March 2006
Pope Benedict XVI's general
prayer intention for March is: "That
young people, who are looking for the meaning of life, be understood,
respected and supported with patience and love."
The Pope's mission
intention for March is:
"That Catholics grow in mission awareness and
offer support and collaboration to missionary work."
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Ash Wednesday
(March
1) Today
let us think of St David (Saints)
Scripture: Joel 2: 12-18; Psalm 51: 3-6,
12-14, 17; 2 Corinthians
5:20 - 6:2; Matthew 6: 1-6,
16-18.
"The
appeal we make to you in Christ's name is: be reconciled to God" (2 Corinthians
5:20 - 6:2)
Today the Church
places before us the stark appeal of St Paul and makes it her own: “We
are ambassadors for Christ; ... and the appeal that we make in Christ’s
name is, be reconciled to God.” (2 Corinthians
5:20 - 6:2) Were
it not for what God has done in sending us his Son, such an appeal
would be impossible. We would be able to do nothing about such a call,
for we would be enslaved by our sins. But Christ has broken the power
of sin and we are able to live a new life, the life of God. Now, that
being granted, what must we do in order to be reconciled to God? To
begin with, we should meditate on who God is and on what he is like:
"he is all tenderness and compassion" (Joel 2: 12-18). Were we simply to go on our own
natural sense of things, we would hardly be encouraged to draw near to
God, for the thought of our sins would give to our thought of God a
great foreboding. There would be little reason for confidence in
approaching an all-holy God. But God has revealed his face in the face
of Christ, a face of one who is full of love and compassion, the face
of the one who has expiated for our sins.
The grace of the liturgical season of Lent is the grace of being more
deeply reconciled with God. A great good awaits us during Lent.
It is the good of repenting of our sins and, in union with Christ, of
making up for them and for the sins of others. Let us, in the clear
light of what the Church tells us of the season of Lent, resolve to
make of Lent this year a time of true renewal. Apart from relying on
the grace of God for this, we must draw up a plan of action on our
part, involving prayer, self-denial and works of mercy (Matthew 6: 1-6,
16-18). It
will mean more fervent prayer, possibly more time at prayer if we are
not giving sufficient time to it. If we are, we can certainly resolve
to pray with greater fervour. It will mean more self-denial, possibly
in little unnoticed ways, especially the inner self-denial that is
involved in overcoming intractable secret faults, but supported by
physical mortification as well. Why not cut out television except for a
certain amount of necessary news bulletin? And then there is almsgiving
and works of mercy.
Let us resolve to make this year’s Lent a time of genuine spiritual
advance.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Forty days that lead us to baptism
into the death and resurrection of Christ
Comment from St Maxim of
Turin (? –– around 420), Bishop (Sermon 28)
“In a time of favour I answer you, on the day of salvation I help you.”
(Isa 49:8) After quoting this, the apostle Paul continues with the
words: “Now is the acceptable time! Now is the day of salvation!” (2
Cor 6:2). I in turn call upon you to witness that now the days of
redemption have come, now has come in a sense the moment of spiritual
healing. We can take care of all of the stains from our vices, all the
wounds from our sins, if we pray constantly to the doctor of our souls,
if ……we do not neglect any of his prescriptions……
The doctor is our Lord Jesus who said: “It is I who bring forth both
death and life.” (Deut 32:39). The Lord first brings forth death, and
then he gives back life. Through baptism, he destroys in us adulteries,
homicides, murders and theft; then he brings us back to life as new
persons in eternal immortality. We die to our sins, of course through
baptism, we return to life in the Spirit of life…… Let us surrender to
our doctor with patience in order to regain health. Everything that he
will have detected in us that is unworthy, soiled through sin, eaten by
ulcers, he will trim, he will cut it, he will take it away, so that,
once all the wounds inflicted by the demon have been eliminated, only
what belongs to God will remain.
This is his first prescription: to consecrate forty days to fasting, to
prayer, to vigils. Fasting heals flabbiness, prayer nourishes the
reverent soul, vigils reject the devil’s traps. After this period of
time given to all these observances, the soul that is purified and
exhausted from so many practices, comes to baptism. It regains strength
by plunging into the waters of the Spirit: everything that had been
burnt in the flames of illness is born again in the dew of heaven’s
grace…… By means of a new birth, we are born again changed.
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Our lives can effectively co-redeem, in an eternal way, only if we act
with humility, passing unnoticed, so that others can discover Him.
(The Forge,
no.669)
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Thursday
after Ash Wednesday
(March 2) Today let us think of St Chad (Saints)
Scripture today:
Deuteronomy
30: 15-20; Psalm 1: 1-4 and 6;
Luke 9: 22-25.
“See, today I set before you life and
prosperity, death and disaster.” (Deuteronomy
30:15-20)
It has been well said that we are born into this world to work. The
next great truth to master is, what we are meant to be working for. The
danger is that in the daily busy-ness of a life immersed in work, we
can easily lose sight of what we are ultimately meant to be living and
working for. We can easily be led to live for things other than those
that are truly necessary.
Lent is a time that comes around each year when we can take stock of
the fundamentals. The Church asks us to consider the basic choices to
be made in life, and what these choices will lead to. Accordingly today
she places before us in the first reading our passage from the book of
Deuteronomy Moses’ inspired statement of the two stark alternatives of
life (Deuteronomy
30:15-20).
The first: “See, today I set before you life and prosperity, death and
disaster. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God ... you
will live and increase.” The second is both stark and frightening: “But
if your heart strays ...you will most certainly perish.”
The season of Lent is a valuable opportunity to return to these basics,
and, with a renewed vision of the real and eternal issues, to choose
for
God and his holy will: "Choose life, then, that you
and your descendants may live, by loving the Lord, your God" (Deuteronomy
30:15-20).
It is impossible to have a great desire for
something and the capacity to devote all our energies to it unless we
have great clarity of vision. The average person lacks clarity of
vision in respect to the last and final thing, which is the judgment of
God on which our eternity will hang. From that judgment will flow the
life or death that the words of Moses ultimately refer to. It will all
depend on how well we have prepared for that divine judgment. Today let
us pray for the grace to see clearly the choices to be made, and the
generosity to act in daily life accordingly.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Let him take up his cross each day
and follow in my steps” (Luke 9: 22-25)
Commentary from the Oriental
Liturgy (Office of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross)
Hail, life-giving cross, invincible trophy of piety, door to Paradise,
comfort of those who believe, ramparts of the Church. Through you,
corruption was annihilated, the power of death was swallowed up and
abolished, and we have been raised up from the earth to heavenly
things. You are the invincible weapon, the demons’ adversary, the
martyrs’ glory, the saints’ true ornament, the gate to salvation……
Hail, cross of the Lord, by which humankind has been delivered from the
curse. You are the sign of true joy. When you are raised up, you crash
our enemies to the ground. We venerate you. You are our help, the
strength of kings, the assurance of the righteous, the dignity of
sinners……
Hail, precious cross, guide to the blind, doctor for the sick,
resurrection for all who have died. You lifted us up when we had become
stained. Through you, corruption was brought to an end and immortality
blossomed; through you, we who are mortal were divinized and the demon
was entirely brought down.
O Christ, today we who are sinners venerate your precious cross with
our unworthy lips. We sing to you who wanted to be attached to that
cross. And like the thief, we cry out to you: “Make us worthy of your
Kingdom!”
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When the children of God act in their apostolate, they have to be like
those great lighting systems which fill the world with light, but the
lamp is not seen.
(The Forge,
no.670)
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Friday
after Ash Wednesday
(March 3) Today let us think of St. Cunegundes and St. Katherine Drexel (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah 58:
1-9; Psalm 51: 3-6,
18-19;
Matthew 9: 14-15.
“The time will come for the bridegroom
to be taken away from them, and then they will fast.”
(Matthew 9: 14-15)
During these early days of Lent the Church places before us our Gospel
scene of today in which John’s disciples come to Jesus puzzled that he
does not insist that his disciples fast, in the way they and the
Pharisees did. After all, fasting was a perennial means of spiritual
growth and life. Our Lord replied, “Surely the bridegroom’s attendants
would never think of mourning as long as the bridegroom is still with
them? But the time will come for the bridegroom to be taken away from
them, and then they will fast.” (Matthew 9:
14-15) What
are we to make of our Lord’s answer?
To begin with,
our Lord’s reply surely shows his kindness, his flexibility, his
willingness to wait - all qualities which are in evidence in his
dealings with each one of us. Our Lord was forming his disciples and
had still a long way to go with them. Even after his resurrection they
had much distance to travel in understanding. They
were made up of different personalities, different backgrounds, and
with only the haziest notions of what our Lord himself as the Messiah
had come to do - some of their expectations were entirely mistaken. He
allowed them to find their feet, to become his friends, to enjoy his
company, and to begin to learn from him, the Master. His work and goals
were of a radically different order from that of the Pharisees, and
even from that of John - for we remember how he contrasted John with
those ‘in the kingdom of heaven.’ So our Lord was allowing his
disciples simply to be with him, the Bridegroom, with all the joy and
the newness that this involved. Our Lord was kindly, flexible and
patient with them as he is with each of us too, as we work our way
towards spiritual maturity.
But, as our Lord explained to John’s disciples, the time for
seriousness and spiritual struggle in his disciples would come. He
would be taken away from them, and another Advocate would come to be
with them forever. And then indeed they would fast, and take the
Kingdom by constant struggle unto death. With
these words of our Lord before us, and with the assurance of the help
of the Holy Spirit ahead of us, let us use this Lenten period to set in
place in our lives a pattern of true self-denial and spiritual
struggle,
following in the footsteps of the Bridegroom who has been taken away
from our sight - but who is present intimately to us, giving
us the grace to follow after him. Let us renounce all mediocrity and
all tendency simply to coast along. We must be disciples with a great
desire to follow the Bridegroom whithersoever he goes.
Let us begin this concretely, in practical terms, by aiming higher in
prayer, in self-denial, and in service and assistance to others.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Then they will fast” (Matthew 9:
14-15) Comment by John Paul II (Angelus on
March 10, 1996)
Among the penitential practices that the Church suggests to us above
all during this Lenten time is fasting. It consists in a special
sobriety in the food we eat, while ensuring care for the needs of our
body. This is a traditional form of penance, which has lost none of its
significance, and which we perhaps need to rediscover, above all in
that part of the world and in the milieus where food not only abounds,
but where we at times encounter illnesses due to overeating.
Obviously, penitential fasting is very different from therapeutic
diets. But as it is, we can see in it a therapy for the soul. For when
it is practised as a sign of conversion, it facilitates the interior
effort to make oneself available to listening to God. To fast is to
reaffirm for oneself what Jesus replied to Satan, when the latter
tempted him at the end of forty days of fasting in the desert: “Not on
bread alone is man to live but on every utterance that comes from the
mouth of God.” (Mt 4:4) Today, especially in our well-to-do societies,
it is difficult for us to understand the meaning of this word of the
gospel. Instead of pacifying our needs, the consumer society creates
ever new ones, even engendering disproportionate activism... Among
other meanings, penitential fasting has precisely the aim of helping us
to recover interiority.
The effort towards moderation in food also extends to other things that
are not necessary, and it greatly aids the life of the spirit.
Sobriety, recollection and prayer go together. This principle can be
appropriately applied to our use of the mass media. They are
unquestionably useful, but they must not become the “masters” over our
life. In so many families, the television seems to replace rather than
facilitate dialogue among the persons! A certain “fasting” in this area
can be salutary, either so as to give more time to reflection and
prayer or to cultivate human relations.
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Jesus says: “He who hears you hears me.” Do you still think it is your
words that convince people? Don’t forget either that the Holy Spirit
can carry out his plans with the most useless instrument.
(The
Forge, no.671)
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Saturday
after Ash Wednesday
(March
4) Saint
Casimir (1458-1484) The son of the King of Poland, he practised
the Christian virtues especially chastity and love of the poor. He was
conspicuous for a firm faith and for his veneration of the Holy
Eucharist and the Blessed Virgin Mary. He died of phthisis. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah 58:
9-14; Psalm 86: 1-6;
Luke 5: 27-32
“I have not come to call the virtuous
but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5: 27-32)
If God had not deigned to reveal himself to us, what would we have
known of him? Suffice it to point to the vast array of religions and
philosophies of man to show how meagre and contradictory would be our
common knowledge of him. Whatever of that general observation, one of
the most surprising and consoling of the divine attributes revealed by
the Son of God made man is the love of God for those who offend him by
sin. God loves the sinner and calls on him continually to repent.
Christ assures us that there is more joy in heaven over one repentant
sinner than over the ninety nine, as it were, who have no need of
repentance. That is to say, precisely because God loves the sinner, his
repentance from sin causes him joy.
Of course, it is not as if only one in a hundred needs to repent. Every
man and woman needs to embark on a daily process of repentance. In our
Gospel today (Luke 5: 27-32) our Lord calls on Levi the tax
collector to follow him, and Levi immediately leaves everything to
follow him. What is behind this immediacy of response? Perhaps in a
special sense Levi knew he was a sinner and Christ’s invitation
expressed to him in wondrous fashion God’s loving mercy and pardon. It
was a stunning invitation to friendship with God, despite his sins.
Levi, being a tax collector, was regarded as "a sinner", and was
consequently made conscious of his sinful condition. The same applied
to his colleagues the other tax collectors. Our passage tells us that
when Levi held a great reception for our Lord and his disciples in his
house, there was with them “a large gathering of tax collectors and
others” - sinners, as they were regarded by the Pharisees and their
scribes. These sinners felt welcomed, loved and honoured by our Lord’s
presence. In large measure they were open to the love of God in Christ
because of the sense they had of their own sinfulness.
It has often been pointed out - as it was years ago by Pope Pius XII -
that the sin of our time is the loss of the sense of sin. Let us pray
for the grace of a personal sense of sin. If we lack this we will be
out of touch with our true condition and feel little need for the
Saviour who came to take away the sin of the world. Let us resolve then
to be like the Publican of our Lord’s parable who beat his breast in
the presence of God saying, “Lord, be merciful to me a sinner.” It was
he who went home justified, not the Pharisee.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Leaving everything behind, he stood
up and became his follower” (Luke 5: 27-32)
Comment by John Paul II
(Message to youth in preparation for the 20th WYD) (August 6, 2004)
Listening to Christ and adoring him leads to courageous choices, to
decisions that are at times heroic. Jesus makes demands, because he
wants us to be authentically happy. He calls certain people to leave
everything in order to follow him in a life as a priest or in a
consecrated life. May those who hear this invitation not be afraid to
answer “yes”, and may they generously follow him. But aside from
particular vocations to a consecrated life, there is the vocation of
every baptized person. It also is a vocation to that “high degree” of
ordinary Christian life, which finds its expression in sanctity (cf. Novo millenio ineunte,
At the beginning of the new millennium, 31).
So many of our contemporaries do not yet know God’s love or are trying
to fill their heart with insignificant substitutes. It is thus urgent
to be witnesses of the love contemplated in Christ…… The Church needs
authentic witnesses for the new evangelization: men and women whose
lives have been transformed through their encounter with Jesus, men and
women who are able to communicate this experience to others. The Church
needs saints. We are all called to sanctity, and only the saints can
renew humankind.
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Saint Ambrose has some words that fit the children of God
marvellously well. He is speaking of the ass’s colt, tethered to its
dam, which Jesus needed for his triumph: “Only an order of the Lord
could untie it”, he says. “It was set loose by the hands of the
Apostles. To do such a deed, one needs a special way of living and a
special grace. You too must be an apostle, to set free those who are
captive.”
Let me comment on this text for you once more. How often,
upon a word from Jesus, will we have to loosen souls from their bonds,
because he needs them for his triumph! May our hands be apostles’
hands, and our actions, and our lives also. Then God will give us an
apostle’s grace, too, to break the fetters of those who are enchained.
(The Forge,
no.672)
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The
First Sunday of Lent B
(March 5) Today
let us think of St Kieran
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Genesis
9:8-15; Psalm 25: 4-9;
1 Peter 3:
18-22; Mark 1: 12-15
Pope Benedict XVI's Message for
Lent
2006
"Jesus, at the Sight of the Crowds, Was Moved With Pity" (Matthew 9:36)
Dear Brothers and Sisters!
Lent is a privileged time of interior pilgrimage towards Him Who is the
fount of mercy. It is a pilgrimage in which He Himself accompanies us
through the desert of our poverty, sustaining us on our way towards the
intense joy of Easter. Even in the "valley of darkness" of which the
Psalmist speaks (Psalm 23:4), while the tempter prompts us to despair
or to place a vain hope in the work of our own hands, God is there to
guard us and sustain us. Yes, even today the Lord hears the cry of the
multitudes longing for joy, peace, and love. As in every age, they feel
abandoned. Yet, even in the desolation of misery, loneliness, violence
and hunger that indiscriminately afflict children, adults, and the
elderly, God does not allow darkness to prevail. In fact, in the words
of my beloved Predecessor, Pope John Paul II, there is a "divine limit
imposed upon evil," namely, mercy (Memory and Identity,
pp. 19ff.).
It is with these thoughts in mind that I have chosen as my theme for
this Message the Gospel text: "Jesus, at the sight of the crowds, was
moved with pity" (Matthew 9:36).
In this light, I would like to pause and reflect upon an issue much
debated today: the question of development. Even now, the compassionate
"gaze" of Christ continues to fall upon individuals and peoples. He
watches them, knowing that the divine "plan" includes their call to
salvation. Jesus knows the perils that put this plan at risk, and He is
moved with pity for the crowds. He chooses to defend them from the
wolves even at the cost of His own life. The gaze of Jesus embraces
individuals and multitudes, and he brings them all before the Father,
offering Himself as a sacrifice of expiation.
Enlightened by this Paschal truth, the Church knows that if we are to
promote development in its fullness, our own "gaze" upon mankind has to
be measured against that of Christ. In fact, it is quite impossible to
separate the response to people's material and social needs from the
fulfillment of the profound desires of their hearts. This has to be
emphasized all the more in today's rapidly changing world, in which our
responsibility towards the poor emerges with ever greater clarity and
urgency. My venerable Predecessor, Pope Paul VI, accurately described
the scandal of underdevelopment as an outrage against humanity. In this
sense, in the Encyclical Populorum Progressio,
he denounced "the lack
of material necessities for those who are without the minimum essential
for life, the moral deficiencies of those who are mutilated by
selfishness" and "oppressive social structures, whether due to the
abuses of ownership or to the abuses of power, to the exploitation of
workers or to unjust transactions" (ibid., 21).
As the antidote to such evil, Pope Paul VI suggested not only
"increased
esteem for the dignity of others, the turning towards the spirit of
poverty, cooperation for the common good, the will and desire for
peace," but also "the acknowledgment by man of supreme values, and of
God, their source and their finality" (ibid.). In this vein, the Pope
went on to propose that, finally and above all, there is "faith, a gift
of God accepted by the good will of man, and unity in the charity of
Christ" (ibid.). Thus, the "gaze" of Christ upon the crowd impels us to
affirm the true content of this "complete humanism" that, according to
Paul VI, consists in the "fully-rounded development of the whole man
and of all men" (ibid., 42). For this reason, the primary contribution
that the Church offers to the development of mankind and peoples does
not consist merely in material means or technical solutions. Rather, it
involves the proclamation of the truth of Christ, Who educates
consciences and teaches the authentic dignity of the person and of
work; it means the promotion of a culture that truly responds to all
the questions of humanity.
In the face of the terrible challenge of poverty afflicting so much of
the world's population, indifference and self-centered isolation stand
in stark contrast to the "gaze" of Christ. Fasting and almsgiving,
which, together with prayer, the Church proposes in a special way
during the Lenten Season, are suitable means for us to become conformed
to this "gaze." The examples of the saints and the long history of the
Church's missionary activity provide invaluable indications of the most
effective ways to support development. Even in this era of global
interdependence, it is clear that no economic, social, or political
project can replace that gift of self to another through which charity
is expressed. Those who act according to the logic of the Gospel live
the faith as friendship with God Incarnate and, like Him, bear the
burden of the material and spiritual needs of their neighbors. They see
it as an inexhaustible mystery, worthy of infinite care and attention.
They know that he who does not give God gives too little; as Blessed
Teresa of Calcutta frequently observed, the worst poverty is not to
know Christ. Therefore, we must help others to find God in the merciful
face of Christ. Without this perspective, civilization lacks a solid
foundation.
Thanks to men and women obedient to the Holy Spirit, many forms of
charitable work intended to promote development have arisen in the
Church: hospitals, universities, professional formation schools, and
small businesses. Such initiatives demonstrate the genuine humanitarian
concern of those moved by the Gospel message, far in advance of other
forms of social welfare. These charitable activities point out the way
to achieve a globalization that is focused upon the true good of
mankind and, hence, the path towards authentic peace. Moved like Jesus
with compassion for the crowds, the Church today considers it her duty
to ask political leaders and those with economic and financial power to
promote development based on respect for the dignity of every man and
woman. An important litmus test for the success of their efforts is
religious liberty, understood not simply as the freedom to proclaim and
celebrate Christ, but also the opportunity to contribute to the
building of a world enlivened by charity. These efforts have to include
a recognition of the central role of authentic religious values in
responding to man's deepest concerns, and in supplying the ethical
motivation for his personal and social responsibilities. These are the
criteria by which Christians should assess the political programs of
their leaders.
We cannot ignore the fact that many mistakes have been made in the
course of history by those who claimed to be disciples of Jesus. Very
often, when having to address grave problems, they have thought that
they should first improve this world and only afterwards turn their
minds to the next. The temptation was to believe that, in the face of
urgent needs, the first imperative was to change external structures.
The consequence, for some, was that Christianity became a kind of
moralism, "believing" was replaced with "doing."
Rightly, therefore, my Predecessor, Pope John Paul II, of blessed
memory, observed: "The temptation today is to reduce Christianity to
merely human wisdom, a pseudo-science of well-being. In our heavily
secularized world, a 'gradual secularization of salvation' has taken
place, so that people strive for the good of man, but man who is
truncated. ……We know, however, that Jesus came to bring integral
salvation" (Redemptoris
Missio, 11).
It is this integral salvation that Lent puts before us, pointing
towards the victory of Christ over every evil that oppresses us. In
turning to the Divine Master, in being converted to Him, in
experiencing His mercy through the Sacrament of Reconciliation, we will
discover a "gaze" that searches us profoundly and gives new life to the
crowds and to each one of us. It restores trust to those who do not
succumb to skepticism, opening up before them the perspective of
eternal beatitude. Throughout history, even when hate seems to prevail,
the luminous testimony of His love is never lacking. To Mary, "the
living fount of hope" (Dante Alighieri, Paradiso,
XXXIII, 12), we
entrust our Lenten journey, so that she may lead us to her Son. I
commend to her in particular the multitudes who suffer poverty and cry
out for help, support, and understanding. With these sentiments, I
cordially impart to all of you a special Apostolic Blessing.
From the Vatican, 29 September 2005
Pope Benedict XVI
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“He stayed in the desert for forty
days.” (Mark 1: 12-15)
Comment by Joseph Cardinal
Ratzinger [Pope Benedict XVI] (Retreat
preached at the Vatican in 1983)
When he went into the desert, Jesus inserted himself into his people’s
history of salvation, that of the chosen people. This history begins
after the exodus from Egypt, with the people’s wandering in the desert
for forty years. At the centre of those forty years were the days of
face to face encounter with God: the forty days which Moses spent on
the mountain, in absolute fasting, far from his people, in the solitude
of the cloud, at the top of the mountain (Ex 24:18). The spring of
revelation sprang forth from the heart of those days. We again find a
duration of forty days in the life of Elijah: persecuted by King Ahab,
he wandered in the desert for forty days, thus returning to the place
where the covenant had its origin, to the voice of God, in order to
begin a new stage in the history of salvation (1 Kings 19:8).
Jesus entered into this history. He lived again his people’s
temptations, the temptations of Moses. Like Moses, he offered a sacred
exchange: to be wiped out from the book of life in order to save his
people (Ex 32:32). Thus Jesus became the Lamb of God who carries the
sins of the world; he became the true Moses who is truly “at the
Father’s side” (Jn 1:18), face to face with him so as to reveal him. In
the deserts of the world, he is truly the source of living water (Jn
7:38), he who is not content with speaking, but who is himself the word
of life: the way, the truth, and the life (Jn14:6). From the height of
the cross, he gave us the new covenant. By his resurrection, he entered
into the promised land as the true Moses, the land to which Moses was
refused access and to which he opens the door to us by means of the key
of the cross.
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We can never attribute to ourselves the power of Jesus who is passing
by amongst us. Our Lord is passing by: and he transforms souls when we
come close to him with one heart, one feeling, one desire: to be good
Christians. But it is he who does it: not you nor I. It is Christ who
is passing by! And then he stays in our hearts - in yours and in mine -
and in our tabernacles. Jesus is passing by, and Jesus comes to stay.
He stays in you, in each one of you, and in me.
(The Forge,
no.673)
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Monday
of the first week of Lent
(March 6) Today let us think of St. Colette
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Leviticus
19: 1-2.11-18; Psalm 19: 8-10, 15;
Matthew 25: 31-46
“Speak to the whole community of the
sons of Israel and say to them: ‘Be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am
holy’.” (Leviticus 19:
1-2)
It has been said that one of the notable differences
between the average Protestant and the average Catholic for quite a
period of time in
the past was
that the Protestant delved into the Old Testament
and quoted it far more than the New, and it was the reverse for the
Catholic. Whether this was true is a further question, but at least it
highlights the lack of familiarity with and use of the Old Testament by
great numbers of Catholics. Catholics are at home with the New
Testament, and in particular with the Gospels - and that is a great
good. The Gospels are the centrepiece of the New Testament and
therefore of the entire Bible because the living Jesus stands forth
from the pages of the Gospels more sharply than in any other of the
inspired books. However, we ought cultivate an enormous veneration for
every part of the Scriptures, including the Old Testament. Our first
reading today, taken from one of the more neglected books of the Old
Testament (Leviticus), gives us a passage of great beauty and immense
spiritual relevance.
Why is this? Its opening verse brings us to the heart of divine
revelation with a momentous sentence: The Lord spoke to Moses; he
said: 'Speak to the whole community of the sons of Israel and say to
them: “Be holy, for I the Lord your God, am holy”.' (Leviticus 19:
1-2) Man’s
condition is a sinful one. The moral goodness to which his conscience
summons him is beyond his natural reach because of the burden of sin
which he knows afflicts him. God in revealing himself to man
commands him to seek holiness: “Be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am
holy.”
Perhaps the most
distinctive note of the Judaeo-Christian revelation is that its purpose
is to bring to man the gift of a share in God’s holiness. That is to
say, together
with this command to be holy comes the promise of redemption from the
sin
that makes holiness impossible. God so loved the world that he sent his
Son to take away the sin of the world, and by the gift of his Holy
Spirit to make man’s transformation entirely possible. “This is the
will of God, your sanctification”, St Paul writes.
During these weeks of Lent, let us hear again the call to holiness, and
let us dispose ourselves (by prayer, self-denial and concern for
others) to walk in its path by the grace of God, a path marked
especially by justice and charity to our fellow man. (Leviticus
19: 1-2.11-18 and Matthew 25:
31-46).
(E.J.Tyler)
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“Come. You have my Father’s blessing!
Inherit the kingdom prepared for you” (Matt. 25: 31-46)
Comment by Saint Cesarius of Arles
(470-543), Monk and Bishop (Sermon 26,5)
Christ, that is to say, heavenly mercy, comes to the door of your house
every day, not only spiritually to the door of your soul, but also
materially to the door of your house. For every time a poor person
approaches your house, it is without any doubt Christ who is coming, he
who said: “As often as you did it for one of these little ones, you did
it for me.” So don’t harden you heart; give a little money to Christ,
from whom you want to receive the Kingdom. Give a piece of bread to
him, from whom you hope to receive life. Welcome him into your home, so
that he might welcome you into his paradise. Give him alms, so that in
return he might give you eternal life.
What audacity to want to reign in heaven with him to whom you refuse to
give alms in this world! If you receive him during this earthly
journey, he will welcome you into his heavenly happiness; if you
despise him here in your homeland, he will turn his eyes away from you
in his glory. A Psalm says: “In your city, Lord, you despise their
image.” (Ps 72:20 Vulg.) If we despise those who are made in the image
of God (Gen 1:26) in our city, that is to say, in this life, we must
fear being rejected in his eternal city. So be merciful here below……
Thanks to your generosity, you will hear that wonderful word said to
you: “Come. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you”
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Our Lord wants to make us co-redeemers with him. That is why to help us
understand this marvel, he moves the evangelists to tell us of so many
great wonders. He could have produced bread from anything ... but he
doesn’t! He looks for human co-operation: he “needs” a child, a boy, a
few pieces of bread and some fish. He needs you and me: and he is God!
This should move us to be generous in our corresponding with his grace.
(The Forge,
no.674)
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Tuesday
of the first week of Lent
(March 7) Saint Perpetua and
Saint Felicity, martyrs. Perpetua was a young mother of
Carthaginian nobility and Felicity was a slave girl. These two martyrs
were thrown to the wild beasts in the persecution of Septimus Severus
in the year 203 at Carthage. Perpetua was still nursing her newly born
baby boy. There is an impressive narrative of their martyrdom in
existence, partially written by the saints themselves and partly by a
contemporary writer. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah 55:
10-11; Psalm 34: 4-7,
16-19;
Matthew 6:7-15
“Your Father knows what you need
before you ask him. So you should pray like this.”
(Matthew 6:7-15)
To have received guidance on how to pray from the Son of God himself is
a very precious thing. Our Gospel passage today tells us how God
wants us to pray: we call it the Lord’s Prayer. Now, the first thing we
surely notice about this Prayer taught to us by the Lord is its
simplicity. And that is exactly what our Lord states in his preamble:
‘In your prayers do not babble as the pagans do, for they think that by
using many words they will make themselves heard.’ (Matthew 6:7-15) When two very good friends are
together, or, say, two such as mother and
daughter or son, their communication is simple and direct in character
and in their words. So it is with our
prayer to God. As we read this very simple prayer that our Lord teaches
us to pray, we also gain a glimpse of his own prayer to his heavenly
Father. Obviously, it too was simple and direct. Why is this? It is
surely because the Father is very near to Jesus, near beyond our
imagining. So
too with us. There
is no need to strain, as it were, to be understood by
the Father. He is not some distance away. He is very
near, and he loves us. This too is revealed by the Lord's Prayer.
This simplicity in prayer is what our Lord emphasises in his
introduction. In his conclusion
he emphasises something else which is also surprising and demanding. It
is that we must forgive others their failings. If we do not, our
request to be forgiven ours will not be granted: “Yes, if you forgive
others their failings your heavenly Father will forgive you yours.” (Matthew 6:7-15) So Christian prayer involves not only a
trusting and simple attitude to God our Father, but also a forgiving
attitude to our neighbour. We can go through life never forgiving this
or that person from the heart. If this amounts to a deliberate refusal
to forgive, our eternity can be at stake because God has told us that
his forgiveness of our trespasses will depend on our forgiveness of the
trespasses of others. So then, every time we think of someone who has
hurt us in the past in any way, let us resolve to pray for that person
there and then and to do so from the heart. If we have offended
another, let us pray for that person too. Let us pray for the grace to
forgive genuinely from the heart everyone who has caused us any injury
of any kind.
Let us reflect on the preamble and on the conclusion of the Lord’s
Prayer as Matthew presents it to us. The preamble directs us to be
simple, trusting and immediate in our prayer to God. The conclusion
asks us to forgive others, so as to be able to ask God for forgiveness
for our sins.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The "Our Father": The prayer of the
children of God (Matthew 6:7-15)
Comment by Blessed Teresa of
Calcutta (1910-1997), Foundress of the Missionary Sisters of
Charity
In order for prayer to be fruitful, it must come from the heart and be
able to touch God’s heart. See how Jesus taught his disciples to pray.
Every time we say the “Our Father”, I believe that God looks at his
hands, at the place where he has engraved us: “Upon the palms of my
hands I have written your name.” (Isa 49:16) God contemplates his
hands, and he sees us there, nestling in them. How marvellous is God’s
tenderness!
Let us pray, let us say the “Our Father”. Let us live it and then we
will be saints. Everything is there: God, myself, my neighbour. If I
forgive, I can be holy, I can pray. Everything comes from a humble
heart; when we have such a heart, we will know how to love God, how to
love ourselves, and how to love our neighbour (Mt 22:37f.). That is
nothing complicated, and yet we complicate our lives so much and make
them heavy with so many extra loads. Only one thing counts: to be
humble and to pray. The more you pray, the better you will pray.
A child encounters no difficulty in expressing its ingenuous
understanding in simple words that say a lot. Didn’t Jesus give
Nicodemus to understand that we must become like a small child (Jn
3:3)? If we pray according to the Gospel, we will allow Christ to grow
in us. So pray with love, the way children do, with the ardent desire
to love much and to make beloved the person who is not loved.
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If you help him, even with a trifle, as the Apostles did, He is ready
to work miracles; to multiply the bread, to reform wills, to give light
to the most benighted minds, to enable those who have never been
upright to be so, with an extraordinary grace. All this he will do ....
and more, if you will help him with what you have.
(The Forge,
no.675)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday
of the first week of Lent
(March 8) St John of God,
religious (1495-1550). He heeded the word of God when he was
already forty years old and from then on lived at the service of the
sick in Granada (Spain). Before that, he was successively a farmer, a
soldier, and merchant. He founded his Order of Brothers Hospitallers of
Saint John of God, devoting themselves to the infirm in body and soul. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Jonah 3:
1-10; Psalm 51: 3-4,
12-13, 18-19;
Luke 11: 29-32
“God saw their efforts to renounce
their evil behaviour. And God relented.” (Jonah 3: 1-10)
When we consider the saints, the striking thing about them is their
great spiritual progress. Spiritually they continued improving day by
day. What then is the secret to this pattern of great progress in their
life, in contrast to the little progress made in the lives of so many
others? The secret, the key to it was that they knew how to repent.
That is to say, their daily lives were marked by a pattern of
repentance from faults and sins which they combatted and renounced and
rid their lives from. They identified their sins and faults - which is
to say they came to know themselves - and then with the example of
Christ before them they renounced these sins and faults. If we are to
make similar spiritual progress we must do the same. We must set in
place a practice of daily examination of conscience, and then each day
identify what is preventing spiritual progress and renounce those moral
obstacles. The repentance of a Christian is not a one-off event, but
rather a daily and life-long pattern. If we are attempting this
genuinely every day we are preparing well for the hour of our death,
when we must renounce all for the will of God.
In our first reading of today the prophet Jonah is sent to the pagan
city of Niniveh (Jonah 3: 1-10). The inspired author develops his
story to bring out the climax of repentance. The pagan people of
Niniveh repented of their sins. That they repented was due to the mercy
of God in sending a (reluctant, and not very obedient) preacher of
repentance, but they also had the readiness to respond to the warning
that was preached to them. They were disposed to do what God wanted.
The Church during these days of Lent preaches repentance to us too, and
invites us to take heed of what the pagan people did in the story of
Jonah. If they can do it, so can we - even more so for we have the
Spirit of God to sustain the promptings of our conscience. So then, let
us heed the call to repent. Our Lord replies in the Gospel (Luke 11: 29-32) to those who were demanding a sign: “On
Judgment Day the men of Niniveh will stand up with this generation and
condemn it, because when Jonah preached they repented; and there is
something greater than Jonah here.”
So then, now begin! Let us make our goal this Lent putting repentance
at the centre of our life. Any genuine spiritual progress will be
impossible unless we do.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“No sign will be given it except the
sign of Jonah.” (Luke 11: 29-32)
Comment by Joseph Cardinal
Ratzinger [Pope Benedict XVI] (Retreat preached at the Vatican
in 1983)
“This generation seeks a sign.” We also wait for a demonstration, a
sign of success, in the history of the world as much as in our personal
life. Consequently, we wonder whether Christianity has transformed the
world, whether it has produced that sign of bread and of security that
the devil spoke about in the desert (Mt 4:3f.). Following Karl Marx’s
argumentation, Christianity has had enough time to establish the proof
of its principles, to give a proof of its success, to demonstrate that
it has created the earthly paradise. According to Marx, after all this
time, it would thus be necessary from now on to base oneself on other
principles.
This argumentation does not fail to impress many Christians, and many
think that it is at least necessary to invent a very different
Christianity, one that renounces the luxury of interiority, of a
spiritual life. But that is precisely how they prevent the true
transformation of the world, which has its origin in a new heart, a
vigilant heart, a heart that is open to the truth and to love, a heart
that is liberated and free.
Selfishness, the impurity of a heart that expects nothing from God
except personal success and help in affirming the absoluteness of self,
is at the root of that corrupt demand for a sign. This form of
religiosity is a fundamental refusal of conversion. But how often do we
ourselves not depend on a sign of success! How often do we not demand a
sign and refuse conversion!
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Jesus has died. He is a corpse. Those holy women had no expectations.
They had seen how he had been abused, and how he had been crucified.
How vivid in their minds was the violence of the Passion he had
undergone! They knew too that the soldiers were keeping watch over the
place. They knew that the tomb was sealed shut. “Who will roll away the
stone for us from the door?” they ask themselves, for it was a massive
slab. But all the same, in spite of everything, they went to be with
him.
Look: difficulties, large and small, can be seen at once. But if
there is love, one pays no heed to those obstacles: one goes ahead with
daring, with conviction, with courage. Don’t you have to confess your
shame when you contemplate the drive, he daring and the courage of
these women?
(The
Forge, no.676)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the first week of Lent
(March 9) St Frances of Rome,
religious (1384-1440). A married woman, she brought up her three
children in the love and fear of God. She was zealous in the
performance of every household duty, saying, “A married woman must
often love God at the altar to find him in her household care.” She
founded an Order of Oblates. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Esther 14: 1,
3-5, 12-14;
Psalm 138: 1-3,
7-8;
Matthew 7: 7-12
“Queen Esther took refuge with the Lord
in the mortal peril which had overtaken her.”
(Esther 14:1)
I have often thought that those moments of prayer that are most
memorable in our lives are those occasioned by some very great need. It
could be the threat of some life-threatening disease or illness of some
kind. It could be an imminent threat to our employment, or something
threat to a loved one. Whatever be the need, it prompts us to
ardent prayer and brings to the fore our faith which otherwise might
operate at a real but not notably vivid level. Faced with this profound
need, we find ourselves praying with faith and perseverence. Indeed, we
might never forget the experience, especially so if later on we notice
that our heartfelt prayer has in some surprising way been answered.
In today’s first reading from the Old Testament book of Esther, Queen
Esther prays her heartfelt prayer. Its earnest and genuine character is
evident throughout the text. It is a model of a direct and piercing
prayer to God, and the Book of Esther is the story of how the prayer
was heard.
But let us notice what occasioned it. The beginning of the passage
tells us that “Queen Esther took refuge with the Lord in the mortal
peril which had overtaken her.” (Esther 14: 1) It was her peril that evoked this
admirable prayer to God. Many other examples of this pattern of prayer
inspired by some peril could be cited from the Old Testament. What it
suggests is that our prayer to God for what we need should be earnest,
genuine, heartfelt. It must not be half-hearted, if we want it answered.
Our Gospel passage (Matthew 7: 7-12)
gives us
our Lord’s guarantee as to petitions we place before the throne of God.
Our Lord says that they will be heard: “Ask and it will be given to
you; search, and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened to
you.” Yet so
often we hear the complaint
that prayer is useless, with the implication that God does not hear our
prayer. Rather, we ought ask whether we have been asking as God wants
us to ask, and also whether we really have been asking for
it. Have we
asked, genuinely, in true and heartfelt fashion, and in the presence of
God? Or rather has our petition been only half-hearted and scarcely a
petition at all? This consideration takes us to the further point about
such prayers of petition, which is that when at prayer we ought strive
to be truly conscious of our condition, of our need, and indeed of our
peril, were it not for the supporting hand of God. A profound
consciousness of our need - such as is evident in the prayer of Esther
- will give to
our petitions to God a real urgency and a heartfelt character.
Whenever we pray to God for anything, let us bring to our prayer an
awareness of who we are and of who God is. We are utterly dependent and
contingent. God is unlimited and all-powerful in his being.
(E.J.Tyler)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Ask, and you will receive…… Knock,
and the door will be opened to you.” (Matthew 7: 7-12)
Comment by an anonymous 4th century homily (wrongly attributed to St.
John Chrysostom)
“Hearken to my words, O Lord.” (Ps 5:2) You came not only to have mercy
on your people Israel, but to save all the nations……, not only to
restore a part of the earth, but to renew the whole world. Therefore,
“hearken to my words, O Lord.”…… Do not reject my supplication as being
unworthy; do not dismiss my prayer. I am not asking for gold or
riches…… It is with the desire for love and respect that I constantly
cry out: “Hearken to my words, O Lord.”
Israel enjoys your goods; I also want to experience your kindness. You
led Israel out of Egypt; pull me out of error. You redeemed Israel from
Pharaoh; deliver me from the author of evil. You led Israel through the
Red Sea; lead me through the water of baptism. You guided Israel by
means of the pillar of fire; enlighten me by means of your Holy Spirit.
Israel ate the bread of angels in the desert; give me your most holy
Body. Israel drank water from the rock; quench my thirst with the Blood
from your side. Israel received the tables of your Law; inscribe your
Gospel in my heart……
“Hearken to my words, O Lord, attend to my sighing.” Thanks to this
sighing, Moses had creation as your people’s ally [at the Red Sea].
Thanks to this clamour, Joshua stopped the sun’s course (Josh 10:12).
Thanks to this cry, Elijah made the clouds of heaven sterile (1 Kings
17:1). Thanks to this moaning, against all hope, Hannah gave birth to a
child (1 Sam 1:10f.). “So Lord, attend to my sighing.”
I proclaim the Father’s absolute power and the Son’s mediation, his
being sent into the world and his obedience. The Father is eternally
enthroned and you “inclined the heavens and came down.” (Ps 29:10;
18:10)…… You received his testimony in the Jordan. In calling Lazarus
to come out of the tomb, you gave thanks to your Father…… In
multiplying the loaves in the desert, you raised your eyes to heaven
and you said the blessing. When you were hanged on the cross, it was he
who received your spirit. When you were laid in the tomb, it was he who
raised you on the third day. All of that is what I cry out in my
prayer; that is what I proclaim throughout the ages.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mary, your Mother, will bring you to the Love of Jesus. There you will
be with joy and peace. And you will be always “brought”, because on
your own you would fall and get covered in mud: you will be brought
onward, brought to believe, to love and to suffer.
(The Forge,
no.677)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday
of the first week of Lent
(March 10) Today let us think of St. Macarius (Saints)
Scripture today:
Ezechiel
18: 21-28; Psalm 130: 1-8;
Matthew 5: 20-26
“If the wicked man renounces all the
sins he has committed, ... he will not die.” (Ezechiel 18:1)
Ultimately there are two stark alternatives that face every living
thing, especially man. The alternatives are life or death. Even
if there is no direct
and immediate threat to life, still, what is at stake for us is life -
a
fulfilled
life, or a life that has wasted its promise. For the human being to
exist means life, and so the alternative before him is life involving
great promise, or death.
Now, God has revealed to us the key which unlocks
the door to each of these opposites, and our first reading from the
Prophet Ezechiel sets before us this key (Ezechiel 18:
21-28).
On the one hand, “If the wicked man renounces all the sins he has
committed, ... he will not die.” On the other, “if the upright man
renounces his integrity, commits sin, .. for this he shall die.” So
life or death in its ultimate sense depends on whether or not we
renounce sin and obey God.
It is as simple and as difficult as that. St Paul writes that the wages
of sin are death. During this season of Lent
the Church puts before us in all its clarity what God has revealed
about the importance of repentance from sin. Our Lord has told us that
he came to bring us life, life in abundance. The key to this will be to
repent.
For this reason we read in the Gospel that our Lord began his public
ministry by calling on all to
repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven was at hand.
If we are to renounce the sins we are guilty of, especially those which
are constantly recurring and impeding real progress in holiness, we
have to become aware of them. Let us begin by renewing our sense of
vocation, our
calling to belong to Jesus entirely. The Father has called us to live
in Christ, to live in his company and in his friendship and to make his
work our own. Let us then identify the sins that are impeding this
identification with Jesus and transformation into his likeness. Lent is
the time to do this in earnest. Our Gospel passage (Matthew 5:
20-26) gives
us our Lord’s words on a particularly important spiritual matter:
reconciliation with those from whom in any sense we have become
estranged. This is a particularly difficult spiritual challenge, but as
our Lord makes clear, real spiritual progress is out of the question
unless we face up to it. We need to pray earnestly and persistently for
the grace and the moral courage to renounce grudges and refusals to
forgive.
Let us take to heart during Lent the fundamental necessity to repent,
to renounce sin. If we do, the path to life is before us. The refusal
to repent takes us down the path to death.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“If you recall that your brother has
anything against you” (Matthew 5: 20-26)
Comment by St Augustine (354-430),
Bishop of Hippo and Doctor of the Church (Sermon 357)
“God’s sun rises on the bad and the good, he rains on the just and the
unjust.” (Mt 5:45) God shows his patience; he does not yet unfold his
power as the Almighty. You too…… renounce provocative activity, do not
increase the discomfort of swollen eyes. Are you a friend of peace?
Remain quiet within yourself…… Leave aside quarrels and turn to prayer.
Do not begin to fight with anyone or even to defend our faith by
arguing with a person who blasphemes. Do not respond to injury with
injury, but rather, pray for that person.
You want to talk to him against himself: speak to God for him. I am not
saying you should remain silent. Choose the appropriate place and see
Him to whom you are speaking in silence, through a cry of the heart. In
the very place where your adversary does not see you, be good to him.
You who are a friend of peace respond to this adversary of peace, to
this friend of dispute, saying: “Say whatever you want, whatever your
hostility might be, you are my brother.”……
“No matter how much you hate and reject me, you are my brother!
Recognize in yourself the sign of my Father; it is our Father’s Word.
Fighter brother, you are my brother, for like me, you also say: ‘Our
Father, who art in heaven.’ Our language is one. Why aren’t we one? I
beg you to recognize what you say together with me and to disown what
you do against me…… We have only one voice before the Father. Why
should we not enjoy one single peace with one another?”
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Saint Paul’s teaching we know that we have to renew the world in
the spirit of Jesus Christ, that we have to place Our Lord at the
summit and at the heart of all things. Do you think you are carrying
this out in your work, in your professional work?
(The Forge,
no.678)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the first week of Lent
(March 11) Today let us think of St Oengus (Saints)
Scripture today:
Deuteronomy
26: 16-19; Psalm 119: 1-2,
4-5, 7-8;
Matthew 5: 43-48
“You must observe them with all your
heart and with all your soul.” (Deuteronomy
26:16-19)
To most people it is fairly obvious that the fulfilment of one’s duty
is a key to the living of a truly human life. It is not material and
financial success, nor the attainment of social status, nor a
pleasure-filled life that makes a person a real human being. It is
being one who is committed to the doing of one’s duty, of fulfilling
one’s responsibilities. Even if one has little money, or is relatively
unnoticed in a social sense, if one fulfills one’s duty in life one
will have lived successfully in a true and ultimate sense. Furthermore,
the fulfilment of one's duty involves knowing one's duty, so "doing one's duty" is more than
simply "following one’s conscience", because one’s
conscience
can be entirely mistaken and could accordingly lead one to do harm. Few
would respect a person who "followed his conscience" in doing needless
and unjustified harm to others. Rather, it is a matter of knowing
what really is one’s objective duty and responsibilities, and having
the sense of responsibility and perseverence to fulfil it.
We are reminded of all this in today’s first reading (Deuteronomy
26:16-19) from the book of
Deuteronomy which makes
it clear that one must obey God’s commands. But there is a detail which
we could miss, and which provides a key to the attainment not only of a
truly human life by the fulfilment of one’s duty, but to the attainment
of sanctity. The key is to do God’s will, to do one’s duty, with all
one’s heart and soul. Our first reading tells us “you must keep
and
observe them
(God’s commands) with all your heart and with all your soul.” A similar point occurs in today's
psalm: "
You have commanded that your precepts be diligently kept." (Psalm 119: 1-2,
4-5) This
surely means that in all the
little duties of everyday life, in all our daily
work that goes to the fulfilling of our God-given responsibilities, we
ought aim to do things thoroughly and for God: “with all your heart and
with all
your soul”. The saints have taught that we should try to sanctify our
daily work and our daily duties by fulfilling them as perfectly as
possible out of love for God. Pope Benedict XV ninety years ago taught
that sanctity
involved as perfect a fulfilment of one's duties of state for the love
of God as possible. So let us resolve to do all our daily work
thoroughly,
and for God.
Let us apply this to today’s Gospel (Matthew 5: 43-48), in which our Lord teaches us that we
are to love our enemies. Let us put our mind to how we can do this
“with all our heart and with all our soul” and not half-heartedly. For
this we need divine aid and the constant example of Christ before us.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Love your enemies, pray for your
persecutors.” (Matthew 5: 43-48)
Comment by St Ignatius of
Antioch (? – 110), Bishop and Martyr (Letter to the Ephesians,
10-14)
“Never cease praying” (1 Thess 5:17) for the others. We can hope for
their repentance and that they will come to God. But at least may your
example show them the way. Counter their anger with your gentleness;
their arrogance with your humility; their blasphemies with your
prayers; their errors with the firmness of your faith; their violence
with your serenity, without seeking to do anything as they do. Through
our kindness, let us show them that we are their brothers. Let us try
to become “imitators of the Lord” (1 Thess 1:6). Who suffered injustice
more than he? Who was stripped and rejected? May it be impossible to
find the devil’’s weeds among you (cf. Mt 13:25). In perfect purity and
temperance of the flesh and the mind, remain in Jesus Christ.
The last times have come…… Only in Christ do we enter into true life.
Outside of him, nothing is worthwhile! ... Nothing surpasses peace; it
triumphs over all the assaults from our enemies, whether they be
heavenly or earthly…… Today, it is no longer enough to profess our
faith; we have to show to the end the strength with which it fills us.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why don’t you try converting your whole life into the service of God -
your work and your rest, your tears and your smiles? You can .... and
you must!
(The Forge,
no.679)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Second Sunday of
Lent (B)
(March 12) Today
let us think of St Maximilian
(Saints)
Scripture: Genesis
22:1-2.9.10-13.15-18; Psalm 116: 10,
15-19; Romans
8:31-34; Mark 9:2-10.
“Elijah appeared to them with Moses;
and they were talking with Jesus.” (Mark 9: 2-10)
Consider the several passages for this Sunday (set out
below) from Sacred Scripture, the inspired word of God. Scripture
consists of numerous small books written at various times under the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit by various authors over many centuries.
The meaning of those sacred writings has been interpreted in radically
different ways by different individuals and peoples. The Jewish people,
whose religion is that of the Old Testament, makes use of the Old
Testament alone because they do not consider that the Messiah has yet
come. Their religion is a revealed religion but it does not include all
of what God has revealed, nor the key to it. Islam accepts that the
religion of the Old Testament is revealed, but it is even more mistaken
because it considers Mahomet to be the greatest of the prophets.
Mahomet was not one of the prophets. Rather he was a founder of a world
religion whose thought was influenced by Judaism and Christianity,
while retaining his own (often erroneous) teachings.
]
The point I am making here is that in order to perceive
the true meaning of the Scriptures we need to have the divine key to
unlock that meaning. What is the key to unlock the meaning of all that
God has revealed, whether it be the Old Testament or the New? There is
a key and each one of us has it. That key enables us to read both the
Old Testament and the New, knowing that both are inspired by the Holy
Spirit, both are the word of God, and both have a common focus or
point. The key to the entire religion revealed by God is suggested in
the event of the Transfiguration described in today’s Gospel. Let us
place ourselves in the midst of our Gospel scene (Mark 9: 2-10).
There we see Peter, James and John whom in later years St
Paul would call the pillars of the infant Church. They are gazing on
our Lord, transfigured in a glorious and radiant beauty. Moses and
Elijah appear speaking with him, the two who represent the Law and the
Prophets, the entire Old Testament. The voice of the Father is heard.
Peter, James and John are present, the pillars of the coming Church,
and Peter will be its rock. Peter and John will both be inspired
authors of books in the New Testament. We could therefore regard them
as representing the New Testament and the Church which Christ would
found, and of which we are members. Speaking to our Lord are Moses and
Elijah, representing the Old Testament, and the Church of the Old
Testament. Both Old and New are present in our scene.
But now, who is there at the centre of this scene? It is
the person of Jesus. He is the promised Messiah, the redeemer of man,
the centre and the key to the entire revelation of God, be it
Old or New. And the Father makes his voice heard to confirm this. He
says to all present: “This is my Son, the beloved. Listen to him.” The
person of Christ is the key to the entire Bible, Old and New
Testaments. He is the key to the revealed religion before him (and this
is symbolized by Moses and Elijah talking with him). He is also the key
and the heart of the religion and the Church he founded, which was the
fulfilment of
what had come before. In fact, the person of Jesus is the key to the
meaning of all of human history and of the history of the religions of
man. Everything ought be considered in the light of the person of
Christ. On the mountain our Lord in glory is manifested as the
centre and focus of the scene. He is the centre and focus of everything.
So then, we ought read the Old Testament with confidence,
knowing that we have the key to it. That is to say, when we read some
passage of the Old Testament we ought have before us the figure of
Jesus, and ask ourselves what light Christ throws on that passage, and
what light that passage throws on the person of Jesus. For instance,
let us take the first reading today from the book of Genesis in which
Abraham is asked by God to sacrifice his son Isaac as an offering to
him (Genesis
22:1-2.9.10-13.15-18). It is a pointer to the coming
sacrifice of the Son of God, which, unlike the sacrifice of Isaac,
would be accepted as an offering, and as a result of which blessings as
many as the stars of heaven and as the grains of sand on the seashore
have flowed to humanity. Both the Old Testament and the New should be
read in the light of Christ. Christ is the reference point of
everything. The important thing, what brings eternal life to us, is the
knowledge and the love of Jesus. Jesus is the word and the utterance of
God. We must learn to live by that word. As St Paul writes, for me, to
live is Christ.
Let us then give ourselves over to Christ and make him the
centre and focus of everything.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further Reading:
Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no. 101-108; 131-133.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Jesus enjoined them not to tell
anyone what they had seen, before the Son of Man had risen from the
dead.” (Mark 9: 2-10)
By St Leo the Great (? ––
461), Pope and Doctor of the Church (Homily 51/38 on the Transfiguration)
Jesus wanted to arm his apostles with great strength of soul and with a
constancy that would allow them to take up their own cross without
fear, in spite of its harshness. Nor did he want them to blush over his
death or that they consider a shame the patience with which he had to
undergo such a cruel passion, without in any way losing the glory of
his power. So “Jesus took Peter, James, and John …… and led them up a
high mountain,” and there he showed them the brilliance of his glory.
Even if they had understood that divine majesty was in him, they did
not yet know the power that was contained in this body, which concealed
the divinity……
Thus the Lord revealed his glory in the presence of the witnesses he
had chosen, and he spread such splendour over his body, which was like
all other bodies, that “his face became as dazzling as the sun, his
clothes as radiant as light.” Without doubt, the aim of this
transfiguration was above all to remove the scandal of the cross from
the heart of his disciples, not to overwhelm their faith by the
humility of his voluntary passion……, but this revelation also gave
foundation in his Church to the hope that was to uphold it. All the
members of the Church, his Body, would thus understand what
transformation would be worked in them one day, since the members have
been promised that they will participate in the honour that shone forth
in the head. When speaking of the majesty of his coming, the Lord
himself had said: “Then the saints will shine like the sun in their
Father’s kingdom.” (Mt 13:43) And the apostle Paul in turn affirmed: “I
consider the sufferings of the present to be as nothing compared with
the glory to be revealed in us.” (Rom 8:18) …… It is also written: “You
have died! Your life is hidden now with Christ in God. When Christ our
life appears, then you shall appear with him in glory.” (Col 3:3-4)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Each and every creature, each and every
event of this life, without
exception, must be steps which take you to God, which move you to know
him and love him, to give him thanks, and to strive to make everyone
else know and love him.
(The Forge,
no.680)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday
of the second week of Lent
(March 13) Today let us think of St Euphrasia (Saints)
Scripture today:
Daniel
9:4-10; Psalm 79: 8, 9,
11 and 13;
Luke 6:36-38
“Jesus said to his disciples: ‘Be
compassionate as your Father is compassionate’.” (Luke 6:36)
One of the very intriguing and attractive characteristics of childhood
is its imitative character. That is to say, the child naturally
imitates his parents in so many ways, and others immediately around
him. Take the child’s accent, for example. If the parents have a
notably cultured Australian accent, often the child in his
earliest
years will pick up that very cultured accent, while perhaps losing it
when he
begins to mix with others at school or in other environments. Or if the
parents speak English with an accent characteristic of say,
the Filipino, that accent could persist in the child for many years
even
though the child may go to a local Australian school. And so it
is in so many other aspects of a child's early development. This
obvious imitative characteristic, incidentally, ought remind the
parents that it is very important that the child see in his parents and
those around him in the
family an example of a profoundly religious life. This will give the
child an excellent foundation in life, and to which he will be able to
return were he subsequently to wander from that religious upbringing.
Now our true parent, of course, is God our heavenly Father. He it is we
should be imitating in everything. Our Lord places the Father before us
for our
imitation, just as he himself imitates the Father: “He who sees me sees
the Father.” In our Gospel passage today our Lord places before us the
Father as our inspiration and model for all our dealings with our
neighbour.
“Jesus said to his disciples: ‘Be compassionate as your Father is
compassionate. Do not judge, and you will not be judged yourselves’.” (Luke 6:36-38) So then, our faith in God the Father,
Son and Holy Spirit ought have a direct effect on how we treat others.
Our model is to be the Father. For this reason we ought steep our daily
lives in the contemplation of the three divine Persons, living in their
presence, coming to know them well, and modelling our entire behaviour
on them. The closer we draw to the Father (in the Son and by the power
of the Holy Spirit) the more will our behaviour tend to be like that of
the Father - just as, we noticed above, a child tends to imitate
his parents.
One of the dangers of any religious life is to allow a separation
between religion and life. Our religion ought be intimately part
and parcel of every aspect of our lives, especially our attitude to and
treatment of our neighbour. Let us make this very much part of our
living of Lent.
(E.J.Tyler)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Be compassionate, as your Father is
compassionate.” (Luke 6:36)
Comment by St Isaac the Syrian (7th
century), Monk in Ninive, near Mosul in present-day Iraq
(Discourse,
1st series, no. 34)
I recommend this to you, Brother: may compassion always have the upper
hand on your scales until you feel in yourself the compassion which God
feels for the world. May this state become the mirror in which we see
in ourselves the true “image and likeness” of God’s nature and being
(Gen 1:26). It is by means of these and other similar things that we
receive the light and that a clear resolution makes us imitate God. A
heart that is hard and without pity will never be pure (Mt 5:8). But
the compassionate person is that soul’s doctor; as with a violent wind,
that person chases the darkness of trouble out of himself.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We are under an obligation to work, and to work conscientiously, with a
sense of responsibility, with love and perseverence, without any
shirking or frivolity. Because work is a command from God, and God is
to be obeyed, as the Psalmist says, joyfully!
(The Forge,
no.681)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday
of the second week of Lent
(March 14) Today let us think of St Leobinus and St Matilde (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah 1:
10.16-20; Psalm 50: 8-9,
16-17, 21 and 23;
Matthew 23: 1-12
“Anyone who exalts himself will be
humbled, and anyone who humbles himself will be exalted.”
(Matthew 23: 1-12)
Among
the most popular forms of television viewing are nature documentaries,
and in particular documentaries of wild life. One pattern we notice
across the
animal kingdom is the quest for dominance. Various apes want to
dominate, so do lions, tigers, camels and so on. Among household pets
the common dog wants to be the ‘top dog’. But this feature is not just
confined to animals. It is a feature of human history too. All through
history we see personalities imposing themselves on others and on their
peoples for
little reason other than to dominate. Such persons - generals, rulers,
economic leaders - have wished to exalt themselves, and this desire has
at various times reached the absurdity of rulers wishing even to be
regarded as gods. It is an absurdity, but it shows the tendency of
pride. Even from a human point of view pride can be seen to be harmful
to the individual and to society, and to tend to absurdities.
Our Lord in our gospel today points out those who were exalting
themselves. They included the scribes and the Pharisees: “Everything
they do is done to attract attention, like wearing broader phylacteries
and longer tassels, like wanting to take the place of honour at
banquets and the front seats in the synagogues, being greeted
obsequiously in the marked squares and having people call them Rabbi.”
This desire to be exalted is the tendency of fallen man, and it was the
temptation placed before Eve at the dawn of history, when the Tempter
said that if she ate of the fruit of the tree she would be like God. We
must recognise it in ourselves and embrace the opposite. The opposite
is the person of Christ who, as St Paul tells us, did not cling to his
equality with God but became as men are, and humbler still. In our
Gospel today our Lord tells us that “the greatest among you must be
your servant.” (Matthew 23:
1-12) Christ
humbled himself and was exalted. So too with the
one who strives to be like him: “Anyone who exalts himself will be
humbled, and anyone who humbles himself will be exalted.”
During Lent let us decide on concrete ways in which we will follow the
path of humility, the path of choosing to lower ourselves, rather than
exalting ourselves. If we do this with Christ, with him we shall be
exalted.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Whoever humbles himself shall be
exalted.” (Matthew 23: 1-12)
Comment by Saint [Padre] Pio de Pietrelcina
(1887-1968), Capuchin (T. 54)
Do not cease to do acts of humility and love towards God and human
beings. For God speaks to the person who keeps his heart humble before
him, and God enriches him with his gifts.
If God has the sufferings of his Son in store for you and wants to let
you touch with your finger your own weakness, it is better to make an
act of humility than to lose courage. Let a prayer of surrender and
hope rise up to God when your fragility causes you to fall, and thank
the Lord for all the graces with which he enriches you.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We have to conquer for Christ every noble human value.
(The Forge,
no.682)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday
of the second week of Lent
(March 15) Today let us think of St. Louise de Marcillac
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Jeremiah 18:
18-20; Psalm 31: 5-6,
14-16;
Matthew 20: 17-28
"'Can you drink the cup that I am
going to drink?' They replied, 'We can.' 'Very well,' he said."
(Matthew 20:
17-28)
I remember reading one
leading British anthropologist (Evans-Pritchard) whose speciality was
primal religions. In one of his articles reviewing theories about
primal religions he proposed that a key to the understanding,
assessment and comparison of such religions is the way they deal with
and
theorize about evil and suffering. Evans-Pritchard's point reminds us
that suffering is a pivotal issue in the
history of man. In the course of history and in his religious life man
has grappled with its explanation, its presence and with the means of
overcoming and avoiding it. Suffering seems to be such a negative
phenomenon, especially inasmuch as its ultimate term appears to be
death and destruction. On the face of it, it seems that suffering
simply must somehow he eliminated - and to the extent that it is, to
that extent is life successful.
But no. It has been revealed by God that while suffering and death
entered the
world because of man’s sin, its meaning has been transformed into being
the preeminent path to life. Christ has shown us the way to life, life
in abundance, life eternal, and that way is the way of suffering
accepted in a spirit of obedience to God. We ought pray for the grace
to look on suffering and death as Christ looked on it. In our Gospel
passage today (Matthew 20:
17-28) we
find our Lord taking the Twelve aside and with great deliberation
teaching them what would be his end. He was making his way to Jerusalem
to accomplish this divinely appointed goal, to suffer and to die, and
then to rise again. His two disciples (future pillars of the infant
Church) and their mother came to him to ask for places in his glory,
and our Lord made
it clear that the only path to a share in his glory would be to share
in his suffering.
Our Lord promised his two disciples that they would indeed drink his
cup of suffering - a beautiful promise! Let us pray for the grace to be
maturely eager to share in the Cross of
Christ so as to co-redeem the world with him. Our Lord tells us it is
the only way. To understand this we need light from the Holy Spirit and
then his grace to live according to is. This is the sure way to
sanctity.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“We are going up to Jerusalem now and
the Son of Man will be handed over.” (Matt. 20:
17-28)
Comment by St Augustine (354-430),
Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Commentary on Psalm 126)
“It is vain for you to rise early.” (Ps 127:2 –– LXX Ps 126:2) What
does that mean? …… Christ, our Day, has risen. It is good for you to
rise after Christ and not before him. Who are those who rise before
Christ? …… Those who want to be raised up here below, where he was
humble. So may they be humble in this world, if they want to be raised
up where Christ is raised up. For he said of those who adhered to him
by faith –– and we are among them: “Father, all those you gave me I
would have in my company where I am.” (Jn 17:24) A magnificent gift, a
great grace, a glorious promise…… Do you want to be where he is raised
up? Be humble where he was humble.
“No pupil outranks his teacher.” (Mt 10:24)…… And yet, before
undergoing humiliation in conformity with the Lord’s Passion, the sons
of Zebedee had already chosen their places, one at his right side, the
other at his left. They wanted to “rise early”. That is why they were
walking in vain. The Lord called them back to humility by asking them:
“Can you drink the chalice that I must drink? I came to be humble, and
you want to be raised up before me? Follow me on the path where I am
going, he said. For if you want to go by a path where I am not going,
it is in vain.”
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When a person really lives charity, there is no time left for
self-seeking. There is no room left for pride. We will not find
occasion for anything but service!
(The Forge,
no.683)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the second week of Lent
(March 16) Today let us think of St Finnian, St
Agapito (Saints)
Scripture today:
1 Jeremiah 17:
5-10; Psalm
1: 1-4 and 6;
Luke 16: 19-31
“The rich man also died and was
buried.” (Luke 16: 19-31)
In a recent feature article in the Sydney Morning Herald
(March 13, 2006, p.9) a columnist discussed what he called “the
world’s great cultural fault line.” He went on to quote Philip Jenkins
who writes in his book The
Next Christendom (2002) that “the critical political frontiers
around the world are not decided by attitudes towards class or
dialectical materialism, but by rival concepts of God.” Whatever about
the truth of that observation, it at least highlights the fundamental
significance of concepts of God not only for the individual but for
society and the world. The impact of various images and concepts of
God are far- reaching indeed. Pope Benedict in his very first
Encyclical
reaffirms at depth and with great lucidity the Christian concept of
God, a concept that is, of course, revealed. It is that God is love. It
has direct implications for our treatment of our neighbour and for all
those in need. Our treatment of them ought reflect God’s attitude: love.
In our Gospel passage today (Luke 16: 19-31) our Lord tells the parable of the rich
man and Lazarus the poor man. Let us notice that our Lord tells this to
the Pharisees. It is as if our Lord is directing this to the religious
leaders of the people, to those who were setting a benchmark of
religious life and zeal. Their concept and image of God was wrong. The
Pharisees' concept of God was not of a God of love and compassion for
those who were in need. Our
Lord goes on to portray the seriousness of neglecting those in
need, for it would seem that the rich man’s great sin was one of
omission, of neglect, rather than of actively harming the poor man. He
allowed the poor man outside his gate to continue in his misery when he
could easily have helped him. And how serious were the consequences!
“The rich man also died and was buried. In his place in Hades he looked
up and saw Abraham a long way off with Lazarus in his bosom." The
result of his neglect of Lazarus was that he was buried in Hades from
which there was to be no return and no relief. There was no
excuse for him because he knew, and “Moses and the prophets” had made
it clear, that
God wanted love and mercy extended to those in need.
Let us bear in mind and nourish constantly in our religious imagination
just who God is. He is love. Let this be the concept of God that we
bring to every aspect of our lives and to all society.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Happy the man who is gracious and
lends…who gives to the poor; his generosity shall endure forever.” (Ps
112) Comment by St Basil (330 – 379), Monk,
Bishop, Doctor of the Church (Homily 6 on wealth)
What will you answer the sovereign
judge, you who cover your walls and do not cover the one who resembles
you? You who decorate your horses and don’t even look at your brother
who is in distress? …… You who bury your gold and do not come to the
aid of the oppressed? ……
Tell me, what belongs to you? From
whom did you receive everything that you carry through this life? ……
Did you not come out of your mother’s womb naked? And won’t you also
return to the earth naked? (Job 1:21) From whom did you get your
present goods? If you answer: by chance, you are an ungodly person who
refuses to know his creator and to thank his benefactor. If you agree
that you got them from God, then tell me why you received them.
Is God unjust in sharing out
unequally the goods that are necessary for life? Why do you have an
abundance and that person there is destitute? Is it not solely so that
one day you might receive the reward for your kindness and your
disinterested management, while the poor person will attain the crown
promised to patience?... The bread that you are keeping belongs to the
person who is starving; the coat that you are concealing in your trunks
belongs to the person who is naked…… Thus, you are committing as many
injustices as there are people whom you could help.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Every activity - be it of great human importance or not - must become
for you a means to serve Our Lord and your fellow men. That is the true
measure of its importance.
(The Forge,
no.684)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday
of the second week of Lent
Scripture for Friday:
Genesis 37:
3-4.12-13.17-28; Psalm 105: 16-21;
Matthew 21: 33-43.45-46
(March 17) St Patrick, bishop (about
385-361) Born in Great Britain (or perhaps Scotland), as a youth he was
taken captive to Ireland as a slave and worked as a herdsman. After
making his escape he wished to become a priest and after being made
Bishop for Ireland he was untiring in preaching the Gospel and he
converted many to the Catholic Faith. In addition he organized the
Church throughout Ireland. It is believed that he died in 461, and was
buried at Downpatrick. He would have been a contemporary of Pope Leo
the Great. (Saints)
Scripture readings for St Patrick:
Jeremiah
1: 4-9; Acts 13: 46-49; Luke 10: 1-12,
17-20
Sin is a very great mystery. In
defending the doctrine of the immaculate
conception of Mary the Mother of God Cardinal Newman wrote that real
puzzle is the doctrine of Original Sin. How is it that sin has spread
through
the whole human race just because one man sinned, and with sin death
too has
spread through the whole human race? After all, mankind came from the
hand of an all-good God. But such is the fact, and really, it is not
hard to accept the
doctrine because there is so much evidence for it. But how this has
happened is a great mystery. Connected with this is the mystery how
powerful and deep sin is. Consider the treatment meted out to the Son
of God made man. The parable told by our Lord in the Gospel for this
Friday of the second week of Lent (Matthew 21:
33-43.45-46) describes
it figuratively. “So they seized him and threw him out of the vineyard
and killed him.” Sin led people to put God made man to death!
The answer to the universal
presence of sin is the announcement of the Gospel and the acceptance of
it by sinful man. Today we celebrate the feast of St Patrick. Our
Gospel for this feast presents us with Peter
acknowledging his own sinfulness (Luke 10: 1-12,
17-20) and in doing this he represents man
with a
sense of sin. Christ is the answer to his sinful predicament. He is the
answer
to Peter’s need and he is the answer to the need of humanity, for
Christ immediately calls Peter to follow him and to become a fisher of
men. Peter and his companions heard the call of Christ and followed
him, and
thus began the Church’s mission of bringing the forgiveness of sins and
salvation to mankind. Patrick was an outstanding successor of the
Apostles in bringing Christ and salvation from sin to Ireland. The
thought of Patrick ought inspire each of us to follow Christ generously
and to do what we can in our everyday life to bring him to others.
The power and the scale of sin is
indeed a mystery and its solution is far beyond the resources of mere
man. Christ has come as the solution, and it is up to us to accept him
and to bring him to others. It is the greatest service we could render
to our fellow man.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Work always and in everything with
sacrifice in order to put Christ at the summit of all human activities.
(The Forge,
no.685)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the second week of Lent
(March 18) St Cyril of
Jerusalem, bishop and doctor of the Church (315-386). He is
mainly known for his Catecheses. His instructions, which are still
extant, show conclusively that Catholic doctrine is the same then as
now. Arian heretics exiled him three times. (Saints)
Scripture today: Micah 7:
14-15.18-20; Psalm 103: 1-4,
9-12;
Luke 15: 1-3.11-32
"He ran to the boy, clasped him in
his arms and kissed him tenderly." (Luke 15:
1-3.11-32)
There is a famous and classic definition of man: it defines man as a
rational animal. Of course, man can be distinguished from the rest of
the animal kingdom by setting forth his rationality. But we could also
broadly distinguish man from the rest of the animal kingdom by
highlighting his religious life. Man could be defined (broadly)
as a religious animal. If we view societies in general and in the
context of human history, man is distinguished by his religious life. A
notable exception to this is the modern Western age which is marked by
its secularism. Be that as it may, as we look on the panorama of human
history and see the immense variety of religious life, we can surely
say it represents the yearning of man to be embraced by God. Man
desires to know God and be known by him, and the revelation that God is
actually a loving Father is surely the fulfilment of man’s religious
strivings. The task, of course, is to bring this revelation
convincingly to the world.
Now, in respect to the desire of man to be embraced by God, what does
Christ our Lord have to say about God’s readiness to embrace us? Let us
look at our Lord’s teaching in today’s Gospel. The context is given at
the beginning in which the Pharisees and the scribes complained of our
Lord welcoming sinners and dining with them. To explain his activity
before his critics our Lord proceeds to tell the story of the loving
and indulgent father and the prodigal son (Luke 15:
1-3.11-32).
Who did the indulgent father embrace? He embraced the son who had
squandered all his father’s gifts to him, and now he was back admitting
his sin and asking acceptance in his father’s household as a mere
employee. What it means is that the way to attain the embrace of God is
through humbly acknowledging one's sin and asking for mercy. That is
the person whom God embraces, and who is the successful seeker after
God. The holy man is the humble and contrite man who with the help of
the God who embraces him puts away his sins and lives a life of
obedience.
Let us pray for the grace to know our true fallen condition, our sinful
state. Let us pray for the grace to approach Christ with confidence in
his love and with the intention to plead for mercy. He will embrace us
as did the indulgent father his prodigal son.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Correspondence to grace is to be found also in the ordinary little
things of each day, which seem unimportant and yet have the over-riding
importance of Love.
(The Forge,
no.686)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Third Sunday of Lent
B
(March 19) Today the Church would normally celebrate St. Joseph
but because it is a Sunday today, the feast of St Joseph will be
celebrated tomorrow.
(Saints)
Exodus 20:1-17 or Exodus 20:1-3,
7-8, 12-17; Psalm
19:8-11; 1 Corinthians 1:22-25; John 2:13-25
“Destroy this sanctuary and in three
days I will raise it up.” (John 2:13-25)
One of our most constant spiritual challenges is to bear
in mind the unseen realities of our Faith. It is a challenge of faith
because those realities are unseen. Above all, I am
referring to the very presence of God. In our Gospel today our Lord
comes to the Temple as he had every year since his youth. Doubtless he
had seen the same spectacle year after year, and now he sees it again.
In the Temple of his heavenly Father there were sheep and cattle,
buying and selling, talk and shouting. God’s presence had been
forgotten, that divine presence which filled the mind, the heart and
the soul of Jesus his divine Son. So, as St John writes, with zeal for
his Father’s house consuming him he drove them all out saying that his
Father’s house must be treated as a house of prayer and not a den of
thieves.
Then, when confronted by the leaders of the people over what
he had just done, our Lord said, “Destroy this sanctuary, and in
three days I will raise it up.” (John 2:13-25) He was speaking of the sanctuary that
was his body, and when he rose from the dead his disciples remembered
that he had said this. The true sanctuary of the living God was the
person of Jesus, his body and soul, his humanity and his divinity. The
Temple there was for prayers and sacrifices to God who was present
there, and it was precisely because God was there and because the
Temple was the place to offer him sacrifice and prayer, that Christ had
just cleansed the Temple. Well, our Lord was here saying that he was
the one, he is the one, who offers up to God the Father a continual
perfect sacrifice and a constant prayer. He is the new Temple of God
and by being baptized into him the Christian lives in him. We are in
Jesus, and he is in us. This is to be our life, a life in Jesus. Being
in Jesus, he is our Temple in whom we offer continual prayer and
sacrifice to the Father.
His greatest self-offering, his greatest sacrifice
offered on our behalf, and therefore which he offered as the high
priest of all mankind, was the sacrifice of himself at Calvary. This he
did by the power of the Holy Spirit, as we are told in the Letter to
the Hebrews. Christ was our Priest, and our Victim. His body was the
Temple in which this sacrifice was offered, and it was the Holy Spirit
who was the life and energy of his self-offering. Now, all this is made
present to us at Mass. The offering, the gift of himself, the victim
and the high priest, are made present at Mass, and this is done once
again by the power of the Holy Spirit, and it is by the power and grace
of the Holy Spirit at Mass that we are drawn into that sacrifice and
are able to make it our own.
But we must make sure that we are not like the buyers and the
sellers whom our Lord cast out of the Temple. Our entire attitude to
the person of Jesus and to his sacrifice on Calvary ought be one full
of faith and appreciation. We must not have a casual attitude to Jesus
and to what he did for us. Very importantly, we must not in any way be
like the buyers and the sellers during Mass, forgetting what is really
happening because we can’t actually see Calvary. We must be full of
reverence during Mass, endeavouring to participate in it with all our
heart and mind and soul. We ought leave the church after Mass
profoundly united to our Lord in his offering of himself to the Father.
He is the true Temple of God in which the perfect sacrifice is offered
to the Father.
There is more than even this to the mystery of Christ.
Christ is the head of his body the Church. The Church of which we are
all members is the mystical body of Christ. Just as our Lord in the
Gospel speaks of his body as the coming Temple of God where God dwells
in all his fulness, so too is the Church the Temple of God. God dwells
in all his fulness in the midst of the Church and in her life. This
happens by the power of the Holy Spirit whom St Augustine called the
soul of the Church. Christ is the head of the Church and we can call
the Holy Spirit her soul.
So then, as members of the Church we are all called to be
a holy priesthood, offering up the spiritual sacrifice of a holy life,
a life of obedience to the Father. Just as our Lord insisted on a
profound reverence for the Temple of his Father, so we should maintain
a profound reverence for the person of Jesus the new Temple, for his
sacrifice at Calvary on our behalf, for the Mass which makes present
Christ offering this sacrifice of himself, and for the Church which
lives in union with Christ her head, the constant universal Temple of
God here on earth. Our attitude to the Church and to her teaching, her
life, her sacraments, her divine character, ought be one of profound
reverence, a reverence rooted in the recognition of the presence of God
in her midst.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further Reading: The Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no.583-586, 797-798.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You cannot forget that any worthy, noble and honest work at the human
level can - and should! - be raised to the supernatural level,
becoming a divine task.
(The Forge,
no.687)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Feast of St Joseph the husband of Mary
(March 20) St Joseph is
considered as the second greatest saint, next to the blessed Virgin
Mary, because of his humility and his closeness to Jesus as the foster
father of our Lod. Scripture tells us that Joseph was just, pure,
gentle, prudent and unfailingly obedient to the divine will. He died in
the presence of Jesus and Mary. We wish to imitate him by renewing our
desire to be faithful. We know that the only meaning of our life is to
tbe faithful to the Lord till the last as Joseph was. Pope Pius IX
named him as Patron of the Universal Church and Pope John XXIII
included his name in the Roman Canon. Each year his feast is
celebrated on March 19, but this year it is celebrated today
because
yesterday
was a Sunday.
Today let us also
think of
St Cuthbert (Saints)
Samuel
7:4-5.12-14.16; Psalm 89; Romans 4:13.16-18.22; Matthew 1:16.18-21.24 or Luke 2: 41-51
"Jacob was the father of Joseph the
husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born". (Matthew 1:16)
Had the husband of Mary not been mentioned in the Gospels in the way he
is - which is to say, had he not received the unique though hidden
vocation that was his - he would have come and gone utterly unknown to
history. His life was passed in obscurity as an ordinary (though
undoubtedly very good) artisan in a tiny village that had a poor
reputation anyway. That his village had a poor reputation we know from
the remark of Nathanael when he was told of Jesus. Joseph was married
to Mary and was a carpenter-builder in the town of Nazareth. Their
family included one child, Jesus. There was nothing notable about the
kind of thing Joseph spent his life doing, except that (unknown to his
townspeople) he did them very well and with an extraordinary love for
God. He lived an ordinary life, but lived with immense holiness and an
unparalled intimacy with Jesus the Son of God and with Mary the Mother
of God. He is
the shining instance in history of the grandeur of the ordinary life.
St Josemaria Escriva used to refer to the donkey at the wheel. All day
every day the donkey went round and round pulling and the water supply
of he
entire village kept coming as a result. The whole village depended on
that donkey and its humdrum activity.
We learn from the life of Joseph the possibilities of the common lot of
what we might call Everyman. You and I and most of us is an Everyman.
Our daily round is usually fairly repetitive, and when one looks at the
detail in our everyday life that detail seems to be very unimportant.
The temptation is to think that a life filled with seemingly
unimportant detail is an unimportant life, a life that is “commonplace”
and therefore insignificant. But the life of Joseph the husband of Mary
shows us that this is not so. There is no need to be aspiring for and
dreaming of a life that is on a par with that of the widely known
person, or the person possessing power or wealth. Such people gain fame
and their daily round is spoken of, and is therefore considered
significant. It may be significant, but so is the life of the one who
is unknown and regarded as of little importance by society. The point
is, that whatever be the set of circumstances the providence of God
places us in, however “ordinary” it seems, it can be transformed into
something grand in the sight of God. It will be a life of grandeur if
it is characterised by a loving commitment to one’s daily duty and
work, a commitment lived out by a careful attention to the detail in
one’s God-given responsibilities. Joseph is the model for Everyman.
Let us today cultivate a devotion to
St Joseph the husband of Mary. “Go to Joseph” was the advice of one
saint. Let us ask our Lord and our
Lady for a share in their love for Joseph. He is the protector of the
universal Church, and therefore our protector too.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As Jesus, who is our Lord and Model, grows in and lives as one of us,
he reveals to us that human life - your life - and its humdrum,
ordinary business, have a meaning which is divine, which belongs to
eternity.
(The Forge,
no.688)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday
of the third week of Lent
(March 21) Today let us think
of St Euda (Saints)
Scripture today:
Daniel
3:25.34-43;
Psalm 25: 4-9;
Matthew 18: 21-35
“And that is how my heavenly Father
will deal with you unless you each
forgive your brother from your heart.” (Matthew 18:
21-35)
One of the deepest problems of man is
spiritual blindness. That is to
say, he so very often is oblivious as to his real spiritual condition,
and its seriousness. Of course, this state is not confined to the
spiritual life - he can likewise be oblivious as to his real physical
condition. Life will bring its hurts and sorrows, many of them
inflicted by other human beings including those very close to us. As a
person looks back on the years he can very easily find himself nursing
unresolved painful memories that leave him in continual bitterness. He
finds, perhaps, that he cannot forgive. Now, it is one thing to admit
helplessness before the prospect of forgiving certain peple, it is
another to think that the refusal to forgive is justified. In the case
of all too many persons they are utterly convinced they are perfectly
justified in not forgiving. Vengance must be exacted if justice is to
be found. This is their attitude. If we look on things with the mind of
Christ we shall realize that this attitude involves a great spiritual
blindness. Our Lord is
absolutely insistent that whatever be the injury, we must forgive from
the heart.
That is not to say that for the sake of justice, good order
and the vindication of morality, crime ought not be punished and that
injuries not be compensated. But
the spiritual problem is that all too often we who
belong to Christ repeatedly
and even throughout life refuse to forgive, and that we regard this as
being justified, especially if there is no punishment or compensation
forthcoming. Our Lord assures us that if we refuse to forgive from the
heart, God will refuse to forgive us. Our parable in today’s Gospel
(Matthew 18:
21-35) provides us with an aspect of this
situation which could help us to
forgive. It is the thought of all that we owe to God and all our
transgressions against him which he so readily has forgiven. The
servant left the master’s presence after having been forgiven such a
vast
debt, and proceeded to be unyielding with another servant who owed him
a significant enough debt, but one which could not be compared with the
debt he had owed to his master. Nothing that others owe to us can
compare with what we owe to God. Nothing which we are called upon to
forgive in others can compare with what God has forgiven in us.
Let us
pray for the grace to see clearly the necessity to forgive from the
heart, and to see that nothing could compare with what God in his
goodness has forgiven of us. Let us resolve at the end of every day to
forgive all injuries. In this way by the grace of God and our own
spiritual efforts we can be freed from the resentments and rancour
which will prevent our attainment of holiness.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You should be full of wonder at the
goodness of our Father God. Are you
not filled with joy to knhow that your home, your family, your country,
which you love so much, are the raw material which you must sanctify?
(The Forge, no.689)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday
of the third week of Lent
(March 22) Today let us
think of St Nicholas Owen
and St Lea (Saints)
Scripture today:
Deuteronomy
4:1.5-9; Psalm 147: 12-13,
15-16, 19-20;
Matthew 5: 17-19
“The man who infringes even one of the
least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be
considered the least in the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5: 17-19)
A very frequent temptation in living the Christian life is the
temptation to rationalize away one’s duty. That is to say, we are often
tempted to think of reasons for doing what we want and calling it our
duty, or considering it perfectly justified, and thus allowing our real
duty to fade from our conscience. Many examples could be thought of.
The Church lays down the observance of Sunday as a necessary part of
our Christian life. We are obliged to make it the Lord’s Day by
participating in Mass and avoiding servile work unless it is necessary.
Yes, we get to Mass on a Sunday, but do we make it the Day of religious
rest the Church means it to be, and avoid unnecessary servile work? Or,
on the contrary,
do we take whatever employment we can get on a Sunday to get the extra
cash, saying to ourselves that it is "necessary" that we have the
money.
Many other examples could be given of avoiding our duty to observe
God’s commandments, and rationalizing the non-observance of that duty
by having recourse to what is really a pretext in
order to get what we want.
Cardinal Newman once wrote that religion is essentially a matter of
authority and obedience. That is to say, its bedrock element is obeying
the will of God and thus recognising his divine authority. Our Lord
made the same point about the Christian life of
personal love for him when he said that he who loves me keeps my
commandments. In our Gospel today (Matthew 5:
17-19) our
Lord insists on it. He himself came to fulfil and complete God’s Law as
revealed in
the Old Testament, and he tells us in our passage that “the man who
infringes even one of these commandments and teaches others to do the
same will be considered the least in the kingdom of heaven.” So then,
we ought be very careful indeed when it comes to keeping the law of
God, which is interpreted and explained to us by the Church. As Pope
Benedict has said, the Church is the face of Christ, and so in obeying
the precepts and spiritual and moral guidance of the Church we are
obeying Christ. If we wish to love God, we must make it our business to
know God's commandments, and put them assiduously in to practice.
Let us resolve to centre our life on the will and the law of God and
its fulfilment in all its detail.
The bedrock of our life ought be learning what is our duty as expressed
in the law of God and the Church, and then carefully putting it into
practice out of love for him.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My daughter, you have set up a home. I like to remind you that you
women - as you well know - have a great strength, which you know how to
enfold within a special gentleness, so that it is not noticed. With
that strength, you can make your husband and children instruments of
God, or demons. You will always make them instruments of God: he is
counting on your help.
(The Forge,
no.690)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the third week of Lent
(March 23) Saint Turibio of
Mongrovejo, bishop (1538-1606). Born in Leon, Spain. He studied
law in Salamanca and in 1580 was chosen to be Bishop of Lima and went
to South America. He was on fire with apostolic zeal and called
together synods and councils for the purpose of reforming religion in
the whole country. He strenuously defended the rights of the Church and
looked after the flock committed to his care by going among them on
visitation, as well as spending much time and labour for the good of
the native Indian population. St Rose of Lima, St Francis Solano and St
Martin de Porres were his contemporaries in Lima. (Saints)
Scripture today: Jeremiah 7:
23-28; Psalm 95: 1-2, 6-9;
Luke 11:
14-23
“Jesus was casting out a devil and it
was dumb”. (Luke 11:14-23)
Many people have viewed the movie “The Exorcism of Emily Rose”. One of
the surprising twists of the movie comes near the end when the Virgin
Mary makes herself known to Emily and asks her if she would like to be
taken from her burdensome life to heaven, or instead if she would
accept the work of enduring the possession of the devils. The purpose
of continuing to endure this is to bear witness in an agnostic and
materialistic culture to the reality of Satan and the supernatural, and
in this way to be instrumental in prompting people to turn to God. Her
possession is being allowed by God for the spiritual enlightenment of
others, and in the process for the sanctification of Emily herself.
Emily chooses to stay to the end. For this reason the priest declares
in court his belief that some day she will be canonized. The movie is a
story with a remote basis in fact (in Barvaria in the 1970s). Many
elements are plausible and it certainly conveys well (though in
exaggerated fashion) the reality of Satan, the spiritual effectiveness
of the Church in her combat with Satan, and the overarching purposes of
God in saving the world.
In our Gospel today (Luke 11:14-23) our Lord effortlessly casts out a devil
and is then accused of colluding with Satan. Our Lord’s reply makes
reference to the kingdom and the household of Satan. Throughout the
Gospels our Lord refers to the kingdom of God, and St Paul refers to
the household of the Church. So there are two kingdoms revealed to us,
two households. St Ignatius Loyola in his Spiritual Exercises
has a famous meditation on The Two Standards. There is the Standard of
Christ with Christ’s weapons, and the Standard of Satan with his. We
must make a choice under which standard we are going to get to work in
life. Let us today make that choice, a clear choice for Christ with a
commitment to fight the kingdom of Satan with Christ’s weapons and in
Christ's company. The fundamental weapon is that of obedience to the
Father in union with Christ, and then following the way of Christ, the
way of humility, poverty in spirit, bearing willingly our daily cross.
These are the weapons that bring the victory.
Taking our stand with Christ and living by that stand will enable us to
conquer. We have Christ’s word for it in our Gospel today: “He who is
not with me is against me; and he who does not gather with me scatters.”
(E.J.Tyler)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am moved that the Apostle should call Christian marriage a great
sacrament. From this, too, I deduce the enormous importance of the task
of parents. You share in the creative power of God: that is why human
love is holy, good and noble. It is a gladness of heart which God - in
his loving providence - wants others freely to give up. Each child that
God grants you is a wonderful blessing from him: don’t be afraid of
children!
(The Forge,
no.691)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday
of the third week of Lent
(March 24) Today let us think
of St. Catherine of Sweden
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Hosea
14:2-10; Psalm 81: 6-11,
14 and 17;
Mark 12: 28-34
“I will fall like dew on Israel. He
shall bloom like the lily and thrust out roots” (Hosea 14:2-10)
I once read a study of the Blessed Virgin Mary which saw in the
prophets of the Old Testament the main nourishment of her spirituality.
She was nurtured especially on them. In our first reading today we have
a beautiful passage from the prophet Hosea (Hosea 14:2-10) in which the stereotype of the God of the
Old Testament disappears. That stereotype speaks of a God of anger and
punishment, in contrast to the God of the New Testament who is one of
mercy and love. But how different the reality is! The God of the Old
Testament is the same as that of the New, one who is holy, who hates
sin, but who is love and compassion and who yearns for the return of
the sinner to his love. In our first reading today the Lord appeals to his people to return,
telling them that “your iniquity was the cause of your downfall.” He is
the “one in whom orphans find compassion”. Love and tenderness is
expressed in image after image in our passage, and the only thing that
can prevent this from flowing into the life of the people is sin.
What can help us learn that God is love is to dwell over and over on
these prophetic texts. It is a very plausible proposition that the
Blessed Virgin Mary learnt the love of Yahweh very much from dwelling
and pondering on the prophetic texts such as this one today from
Hosea. “I am like a cypress ever green, all your fruitfulness
comes from me. Let the wise man understand these words”, the prophet
tells us. It is in texts such as these that we learn that God loves us
with all his heart. If we come to know the love of God that has been
revealed in the face of Christ, this will be the basis of our
observance of the first commandment that our Lord speaks of in today’s
Gospel (Mark 12: 28-34), quoting as he does from the Old
Testament. “Listen, Israel, the Lord our God is the one Lord, and you
must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul,
with all your mind and with all your strength.”
Let us resolve to set out on the path of love, knowing that God loves
us with all his heart, and resolving to return that love with all our
heart. This twofold and interconnected objective - to know the love of
God and to return it - is the goal of life. Let us pray for the grace
to know the God of Revelation, and to respond as he asks.
(E.J.Tyler)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In conversations I have had with so many married couples, I tell them
often that while both they and their children are alive, they should
help them to be saints, while being well aware that none of us will be
a saint on earth. All we will do is struggle, struggle, struggle. And I
also tell them: you Christian mothers and fathers are a great spiritual
motor, sending the strength of God to your own ones, strength for that
struggle, strength to win, strength to be saints. Don’t let them down!
(The Forge,
no.692)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Annunciation of
the Lord
(March 25) The Annunciation was
the moment when Gabriel the Archangel communicated to Mary that in
God’s plan she was to be the Mother of the Son of God. He came to ask
her consent. Mary gave her “Fiat” (be it done) by which she conceived
the Saviour by the Working of the Holy Spirit. In the dialogue between
her and the angel she appears so great and yet so humble. Through her
consent she participated in the redemptive work of her Son,
Jesus. (Saints)
Scripture:
Isaiah 7:10-14;
8:10; Psalm 40: 7-11;
Hebrews
10:4-10; Luke 1:26-38
“And
he came to her and said, ‘Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you!’”
(Luke 1:
26-38)
The Gospel scene we place ourselves
in today is one of the most simple and obscure, and yet one of the most
momentous in the entire sweep of Scripture. It marks the culmination of
the hope of Israel for the coming Messiah: it relates his coming. With
the consent of the Virgin and the departure of the angel, the Messiah
has arrived. Many aspects of this event we could dwell on at length,
but let us take our note from those words of the archangel to the
Virgin which describe her.
He addresses her as “full of grace”, telling her that “the Lord is with
you!” (Luke 1: 26-38) Mary
is filled with the life of God and the implication is that she is
without sin. What a marvel! Here we have a mortal like ourselves
who by the grace of God is without sin. The Lord is with her.
Contemplating this spectre of holiness in such an ordinary and obscure
setting, our thoughts turn to the angel who is himself holy, filled too
with grace. He, though, speaks to Mary as to one who is much greater
than he in grace. So in that room we find ourselves in the presence of
holiness.
Let us now listen to the words of
the
angel which speak of the Messiah. “The Holy Spirit
will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you;
therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.”
The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are acting upon and within the
Virgin and so the room is filled with the holiness of God. The fruit of
the divine action and the humble consent of Mary most holy is the holy
child: “the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.”
Holiness is
enveloping the locale of this interchange and the result will be that
the gift of holiness will be brought to a sinful and broken world. The
annunciation marks the entry into a fallen world of the all-holy God in
order that the world and each of us who live in it might share in his
life, just as holy Mary shared in it to such utter perfection. Let us
then on this feast day hear in our hearts the call to live a holy life
by living in Jesus together with the Virgin who is our Mother and his
Mother. Our feast is a feast of holiness.
“Be holy, for I am holy!” Yahweh
says in the Old Testament. The annunciation marks the grand entry of
our saviour God to make this possible for us all. Let us give thanks
and praise.
(E.J.Tyler)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Don’t be afraid of loving others,
for His sake: and don’t worry about loving your own people even more,
provided that no matter how much you love them, you love Him a million
times more.
(The Forge,
no.693)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Fourth Sunday of Lent B
(March 26) Today let us think of St. Margaret Clitherow
(Saints)
Scripture:
2 Chronicles
36:14-16.19-23; Psalm 137: 1-6;
Ephesians 2:4-10;
John 3:14-21
“Yes, God loved the world so much that
he gave his only Son”. (John 3: 14-21)
I remember hearing of a couple who went on a picnic
with their small child at a riverside. For a brief moment the parents
had to leave the child to attend to something and out came a crocodile
which made straight for the child. The family dog immediately attacked
the crocodile in defence of the child, and the dog was taken instead.
The child was left unharmed. The dog was acting simply on
instinct, and while not being love that instinct to protect reflected
love, indeed it reflected
the love of God who gave the dog its being. I remember seeing a nature
documentary film of a cat with its baby kittens. Out came a snake from
the bushes and began making for the kittens. At danger to itself the
cat defended its kittens from the snake, attacking the snake and
dodging its lunges. At length the snake made off. The cat was acting
purely on
instinct, but that instinct to protect was a reflection of love, the
love that is
God the Creator.
Knowing that God is love (because he has revealed
this to be so), we can see many reflections of God in the world.
Everywhere in the realm of living things, one living thing lives on
another. Small fish are devoured by larger fish. Plants are devoured by
various animals. One animal preys on another, and man lives by
harvesting living plants, and by consuming the animals he kills. That
is to say, one thing is given up for the sake of another, one living
thing loses its life that another might gain, one thing is sacrificed
that another may have life. While one person observing this sees only
unnecessary savagery and anything but the imprint of a loving God, the
other person who knows love is the foundation of the universe sees in
it a glimmer of that unseen foundation. While within the non-human
realm the overtaking of one thing by and for the sake of another is
just a matter of unthinking instinct, inasmuch as it comes from the
hand of God, it speaks of God. The key will be to search for the
imprint of the Creator’s love. This pattern of being given up for the
sake of another is surely a reflection of sacrificial love, the love
that is behind the universe, the love of God the Creator. This is not
to speak of the the love that is very evident in mankind, a love that
is so often sacrificial. Far more does this reflects the love of God.
But while the world shows the imprint of God, what really
reveals the
love of God is the person and the redemptive work of Jesus our Lord. In
our Gospel today
(John 3:
14-21) our
Lord tells Nicodemus that “God loved the world so much that he gave his
only Son so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may
have eternal life.” Imagine the sacrifice this was to the Father! The
Father and the Son had given themselves to one another in the Holy
Spirit for all eternity in a communion of love utterly beyond our
imagining. But the Father loved us so much that he sent his Son to save
us from our sins. The Son for his part did not cling to his heavenly
state but gave it up to assume the lowly condition of man, and as man
became lowlier still out of love for us, by dying on a cross. It was
God’s sacrifice for our redemption. All our life we ought be
contemplating what our Lord and the Father did for each of us through
the power of the Holy Spirit. Christ died not for himself, but for each
of us. In some mysterious way he united himself to every man and woman
in history, and assumed the burden of their disobedience to God and
made up for it by his obedience in the midst of unimaginable
sufferings. It was done out of love. By his death on the Cross our Lord
atoned for the sins of all mankind, and in doing this broke the power
of sin that holds all of us in its power, and opened up for each of us
the prospect of holiness.
God’s loving redemption of man from sin is a
specifically Christian doctrine. Islam, for instance, has no doctrine
of original sin into which we are born, and from which we need to be
redeemed. It certainly does not look on Christ as our redeemer, let
alone as God made man. Christ is simply an inspired teacher like, but
less than, Mahomet. It is very important that we see the beauty and
necessity of Christ and the Christian religion, revealed by God and
necessary for man. What is at stake is redemption from sin and personal
sanctification. Every man and woman needs the person of Christ,
absolutely needs him because only Christ has brought about our
redemption. Only Christ can make us holy. Christ has died for each, for
each person in the world, including every follower of Mahomet, every
Hindu, every agnostic, every atheist. We ourselves must embrace the
person and
the work of Christ ourselves, and bring this good news of God’s love in
Christ to every person, and invite that person to know, love and follow
Jesus who is the embodiment and the revelation of the love of God.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further Reading: The Catechism of the
Catholic Church No.595-605
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Jesus began to do and then to preach. You and I have to bear witness
with our example, because we cannot live a double life. We cannot
preach what we do not practise. In other words, we have to teach what
we are at least struggling to put into practice.
(The Forge,
no.694)
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Monday
of the fourth week of Lent
(March 27)
Today let us think of St.
Rupert of Salzburg (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah
65:17-21; Psalm 30: 2 and
4, 5-6, 11-13;
John 4:43-54
“Jesus said, ‘So you will not believe
unless you see signs and portents!’” (John 4: 43-54)
Once again we have in today’s Gospel scene a point of the most
fundamental importance and which recurs time and again across the pages
of the Gospel. Our Lord asks for faith in his person. If one has
faith in his person and in his word, there seems to be little that
Christ will refuse him. Upon reentering Cana in Galilee a court
official went and asked our Lord to come and cure his son who was at
the point of death. What was our Lord’s reaction? He responded with a
challenge, a question: “So you will not believe unless you see signs
and portents!” (John 4: 43-54) The man had come for a miracle, but our
Lord wanted a faith that was not dependent on miracles. In the Gospel
of St John from which this passage is drawn, our Lord’s miracles were
“signs” of who he really was and what he came to do, rather than
“proofs” for the sceptical enquirer (such as those who asked for “a
sign” to test him). They required, therefore, a positive disposition of
the will, an openness to the person of Jesus and a readiness to believe
him because of what the signs revealed of him.
Our faith in Jesus involves above all a coming to know him as a real
and living person through sustained and prayerful contemplation of him,
especially as revealed in the Gospels and the Scriptures. It requires a
continued focus on his very person, of which his miracles are signs. We
remember how in this very Gospel St John relates how the two disciples
of John stayed with Jesus the rest of that day, and came back knowing
he was the Messiah. They came to know him. The more we come to
know him as a person through prayer and spiritual reading, supported by
a good life, the more we shall have the dispositions necessary for the
full and heartfelt acceptance of the Church’s testimony about him.
Faith in Jesus is not primarily dependent on his “mighty works” (as
they are referred to in the Acts of the Apostles) but on knowing Jesus
more and more deeply as a person. The miracles then will be seen as
“signs” of who he really is, and will support what one has come to know
of him rather than prove it to the one who is sceptical about him. A
faith springing from knowledge of his person is what will survive
whatever comes during life, including suffering and the lack of "signs
and portents".
Our Lord’s great desire as evidenced in our passage today is that we
have faith in him, a full faith that, yes, leads us to ask him to hear
our prayers, but especially a faith that is focussed on his person.
(E.J.Tyler)
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Christian: you have the obligation of being an example in everything
you do: including being an example as a citizen, in your fulfilment of
the laws directed to the common good.
(The Forge,
no.695)
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Tuesday
of the fourth week of Lent
(March 28) Today
let us think of St.
Guntramnus (Saints)
Scripture today:
Ezechiel
47:1-9.12; Psalm 46: 2-3,
5-6, 8-9;
John 5:1-16
“Jesus.... said ‘do you want to be
well again?’ ‘Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool’.”
(John 5:1-16)
Our Gospel
text tells us that the sick man’s illness had lasted for thirty eight
years, which is to say since before our Lord was born, and that Jesus
“knew he had been in this condition for a long time”. Perhaps our Lord
had seen him during many of his annual journeys to Jerusalem to visit
the Temple since his youth. Perhaps on seeing him our Lord saw all of
sick humanity, not only physically sick but morally and spiritually
sick as well.
Mankind "had been in this condition for a long time". The sick man said
in
reply to our Lord’s question, “I have no one to put me into the pool” (John 5:1-16), and
in this he
spoke for all mankind: man is of himself
helpless, quite unable to deliver himself from his fallen
condition. There is much in our scene today that is symbolic and
full of evocative signals. There stands the Redeemer, and before him
lies the sick man, lying prostrate where he has been for a long time.
The Redeemer of man has arrived to bring new life to fallen mankind
through the water of life. The water of life flows from the Temple, as
we read in our first reading (Ezechiel
47:1-9.12), and the new Temple is Christ, as our
Lord explained earlier in the Gospel of St John.
But there is more to it than this. Our Lord asks a most illuminating
question. He asks, “Do you want to be well again?” (John 5:1-16) Perhaps, just perhaps, the sick man was
more or less content to remain in his condition or at least had long
become somewhat used to it and scarcely yearned any more for a change.
At least our Lord was challenging him to desire something more because
our Lord would not have wanted to impose his healing. That question is
one our Lord
directs to each one of us because we too are helpless in our sins if we
do not rely on his help and grace. Our Lord plans our full spiritual
restoration, a profound sanctification - but he will not impose it. We
must want it and ask for what God wants for us, which is to say the
water of divine life coming to us from the gift of the Holy Spirit who
has been poured into our hearts (like life-giving water). The
sick man had to go to the pool of water. The pool is now within us. As
our Lord says elsewhere in this same Gospel of St John, it is a pool
within us welling up to eternal life. That pool is the Holy Spirit whom
Christ has given to us through the ministry and the sacraments of the
Church.
Let us ask our Lord to give us a profound desire to be sanctified and
to cooperate with his action. Let us see ourselves in that sick man,
with Christ before us. He asks, “Do you want to be well?” Let us say a
firm yes, asking him to enable us to partake deeply of the life-giving
water of the Holy Spirit who flows from the new Temple, Christ. As St
Paul would write, “This is the will of
God, your sanctification.”
(E.J.Tyler)
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You are very demanding. You want everyone else, including those who
work in the public service, to carry out their obligations. “It is
their duty!” you say. Have you then ever thought about whether you
respect your own timetable, whether you carry it out conscientiously?
(The Forge,
no.696)
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Wednesday
of the fourth week of Lent
(March 29) Today let us think of St. Joseph of
Arimathea (Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah
49:8-15; Psalm
145: 8-9, 13-14, 17-18;
John 5:17-30
“He spoke of God as his own Father,
and so made himself God’s equal.” (John 5: 17-30)
There are various instances in history, especially in classical times,
of rulers seeking and claiming divine honours. Alexander the
Great expected this at least towards the end of his short career, and
various of the Roman
emperors expected this recognition from their subjects. But of course
they
were pagans and lived in a belief system that included numerous gods. A
god was a very limited being with some natural and supernatural
influence. But the God of Israel had no rival. He was one and unique
and the sole creator of all. All things looked to him for their being
and their life. He alone was to be worshipped. Now, consider how Christ
spoke of the one God. He spoke of him as his very own father, in a
sense that gave the impression that no one else had the same
relationship. No other holy figure or prophet of the Old
Testament spoke of his relationship with the living God in the way
Jesus did. The leaders of the Jews (“the Jews”) saw the point clearly.
St John tells us (John 5: 17-30) that they were “even more intent on
killing him,
because, not content with breaking the Sabbath, he spoke of God as his
own Father, and so made himself God’s equal.”
Jesus Christ "made himself God's equal." As we read these words in St
John’s Gospel expressing not only our
Lord’s revelation of himself but also the unmistakable impression
conveyed even to his enemies, let us contemplate the Lord Jesus Christ!
He is man - which was very evident to all - and yet God, of the same
nature as the Father. He is the same as the Father in his
nature as God, yet as the Father’s Son he is distinct in his Person
from the Person of the Father. We ought be filled more and more with
praise of Jesus Christ for who he is. He stands in history as one
unique in the fulness and beauty of his humanity and in the grandeur of
his divinity. He is humble before his heavenly Father, acknowledging
that he has received all from the Father: "For just
as the Father has life in himself, so also he gave to the Son the
possession of life in himself." (John 5: 17-30) Very importantly, our Lord
tells us in simple terms what he has come to do for us. He has
come “to
give life to anyone he chooses.” Elsewhere our Lord tells us that he has
come that we may have life and have it in abundance. Christ the Son of
God receives life from the Father and he in turn gives this divine life
to us.
Let us never take the person of our Lord for granted, but on the
contrary let us be
constantly appreciating anew who he really is, approaching him in
prayer daily (especially in the Eucharist) with love and reverence.
(E.J.Tyler)
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“They were determined to kill him
because …he was speaking of God as his own Father.”
(John 5: 17-30)
Commentary from the Letter of Diogenes
(around 200) Ch. 9
Until this time, which is the last, God allowed us to let ourselves be
carried away according to our disordered tendencies, drawn by pleasures
and passions. Not that he was the least pleased by our sins; he only
tolerated that time of iniquity, without consenting to it. He was
preparing the present time of righteousness, so that we, convinced of
the fact that we were unworthy of life during that period because of
our faults, might now become worthy of it through the effectiveness of
divine kindness……
He did not hate us; he did not reject us…… He had mercy on us and
burdened himself with our faults, and he surrendered his own Son as a
ransom for us: the holy one for the ungodly, the innocent one for the
wicked, “the just man for the sake of the unjust” (1 Pet 3:18), the
incorruptible one for those who are corrupted, the immortal one for
those who are mortal. What other than his own justice could have
covered over our sins? In whom could we be justified…… if not through
the only Son of God? Sweet exchange, unfathomable work, unexpected
kindness! The crime of a great number of people was covered over by the
righteousness of a single person, and the righteousness of one single
person justifies many who are guilty. In the past, he convinced our
nature of its inability to attain life; now he shows us the Saviour who
is able to save what could not be saved. In these two ways, he wanted
to give us faith in his kindness and to let us see in him the nutrient,
the father, the teacher, the counsellor, the doctor, understanding,
light, honour, glory, strength and life
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Carry out all your duties as a citizen. Do not try to get out of any of
your obligations. Exercise all your rights, too, for the good of
society, without making any rash exceptions. You must give Christian
witness in that also.
(The Forge,
no.697)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday
of the fourth week of Lent
(March 29) Today
let us think of St. John
Climacus
(Saints)
Scripture today:
Exodus 32:
7-14; Psalm 106: 19-23;
John
5: 31-47
“The Father... You have never heard
his voice, you have never seen his shape”. (John 5: 31-47)
What was it that filled the heart of Jesus Christ? It was his heavenly
Father. If we search the Gospels to know “what made him (Jesus) tick”,
we see plenty of evidence that it was his knowledge and love of his
Father. From his early years he showed this, even to his earthly
parents. The earliest words recorded of him are those he used in reply
to his parents when they found him in the Temple. “Did you not know
that I must be in my Father’s house?” or, alternatively, “Did you not
know that I must be about my Father’s business?” It was his heavenly
Father who filled his heart and his life, and in his Father he loved
his parents and us too. During his public ministry this closeness to
his Father was what distinguished his inner life, and it was what
he said about his relationship to his Father which aroused such
opposition from the leaders of the Jews. He spoke of God as his Father,
making himself equal to God.
In our passage today, we have further light into our Lord’s
relationship with his Father. He accuses his critics of never hearing
his Father’s voice, of never having “seen his shape, and his word finds
no home in you.” (John 5:31-47) Consider our Lord’s words here, and how
he himself has heard the Father’s “voice” and seen his “shape”.
Our Lord knows the Father face to face, knows exactly what he is like
and hears him constantly. Our Lord’s contact with the Father almighty
is immediate, intimate, constant, and ineffable. At his baptism the
Father made his voice heard, as he did at the Transfiguration. The
Father had sent him, and he had come in the name of his Father. Why did
our Lord come? It was in order that we may have life. Our Lord’s
enemies “refuse to come to me for life”. Let us contemplate the person
of Jesus and his relationship to the Father, and how a share in the
life of God is made available to us by coming to him. He is the Saviour
of the world.
Let us meditate on the beautiful text of today’s Gospel in which our
Lord speaks of his relationship with the Father, and how life for us is
to be found in him.
(E.J.Tyler)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“If you believed in Moses you would
then believe me, for it was about me that he wrote.”
(John 5:
31-47) Saint
Jerome (347-420), Priest, Translator of the Bible, Doctor of the
Church
(Letter 53 to Saint Paulinus, Bishop of Nola)
There is a “wisdom of God, mysterious and hidden, which God decided in
advance, before the ages.” This wisdom of God is Christ. He is “the
power of God and the wisdom of God”…… For in the Son “all treasures of
wisdom and of knowledge are hidden.” Hidden in mystery, decided in
advance, before the ages, he was predestined and prefigured in the Law
and the Prophets.
That is why the prophets were called “seers”; they saw him who was
hidden and unknown to others. Abraham also “saw his day and rejoiced.”
For Ezekiel, the heavens opened while the sinful people remained
ignorant. David said: “Remove the veil from my eyes, and I will
contemplate the marvels of your law.” For the law is spiritual, and to
understand it, the veil must be lifted and “the glory of God must be
contemplated with unveiled vision.”
In the Book of Revelation, a sealed book with seven seals is shown……
How many people today who claim to be educated hold a sealed Book in
their hands! And they are incapable of opening it unless it is opened
by “him who has the key of David; if he opens, no one will close, and
if he closes, no one will open.” In the Acts of the Apostles, the
eunuch was reading the prophet Isaiah…… However, without knowing him,
he was ignorant of him whom he was venerating in that book. Philip came
and showed him Jesus hidden under the letter…… So understand that you
cannot get involved in Holy Scripture without a guide who will show you
the way.
(Biblical References: 1 Cor 2:7; 1 Cor 1:24; Col 2:31; 1 Sam 9:9; Jn
8:56; Ps 118:18; 2 Cor 3:16-18; Rev 5:1; Rev 3:7; Acts 8:26ff.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If we really want to sanctify our work, we have inescapably to fulfil
the first condition: that of working, and working well, with human and
supernatural seriousness.
(The Forge,
no.698)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday
of the fourth week of Lent
(March 31) Today let us think of St. Benjamin (Saints)
Scripture today:
Wisdom 2:
1.12-22; Psalm 34: 17-21
and 23;
John 7: 1-2.10.25-30
“Because his time had not yet come no
one laid a hand on him.” (John 7:1-2.10.25-30)
Our Gospel today tells us of Christ’s witness to the truth about
himself amid the closing around him of his enemies’ hostility. He
“stayed in Galilee; he could not stay in Judaea because the Jews were
out to kill him.” Then after he had gone up to Jerusalem and borne
public witness to his knowing the Father and having come from him, we
are told that “they would have arrested him then but because his time
had not yet come no one laid a hand on him.” (John 7:1-2.10.25-30) That is to say, the hand of God was over
all. Our Lord had been sent to fulfill a mission, and this he did to
perfection. He met with opposition, difficulty and betrayal. But
nothing could frustrate, dominate or negate the all-powerful and
loving providence of God. The machinations of the enemies of the Truth
were all-encompassed by God’s foresight and saving plan. For this
reason nothing would happen to our Lord till the time appointed had
come.
St Paul in one of his letters urges us “to let this mind be in you that
was in Christ Jesus.” Part of entering into the mind of Christ and of
living in union with him is to have a Christ-like conviction of the
providence of God our heavenly Father. “Because his time had not yet
come no one laid a hand on him.” We each of us have been given life and
placed by God in a particular situation and circumstance, with certain
responsibilities and duties. All together that makes up our mission in
life, and this mission by our baptism is to be fulfilled in Jesus,
following his path which includes the path of the Cross. But
fundamental to our completing our path in Jesus will be having a
profound sense of the providence of God our Father. All things are in
his hands including and most especially everything that makes up the
Cross we are called to carry. Everything that frustrates our plans and
hopes for doing good is encompassed in the providential plan of God in
our regard. If we love God and try each day to obey his will, offering
up difficulties and frustrations, all things will somehow come together
for the good God intends - as they did preeminently in the life and
person of his Son.
Let us pray for the faith that entrusts all we do and all that life
brings to the providential care of God while we valiantly and with good
humour fulfill our God-given work in life.
(E.J.Tyler)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“No one laid a finger on him because
his hour had not yet come.” (John 7:1-2.10.25-30)
Comment by Origen (185 – 253), Priest
and Theologian (Commentary
on Saint John, 19,12)
To seek Jesus is often something good, for it is the same as to seek
the Word, the truth and wisdom. But you will say that the words “to
seek Jesus” are sometimes said about those who want to harm him. For
example: “They tried to seize him, but no one laid a finger on him
because his hour had not yet come.” …… He knows from whom he distances
himself and with whom he remains without being found yet, so that if
someone seeks him, that person will find him at the favourable time.
The apostle Paul said to those who did not yet possess Jesus in this
way and who did not contemplate him: “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who
shall go up into heaven?’ (that is to bring Christ down), or ‘Who shall
go down into the abyss?’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).
What is it he does say? ‘The word is near you, on your lips and in your
heart.’” (Rom 6:6-8)
When in his love for humankind the Saviour said: “You will look for
me,” (Jn 8:21) he let us glimpse the things pertaining to the reign of
God, so that those who look for him do not do so outside of themselves
saying: “'Here, he is here', or ‘he is there’.” The Gospel tells them:
“The reign of God is already in your midst.” (Lk 17:21) So long as we
keep the seed of truth that has been placed in our soul, and his
commandments, the Word will not distance himself from us. But if evil
spreads in us to corrupt us, Jesus will tell us: “I am going away. You
will look for me but you will die in your sins.”
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Your charity should be likeable. Without neglecting prudence and
naturalness, try to have a smile on your lips for everyone at all
times, though you may be weeping inside. The service you give to others
should be unstinting too.
(The Forge,
no.699)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the fourth week of Lent
(April 1) Today let us think
of St. Hugh (Saints)
Scripture today:
Jeremiah 11:
18-20; Psalm 7: 2-3, 9-12;
John 7: 40-53
“The
police replied, ‘there has never been anybody who has spoken like
him’.”
(John 7:40-53)
At the end of St John’s Gospel the
inspired author concludes, ‘There were many other things that Jesus
did; if all were written down, the whole world, I suppose, would not
hold all the books that would have to be written.” The author is
telling us that no book, however inspired, could hope to express
adequately who our Lord was and what he did. We must ask the Holy
Spirit to teach us with the aid of his inspired written word. A case in
point is our Gospel today in which the people hear our Lord speaking of
the Father, of himself and of his own mission which he received from
the Father. Just to have heard him convinced many of them. “Several
people who had been listening to Jesus said, ‘Surely he must be the
prophet’, and some said, ‘He is the Christ’.” (John
7:40-53) In
reactions such as these we have hints of the marvellous impression made
on the hearer whose heart was open to goodness. When the police who had
been sent to arrest Jesus returned to their superiors they said, “there
has never been anybody who has spoken like him.” How could it be
otherwise, for the man to whom they were listening was not only man but
God.
Every time we place ourselves in the
presence of Christ in prayer we ought strive to remember who he is.
Every time we open the Gospels to read his words and to place ourselves
in the scene of his activities, we ought remember who is the one
of whom the Gospel speaks. Every time we participate in Mass we ought
remember who is the one who is really addressing us in the Scripture
that is read and in the homily that is spoken. Every time we
participate in the Eucharistic Prayer and witness the Consecration and
then receive Holy Communion we ought remember who it is who has made
himself present. We must learn not to take our Lord for granted and
neglect the wonder and the spiritual blessing of his presence and his
coming. We will gain this profound appreciation of the person of the
risen Jesus if we attend to him, striving to know him with all our
powers, our mind, heart, imagination, with our all. We must not just
let Jesus our Lord pass us by, as it were. We must attend to him day by
day, striving to know him as intimately as possible. If we do this, a
more and more profound love for him will be born and nourished. This
love will then have to be protected by detachment from other loves.
As we think of the response of our
Lord’s hearers, let us ask the Holy Spirit to help us so to listen to
Jesus that we come to know him lovingly. As our Lord said in his prayer
to the Father during the Last Supper, “Eternal life is this, to know
you Father and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.”
(E.J.Tyler)
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That half-finished work of yours is
a caricature of the holocaust, the total offering God is asking of you.
(The Forge,
no.700)
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