5th Sunday of Ordinary Time (10.02.13)
What can we learn from today’s scripture readings!
We hear about three men who did great things for God – Isaiah, Paul and Peter.
Yet, strange as it may seem, each of them suffered from an inferiority complex. None of them was a volunteer in the sense of offering themselves spontaneously. However, they were all called by God, and accepted that call somewhat reluctantly, aware of their own unworthiness, inadequacy and sinfulness.
Isaiah cried out : “Lord, I am not fit for such a task……”
Paul exclaimed: “Of all the apostles, I am the least..in fact I do not deserve the name apostle…”
Peter : “Lord, depart from me. I am a sinful man…”
The Lord’s response to them is also His response to us: “My grace is sufficient for you”. Yes, nothing is impossible to God. When we have experienced our own weakness, God can strengthen us – our own emptiness God can fill us – our own poverty, God can enrich us. Conscious always of our own weakness and our constant need of God’s help, we then become available to Him, to do His work – to be channels of His grace to others – instruments of His peace.
We have a fallen nature, and without the grace of God, we are unable to work out our own salvation, much less that of anyone else.
Each of us needs a true friend – someone who accepts us as we are; who does not condemn us or write us off because of our sins and weaknesses – someone who believes in our potential for good and who challenges us to keep trying, and to believe in our capability of better things. Christ, our everyday friend, helps us to accept ourselves and others as He does everyone.
The paradox – strength arising out of weakness and failure – it was at the very moment Peter recognised and acknowledged his sinfulness that Jesus called him to become a fisher of men.
So, too, with us, when we are most aware of our sinfulness, God can call us through our inadequacies to do great things for Him, relying not on our own strength, but rather on His grace.
Another important point in these scripture readings is the fact that, once forgiven by God, these prophets and apostles were not preoccupied by their unworthiness, remaining depressed by their failings, but in gratitude for thus being released for mission they courageously and joyfully go forth in answer to their call. As Isaiah exclaims: “Here I am, Lord. Send me.” May we have the courage to follow suit.
Indeed, our Faith assures us that Christ loves us so much that He died for our sins. We are therefore released from our burden of guilt, and free to follow Him, by helping to seek out the lost, the wounded, the sinners – bringing them to Him to be healed, forgiven and saved…. thereby acting as His instruments in spreading the Good News of the Gospel.
4th Sunday of Ordinary Time (03.02.13)
Mood Change
When does a ‘crowd’ become a ‘mob’? At what point does the change happen? In this Sunday’s Gospel (4:21-30) St.Luke invites us to focus on a crowded Nazareth synagogue 2,000 yrs. ago. He indicates a warm and welcoming atmosphere for the ‘local boy’, Jesus, returning as a adult itinerant preacher. Then, in next to no time, there’s a change. That synagogue crowd took on the characteristic of a mob. We associate ‘mob’ with words like anger, force, bitterness, hatred, violence. We’ve only to think of East Belfast in recent times. There are, too, Middle Eastern examples a-plenty starting with Egypt.
What is the core catalyst for such a change? Could it be the inescapable yet unnaceptable element of ‘Truth’? A Truth that is so profound and comprehensive that it underpins not just the present, but the past and the future too? It was Jesus’ presentation of the Truth in Nazareth that tipped the crowd from applause to aggressive hostility. ‘Local boy’ or not Jesus must be got rid of!
Undoubtedly there was deep, latent anger smouldering in the Jewish inhabitants of that occupied land like the bubbling white-hot cauldron of magma just bellow the black, apparently dormant, crust of the active volcano. Jesus’ focus on the sinfulness of his own people didn’t suit the mood. That truth that they had broken their Covenant with God was unpalatable. His fellow Jews wanted strong leadership for a rebellion against Roman occupation not a sermon on repentance.
Today, we still think of crowds/mobs as physical gatherings of people in a particular place. But, the truth is something else. ‘Facebook’, ‘Twitter’ and ‘Texting’ are just three well-known examples of crowds, with the potential to become mobs, which have no united physical presence. Remember the multiple occasions when petrol stations and supermarket shelves have been emptied within hours across a country because of an Internet scare!
Unpredictable mood changes are not confined to crowds. They happen in individuals, too. What someone perceives as a wrong word, look or action can trigger a storm by way of response, quite often out of all proportion to the supposed injury. How many allow themselves to be aware of the latent anger simmering just beneath the surface of their public face? Believers in Christianity are among those who hold that God gifts us with freedom of choice. It is what distinguishes us from all other forms of creation. God’s gifts are given in perpetuity. Before the invasion of selfishness, humanity’s focus was uninterruptedly on God. Afterwards, there began, and continues to be, the tussle between self and God. All sin shares a single foundation – selfishness. It’s what snared ‘Adam’ and ‘Eve’. Adam didn’t eat the apple because Eve chose to eat it at Satan’s instigation; Adam ate it because he chose to do so. Adam’s recorded lame-duck excuse, “It was the woman you put with me; she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” (Genesis 3:12) is just that ‘lame’!
3rd Sunday of Ordinary Time (27.01.13)
IS HEARING THE SAME AS LISTENING?
In this Sunday’s Gospel (Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21) we eavesdrop on a homecoming. Since beginning his public ministry, this would appear to be Jesus’ first visit to his former home, the place where he spent his childhood and adolescence. Among the Nazarenes would be those who remembered the child, but would they recognise the man? Jesus is the first human person totally infused with God’s Holy Spirit, revealed at his Baptism in the Jordan (Luke 3:22) and proclaimed at his Transfiguration on the mountaintop (Luke 9:35). What might Jesus’ focus have been as he neared Nazareth?It was customary for male visitors to be invited to speak in local synagogues, a custom extended to Jesus. He chose to read from the Isaiah’s lengthy description of a prophet’s mission (Ch. 61 & 62). Jesus chose just the first two verses, which we hear quoted in this Sunday’s Gospel.The Jews of Jesus’ day were more familiar with their Scripture than many Christians are, today, with the New Testament. The Nazarenes in the synagogue would have been able to contextualise Jesus’ quotation thereby embracing the whole chapter. I wonder how many Catholics, today, are able to contextualise the Gospel heard at a Sunday Mass?A quotation can be a whole text or an extract. Speakers, for example, pare their quotations to suit their theme or their audience or both. Why might Jesus have chosen to foreshorten his Isaiah quote? Both Matthew (13:53) and Mark (6:1) refer to Jesus’ post Baptismal visit to Nazareth but in abbreviated form. Honest speakers select their quotation to assist in the furthering of truth and understanding. Others may ‘adjust’ their quotations for less honourable reasons. Jesus, God-made-Man, is incapable of deceit or falsehood. At Nazareth, as elsewhere, he would only have had pure, truthful reasons for his choice of text.Speculatively speaking, what may have influenced Jesus to choose a reduced quote? His memory of Nazareth and, for that matter, anywhere in his occupied homeland would be of continuous military oppression and religious corruption. By a less than judicious word, action or quotation, Jesus could have ignited the smouldering anger barely held in check by the Jewish population.Jesus, true to the mission his heavenly Father had entrusted to him, was the bringer of ‘good news’ not bloody revolution. By ending his Isaiah quotation with the words “a year of favour from the Lord”, Jesus was honouring his mission. He stopped short of the very next sentence “…and a day of vengeance for our God, to comfort all who mourn … ”. (Isaiah 61:2). Had Jesus quoted these words might he have fractured the Nazarenes’ fragile patience? People cheering in the aisles could have quickly led to harsh military retaliation, with its inevitable crucifixions.The synagogue congregation would have realised what Jesus had not included in his quotation. Their misgivings were not soothed by Jesus, speaking for himself, adding: “Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.” (Luke 4:21)Discontent began to show and Jesus would have been aware of it. The challenge soon followed: “We have heard all that happened in Capernaum, do the same here in your own area.”(Luke 4:23) It’s no surprise, then, that Jesus commented, “In truth I tell you, no prophet is ever accepted in his own country.”(Luke 4:24)Despite the unending, and largely unfulfilled, promises of the 21st. century’s secular society there’s a deep frustration dangerously near the surface of many peoples’ lives. It explodes with little warning at the checkout, on the motorway, in the home, in the school or college. Syria and Egypt are current reminders that such explosions can ignite nations. Parallels with the Nazareth synagogue of Jesus’ time are to be found today, plentifully. It’s as well to remember that in Nazareth, too, they tried to silence Jesus by attempting to throw him down the cliff: “And they rose up and thrust him out of the city; and they brought him to the brow of the hill, whereon their city was built, that they might cast him down headlong.” (Luke 4:29)As the Baptised, we claim to be people who are committed to God’s Word but does the evidence of our lives sustain the claim? Do we immerse ourselves in the Scriptures? Do we listen, really listen in depth through stillness and silence, to what God is asking us to implement in our daily life? Many good people, burdened by the shackles of corruptive demands and political correctness, fail to appreciate how they are preventing God’s Word permeating their inner depths. They epitomise the difference between ‘hearing’ and ‘listening’.
Instant gratification cannot substitute for long-term commitment. ‘Love is not about feelings. Love is a deliberate decision to serve another regardless of our passing emotions. Loving God is about making decisions based upon the vision of Jesus, despite the allure of so many other visions clamouring for our daily attention and allegiance. (Ref. ‘Living the Word’ by Ralph Kuehner and Joseph Juknialis)