by proclaiming that the kingdom of God was at hand. He gathered people from all walks of life and backgrounds around himself, declaring that they could all be his brothers and sisters if they did the will of his heavenly Father, if they followed in the way of God’s Son. He taught his followers to pray to God his Father, ‘they kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven’. He called others to help him in his work of creating an opening for the coming of God’s kingdom, the city of the living God. This is what we find Jesus doing in today’s gospel reading, as he sends out the twelve to share in his mission of word and deed. In the course of the gospels, he calls and sends out many more, men and women. He needs each one of us to share in his work of creating an opening for the coming of the city of the living God, a community where all are cherished equally as sons and daughters of God and brothers and sisters of Christ. Our earthly cities fall far short at times of the city of the living God, but the Lord needs the goodness and the giftedness of us all if our earthly cities are to become more like the heavenly Jerusalem.

And/Or

(ix) Thursday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

The disciples whom Jesus had earlier called and who have been with him for some time are now ready to be sent out on mission. They are to travel light, so as to be open to what God will give them through those to whom they preach the gospel. They are not to be so self-sufficient that they feel they have everything they need and nothing to receive from those to whom they are sent. Yes, they have much to give to others, the richness of the gospel, the life-giving power of the Lord, but they also have something to receive from others. The Lord is reminding us that we are dependent on each other. This is especially the case within the realm of faith. The Lord wants to work through us for the building up of others in the Lord and the Lord also wants to work through others for our building up. We are to be generous enough to share what the Lord gives us with others and humble enough to receive from others what the Lord has given them. This is the essential nature of the church. Saint Paul expressed this nature of the church when he spoke of the church as the body of Christ in which no one was self-sufficient and everyone was needed. It is very much a vision of church for our time. All of the baptized are called to be both givers and receivers. As the Lord sent out the Twelve, the Lord sends each one of us to everyone else and is sending others to each one of us. We are always to be asking ourselves, ‘To whom is the Lord sending me?’ and ‘Whom is the Lord sending to me?’

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

5th February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Wednesday, Fourth Week of the Year (Inc. Mark 6:1-6): ‘Where did the man get all this?’

Wednesday, Fourth Week of the Year

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 6:1-6 'A prophet is only despised in his own country'.

Jesus went to his home town and his disciples accompanied him. With the coming of the sabbath he began teaching in the synagogue and most of them were astonished when they heard him. They said, ‘Where did the man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been granted him, and these miracles that are worked through him? This is the carpenter, surely, the son of Mary, the brother of James and Joset and Jude and Simon? His sisters, too, are they not here with us?’ And they would not accept him. And Jesus said to them, ‘A prophet is only despised in his own country, among his own relations and in his own house’; and he could work no miracle there, though he cured a few sick people by laying his hands on them. He was amazed at their lack of faith.

Gospel (GB) Mark 6:1-6 ‘A prophet is not without honour, except in his home town.’

At that time: Jesus came to his home town, and his disciples followed him. And on the Sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished, saying, ‘Where did this man get these things? What is the wisdom given to him? How are such mighty works done by his hands? Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?’ And they took offence at him. And Jesus said to them, ‘A prophet is not without honour, except in his home town and among his relatives and in his own household.’ And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. And he marvelled because of their unbelief. And he went about among the villages teaching.

Gospel (USA) Mark 6:1-6 A prophet is not without honor except in his native place.

Jesus departed from there and came to his native place, accompanied by his disciples. When the sabbath came he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished. They said, “Where did this man get all this? What kind of wisdom has been given him? What mighty deeds are wrought by his hands! Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joseph and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.” So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them. He was amazed at their lack of faith.

Reflections (5)

(i) Wednesday, Fourth Week of the Year

Jesus had spent the best part of thirty years in Nazareth. During that time he was known by all as the carpenter, or the son of the carpenter, and the son of Mary. However, since leaving Nazareth, Jesus’ life had taken a new direction. He had thrown himself into the work that God had given him to do. He had left Nazareth as a carpenter; he returned as a teacher and a healer. There was in fact much more to Jesus that his own townspeople had ever suspected while he was living among them. The gospel reading suggests that, when he returned for the first time after leaving, they could not accept this ‘more’; they rejected him. They wanted him to be the person they had always known; they would not allow him to move on from their former perception of him. The image they had of him, which they held on to with great tenacity, became a block to their learning more about him. There was more to Jesus than the people of Nazareth were aware of. Indeed there is always more to every human being than we are aware of. That is true even of those we would claim to know well. We can easily assume that we know someone, when, in reality, we only know one side to them. We are each made in God’s image. There is a profound mystery to each one of us. We can never fully grasp the mystery of another person’s life. This is uniquely true of Jesus. It was Jesus’ very ordinariness that made it difficult for the people of Nazareth to see him as he really was, in all his mystery. God was powerfully present to them in and through someone who was as ordinary, in many respects, as they themselves. God continues to come to us today in and through the ordinary, in and through those who are most familiar to us. Indeed, the primary way the Lord comes to us is in and through the everyday. The ordinary and familiar will often reveal to us the mystery of God’s presence, if we have eyes to see and ears to hear. The ground of daily life is often holy ground.

And/Or

(ii) Wednesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

The people of Nazareth were slow to recognize the implications of the great wisdom Jesus possessed and the power for good that was at work through him on behalf of the sick and suffering. They should have concluded from all of this that God must be working through this man in a special way. Instead, they would not accept him; in the words of Jesus, they despised him. He was too familiar to them; they knew his mother and his family. He was one of their own; he was too ordinary. He could not possibly be all that different to everyone else in Nazareth. It is a clear case of familiarity breeding contempt. The reading suggests that we can sometimes be slow to recognize the presence of God in the ordinary and the familiar. We don’t have to go long distances, or encounter extraordinary phenomena, to make contact with the wisdom and the power of God. The Lord’s presence is all around us in the near and the familiar, in the humdrum and in the ordinary, if we have eyes to see and ears to hear. The gospel reading invites us to see the familiar and the ordinary with new eyes, the eyes of faith. The failure of the people of Nazareth to see in this way inhibited what Jesus could do among them, ‘he could work no miracle there’. Our seeing with the eyes of faith gives the Lord space to work among us in new ways.

And/Or

(iii) Wednesday, Fourth Week of the Year

In today’s gospel reading the people of Nazareth took offense at the fact that one of their own, someone whose family they knew well, someone whom they had known as a carpenter, was now displaying great wisdom in the words he spoke and great power in his deeds on behalf of others. ‘What is this wisdom that has been granted to him, and these miracles that are worked through him?’ They took offense, it seems, not at his actual wisdom and power, but at the fact that one of their own was displaying such wisdom and power. It was as if Jesus was too ordinary, too much like themselves, to be taken seriously. They were coming up against the scandal of the incarnation, the Word who was God became flesh as all of us are flesh. God chose to come to us in and through someone who was like us in all things, except sin. When Jesus went on to speak about God, he often pointed to the ordinary, to the familiar, to the normal – a farmer sowing seed, a man on a journey from Jerusalem to Jericho, a rebellious son in a family, a widow looking for justice from a judge. The life and teaching of Jesus shows us that God speaks to us in and through the ordinary events of life. What we need are the eyes to see and the ears to hear the extraordinary in the ordinary, the divine in the human.

And/Or

(iv) Wednesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

In today’s first reading, the author says to his listeners, ‘Be careful… that no root of bitterness should begin to grow and make trouble; this can poison a whole community’. That bitterness is in evidence among those who were present in the synagogue of Nazareth when Jesus was preaching. According to Mark, when Jesus had preached elsewhere in Galilee people ‘were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, “What is this? A new teaching – with authority!”’. When he healed the paralytic, ‘they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”’. The reaction of the people of Jesus’ own village was very different. They recognized the wisdom of his teaching and the powerful deeds that were worked through him. However, far from glorifying God, recognizing that God was the source of his wisdom and powerful deeds, they would not accept him. Jesus met with a wall of unbelief, with the result, according to Mark, ‘he could work no miracle there’. It was as if the resistance of the people of Nazareth disempowered him. The gospel reading suggests that the very familiarity of Jesus, one of their own, prevented them from appreciating the true identity of the one who was standing among them. Sometimes familiarity does breed contempt. Our very familiarity with the gospel message can breed, if not contempt, a certain indifference within us. We need to keep on recovering the freshness of the gospel, which is both ever ancient and ever new, so that we continue to stand in amazement at all Jesus says and does in the gospel story, and, also, at the enduring power of his words and his presence among us today. The people of Nazareth couldn’t accept that an ordinary carpenter could be revealing God to them. The gospel reading encourages us to keep recognizing the presence of the Lord in the familiar. As the poet Patrick Kavanagh says, ‘God is in the bits and pieces of everyday’.

And/Or

(v) Wednesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

We are familiar with the saying, ‘Familiarity breeds contempt’. We see this saying working itself out in today’s gospel reading. Jesus returns to his home town of Nazareth. It was a very ordinary, insignificant, out of the way kind of place, which is never mentioned in the Jewish Scriptures. Jesus’ family were as ordinary as all the other inhabitants of this small town. He was the son of a ‘carpenter’, a term that can refer to a person with a skill not just with wood but with stone. Such a skill would have been in demand but indicated nothing exceptional. The people of Nazareth were familiar with Jesus’ family who continued to live among them and whose members they could name off. Rather than rejoicing in the life-giving power of his ministry and the wisdom of his teaching, the people of Nazareth were scandalized by him, because, in so many ways, he was no different from themselves. We encounter here the scandal of the incarnation. God was powerfully present to them through someone who was one of their own. God comes to us all in and through the ordinary and the everyday. The great saints never ceased being amazed at the mysterious presence of God that they sensed all around them. To grow in faith is to grow in our capacity to recognize the presence of the Lord in and through the ordinary and the familiar. What we call in the liturgy ‘Ordinary Time’ is filled with the mysterious presence of the Lord and every place can be holy ground. In today’s psalm, the one praying says, ‘You are my hiding place, O Lord’. The Lord can be our hiding place, protecting us from harm. There is also a sense in which we are the Lord’s hiding place. The Lord is present, often in a hidden way, in each one of us, and, also, in all the circumstances of our daily lives. The Word who took flesh and dwelt among us continues to dwell among us, even though we are not always aware of him. In the words of John the Baptist, ‘Among you stands one whom you do not know, the one who is coming after me’.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

4th February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 5:21-43): ‘My daughter, your faith has restored you to health’.

Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 5:21-43 Little girl, I tell you to get up.

When Jesus had crossed in the boat to the other side, a large crowd gathered round him and he stayed by the lakeside. Then one of the synagogue officials came up, Jairus by name, and seeing him, fell at his feet and pleaded with him earnestly, saying, ‘My little daughter is desperately sick. Do come and lay your hands on her to make her better and save her life.’ Jesus went with him and a large crowd followed him; they were pressing all round him. Now there was a woman who had suffered from a haemorrhage for twelve years; after long and painful treatment under various doctors, she spent all she had without being any the better for it, in fact, she was getting worse. She had heard about Jesus, and she came up behind him through the crowd and touched his cloak. ‘If I can touch even his clothes,’ she had told herself ‘I shall be well again.’ And the source of the bleeding dried up instantly, and she felt in herself that she was cured of her complaint. Immediately aware that power had gone out from him, Jesus turned round in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched my clothes?’ His disciples said to him, ‘You see how the crowd is pressing round you and yet you say, “Who touched me?”’ But he continued to look all round to see who had done it. Then the woman came forward, frightened and trembling because she knew what had happened to her, and she fell at his feet and told him the whole truth. ‘My daughter,’ he said ‘your faith has restored you to health; go in peace and be free from your complaint.’ While he was still speaking some people arrived from the house of the synagogue official to say, ‘Your daughter is dead: why put the Master to any further trouble?’ But Jesus had overheard this remark of theirs and he said to the official, ‘Do not be afraid; only have faith.’ And he allowed no one to go with him except Peter and James and John the brother of James. So they came to the official’s house and Jesus noticed all the commotion, with people weeping and wailing unrestrainedly. He went in and said to them, ‘Why all this commotion and crying? The child is not dead, but asleep.’ But they laughed at him. So he turned them all out and, taking with him the child’s father and mother and his own companions, he went into the place where the child lay. And taking the child by the hand he said to her, ‘Talitha, kum!’ which means, ‘Little girl, I tell you to get up.’ The little girl got up at once and began to walk about, for she was twelve years old. At this they were overcome with astonishment, and he ordered them strictly not to let anyone know about it, and told them to give her something to eat.

Gospel (GB) Mark 5:21-43 ‘Little girl, I say to you, arise.’

At that time: When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him, and he was beside the sea. Then came one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name, and seeing him, he fell at his feet and implored him earnestly, saying, ‘My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well and live.’ And he went with him. And a great crowd followed him and thronged about him. And there was a woman who had had a discharge of blood for twelve years, and who had suffered much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was no better but rather grew worse. She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment. For she said, ‘If I touch even his garments, I will be made well.’ And immediately the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. And Jesus, perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched my garments?’ And his disciples said to him, ‘You see the crowd pressing around you, and yet you say, “Who touched me?” ’ And he looked round to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling and fell down before him and told him the whole truth. And he said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.’ While he was still speaking, there came from the ruler’s house some who said, ‘Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the Teacher any further?’ But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue, ‘Do not fear, only believe.’ And he allowed no one to follow him except Peter and James and John the brother of James. They came to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. And when he had entered, he said to them, ‘Why are you making a commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but sleeping.’ And they laughed at him. But he put them all outside and took the child’s father and mother and those who were with him and went in where the child was. Taking her by the hand he said to her, ‘Talitha cumi’, which means, ‘Little girl, I say to you, arise.’ And immediately the girl got up and began walking, for she was twelve years of age, and they were immediately overcome with amazement. And he strictly charged them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat.

Gospel (USA) Mark 5:21-43 Little girl, I say to you, arise!

When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a large crowd gathered around him, and he stayed close to the sea. One of the synagogue officials, named Jairus, came forward. Seeing him he fell at his feet and pleaded earnestly with him, saying, “My daughter is at the point of death. Please, come lay your hands on her that she may get well and live.” He went off with him and a large crowd followed him. There was a woman afflicted with hemorrhages for twelve years. She had suffered greatly at the hands of many doctors and had spent all that she had. Yet she was not helped but only grew worse. She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak. She said, “If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured.” Immediately her flow of blood dried up. She felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction. Jesus, aware at once that power had gone out from him, turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who has touched my clothes?” But his disciples said to him, “You see how the crowd is pressing upon you, and yet you ask, Who touched me?” And he looked around to see who had done it. The woman, realizing what had happened to her, approached in fear and trembling. She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth. He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has saved you. Go in peace and be cured of your affliction.” While he was still speaking, people from the synagogue official’s house arrived and said, “Your daughter has died; why trouble the teacher any longer?” Disregarding the message that was reported, Jesus said to the synagogue official, “Do not be afraid; just have faith.” He did not allow anyone to accompany him inside except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. When they arrived at the house of the synagogue official, he caught sight of a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. So he went in and said to them, “Why this commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but asleep.” And they ridiculed him. Then he put them all out. He took along the child’s father and mother and those who were with him and entered the room where the child was. He took the child by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum,” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise!” The girl, a child of twelve, arose immediately and walked around. At that they were utterly astounded. He gave strict orders that no one should know this and said that she should be given something to eat.

Reflections (8)

(i) Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

When Jesus set out walking to the house of Jairus in response to Jairus’ urgent plea for this daughter, his urgent journey was interrupted by a woman who approached Jesus furtively for healing. Yet, Jesus gave himself fully to this interruption. He could have kept walking when the woman touched his clothing, but he attended to her in a very personal way. That was the call of the present moment for Jesus, even though he was on an urgent mission. In answering that call, he was doing God’s work, and the task he initially set out to accomplish did not suffer. Jairus had his daughter restored to him. The gospel reading encourages us to pay attention to the interruptions in life. What can seem like distractions can be where the Lord is calling us to be. When matters don’t turn out as we wanted because of some unexpected turn of events, it may not be the disaster that we think it is at the time. When what we had planned doesn’t quite come to pass, it can create the space for something else to happen that we did not plan for but which can have great value for ourselves and for others. Sometimes we need to embrace the interruptions, rather than just driving on with our head down towards the goal we have set for ourselves. We can misjudge where the real work lies. Sometimes the interruptions are our work, especially when they involve responding with compassion to the needs of others. When we set out on a journey, what happens on the way can be just as important as what happens at our destination.

And/Or

(ii) Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

There are two stories in this morning’s gospel reading. There is the story of Jesus healing the daughter of Jairus and the story of the healing of the woman with a flow of blood. The woman’s condition not only cost her a lot of money on physicians but would have left her on the margins of the community. In virtue of her condition she would have been considered ritually unclean and would not have been able to attend the synagogue. On his way to the house of Jairus, Jesus is interrupted by this nameless woman who furtively touches the cloak of Jesus and, as a result, experiences healing of her condition. Although he is interrupted while on an important mission to heal Jairus’ daughter, Jesus looks to engage this woman in a very personal way. She simply wanted the most secretive and impersonal of contacts, the touching of Jesus’ cloak. Jesus wanted more. He sensed a woman of faith had touched him and had opened herself to the life-giving power of God’s kingdom at work within him. Jesus wanted to acknowledge this woman’s faith publicly; he wanted her to witness publicly to her own faith in him. When she comes forward to do so, Jesus assures this woman who had been excluded from the community that she belongs; he addresses her as ‘daughter’. She is as much a daughter of Abraham as anyone else. Jesus also acknowledges that while many people were touching him, her touching him was an act of faith that was life-giving for her. The story suggests that when we are heading somewhere and we are delayed or interrupted, the interruption can be just as important as the destination towards which we are journeying.  Jesus shows us that the interruption can often be an opportunity to reach out to someone in a way that leaves them with a greater sense of belonging.

And/Or

(iii) Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel reading, two people approach Jesus for help. One was a synagogue official named Jairus, a person of some standing in the community, who approached Jesus very publicly on behalf of his dying daughter. The other was a nameless woman who would have been excluded from the synagogue because of her condition and who approached Jesus very privately on her own behalf, discreetly touching the hem of his garment. For all their differences, these two people had something in common. Their need was great, and they approached Jesus in their need. They also shared a great trust in the power of Jesus to bring life where there was death. Faith in the Lord can bring together people who otherwise might have very little else in common. The church, the community of believers, is very diverse. All of humanity is there. The gospel reading also suggests that the Lord wants to engage with each one of us in our uniqueness. He wants a personal relationship with each of us. That is why he wanted to meet the woman who touched the hem of his cloak. He needed to look into her eyes, to talk to her, to confirm her faith that led her to him. The woman who wanted to be anonymous found herself addressed by Jesus as ‘my daughter’. The Lord calls each of us by name; he relates to us as the unique individual that we are.

And/Or

(iv) Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s gospel reading gives us two stories that are interconnected. At the centre of the two stories are two adults who differ greatly from each one. We are given the name of one, Jairus; he was a synagogue official and, therefore, a person of reasonably high social status and probably well to do. The other person is a woman, whose name we are not given; she had a condition which excluded her from the synagogue and had become impoverished because of her illness. Here we have two people from opposite ends of the social and religious spectrum. Yet, they have something in common and that is their trusting faith in Jesus as the Lord and giver of life. Jairus fell at Jesus’ feet in a very public way; the woman came up behind Jesus and secretly touched his cloak. One didn’t mind being noticed; the other didn’t want to be noticed. They approach Jesus in very different ways but their faith is equally strong. Yet, it was the woman that Jesus challenged to be more public about her faith, with the question, ‘Who touched me?’ The Lord looks to us to publicly witness to our trusting faith in him. Our public witness is a support to the faith of others.

And/Or

(v) Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Jesus asks many questions on the pages of the four gospels. It can sometimes be worthwhile to notice the questions he asks and to sit with them. In this morning’s gospel reading we have one of those questions, ‘Who touched me?’ The disciples found this a very strange question, ‘You see the crowd is pressing round you and yet you say, “Who touched me?”’ The disciples were saying, ‘how can you ask that question; there are dozens of people touching you’. Yet, Jesus knew that one person touched him in a way that was different. Many people were brushing up against him; one person took the initiative to make personal contact with him. When Jesus discovered who it was, he said to her, ‘your faith has restored you to health’. The woman was seeking him out in a way that was not true of others who were around him. The Lord is always passing by; he is always among us. Sometimes we can brush up against him without paying him much attention. The woman shows us the value of a very personal and very deliberate reaching out towards the Lord. The gospel reading suggests that this is how we will experience his life-giving presence in our lives.

And/Or

(vi) Tuesday, fourth week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel reading, two people approach Jesus in their need, one a well-to-do synagogue official and the other an impoverished woman. There is quite a difference in the way that each of them approaches Jesus. The synagogue official approaches him in a very public way, falling at Jesus’ feet and pleading with him earnestly before the crowd that was gathered around him. In contrast, the woman approached Jesus in a very private way, coming up behind him through the crowd and touching his cloak. She didn’t have the self-confidence of the synagogue official. Perhaps she felt unworthy to be approaching Jesus. After all, she was a woman; she was penniless; she had a physical condition that, under the Jewish Law, rendered her ritually unclean and prevented her from entering the synagogue. Yet, Jesus wanted a personal encounter with this woman; he wanted to engage publicly with her, just as he had engaged publicly with the synagogue official. That is why he asked aloud, ‘Who touched me?’ When the woman eventually came forward, Jesus addressed her as ‘My daughter’ and commended her for her faith. The gospel reading reminds us that the Lord does not make distinctions between people. He wants each one of us to approach him in trust as beloved sons and daughters regardless of where we find ourselves in life. There is nothing that need block us from confidently coming before the Lord in our need and opening ourselves to his personal presence to us.

And/Or

(vii) Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s gospel reading presents us with two interlocking stories. Two desperate people approach Jesus in their need, a man and a woman, a prominent person within the synagogue community and someone excluded from that community because of her physical condition. Both stories make reference to touching. Jairus pleads with Jesus to come and touch, lay his hands, on his seriously ill daughter, and Jesus goes on to take Jairus’ daughter by the hand and lift her up. The woman reaches out and touches the hem of Jesus’ cloak. In both stories, the act of touching brings life where there was death, healing where there was sickness. Both stories can speak to our own faith lives. The Lord wants to touch our lives in a healing and life-giving way, as he touched the life of Jairus’ daughter. The Lord does not relate to us at a distance. As he entered the home of Jairus and took his daughter by the hand, so he enters our homes, our lives, and takes us by the hand. He has entered fully into our human condition and meets each one of us where we are. The Lord who comes to us also desires us to come to him, like the woman in the gospel reading. As he touches our lives with his presence, he looks to us to touch his presence with our faith, like the woman. Michelangelo’s masterly painting of God creating Adam on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel comes to mind. The Lord reaches out to touch our lives and, in doing so, moves us to reach out in faith and touch his presence to us.

And/Or

(viii) Tuesday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

The grief of David in the first reading is very moving. Even though his son Absalom had led a rebellion against his father, he was still David’s son and on hearing the news of Absalom’s death David grieved bitter tears, as any father would for a son, even a rebellious son. In the gospel reading, we hear of the death of a daughter, not a rebellious daughter but a young girl of twelve years of age. Her death causes people to grieve, to weep and wail unreservedly, in the words of the gospel reading. The death of children is especially heart-breaking, especially for the child’s parents. In the gospel reading, Jesus takes the child by the hand and restores her to life and instructs that she be given something to eat. The evangelist is showing us that the power of Jesus is stronger than the power of death. This became very evident to the early church in the light of the resurrection of Jesus. As believers in a risen Lord, we continue to grieve when a loved one dies. Yet, there is hope in our grief because we are convinced that the Lord is stronger than death. If we open ourselves in faith to the Lord, like Jairus and the woman with the flow of blood in the gospel reading, we will experience his life-giving power just as they did. Jesus remains the life-giver for all who turn to him in faith, both in the course of this earthly life and, especially, at the hour of our death.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

3rd February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 5:1-20): ‘What do you want with me?’

Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 5:1-20 The Gadarene swine.

Jesus and his disciples reached the country of the Gerasenes on the other side of the lake, and no sooner had Jesus left the boat than a man with an unclean spirit came out from the tombs towards him. The man lived in the tombs and no one could secure him any more, even with a chain; because he had often been secured with fetters and chains but had snapped the chains and broken the fetters, and no one had the strength to control him. All night and all day, among the tombs and in the mountains, he would howl and gash himself with stones. Catching sight of Jesus from a distance, he ran up and fell at his feet and shouted at the top of his voice, ‘What do you want with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God? Swear by God you will not torture me!’ – for Jesus had been saying to him, ‘Come out of the man, unclean spirit.’ ‘What is your name?’ Jesus asked. ‘My name is legion,’ he answered ‘for there are many of us.’ And he begged him earnestly not to send them out of the district. Now there was there on the mountainside a great herd of pigs feeding, and the unclean spirits begged him, ‘Send us to the pigs, let us go into them.’ So he gave them leave. With that, the unclean spirits came out and went into the pigs, and the herd of about two thousand pigs charged down the cliff into the lake, and there they were drowned. The swineherds ran off and told their story in the town and in the country round about; and the people came to see what had really happened. They came to Jesus and saw the demoniac sitting there, clothed and in his full senses – the very man who had had the legion in him before – and they were afraid. And those who had witnessed it reported what had happened to the demoniac and what had become of the pigs. Then they began to implore Jesus to leave the neighbourhood. As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed begged to be allowed to stay with him. Jesus would not let him but said to him, ‘Go home to your people and tell them all that the Lord in his mercy has done for you.’ So the man went off and proceeded to spread throughout the Decapolis all that Jesus had done for him. And everyone was amazed.

Gospel (GB) Mark 5:1-20 ‘Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!’

At that time: Jesus and his disciples came to the other side of the lake, to the country of the Gerasenes. And when Jesus had stepped out of the boat, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit. He lived among the tombs. And no one could bind him any more, not even with a chain, for he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but he wrenched the chains apart, and he broke the shackles in pieces. No one had the strength to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains he was always crying out and cutting himself with stones. And when he saw Jesus from afar, he ran and fell down before him. And crying out with a loud voice, he said, ‘What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.’ For he was saying to him, ‘Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!’ And Jesus asked him, ‘What is your name?’ He replied, ‘My name is Legion, for we are many.’ And he begged him earnestly not to send them out of the country. Now a great herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside, and they begged him, saying, ‘Send us to the pigs; let us enter them.’ So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the pigs; and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned in the sea. The herdsmen fled and told it in the city and in the country. And people came to see what it was that had happened. And they came to Jesus and saw the demon-possessed man, the one who had had the legion, sitting there, clothed and in his right mind, and they were afraid. And those who had seen it described to them what had happened to the demon-possessed man and to the pigs. And they began to beg Jesus to depart from their region. As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed with demons begged him that he might be with him. And he did not permit him but said to him, ‘Go home to your friends and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.’ And he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and everyone marvelled.

Gospel (USA) Mark 5:1-20 Unclean spirit, come out of the man!

Jesus and his disciples came to the other side of the sea, to the territory of the Gerasenes. When he got out of the boat, at once a man from the tombs who had an unclean spirit met him. The man had been dwelling among the tombs, and no one could restrain him any longer, even with a chain. In fact, he had frequently been bound with shackles and chains, but the chains had been pulled apart by him and the shackles smashed, and no one was strong enough to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the hillsides he was always crying out and bruising himself with stones. Catching sight of Jesus from a distance, he ran up and prostrated himself before him, crying out in a loud voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me!” (He had been saying to him, “Unclean spirit, come out of the man!”) He asked him, “What is your name?” He replied, “Legion is my name. There are many of us.” And he pleaded earnestly with him not to drive them away from that territory. Now a large herd of swine was feeding there on the hillside. And they pleaded with him, “Send us into the swine. Let us enter them.” And he let them, and the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine. The herd of about two thousand rushed down a steep bank into the sea, where they were drowned. The swineherds ran away and reported the incident in the town and throughout the countryside. And people came out to see what had happened. As they approached Jesus, they caught sight of the man who had been possessed by Legion, sitting there clothed and in his right mind. And they were seized with fear. Those who witnessed the incident explained to them what had happened to the possessed man and to the swine. Then they began to beg him to leave their district. As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed pleaded to remain with him. But Jesus would not permit him but told him instead, “Go home to your family and announce to them all that the Lord in his pity has done for you.” Then the man went off and began to proclaim in the Decapolis what Jesus had done for him; and all were amazed.

Reflections (10)

(i) Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s first reading mentions a number of people from the Old Testament. It is said of them, ‘they were weak people who were given strength’. God gave them the strength they needed to face the most difficult of situations. The man who lived among the tombs, in the gospel reading, could not be described as weak. He had the strength to snap the chains and break the fetters with which he had been secured. No one had the strength to control him. He seems to have had an almost superhuman strength. Yet, it was a destructive strength, damaging to himself and to others. According to the gospel reading, he would gash himself with stones and was clearly a danger to the local townspeople, which is why he had been banished to the local graveyard. Here was someone who had a storm raging within him. When Jesus came within sight of him, he addressed Jesus very aggressively, ‘What do you want with me, Jesus Son of the Most High God?’ His destructive strength came from his anger, and his anger was a sign of how damaged and broken he was. Yet, Jesus did not run from him, as others did. He absorbed his anger and then healed his brokenness. When the townspeople saw him in the company of Jesus, he was ‘in his full senses’. The story reminds us that Jesus never runs away from us, no matter how unapproachable we may be to others. He comes to us as we are, sometimes in our brokenness and anger, and, if we are open to his coming, he can calm the storm that might be raging within us, just as he calmed the storm at sea. The risen Lord is always entering our personal storms to give us a share in his strength, which is a life-giving strength that empowers us to become the person he is calling us to be.

And/Or

(ii) Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

The gospel reading this morning puts before us probably the most disturbed person in the whole gospel story. He loved alone among the tombs; he was so violent that he could not be secured even with fetters and chains. He howled among the tombs night and day and regularly inflicted serious injury on himself. Here is someone who is out of control who, from a Jewish perspective, is living in territory that is out of bounds, a graveyard in a Gentile region. Yet, he was not out of bounds, as far as Jesus was concerned. Jesus met with him and spoke to him. After his meeting with Jesus he ceased to be out of control. Indeed, we are told that, in response to the call of Jesus, he went on to spread the word about all that Jesus had done for him throughout a very large region. This very disturbed person became an evangelist, the preacher of the gospel to the Gentiles. It is hard to imagine a greater transformation in someone’s life. We all need to be transformed in one way or another. We all need the Lord to help change us for the better. We too can find ourselves out of bounds, out of control. We ask the Lord this morning to bring us within the bounds of his love and to free us to submit to his control.

And/Or

(iii) Monday, Fourth week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s gospel reading is one of the most unusual miracle stories in the four gospels. The story is set in pagan territory and at its centre is a very disturbed person who was a danger to himself and probably to others. The response of those in his neighbourhood was to secure him with chains and to place him among the tombs with the dead. There was no place for him among the living. When Jesus arrived in this territory, this disturbed man approached him, and even though the man’s initial approach to Jesus was very aggressive, Jesus engaged him in conversation. By the end of the conversation, the man was freed from what had left him so disturbed and not only that but he had taken on a ministry. In response to Jesus’ invitation, he proclaimed throughout the region all that Jesus had done for him - all that God had done for him through Jesus. He became a preacher of the gospel. Jesus had just calmed the storm at sea; now he had calmed the storm in this man’s life, and released him to serve others. The risen Lord continues to calm the storms in all of our hearts if we approach him in confidence. When he does so, it will be with a view to releasing us to share in some way in his own work.

And/Or

(iv) Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s gospel reading follows directly on in Mark’s gospel from Saturday’s gospel reading. There Jesus calmed the storm at sea and calmed the panic of his own disciples. As Jesus and his disciples reach land they are met with another storm, this time a storm of the human spirit, a man who was so disturbed that people had him chained so that he couldn’t harm himself or others. He had also been banished to the local graveyard, to the tombs. He was living among the dead, cut off from the living. The Lord’s response to him was not to chain him up but to release him, to release him not only from his chains but from the spirit that left him so disturbed. We have an image here of how the Lord works. He works to free people from all that diminishes and dehumanizes them. This is not only the Lord’s work, but it is also the work of the church, the work of his followers, our work. That work of helping people to live a freer and fuller life is work we are called to engage in each day of our lives. If we are to engage in that work of the Lord, we need to open up our own lives to the Lord’s healing and life-giving presence. It is always as broken people in need of the Lord’s healing that we engage in his work of healing the broken.

And/Or

(v) Monday, Fourth week in Ordinary Time

The central character of the gospel story is one of the most disturbed people that we find in the gospels. He was someone out of control, completely alienated from himself and from others. He was more dead than alive, as is shown by his living among the tombs. He was the total outsider. Yet, Jesus engaged with him and as a result of his encounter with Jesus he was restored to himself and to the community from which he came. Having just calmed a storm at sea, Jesus calmed the storm in this man’s psyche and spirit and sent him out as a messenger of good news to his community. We may never be as disturbed as this man evidently was, but we can all find ourselves out of joint from time to time, out of sorts with ourselves and with others, feeling only half alive within ourselves, tossed and thrown about. It is then that we need to come before the Lord as the man in the gospel did. His initial approach to the Lord was quite aggressive; it was full of anger, ‘What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?’ That can be our starting point too when we come before the Lord in prayer. Yet, he is never put off by our disturbance within. If we allow him, he will pour his peace into our hearts; he will calm us as he calmed the storm, and having done so he will send us out to share his peace and mercy with others, just as he sent out the man in the gospel reading.

And/Or

(vi) Monday, Fourth week in Ordinary Time

The gospel reading is a story of how Jesus transforms a very disturbed man. There is an extraordinary transformation in the man between the beginning and the end of this story. At the beginning of the story he is living among the tombs on the outskirts of the town because people could not manage him. He could not be kept under control and so he was banished to a place where nobody but the dead lived. The temptation can be great to banish those who are considered too troublesome to keep. An important part of Jesus’ work consisted in bringing in from the cold those who had been excluded and restoring to the community those who had been banished to the margins. Jesus did not try to get rid of this man when he approached and spoke to Jesus in a very aggressive way. Rather, he calmed the storm within him and brought him to a place of inner calm. It is curious that when Jesus healed the man, the people reacted to Jesus in the way they had earlier reacted to the man. They wanted Jesus to leave their neighbourhood. There was something unsettling about someone who could show that a very disturbed person was not all that different from anyone else after all. Having healed the man, Jesus sent him home to his people to tell them all that Jesus had done for him. The one who had been expelled by the community now became their evangelist, sent by Jesus to proclaim the gospel, the presence of God’s kingdom in Jesus. The story suggests that those we might be tempted to expel or remove from our company can become messengers through whom the Lord preaches the gospel to us.

And/Or

(vii) Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

This is one of the most graphically narrated of Jesus’ miracles. Jesus is on the far side of the Sea of Galilee, mostly pagan territory. The man at the centre of the story is a very disturbed person. A powerful storm is raging within him. The community’s response to him was to chain him and exile him to the tombs outside the town. They considered him as good as dead and consigned him to live among the dead. Yet, his spirit would not be chained. Although he continued to live among the tombs, he broke free of his chains. When he saw Jesus at a distance, he ran to him. He left the tombs and threw himself at the feet of the Life Giver. We are given a picture of someone who is desperately trying to move beyond his situation of enslavement and death. Through his encounter with Jesus, the storm within him is calmed. The community who were so determined to enslave him and to be rid of him now find him sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. Whereas the community only succeeded in making the storm within the man worse, Jesus calmed his storm and restored him to himself. The Lord invites us all to come before him in our need, with whatever storm may be brewing within us. If we open ourselves to the Lord’s life-giving presence, as we do in prayer, he will calm us as he calmed the storm; he will restore us to ourselves and to others. There is a striking contrast between the reaction of the man’s neighbours to what had happened and the reaction of the man himself. The neighbours implored Jesus to leave; the man begged to be allowed to stay with Jesus. The neighbours found Jesus’ presence disturbing; he had disturbed their ordered lives, restoring someone to the community who had been judged not to belong there. The man found Jesus’ presence calming; he had calmed the disturbance within him. We are being reminded that the Lord can both disturb the calm and calm the disturbed. It is striking that Jesus would not allow the man to go with him as he requested. Having received the gift of wholeness from Jesus, he now had a mission among his own people, the very people who had treated him so badly. He was to proclaim in this pagan region the gospel of the Lord’s mercy to the broken. Whenever we receive the Lord’s mercy, in whatever form, he sends us out as messengers of his mercy to others. What we receive in prayer, we give with our lives.

And/Or

(viii) Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

We are all aware of the phenomenon of violence in our world, both in far off places and closer to home. We can be shocked at how violent people can be towards others, especially towards the most vulnerable. As well as violence done to others, sometimes people can do violence to themselves. Our natural instinct is to protect ourselves, but when some people are in a dark place that natural instinct can be abandoned and they can end up harming themselves. We have an example of that kind self- harm in today’s gospel reading. It features someone who is probably the most disturbed person in all of the gospels. He was so disturbed that the local community had banished him to the tombs, the graveyard, outside their town, and they had tried to chain him there. Such was his disturbed strength that he broke the chains and harmed himself, gashing himself with stones. He was a total outsider; he knew that no one wanted him. Yet, according to the gospel reading, when Jesus arrived in the area, he ran up to Jesus. Perhaps, he sensed that Jesus could help him. Whereas others shunned him, Jesus went on to engage with him, asking him his name, and, finally, releasing him from his demons, freeing him from his disturbance. The people were amazed to see the man sitting beside Jesus, properly clothed and in his full senses. It is strange that they should then implore Jesus to leave their neighbourhood. It’s as if they were disturbed by Jesus’ capacity and power to release this man from his disturbance. The story reminds us that there is no human situation or condition so disturbed that the Lord cannot touch in a healing and life-giving way. It can be tempting to write off certain people or even ourselves as lost causes. We give up on what seems like a lost cause, just as the people in the gospel reading gave up on this member of their community. Yet, the Lord never gives up on us. He can calm even the most disturbed and disturbing of human spirits. The power of the Lord’s calming presence can never be underestimated. We can open ourselves to his calming presence in prayer, so that we become a calming influence, the Lord’s calming influence, on those we come across in life.

And/Or

(ix) Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

When David was cursed by one of his opponents in today’s first reading, he did not do what one of his soldiers suggested to him, namely to have this man’s head cut off. Instead, David absorbed the man’s curse and went on his way. In the gospel reading, Jesus is related to in a similarly threatening way by a very disturbed person, ‘What do you want with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God?’ Like David, Jesus did not return aggression for aggression. However, Jesus went beyond what David did. He did not simply continue on his way, like David, but, rather, he addressed his opponent in a very personal and respectful manner, ‘What is your name?’ and then went on to heal him of his demons, restoring him to himself and to his community. At the end, the disturbed man was so touched by Jesus that he wanted to stay with Jesus and join him on his journeys. David, and to a greater extent, Jesus, reveals to us something of God’s way of relating to us. God is not put off by our resistance to him, or even by our hostility towards him. Rather, regardless of how we relate to God, God continues to relate to us out of the goodness in his own heart. He keeps asking us, ‘what is your name?’ inviting us to reveal ourselves to him, to open our hearts to him, even when darkness lurks there. As Jesus shows in the gospel reading, God works in our lives to rid us of our demons, to restore us to harmony with ourselves and with others. What the Lord needs from us in response is some openness of mind, heart and spirit to his healing and life-giving presence, the kind of openness shown by the man in the gospel reading after his healing, when he begged to be allowed to stay with Jesus.

And/Or

(x) Monday, Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s gospel reading portrays one of the most disturbed people in all of the gospels. He is portrayed as the living dead. He lives among the tombs, far from the community of the living. He was inflicting bodily harm on himself on a regular basis. The only response of the community to him was to try and secure him with chains and fetters, a version of locking him up and throwing away the key. Even that totally inadequate response to him was a failure. Such was the energy generated by his rage that he snapped the chains and broke the fetters. He was completely out of control, unapproachable. Yet, although the gospel story does not say so explicitly, Jesus approached him. According to the gospel reading, the man caught sight of Jesus from a distance, ran up and fell at his feet. His words to Jesus were seething with anger, ‘What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God?’ Jesus had every reason to walk away, but he didn’t. He spoke a word to him that healed him of his demons. The gospel reading says that he sat there beside Jesus, clothed and in his full senses. What does this passage tell us about Jesus? It tells us that there is nothing in our lives that we cannot bring to the Lord for his healing touch. It tells us that there is no one whom Jesus regards as unapproachable or out of bounds. It assures us that there is no disturbance or turmoil in our lives that the Lord cannot calm if we approach him and fall at his feet. After the man was restored to his right mind, Jesus gave him a task. He told him to go and tell others all that the Lord in his mercy had done for him. Whenever we open ourselves to the Lord’s healing and calming presence, he sends us out to share what we have received, to bring his healing and calming presence to all who need it.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

2nd February >> Fr. Martin's Homilies/Reflections on Today's Mass Readings for the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord (Inc. Luke 2:22-40): ‘A light to enlighten the pagans’.

Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Luke 2:22-40 My eyes have seen your salvation.

When the day came for them to be purified as laid down by the Law of Moses, the parents of Jesus took him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord, – observing what stands written in the Law of the Lord: Every first-born male must be consecrated to the Lord – and also to offer in sacrifice, in accordance with what is said in the Law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons. Now in Jerusalem there was a man named Simeon. He was an upright and devout man; he looked forward to Israel’s comforting and the Holy Spirit rested on him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death until he had set eyes on the Christ of the Lord. Prompted by the Spirit he came to the Temple and when the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the Law required, he took him into his arms and blessed God; and he said:

‘Now, Master, you can let your servant go in peace, just as you promised; because my eyes have seen the salvation which you have prepared for all the nations to see, a light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of your people Israel.’

As the child’s father and mother stood there wondering at the things that were being said about him, Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, ‘You see this child: he is destined for the fall and for the rising of many in Israel, destined to be a sign that is rejected – and a sword will pierce your own soul too – so that the secret thoughts of many may be laid bare.’ There was a prophetess also, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was well on in years. Her days of girlhood over, she had been married for seven years before becoming a widow. She was now eighty-four years old and never left the Temple, serving God night and day with fasting and prayer. She came by just at that moment and began to praise God; and she spoke of the child to all who looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem. When they had done everything the Law of the Lord required, they went back to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. Meanwhile the child grew to maturity, and he was filled with wisdom; and God’s favour was with him.

Gospel (GB) Luke 2:22-40 ‘The child grew, filled with wisdom.’

When the time came for their purification according to the Law of Moses, the parents of Jesus brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, ‘Every male who first opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord’) and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the Law of the Lord, ‘a pair of turtle-doves, or two young pigeons’. Now there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ. And he came in the Spirit into the Temple, and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him according to the custom of the Law, he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said,

‘Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel.’

And his father and his mother marvelled at what was said about him. And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, ‘Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed — and a sword will pierce through your own soul also — so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.’ And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She did not depart from the Temple, worshipping with fasting and prayer night and day. And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem. And when they had performed everything according to the Law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. And the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom. And the favour of God was upon him.

Gospel (USA) Luke 2:22–40 My eyes have seen your salvation.

When the days were completed for their purification according to the law of Moses, Mary and Joseph took Jesus up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord, just as it is written in the law of the Lord, Every male that opens the womb shall be consecrated to the Lord, and to offer the sacrifice of a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons, in accordance with the dictate in the law of the Lord. Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. This man was righteous and devout, awaiting the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he should not see death before he had seen the Christ of the Lord. He came in the Spirit into the temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus to perform the custom of the law in regard to him, He took him into his arms and blessed God, saying:

“Now, Master, you may let your servant go in peace, according to your word, for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you prepared in the sight of all the peoples: a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and glory for your people Israel.”

The child’s father and mother were amazed at what was said about him; and Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, “Behold, this child is destined for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be contradicted —and you yourself a sword will pierce— so that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.” There was also a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived seven years with her husband after her marriage, and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She never left the temple, but worshiped night and day with fasting and prayer. And coming forward at that very time, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were awaiting the redemption of Jerusalem. When they had fulfilled all the prescriptions of the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth. The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him.

Homilies (13)

(i) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

As a priest I love to celebrate the Sacrament of Baptism. Young parents bring their child to the church for baptism. In doing so, they are expressing a desire that their child would belong to the Lord in some way. They are inviting the Lord into the life of their child. They recognize that connecting their child with the Lord and with his body, the church, at such a young age will be beneficial for their child. As a priest, it is a great privilege to be able to respond to this desire of parents. The focal point of the liturgy of baptism is when the parents hold their child over the baptismal font, with the godparents standing by, and water is poured over the child’s head, accompanied by the words, ‘I baptize you…’ I always feel at that moment that something very special is happening for the child and his or her parents. It is a sacred moment when the Holy Spirit is moving in a special way. Because of the Holy Spirit coming into the life of the young child at that moment, all of us in the church are in some way touched by the Spirit.

Today’s feast, and today’s gospel reading, brought that sacramental moment to my mind. There in the gospel reading, we find a young Jewish couple bringing their child to the Temple in Jerusalem to present him to the Lord. There is a real continuity between what young parents are doing when they bring their child to the church for baptism and what Mary and Joseph are depicted as doing in the gospel reading. The fundamental spiritual movement is the same, parents presenting their child to the Lord. I have often noticed at baptisms that the presence of grandparents is very significant. As they brought their children to the Lord at their baptism, those children, now adults, are bringing their child to the Lord. There is no reference to Jesus’ grandparents in today’s gospel reading, but there is a very significant reference to two people, Anna and Simeon, who would have been the same age as Jesus’ grandparents, if not older. Anna is eighty four years of age, having been a widow for much of her adult life. We are not given Simeon’s age, but the sense is that he has lived a long life. He has been looking forward to Israel’s comforting, probably for many years. When he sees the child Jesus, he knows that he has finally set his eyes on the one who is to bring God’s comfort not just to Israel but to all the nations. He is moved to pray, ‘Now, Master, you can let your servant go in peace, just as you promised’. He has seen what he had always hoped to see and he is now ready to leave this world. Simeon has been described as the patron saint of all who, having found meaning at last in their lives, are ready to let go and surrender all to the Lord. It is fitting that Simeon’s prayer, coming at the end of his life, is now part of the Night Prayer of the church, coming at the end of the day.

The sense you get from the gospel reading is that this young couple and their child are greatly blessed by the presence of this older man and woman, both of whom are clearly people of God, people of prayer, whose prayerful presence graces the lives of others. It is often the way that the lives of children and their parents are blessed by the prayerful presence of the children’s grandparents. Simeon and Anna represent continuity with the great figures of Israel’s past and, likewise, grandparents often represent continuity with all that is best in the church’s tradition. Just by their presence, they hold the faith that is both ever ancient and ever new, and they offer their own faith in the Lord to the generations below them. It is what we find Simeon and Anna doing in the gospel reading. Simeon proclaims to Mary and Joseph the true identity of their child, ‘a light to enlighten the pagans, and the glory of your people, Israel’. Anna spoke of the child to all who looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem. There is a wonderful meeting of the generations in that gospel reading. The young couple and their child touched the lives of these two elderly people in a wonderful way, and Simeon and Anna, in turn, touched the lives of this young couple and their child in an equally wonderful way. There is an image here of the life of the church in our own time. Within the church, we need all the generations. On the journey of faith, we have much to receive from and give to one another, across the generations.

The young couple, Mary and Joseph, learned from the older Simeon that they were carrying God’s light, the one who would go on to proclaim himself to be the light of the world. We are all called to be carriers of the Lord’s light to each other, at every stage of our life’s journey, from childhood to advanced years. All the generations need to journey together in faith, giving to and receiving from one another, if the Lord’s light is to shine in its full splendour before the world.

And/Or

(ii) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

One of the great blessings of our parish here in Corpus Christi is what is known as the Drumcondra Active Age Association. The work of this association reflects the association’s name. It helps older people to live active lives. The generosity and commitment of a large number of parishioners ensures that older people in the parish are offered a whole range of activities that they can choose from. We thank God for the work of this association, and we hope and pray that it will continue to thrive for many years.

There is a very good example of an active older person in today’s gospel reading. Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, was an eighty-four year old woman. The gospel reading tells us that she was serving God night and day, with fasting and prayer. She was also something of a preacher because we are told that she spoke of the child Jesus to all who looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem. She certainly qualifies as one of the active aged. We are not told how old Simeon was, but it is likely that he was elderly too. He had been waiting a long time to see the Christ, and having seen him he was now ready to depart this life. He was a regular visitor to the Temple, going wherever the Holy Spirit led him. Here was another active, aged person. He was also someone who was alert to the deeper meaning of things. He recognized the true significance of the child that was brought into the temple by the young couple Mary and Joseph to be presented to God..

The gospel reading puts before us a meeting between youth and age. A very young couple with their child enter the Temple of God and there they meet a much older man and woman. This meeting turned out to be a source of blessing for both generations.. Simeon and Anna were graced and blessed by the coming of this young couple and their child into the Temple. The young couple were themselves blessed and graced by the older pair. Each generation brought the Lord to the other generation in different ways.

This can be true of our own experience as well. The younger generation can be a source of great blessing to the older generation, and vice-versa. They each have something to give the other. The energy of youth can be an inspiration to older people. The experience and wisdom of age can serve as a source of strength and stability for the young. We need to bring the generations into contact with each other, because each generation can bring something of the Lord to the other generation. On this feast of the presentation of the Lord each of us, regardless of our age, are being called to allow the Lord to present himself to others in and through our lives.

And/Or

(iii) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Today we celebrate Jesus’ presentation in the Temple in Jerusalem by his parents, in accordance with the Jewish Law. In the opening chapters of his gospel, Luke portrays Jesus’ parents as faithfully observing the Jewish Law. In this way he wants to stress that the movement that became known as Christianity has its roots deeply in the Jewish faith. In the Jewish Scriptures, especially in the prophet Isaiah, Israel’s role was to be a light to the Gentiles, to reveal the light of God to the world. According to our gospel reading, the elderly Simeon, a devout Jew, recognizes Mary and Joseph’s child as the one who is to embody this calling of Israel. He is to be a light to enlighten the pagans, and in being faithful to this role he will bring glory to Israel. Simeon had spent his life looking forward to ‘Israel’s comforting’. When Mary and Joseph entered the Temple with their new born first child on that day, Simeon’s longings and hopes were brought to fulfilment. It has been said that Simeon has become the patron saint of those who, having found meaning at last in their lives, are able to let go and surrender to the Lord. His prayer of surrender has become part of the Night Prayer of the Church. We pray that prayer as people who have been graced by God’s light shining through Jesus. Like Simeon, we have come to recognize Jesus as the light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of Israel. We have candles blessed on this day; we light them and carry them as a sign of our joy of discovering Jesus as the light of the world. Indeed, every time we light a candle in church or at home, we are acknowledging Jesus as the light of the world and we are also recognizing our own need for his gracious light as we struggle with the various forms of darkness in our lives.

And/Or

(iv) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

This morning’s gospel reading features a man and a woman, Simeon and Anna, who had given themselves over to the service of the Lord for many years. Simeon is described as upright and devout, on whom the Holy Spirit rested. It is said of Anna that she never left the Temple, serving God night and day with fasting and prayer. As well as being the Feast of the Presentation, today is also the World Day for Consecrated Life. Simeon and Anna remind us of those men and women who have consecrated themselves to serve the Lord in the religious life. Today we thank God for them all and we ask God’s blessing upon them. Simeon and Anna’s close relationship with the Lord gave them a special gift of insight. When Mary and Joseph brought Jesus into the Temple, Simeon recognized their child as a ‘light to enlighten the pagans’ and as ‘the glory of your people Israel’. Anna recognized their child as the one who fulfilled the hopes of those who were looking forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem. They had a rich insight into who this child really was and they shared this insight with others; they continue to share their insight with us today. As our relationship with the Lord deepens, through prayer and through our following his way, we too will grow in our insight into the Lord’s identity and into the meaning of his whole ministry from his birth to resurrection. We too will be called upon to witness to that growing insight as Simeon and Anna did. This morning, we celebrate Simeon’s insight into Jesus as the light to enlighten all peoples. We recognize our own need for this light and we invite the Lord to shine his light into whatever darkness may be in our own hearts and lives.

And/Or

(v) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

The gospel reading for today’s feast describes a meeting between a young couple and their infant child and two people who were well on in years, Simeon and Anna. Simeon’s response when he met the infant Jesus was to pray; he blessed God. His prayer has become part of the official prayer of the church and is prayed every night by those who pray night prayer. Anna’s response on meeting the child Jesus was to speak about Jesus to others, especially to those who were waiting for God to visit them in a special way. Simeon’s meeting with Jesus and his parents led him to look upwards towards God in prayer; Anna’s meeting with Jesus and his parents led her to look outwards towards others in witness. Simeon and Anna have each something to say to us about how to receive the Lord. We too are called to respond to the Lord’s coming to us as light of the world, in the same two-fold way, in prayer and in witness. We bless God, we thank God, in prayer for the gift of his Son, the light to enlighten all people, and we also allow that light to shine through us before others, by witnessing to the Lord in the way that we live, by what we say and do. The Lord who entered the temple in Jerusalem as the light of the world has entered and is entering all our lives; this morning we look to Simeon and Anna to show us how best to respond to his gracious coming.

And/Or

(vi) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

At the centre of today’s gospel reading are two older people, Simeon and Anna. They were both blessed with the gift of recognition or insight. They both recognized the true identity of the child who was carried into the temple by his young parents. Simeon recognized Jesus as the light to enlighten the pagans and as the glory of Israel. Anna recognized him as the Deliverer for whom people had been waiting. They both went on to proclaim to others what they had come to recognize for themselves.  Their gift of recognition was the fruit of their prayer. They were people of prayer; Simeon’s prayer has become part of the Night Prayer of the church; Anna is described as serving God night and day with fasting and prayer. Their prayerfulness made them sensitive to the Lord’s presence and helped them to recognize the Lord even in the surprising form of the new born child of a young couple. Simon and Anna remind us that our own faithfulness to prayer can help to make us more sensitive to the various, and sometimes surprising, ways that the Lord is present to us throughout our life. The time we spent with the Lord in prayer makes it easier for us to recognize him when he comes to us.

And/Or

(vii) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Today is a day when we traditionally bless candles. It is a feast of light, of God’s light revealed in Jesus. In the gospel reading Simeon declares Jesus to be a light to enlighten the pagans, as well as being the glory of Israel. Today’s feast closes the Christmas festival of light. It is a joyful feast and, yet, a shadow is cast over this joyful scene in the Temple in Jerusalem. Having declared the child Jesus to be God’s light to enlighten the pagans and to bring glory to Israel, Simeon goes on to declare that this same child is also destined to be a sign that is rejected. Not everyone will welcome the light that he brings which is why this child, according to Simeon, is destined for the fall and the rising of many in Israel. Some in Israel will stumble over Jesus; others will be lifted up by him. In the language of the fourth gospel, ‘the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil’. We are all capable of turning away from the light, the light of God’s love and God’s truth shining through Jesus. We can be more comfortable with lesser lights. Yet, the light of God continues to shine through Jesus, the risen Lord. No amount of human rejection diminishes that light. Every day we are called by God to keep turning towards this radiant light of Jesus, after the example of Simeon and Anna in the gospel reading.

And/Or

(viii) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

In today’s first reading, the prophet Malachi announces that the Lord will one day enter his Temple in Jerusalem as the refiner and purifier of his people, so that their worship will be as the Lord desires it. In the gospel of John, Jesus declares that he will enable people to worship God as God wants to be worshipped, a worship in spirit and truth. Jesus is referring to a worship of God that is inspired by the Spirit of Truth, the Holy Spirit. This worship of God, inspired by the Spirit of God, is not confined to a religious building, a church. The Spirit inspires us to worship God not only with our lips, as in the liturgy, but with our lives. Saint Paul in his letter to the Romans refers to our spiritual worship, by which he means a worship which embraces all of our lives. He calls on us to present our bodies, our embodied selves, as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God. This is the worship of our lives. Each day we are to offer our lives to God. This was the kind of worship that characterized the life of Jesus. In the gospel reading, Mary and Joseph came to the principal place of worship for Jews, the Temple. They come not just to worship, but to present their son to God. As an adult, Jesus lived out that presentation of himself to God that was made by his parents at this time. Throughout his adult life, Jesus presented himself as a living sacrifice to God, in the words of Saint Paul. He lived his life with a clear focus on God at all times. Jesus calls on us to have that same focus. Because Jesus is the full revelation of God, to live our lives with a clear focus on God amounts to living our lives with a clear focus on Jesus, our risen Lord. Today’s feast encourages us to keep presenting ourselves, our hearts, minds and bodies, to the Lord. We are to keep our relationship with the Lord to the fore in all we say and do. In that way, our whole lives will be a worship of the Lord.

And/Or

(ix) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

The feast of the Presentation of the Lord is a day when, traditionally, we bless candles that will be used in the church’s liturgy or at home. The blessing and lighting of candles speaks to us of Jesus, the light of the world. When Mary and Joseph brought their child, Jesus, to the Temple in Jerusalem to present him to God, Simeon addressed their child as a ‘light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of your people Israel’. We all have a longing for light, especially at this dark time of the year. During the week, we had one very bright day, when, even though it was very cold, the sun shine all day and the sky was blue from sunrise to sunset. We appreciate such days all the more in these dark winter months. When Mary and Joseph brought their new born child into the Temple, they were presenting him not just to God but, in a sense, to all of humanity as a light to shine in darkness, a ‘light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of your people Israel’. We can all experience a darkness of spirit at any time of the year, but perhaps especially in the dark months of winter. Today’s feast reminds us that no matter how dark our spirit, we always walk in the light of the Lord’s presence. The candles we bless today, the candles we light in our church or in our homes. speaks to us of that greater light from God, Jesus, our risen Lord. In the words of Saint John’s gospel, ‘the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it’. Today’s feast invites us to keep opening our minds and our spirits to this light from God, which shines through Jesus. It is the light of love and the light of life. As Mary and Joseph presented Jesus in the Temple, we are invited to keep presenting ourselves to the Lord, the light of whose presence is always shining upon us, especially in those times when we sense a darkness of some kind coming over us.

And/Or

(x) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Sometimes older people have an insight into life and into other people that is the fruit of long experience. Life has taught them what is important and what is not so important. In today’s gospel reading, we find two older people who express a great insight into the young child of a young married couple. Simeon declares the child to be God’s salvation, a light to enlighten the pagans and to bring glory to Israel. Anna announces that this child will fulfil the hopes of all who have looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem. Simeon made his declaration to the child’s parents, and Anna made hers to a larger group. They both speak to all of us today about the true identity of Jesus. As Mary and Joseph present Jesus to God in the Temple, in a sense, Simeon and Anna present Jesus to us by what they say about him. Perhaps, we might remember to day and give thanks for all those who presented Jesus to us, especially the older members of our family and our community. We bless and light candles on this day in response to Simeon’s recognition of Jesus as the light to enlighten all people. God’s light has shone and continues to shine upon us through Jesus, the light of God’s love, God’s truth and God’s life. It is a light that has the power to overcome the darkness that can easily hang over us, especially the darkness of fear and of death. The second reading declares that Jesus shared in our flesh and blood so that by his death he might set free all those who had been held on slavery by the fear of death. On this feast, we open our lives and hearts afresh to what Saint John Henry Newman calls God’s ‘kindly light’ which has shone so abundantly upon us through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.

And/Or

(xi) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

The feast of the Presentation of the Lord is celebrated forty days after the feast of Christmas, as it was traditionally understood that Jesus was presented in the Temple forty days after his birth. This day is also known as Candlemas, because candles are blessed on this day to remind us that Jesus is the light of the world and the light of our life. This is in keeping with Simeon’s reference to the child Jesus in the gospel reading as a ‘light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of your people Israel’. Simeon’s prayer beginning, ‘Now, Master, you can let your servant go in peace’, has become an integral element of the Night Prayer of the Church. Simeon recognized the true identity of the child that the young couple from Nazareth brought into the Temple. Simeon realized who had just entered the Temple, who had entered his life. Looking at this new born child, he could see the ‘salvation’ that God had been preparing for all the nations to see. Simeon recognized that the light of God’s love was shining through the face of this child, a light that would enlighten the pagans and bring glory to Israel. The gospel reading suggests that Simeon had this level of insight into the child of Joseph and Mary because the Holy Spirit rested on him and he came to the child prompted by the Holy Spirit. It is the Spirit who allows us to see Jesus as he really is. Paul, in his first letter to the Corinthians, says, ‘No one comprehends what is truly God’s except the Spirit of God’ and declares, ‘we have received… the Spirit that is from God, so that we can understand the gifts bestowed on us by God’. We need the Holy Spirit to appreciate the gifts that God has given us, especially God’s greatest gift, his beloved Son, who is with us until the end of time. On this feast, we invite the Holy Spirit to rest upon us afresh, as he rested on Simeon, so that, like him, we may recognize the many ways that the risen Lord enters our lives.

And/Or

(xii) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

The prayer of Simeon in today’s gospel reading has become part of the Night Prayer of the Church, ‘Now, Master, you can let your servant go in peace’. He is now ready to embrace death because his eyes have seen the Saviour promised by God in the Jewish Scriptures. It is often said of people who are dying that they seem to hang on until some loved one who has been away arrives to their bedside. Then, having seen their loved one or heard their voice, they slip away. When a young couple came to the Temple that day with their new born child, Simeon knew that the one he had been longing to see had finally arrived and he was now ready to depart this life. Simeon’s prayer has become part of the Night Prayer of the church because believers have recognized from earliest times that Simeon’s prayer can easily become our prayer. Our eyes too have seen the salvation that God has prepared for all the nations to see. The light of God that shone upon Simeon through the child Jesus in the Temple on that day has shone upon all of us. The risen Lord journeys with us every day as God’s light, dispelling our darkness, guiding us along the right path. The candles we light on this day remind us that we have seen Jesus, the light of the world, with the eyes of faith, and that we will see him face to face in heaven, when eternal light shines upon us. The other elderly person in the gospel reading, Anna, spoke about the child of Mary and Joseph, God’s light to enlighten everyone, to all those who were looking forward to the Saviour God had promised. She reminds us that having looked upon Christ our Light with the eyes of faith, we are called to allow his light to shine through us so that others can be drawn to him.

And/Or

(xiii) Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

On this feast we bless and light candles to express our belief that, in the words of Simeon’s prayer to God in the gospel reading, Jesus is a ‘light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of your people Israel’. People of all faiths and of no faith often feel the need to light a candle, especially in times of darkness, when faced with some human tragedy. We seem to have a deep conviction that no matter how deep the darkness a light can always shine in it. We are familiar with the saying, ‘it is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness’. As followers of the risen Lord we certainly know that to be true. We share the faith of the fourth evangelist who wrote, ‘The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it’. It could be said that the darkness was at its deepest as Jesus hung from the cross on the hill of Calvary. The worst instincts of humanity had put to death in the cruellest way someone who revealed not only God but the best of humanity. Yet, in that terrible darkness a light was shining, the light of God’s merciful and unconditional love. It was above all when Jesus was lifted up on the cross that he revealed the glorious light of God’s love to the full. As the fourth evangelist puts it so memorably, God so loved the world that he gave his only Son. In our own experiences of darkness, whatever for they take, the light of the Lord’s loving presence shines brightly. In the words of a modern chant, ‘Within our darkest night, you kindle a fire that never dies away’. We bless and light candles on this feast to express our conviction that Jesus by his life, death and resurrection has shown that God is Love and God is Light. It is a good day to pray the prayer of Simeon in today’s gospel reading, a prayer of confident trust in God who has given us Jesus, his Son, as a kindly light to lead us on towards that place of eternal light which is our final destiny.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

1st February >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for the:

Feast of Saint Brigid, Abbess, Secondary Patron of Ireland (Inc. Luke 6:32-38): ‘Be compassionate as your Father is compassionate’.

And

Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 4:35-41)

Feast of Saint Brigid, Abbess, Secondary Patron of Ireland

Gospel (Ireland) Luke 6:32-38 Be compassionate just as your Father is compassionate. Psalm 106 (107):35-38, 41-42. R/. v. 1

Jesus said to his disciples: ‘If you love those who love you, what thanks can you expect? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what thanks can you expect? For even sinners do that much. And if you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what thanks can you expect? Even sinners lend to sinners to get back the same amount. Instead, love your enemies and do good, and lend without any hope of return. You will have a great reward, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. ‘Be compassionate as your Father is compassionate. Do not judge, and you will not be judged yourselves; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned yourselves; grant pardon, and you will be pardoned. Give, and there will be gifts for you: a full measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be poured into your lap; because the amount you measure out is the amount you will be given back.’

Reflections (7)

(i) Feast of Saint Brigid, Abbess, Secondary Patron of Ireland

Saint Brigid is the secondary patron of Ireland, after Saint Patrick. She was born around 454. When she was young her father wished to make a suitable marriage for her but she insisted that she wanted to consecrate herself to God. She received the veil and spiritual formation probably from Saint Mel and she stayed for a while under his direction in Ardagh. Others followed her example and this led to her founding a double monastery in Kildare, with a section for men and a section for women. Through Brigid’s reputation as a spiritual teacher, the monastery became a centre of pilgrimage. She died in 524 and she is venerated not only throughout Ireland but in several European lands. She was renowned for her hospitality, almsgiving and care of the sick. Saint Brigid’s cross remains a popular sign of God’s protection. In legend it was used by Brigid to explain the Christian faith. A possible first reading for Saint Brigid’s feast day is that wonderful prayer of Saint Paul from his letter to the Ephesians, one of my favourite passages in the New Testament. Paul is praying in intercession for his church, praying for their ‘hidden self to grow strong’, which he equates with Christ living in their heart through faith. Our hidden self grows strong when Christ lives there. The more Christ lives within us, the stronger our hidden self will be. Brigid clearly had a strong hidden self in that sense. Christ lived in and through her. That is the baptismal calling of each one of us, to allow Christ to live in us, so that our deepest self is spiritually strong. Paul also equates Christ living in us with knowing the love of Christ, not just with our head but with our heart. When the love of Christ dwells in us, then, says Paul, we will be filled with the utter fullness of God. This is the goal of all our lives. It is a goal that will never be fully attained in this earthly life, but we can journey ever closer to it in this life, with the help of the Holy Spirit. When our inner self is strong in that sense, it will show itself in the kind of life that Jesus portrays in the gospel reading, a loving, compassionate, non-judgemental life, marked by a willingness to forgive. From all we know of her, this was Brigid’s way of life and she remains an inspiration to us.

And/Or

(ii) Feast of Saint Brigid

Saint Brigid was born around 454. When she was young, her father wished to make a very suitable marriage for her, but she insisted on devoting her life completely to God. She received the veil and spiritual formation probably from Saint Mel and stayed for a period under his direction in Ardagh. Others followed her example and this led her to found a double monastery in Kildare with the assistance of Bishop Conleth. She died in 524 and her cult is widespread not only throughout Ireland but in several European lands. As well as being a person of deep prayer, she was renowned for her hospitality, her almsgiving and her care of the sick. That is why the church has chosen the reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans as an option for her feast day. The reading concludes by calling on us to ‘contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers’. Brigid did both. She served the members of the church, the saints, and she also showed hospitality to strangers, those who were not part of the church. In the language of that first reading, she discovered her gift, the particular grace given to her, and she placed that gift at the service of others. We have all been given some particular grace; our gifts will differ according to the grace that has been given to us. Our calling is to try and discern our own particular gifts, the unique way that the Holy Spirit has graced us, and to place those gifts at the service of the Lord, and of others, both those who are part of the church, the ‘saints’ and those who are not, ‘strangers’.

And/Or

(iii) Feast of Saint Brigid

We know very little about the life of Brigid. She was probably born around the middle of the fifth century and died at the beginning of the sixth century. At a young age she seems to have devoted her life completely to God. She founded a monastery of Kildare which contributed to the spread of Christianity in Ireland. The stories that have come down about her in her various Lives depict her as a woman of deep prayer and as someone whose life was characterized by great generosity and deep compassion, especially for the needy and the broken. In this morning’s first reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans, Paul mentions various gifts that can be expected to be found among the members of Christ’s body. Two in particular seem to fit the profile of Bridgid as it has come down to us in the literature about her, ‘let the almsgivers give freely... and those who do the works of mercy do them cheerfully’. It seems that Brigid gave alms freely and did many works of mercy cheerfully. That lovely reading concludes with ‘if any of the saints are in need you mist share with them, and you should make hospitality your special care’. Again Brigid shared with those in need and had a reputation for a very hospitable spirit. He cult extended beyond the shores of this island. I was only reading recently that in England there were at least nineteen ancient church dedications in her honour, the most famous being Saint Bride’s in Fleet Street. It is clear that her great love of the Lord which was nourished by a life of prayer found expression in a very practical love of others, especially of those in any need. She can continue to inspire us to live the gospel to the full and to find joy in doing so.

And/Or

(iv) Feast of Saint Brigid

Saint Brigid is the secondary patron of Ireland, after Saint Patrick. She was born around 454. When she was young her father wished to make a suitable marriage for her but she insisted that she wanted to consecrate herself to God. She received the veil and spiritual formation probably from Saint Mel and she stayed for a while under his direction in Ardagh. Others followed her example and this led to her founding a double monastery in Kildare, with a section for men and a section for women. Through Brigid’s reputation as a spiritual teacher, the monastery became a centre of pilgrimage. She died in 524 and she is venerated not only throughout Ireland but in several European lands. She was renowned for her hospitality, almsgiving and care of the sick. The gospel reading is very suited for her feast because it calls on us to be generous not only to those who are generous to us but even to our enemies. Jesus declares in that gospel reading, ‘Give, and there will be gifts for you: a full measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be poured into your lap’. Jesus is saying there that if our focus is on giving, then we will discover that we receive more than we give. It could be said to the contrary that if our focus is on receiving then we will be ultimately disappointed. It is not the case that we give with a view to receiving. It is simply that we give in various ways, in accordance with our gifts, abilities and energies, and we discover along the way that we are actually receiving more than we are giving. Our giving creates an opening for the Lord to grace us. The most generous form of giving, according to the gospel reading, is to love those who do not love us and to give to those from whom we have no hope of receiving anything in return. This kind of giving, according to the gospel reading, has something of God about it, because God is just as kind to the ungrateful and the wicked as he is to those who are good. Such selfless giving opens up our hearts to receiving a great abundance from the Lord, what the gospel reading calls, a ‘full measure’.

And/Or

(v) Feast of Saint Brigid

Saint Brigid is the secondary patron of Ireland, after Saint Patrick. She was born around 454. When she was young her father wished to make a suitable marriage for her but she insisted that she wanted to consecrate herself to God. She received the veil and spiritual formation probably from Saint Mel and she stayed for a while under his direction in Ardagh. Others followed her example and this led to her founding a double monastery in Kildare, with a section for men and a section for women. Through Brigid’s reputation as a spiritual teacher, the monastery became a centre of pilgrimage. She died in 524 and she is venerated not only throughout Ireland but in several European lands. She was renowned for her hospitality, almsgiving and care of the sick. All of her service of others flowed from a rich interior spiritual life. The two readings for this feast express both the interior dimension of the Christian life and its outward expression of service. In the first reading, Saint Paul prays for the church in Ephesus, asking that their hidden self, their inner self, would grow strong, so that Christ may live in their hearts through faith. It is a wonderful way of speaking about the inner dimension of our lives as followers of the Lord. Christ wants to live in our hearts through our faith, so that our hidden self, or inner self, may grow strong. In that reading Paul goes on to identify our inner self growing strong with being filled with the utter fullness of God. When Christ lives deep within us, when we are filled with his fullness of God, then our inner self will grow strong. In the gospel reading, Jesus speaks of the outer life that flows from such an inner self. It is a life of generous self-giving love of others, including those who are hostile to us. It is a compassionate life that is slow to judge, slow to condemn and ready to forgive. As Jesus says, it is a life that befits sons and daughters of the Most High who is kind to ungrateful and the wicked. Saint Brigid embodied both that deep interior life that Paul speaks about in the first reading and the generous outer life that Jesus speaks about in the gospel reading. On this, her feast day, we look to her, asking her to help us to grow into the fully mature follower of the Lord that she was.

And/Or

(vi) Feast of Saint Brigid

Saint Brigid is the secondary patron of Ireland, after Saint Patrick. She was born around 454. When she was young her father wished to make a suitable marriage for her but she insisted that she wanted to consecrate herself to God. She received the veil and spiritual formation probably from Saint Mel and she stayed for a while under his direction in Ardagh. Others followed her example and this led to her founding a double monastery in Kildare, with a section for men and a section for women. Through Brigid’s reputation as a spiritual teacher, the monastery became a centre of pilgrimage. She died in 524 and she is venerated not only throughout Ireland but in several European lands. She was renowned for her hospitality, almsgiving and care of the sick. Saint Brigid’s cross remains a popular sign of God’s protection. In legend it was used by Brigid to explain the Christian faith. As a woman of deep prayer, it is appropriate that the first reading for her feast is that wonderful prayer of Saint Paul in his letter to the Ephesians. He prays that our hidden self would grow strong, that Christ would live in our hearts. When we allow Christ to live in our hearts, then our hidden self, our deepest self, grows strong. Paul equates allowing Christ to live in our hearts with gospel reading. Jesus is calling there for a life of love that reflects the love that is in God, ‘Be compassionate as your Father in compassionate’. Paul reminds us that such a life flows from Christ living in us.

And/Or

(vii) Feast of Saint Brigid (for children)

I am sure the children know something about Brigid. What do you know? She had a great love of God and she gave her life to God. She was a friend of God. Because she was a friend of God, she was a very good and kind person. She was especially good and kind to the poor. She knew that God had a special love for them too. Brigid often gave away food to those who were poor and hungry. She welcomed all who visited her. She lived the kind of life that Jesus speaks about in the gospel reading when he called on us to be loving and forgiving and to give generously to others. She lived like Jesus. People realized that Brigid was a very special person because she lived like Jesus. Brigid is now a saint in heaven and we can pray to her. We can ask her to help us to live like Jesus, to be as loving and kind as she was. She can help us to be kind and loving in our work and in our play. Brigid gave new life to people by her kindness and generosity. Today is not only the feast of Saint Brigid. It is also the first day of spring when we begin to notice signs of new life in nature. Brigid welcomes the spring. She is the saint of springtime. Brigid not only took special care of people, she also cared for animals and nature. She teaches us to care for all of God’s creation. Have you ever heard of St Brigid’s cross. That is made from something in nature. It is made from rushes or straw. People often place it in their homes, perhaps over the door or in the window, because they believe it brings a very special blessing to the house. Today on her feast, we ask St Brigid to bless each one of us by helping us to be as kind, generous and loving as she was.

-----------------------------------------

Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 4:35-41 'Even the wind and the sea obey him'.

With the coming of evening, Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Let us cross over to the other side.’ And leaving the crowd behind they took him, just as he was, in the boat; and there were other boats with him. Then it began to blow a gale and the waves were breaking into the boat so that it was almost swamped. But he was in the stern, his head on the cushion, asleep. They woke him and said to him, ‘Master, do you not care? We are going down!’ And he woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ‘Quiet now! Be calm!’ And the wind dropped, and all was calm again. Then he said to them, ‘Why are you so frightened? How is it that you have no faith?’ They were filled with awe and said to one another, ‘Who can this be? Even the wind and the sea obey him.’

Gospel (GB) Mark 4:35-41 ‘Who is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?’

On that day, when evening had come, Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Let us go across to the other side.’ And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’ And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, ‘Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?’ And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, ‘Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?’

Gospel (USA) Mark 4:35-41 Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?

On that day, as evening drew on, Jesus said to his disciples: “Let us cross to the other side.” Leaving the crowd, they took Jesus with them in the boat just as he was. And other boats were with him. A violent squall came up and waves were breaking over the boat, so that it was already filling up. Jesus was in the stern, asleep on a cushion. They woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Quiet! Be still!” The wind ceased and there was great calm. Then he asked them, “Why are you terrified? Do you not yet have faith?” They were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?”

Reflections (9)

(i) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

There is a strong contrast between the demeanour of Jesus and the demeanour of the disciples in this morning’s gospel reading as their fishing boat is threatened to be swamped in a storm. Jesus is asleep in a cushion in the stern of the boat. The disciples panic, terrified that they are going to sink, and they wake Jesus with the somewhat accusing question, ‘Master, do you not care?’ The sleep of Jesus was a kind of silent rebuke to the disciples’ panic. Jesus was at peace in the midst of the storm because he knew that God was greater and more powerful than the storm. The disciples, in contrast, were transfixed by the storm and could not see beyond it, even though Jesus was with them in the boat. This morning’s gospel reminds us that no matter how bad a storm we find ourselves in, there is always a greater reality beyond it, and indeed within it, and that is the reality of God’s presence to us in and through Jesus. God may seem distant at such threatening moments, Jesus may seem asleep, yet he is truly with us in a caring way, and his presence to us will bring us through the storm into a place of calm if we entrust ourselves to that presence.

And/Or

(ii) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

There is a stark contrast between the demeanour of Jesus and that of his disciples when a storm breaks out on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus was in the stern of the boat, his head on a cushion, asleep. The disciples were panicking and in their panic they woke Jesus and rebuked him, ‘Master, do you not care? We are going down’. Jesus’ sleep suggested his quiet trust in God, even in the midst of the storm. His disciples’ panic suggested their lack of trust in God, their lack of faith. Jesus addresses them, ‘Why are you so frightened? How is it that you have no faith?’ Jesus wanted them to have something of his own trust in God in the midst of the storm. We have all known storms of one kind or another in our own lives. This morning’s gospel reading invites us to trust that God is at hand, and at work, even in the midst of the most threatening of storms. We are asked to enter into Jesus’ own trusting relationship with God, even when the ground seems to be opening up under us, whether as individuals or as a community of faith. Jesus was in the boat with the disciples; he is with us too as individuals and as a church. His communion with us, his nearness to us, helps us to imbibe something of his conviction that God will bring us to the other side, the far shore, in spite of storms along the way.

And/Or

(iii) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The evangelist Mark seems to have written his gospel to a church that was going through a kind of a dark valley. It may well have been written to the church in Rome shortly after the persecution of Nero had laid waste to that church. The theme of suffering and failure because of suffering is very strong in this gospel. It is likely that Mark saw the disciples in a small boat on the Sea of Galilee battered by a storm that threatened to sink them as an image of his church. The cry of the disciples to Jesus in the boat as the storm was raging may well be the cry of Mark’s church, ‘Master, do you not care? We are going down’. Perhaps it is a cry we might find easy to identify with. In contrast to the disciples who panic in the storm, Mark presents Jesus as asleep on a cushion in the back of the boat. Jesus was at peace because he knew that God was stronger than the storm, and that in spite of the storm all would be well. His trusting faith in God in spite of the storm left him at peace; the disciples lack of faith in God as the storm howled left them in a state of panic, which is why Jesus goes on to ask them, ‘Why is it that you have no faith?’ In times of crisis, when the elements threaten to engulf us and swamp us, we need something of that calm trust of Jesus in God from whose loving presence the storms of life cannot separate us.

And/Or

(iv) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

It is likely that Mark’s gospel was written to the church in Rome, shortly after it had come through the persecution of the emperor Nero. If so, Mark’s church would easily have recognized itself among the disciples in the boat, battling a gale, with the waves breaking into the boat so that it was almost swamped. Just as Jesus was asleep as the storm howled and the disciples concluded that Jesus didn’t care for them, so Mark’s church may have wondered during their own stormy ordeal whether the risen Lord was asleep, indifferent to their plight. As a church we have been through difficult time; we have taken a battering, for various reasons. We too may be tempted to think that the Lord has forgotten about us and doesn’t care. The message of today’s gospel reading is that nothing could be further from the truth. The reason that Jesus was asleep in the boat as the storm broke wasn’t that he didn’t care for his disciples but that he had complete trust that God would preserve the boat in the storm because God was stronger than the storm. He rebuked his disciples for their lack of trust, ‘How is it that you have no faith?’ The Lord is never asleep to our plight; he is always with us in the storm and will never allow the storm to swamp the church. He does ask, however, that we keep faith in him while the storm is doing its worst and not just in the calm after it.

And/Or

(v) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

If you are fortunate enough to ever to go on pilgrimage to the Holy Land, one of the sights that will remain with you is that of the Sea of Galilee. It is so evocative of the life and ministry of Jesus. In this morning’s gospel reading Jesus invites his disciples to cross over to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, the side opposite Capernaum and all the places familiar to Jesus and his disciples. This was a side where there the population was more pagan than Jewish. In a way that little boat with the disciples and Jesus in it reminds us of the church. Jesus is always calling the church to go over to the other side, to break new ground, to move beyond the familiar and the comfortable. The disciples did what Jesus asked, but they discovered that this journey to the other side was not easy. They ran into a storm; they thought they were going to drown; they accused Jesus of not caring because he was asleep in the back of the boat. He was asleep not because he didn’t care but because he had complete trust in God, unlike his panicking disciples. Whenever the church tries to break new ground in response to the promptings of the Spirit it will invariably run into storms of one kind or another. Today’s gospel reading assures that the Lord is always with the church in such storms and that his power is greater than the force of the storm. If as church we learn to trust in him in the midst of the storm, rather than being full of fear like the disciples, we will reach the other side.

And/Or

(vi) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

There is a very striking image of Jesus in today’s gospel reading. As a gale blew and the waves broke into the boat he is there in the stern of the boat asleep with his head on a cushion. There is a storm at sea and a storm within the disciples; they are filled with terror before the terror of the storm. Yet amid all this chaos in nature and in his disciples, there is Jesus, a focal point of calm and stillness. He is at peace. His peaceful sleep when all seems lost speaks of his trust in God as one who is more powerful than the storm. The disciples focused on the storm and lost sight of God and, so, they felt overwhelmed by the storm. Jesus focused on God rather than on the storm and, so, he was completely at peace as the storm raged. Jesus’ demeanour teaches us to keep our focus on God even when we seem to be overwhelmed by forces before which we feel powerless.  Our faith does not preserve us from the storms of life, no more than it preserved Jesus, but it can enable us to remain at peace in the midst of the storm. Jesus rebuked his disciples for their lack of faith in God, their lack of trust. Jesus was with them; that should have been enough for them, even as the storm howled. Jesus is with us too as risen Lord, as we battle with our own storms in life. If we keep our focus on him at such times, we will come to share in his own peace and rest. It is a peace the world cannot give and the world cannot take away. It is a gift which empowers to be peacemakers for others.

And/Or

(vii) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

When a storm breaks over us in life, we often find ourselves in panic mode. At such times, it can be very helpful to have someone who remains calm as the storm rages. Their calmness has help to calm us. We find such a scenario in today’s gospel reading. The disciples and Jesus find themselves in a storm at sea. As a gale blew, waves were breaking into the boat, just as waves sometimes break over the sea wall when the wind is especially strong and the tide is high. In the midst of this storm, the disciples are clearly in panic mode. ‘Master, do you not care? We are going down!’, they exclaimed to Jesus. In contrast, Jesus is a centre of calm in the midst of the storm. He is so calm that he sleeps through the storm. The evangelist gives us that graphic little detail of the head of Jesus asleep on a cushion in the stern of the boat. The disciples’ panic did not disturb Jesus, rather his calm becalmed his disturbed disciples, and also becalmed the raging storm. When the storm had passed, Jesus asks his disciples two questions, ‘Why are you so frightened? How is it that you have no faith?’ In Mark’s gospel, the opposite of faith is not so much doubt as fear, the failure to trust. The Lord is always present to us as the centre of calm in the midst of the storms of life. Rather than allowing ourselves to be overcome with fear, he keeps calling on us to open ourselves to his calming presence, trusting that he is more powerful than any storm that life can hurl at us, and that he will ultimately protect us from all that threatens us.

And/Or

(viii) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

I have always been drawn to Mark’s depiction of the demeanour of Jesus in the boat as it battled with a raging storm. While the disciples were panicking, it is said of Jesus that ‘he was in the stern, his head on the cushion, asleep’. The disciples were overcome with fear, saying to Jesus, ‘Master, do you not care? We are going down!’ Jesus somehow knew that all was well and all would be well. He trusted in God’s providential care in the midst of the storm and that gave him an inner peace and calm. He rebuked his disciples for not having something of his trusting faith in God’s loving care, ‘Why are you so frightened? How is it that you have no faith?’ He spoke those words to his disciples having first calmed the wind and the sea. His inner calm becalmed the raging elements. In the gospels, the boat with the disciples in it is often a symbol of the church, the community of faith. The evangelist wants all of us to know that the risen Lord is with us in the storms of life. We are in stormy times at present; we sense that in these Covid times we are battled with a strong headwind and heavy seas. In these days, the Lord is present to us as a centre of calm. He calls out to us to enter into his own trusting faith in God our Father, so that we are not overcome by fear and anxiety. If we can imbibe some of his inner calm, then we can be a centre of calm for others who may be struggling in these days.

And/Or

(ix) Saturday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

We often find ourselves in a personal storm of one kind or another. We can feel somewhat overwhelmed by some situation, just as the disciples felt overwhelmed by the storm when they were in the boat on the Sea of Galilee. When that happens it is easy to turn in on ourselves and imagine that we have to get ourselves through the storm. Perhaps that is how the disciples felt in the boat as they turned in panic to Jesus, saying, ‘Master, do you not care, we are going down?’ Surely they had learned enough about Jesus by then to realize that of course he cared for them. They were not on their own; the Lord was with them and he was at peace about the storm, sleeping in the stern of the boat. His sleep was a sign of his own trusting faith in God his Father. Having calmed the storm, the Lord rebuked his disciples for their own lack of trusting faith in him during the storm. Like the disciples, we can imagine that we are on our own when some overwhelming situation threatens to drag us down. However, it is above all at such times that the Lord is powerfully with us. The Lord is always stronger than the storm and if we entrust ourselves to him in the storm we will be able to draw from his strength. As he was asleep in the boat while the storm rages, the Lord is always the still centre in the midst of the storm, and if we turn to him at such times, his stillness will help to keep us calm and at peace, even as the storm howls around us. Even when the waters of life are rough, the Lord, the good shepherd, can always lead us near restful waters.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

31st January >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 4:26-34): ‘This is what the kingdom of God is like’.

Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 4:26-34 The kingdom of God is a mustard seed growing into the biggest shrub of all.

Jesus said to the crowds: ‘This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man throws seed on the land. Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is sprouting and growing; how, he does not know. Of its own accord the land produces first the shoot, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the crop is ready, he loses no time: he starts to reap because the harvest has come.’ He also said, ‘What can we say the kingdom of God is like? What parable can we find for it? It is like a mustard seed which at the time of its sowing in the soil is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet once it is sown it grows into the biggest shrub of them all and puts out big branches so that the birds of the air can shelter in its shade.’ Using many parables like these, he spoke the word to them, so far as they were capable of understanding it. He would not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything to his disciples when they were alone.

Gospel (GB) Mark 4:26-34 ‘The smallest of all the seeds on earth becomes larger than all the garden plants.’

At that time: Jesus said to the crowd: ‘The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how. The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.’ And he said, ‘With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when sown on the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth, yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.’ With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it. He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to his own disciples he explained everything.

Gospel (USA) Mark 4:26-34 A man scatters seed on the land and would sleep and the seed would sprout and grow, he knows not how.

Jesus said to the crowds: “This is how it is with the Kingdom of God; it is as if a man were to scatter seed on the land and would sleep and rise night and day and the seed would sprout and grow, he knows not how. Of its own accord the land yields fruit, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the grain is ripe, he wields the sickle at once, for the harvest has come.” He said, “To what shall we compare the Kingdom of God, or what parable can we use for it? It is like a mustard seed that, when it is sown in the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on the earth. But once it is sown, it springs up and becomes the largest of plants and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the sky can dwell in its shade.” With many such parables he spoke the word to them as they were able to understand it. Without parables he did not speak to them, but to his own disciples he explained everything in private.

Reflections (9)

(i) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

I planted lots of daffodil bulbs in the garden for the first time ever last Autumn. The first shoots have already broken through the soil and are heading upwards. I was reminded of that by the first parable Jesus spoke in today’s gospel reading. He was referring to a farmer sowing seed, rather than someone planting bulbs. Jesus notices how, once planted, the seed sprouts and grows without the famer doing anything, and without the farmer knowing how it all happens. It is only at harvest time, when the seed is fully grown, that the farmer swings into action again. Jesus began this parable with the statement, ‘This is what the kingdom of God is like’. In what sense? Perhaps Jesus is saying that just as the seed sprouts and grows while the famer sleeps at night and goes about his business during the day, so God can be at work in our lives and in the life of our church, and our world, without us always being aware of it or understanding how God is at work. The Lord is always at work, bringing the kingdom of heaven to earth, including to our own personal lives. We can sometimes get discouraged because we are not doing enough, or we are not living well enough. Yet, the Lord is always at work in a life-giving way on our behalf and on behalf of all humanity. As the psalm says, he never slumbers or sleeps – even when we slumber and sleep! There are crucial times when our intervention, our work, is needed, just as the farmer has to sow the seed and reap the harvest. Yet, there are other times, many times, when we have to step back, and just allow the Lord to get on with his life-giving work. At such times, we need to commit our life to the Lord, to trust in him, in the words of today’s psalm.

And/Or

(ii) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The first of the two parables that Jesus speaks in this morning’s gospel reading seems to suggest that once the farmer has sown the seed he has to step back and allow nature to take over as it were. As he sleeps at night and goes about his business during the day the seed is quietly growing until the day comes when the crop is ready to be harvested. Jesus says that the kingdom of God is like that. In what sense is this true? Jesus seems to be saying that we have a part to play in the coming about of God’s kingdom among us; the seed has to be sown and only we can do it. Yet, the coming to pass of God’s kingdom in our midst is more God’s work than ours. Like the farmer, we cannot force the growth of God’s kingdom. We have to step back and allow God to do the work that only God can do. Saint Paul understood this truth very clearly and he expressed it very simply in his first letter to the Corinthians when referring to the coming to pass of the church of God in Corinth he said, ‘I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth’. The conclusion Paul draws from this reality is that people should not make too much of Paul or Apollos or any other labourer in the harvest, because it is always God who is the prime mover when any good is being done. Our contribution is very important, but it is God’s contribution that really brings the kingdom to earth. That is why we need to do all we can to further God’s work while at the same time leaving a great deal of space for God to work, and if something good comes out of it all, let the Lord be glorified and not ourselves.

And/Or

(iii) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The first parable that Jesus speaks in this morning’s gospel is often called ‘the parable of the seed growing secretly’. Jesus is saying that there is some correspondence between the coming of the kingdom of God and the way the farmer, having thrown seed on the land, then has nothing much to do, until the crop is ready for harvest. Yet, even though the farmer is doing very little in between sowing and harvesting, the seed is working away during that time, producing first a shoot, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. Jesus appears to be saying that God can be powerfully at work in our lives even in those times when we ourselves appear to be doing very little. Sometimes we equate God’s work with our own exercise of energy. Yet, there are times in our lives when we can do very little, whether for reasons of health or for some other reason. Jesus suggests in that parable that even in those quiet times when we appear to have very little to show for ourselves, God can be working away in our lives for the good, working in us and through us. It was Paul who said that God’s power is made perfect in weakness.

And/Or

(iv) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The first of the two parables in this morning’s gospel reading, the parable of the seed growing secretly, is only to be found in the gospel of Mark. It is an intriguing parable. Parables are like that; they are meant to make us think. Rather than telling us the message straight, they tease us into reflection. In the parable, once the farmer sows the seed he has to wait until the harvest. There is very little he can do between sowing and harvesting. He has to stand back and let the seed grow of its own accord. There are times in life when we too will need to stand back; there is a time to act and there is a time to wait and to recognize that the real action is happening away from us and without us. In our relationship with the Lord there is also a time to act and a time to step back and allow the Lord to act without any direct involvement from us. There are times when we need the humility to recognize that the Lord can work better in some situations if we do nothing rather than if we do something. What we do need and what we can pray for is the wisdom to know when to act, when to sow and to reap, and when to refrain from acting so that the Lord can work more effectively.

And/Or

(v) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

That first parable of the seed growing secretly suggests the mystery of growth. The farmer works hard to sow the seed, but then he has to wait. In a way he does not fully understand, the seed grows of his own accord. It is only when the seed is fully grown and the crop is ripe that the farmer can get down to work again. The wise farmer knows when it is time to work, and when it is time to stand back and wait patiently, and allow nature to take its course. We are not all farmers, but like the farmer in the parable we all have to try and get that balance between working to make something happen and standing back to allow something to happen. The balance between engagement and disengagement is important when it comes to all growth, including human growth, our own growth and the growth of others. The process of growth is not something we can fully control. That is especially true of our growth in Christ. There are certain things we can do to bring that about, but there are some things only the Lord can do. There comes a time when we have the allow the Lord to work his growth in us; that will often mean for us, easing up a little, doing less, making room for the Lord to work.

And/Or

(vi) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

There are times when less is better. We can want sometime to happen so much that we try to force it and in doing so we only manage to hold it back or even derail it. There is a time to be active and a time to be still and let be. In the first parable of today’s gospel reading, the farmer needed to be active in sowing the seed but then he needed to step back and allow the soil to interact with the seed in nature’s way. Jesus says that the kingdom of God is like that. Yes, God needs labourers for his harvest. Jesus once called on those he was sending out as his messengers to pray to God to send more labourers into his harvest. However, our labour is not the decisive factor in the coming of God’s kingdom into our world. It is ultimately God who will see to the coming of God’s kingdom. Like the farmer in the parable there will be times when, after our labour, all we can do is step back and allow God to do what only God can do. The farmer in the parable did not understand how the seed he had sown comes to maturity as full grain, ‘how, he does not know’. There is much about how the Lord works that we will not understand either. Saint Paul said of his ministry and that of his co-worker Apollo in his first letter to the Corinthians, ‘I planted, Apollo watered, but God gave the growth’. We do what we can and then we trust that the Lord will do what the Lord can, which is much more significant. The Lord is always at work beyond our human efforts.  He will continue to work for the coming of his kingdom, even when our efforts seem insufficient to the task.

And/Or

(vii) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

It is said that all of human life is to be found in the Scriptures. In the first reading, the darker side of the human spirit is on display. It is a story of the abuse of power. David, the king, commits adultery with Bathsheba, the wife of one of his commanders, Uriah, and then arranges for Uriah to be killed in battle, so that he can marry her. It is a stark depiction of ruthless, self-serving power. Yet, David was the Lord’s anointed, the one whom he chose from all the sons of Jesse. David would go on to acknowledge his sin before God, and our responsorial psalm was often considered to be the prayer of David, ‘Have mercy on me God in your kindness’. The story of David reminds us that people can be complex, open to God’s call and yet, sometimes, turning away from God. It is the story of us all, in different ways. We can sometimes see only the shadow side of someone and fail to see that there is good there as well. The first of the two parables in today’s gospel reading reminds us that real growth can be taking place beneath the soil, invisible to all. The Lord can be working away beneath the surface of our lives, even at those times when we seem to ourselves and to others to be falling short of the Lord’s desire for us. Taking up the image of the second parable, even a mustard see of goodness buried deep within us can, with the Lord’s help, blossom into something wonderful that serves others.  Saint Paul assures us in one of his letters that the Lord will bring the good work he has begun in us to completion. The good work that the Lord began in creating us, in receiving us at baptism into his body, continues throughout our lives, in spite of our various resistances to it, our failures, our sin. If we give the Lord the slightest opening, he will bring his good work to completion in his own time.

And/Or

(viii) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The first of the two parables in today’s gospel reading suggests that when a farmer has sown seed in the ground, he has to step back and allow nature to bring the seed to fruition. It is only when the seed is fully grown that the farmer swings into action again, harvesting the crop. Between sowing and harvesting, he has to leave the seed alone. If he were to start poking around in the soil to see how the seed is doing, he would greatly inhibit its growth. When Jesus says the kingdom of God is like that, what does he mean? He may be saying that the coming of God’s kingdom into our lives and into our world isn’t all down to us. We have our work to do, as the farmer has to sow and harvest. However, the real work of spiritual growth within ourselves and in our world is God’s doing. As Saint Paul says in his first letter to the Corinthians, ‘I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth’. Having done what we can, we have to step back and allow God to work. Sometimes, God’s good work can be happening all around us, even when we are doing very little. God can be working powerfully in our through our lives in those times when we seem to have little to give, perhaps because of advancing years or illness. The good work we have done in the past can be bearing fruit in ways that we might never suspect. God’s good work continues, even when we seem to have little to show for our efforts. What the Lord asks of us is perseverance, not to lose heart. We are to keep faithful, especially when times are lean and difficult.

And/Or

(ix) Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

We are all familiar with how those in power can abuse their power, using it to serve their own interests. We have a very clear instance of that in today’s first reading. David had many fine qualities; he was the Lord’s anointed. Yet, he used his power to take the wife of one of his commanders to live with him and then to arrange for the death of that commander in battle. When we see such shocking abuse of power in our world we can get very discouraged. The parable of the seed growing secretly in today’s gospel reading can be a source of encouragement to us when we are tempted to get despondent about all that is happening around us. The farmer sows the seed, but for the period of the seeds germination and growth, there is nothing much for him to do. It is only when what he sowed is ready to be harvested that he can swing back into action again. Between the sowing and the harvesting, something wonderful is happening in the life of the seed, much of which the farmer doesn’t understand. ‘Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is sprouting and growing; how, he does not know’. Jesus may be saying to us through this parable, if we do what we can, sowing the seed of faith by our faithfulness to him, God will work away through our faith, even faith the size of a mustard seed. How God is working among us may not be very visible, just as the sprouting and growing of the seed was happening below the surface, yet, God can be bringing something wonderful to pass. In other words, the doing of God’s work, the coming of God’s kingdom, is not all down to us. We have a contribution to make, but the primary work is God’s. The Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, is always at work in ways that we can never fully understand. If we do some sowing, the Spirit will work through our efforts, small as they may seem to us, in ways that will surprise us.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

30th January >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 4:21-25): ‘The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given’.

Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 4:21-25 A lamp is to be put on a lampstand. The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given.

Jesus said to the crowd, ‘Would you bring in a lamp to put it under a tub or under the bed? Surely you will put it on the lamp-stand? For there is nothing hidden but it must be disclosed, nothing kept secret except to be brought to light. If anyone has ears to hear, let him listen to this.’ He also said to them, ‘Take notice of what you are hearing. The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given – and more besides; for the man who has will be given more; from the man who has not, even what he has will be taken away.’

Gospel (GB) Mark 4:21-25 ‘A lamp brought in is to be put on a stand. The measure you use, it will be measured to you.’

At that time: Jesus said to the crowd, ‘Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket, or under a bed, and not on a stand? For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest; nor is anything secret except to come to light. If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.’ And he said to them, ‘Pay attention to what you hear: with the measure you use, it will be measured to you, and still more will be added to you. For to the one who has, more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.’

Gospel (USA) Mark 4:21-25 A lamp is to be placed on a lampstand. The measure with which you measure will be measured out to you.

Jesus said to his disciples, “Is a lamp brought in to be placed under a bushel basket or under a bed, and not to be placed on a lampstand? For there is nothing hidden except to be made visible; nothing is secret except to come to light. Anyone who has ears to hear ought to hear.” He also told them, “Take care what you hear. The measure with which you measure will be measured out to you, and still more will be given to you. To the one who has, more will be given; from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”

Reflections (7)

(i) Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus says, ‘Take notice of what you are hearing’. We are exposed to all kinds of words all of the time. We are bombarded by speech of various kinds. Jesus suggests that we have to be discerning about what we hear, ‘Take notice…’. Not everything we hear is worth paying attention to or taking seriously. The word of God is not the only word abroad in the world; other words are clamouring to be heard. The focus of our hearing, as followers of the Lord, is to be the word of God. As Jesus says in the gospel reading, ‘if anyone has ears to hear, let them listen to this’. The more attuned we are to the word of God, the better able we will be to discern the value of all other words. As one of the psalms puts it, ‘your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path’. Attentiveness to the Lord’s word gives us the light to make our way through the maze of words that surround us. Jesus also declares in the gospel reading that the more attentive we are to the Lord’s word, the more we will receive from the Lord, ‘the amount you measure out is the amount you will be given – and more besides’. The more receptive we are to what the Lord is offering us through his word, the more we will be given as we continue our journey of faith. As we exercise our spiritual muscle of listening to the Lord’s word, we will grow in our capacity to receive all that the Lord wants to give us.

And/Or

(ii) Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading this morning, Jesus calls upon his contemporaries to listen carefully to what he says, ‘Take notice of/pay attention to what you hear’. We hear a lot but we do not always pay attention to or take notice of what we hear. Jesus as there is often more to someone than meets the eye, so there can be more to someone than meets the ear. When we listen attentively we can hear the more in what someone says that is often not obvious. What is true in regard to the speaking of others is even more true in regard to the Lord’s speaking, the Lord’s word. There is always more there than meets the ear. Jesus declares in the gospel reading that the more carefully we listen, the more we will receive, ‘the amount you measure out is the amount you will be given – and more besides’. The riches contained within the Lord’s word are plentiful and he is generous with them, but it is our generosity, our generous listening, that releases those riches into our lives.

And/Or

(iii) Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Jesus was a master of images and stories. In this morning’s gospel reading we find the image of the lamp. In a kind of mini parable he says that you do not bring in a lamp to put it under a tub or under the bed, but you put it on a lamp-stand. Only in this way will the light which the lamp gives out be effective in lighting up the space where people gather. How are we to understand that image? Jesus may be saying that the light of faith which we carry within us is not meant to be hidden away somewhere but is to shine publicly for all to see. The church, and all of us who make up the church, are to be the light of the world. We are to allow the light of our faith, the light of the Lord, to shine through us, so that it is seen by others. This image of the church as a light suggests a church that is not turned in on itself, overly preoccupied with its own problems, but a church that is turned out towards the world. In one of his recent Angelus addresses Pope Francis spoke of the church in this way. He said, ‘being disciples of the Lamb means not living like a besieged citadel, but like a city placed on a hill, open, welcoming and supportive. It means not assuming closed attitudes but rather proposing the Gospel to everyone’. The second part of today’s gospel reading suggests that the courageous the church is in witnessing to the treasure of the gospel, the stronger it will become. ‘The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given back’.

And/Or

(iv) Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The verses we have just heard come immediately after the parable of the sower and its interpretation. That parable sought to reassure Jesus’ disciples that the word Jesus proclaimed would bear fruit in people’s lives, in spite of the many obstacles working against that word, such as the cares and pleasures of this life and the persecution that the word can bring. The verses that make up this morning’s gospel reading remind us that we have our part to play in the word bearing fruit. Jesus says, ‘if anyone has ears to hear, let him listen’ and ‘take notice of what you are hearing’. We need to become good listeners of the word. Jesus goes on to say that the more we invest ourselves in that attentive listening to the word, the more we will be given, ‘the amount you measure out is the amount you will be given’. In that sense, ‘the one who has will be given more’. As we give of ourselves to the word, we discover that we keep receiving more. On the other hand, ‘from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away’. If we don’t make the effort to hear the word and receive from its riches, our spiritual understanding of the word diminishes. We can never underestimate the power of the Lord’s word, but this morning’s gospel reminds us that its power is rendered ineffective if we do not make the effort to hear it.

And/Or

(v) Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Just prior to this gospel, Jesus has spoken the parable of the sower and given his interpretation of that parable. In that parable and its interpretation the focus is on the word of God that Jesus proclaims and on the need to really hear the word so that it takes root in our hearts and bears fruit in our lives. In today’s gospel reading the ‘lamp’ is an image of God’s word. It is proclaimed to all, just as a lamp is placed on a lamp-stand for all to benefit from its light. The Lord proclaims his word; it is up to us to really listen to it. In the words of the gospel reading, ‘if anyone has ears to hear, let him listen to this’. The gospel reading goes on to suggest that the more we more we give ourselves to the Lord’s word, the more we will receive from it. ‘The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given’. In other terms, the more we invest in God’s word, the more we will get. The light of God’s word will shine but we have to listen attentively to it, if it is to bear fruit in our lives. As we make a greater effort to really hear and understand God’s word, we will receive more, ‘the one who has will be given more’. If we make no effort, if we ignore the Lord’s word, we risk losing what we have already gained, ‘the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away’. We have to exercise our spiritual muscles, otherwise they will lose the strength they once had. The gospel reading suggests that the Lord can’t do it all. We must play our part if his word is to bear the good and rich fruit in our lives that the Lord desires for us.

And/Or

(vi) Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

In today’s first reading, David responds in thankful prayer to the word of God that has just been spoken to him by the prophet Nathan. God, speaking through Nathan, had declared that he would enter into a special relationship with David’s heirs, David’s house or household. God would adopt future kings of the line of David as his son, ‘I will be a father to him, and he will be a son to me’. David’s heirs would be expected to rule in God’s name, as befits adopted sons of God. They were to give expression to God’s justice, God’s care for the vulnerable, for the widows, the orphans and the stranger. Very few of David’s heirs lived up to his noble calling. Jesus belonged to this house or line of David, through Joseph his legal father. Jesus alone would respond fully to the calling of David’s heirs. As a descendant of David, Jesus was not only the adopted son of God, but the Son of God in a unique sense. He would give full expression to God’s just and merciful love for humanity. Because of who Jesus is, the Son of David who is also Son of God, Jesus declares in the gospel reading, ‘take notice of what you are hearing’. We need to pay careful attention to what Jesus says. The more attentively we listen to Jesus’ word to us, the more we will receive. In the words of Jesus in our gospel reading, ‘the amount you measure out is the amount you will be given… the one who has will be given more’. Our attentive listening to the Lord’s word expands our capacity to receive all that the Lord wants to give us as God’s unique Son.

And/Or

(vii) Thursday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s gospel reading from Mark follows immediately after yesterday’s gospel reading of the parable of the sower and its interpretation, which was a reflection on Jesus’ proclamation of God’s word and how it was being responded to. Today’s gospel reading suggests that God’s word is like a light that needs to be let shine. No one puts a lamp under a bed but on a lamp stand where it can give light to all. God’s word proclaimed by Jesus is a lamp for our way and a light for our steps. It needs constant proclamation. We are aware of various forms of darkness in our world. We are always on the lookout for some light. The words of Jesus allow God’s light to shine upon us. That is why, in the words of the gospel reading, we need to listen carefully to the Lord’s word, ‘Take notice of what you are hearing’. According to the gospel reading, the more attentively we listen to God’s word, the more we will receive. ‘The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given – and more besides, for the one who has will be given more’. The contrary is also true. If we fail to listen to the Lord’s word, if we turn away from it, we can easily lose what we may have gained from listening to it in the past, ‘the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away’. The Lord’s word is a wonderful light in our lives; it has the power to bring us life. However, it needs our response. The Lord who speaks needs us to listen, but if we give ourselves over to really listening to his word then we will receive more than we ever anticipated. In the words of Jesus from another of the gospels, ‘A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap’.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

29th January >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Wednesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 4:1-20): ‘Listen anyone who has ears to hear’.

Wednesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 4:1-20 The parable of the sower.

Jesus began to teach by the lakeside, but such a huge crowd gathered round him that he got into a boat on the lake and sat there. The people were all along the shore, at the water’s edge. He taught them many things in parables, and in the course of his teaching he said to them, ‘Listen! Imagine a sower going out to sow. Now it happened that, as he sowed, some of the seed fell on the edge of the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some seed fell on rocky ground where it found little soil and sprang up straightaway, because there was no depth of earth; and when the sun came up it was scorched and, not having any roots, it withered away. Some seed fell into thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it produced no crop. And some seeds fell into rich soil and, growing tall and strong, produced crop; and yielded thirty, sixty, even a hundredfold.’ And he said, ‘Listen, anyone who has ears to hear!’ When he was alone, the Twelve, together with the others who formed his company, asked what the parables meant. He told them, ‘The secret of the kingdom of God is given to you, but to those who are outside everything comes in parables, so that they may see and see again, but not perceive; may hear and hear again, but not understand; otherwise they might be converted and be forgiven.’ He said to them, ‘Do you not understand this parable? Then how will you understand any of the parables? What the sower is sowing is the word. Those on the edge of the path where the word is sown are people who have no sooner heard it than Satan comes and carries away the word that was sown in them. Similarly, those who receive the seed on patches of rock are people who, when first they hear the word, welcome it at once with joy. But they have no root in them, they do not last; should some trial come, or some persecution on account of the word, they fall away at once. Then there are others who receive the seed in thorns. These have heard the word, but the worries of this world, the lure of riches and all the other passions come in to choke the word, and so it produces nothing. And there are those who have received the seed in rich soil: they hear the word and accept it and yield a harvest, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.’

Gospel (GB) Mark 4:1-20 ‘A sower went out to sow.’

At that time: Again Jesus began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: ‘Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.’ And he said, ‘He who has ears to hear, let him hear.’ And when he was alone, those around him with the Twelve asked him about the parables. And he said to them, ‘To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, so that “they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven.” ’ And he said to them, ‘Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? The sower sows the word. And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. And they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. And others are the ones sown among thorns: they are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.’

Gospel (USA) Mark 4:1-20 A sower went out to sow.

On another occasion, Jesus began to teach by the sea. A very large crowd gathered around him so that he got into a boat on the sea and sat down. And the whole crowd was beside the sea on land. And he taught them at length in parables, and in the course of his instruction he said to them, “Hear this! A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Other seed fell on rocky ground where it had little soil. It sprang up at once because the soil was not deep. And when the sun rose, it was scorched and it withered for lack of roots. Some seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it and it produced no grain. And some seed fell on rich soil and produced fruit. It came up and grew and yielded thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold.” He added, “Whoever has ears to hear ought to hear.” And when he was alone, those present along with the Twelve questioned him about the parables. He answered them, “The mystery of the Kingdom of God has been granted to you. But to those outside everything comes in parables, so that

they may look and see but not perceive, and hear and listen but not understand, in order that they may not be converted and be forgiven.”

Jesus said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? Then how will you understand any of the parables? The sower sows the word. These are the ones on the path where the word is sown. As soon as they hear, Satan comes at once and takes away the word sown in them. And these are the ones sown on rocky ground who, when they hear the word, receive it at once with joy. But they have no roots; they last only for a time. Then when tribulation or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. Those sown among thorns are another sort. They are the people who hear the word, but worldly anxiety, the lure of riches, and the craving for other things intrude and choke the word, and it bears no fruit. But those sown on rich soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.”

Reflections (5)

(i) Wednesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Many scholars hold that, whereas the parable in today’s gospel reading was spoken by Jesus, the interpretation that follows reflects the experience of the early church. The focus has shifted from the sower to the various types of soil which have come to represent various responses to the preaching of the gospel. How might Jesus have intended this parable to be heard? When Jesus saw the farmer going out to sow seeds, it reminded him of the way God was at work in his ministry. Jesus noticed that the farmer scattered the seed with abandon, not knowing what kind of soil it would fall on. Inevitably, a great deal of the seed that was scattered never germinated. Yet, some of the seed fell on good soil and produced an extraordinary harvest. In a similar way, God was scattering the seed of his life-giving word through Jesus’ ministry. God’s favour was being scattered abroad in an almost reckless manner. God gave the most unlikely places the opportunity of receiving the life-giving seed of his word. Jesus’ ministry had something of that scatter gun approach of the sower. There was nothing selective about Jesus’ company. As with the farmer in the parable, much of what Jesus scattered was lost; it met with little or no response. Yet, Jesus knew that some people were receiving the seed of his word, and that would be enough to bring about the harvest of God’s kingdom. In speaking this parable, Jesus may have been speaking a word of encouragement to his disciples, ‘Despite all the setbacks, the opposition and hostility, God is at work and that work will lead to something wonderful’. The seed of the gospel is good and powerful. Whatever the odds against us, we must keep sowing, because as the prophet Isaiah has said, God’s word does not return to him empty.

And/Or

(ii) Wednesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

There are times when our efforts to do something worthwhile don’t appear to get very far. The opening lines of the parable of the sower in this morning’s gospel reading reflect that reality. Much of the seed that the sower scattered produced nothing; it was taken by the birds of the air, choked by thorns, scorched by the sun. Yet, some of what he sowed produced a wonderful harvest. In spite of much frustration and failure, there was a great crop at the end of the day. The Lord appears to be saying through that parable that his own efforts, his words and his deeds, would eventually bear great fruit, in spite of many setbacks, including misunderstanding, rejection and, eventually, crucifixion. The parable is a word of encouragement to those who might be tempted to lose faith in him. It is also a word of encouragement to all of us as we try to share in the Lord’s work and mission. It is as if Jesus is saying to us, ‘if the seed is good, the crop will be good, in spite of setbacks and failure’. We do have good seed, the good seed of the gospel. We can be confident that in scattering that seed, in witnessing to that gospel, the Lord will work powerfully through us.

And/Or

(iii) Wednesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The parable of the sower was probably spoken by Jesus as an encouraging word to his disciples. As Mark has been telling the story of Jesus’ public ministry prior to Jesus speaking this parable, Jesus and his disciples have been encountering many difficulties and obstacles. The religious leaders have accused Jesus and his disciples of breaking the Sabbath; they have claimed that Jesus heals by the power of Satan. Jesus’ own relatives have tried to take him in hand because of the general impression that he had lost the run of himself. In that context Jesus draws the attention of the disciples to the farmer sowing seed in Galilee. The farmer has to deal with all kinds of obstacles, with the result that much of the seed that he sows never takes root, or if it does it never reaches maturity. Yet, in spite of obstacles and setbacks, the harvest is great. Jesus is saying, look beyond the obstacles, the set-backs, the disappointments; God is at work in my ministry and the harvest will be great in the end. We can all become absorbed by what is not going well, by the failures, the losses all around us. The parable encourages us to keep hopeful in the midst of loss and failure that our good efforts seem to yield, because the Lord is always at work in a life-giving way even when failure and loss seem to dominate the landscape.

And/Or

(iv) Wednesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Speaking through the prophet Isaiah the Lord says, ‘the word be that goes out of my mouth… shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplished that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it’. To some extent the parable in today’s gospel reading reflects that declaration of the Lord that his word will accomplish God’s purpose in the end. Much of the farmer’s work in sowing the seed seems like a waste of time. Nature’s elements, like the birds of the air, rocky soil and thorns, inhibit the farmer’s work of sowing seed. However, in spite of the loss, some of the seed falls on good soil and the return from that seed far outweighs the failure of the other seed. If the seed is an image of the word of God, as the interpretation of the parable suggests, then, the Lord’s word accomplishes the Lord’s purposes, in spite of the many resistances in the human heart, be it a failure to allow the word to take root there, or an unwillingness to be faithful in times of trial, or allowing the attractions of the world to choke the word. Human resistance will not, in the end, undermine the power of the Lord’s word. Human failure will not have the last word. In the language of Paul, where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. This realization does not make us complacent. However, it does keep us hopeful when we are faced with the various forms that our own failure can take. Our resistance to the Lord’s word does not weaken the life-giving power of that word. After failure, the word remains in all its nurturing efficacy. Even after all our various resistances to the Lord’s word, we can always keep returning him, saying with Peter, ‘Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life’.

And/Or

(v) Wednesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Those who like to do some gardening are aware that not everything that is planted will survive the various assaults of weather and insects. However, what doesn’t grow, or what grows and doesn’t last, can be more than compensated for by what flourishes. It can be such a joy when something that is planted reaches its full potential, even if other plantings are much less successful. In the parable, Jesus imagines a sower scattering seed in a very liberal fashion. Much of it does not come to fruition, because of hungry birds, thin soil, thorny weeds and much else. However, some seed survived all those threats and produced an extraordinary crop. Thirty, sixty, a hundredfold is way above the yield any farmer would expect. At this point the parable loses touch a little with reality. However, perhaps that is the point. Much of Jesus’ preaching made little or no impact on many. The interpretation of the parable suggests some of the reasons why the preaching of the Lord’s word fails to bear fruit in people’s lives. Yet, Jesus was saying to his disciples that whenever his word is received by hearts that are open and receptive the results can be extraordinary. In spite of so much indifference and failure, even a small number of receptive hearts can usher in the kingdom of God in ways that defy all normal expectations. We can easily get discouraged by the indifference of many to the message of the gospel. In this parable, the Lord is reminding us that even in times of great loss, he can nevertheless work powerfully through those whose hearts are receptive to his word. They can be the beachhead in our world for the coming of God’s kingdom. Even a small amount of good soil can yield a harvest beyond imagining.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

28th January >> Fr. Martin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Tuesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time (Mark 3:31-35): ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’

Tuesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 3:31-35 Who are my mother and my brothers? Those that do the will of God.

The mother and brothers of Jesus arrived and, standing outside, sent in a message asking for him. A crowd was sitting round him at the time the message was passed to him, ‘Your mother and brothers and sisters are outside asking for you.’ He replied, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking round at those sitting in a circle about him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my brother and sister and mother.’

Gospel (GB) Mark 3:31-35 ‘Whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.’

At that time: The mother of Jesus and his brothers came, and standing outside they sent to him and called him. And a crowd was sitting around him, and they said to him, ‘Your mother and your brothers are outside, seeking you.’ And he answered them, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking about at those who sat around him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.’

Gospel (USA) Mark 3:31-35 Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.

The mother of Jesus and his brothers arrived at the house. Standing outside, they sent word to Jesus and called him. A crowd seated around him told him, “Your mother and your brothers and your sisters are outside asking for you.” But he said to them in reply, “Who are my mother and my brothers?” And looking around at those seated in the circle he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”

Reflections (8)

(i) Tuesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

A few verses before our gospel reading, Mark tells us that the family of Jesus set out from Nazareth to Capernaum to restrain Jesus, to seize him, because people were saying that Jesus was out of his mind. With the best of intentions, they set out to take charge of Jesus. According to today’s gospel reading, when the mother and brothers of Jesus arrived at Capernaum asking to see Jesus, he more or less ignored them. He didn’t leave what he was doing, teaching his disciples in a house, to go out to his family. Instead, he sent a message out to them declaring that he now had a new family, the family of his disciples, the family of those who listened to his word and lived that word, thereby doing God’s will. It can’t have been easy for Jesus’ family, especially his mother, to hear that message. Jesus was not going to be managed or reigned in. Jesus’ family had to learn to let him go to God’s purpose for his life. It is a lesson we all have to learn in relation to others, especially those we love. We feel we know what is best for them and we want them to respond to our promptings. Yet, there comes a time when we have to acknowledge our powerlessness and let them go, even though we do not fully understand what is happening in their lives. This can be painful, as it must have been for Mary and the other members of Jesus’ family. Letting go of other is but one expression of a more fundamental lettering go, which is letting go to the Lord. This is what is being asked of Mary and her family in the gospel reading. Their purpose for Jesus was much narrower than the Lord’s purpose for them; he wanted them to be part of his new family of disciples. The Lord’s purpose for our lives and the lives of others is always greater than our own purposes for ourselves and others. We spend our lives letting go to the Lord’s purpose for our lives which alone can do justice to our full humanity.

And/Or

(ii) Tuesday, Third week in Ordinary Time

This morning’s gospel reading is the only passage in Mark’s gospel where the mother of Jesus features. According to Mark, she comes with other members of Jesus’ family to ‘restrain’ Jesus, to seize him, because people were saying about Jesus that he had gone out of his mind. Mark presents Mary and other family members as acting out of genuine concern for Jesus. However, the fact that we do something out of concern for someone doesn’t necessarily mean that it is the right thing to do. On this occasion, according to Mark, Jesus kept his distance from his mother and the other members of his family, in spite of their very good intentions. When word came to him that his mother and brothers and sisters were outside the house looking for him, Jesus identified those inside the house, his disciples, as his real family. ‘Whoever does the will of God’, Jesus said, ‘that person is my brother and sister and mother’. There was an implicit invitation here to his mother and family members to come inside the house and to fully become his disciples. Mary and the other family members had to learn to set aside their will for Jesus and surrender to God’s will for his life. It is reassuring to be reminded by Mark that even Mary struggled to live out the implications of the prayer, ‘thy will be done on earth as in heaven’. It is a daily struggle for all of us to give priority to what God wants over what we want. This is the Christian struggle; it was the struggle of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. In that struggle we are assured of the help of Jesus, who declared, ‘I have come… not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me’.

And/Or

(iii) Tuesday, Third week in Ordinary Time

There are many images of the church in the New Testament. We are all familiar with Paul’s image of the church as the body of Christ. For Paul, each of us is a member of that body through baptism and as members we are dependent on one another’s gifts given by the Holy Spirit. In this morning’s gospel reading, the words of Jesus suggest another image for the church and that is the image of a family. He addresses his disciples, all those who seek to do God’s will, as his mother, his brothers and his sisters. His blood family, his mother and brothers, had come looking for him, to take him away, but, in response he points to his disciples as his new family. The church is a family under God as Father; we are all brothers and sisters of one another and of the Lord. This image of church suggests a church in which everyone is equally cherished and no one is more important than anyone else. Within this family we are all spiritual siblings, called to give support to other members of the family and to receive support from other members of the family. The image of the family, like that of the body, suggests our interconnectedness and our interdependence. When Pope Francis came to the window of Saint Peter’s after being elected Pope, he gave expression of this vision of church when he asked everyone in the Square to pray for him, before he gave them his blessing. One of the important ways we give expression to our interconnectedness is by praying for one another.

And/Or

(iv) Tuesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Many images have been used for the church in the course of the church’s history. The most authentic images are those that are drawn from the Scriptures, such as the church as the body of Christ or the bride of Christ or the people of God. The gospel reading this morning suggests another image for the church. Jesus looks around at his disciples sitting around him in a circle, listening to him speaking, and he identifies them as his mother, his brother and his sister. Here we have the nucleus of the church, the first disciples of Jesus, and Jesus identifies them as his family. He attaches more importance to this new family than to his blood family who are standing outside the house in which he is speaking insisting that he come home with them. The church can helpfully be understood as a family. Because of our baptism we are brothers and sisters of Jesus. The letter to the Hebrews says that Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers and sisters and declares that the one who sanctifies, Jesus, and those who are sanctified, ourselves, all have one Father. Because we are adopted brothers and sisters of Jesus, his heavenly Father is our heavenly Father, and we also call on the mother of Jesus as our mother. As church, we are privileged to be members of a very special family, and calling is to true

And/Or

(v) Tuesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel reading, Jesus seems to distance himself from his family of origin. While Jesus is teaching in a house, one of the crowd informs him that his mother and brothers are outside the house wanting to speak to him. Jesus declares that he now has a new family, the family of those seated around him, the family of his disciples, the family of those who do the will of God as proclaimed and lived by Jesus. It must have been difficult for Jesus’ mother to come to terms with this new reality. Jesus no longer belonged to her or the rest of her family. Jesus now belonged to a much larger family that was not defined by blood but by its relationship to him and to the God whom he proclaimed. This family soon came to be called the church and we are all members of that family today. Through baptism we have been initiated into that family, becoming sons and daughters of God, brothers and sisters of Jesus and, as one family, people who look to Mary as our mother. We are, in many ways, shaped by our family of origin, but, more fundamentally, we are shaped by this ecclesial family to which we belong. It is there that we encounter Jesus, the Lord, in word, in sacrament and in each other; it is there that we imbibe his values and receive his Spirit. According to Jesus in this morning’s gospel reading what really defines us as members of this family is our willingness to do the will of God, as Jesus proclaimed and lived it. That is why the distinguishing prayer that Jesus gave to this family of disciples, our family prayer, begins, ‘Father... thy will be done, on earth as in heaven’.

And/Or

(vi) Tuesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s gospel reading is the only passage in the gospel of Mark where the mother of Jesus appears. If we only had Mark’s gospel this would be the only gospel portrait of Mary we would have. She is standing with other members of Jesus’ family outside a house where Jesus is teaching surrounded by his disciples. A few verses earlier Mark had told us why Jesus’ mother and other members of his family were there. They had come to restrain him, to seize him, because people were saying that he had gone out of his mind. Here he was, upsetting all sorts of influential and powerful people, making deadly enemies for himself. Somebody needed to talk sense to him and who better than his mother. However, the plans of Jesus’ mother and family for Jesus did not come to pass. When Jesus was informed that his mother and family members were outside waiting to see him, he pointed to the disciples seated around him and said, ‘here are my mother and brothers’. ‘This is now my family’, he was saying. Jesus had moved on from his blood family and was forming a new family of disciples, the nucleus of the church. It cannot have been easy for Mary to come to terms with losing her son in this way. He was taking a path she did not understand and did not always approve of. She was struggling to come to terms with the mystery of her son’s identity. So often those close to us don’t take a path we expect them to take or want them to take. Like Mary, we struggle to come to terms with the mystery of the other’s identity. Like her, we sometimes have to learn to let go and to let be, trusting that in the end God’s purpose will prevail in the lives of those we love.

And/Or

(vii) Tuesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

This is the only scene in Mark’s gospel where Jesus’ family feature. Reference is made to Jesus’ mother, brothers and sisters. There is no reference to Jesus’ father. Joseph never appears in the context of Jesus’ public ministry in any of the gospels. This may suggest that Joseph was already dead by the time Jesus began his public ministry at the age of thirty or so. It seems as if the family of Jesus on this occasion want to take Jesus away with them; this was their will. Yet, Jesus does not go with them. Instead he declares that his disciples seated in a circle around him are his new spiritual family. Anyone who seeks to do God’s will as Jesus’ reveals it can become a member of this new spiritual family. It must have been a struggle for Jesus’ blood family to let him go to this new family he was forming, the family of his disciples, which came to be called the church. We have been baptized into this family. As members of Jesus’ spiritual family, we are called to do the will of God as Jesus has revealed it to us, through his teaching, his life, his death and resurrection. We spend our lives trying to discern what the Lord’s will for our lives is, and then trying to grow in the freedom to do that will. For Jesus’ mother and his family, doing God’s will entailed renouncing control over Jesus, letting go of their own will for him, which did not come easy to them. Doing the will of God does not come easy to us either. Yet, with the help of the Holy Spirit, our will can be gradually conformed to God’s will for our lives. This is the journey we are asked to be faithful to until the end of our earthly lives.

And/Or

(viii) Tuesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The bringing of the ark of God, or the Ark of the Covenant, in procession to Jerusalem was a very significant event for the people of Israel under their king, David. The ark of God was a container which held the two tablets of stone on which the Ten Commandments were written. On Mount Sinai, God had promised the people of Israel that he would be their God, and they in turn promised God that they would be his people by living according to the Ten Commandments. This container with its contents symbolized God’s covenant with his people and theirs with him. It embodied God’s choice of the people of Israel in the service of all humanity. As the ark of God is brought to the citadel of David in Jerusalem, it is celebrated with elements with which we are very family from our own liturgy, especially the Eucharist. There is music and song, there is sacrifice and there is communion, the sharing of food. At every Eucharist, we generally have some singing. At every Eucharist, the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, his loving surrender to God and to humanity on Calvary, is sacramentally present to us. At every Eucharist, we enter into communion with the Lord as Bread of Life and with each other. So much of our faith has deep roots in the religion of Israel. In the gospel reading we have another element that is central to our Eucharist, the ministry of the word. Jesus is in a house in Capernaum with people sitting around him listening to him preaching, proclaiming God’s word, God’s will. He identifies those sitting around him, those who do God’s will, as his brothers and sisters and mother, his new spiritual family. We all invited to belong to the Lord’s family and at the Eucharist we both celebrate and consolidate our belonging to this family.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

27th January >> Fr. Matin's Reflections/Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time (Inc. Mark 3:22-30): ‘How can Satan cast out Satan?’

Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Mark 3:22-30 A kingdom divided against itself cannot stand.

The scribes who had come down from Jerusalem were saying, ‘Beelzebul is in him’ and, ‘It is through the prince of devils that he casts devils out.’ So he called them to him and spoke to them in parables, ‘How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot last. And if a household is divided against itself, that household can never stand. Now if Satan has rebelled against himself and is divided, he cannot stand either – it is the end of him. But no one can make his way into a strong man’s house and burgle his property unless he has tied up the strong man first. Only then can he burgle his house. ‘I tell you solemnly, all men’s sins will be forgiven, and all their blasphemies; but let anyone blaspheme against the Holy Spirit and he will never have forgiveness: he is guilty of an eternal sin.’ This was because they were saying, ‘An unclean spirit is in him.’

Gospel (GB) Mark 3:22-30 ‘Satan is coming to an end.’

At that time: The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, ‘He is possessed by Beelzebul,’ and ‘By the prince of demons he casts out the demons.’ And he called them to him and said to them in parables, ‘How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but is coming to an end. But no one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man. Then indeed he may plunder his house. ‘Truly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the children of man, and whatever blasphemies they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin’ — for they were saying, ‘He has an unclean spirit.’

Gospel (USA) Mark 3:22-30 It is the end of Satan.

The scribes who had come from Jerusalem said of Jesus, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and “By the prince of demons he drives out demons.” Summoning them, he began to speak to them in parables, “How can Satan drive out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand; that is the end of him. But no one can enter a strong man’s house to plunder his property unless he first ties up the strong man. Then he can plunder his house. Amen, I say to you, all sins and all blasphemies that people utter will be forgiven them. But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an everlasting sin.” For they had said, “He has an unclean spirit.”

Reflections (9)

(i) Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

There is a statement towards the end of today’s gospel reading that will strike us as very consoling, ‘all people’s sins will be forgiven, and all their blasphemies’. We can never underestimate the power or the extent of God’s forgiveness. To access it, all we have to do is to ask for it. Yet, Jesus goes on to say that there is one sin that will never have forgiveness, the sin of blaspheming against the Holy Spirit, which Jesus describes as an ‘eternal sin’. It is the sin of the scribes in today’s gospel reading. Jesus has been healing the sick and casting out demons through the power of the Holy Spirit. However, the scribes claim that the power that is really at work through Jesus is not the power of the Holy Spirit but the power of Satan. They identify the life-giving power of the Spirit at work in Jesus’ ministry with the power of the evil one, Satan. Jesus claims that this level of wilful blindness and rejection places someone beyond the reach of God’s forgiveness. It is not that God does not want to forgive such a person but there is simply no openness in the heart of someone who makes such a terrible claim for God’s forgiveness to enter in. Jesus is suggesting that even God can be powerless before the kind of attitude that accuses Jesus of being an instrument of Satan. According to today’s first reading, ‘Christ offers himself only once to take the faults of many on himself’. God sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world but to pour out the Spirit of God’s loving forgiveness on all, so that we may be reconciled to God. However, God needs an opening in our hearts, no matter how tiny, if God’s loving purpose for our lives is to come to pass. All we need do is to pray the prayer of the tax collector in the Temple, ‘Lord, be merciful to me a sinner’.

And/Or

(ii) Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

We live in a world in which goodness and evil are to be found. Sometimes the evil in the world is very obvious, as in the taking of a human life. Goodness can also be very obvious; we recognize it in the willingness of people to give generously of themselves on behalf of others. In this morning’s gospel reading the scribes make the very serious mistake of mistaking goodness for evil. Jesus was the ultimate example of obvious goodness; most people recognized his goodness and declared that in and through him God was visiting his people. A small minority attributed Jesus’ goodness to an evil source, declaring that Satan, not God, was working through him. This is the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, the eternal sin that Jesus speaks about at the end of the gospel reading. Such people failed to recognize that it was the Holy Spirit and not an evil spirit that was at work in the life of Jesus. An important part of our calling is to recognize the Holy Spirit in the lives of others and in our own lives. Saint Paul reminds us that the Spirit works in all kinds of different ways in different people. Some aspect of the rich fruit of the Spirit is likely to be visible in our lives and in the lives of others; one of the Spirit’s many gifts will grace our lives and those of others. The gospel reading calls us to be attentive to the many signs of the Spirit and to rejoice in those signs wherever we find them, in whomever we find them.

And/Or

(iii) Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The gospels suggest that different people responded to Jesus in very different ways. Some recognized God at work in him and responded to him with great openness. Others saw him very differently, however. In this morning’s gospel reading, some experts in the Jewish Law declare that it is Satan who is working through Jesus, not God; this is the unforgivable sin that Jesus speaks about at the end of the gospel reading. Jesus seems to be saying that those who look upon complete goodness and declare that it is evil are beyond repentance and therefore beyond forgiveness. They have closed themselves completely to God’s approach. The gospels suggest that human beings are capable of every conceivable response to God’s presence in Jesus, from tremendous openness to complete rejection. We spend our lives growing in our response to the Lord’s presence and the Lord’s call. There is always another step to be taken in our relationship with the Lord, as someone like Peter learnt. The good news is that the Lord continues to call us and continues to wait on our ever more generous response and will exploit any opening we give him for our ultimate salvation.

And/Or

(iv) Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading Jesus speaks of a kingdom divided against itself not being able to stand, and likewise a household divided against itself not being able to stand. He was refuting those who claimed that the power at work in his life was the power of Satan. How could Satan, he asked, be driving out Satan? Why would the kingdom of Satan seek to be divided against itself? That would be a recipe for its collapse. It is extraordinary to think that some people were of the opinion that the power at work in Jesus was the power of evil. Here was Jesus doing good, healing the sick, seeking the lost, feeding the hungry, proclaiming God’s mercy to sinners. It was the power of God that was at work through Jesus, not the power of Satan. The scribes who came down from Jerusalem and who accused Jesus of acting in the power of Satan were blind; they saw white and called it black. It is easy for any of us to see what is not there or not to see what is there. We need ongoing healing of our blindness. We need to keep coming before the Lord with the prayer, ‘Lord, that I may see’. We ask to see as Jesus sees, to see with generous and compassionate eyes, recognizing the good that is in people even when it is hidden.

And/Or

(v) Monday, third week in Ordinary Time

The final verses of this morning’s gospel reading seem rather harsh to our ears. Jesus speaks of an eternal sin, a sin that is beyond forgiveness. The sin in question is to attribute the work of God’s Spirit in Jesus to the Spirit of Satan, which is what the scribes who came up from Jerusalem were doing. They were saying that the power beyond the good work that Jesus was doing was the power of Satan. Those who say such a thing are so closed to God’s presence and activity that even God’s power to forgive will not penetrate their heart. The gospels are clear that God’s mercy is boundless and that Jesus is the revelation of the boundless mercy of God. Yet, even the boundless mercy of God requires some little openness on the part of others to receive it. Those who see only evil in the obvious good that others are doing, while seeing no sin in themselves, will struggle to allow themselves to be embraced by God’s merciful love. The good news is that even the slightest opening on our part is all God needs to bring us to himself. The Lord has done and is doing most of the work; all he needs is a little from us, but that little is very important. One expression of that ‘little’ is expressed in the prayer of the tax-collector in the parable Jesus spoke, ‘Lord, be merciful to me a sinner’, a prayer we can all make our own.

And/Or

(vi) Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

We can all find ourselves being misunderstood or misjudged. We do something and it is interpreted in a way that is completely different to what we intended. We say something and it is heard in a very different way to what we wanted to say. It can be very upsetting when we are misjudged and misinterpreted in this way. The gospel reading suggests that Jesus was misinterpreted in the greatest way imaginable. Jesus was doing the work of God, healing the sick and releasing people from their demons. The Holy Spirit who came down upon him at this baptism was powerfully at work in all he said and did. However, some of the religious experts of the time held the view that the spirit at work in Jesus was an evil spirit, not the Holy Spirit. ‘It is through the price of devils that he casts devils out’. It is hard to imagine a more serious misjudgement of others that to confuse the work of the Holy Spirit in their lives with the work of an evil spirit. It is what Jesus calls in the gospel reading, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. These religious experts were completely blind to the presence of the Holy Spirit in the life of Jesus. We might be tempted to think that we could not be so blind. Yet, we too can fail to recognize the presence and working of the Holy Spirit in the lives of others. We can be so focused on what we perceive to be their failings that we fail to see the presence of the Holy Spirit in them. The gospel reading calls on us to be alert to the signs of the Holy Spirit in each other, even when those signs are not always glaringly obvious.

And/Or

(vii) Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

The final verses of today’s gospel reading seem rather harsh to our ears. Jesus speaks of a sin that is beyond forgiveness, an eternal sin. The sin in question is to attribute the work of God’s Spirit in Jesus to the Spirit of Satan, which is what the scribes who came up from Jerusalem were doing. They were saying that the power beyond the good work that Jesus was doing was the power of Satan. Those who say such a thing are so closed to God’s presence and activity that even God’s power to forgive will not penetrate their heart. The gospels are clear that God’s mercy is boundless and that Jesus is the revelation of the boundless mercy of God. Yet, even the boundless mercy of God requires some level of openness on the part of others to receive it. Those who see only evil in the obvious good that others are doing, while seeing no sin in themselves, will struggle to allow themselves to be embraced by God’s merciful love. The good news is that even the slightest opening on our part is all God needs to bring us to himself. The Lord has done and is doing most of the work; all he needs is a little from us, but that little is very important. One expression of that ‘little’ is expressed in the prayer of the tax-collector in the parable Jesus spoke, ‘Lord, be merciful to me a sinner’, a prayer we can all make our own.

And/Or

(viii) Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

In Matthew’s gospel Jesus speaks of himself as gentle and humble in heart. In today’s gospel reading from Mark, Jesus uses the image of a burglar who enters a strong man’s house and ties up the strong man before burgling his property. Jesus is referring to himself, even though it may seem a strange image for Jesus to use for his ministry. His work consists in entering the property of the strong man, Satan, and binding him up. Jesus is the stronger one who has come to launch an assault on the domain of Satan. The gentle one is also the strong one who is ready to wage a spiritual warfare against the powers that enslave and dehumanize people. Although Jesus’ opponents claim that the power at work in his ministry is the power of Satan, in reality the power that moves Jesus’ ministry is the power of the Holy Spirit. Those who identify this power of the Spirit as the power of Satan are sinning against the Holy Spirit, in the words of Jesus. It will be almost impossible for God’s forgiving and healing love to penetrate hearts that are so blind and prejudiced. They will never be forgiven because they are completely closed to the gift of Jesus’ forgiving love. The same Holy Spirit that shaped the ministry of Jesus has been given to us all. One of the signs or fruits of the Spirit in our lives is that strong gentleness or gentle strength that characterized the life and ministry of Jesus. This will often involve for us, as it did for Jesus, standing up against all the forces and powers that enslave and dehumanize people and that prevent them from living that full life that the Lord desires for them.

And/Or

(ix) Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time

You have heard the expression, ‘United we stand; divided we fall’. One of the reasons we came through the pandemic so well as a nation was that we were united in our response to the challenge of the pandemic. We looked out for one another, rather than going our own way. There was good communal solidarity. People accepted all kinds of sacrifices for the good of others as well as for their own good. In today’s gospel reading, Jesus declares that if a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot last, and, likewise, with a divided household. He said this in response to those who claimed that the power behind his healing work was the power of Satan. It is hard to imagine a greater misjudgement of Jesus than to declare that the spirit at work in his ministry is the spirit of Satan, when in reality it was the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit. Jesus goes on to suggest that those who identify the work of the Holy Spirit in Jesus with the work of the evil spirit have placed themselves beyond the reach of God’s merciful and healing love, if they stubbornly persist in that view. There are guilty of an eternal sin that cannot be forgiven. It is not that God is unwilling to forgive all sin, but, rather, that God’s merciful love cannot penetrate hearts that persist in calling Jesus an agent of Satan. The Lord needs some opening in others, no matter how small, some chink in their armour of resistance. The tiniest chink is all the Lord needs to do his saving work in our lives. As Jesus says elsewhere in the gospels, God can work powerfully through faith the size of a mustard seed, the smallest of all the seeds. Although the Lord needs some opening in us, even if as small as a mustard seed, he is always totally for us. As today’s first reading declares, he ‘offers himself once to take the faults of many on himself’.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

26th January >> Fr. Martin's Homilies/Reflections on Today's Mass Readings for Third Sunday in Ordinary Time (C) (Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21): ‘This text is being fulfilled today’.

Third Sunday in Ordinary Time (C)

Gospel (Except GB & USA) Luke 1:1-4,4:14-21 'This text is being fulfilled today even as you listen'.

Seeing that many others have undertaken to draw up accounts of the events that have taken place among us, exactly as these were handed down to us by those who from the outset were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word, I in my turn, after carefully going over the whole story from the beginning, have decided to write an ordered account for you, Theophilus, so that your Excellency may learn how well founded the teaching is that you have received. Jesus, with the power of the Spirit in him, returned to Galilee; and his reputation spread throughout the countryside. He taught in their synagogues and everyone praised him. He came to Nazara, where he had been brought up, and went into the synagogue on the sabbath day as he usually did. He stood up to read and they handed him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Unrolling the scroll he found the place where it is written:

The spirit of the Lord has been given to me, for he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring the good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives and to the blind new sight, to set the downtrodden free, to proclaim the Lord’s year of favour.

He then rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the assistant and sat down. And all eyes in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to speak to them, ‘This text is being fulfilled today even as you listen.’

Gospel (GB) Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21 ‘Today this Scripture has been fulfilled.’

Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word have delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, that you may have certainty concerning the things you have been taught. At that time: Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and a report about him went out through all the surrounding country. And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all. And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read. And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll, and found the place where it was written,

‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.’

And he rolled up the scroll, and gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, ‘Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’

Gospel (USA) Luke 1:1–4; 4:14–21 Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled.

Since many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the events that have been fulfilled among us, just as those who were eyewitnesses from the beginning and ministers of the word have handed them down to us, I too have decided, after investigating everything accurately anew, to write it down in an orderly sequence for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may realize the certainty of the teachings you have received. Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news of him spread throughout the whole region. He taught in their synagogues and was praised by all. He came to Nazareth, where he had grown up, and went according to his custom into the synagogue on the sabbath day. He stood up to read and was handed a scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.

Rolling up the scroll, he handed it back to the attendant and sat down, and the eyes of all in the synagogue looked intently at him. He said to them, “Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.”

Homilies (6)

(i) Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

When the ministers of the word steps up at Mass to read the word of God, the reading has already been chosen for them. It is laid out in what we call the lectionary. When Jesus stepped up to read from the word of God in his local synagogue at Nazareth, according to today’s gospel reading, he had greater freedom to choose his reading. The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him, but Jesus was free to choose any passage he liked from that scroll. He very deliberately went looking for a particular passage, unrolling the scroll until he found it. This passage which he proclaimed aloud to the people in the synagogue must have meant a great deal to him. Indeed, the words of Isaiah that he looked for and found summed up his own understanding of his mission.

Jesus in the synagogue of Nazareth was announcing what his ministry was going to be about. He knew that the Holy Spirit was moving him to proclaim what Isaiah called ‘the Lord’s year of favour’. Jesus would reveal God’s favour for all, especially for all those who were out of favour in that time and culture, such as the economically and spiritually poor, those who were held captive in some way, those who were broken in body, such as the blind, those who were downtrodden, treated unjustly, and all who found themselves on the margins at that time, for one reason or another. Jesus was announcing that he was about to reveal a God who had no favourites, because he favoured all, especially those who felt they were outside the favour of God and of God’s people. In the ‘today’ of his own ministry, he would make present the hospitality of God, the lavish love of God. He would work to draw all people together into a community of faith, hope and love around himself, under God, drawing in especially those who felt they didn’t belong anywhere.

This was what we might call today a wonderful mission statement. However, when organizations, including church ones, create a mission statement it is often then just put to one aside. It is as if the making of the mission statement was the end in itself. This was not the case with Jesus. What he said he would do in the synagogue of Nazareth is what he went on to do during the course of his public ministry. He showed God’s favour to those referred to as ‘tax collectors and sinners’, scandalizing many at the time. One of that group, Zacchaeus, had an unexpected experience of God’s favour through visit to his home. This experience empowered him to turn his life around. Jesus told a parable in which a father shows lavish favour to a son who had dishonoured him; this was Jesus’ image of God. He revealed God’s hospitable love to people like the blind beggar, Bartimaeus, whom the people around Jesus had been trying to silence. He brought the favour of God to a poor widow who was accompanying the body of her only son to his burial, restoring her son to life and to his mother. He promised God’s favour to one of the criminals crucified alongside him, assuring him of gaining Paradise, even though he had only asked to be remembered. As risen Lord, he brought God’s favour to two of his broken hearted disciples as they made their sad way home to Emmaus, transforming their despondency to joyful hope. In so many other ways, the gospels show that Jesus was true to the mission that he announced in the synagogue of Nazareth.

The year of God’s favour that Jesus announced in Nazareth is a year that never ends. When Jesus announced, ‘This text is being fulfilled today’, that ‘today’ is also our ‘today’; it is every day. The risen Lord continues to make present God’s favour to each one of us, especially in those moments of our life’s journey when we feel out of favour with God, with others, with ourselves. We can sometimes find ourselves ‘poor’, whether economically poor or spiritually poor or emotionally poor. We often sense that we are captive, not free to live the loving life that God is calling us to live. We can be very aware of areas of blindness in our lives, failing to see the goodness in others and in ourselves. We can find ourselves downtrodden, oppressed, overburdened by some weight we are carrying. In all those moments the Lord comes to us to bring us the liberating and healing power of God’s favour, calling out to us to turn towards him, to fix our eyes on him, in the words of today’s gospel reading.

In fixing our eyes on the Lord, we are not only graced and blessed by his gift of God’s favour, but we are empowered to become channels of God’s favour to others. The Lord needs us to continue the mission he announced in the synagogue of Nazareth. Saint Paul reminds us in today’s second reading, ‘Now together you are Christ’s body; but each of you is a different part of it’. We are the Lord’s hands and feet, ears and eyes, mind and heart, today. The Lord comes to us in our own poverty and brokenness so that we can be living and life-giving members of his body today, each in our own unique way.

And/Or

(ii) Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

A set of boxes was delivered to the parish some weeks ago with the name Corpus Christi stamped on it. The stamped name brought a smile to all our lips because Christi was spelt ‘Christy’. It is an understandable mistake. For most people, the sound ‘Christi’ suggests a Christian name, a shortened version of Christopher. However, we who worship in this church known that ‘Christi’ is a Latin form for ‘Christ’ and that the term ‘Corpus Christi’ is Latin for ‘Body of Christ’. When we hear the term ‘Corpus Christi’ we probably instinctively think of the Eucharist, the body of Christ that we receive in the Eucharist. The term ‘Corpus Christi’, ‘Body of Christ’ also refers, of course, to all of us who gather to celebrate the Eucharist, the community of the baptized.

That is how Paul uses the term in the second reading this morning. He tells the Corinthians, ‘you are the body of Christ’. If Paul were standing here this morning, he would address the same words to all of us, ‘you are the body of Christ’. It is good to remind ourselves that the term ‘Corpus Christi’ refers not only to this church building but also to ourselves as a faith community. Paul does not say to the Corinthians in today’s second reading, ‘if you do this, or if you live in this way, then you will become the body of Christ’. He says ‘you are the body of Christ’. In a similar way, we who gather here this morning do not have to become the body of Christ. We are already the body of Christ; all of us are members of Christ’s body.  As Paul says in that reading, we were baptized in the one Spirit, in the Spirit of Christ, and our baptism in the Spirit has made us members of Christ’s body. This was a gift that was given to us at a very early age. We did not have to earn it; we were not asked to do an entrance examination. Before we were capable of earning or deserving anything, we were graced by God in this extraordinary way; baptised into Christ, clothed with Christ, made members of Christ’s body. For that, we give thanks to God every day.

Paul in that reading compares the body of Christ, the church, to a human body. Just as a human body has great diversity, he says, so also has the body of Christ. There is tremendous diversity within the church, within the local church here in Corpus Christi parish. Although the one Spirit has made us all members of one body, that one Spirit has graced us all in different ways. As members of Christ’s body we each show a different aspect of the richness of Christ. If Christ is to express his richness, his fullness through us, the members of his body, he needs to express himself in different ways through different people. No one of us, no matter how gifted we are, can do justice to the richness of Christ. The Spirit enables each of us to reveal Christ in our own unique way, in a way that corresponds to our natural abilities and temperament. If there is too much uniformity in the body of Christ, then Christ will not be able to express himself fully in the world. As Paul says in the second reading, ‘If your whole body was just one eye, how would you hear anything? If it was just one ear, how could it smell anything?’ The Spirit is always at work creating diversity in the one body of Christ, because, without that diversity, we the church would not be able to reveal Christ properly.

The particular way that the Spirit has graced each one of us is vital for the full functioning of Christ’s body. For that reason, we each need to value our place in the church, and to appreciate the unique role that only I can play. None of us in the church can ever say, in the words of the second reading, ‘Because I am not this that or the other I do not belong to the body’. In stating, ‘I do not belong’, we sell ourselves short, and we sell everybody else in the church short as well, because we are dependant on each other. I, who have been gifted in a particular way by the Spirit, need all the other members of the church, who have been gifted in different ways. That is why it is wrong for any member of Christ’s body to send out the signal to any other member, ‘you are not important, you are not needed’. As Paul says in the second reading, ‘The eye cannot say to the hand, “I do not need you”’ We can sometimes send out that signal to others in the body of Christ, without always being aware of it.  I am tempted to say that, from time to time, the clergy in the church may have sent out that signal to the laity.

It is only when all the members of Christ’s body are making the contribution that the Spirit enables them to make, that, in the words of the gospel reading, the poor will hear good news, captives will be freed, and the blind will receive new sight. The programme that Jesus outlined for himself in his inaugural sermon in Nazareth was not only a programme for his own ministry. It is also a programme for his body the church. The Spirit has gifted all of us in different ways to enable us as Christ’s body to continue Christ’s work, as he outlined it in Nazareth. It is the church’s calling to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour, to reveal the welcoming love of God to all, especially to those who are struggling, who are burdened. We pray this morning that each of us would be open to the particular way the Spirit is gifting us, so that the Lord’s life-giving work, begun in Nazareth, might continue through us today.

And/Or

(iii) Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Most of us are aware of the debt we owe to others. In all kinds of different ways we are all standing on the shoulders of others. We owe more than we realize to the generosity and hard work of those who have gone before us. It can be good to publicly acknowledge that from time to time. In today’s gospel reading, Luke, the evangelist, as he begins his gospel, acknowledges the debt he owes to those who went before him. He states clearly that without their efforts, his own effort would not have been possible. He speaks about the eyewitnesses of the ministry of Jesus who went on to become servants of the word, preachers and teachers. He also refers to the many who were not eyewitnesses but who attempted to put in writing what these preachers and teachers passed on orally. All of these preachers, teachers and writers came before Luke, and now he declares that he wants to build on their work by means of the gospel he is about to write.

Luke is very aware that he stands on the shoulders of others who were followers of Jesus long before he was. He knew that his own faith, the faith that led him to write a gospel, owed a great deal to the faith of those who had gone before him. I think that we would all recognize that whatever faith we have owes a great deal to the faith of those who went before us. People can be very critical of the church of the past. In particular, the 1950s are often singled out as a regressive period in the life of the church. Undoubtedly, there are elements about the church of that time that none of us would want to return to. Yet, like Luke in today’s gospel reading, we need to acknowledge what we owe to the generation of believers before us and to the generation before that again. We may not give expression to our faith in the way that earlier generations did, but we are greatly in their debt. We continue to reap the harvest of their prayerfulness and faithfulness.

When it comes to our faith, to our relationship with the Lord, we are always in debt to each other. We need each other on our way to the Lord; we have much to receive from each other and much to give each other. That is true not just between one generation and the next, but within each generation. Within the church, we are dependant on one another if we are to become all the Lord wants us to be. That is very much the point that Paul is making in today’s second reading. Paul speaks of the church as the body of Christ. We are all Christ’s body in the world. The church as the body of Christ is like a human body with a great diversity of members, all interconnected and interdependent. When it comes to our relationship with the Lord, and the living of a life in keeping with that relationship, none of us can go it alone. None of us can say to our fellow believers, our fellow travellers, ‘I do not need you’. As Paul states in that reading, ‘the eye cannot say to the hand, “I do not need you”, nor can the head say to the feet, “I do not need you”’. You do hear people saying today, ‘I believe in God, but not in the church’. In a sense they are saying, ‘I do not need the church’, ‘I do not need other believers’, ‘I do not need the community of faith’. The language of ‘God and me’, however, is not the language of Christianity. The language of Christianity has always been ‘God and us’.

As well as the tendency of some believers to say to the rest of us, ‘I do not need you’, Paul shows in that second reading that he is also aware of another attitude that can be found among believers, and that is the tendency of some to think that they have nothing to offer to others within the church. This is the attitude that says not so much, ‘I do not need you’, but rather, ‘you do not really need me’, ‘I am not important here’, ‘I won’t be missed if I disappear’. This is what Paul is getting at when he asks, ‘If the foot were to say - “I am not a hand and so I do not belong to the body” - would that mean that it stopped being part of the body?’ It can be tempting for people to think that because they are not x, y, or z in the church, therefore they do not fully belong - they are not full members, as it were. Nothing could be further from the truth. As Paul again says in that reading, ‘in the one Spirit we were all baptized, Jews as well as Greeks, slaves as well as free, and one Spirit was given to us all to drink’.

Each one of us can say to every one else in the church both, ‘I need you’ and ‘you need me’. The Spirit has graced each one of us differently, and we all need each other’s graces and gifts. Only if all of these graces and gifts come to expression in the church will the mission that Jesus announces in today’s gospel become a reality in each generation. Jesus’ mission of proclaiming the Lord’s year of favour is now the church’s mission. It is the church’s calling to reveal the welcoming love of God to all, especially to those who are struggling, who are burdened. It is only together, as church, that we can be faithful to this calling and mission.

And/Or

(iv) Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Many organizations have a mission statement. A mission statement could be said to have a two-fold purpose. One purpose is to state clearly to those outside the organization what is the primary aim of the organization, its significant values, its vision for the future. Another purpose is more internal, to help those within the organization to stay focused and to live by the values that the statement proclaims. As we know, it is one thing having a mission statement and another matter to live by it. In the opening paragraph of our gospel reading this morning, we find Luke the evangelist’s own brief mission statement. He declares to Theophilus, probably Luke’s patron, why he is writing his gospel. He tells Theophilus that he is writing his gospel so that he, Theopilus, and believers like him, may learn how well founded the teaching is that they have received. Luke’s mission in writing his gospel is to give people greater assurance about the faith in which they have been instructed. He is going to tell the story of Jesus in such a way that he will be able to confirm believers in their faith. That is what the gospel of Luke has been doing since it was written about fifty years after the death and resurrection of Jesus. It is many people’s favourite gospel. If we did not have the gospel of Luke, we would not have such memorable parables of Jesus as the good Samaritan, the prodigal son, the rich man and Lazarus. We would not have the story of Jesus in the home of Mary and Martha or the story of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. Our faith would certainly be the poorer without Luke’s gospel. Luke did what he said he would do in his mission statement.

The remainder of this morning’s gospel reading is Luke’s account of Jesus’ first visit to his home town Nazareth, having left there to begin his mission. According to Luke, this is when Jesus announced his mission statement. Going into his local synagogue on the Sabbath, Jesus was given the scroll of the prophet Isaiah and invited to read from it. He immediately went to a section of the scroll which gave him, ready-made, his own mission statement. Having recently received the Spirit afresh at his baptism, Jesus easily identified with the line, ‘the spirit of the Lord has been given to me’; he then declares his mission to consist in bringing good news to the poor, proclaiming liberty to captives and new sight to the blind, setting free the downtrodden and proclaiming the Lord’s year of favour. He declares that his mission will be focused primarily on those who probably thought of themselves as out of favour with God because of their poverty, their sense of being captive to some power beyond themselves, their awareness of their own blindness, including spiritual blindness. There are many people in Luke’s gospel who fit that description. The ‘good thief’, as he is often called, comes to mind. As he hangs alongside Jesus, he is the poorest of the poor; all has been taken from him. He is held captive by the wood of the cross as Jesus is; he shows an awareness of his own spiritual blindness and darkness. Out of that desperate situation of grave material and spiritual need he cries out one of the most heartfelt prayers in all of Scripture, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom’. In response, Jesus proclaims to him the year of the Lord’s favour, ‘Today, you will be with me in Paradise’. In a moment of great human weakness and darkness, he is showered with God’s favour. This was Jesus’ mission statement in action. Here was Jesus doing what he said he would do in the synagogue of Nazareth.

That mission statement of Jesus embraces all of us. It remains the mission statement of the risen Lord who journeys with all of us, just as he journeyed with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, who is with us in the Eucharist, just as the two disciples recognized him in the breaking of bread. There are times in all our lives when we are poor, captive, blind, downtrodden. There are moments when we feel out of favour, with ourselves, with others, with God. It is above all then that we must allow the Lord to find us, just as he found Zacchaeus, another of those who were out of favour, saying to him, ‘Zacchaeus, I must stay at your house today’. The Lord seeks us out, especially in our times of greatest need; he seeks us out to shower us with God’s favour. He then sends us out to be channels of God’s favour to others. Each of us is called to be a unique revelation of God’s favour. That is the message of Paul in this morning’s second reading. If Jesus was the revelation of God’s favour, Paul reminds us that we are all members of Christ’s body, each of us gifted by the Holy Spirit to reveal God’s favour in a way that is unique to each one of us. We are all equally important within the church because each of us has a unique mission that no one else can fulfil.

And/Or

(v) Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Over the Christmas I was looking at a documentary on television about the 900 day siege of Leningrad beginning in 1941, today’s St. Petersburg. The population endured one of the coldest winters in living memory in 1941/42 and people died of starvation in the thousands that winter. The great Russian composer Shostakovich composed his 7th symphony to give expression to the anguish, suffering and hopes of the Russian people and in particular the people of Leningrad. Against all the odds, as the city was in the midst of its siege, this great work was performed in the Concert Hall in Leningrad in August 1942. The conductor managed to bring together the remnants of the last remaining orchestra in Leningrad. Most of them were weak and emaciated as everyone was living on the smallest of rations. Yet, he managed to bring an orchestra together and at the height of the siege this great work was performed before a full Concert Hall. Some of those who were present on that occasion are still alive and they spoke on the programme about their experience of this wonderful event. As they sat listening to the music that August of 1942, they were cold and hungry and sickly. In one sense, music, even great music, could not satisfy these basic human needs. Yet, the few remaining people who had been there recalled how this wonderful musical event fed their spirits, lifted their hearts and souls, gave them a sense of their own worth and value, and strengthened them for the struggle that lay ahead.

I was reminded of that documentary by this morning’s gospel reading. There Jesus speaks of himself as the Spirit filled prophet sent by God to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives and new sight to the blind, to set free the downtrodden and to proclaim the Lord’s year of favour. The people of Leningrad during those long months of the siege were poor and captive and downtrodden. Yet at least for a short while the performance of Shostakovich’s 7th symphony was bringing good news to the poor, proclaiming liberty to captives and giving new sight to those who had been blinded by so much tragic suffering. The Lord’s favour was touching these people through this beautiful creation of the human spirit, this great orchestral work. They had been experiencing the worst atrocities that human beings can inflict on other human beings. Now, in the midst of this darkness, light and hope was being brought into their lives by what was best in the human spirit– the creative genius of the composer, the tenacity of the conductor in bringing the orchestra together, the musical ability of the members of the orchestra and their determination to give of themselves even though they were weak and frail. Together they brought a glimpse of ‘the year of the Lord’s favour’ to those who lived in darkness and in the shadow of death.

Whenever the best instincts of the human spirit find expression, there something of the year of the Lord’s favour becomes present in our world. When Jesus was given the scroll of the prophet Isaiah in the synagogue of Nazareth and he read a passage of his choosing, he was really making public his mission statement. He was saying to the people of his hometown, ‘this is what I am about’. His Spirit inspired mission was to give an experience of God’s favour to those who were most in need of it, the poor, be they the materially poor or the spiritually poor, the captives, be it those who were enslaved by their economic circumstances or enslaved by a way of life that was contrary to God’s will for them, the blind, be it the physically blind or the spiritually blind. This remains Jesus’ mission today. He wishes to continue to proclaim this year of God’s favour through us, his followers.

In today’s second reading, Paul speaks about the community of the Lord’s followers, the church, as the body of Christ. All of us together are now Christ’s body in the world. The Spirit of the Lord that empowered and directed Jesus’ mission has been given to us, the members of Christ’s body. As Paul says at the beginning of that second reading, ‘In the one Spirit we were all baptized, Jews as well as Greeks, slaves as well as free, and one Spirit was given to us all to drink’. The Spirit of the Lord will bring what is best in our human spirit to full expression, and whenever that happens the poor experience good news and those who are captive discover a new freedom. Paul reminds us in that reading that there is great diversity in the body of Christ. We each have different gifts of nature which the Spirit of God can bring fully to life. We each have a unique contribution to make to the Lord’s mission in today’s world. The gifts of each one of us are needed and each one of us needs the gifts of everyone else. The Lord looks to each of us to place our gifts and our energies at his disposal, at the disposal of the Holy Spirit, so that he can continue to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour in our world today.

And/Or

(vi) Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

When the minister of the word steps up at Mass to read the word of God, the reading is laid out in what we call the lectionary. When the priest stands to read the gospel reading, it is there in the lectionary. We follow a series of readings that the church has given us. The synagogue service in the time of Jesus was primarily a liturgy of the word. There was a reading from the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible, often followed by a reading from the prophets. The readings were followed by a series of prayers. According to today’s gospel reading, when Jesus returned to his home town Nazareth for the first time after beginning his public ministry, he went to the local synagogue on the Sabbath, just as we come to Mass on Sunday. When he was invited to read the second reading from the prophets, he chose a reading for himself, rather than a set reading. When the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him, he very deliberately unrolled the scroll until he found the passage he wanted.

This particular passage must have meant a great deal to him; it summed up how he understood his mission. Like Isaiah, Jesus knew that the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, had come upon him. Luke had just told us that after his baptism, while he was praying, the Holy Spirit descended on him. The Spirit was empowering him for his mission that lay ahead. Jesus realized that the Holy Spirit was pushing him towards certain kind of people, in particular what the passage from Isaiah refers to as the poor, the captives, the blind and the downtrodden. Jesus recognized that it was above all this diverse group that needed to hear the good news that they were loved by God, that God’s favour rested upon them and that God was working to transform their lives, bringing them healing, wholeness and liberation.

In the time and place of Jesus, only a small elite were very wealthy; the vast bulk of the population would have been considered ‘poor’; they could easily and suddenly find themselves dependent on other people’s generosity for survival. The person of Lazarus in one of Jesus’ parables is an extreme example of the poorest. Many were ‘captive’, in that they slaves of wealthy masters, or were imprisoned, or enslaved to debt. Those who were ‘blind’ or deaf or crippled or who suffered from some other disability were poor because they could not work. The gospel story of blind Bartimaeus who begged by the roadside comes to mind. Many people in Jesus’ day were downtrodden or oppressed, the victims of injustice, such as the widow in Jesus’ parable of widow and the unjust judge.  The word translated ‘liberty’ in the gospel reading also has the meaning ‘forgiveness’ elsewhere in Luke’s gospel. Proclaiming liberty to captives can also be understood as bringing God’s forgiveness to those considered ‘sinners’ and who felt trapped by this realization. In that sense, we can also understand the ‘poor’ as the spiritually poor. In the rest of Luke’s gospel, Jesus refers to this group as the ‘lost’. Zacchaeus was one of the lost; he was very wealthy but he was spiritually poor. The prodigal son in that wonderful parable was rich; his father had lots of land and loads of servants. Yet, he was spiritually poor; he was lost.  Jesus was saying in this opening homily, this mission statement, ‘I have come to bring God’s favour to all who need it most, all who feel on the edge for whatever reason, and I am going to do this “today”, in the here and now of my ministry’.

There is no other text in all of the gospels which gives us a clearer understanding of how Jesus understood his mission. There is a wonderful wide embrace in this mission statement of Jesus; we are all included in this embrace. There are times in all our lives when we feel poor, captive, blind, lost and downtrodden in some way. It is then that Jesus, the risen Lord, is especially close to us. We can turn to him in our weakness, in our vulnerability, and experience his favour, his strengthening presence. The mission that Jesus announces in Nazareth is also the mission of the church. The church exists to make present in the ‘today’ of our age this mission of Jesus to proclaim God’s favour, God’s liberating love, to all who need it most. Pope Francis once declared, ‘The thing the church needs most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm the hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity. I see the church as a field hospital after battle’. This is the kind of church that Pope Francis is asking us to become. In the second reading Paul speaks of the church as the body of Christ, in which each member is concerned for all the others, so that if one member suffers, all suffer with it. Jesus’ subsequent mission shows that our loving concern must extend beyond the members of the church to embrace all who suffer, regardless of race or creed, just as the Samaritan in one of Jesus’ parables embraced the half dead Jew, his traditional enemy. Jesus’ mission statement is also a mission statement for us all as members of the church.

Fr. Martin Hogan.