Pope Benedict
XVI'sgeneral prayer intention
for the month of February
2007: "that the goods of
the earth, given by God for all men, may be used wisely and according
to criteria of justice and solidarity."
Pope Benedict
XVI'smissionary prayer
intention for February 2007:
"That the fight against
diseases and great epidemics in the Third World may find, in the spirit
of solidarity, ever more generous collaboration on the part of the
governments of all nations."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Fifth
Sunday in Ordinary Time C
(February 4) Today let us think of St John de Britto(Saints)
While the crowd was
pressing in on Jesus and listening to the word of God, he was standing
by the Lake of Gennesaret. He saw two boats there alongside the lake;
the fishermen had disembarked and were washing their nets. Getting into
one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, he asked him to put out a
short distance from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds
from the boat. After he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put
out into deep water and lower your nets for a catch.” Simon said in
reply, “Master, we have worked hard all night and have caught nothing,
but at your command I will lower the nets.” When they had done this,
they caught a great number of fish and their nets were tearing. They
signaled to their partners in the other boat to come to help them. They
came and filled both boats so that the boats were in danger of sinking.
When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at the knees of Jesus and said,
“Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.” For astonishment at the
catch of fish they had made seized him and all those with him, and
likewise James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were partners of
Simon. Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be
catching men.” When they brought their boats to the shore, they left
everything and followed him.(Luke 5:1-11)
In a
recent issue of the Sydney
Morning Herald
(February 1, 2007, p.9) there was a report of excavations at Stonehenge
in southern England, in which dozens of ancient homes have been
uncovered. The settlement has been dated at about 4600 years ago, at
about the time the giant Egyptian pyramid of Giza was being built. Much
of the Stonehenge appears to be of a religious character, reminding us
that religious practice was
almost universal in ancient and prehistoric times. All the evidence
that is available suggests the same for traditional Aboriginal culture
in Australia during the thousands of years of its history. Higher
supernatural beings were acknowledged and ritual and myth shaped
society. There is one thing, though, that seems to me to be worthy of
further study in respect to the non-Christian religions of the world.
It is whether the higher supernatural powers of this or that religion
were understood as truly transcending the world, or whether basically
they were part of it, though occupying a much higher place in it. My
own reading suggests to me that the supernatural beings of, for
instance, traditional Aboriginal religion did not really transcend the
world, but fundamentally were part of it. Whether or not this is so, at
least the question reminds us that because we come to know things in
the first instance through our senses, there is the tendency to accept
as real only that which is part of our world. For many years prior to
his conversion St Augustine could not shake off his image of God as
material. There are serious philosophies that do not allow for anything
that cannot be confirmed empirically. While we reject this notion and
insist on a God who transcends the world, nevertheless it could be that
we barely realize the transcendence of God. That is to say, we need to
work at realizing that God our Father is not on earth but in heaven.
Our Lord
time and again referred to God as his Father, whom more often than not
he called his heavenly Father. I wonder if we ever give much thought to
the importance of the word “heavenly” when used by our Lord of his
Father. On one occasion when our Lord’s disciples saw him praying to
his heavenly Father, they approached him to ask him to teach them how
to pray. The prayer he taught them begins with a few very revealing
words: Our Father, who art in heaven. In addressing God our Father I am
sure we tend not to appreciate the significance of his being in heaven.
That God is in heaven does not mean that he is far away from us in a
distant place. One of the features of many indigenous religions is that
the principal deity is remote and withdrawn. Ritualistic contacts are
more easily made with lesser spirits who are seen as more active and
accessible, and often the myths are more commonly about them. That is
to say, the abode of the supreme being or what we might call heaven, is
often imagined in terms of a very distant land. But the real heaven is
not like this. Heaven is God and his transcendent way of being. Being
in heaven means being face to face with him in an intimate and
permanent union with him. The truth that God is in heaven insists that
he is in no way part of this world which we can unconsciously take him
to be. He is utterly other than his creation. If it were otherwise, if
he were in some sense part of the world though superior to everything
else in it - as is, I think, the implicit notion in many religions -
then he would not be the one only God. Yet at the same time he is
intimately near for he holds in existence everything that is. His
finger, as it were, touches the tiniest particle that exists and in
touching it sustains its being in its allotted span.
All of this
we are reminded of in today’s Gospel (Luke 5:1-11) when Simon, having made
his miraculous catch of fish at the command of our Lord, fell at the
feet of Jesus and said to him, “Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.” His
words bore witness to the transcendent holiness and power of Jesus. In
Christ dwells the fullness of the godhead bodily. In him dwells the
thrice holy God. Christ’s divine person utterly transcends the world,
and in him heaven was present. Yet by becoming man he who transcends
the world became part of it as well. The Christian religion worships a
God who is utterly other, but who as man is God with us and one of us.
As we think of Simon’s words let us pray for a profound realization of
the utter transcendence of God our Father. Our Father is in heaven, a
heaven that is utterly beyond and in Christ is at the same time utterly
near.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: The Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no.2794-2796
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Depart
from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man." (Catechism of the
Catholic Church § 311-312)
Angels and men, as intelligent and free creatures, have to journey
toward their ultimate destinies by their free choice and preferential
love. They can therefore go astray. Indeed, they have sinned. Thus has
moral evil, incommensurably more harmful than physical evil, entered
the world. God is in no way, directly or indirectly, the cause of moral
evil.176 He permits it, however, because he respects the freedom of his
creatures and, mysteriously, knows how to derive good from it: "For
almighty God. . ., because he is supremely good, would never allow any
evil whatsoever to exist in his works if he were not so all-powerful
and good as to cause good to emerge from evil itself." (Saint Augustine)
In time we can discover that God in his almighty providence can bring a
good from the consequences of an evil, even a moral evil, caused by his
creatures: "It was not you", said Joseph to his brothers, "who sent me
here, but God. . . You meant evil against me; but God meant it for
good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive."
(Genesis 45:8 ; 50:20)
From the greatest moral evil ever committed - the rejection and murder
of God's only Son, caused by the sins of all men - God, by his grace
that "abounded all the more",179 brought the greatest of goods: the
glorification of Christ and our redemption. But for all that, evil
never becomes a good.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
Get into the habit of praying to the
Guardian Angel of each person you are following up. Their Angel will
help them to be good and faithful and cheerful, so that when the time
comes they will be able to receive the eternal embrace of Love from God
the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit and from the Blessed
Virgin.
(The Forge,
no.1012)
Why can venial sins also be the object
of sacramental confession?
The confession of venial sins is strongly recommended by the Church,
even if this is not strictly necessary, because it helps us to form a
correct conscience and to fight against evil tendencies. It allows us
to be healed by Christ and to progress in the life of the Spirit. (CCC
1458)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.306)
(February 5) Saint
Agatha, virgin and martyr (died about 251) She
was martyred in Catania (Sicily) probably during the time of Decius.
Her name appears in the Roman Canon. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Genesis
1:1-19; Psalm
104:1-2a, 5-6, 10 and 12, 24 and 35c;
Mark 6:53-56
After making the
crossing to the other side of the sea, Jesus and his
disciples came to land at Gennesaret and tied up there. As they were
leaving the boat, people immediately recognized him. They scurried
about the surrounding country and began to bring in the sick on mats to
wherever they heard he was. Whatever villages or towns or countryside
he entered, they laid the sick in the marketplaces and begged him that
they might touch only the tassel on his cloak; and as many as touched
it were healed. (Mark 6:53-56)
Our Gospel scene
today places us with Jesus and his disciples landing
at Gennesaret and tying up there. As they left the boat those who were
near the shore immediately recognized him and word spread like
wildfire. People hurried throughout the surrounding region and brought
to him all the sick they could (Mark 6:53-56). This was typical of so
many villages
and towns he entered. St Mark writes that all they needed to do was
touch him and healing would come. So many were sick and helpless,
especially in the ancient world when medical science was so
rudimentary, and where in any case so many were far from professional
medical attention. They hungered for life and health, and lacked the
light to see any true meaning in their physical plight. Christ offered
them hope. His power to do good for them seemed (and was) without
limit. Whatever their need, he was able to help them and if he refused
(as occasionally he did) it was for a good purpose and because the
request was not in accord with the will of God. Now, on the one hand
this picture reminds us of the profoundly broken situation of fallen
man stemming from sin. On the other, Christ gave himself to this
ministry of healing but it is clear that he did so to give a sign of
something much greater that he had come to bring. His miracles were a
sign of the coming of God’s Kingdom which would be a Kingdom of
holiness. It is this which he especially had come to offer. St John the
Baptist at the beginning of his public ministry pointed him out and
said of him, “There is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the
world.” Years before this the angel had said of him before he was born
that he would save his people from their sins. It was the evil of sin
which he had come to take away, and his wide ranging healings and his
raising of some from the dead were meant to signal to the people the
coming of God’s kingdom, its establishment in the hearts of men, and
their release from the power of sin.
But the true and
deeper evil of sin which Christ had come to take away,
the holiness of life which would be his gift to all who come to him,
was not of interest to the body of the people. Christ was sent, he told
his disciples on one occasion, to the lost sheep of the House of
Israel, and it was to the people of Israel that he sent his disciples
during the period of his public ministry. But the deeper message
was not accepted. St John in the prologue to his Gospel writes that he
came unto his own and his own did not accept him. For those who did
accept him he gave power to become children of God. St John in his
Gospel speaks of the miracles of Christ as being signs, signs of the
much greater benefits of redemption and sanctification he offers all
who come to him. But let us look on the uncomprehending crowds as a
sign for us too. Let us look on the rapid spread of word about his
arrival which we read of in today’s Gospel (Mark 6:53-56) as a symbolic picture or
sign of the response we and all mankind are called to show to Christ
and the deeper blessings of redemption he has gained for us by his
death and resurrection. The crowds running everywhere spreading the
word of his arrival, their bringing their sick to him, their reaching
out to him for healing and solace, all these scenes can be looked upon
as inspiring pointers to what we ought be doing at a deeper and more
important level. We all suffer from the profoundly debilitating and
lethal disease of sin. It is passed on to each of us as our
inheritance, and we cooperate with it to a greater or lesser extent. It
is a great serpent that has found its way into the heart and soul of
each of us, and only Christ can rid us of its presence. So we should
come to him as our hope. Christ invites us to come to him
unhesitatingly. He has the love and the power to deal with sin and to
make us holy. We ought hurry towards him bringing before him our sinful
selves together with the varied effects of sin in the world. We ought
be like the people who hurried everywhere passing word of his arrival
and bringing to him all we can for his healing touch.
We know where
Christ is to be found. He is to be found in his Church,
the Church he founded and in which he constantly abides. Within the
life of the his Church of which he is the head he acts in the
Sacraments he instituted. Most especially he offers himself and his
sanctifying action in the Sacraments of the Eucharist and Penance, and
he teaches and preaches in the teaching and the preaching of the
Church’s pastors and all who have a responsibility to hand on his word.
Let us then come to him and find light and life in him.
(E.J.Tyler)
«All
those who touched him were healed»(Mark 6:53-56) Saint Leo the Great
(?-about 461), pope and doctor of the Church
(Letter 28 to
Flavian, 3-4)
Lowliness is assured by majesty, weakness by power, and mortality by
eternity. To pay the debt of our sinful state, a nature that is
incapable of suffering was joined to one that could suffer. Thus, in
keeping with the healing that we needed, one and the same mediator
between God and men, the man Jesus Christ (1Tim 2,5), was able to die
in one nature, and unable to die in the other...
He was born in a new condition, for, invisible in his own nature, he
became visible in ours. Beyond our grasp, he chose to come within our
grasp. Existing before time began, he began to exist at a moment in
time. Lord of the universe, he hid his infinite glory and took the
nature of a servant (Phil 2,7). Incapable of suffering as God, he did
not refuse to be a man, capable of suffering. Immortal, he chose to be
subject to the laws of death. He who is true God is also true man.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
Like
the grain of wheat, we too have to die in order to become fruitful.
You and I, with the help of God's grace, want to open up a deep furrow,
to blaze a trail. That is why we have to leave behind our poor animal
man and launch out into the sphere of the spirit, giving a supernatural
meaning to every human undertaking and, at the same time, to all those
engaged in them.
(The Forge,
no.1013)
Who is the
minister of this sacrament?
Christ has entrusted the ministry of Reconciliation to his apostles, to
the bishops who are their successors and to the priests who are the
collaborators of the bishops, all of whom become thereby instruments of
the mercy and justice of God. They exercise their power of forgiving
sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
(CCC 1461-1466, 1495)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.307)
Jesus summoned the
crowd again and said to them, “Hear me, all of you, and understand.
Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person; but the
things that come out from within are what defile.” When he got home
away from the crowd his disciples questioned him about the parable. He
said to them, “Are even you likewise without understanding? Do you not
realize that everything that goes into a person from outside cannot
defile, since it enters not the heart but the stomach and passes out
into the latrine?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.) “But what comes
out of the man, that is what defiles him. From within the man, from his
heart, come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed,
malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly. All
these evils come from within and they defile.” (Mark 7:14-23)
Recently there were
reports in the news media, especially on television, of the vast
numbers of Hindus in India present at the ceremonial washing in the
Ganges River. It is a most important Hindu ritual which brings together
immense numbers of Hindus, and it manifests strikingly man’s natural
and religious sense of sin - whatever be the word for “sin” that is
used. Hinduism is a great world religion and is a notable indication
of man’s religious sense, and the fact that ritual purification plays
such a significant part in it is itself worthy of reflection. Over the
years of his literary and theological career Cardinal Newman
(1801-1890) gradually worked out the elements of a philosophy of
religion. His philosophy could be said to be based on the natural sense
of sin which is - or normally should be - instinctive to man. He often
made the point that the religion typical of philosophy and civilization
is not particularly authentic because it tends to snuff out the sense
of
sin. Whatever of that theory and of a philosophy which starts with the
instinctive sense of sin, there is surely no doubt of the importance of
a sense of sin. If we are unaware that we are guilty of sin and in need
of purification, if we are unaware of the capital importance of
avoiding sin and being freed of it, then nature itself intimates that
we shall gradually sink into one form or another of spiritual
corruption. Now, beginning from the Old Testament the religion revealed
by God is distinguished by concern for sin. Yahweh God is the Holy One,
and he says to us, “Be holy, for I am holy”. Holiness and moral
goodness is stipulated as a requirement of any relationship with God.
If his people keep his commandments then he will be with them as their
God. It is not enough merely to observe ritual practices (though this
is very necessary) for moral action is also necessary, such as justice
and mercy.
In our Gospel today
our Lord points out the religious aberration which had gradually taken
hold in the religion taught by many of the spiritual leaders of Israel.
The great concern for religious purity before God was an authentic note
of revealed religion, but many had come to understand and teach this as
primarily involving external purity. The Gospel of St Mark shows that
physical cleanliness in its various forms and the avoidance of things
(such as certain foods) which were unclean had become very largely a
substitute for the inner purity of heart which was the true end of
revealed religion. It is sin which defiles, and it is at this level
that purification has to be put into effect. It is sin which has to be
avoided and taken away by some form of purification of the heart and
soul. The religion of the Old Testament was truly revealed but it
awaited fulfilment in its core concern: the redemption and cleansing
from sin. This was to be the supreme work of the Messiah, to take away
the sin of the world and to establish God’s Kingdom in which to him
would be the glory. As John the Baptist said of Jesus, he is the Lamb
of God who takes away the sin of the world. He has done this by his
death and resurrection. In our Gospel today our Lord points out that it
is “from within the man, from his heart, come evil thoughts,
unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit,
licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly. All these evils come
from within and they defile.” (Mark 7:14-23).
So we must aim at holiness of the heart and goodness of soul. That is
to say, we must have as the object of our personal religion putting on
the mind of Christ. As St Paul said in one of his Letters, “Let this
mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.” It is the heart of Christ
which we must study and come to love. Our whole object in life must be
to attain, with the power of the Holy Spirit, the likeness of Christ
within, at the level of the mind and heart.
It is a common phrase to speak
of the tip of the iceberg. In a sense what we say and do is just the
tip of the iceberg. The bulk of the iceberg is out of sight underneath.
That bulk is what is going on in our mind and heart. Our thoughts, our
desires, our loves and our hates constitute the world of the heart. It
is this inner man which must be made new and shaped in a radical
likeness to the heart of Christ. This is the religion we must live,
and it is the religion our Lord calls us to in today’s Gospel.
(E.J.Tyler)
“A clean
heart create for me, O God” (Psalm
51:12) (Mark 7:14-23) Saint Isaac the Syrian
(7th century), Monk at Nineveh, near Mosul in present-day Iraq
(Spiritual
Discourses, 1st series, no. 21)
It is said that only God’s help saves. When a person knows that there
is no other help, he prays a lot. And the more he prays, the more his
heart becomes humble, for it is not possible to pray and to request
without being humble. “A heart contrite and humble, o God, you will not
spurn.” (Ps 51:19) So long as the heart has not become humble, it is
impossible for it to escape being scattered; humility gathers the heart
together.
When a person has become humble, compassion immediately surrounds him
and his heart then feels God’s help. He discovers a strength rising up
within him, the strength of trust. When a person thus feels God’s help,
when he feels that God is there and that he comes to his aid,
immediately his heart is filled with faith and he then understands that
prayer is the refuge of help, the source of salvation, trust’s
treasure, the port that has been freed of the storm, the light of those
who are in darkness, the support of the weak, the shelter in times of
trial, help at the height of illness, the shield that saves in combat,
the arrow sent out against the enemy. In one word, a multitude of good
enters into him by means of prayer. So from then on, he finds his
delight in the prayer of faith. His heart is radiant with trust.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
You became a bit frightened when you saw
such dazzling light, so bright that you thought it would be difficult
to look, or even to see.
Disregard your obvious weaknesses, and open the eyes of your soul to
faith, to hope and to love. Carry on, allowing yourself to be guided by
God through whoever directs your soul.
(The Forge,
no.1015)
Is a confessor bound to secrecy?
Given the delicacy and greatness of this ministry and the respect due
to people every confessor, without any exception and under very severe
penalties, is bound to maintain “the sacramental seal” which means
absolute secrecy about the sins revealed to him in confession. (CCC
1467)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.309)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thursday
of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time II
(February 8) St.
Jerome Emiliani (1486-1537). Born in Venice. Converted to
Christianity after a rather dissolute youth, he dedicated himself to
the service of the poor, the sick, and abandoned children. He founded a
religious congregation (Somaschi) which looked after the education of
children, especially orphans. He died of the plague while serving the
afflicted. (Saints)
Scripture today:Genesis
2:18-25; Psalm 128:1-2, 3,
4-5; Mark 7:24-30
Jesus went to the
district of Tyre. He entered a house and wanted no one to know about
it, but he could not escape notice. Soon a woman whose daughter had an
unclean spirit heard about him. She came and fell at his feet. The
woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth, and she begged him to
drive the demon out of her daughter. He said to her, “Let the children
be fed first. For it is not right to take the food of the children and
throw it to the dogs.” She replied and said to him, “Lord, even the
dogs under the table eat the children’s scraps.” Then he said to her,
“For saying this, you may go. The demon has gone out of your daughter.”
When the woman went home, she found the child lying in bed and the
demon gone.(Mark 7:24-30)
In our Gospel
passage today our Lord goes into the district of Tyre, which was
considerably pagan. His entering a house secretly to avoid being
noticed suggests that he has come to this district to get away from the
crowds in Galilee and Judea and from the persecuting Jewish
authorities. He wanted a respite to continue his intensive
formation of his apostles for time was limited. But the house was not
to be the hide-out he had hoped, for word got around and “soon a woman
whose daughter had an unclean spirit heard about him. She came and fell
at his feet. The woman was (what Mark calls) a Greek, a
Syrophoenician by birth, and she begged him to drive the demon out of
her daughter.” Let us imagine the scene and contemplate the pagan woman
who comes insisting that he drive the demon out of her daughter. Her
love for her daughter and her helplessness before her plight drove her
in her prayer. She appears out of nowhere and once the favour is
obtained she disappears into nowhere. Her untold story is a picture in
miniature of the broken human condition and Satan’s presence in it.
She, a “Greek” as Mark calls the Gentiles, bespeaks the natural man’s
crying need of a redeemer who will deliver him from the power of the
underworld. In man’s history of superstitions, fortune telling,
astrology, spiritism, New Age, and countless other fetishes the
Syrophoenician woman is surely an example to all of who it is
that man ought to turn to for relief from the thraldom of evil.
Christ was visiting her pagan land and she heard about it. She had the
sense and good fortune to come to him in her desperate situation. Most
importantly, she placed her faith in him, such as that faith with all
its limitations was. She shows that natural man can respond to the news
of Christ and rise to a certain level of faith in him.
But more revealing
is the response of Christ to her words. She came to him and he rebuffed
her with words that did not seem to be kind. Her request did not attain
its goal immediately. Of course we are not told whether Christ said
these words smilingly or somewhat severely, but our immediate
impression suggests that he did not say them with a warm smile - though
we know that charity and compassion filled his sacred heart. His
response was a test, and this test reminds us that God can choose to
test those who come to him including those who come to him for a favour
without what we might call a developed faith. Christ chose to test the
pagan woman with a none-too-flattering image: “He said to her, ‘Let the
children be fed first. For it is not right to take the food of the
children and throw it to the dogs’.” (Mark 7:24-30) His own mission was
almost exclusively to the children of Israel, especially to their lost
ones. They were the children, and let us say in passing that our Lord’s
words to this effect reminds us of the faithfulness of God in looking
after his own. He sent his own divine Son to dwell among his chosen
people. Our Lord’s words to the pagan woman remind us that those who
are members of the Church he founded are the object of his special
love, a love manifested in the person and abiding presence of his Son
among us. His response to her assuring her with warmth that her faith
had saved her daughter reminds us that all who come to Christ in faith
can expect from him what is best. Therefore, we who are disciples
of Christ ought bring to all word of his person and presence, inviting
them to go to him in their need. But they must go to him in faith. The
challenge is then to believe enduringly, with perseverence. All too
often people came to him in their need and then once the need had been
met, their interest in him diminished, especially if his teaching was
too hard. One presumes the Syro-Phoenecian woman had no more contact
with him.
Christ abides in
the Church, and our mission is to speak of him to all, and to tell them
where he is to be found in his fulness. Christ was there in the region
of Tyre, and in a house unbeknowns to most. But word got around. Let us
do all we can to bring Christ to all, most especially to the poor and
to those who are suffering any form of affliction.
(E.J.Tyler)
“The
woman was a Greek” (Mark 7:24-30) Vatican II
(Declaration on the Relation of the Church to non-Christian Religions, Nostra Aetate,
1-2)
In our time, when day by day mankind is being drawn closer together and
the ties between different peoples are becoming stronger, the Church
examines more closely her relationship to non-Christian religions. In
her task of promoting unity and love among men, indeed among nations,
she considers above all in this declaration what men have in common and
what draws them to fellowship.
One is the community of all peoples, one their origin, for God made the
whole human race to live over the face of the earth (cf. Acts 17:26).
One also is their final goal, God. His Providence, his manifestations
of goodness, his saving design extend to all men (cf. Wis 8:1; Acts
14:17; Rom 2:6-7; 1 Tim 2:4), until that time when the elect will be
united in the Holy City, the city ablaze with the glory of God, where
the nations will walk in his light (cf. Rev 21:23ff.).
Men expect from the various religions answers to the unsolved riddles
of the human condition, which today even as in former times deeply stir
the hearts of men… Religions…try to counter the restlessness of the
human heart, each in its own manner, by proposing “ways,” comprising
teachings, rules of life and sacred rites.
The Catholic Church rejects nothing that is true and holy in these
religions. She regards with sincere reverence those ways of conduct and
of life, those precepts and teachings which, though differing in many
aspects from the ones she holds and sets forth, nonetheless often
reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men. Indeed, she
proclaims and ever must proclaim Christ “the way, the truth, and the
life” (Jn 14:6), in whom men may find the fullness of religious life,
in whom God has reconciled all things to himself (cf. 2 Cor 5:18-19).
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
Be generous. Don't ask Jesus for even one
consolation!
You ask me why. And I reply,
because you know very well that even though this God of ours seems to
be far away, he really is seated in the very centre of your soul,
imparting a divine character to your whole life.
(The Forge,
no.1016)
What
are the effects of this sacrament? The effects of the sacrament of Penance
are: reconciliation with God and therefore the forgiveness of sins;
reconciliation with the Church; recovery, if it has been lost, of the
state of grace; remission of the eternal punishment merited by mortal
sins, and remission, at least in part, of the temporal punishment which
is the consequence of sin; peace, serenity of conscience and spiritual
consolation; and an increase of spiritual strength for the struggle of
Christian living. (CCC 1468-1470, 1496)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.310)
Friday
of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time II
(February 9) Today let us think of St Teilo(Saints)
Scripture today: Genesis
3:1-8; Psalm 32:1-2, 5, 6,
7; Mark 7:31-37 Jesus left the
district of Tyre and went by way of Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, into
the district of the Decapolis. And people brought to him a deaf man who
had a speech impediment and begged him to lay his hand on him. He took
him off by himself away from the crowd. He put his finger into the
man(s ears and, spitting, touched his tongue; then he looked up to
heaven and groaned, and said to him, “Ephphatha!” (that is, “Be
opened!”) And immediately the man’s ears were opened, his speech
impediment was removed, and he spoke plainly. He ordered them not to
tell anyone. But the more he ordered them not to, the more they
proclaimed it. They were exceedingly astonished and they said, “He has
done all things well. He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”(Mark
7:31-37) In the passage
immediately before this one in the Gospel of St Mark our Lord has been
in the region of Tyre in retreat from the throngs of people seeking him
for healing from their afflictions. The purpose of retreats such as
this was above all to provide greater instructions to the Twelve for their
coming mission as the foundation stones of the Church he would found.
Now, in our Gospel today (Mark 7:31-37)
he returns from Tyre and our scene finds him again in a Gentile
district, that of the Decapolis. Once again, some people “brought him a
deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they asked him to lay
his hand on him.” Let us notice this detail that “they asked him to lay
his hand on him.” Our Lord, then, had what we might call a well-known
ritual of placing his hand on the one he was about to heal. Busy as he
was with such requests he rarely just uttered a word of healing and
sent a person off. The exceptions to this in the Gospels seem to have
been for Gentiles whose evangelization had not yet begun. The
Syrophoenician woman was one case - our Lord cured her daughter with a
word. But otherwise the indications we have show that our Lord gave a
very personal touch to his healings. In our case today there is even
more of this personal touch. “He took him off by himself away from the
crowd. He put his finger into the man(s ears and, spitting, touched his
tongue; then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him,
‘Ephphatha!’ (that is, ‘Be opened!’).” Christ is surely showing the
afflicted man that he is the object of very personal attention. He
takes the trouble to show his deliberate involvement in the life of a
suffering individual. Now, if we appeal to Christ, he will attend to us
personally. At various points
in the Gospel we see Christ commanding the one he has healed not to
spread abroad the healing he had been granted, though in this too there
are exceptions. For instance, after having healed the one possessed by
the devils called “Legion” on another occasion here in this Decapolis
region, he told him to go and make known what God in his mercy had done
for him. Nevertheless we do see that time and again Christ commanded
the cured person not to tell others about it. Why was this? This
healing ministry was not Christ’s principal work and he did not want it
to be taken as the primary benefit he was sent by his heavenly Father
to bring to man. His work was something incomparably greater and his
miracles were signs that he had the power and the love to establish the
Kingdom he was announcing. Jesus desired to concentrate - and he wished
others to concentrate - on his principal mission which was to announce,
explain and establish God’s Kingdom. That Kingdom in which God would be
ruler of the hearts of men and in which he would enable them to live
the life preached by Christ, would come above all through his death and
resurrection. Personal holiness, the overcoming of sin, the
transformation of the heart of man, all this was the mission he had
come to fulfil. He had come to bring to each individual the immense
heavenly blessing of God’s kingdom which would be within. The heart of
man would be transformed by the power of God’s grace, and God would be
all in all. As we read of Christ treating the man with the speech
impediment in such a personal and individual way, and as we then read
of his ordering him and his friends not to tell others about this
physical healing, let us focus our lives on the true meaning of
Christ’s person, teaching and ministry. Let us pray for a
knowledge of the person of Christ and for a true understanding of the
plan of God for us. Let us not be sidetracked into looking on Christ in
ways that miss the essential purpose of his coming. He has come above
all to make saints of us, hidden saints immersed in the ordinary life
and transforming that ordinary and humble life into something which
before God has a true grandeur, the grandeur of life in Christ.
(E.J.Tyler) If you wish to
view a video broadcast of this reflection on today's Gospel, click here -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- “He
put his fingers into the man’s ears and… touched his tongue”(Mark
7:31-37) St Ephrem (306 – 373),
Deacon and Doctor of the Church (Sermon “On our Lord”, 10-11)
Divine strength, which the human being cannot touch, came down; it
covered itself with a palpable body, so that the poor might touch it,
and in touching Christ’s humanity, they might perceive his divinity.
Through the fingers of flesh, the deaf-mute felt that his ears and his
tongue were being touched. Through the palpable fingers, he perceived
the divinity that cannot be touched when his tongue’s bond was broken
and when the closed doors of his ears were opened. For the body’s
architect and artisan came to him, and with a gentle word, without
pain, he created openings in deaf ears. Then the mouth as well, that
had been closed and until then incapable of giving light to the word,
put into the world praise of him who thus caused its sterility to bear
fruit.
In the same way, the Lord made mud with his saliva and spread it over
the eyes of the man born blind (Jn 9:6) so as to make us understand
that, like the deaf-mute, he was lacking something. An inborn
imperfection in our human batter was removed thanks to the leaven that
comes from his perfect body… To fill in what was missing in these human
bodies, he gave something of himself, just as he gives himself to be
aten [in the Eucharist]. By this means he causes the faults to
disappear and raises the dead, so that we might recognize that the
faults of our humanity are filled, thanks to his body in which “the
fullness of deity resides” (Col 2:9), and that true life is given to
mortals by means of this body, in which true life resides.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I was telling you that even people who
had not received baptism had been moved to say, ``I can well understand
that saintly souls must be happy, for they look at events with a vision
that is above the things of this world. They see things with the eyes
of eternity.''
May you not lack that same vision, I added afterwards, so that you can
respond to the special love with which the Blessed Trinity has treated
you.
(The Forge,
no.1017) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Can this sacrament be celebrated in some
cases with a general confession and general absolution?
In cases of serious necessity (as in imminent danger of death) recourse
may be had to a communal celebration of Reconciliation with general
confession and general absolution, as long as the norms of the Church
are observed and there is the intention of individually confessing
one’s grave sins in due time. (CCC 1480-1484)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.311) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the fifth week of Ordinary Time II
(February 10) Saint Scholastica,
virgin (480-547). Born at Norcia in Umbria, she was the twin
sister of St Benedict. She followed the rule of her brother in founding
the Order of Benedictine nuns. (Saints)
In those days when
there again was a great crowd without anything to eat, Jesus summoned
the disciples and said, “My heart is moved with pity for the crowd,
because they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to
eat. If I send them away hungry to their homes, they will collapse on
the way, and some of them have come a great distance.” His disciples
answered him, “Where can anyone get enough bread to satisfy them here
in this deserted place?” Still he asked them, “How many loaves do you
have?” They replied, “Seven.” He ordered the crowd to sit down on the
ground. Then, taking the seven loaves he gave thanks, broke them, and
gave them to his disciples to distribute, and they distributed them to
the crowd. They also had a few fish. He said the blessing over them and
ordered them distributed also. They ate and were satisfied. They picked
up the fragments left over—seven baskets. There were about four
thousand people. He dismissed the crowd and got into the boat with his
disciples and came to the region of Dalmanutha. (Mark 8:1-10)
When we read the
Gospels we read with a view to contemplating the living person of
Jesus, and in order to understand his salvific ways. St John in his
Gospel narrates that our Lord in his prayer to his heavenly Father
during the Last Supper said that “eternal life is this, to know you
Father, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” So our purpose in reading
the Gospels is to come to know Jesus in the first instance, and in him to
know the Father and the Holy Spirit. Well then, let us contemplate him.
There was “a great crowd without anything to eat” following him (Mark 8:1-10),
and while those who made up this particular crowd would have been a
mixed lot, surely they can be taken to symbolize the numbers who would
come to follow him down the ages “without anything to eat”, as it were.
That is to say, let us look on them as a pointer to those of Christ’s
faithful who choose to follow the Lamb wherever he goes, and who trust
in God’s loving providence as they find in the person of Christ their
life and their light. The needs of the crowd following Christ evoke
from him a great act of power and compassion. They have nothing to eat,
and practically nothing is at hand to feed them. So Christ blesses his
heavenly Father for the meagre particles of food before him and at a
word proceeds to feed the four thousand people seated in front of him.
The scene is a revelation of the immense power of Christ over all
things - in this case over the limits of nature - and of the merciful
character of this power. Christ shows his power in acts of love, pity
and mercy. In him is revealed a God who is love. Indeed, if we are to
come to know God we ought look on the face of Christ, for as Pope
Benedict is fond of saying in his writings, Christ is the face of God.
Over the course of
life very many things can come our way. There can be consolations,
achievements, vicissitudes, and many disappointments. There can be bad
health, physical operations, financial distress and reversals, anxiety
stemming from various family members, joys and sorrows. But in all of
this there is one thing we are called to do if life is to acquire its
true meaning and if it is to be a success in the sight of God. It is
that we must follow Christ wherever this might lead us and whatever
might be the cost. His person and his teaching and his grace are the
constant in our life. We must exercise all the due prudence that
is pleasing to God but in the last analysis the only truly prudent
thing is to be ready to forego everything for the sake of Christ whom
we are following. We do this knowing that he will look after us. He
does not need much and our Gospel passage today shows our Lord feeding
the crowds with the few loaves and the fish. There is one pattern that
we may well notice when crises bringing great perplexity come. It is
that if we trust in Christ and ask for help in being obedient to the
will of God, we may well be surprised at the sequel as we look back on
it long afterwards. The power and the compassion of God may well be
evident to us. In any case we must trust and this is surely the abiding
lesson from our Gospel passage today. The same Christ who is described
in today’s Gospel, the same one who exercised such power and showed
such pity, lives now in the life of the Church his body. He is present
among us in the Church’s ministry of the word and the Sacraments. He is
in our midst in this way, inviting us to make him and his teaching the
object of our life whatever be the inconvenience and cost, knowing that
he will look after us.
As is often
narrated, St Thomas More on the way to the scaffold said, “though I
lose my head I’ll come to no harm.” Christ who lives now and who is
God-with-us in the Church of which he is the head asks of us that we
give him our faith. He is the constant in our world of flux and
uncertainty. He is the one thing that is certain, the truth that
abides, the grace that will never fail. He invites each of us to come
to him and learn from him, especially from his sacred heart which is
revealed in our Gospel text today, just as it is in the whole sweep of
the Gospels.
(E.J.Tyler)
Our
shepherd gives himself as food (Mark 8:1-10) St John Chrysostom (345 –
407), Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Homilies on St. Matthew,
no. 82)
“Who can tell the mighty deeds of the Lord, or proclaim all his
praises?” (Ps 106:2) Which shepherd ever nourished his sheep with his
own body? But what am I saying – a shepherd? Often, mothers entrust
their children to a wet nurse as soon as they are born. But Jesus
Christ cannot accept that for his sheep; he himself nourishes us with
his own blood, and thus he causes us to become one single body with him.
My brothers, consider that Christ was born of our own human substance.
But, you will say, so what? That doesn’t concern all human beings.
Excuse me, my brother; it is a great advantage for all of them. If he
became man, if he came to take on our nature, that concerns the
salvation of all human beings. And if he came for all, he also came for
each one in particular. Perhaps you will say: So why have not all
accepted the fruit that they were supposed to receive through that
coming? Don’t blame Jesus, who chose this means for the salvation of
everyone; the fault lies with those who reject this kindness. For in
the Eucharist, Jesus Christ unites himself to each of his faithful; he
causes them to be reborn, he nourishes them with himself, he does not
abandon them to another, and thus he convinces them once again that he
really took on our flesh.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
I assure you that if we want to, as
children of God, we can make a powerful contribution towards lighting
up the work and the lives of men with the divine and eternal splendour
which it has pleased the Lord to place in our souls.
But “he who says he abides in Jesus ought to
walk the same way He walked” as Saint John teaches. It is a path
which always leads to glory. But it also always passes through
sacrifice.
(The
Forge, no.1018)
What are
indulgences?
Indulgences are the remission before God of the temporal punishment due
to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven. The faithful Christian
who is duly disposed gains the indulgence under prescribed conditions
for either himself or the departed. Indulgences are granted through the
ministry of the Church which, as the dispenser of the grace of
redemption, distributes the treasury of the merits of Christ and the
Saints. (CCC 1471-1479, 1498)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.312)
(February 11) Our
Lady of Lourdes. This day marks the first apparition of the
Blessed Virgin Mary in 1858 to fourteen-year old Marie Bernade (St
Bernadette) Soubirous. There were eighteen apparitions in all, the last
of which was on 16 July 1858. The message of Lourdes is a call to
personal conversion, prayer and charity. (Saints)
(World Day of Prayer for the Sick)
Scripture: Jeremiah
17:5-8; Psalm 1:1-2, 3, 4 and 6; 1
Corinthians 15:12, 16-20; Luke 6:17, 20-26
Jesus came down
with the twelve and stood on a stretch of level ground with a great
crowd of his disciples and a large number of the people from all Judea
and Jerusalem and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon. And raising his
eyes toward his disciples he said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for
the kingdom of God is yours. Blessed are you who are now hungry, for
you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who are now weeping, for you
will laugh. Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude
and insult you, and denounce your name as evil on account of the Son of
Man. Rejoice and leap for joy on that day! Behold, your reward will be
great in heaven. For their ancestors treated the prophets in the same
way. But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your
consolation. Woe to you who are filled now, for you will be hungry. Woe
to you who laugh now, for you will grieve and weep. Woe to you when all
speak well of you, for their ancestors treated the false prophets in
this way.”(Luke 6:17, 20-26)
I remember years ago
when I was a student I was discussing with a fellow student the essence
and necessity of morality. What is it to be moral, and why should we
be moral? In response to this question he said to me that, rather than
this being the issue for him, basically what he wanted was to be happy.
It was
a very good comment because it implied that the fundamental obligation
to be good needs to be connected with our basic desire for happiness.
The profound link between holiness and peace ought be appreciated, and
each provides a yardstick for the other. It is impossible to be happy
if one is not good, and a goodness in which happiness is absent lacks
authenticity. The quest for happiness is a fundamental starting point
in the heart of man. It is instinctive and natural and is implanted in
man by his Creator in order that he may actually find that happiness.
God means us to be happy. So profound a part of human nature is this
that the thought of a human being who does not want to be happy is
almost unimaginable, and wherever there is such a person we know that
something is wrong with him. The critical issue is, how is happiness to
be understood, and what steps are to be taken to gain it? Above all,
what has God revealed in answer to this? From the answers to this will
flow certain choices that will set a person’s course in this life and
in the next.
Let
us turn to our Gospel today (Luke 6:17,
20-26) and notice right away
that our Lord in his beatitudes addresses man’s desire to be happy. In
doing this our Lord is taking up a fundamental theme of the Old
Testament. God had called Abraham from his native country to a new land
which he would give him. He promised Abraham that through him all the
nations would be blessed. He was promising happiness and blessings to
the world through Abraham’s posterity. Then when Abraham’s descendants
were enslaved in Egypt, God sent Moses to lead them out to the promised
land. If they accepted him as their God and kept his commandments, he
would be their God and he would bless them. That is to say, God held
out to his chosen people the promise of happiness if they remained
faithful to their covenant with him as their Lord. So happiness would
flow from obeying God’s commands. Now, in the Old Testament promise of
future happiness and blessings, the emphasis was given to this life. If
they were faithful to God and his covenant with them, they would be
blessed and happy in this life, while, of course including the next.
Now, this emphasis in the Old Testament was true, and we remember how
our Lord himself promised happiness in this life - but together with
the Cross. But the Old Testament revelation was very incomplete and one
which very many of the children of Israel misunderstood, even though
there were outstanding examples of holiness in the Old Testament. That
misunderstanding is one in which we can all share. Our constant
tendency precisely in our religion is to look for happiness in this
world and scarcely beyond it.
In the Beatitudes
according to St Luke today our Lord reveals wherein lies our true
happiness, and his words complete what God had already revealed about
the happiness intended for man. If all we had were the conclusions of
human reason, or the revelation of the Old Testament, our knowledge of
man’s happiness would be very limited. Our Lord promises
a true and authentic happiness, a happiness which is a share in his own
happiness and a share in the beatitude of God himself. It is
centered on
his kingdom. Therein lies the happiness of man, and that kingdom is
present in this life but is to be fully enjoyed in the next. It is the
happiness our Lord himself enjoyed during his years on this earth and
it is especially the happiness he enjoys in his glory. Happy are you
who are
poor: yours is the kingdom of God. The one whose treasure is not in
this world but in God and his kingdom will be truly happy. The one who
hungers, who is deprived of human respect and natural joys, the one who
is persecuted for his belief in Christ, in a word the one who looks to
Christ as his life, will enjoy the truest happiness here while bearing
his daily cross, and will obtain perfect happiness hereafter.
Let us ask
ourselves
what is it that we are seeking in life in order to be happy. If we are
looking to God, let us ask ourselves if we are not putting our bets on
other things as well. Let us look to Christ, and to all else only in
Christ. For me, St Paul said, to live is Christ. Christ is our life and
happiness.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further reading: Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no.1716-1724
"And
raising his eyes toward his disciples he said: "Blessed are you who are
poor, for the kingdom of God is yours." (Luke 6:17,
20-26) Paul VI, pope from 1963 to
1978 (Apostolic Exhortation On Christian Joy
- May 9, 1975)
But it is necessary here below to understand properly the secret of the
unfathomable joy which dwells in Jesus and which is special to Him...
If Jesus radiates such peace, such assurance, such happiness, such
availability, it is by reason of the inexpressible love by which He
knows that He is loved by His Father. When He is baptized on the banks
of the Jordan, this love, which is present from the first moment of His
Incarnation, is manifested: "You are my Son, the Beloved; my favor
rests on you."(Lk 3:22) This certitude is inseparable from the
consciousness of Jesus. It is a presence which never leaves Him all
alone.(Jn 16:32) It is an intimate knowledge which fills Him: "...the
Father knows me and I know the Father."(Jn 10:15) It is an unceasing
and total exchange: "All I have is yours and all you have is mine."(Jn
17:10) "...You loved me before the foundation of the world."(Jn 17:24)
Here there is an uncommunicable relationship of love which is
identified with His existence as the Son and which is the secret of the
life of the Trinity: the Father is seen here as the one, who gives
Himself to the Son, without reserve and without ceasing, in a burst of
joyful generosity, and the Son is seen as He who gives Himself in the
same way to the Father, in a burst of joyful gratitude, in the Holy
Spirit.
And the disciples and all those who believe in Christ are called to
share this joy. Jesus wishes them to have in themselves His joy in its
fullness.(Jn 17:13) "I have made your name known to them and will
continue to make it known, so that the love with which you loved me may
be in them, and so that I may be in them."(Jn 17:26)
This joy of living in God's love begins here below. It is the joy of
the kingdom of God. But it is granted on a steep road which requires a
total confidence in the Father and in the Son, and a preference given
to the kingdom. The message of Jesus promises above all joy—this
demanding joy; and does it not begin with the beatitudes? "How happy
are you who are poor: yours is the kingdom of God. Happy you who are
hungry now: you shall be satisfied. Happy you who weep now: you shall
laugh."
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
What
a disappointment awaited those who saw the light of the pseudo-apostle,
and wishing to come out of their darkness, were drawn to his light.
They raced to get there. They may have left shreds of their skin along
the way. Some in their eagerness for that light may also have left
behind some shreds of their very souls. And now, having reached the
pseudo-apostle, they find cold and darkness. Cold and darkness which
will eventually congeal the broken hearts of those who for a while had
believed in that ideal.
t
is an evil deed the pseudo-apostle has done. Those disappointed men who
had been ready to give their very flesh in exchange for those glowing
fires, for that gleaming ruby of charity, drop once more, instead, back
to the earth from which they had come. Down they go, with a saddened
heart, with a heart that is a heart no longer — just a chunk of ice
shrouded in a darkness which will eventually cloud their minds.
You false paradoxical apostle, see what you have done: because Christ
is on your lips but not in your deeds; because you attract with a light
which you yourself lack; because there is no warmth of charity in you,
and you claim to be concerned about outsiders while all the time you
are neglecting your own; because you are a liar, and lying is the
daughter of the devil. And so, you are working for the devil, causing
bewilderment to those who follow the Master, and even though you may
triumph frequently here on earth, woe to you on that day which is
approaching when our friend Death will come, and you shall see the
anger of the Judge whom you have never deceived. Paradoxes, no, Lord:
paradoxes, never.
(The Forge,
no.1019)
How
was sickness viewed in the Old Testament?
In the Old Testament sickness was experienced as a sign of weakness and
at the same time perceived as mysteriously bound up with sin. The
prophets intuited that sickness could also have a redemptive value for
one’s own sins and those of others. Thus sickness was lived out in the
presence of God from whom people implored healing. (CCC 1499-1502)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.313)
(February 12) Today let us think of Saint Damian(Saints)
Scripture today: Genesis 4:1-15,
25; Psalm 50:1 and 8, 16bc-17,
20-21; Mark 8:11-13
The Pharisees came
forward and began to argue with Jesus, seeking from him a sign from
heaven to test him. He sighed from the depth of his spirit and said,
“Why does this generation seek a sign? Amen, I say to you, no sign will
be given to this generation.” Then he left them, got into the boat
again, and went off to the other shore.(Mark 8:11-13)
In our Gospel
passage today we find ourselves in a scene which is often repeated in
other parts of the Gospels. “The Pharisees came forward and began to
argue with Jesus, seeking from him a sign from heaven to test him”(Mark
8:11). Here
we have the noblest and most exalted person who
ever walked the earth being subjected to persistent disputes and
opposition. He is no ordinary human person, rather he is a divine
person. This Jesus who is the subject of the Gospels is God the Son,
the same God as is the Father and as is the Holy Spirit, though as a
person is distinct from each of them. From all eternity his glory was
that of God, a glory shared also by the Father and the Holy Spirit. Yet
he did not hesitate to set aside this glory to become as we are and
humbler still, even to death on the Cross. And here in our Gospel
passage today we see him in his fully human condition subjected to the
unreasonable humiliation of being opposed and taken to task by those
whom as God he constantly holds in existence. Through him, St John
tells us in his prologue, all things came to be. He came unto his own
and his own did not receive him, but to those who did accept him he
gave power to become children of God. So as we think of Christ being
affronted by the attacks and hostile questioning by the Pharisees who
demanded from him a sign from heaven to test him, let us think of the
extent and wonder of the Incarnation. God truly became man, and though
utterly holy, utterly powerful, utterly perfect, he allowed himself to
be treated as if he were an ordinary and flawed man. He became as men
are and humbler still. Gazing on Christ with our mind’s eye and
contemplating him in our scene, let us be filled with amazement that
God has deigned to become man, a man like us in all things but sin, and
in becoming man to subject himself to the indignities so often
characteristic of the human condition.
As we think thus of
the person of Jesus and renew in our hearts our sense of wonder at his
becoming man, let us turn our gaze to the Pharisees who were arguing
with him. Little did they know! When our Lord was dying on the cross he
prayed to his heavenly Father to forgive those who were jeering at him
and who had brought him to this pass because they did not know what
they were doing. They did not know that what they were doing to Jesus
they were doing to one who is a man, yes, but who in his person is God.
They were blind. But the question is, why did they not recognize his
goodness and authority? Their blindness was due to sin. Let us not
attempt to probe the levels of responsibility for their blindness,
their stubbornness and their advancing hatred for Jesus. Their
blindness was due to their sinful hearts and the only answer to sin was
and is the person of Jesus. He had come to take away the sin of the
world, but there had to be a readiness to accept him for who he was and
for his redemptive work and teaching. This readiness the Pharisees
stubbornly refused to have and to show, and so Christ left them. “He
sighed from the depth of his spirit and said, ‘Why does this generation
seek a sign? Amen, I say to you, no sign will be given to this
generation.’ Then he left them, got into the boat again, and went off
to the other shore” (Mark
8:11-13).
The actions of the Pharisees and the response it drew from Christ is a
warning to us. We must come to Christ in all humility and appreciation,
sitting at his feet as before the one who is the Master. We must not
dispute with his teaching and we ought do our very best to determine
where he continues to teach in our day and in every generation. He
continues to teach from within the life of his body the Church, and in
and through the Church’s ministry of the word and the Sacraments.
Let us renounce anything in our dispositions or response that likens us
to the Pharisees, for if we do not put away all such attitudes, Christ
will sigh from his heart and pass us by. If we refuse Christ, we shall
be left in our sins.
Let us then place
ourselves in our Gospel scene and contemplate the person of Jesus. He
is the Lord of lords and King of kings. He is the Son of the
Father, and is the same divine being as the Father and the Holy Spirit.
He is God and man. Let us accept him as the Master of our life, our
true and constant teacher and redeemer. Let us renounce any secret
attitudes in us that calls Christ’s teaching into question and which
prompt our hearts to argue with the Son of God as he speaks to us in
and through his body the Church. Let us throw in our lot with him and
resolve to follow him wherever he might lead us.
(E.J.Tyler)
“Why
does this age seek a sign?” - Believing even in
darkness (Mark 8:11-13)
Saint [Padre] Pio de
Pietrelcina (1887-1968), Capuchin (OP; GF 174; Ep 4,418)
The Holy Spirit tells us: Don’t let your mind succumb to temptation and
sorrow, for joy of the heart is life for the soul. Sorrow is no good
for anything and causes our spiritual death.
It happens sometimes that the darkness of trial overwhelms your soul’s
heaven; but this darkness is light! Thanks to it, you believe even in
darkness; the mind feels lost, it fears no longer being able to see, no
longer understanding anything. But this is the moment when the Lord
speaks and makes himself present to the soul; and the soul listens,
understands and loves in the fear of God. So don’t wait for Tabor to
“see” God when you are already contemplating him on Sinai.
Progress in the joy of a sincere heart that is wide open. And if it is
impossible for you to keep that happiness, at least don’t lose courage
and keep all your trust in God.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
What is the
attitude of the Church toward the sick?
Having received from the Lord the charge to heal the sick, the Church
strives to carry it out by taking care of the sick and accompanying
them with her prayer of intercession. Above all, the Church possesses a
sacrament specifically intended for the benefit of the sick. This
sacrament was instituted by Christ and is attested by Saint James: “Is
anyone among you sick? Let him call in the presbyters of the Church and
let them pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord”
(James 5:14-15). (1506-1513, 1526-1527)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.315)
(February 13) Today let us think of St. Catherine de Ricci(Saints)
Scripture today:
Genesis
6:5-8;
7:1-5, 10; Psalm 29:1a and 2, 3ac-4, 3b and
9c-10; Mark 8:14-21
The disciples had
forgotten to bring bread, and they had only one loaf with them in the
boat. Jesus enjoined them, “Watch out, guard against the leaven of the
Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.” They concluded among themselves
that it was because they had no bread. When he became aware of this he
said to them, “Why do you conclude that it is because you have no
bread? Do you not yet understand or comprehend? Are your hearts
hardened? Do you have eyes and not see, ears and not hear? And do you
not remember, when I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how
many wicker baskets full of fragments you picked up?” They answered
him, “Twelve.” “When I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand,
how many full baskets of fragments did you pick up?” They answered him,
“Seven.” He said to them, “Do you still not understand?”(Mark 8:14-21)
Saint Jerome once
wrote that ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ. Of
course, he would have been referring to ignorance of the content of
Scripture, rather than simply to the reading of Scripture. Even in his
own day the widespread illiteracy and the very limited number of written copies of the
Scriptures, would have excluded great numbers from a formal reading of
the Scriptures. A considerable knowledge of the contents of the
Scriptures has been handed on to the faithful over the centuries by the
Church’s teaching and preaching, by the Church’s art work, her liturgy,
her popular devotions and by a variety of other means available in the
Church’s life and ministry. For instance, a daily praying of the rosary
involves a prayerful contemplation of Christ in the Gospels scenes. But
of course, the daily, prayerful and assiduous reading of the Scriptures
by those able to do so holds pride of place among the ways of knowing
the content of Scripture and therefore of knowing the person of Christ.
In respect to the Scriptures the reading of the Gospels is especially
important because the person of Christ is set forth especially in the
Gospels. He is the way, the truth and the life, and eternal life is
knowing, loving, serving and being faithful to him. So then, let us
consider Jesus in our Gospel passage today (Mark 8:14-21). One thing we notice
about him in his teaching is his frequent use of analogy and metaphor.
When we think of certain great thinkers in the history of Western
philosophy - such as Plato and Aristotle a few centuries before Christ
- we remember how they made great use of philosophical abstraction. Our
Lord, though, uses stories and analogies drawn from everyday life to
make the most sublime points. He speaks concretely and pictorially and
thus addresses the mind with the aid of the imagination. Newman once
wrote that an essential medium of religion is the imagination.
In our passage
today the disciples noticed that they had forgotten to bring bread (and
the bread of that time was bread of real substance), and Christ said to
them, “Watch out, guard against the leaven of the Pharisees and the
leaven of Herod.” He was using the analogy of bread to warn against the
teaching and example of the Pharisees and the Herodians, which
constituted a principal obstacle to his own ministry. He was being
opposed at every opportunity by them, and their growing hatred of him
was implacable. It would lead to his death, which he would embrace
obediently for the salvation of the world. Let us understand that in
thus warning them against this our Lord warns all his disciples down
through the ages against any teaching which opposes his own. Christ
states plainly in the Gospels that he is the Light of the world and
that anyone who does not walk by his light is walking in the darkness.
Being a disciple of Christ must include a careful and persevering
attempt to know his teaching and to guard against whatever is not in
accord with it. This teaching comes to us through the knowledge of
Scripture, but as read not just with our own private judgment alone but
with the mind of the Church which produced and authenticated these
sacred writings. The Gospels and the New Testament come to the
faithful, as it always has, from the hand of the Church who, in certain
of her inspired and earliest members, wrote them. They are the Church’s
own book, and their acceptance as inspired is due to the Church’s
judgment about them. They are part of the canon of Scripture because
the Church
has discerned this to be the case. So Scripture must be read with the
mind of the Church. Revelation comes to us in two intimately connected
channels, Scripture and the Church’s living Tradition. Each is
understood in light of the other, and we come to know Christ by being
immersed in both.
As we think of
today’s Gospel scene in which our Lord warns his disciples against
false teaching that is not in accord with his own, let us resolve to
abide in the true doctrine of Christ so as to abide in him. The person
of Christ is the object of our life, but if we are to know and love him
we must know and assent to his teaching. Let us learn to recognize the
true channels through which this teaching comes to us, Scripture and
the Church’s living Tradition. By immersing ourselves in these two
intimately connected gifts of God, we shall abide in the true and
living person of Jesus.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Do you
not yet understand or
comprehend?" (Mark
8:14-21) Vincent of Lérins
(d. c. 450), monk (Commonitory,
23)
But some one will say, perhaps, Shall there, then, be no progress in
Christ's Church? Certainly; all possible progress. For what being is
there, so envious of men, so full of hatred to God, who would seek to
forbid it? Yet on condition that it be real progress, not alteration of
the faith… The intelligence, then, the knowledge, the wisdom, as well
of individuals as of all, as well of one man as of the whole Church,
ought, in the course of ages and centuries, to increase and make much
and vigorous progress; but yet only in its own kind; that is to say, in
the same doctrine, in the same sense, and in the same meaning.
The growth of religion in the soul must be analogous to the growth of
the body, which, though in process of years it is developed and attains
its full size, yet remains still the same. There is a wide difference
between the flower of youth and the maturity of age; yet they who were
once young are still the same now that they have become old, insomuch
that though the stature and outward form of the individual are changed,
yet his nature is one and the same, his person is one and the same. An
infant's limbs are small, a young man's large, yet the infant and the
young man are the same…, there were already present in embryo…
In like manner, it behoves Christian doctrine to follow the same laws
of progress, so as to be consolidated by years, enlarged by time,
refined by age… Our forefathers in the old time sowed wheat in the
Church's field. It would be most unmeet and iniquitous if we, their
descendants, instead of the genuine truth of corn, should reap the
counterfeit error of tares (Mt 13:24 sq). This rather should be the
result,—there should be no discrepancy between the first and the last.
From doctrine which was sown as wheat, we should reap, in the increase,
doctrine of the same kind—wheat also; so that when in process of time
any of the original seed is developed, and now flourishes under
cultivation, no change may ensue in the character of the plant…
Therefore,… the same ought to be cultivated and taken care of by the
industry of their children, the same ought to flourish and ripen, the
same ought to advance and go forward to perfection.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
How much I savoured the epistle of that
day! The Holy Spirit through Saint Paul teaches us the secret of
immortality and of Glory. All of us human beings yearn to live on.
We would wish to make those moments in our lives when we are happy last
forever. We would wish the memory of our deeds to be glorified. We
would like our cherished ideals to become immortal. And so it is that
when we seem to be happy, when something consoles us in our distress,
we all naturally say and desire that it should last forever, forever.
Oh the wisdom of the devil! How well he knew the human heart. You will
be like gods, he said to our first parents. That was a cruel deception.
Saint Paul in his Epistle to the Philippians teaches us a divine secret
by which to attain immortality and Glory: Jesus|... emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave|... He humbled himself and became obedient
unto death, even death on the Cross. Therefore God has highly exalted
him and bestowed on him a name which is above every other name, that at
the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in Heaven and on earth and
under the earth...
(The Forge,
no.1021)
Who can receive the sacrament of the anointing of the sick?
Any member of the faithful can receive this sacrament as soon as he or
she begins to be in danger of death because of sickness or old age. The
faithful who receive this sacrament can receive it several times if
their illness becomes worse or another serious sickness afflicts them.
The celebration of this sacrament should, if possible, be preceded by
individual confession on the part of the sick person.
(CCC 1514-1515,
1528-1529)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.316)
(February 14) Saints Cyril, monk
(died 869), and Methodius, bishop (died 885). These two brothers
evangelized Moravia, Bohemia, and Bulgaria. Methodius was consecrated
bishop by Pope Adrian II. Pope John Paul II proclaimed them patron
saints of Europe, with St Benedict. (Saints)
When Jesus and his
disciples arrived at Bethsaida, people brought to him a blind man and
begged Jesus to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand and led
him outside the village. Putting spittle on his eyes he laid his hands
on the man and asked, “Do you see anything?” Looking up the man
replied, “I see people looking like trees and walking.” Then he laid
hands on the man’s eyes a second time and he saw clearly; his sight was
restored and he could see everything distinctly. Then he sent him home
and said, “Do not even go into the village.”(Mark 8:22-26)
Our Gospel scene
today presents us with an unusual circumstance. The four Gospels
narrate numerous healings by Christ. People are brought before him with
all sorts of afflictions and he heals them at a word. People approach
him to touch his clothes and they are healed. He sees the body of a
young man being brought out of a village for burial accompanied by his
grieving widowed mother and he steps forward and at a word
raises him to life. He feeds the multitude with just a few loaves and a
couple of fish. He calms storms at a word, in an instant. He walks on
water to reach his disciples who were battling a heavy sea. There is no
limit to his power which he effortlessly exercises at the service of
his mission. What then is the meaning of his procedure in today’s scene
when he heals the blind man? “He took the blind man by the hand and led
him outside the village. Putting spittle on his eyes he laid his hands
on the man and asked, ‘Do you see anything?’ Looking up the man
replied, ‘I see people looking like trees and walking.’Then he laid
hands on the man’s eyes a second time and he saw clearly; his sight was
restored and he could see everything distinctly”
(Mark 8:22-26).
This time the man’s sight returns only gradually after two gestures on
Christ’s part. Why is Christ doing things this way here? Well, let us
remember that our Lord was constantly dealing with incomprehension and
spiritual blindness in respect to his person and mission. In the
chapter previous to the one in which our Gospel scene today is
presented, our Lord complains to his own disciples about their lack of
understanding. His miracles were signs of what he was sent to do and of
how it would be done. Perhaps our Lord was making the point to his
disciples that the light that emanated from him was coming and would
come only gradually to them and to the rest of mankind. The power of
sin and of fallen human nature was very great, and his victory over the
world would not be sudden.
That is exactly the
typical experience of Christ’s disciples and of each of us. Our
knowledge of him and our appreciation of his mission grows gradually.
Our conversion and growth to life in him is a gradual thing. Repentance
can be and often is sudden but that same repentance must continue to
grow and deepen over the course of a lifetime. Holiness is not the work
of a day. We do not have holiness thrust upon us in one divine act with
nothing more for God to do or for us to do. We are given the gift of
holiness at our baptism, but with that the battle has only just been
joined. A long and difficult struggle remains ahead in which Christ
involves himself with us day by day and by the power of his grace and
our cooperation he slowly transforms us into his likeness. That is to
say, the gradual and seemingly laboured healing of the blind man in
today’s Gospel is something of a parable of the work of Christ in the
soul of each person and in the life of the Church over the course of
the ages. While his numerous instantaneous healings manifest his
almighty power and mercy, their instantaneous character does not
manifest the usual way he works. He usually works gradually. Grace
builds on nature. That is to say that in giving our lives to Christ our
Master we must ourselves be patient with the sin that is within and
with our own lack of understanding. We have a battle ahead, and Christ
will be working with us just as, we might say, he worked with the blind
man in today’s scene. It is Christ’s power that will do it, his
grace that will be our salvation, but he will work with us and respect
the pace we choose to go at. Discipleship and Christian holiness
involve growth, and we must be prepared to persevere patiently at the
work of cooperating with the Holy Spirit who over the span of our life
fashions us in the image of Jesus. We can imagine the disciples and
especially the Twelve over the years remembering the gradual healing of
this blind man and understanding that the gradual and at times
difficult growth of the Church is all part of the providence of God.
There is an old
saying that Rome was not built in a day. St Luke tells us that in his
human nature the boy Jesus grew in wisdom, stature and favour before
God and man. His all-holy mother pondered on things and kept them in
her heart - obviously growing in spiritual understanding of the ways of
God. Authentic holiness involves growth. We must be prepared to
persevere, constantly beginning again. Our Gospel scene today is
something of a parable of how Christ involves himself in the life of
every man to bring him gradually to the term which God intends for him.
(E.J.Tyler)
“They
shall see God”(Matthew 5:8) Saint Gregory of Nyssa
(around 335 - 395), Monk and Bishop (Homilies on the
Beatitudes, 6,1)
When from the height of the Lord’s steep words I contemplate their
infinite abyss as from the top of a cliff, my mind gets the same
impression one gets when gazing at the immensity of the sea… My soul
feels dizzy before this word of the Lord: “Blest are the pure of heart
for they shall see God.” (Mt 5:8) God gives himself to the gaze of
those who have a pure heart. But Saint John says that “no one has ever
seen God.” (Jn 1:18) And Saint Paul confirms this idea when he speaks
of him whom “no human being has ever seen or can see.” (1 Tim 6:16) God
is the abrupt and highly sharpened rock, which does not give even the
smallest hold to our imagination. Moses also called God the
Inaccessible One… He said that “no man sees the Lord and still lives.”
(Ex 33:20) But what? Eternal life is the vision of God, and these
pillars of faith certify that this vision is impossible? What an
abyss! ... If God is life, the person who does not see him does not see
life either…
But the Lord stimulates this hope. Did he not give Peter the proof?
Under the feet of this disciple who was close to drowning, he
consolidated and hardened the waves (Mt 4:30).Will the hand of the Word
also stretch out over us who are submerged in this abyss, will it
strengthen us? Then we shall be reassured, for we shall be firmly led
by the hand of the Word.
“Blest are the pure of heart for they shall see God.” Such a promise
goes beyond our greatest joys; after this happiness, what other
happiness could we desire? … The person who sees God has every
imaginable good through that vision: life without end, perpetual
incorruptibility, inexhaustible joy, unconquerable power, eternal
delights, true light, the sweet words of the spirit, incomparable
glory, uninterrupted happiness, finally, every good. What great and
beautiful hope this beatitude thus offers us!
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
If we are to accompany Christ
in his Glory, in his final triumph, we have first of all to share in
his holocaust, becoming identified with him, who died on Calvary.
(The Forge,
1022)
Who
administers this sacrament?
This sacrament can be administered only by priests (bishops or
presbyters). (CCC 1516, 1530)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.317)
(February 15) Today let us think of Saint Sigfrid of Vaxjo(Saints)
Scripture today:
Genesis
9:1-13; Psalm 102:16-18, 19-21, 29 and
22-23; Mark 8:27-33
Jesus and his
disciples set out for the villages of Caesarea Philippi. Along the way
he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” They said in
reply, “John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others one of the
prophets.” And he asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter
said to him in reply, “You are the Christ.” Then he warned them not to
tell anyone about him. He began to teach them that the Son of Man must
suffer greatly and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and
the scribes, and be killed, and rise after three days. He spoke this
openly. Then Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. At this he
turned around and, looking at his disciples, rebuked Peter and said,
“Get behind me, Satan. You are thinking not as God does, but as human
beings do.”(Mark 8:27-33)
There is no doubt
that our passage today is a pivotal one in the Gospel of St Mark. To
this point in this Gospel Christ has been revealing his extraordinary
power and teaching, and in the process revealing that he is the
long-awaited Messiah. While he has been wary of the title because of
the temporal and political assumptions which were widely held about the
coming Messiah, in our passage today he asks his disciples who they think he is. Peter answers that
he is indeed the Christ. No other prophetic figure in the Old Testament
was thought to be the Messiah, and no other figure accepted the title.
In the New Testament, John the Baptist was considered by many as a
possible contender, but he disclaimed the title. He was a voice
preparing the way for the Messiah, and he went on to point to Jesus as
the promised One. There was no prophet who could compare with Jesus for
the range, number and character of his miracles, nor could any compare
with the sublimity and authority of his teaching. Of all the
personalities who feature in the inspired writings if anyone were to be
the Messiah, it would have to be Jesus. The question is, was he? Did he
claim to be, and did people see that he was? Our passage today shows
that his own disciples who lived with and accompanied him in his public
ministry had no doubts that he was the Messiah. They told him this, and
he himself made it clear to them that they were right, that he was
indeed the Messiah. At this stage they were not to tell others of what
they knew, presumably because of the notions about the Messiah which
were widely held. This conversation, however, includes a new and, for
the disciples, incomprehensible doctrine. The Messiah is to suffer
greatly, to be rejected by the leaders of the people, and to be put to
death by them. Then he would rise (Mark 8:27-33). The Messiah’s path
would be one diametrically opposed to all they expected of him.
There were various hints and pointers to this in the Old Testament
prophecies, but they were rarely taken up and appreciated. Though in
full accord with the Scriptures, Christ’s teaching on this point was a
complete surprise.
For all practical
purposes, the doctrine that the Messiah is a Suffering Servant of God
and one who would achieve his mission through obedient suffering unto
death is the pivotal point for the Christian life. Peter’s
response to this revelation as described in our passage today is
emblematic of that of so many who are won over by the attractiveness of
Christ and his unique personality. Those who draw near to him with open
and upright dispositions will be fascinated by his person. As the
officers who were sent to arrest him said, no one has ever spoken as he
speaks. The difficult point will be his doctrine of the cross. It will
seem madness. Of course, an obvious difficulty in discipleship will be
simply living by faith in one who cannot be physically seen. Christ has
gone from our sight, and as he said to Thomas, blessed are those who
have not seen and yet believe. But granted the necessity of faith, the
next problem is that Christ is a suffering Messiah. His path is the
path of suffering, and the one who wishes to follow him must follow him
along the same path. Peter had faith in Jesus and professed it before
Jesus when asked. But the revelation that the Messiah was to suffer and
be rejected was a shock to him. He had to come to understand that this
is the Christ he would follow and imitate and preach. This is the
Christ who would save his people and all the peoples from their sins.
Now, it is very possible for any disciple of Christ in any age or place
to fail to accept the implications of this. The implication is that we
must be prepared to follow the path of renunciation. St Ignatius of
Loyola in his famous Spiritual
Exercises
sets forth a Meditation on Three Classes of Men. Each of the three
“wish to save their souls and find God” by abandoning anything that
will impede this. The first wants to do this but in fact never does.
The second is not sincere and does not really want to abandon his
attachments. The third is genuine and immediate in his self denial and
following of Christ. He is the one who accepts a suffering Messiah.
Let us pray for the
grace to follow Christ wholeheartedly along the path he himself chose
to tread, the path he asks his disciples to take. It is the path of
renunciation. It is the path that leads to the cross. It is the path of
the Suffering Servant of God who by his obedient suffering redeems the
world. By taking that path in company with Jesus in our everyday life,
we shall be playing our part in the redemption of the world, a path
that takes us to genuine sanctity in the sight of God.
(E.J.Tyler)
“You
are not judging by God’s standards” (Mark 8:27-33) St John of the Cross
(1542-1591), Carmelite, Doctor of the Church (The Spiritual Canticle,
Stanza 36, 10.13)
(The) thicket of God’s wisdom and knowledge is so deep and immense that
no matter how much the soul knows, she can always enter it further; it
is vast and its riches incomprehensible, as St. Paul exclaims: O height
of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God, how incomprehensible
are His judgments and unsearchable His ways. (Rom 11:33)
Yet the soul wants to enter this thicket and incomprehensibility of
judgments and ways because she is dying with the desire to penetrate
them deeply. Knowledge of them is an inestimable delight surpassing all
understanding…
Oh! If we could but now fully understand how a soul cannot reach the
thicket and wisdom of the riches of God … without entering the thicket
of many kinds of suffering, finding in this her delight and
consolation; and how a soul with an authentic desire for divine wisdom,
wants suffering first in order to enter this wisdom by the thicket of
the cross!… The gate entering into these riches of His wisdom is the
cross, which is narrow, and few desire to enter by it, but many desire
the delights obtained from entering there.
(Selected by
"The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
Don't let yourself be
distracted, don't give free rein to your imagination. Live the life
within you and you will be closer to God.
(The Forge,
no.1023)
How is this sacrament celebrated?
The celebration of this sacrament consists essentially in an anointing
with oil which may be blessed by the bishop. The anointing is on the
forehead and on the hands of the sick person (in the Roman rite) or
also on other parts of the body (in the other rites) accompanied by the
prayer of the priest who asks for the special grace of this sacrament.
(CCC 1517-1519, 1531) (Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.318)
Friday
of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time II
(February 16) Today let us think of Saint Onesimus(Saints)
Scripture today: Genesis
11:1-9; Psalm 33:10-11, 12-13, 14-15;
Mark 8:34--9:1 Jesus summoned the
crowd with his disciples and said to them, “Whoever wishes to come
after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For
whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his
life for my sake and that of the Gospel will save it. What profit is
there for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? What could
one give in exchange for his life? Whoever is ashamed of me and of my
words in this faithless and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be
ashamed of when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.”
He also said to them, “Amen, I say to you, there are some standing here
who will not taste death until they see that the Kingdom of God has
come in power.”(Mark 8:34--9:1) One of the most
cataclysmic periods in the history of Christianity was the Protestant
Reformation. Martin Luther broke from the Bishop of Rome
and various other reformers followed suit, and since that time
Christianity has been profoundly divided. The sixteenth century was a
period of high drama as a result, and part and
parcel of the drama was what has been called the Counter Reformation
led by great and holy Catholics. One of the greatest was Ignatius
Loyola who founded the Society of Jesus - the Jesuits. He took a long
time in his preparation, and a most interesting part of his story was
his gradual gathering about him of his little company during his days
as a converted layman. They were the seed of his great Society. Perhaps
the most famous of this tiny band was Francis Xavier, and it was
Ignatius himself who converted him. Now, what was the thought that
Ignatius persistently insinuated into the active and worldly mind of
Francis? It was the thought of death and God’s judgment. It is said
that he kept asking Francis, what will it profit a man to gain the
whole world and suffer the loss of his immortal soul? I suppose one of
the differences between the animal and human world is that due to his
reasoning powers man is able to look well ahead into the future, set
his goals in view of the future, and plan accordingly. He is able to
realize that death awaits him, and that God has revealed - and this is
supported by the intimations of his conscience - that a judgment
follows death. So he is able to plan accordingly. The important thing
is to bear in mind these last things and to take them to heart rather
than to disregard them, for come upon him they will.
In our Gospel scene
today Christ calls the people and his disciples to him and tells them
what it means to be his follower. In the Gospel of St Mark we are told
that great throngs
were following our Lord. They
were made up of disciples and the crowds. But were the crowds
really following our Lord from the heart? Hardly. It looks as though
our Lord was
desirous of bringing the matter to a head and putting it very clearly
what being a follower of his entailed. It did not mean just following
along to be entertained, or to be the recipient of various benefits
such as healings or whatever. It meant self-renunciation and bearing
the cross
in imitation of Jesus. It was the Suffering Servant of Yahweh whom they
were following. He had the power, he had the love, he had the holiness,
and he had the moral beauty, but the medium in which all this was
expressed and the framework in which his mission was completed was that
of obedient suffering. Glory came through the cross. This is the
lesson which Christ says every one of his disciples must learn, and
what is it that will help him learn it? A great help will be the
thought of death and
the judgment of God, to be followed by either heaven or hell. St
Ignatius of Loyola was quoting the words of Christ in today’s Gospel
when he put into Francis Xavier the question that changed his life:
“What gain, then, is it for a man to win the whole world and ruin his
soul? And indeed, what can man offer in exchange for his soul?” (Mark 8:34--9:1) Let us remember that the
fact of death and
the divine judgment on the human race, to be followed by either
salvation or damnation, was in the mind of God himself in sending his
divine Son to redeem the world. So it is a fundamental thought for the
life of every man. Let us be wise and
look well ahead. Let us remember that, as we hear it said to us on Ash
Wednesday, we are dust and unto dust we shall return. Life is short and
eternity long. Hence it avails nothing if we gain much in this life and
lose eternal life. Let us then resolve to take our part with Christ in
real earnest, following him along the path he chose to tread which is
the path of obedient suffering. The one thing necessary is doing the
will of God.
(E.J.Tyler) If you wish to
view a video broadcast of this reflection on today's Gospel, click here ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- “Let
him follow in my steps” (Mark
8:34--9:1)
Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger [Pope Benedict XVI] (Meditation for Holy Week,
1969)
Like the Church itself, the sacraments of the Church are the fruit of
the dying grain of wheat (Jn 12:24). In order to receive them, we must
enter into the movement from which they themselves come. That movement
consists in losing oneself, without which it is impossible to find
oneself: “Whoever would preserve his life will lose it, but whoever
loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will preserve it.” This
word of the Lord is the fundamental formula for a Christian life. When
all is said and done, to believe is to say “yes” to this holy adventure
of “losing oneself”. In its quintessence, faith is nothing other than
true love. Thus, Christian life receives its characteristic form from
the cross. The Christian opening to the world, which today is so
extolled, can find its true model only in the Lord’s open side (Jn
19:34), the expression of that radical love, which alone is able to
save.
(Selected by
"The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Help me repeat in the ear of this person
and of that other one|... and of everyone: a sinner who has faith, even
if he were to obtain all the blessings of this earth, will necessarily
be unhappy and wretched.
It is true that the motive that leads us (and should lead everyone) to
hate sin, even venial sin, ought to be a supernatural one: that God
abhors sin from the depths of his infiniteness, with a supreme, eternal
and necessary hatred, as an evil opposed to the infinite good. But the
first reason I mentioned to you can lead us to this other one.
(The Forge,
no.1024) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- What are the effects of
this sacrament? This sacrament confers a special grace
which unites the sick person more intimately to the Passion of Christ
for his good and for the good of all the Church. It gives comfort,
peace, courage, and even the forgiveness of sins if the sick person is
not able to make a confession. Sometimes, if it is the will of God,
this sacrament even brings about the restoration of physical health. In
any case this Anointing prepares the sick person for the journey to the
Father’s House. (CCC 1520-1523, 1532)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.319)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Saturday
of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time
(February 17) The
Seven Founders of the Order of Servites.These seven were members of a
Florentine confraternity and they founded the Order of Servites
(Servants) of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Servites lead an austere
life of prayer and mortification, meditating constantly on the Passion
of our Lord and venerating the Blessed Virgin Mary as Our Lady of
Sorrows. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Hebrews
11:1-7; Psalm 145:2-3, 4-5,
10-11; Mark 9:2-13
Jesus took Peter,
James, and John and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves.
And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling
white, such as no fuller on earth could bleach them. Then Elijah
appeared to them along with Moses, and they were conversing with Jesus.
Then Peter said to Jesus in reply, “Rabbi, it is good that we are here!
Let us make three tents: one for you, one for Moses, and one for
Elijah.” He hardly knew what to say, they were so terrified. Then a
cloud came, casting a shadow over them; then from the cloud came a
voice, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.” Suddenly, looking
around, the disciples no longer saw anyone but Jesus alone with them.
As they were coming down from the mountain, he charged them not to
relate what they had seen to anyone, except when the Son of Man had
risen from the dead. So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning
what rising from the dead meant. Then they asked him, “Why do the
scribes say that Elijah must come first?” He told them, “Elijah will
indeed come first and restore all things, yet how is it written
regarding the Son of Man that he must suffer greatly and be treated
with contempt? But I tell you that Elijah has come and they did to him
whatever they pleased, as it is written of him.”(Mark 9:2-13)
In the Second
Letter of Peter we read an explicit reference to today’s Gospel scene.
The inspired author tells us that “when we brought to you the knowledge
and the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ”, we did not rely on fables,
but that “we had seen his majesty for ourselves.” He is referring to
our scene today in which the glory and
greatness of Jesus was manifested to them. If we allow our minds to
pass in review across the pages of the Old Testament, there is no event
like it. Moses, for instance, was not shown in glory as Jesus was on
this occasion. Coming down from mount Sinai the face of Moses shone,
but here Christ was “transfigured before them, and his clothes became
dazzling white, such as no fuller on earth could bleach them.” His
glory was not simply a reflection of the glory of Yahweh. It was his
own glory, reminding us of the dazzling whiteness of the sun. In his
glory two of the greatest figures of the Old Testament appeared
conversing with him. It was as if Jesus was being revealed as the
pinnacle of all that had gone before and as the one who outshone the
sacred past with his light. This was confirmed by the Voice from the
cloud, the voice of God the Father, the sublime Glory who specified
Jesus as his own Beloved Son. He is the one God says we must listen to.
So then, while there are many voices in the history of the world whom
we may listen to with profit; while there have been great minds and
inspiring teachers of religion; while many have brought great benefit
to mankind with their wisdom; while the Old Testament itself is the
written expression of God’s own revelation, there is One whom God
himself has pointed to as the Master Teacher. No other is his equal for
his truth and his heavenly status. He is the divine Son of God the
Father, the Father’s Voice on earth.
Let us place
ourselves in this Gospel scene (Mark 9:2-13), lingering in its
memory and often returning to it. The same Jesus who was shown in his
glory on this mount lives with us now in the life of the Church. In the
prologue of his Gospel St John writes that “we saw his glory, the glory
that is his as the only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth.”
John was one of the three witnesses of Christ’s transfiguration when
the Father explicitly revealed and taught who Jesus is. Every man and
woman ought consider the implications of this Gospel event. If one is a
non-believer, an atheist or an agnostic, the question is, could this
not have happened after all? What if I am quite wrong and Jesus is as
he is portrayed in the Gospels by those who knew him, lived with him,
and claimed to have seen what they reported? Three of the four Gospels
describe this scene of the transfiguration of Christ with the voice
from heaven, and the fourth Gospel (written by a witness of the scene)
does not repeat the description but speaks of having seen “his glory.”
In fact the entire life of the disciple of Christ is to be a life of
giving glory to him, just as the Father gave glory to him on this
occasion. We give glory to him by doing as the Father commanded us -
by listening to him. If we listen to him as one who intends to
put into practice what has been heard, Christ will be glorified in our
obedience. The glory that was manifested in him on this occasion will
be rendered to him on our part by following his teaching and adhering
to his Person.
Let us in our
hearts render to Christ the glory that is his by recognizing that he is
the Son of God and the Teacher of mankind. Let us receive his teaching
as it comes to us in the teaching and preaching of the Church, and let
us shape our lives according to that teaching no matter what the cost.
We follow his teaching as the expression of our adherence to him as our
Saviour and our God.
(E.J.Tyler)
Contemplating
and following the Transfigurated One (John Paul II, pope from
1978 to 2005) (Vita Consecrata),
§ 75
He continually calls new disciples to himself, both men and women, to
communicate to them, by an outpouring of the Spirit (cf. Rom 5:5), the
divine agape, his way of loving, and to urge them thus to serve others
in the humble gift of themselves, far from all self-interest. Peter,
overcome by the light of the Transfiguration, exclaims: "Lord, it is
well that we are here" (Mt 17:4), but he is invited to return to the
byways of the world in order to continue serving the Kingdom of God:
"Come down, Peter! You wanted to rest up on the mountain: come down.
Preach the word of God, be insistent both when it is timely and when it
is not; reprove, exhort, give encouragement using all your forbearance
and ability to teach. Work, spend yourself, accept even sufferings and
torments, in order that, through the brightness and beauty of good
works, you may possess in charity what is symbolized in the Lord's
white garments" (Saint Augustine, Sermon 78:6).
The fact that consecrated persons fix their gaze on the Lord's
countenance does not diminish their commitment on behalf of humanity;
on the contrary, it strengthens this commitment, enabling it to have an
impact on history, in order to free history from all that disfigures it.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY
40052. USA.)
What is Viaticum?
Viaticum is the Holy Eucharist received by those who are about to leave
this earthly life and are preparing for the journey to eternal life.
Communion in the body and blood of Christ who died and rose from the
dead, received at the moment of passing from this world to the Father,
is the seed of eternal life and the power of the resurrection. (CCC
1524-1525L)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.320)
Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time C
(February 18) Today let us think of St Flavian(Saints) 1 Samuel
26:2, 7-9, 12-13, 22-23; Psalm 103:1-2, 3-4, 8,
10,
12-1; 1 Corinthians
15:45-49; Luke 6:27-38 Jesus said to his
disciples: “To you who hear I say, love your enemies,
do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for
those who mistreat you. To the person who strikes you on one cheek,
offer the other one as well, and from the person who takes your cloak,
do not withhold even your tunic. Give to everyone who asks of you, and
from the one who takes what is yours do not demand it back. Do to
others as you would have them do to you. For if you love those who love
you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them.
And
if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you?
Even sinners do the same. If you lend money to those from whom you
expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to
sinners, and get back the same amount. But rather, love your enemies
and do good to them, and lend expecting nothing back; then your reward
will be great and you will be children of the Most High, for he himself
is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your
Father is merciful. “Stop judging and you will not be judged. Stop
condemning and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be
forgiven. Give, and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed
together, shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap.
For the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out
to you.” (Luke 6:27-38) In our Gospel
passage today Christ does not present us with what we might call an
ideal, but with his requirements if we wish to be his
disciples. He requires of us that we strive to have hearts like that of
our heavenly Father. “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.” It
is to Jesus that we must look if we are to know what our heavenly
Father is like, because Christ is the image of the unseen God. “He who
sees me” our Lord told his
disciples at the Last Supper, “sees the
Father.” “The Father is in me, and I am in the Father.” Our Lord tells
us in our passage today that we are to love our enemies, to do good to
those who hate us, to bless those who curse us, and to pray for those
who mistreat us. We are not to condemn. We are to forgive. We are to
give liberally. In this way we shall be children of our Father in
heaven. This does not mean that we should allow evildoers to proceed in
their wrongdoing, but it does mean that God wants our hearts, our
thoughts, our words and our deeds to be like his own, and our Lord
tells us that our Father loves the wicked. That would strike the
average religious person, the person of most of the great religions of
the world, at the very least as being unrealistic. But in the sight of
God it is not.
Christ’s command that we love those who wrong us is a new revelation, a
new commandment and he pointed to himself as the model. Love one
another as I have loved you, he told us, and he himself forgave and
loved his enemies. That this is not just an ideal but a requirement is
indicated in the fact that there are divine sanctions involved. Our
Lord warns that “the measure with which you measure will in return be
measured out to you.” (Luke
6:27-38)
If we are
ever to live such a life as our Lord requires, there
are a two essential things we need to appreciate. Firstly, the
foundation of such a life is a clear notion of the character and nature
of God. As Pope Benedict reminds us in his first Encyclical, God is
love. That is the teaching of today’s Gospel and of the New Testament,
and in the light of the New Testament we can see it is the teaching of
the Old Testament too. God has revealed himself to be a God rich in
mercy and compassion. His almighty power is manifested in his mercy and
love. If we are ever to appreciate this all our lives we must ponder
and pray over God’s revelation of himself. Our tendency will be to
attribute to God what we experience in ourselves and in others, and to
project our own limitations and those of others on to him. If only we
can truly discover
the love that God has for us and for all men, what a difference it will
make to our lives! If only we can come to appreciate the enormity of
our own sins, the seriousness of our inherited fallen condition, and
the scale of God’s love for us! God our Father will then be a living
model for all our thoughts, all our words and actions. If then we live
constantly in his loving presence knowing that he sees all that we do,
say and think, he himself, our loving Father, will be our constant
inspiration. We will be drawn to think as he thinks, to want what he
wants, and to love as he loves. So we need to form our image and
impression of God on the basis of his revelation as transmitted in the
Scriptures and in the Church’s living Tradition, and that process will
take time. It will involve prayer, reading and a true commitment. If we
are to love as Christ commands, we must appreciate that God is
love.
Secondly we
need to cultivate detachment of soul, a true poverty
of spirit. We cannot hope to be able to love in a pure and
disinterested way if we want various things for ourselves in the
process. If our heart is attached to riches, to honours, to power and
to pleasures, then whenever these are threatened or denied us to a
greater or lesser extent, our reaction will be one of anger and desire
for revenge. How will we be able to love our enemies and do good to
them, how will we be able to bless those who curse us and pray for
those who mistreat us if we are attached to the things that they are
denying us? The key to loving others as Christ loves us, the key to
being able to do good to those who harm us, the key to being merciful
as our heavenly Father is merciful, is to grow in poverty of spirit for
the love of Christ. We need to empty our hearts of all that is not God
or not related to God. If our hearts are empty of every attachment
except whatever is pleasing to God, we shall have it in us to love
according to the mind of Christ. This is the meaning of our Lord’s
teaching that blessed are the poor in spirit, for they shall inherit
the land. Let us resolve to love others as Christ sets forth in today’s
Gospel. The key to achieving this will be appreciating from the heart
that God is love and striving for a Christlike detachment from all that
is not according to the mind of God.
(E.J.Tyler) Further reading: The Catechism of the
Catholic Church, no.2544-2550 If you wish to
view a video broadcast of this reflection on today's Gospel, click here -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Love
your enemies, and pray for those who
persecute you" (Matthew 5:44) Saint Polycarp (69 –
155) Bishop and Martyr (Letter to the
Philippians,
8-12)
Let us then continually persevere in our hope, and the earnest of our
righteousness, which is Jesus Christ, who bore our sins in his own body
on the tree, "who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth,"
(1P 2:22) but endured all things for us, that we might live in him. Let
us then be imitators of his patience; and if we suffer for his name's
sake, let us glorify him. For he has set us this example in himself,
and we have believed that such is the case… Stand fast, therefore, in
these things, and follow the example of the Lord, being firm and
unchangeable in the faith, loving the brotherhood, and being attached
to one another, joined together in the truth, exhibiting the meekness
of the Lord in your intercourse with one another, and despising no one…
For I trust that you are well versed in the Sacred Scriptures, and that
nothing is hid from you; but to me this privilege is not yet granted.
It is declared then in these Scriptures, "Be angry, and sin not," and,
"Let not the sun go down upon your wrath" (Ep 4:26). Happy is he who
remembers this, which I believe to be the case with you.
But may the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ
himself, who is the Son of God, and our everlasting High Priest, build
you up in faith and truth, and in all meekness, gentleness, patience,
long-suffering, forbearance, and purity; and may he bestow on you a lot
and portion among his saints, and on us with you, and on all that are
under heaven, who shall believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, and in his
Father, who raised him from the dead. Pray for all the saints. Pray
also for kings, and potentates, and princes, and for those that
persecute and hate you, and for the enemies of the cross. May your
fruit be manifest to all, and may you be perfect in him.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Violent persecution had broken
out. And that priest prayed: Jesus, may
every sacrilegious fire increase in me the fire of Love and Reparation.
(The Forge,
no.1026) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- What are the
sacraments at the service
of communion and mission?
Two sacraments, Holy Orders and Matrimony, confer a special grace for a
particular mission in the Church to serve and build up the People of
God. These sacraments contribute in a special way to ecclesial
communion and to the salvation of others. (CCC 1533-1535)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.321) -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday
of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time II
(February 19) Today let us think of St Boniface of Lausanne(Saints)
Scripture today:
Sirach
1:1-10; Psalm 93:1ab, 1cd-2,
5; Mark 9:14-29
As Jesus came down
from the mountain with Peter, James, John and approached the other
disciples, they saw a large crowd around them and scribes arguing with
them. Immediately on seeing him, the whole crowd was utterly amazed.
They ran up to him and greeted him. He asked them, “What are you
arguing about with them?” Someone from the crowd answered him,
“Teacher, I have brought to you my son possessed by a mute spirit.
Wherever it seizes him, it throws him down; he foams at the mouth,
grinds his teeth, and becomes rigid. I asked your disciples to drive it
out, but they were unable to do so.” He said to them in reply, “O
faithless generation, how long will I be with you? How long will I
endure you? Bring him to me.” They brought the boy to him. And when he
saw him, the spirit immediately threw the boy into convulsions. As he
fell to the ground, he began to roll around and foam at the mouth. Then
he questioned his father, “How long has this been happening to him?” He
replied, “Since childhood. It has often thrown him into fire and into
water to kill him. But if you can do anything, have compassion on us
and help us.” Jesus said to him, “‘If you can!’ Everything is possible
to one who has faith.” Then the boy’s father cried out, “I do believe,
help my unbelief!” Jesus, on seeing a crowd rapidly gathering, rebuked
the unclean spirit and said to it, “Mute and deaf spirit, I command
you: come out of him and never enter him again!” Shouting and throwing
the boy into convulsions, it came out. He became like a corpse, which
caused many to say, “He is dead!” But Jesus took him by the hand,
raised him, and he stood up. When he entered the house, his disciples
asked him in private, “Why could we not drive the spirit out?” He said
to them, “This kind can only come out through prayer.” (Mark 9:14-29)
Let us consider
this Gospel scene today in which our Lord offers such an impressive
display of divine power. We have here a confrontation between Christ
and a particularly tenacious demon. Our Lord has just been transfigured
on the mountain and he now arrives with his three apostles at the place
where his other disciples were. These disciples had been asked to cast
out the demon from the boy but they were unable to. Obviously his
disciples had cast out various demons in the name of Jesus and had been
authorized by him to do so. But this one they were unable to drive out.
Our Lord’s response to them suggests that they failed somewhat in
faith, but as he explains later, that was not the whole story. The
demon had afflicted the boy since his childhood and had caused immense
damage to him, casting him into the fire and into the water to kill
him. The father was absolutely desperate and appealed to Jesus for
help. At a word Christ effortlessly expelled the demon from the boy,
despite the convulsions which the demon caused in departing from him (Mark 9:14-29). What is manifest in
our Gospel scene is the great power of the all-holy Christ. There is
nothing he cannot do when asked, provided it is in accord with the will
of his heavenly Father. The underworld is no match for him. What is
also manifest is the reality and evil of the
devils. They exist and they are very evil. In this case the demon had
been preying
on a child. Somehow he had gotten possession of the boy and he would
not let go, doing harm after harm to this young life. From this case we
can conclude that Satan can dominate a person without it necessarily
being that person’s moral fault - because we cannot presume that this
young person was morally responsible for the entry of Satan into his
life. So Satan is not only evil and destructive, but is a coward, at
times
preying on the weak and defenceless.
In every soul, in
every heart, in every family, in every society, and across the face of
the earth, two flags are flying, two banners. The one is the standard
of Christ and the other is the standard of Satan. Two armies are
in battle array, Christ and his followers, and Satan with his evil
spirits and their knowing or unknowing followers. There will be no
quarter between the two, and the one is by far the stronger. Though
Christ is the stronger by far, Satan in his delusions wishes to bring
him down together with those who opt for him. The victory by Christ is
a foregone conclusion, but many skirmishes will be won - we could say -
by Satan. Souls will be lost unless we fight hard with Christ. The flag
of Satan has to be captured and flung into oblivion. This fight goes on
every day in the heart of each man and it is played out in the whole
range of everyday life. The battle is joined in every parliament when
legislation is prepared enabling abortion, embryonic stem cell
research, same sex marriages, and the plethora of immoral abnormalities
that take root in society. The Church fights Satan when every one of
her members opposes moral evil in the world of everyday life. To
conduct the
fight, to drive out the demon, we must live by faith. St John says in
one of his Letters that this is the victory over the world, our faith.
In today’s Gospel our Lord expresses pained disappointment at the lack
of faith in confrontations with Satan: “He said to them in reply, ‘O
faithless generation, how long will I be with you? How long will I
endure you? Bring him to me’.” But even more is needed, and that is
prayer. “When he entered the house, his disciples asked him in private,
‘Why could we not drive the spirit out?’ He said to them, ‘This kind
can only come out through prayer’.”
(Mark 9:14-29).
Let every disciple of Christ, then, face the struggle of every day with
faith and prayer.
Our Gospel scene
today ought teach us that we have in the person of Jesus one whom we
can trust altogether and always. His power is without limit, and his
compassion is beyond compare. He is God and he is one of us. His
kingdom will have no end, and the victory will assuredly be his. So let
us gather
with him and never look back.
(E.J.Tyler)
“I
believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:14-29) Saint Isaac the Syrian (7th
century), Monk in Nineveh, near Mosul in present-day Iraq)
(Ascetic Discourses,
1st series, 72)
Faith is the gateway to the mysteries. What the eyes of the body are
for palpable things, faith is for the hidden eyes of the soul. The
Fathers say that just as our body has two eyes, so our soul has two
spiritual eyes, and each one has its own vision. Through one eye, we
see the secrets of God’s glory hidden in the beings of God’s creation,
which is to say, God’s power, his wisdom, and his eternal providence,
which surrounds us and which we understand when we consider the
greatness of the heights to which God leads us. With that same eye, we
also contemplate the celestial orders, the angels, our companions and
fellow servants (Rev 22:9).
And with the other eye we contemplate the glory of God’s holiness, when
he wants to make us enter into his spiritual mysteries and when he
opens up the ocean of faith to our intelligence.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
When you
consider the beauty, the greatness and the effectiveness of apostolic
work, you say that your head aches thinking of the amount of ground
that still has to be covered —there are so many souls who are waiting!
But you feel so happy offering yourself as a slave to Jesus. You have a
great desire for his Cross and for suffering, for Love and for souls.
Without thinking about it, in an instinctive gesture — which was one of
Love — you stretched out your arms and opened the palms of your hands,
ready for him to nail you to his Holy Cross. You were ready to be his
slave — serviam — which is to reign.
(The Forge,
no.1027)
What is the
sacrament of Holy Orders?
It is the sacrament through which the mission entrusted by Christ to
his apostles continues to be exercised in the Church until the end of
time. (CCC 1536)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.322)
Tuesday
of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time II
(February 20) Today let us think of St Wulfric(Saints)
Scripture today:
Sirach
2:1-11; Psalm 37:3-4, 18-19, 27-28,
39-40; Mark 9:30-37 Jesus and his
disciples left from there and began a journey through Galilee, but he
did not wish anyone to know about it. He was teaching his disciples and
telling them, “The Son of Man is to be handed over to men and they will
kill him, and three days after his death the Son of Man will rise.” But
they did not understand the saying, and they were afraid to question
him. They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, he began to ask
them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” But they remained
silent. For they had been discussing among themselves on the way who
was the greatest. Then he sat down, called the Twelve, and said to
them, “If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and
the servant of all.” Taking a child, he placed it in their midst, and
putting his arms around it, he said to them, “Whoever receives one
child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me,
receives not me but the One who sent me.” (Mark 9:30-37) In our Gospel
passage today our Lord is shown making his way through Galilee quietly
with his disciples. He did not want anyone to know about his presence
or movements. The critical thing at this point was the adequate
instruction of his disciples. Our Lord’s time was running out, and he was making this clear
to them. Of course, if our Lord had wanted to avoid his passion and
death, there would have been no difficulty in his doing so. He had
often eluded capture in the past and he could easily have used his
divine power in his own defense. During his passion he said to Peter
that were he to ask, his heavenly Father would send twelve legions of
angels to defend him. But no. His being “handed over to men” was a
fundamental part of his mission. His death and his resurrection was the
key to his work on earth and he was taking time to convey this to his
disciples. But among his disciples he met with incomprehension: “they
did not understand the saying, and they were afraid to question him.” (Mark 9:30-37) Their profound
difficulty in grasping Christ’s teaching on this critical point reminds
us that the difficulty of man in comprehending Christ’s revelation is
of an order different from that entailed in grasping the teaching of
other great thinkers, writers, philosophers and teachers of religion.
Christ’s teaching is radically other than the teaching of the world and
cannot be reduced to it. It can be and always is defended as being
rational, but not as being simply rational and nothing more, for it
involves a revelation from God. This applies most especially to
Christ’s teaching about his own passion and death and the suffering
that is an essential part of being his disciple. It can take a long
time to grasp this, and it will not be grasped if we are approaching it
with the mind of the world. In a word, the grace of God is needed to
understand and assent to what Christ has revealed. On the one hand,
then, our Gospel scene presents Christ teaching his disciples, and on
the other his disciples failing to comprehend. So we are reminded of
our need for the assistance of the Holy Spirit if we are ever to gain
the insight which Christ wishes us to have. On one occasion our Lord
asked his disciples who the people were saying the Son of Man is. They
gave him various answers, and then he asked them who they themselves
said he was. Simon spoke on behalf of them, telling him that he was the
Messiah the Son of God. Our Lord then told Simon that it was his
heavenly Father who had revealed this to him. It is God who enlightens
us as to the person and the teaching of Christ. Without the grace of
God we would not comprehend. At his death and despite all his efforts
to instruct them, his disciples still did not comprehend. We remember
how on the day he rose from the dead our Lord met two of his disciples
walking downcast on their way to the village of Emmaus. He
pointed out to them their incomprehension and slowness to perceive.
That evening he upbraided his disciples for their inability to accept
it when they had heard of his resurrection. Despite their constant
company with him not only before but even after his resurrection, to a
large extent they failed to comprehend. The unbelief of Thomas until he
actually saw was a case in point. It was only with the coming of the
Holy Spirit at Pentecost that all was changed. The Holy Spirit remains
with the Church through the ages to guide the development of her
understanding of Christ and his teaching. All this is to say that it is
not enough to hear about Christ, nor is it enough to read the
Scriptures and listen to the teaching and the testimony of the Church.
We must ask for the grace and the help of the Holy Spirit to understand
what we hear and read. The Spirit of God is absolutely critical.
Let us place
ourselves in the company of Jesus as he quietly and away from the
crowds puts quality time into the instruction of his disciples. He is
teaching them (and us) what it means to follow him. He wants us to
understand the central place of the Cross in the life of the Christian.
Let us ask the grace of the Holy Spirit to help us be true disciples of
the Master, for we cannot be this if we look on him with the mind of
the world.
(E.J.Tyler) If you wish to
view a video broadcast of this reflection on today's Gospel, click here ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- “What
were you discussing on the way?” (Mark 9:30-37) Silouane (1866-1938),
Orthodox monk (Spiritual
Writings)
Oh humility of Jesus Christ! You give the soul indescribable joy. I
thirst for you because in you the soul forgets the earth and stretches
out ever more ardently towards God. If the world understood the power
of Christ’s words: “Learn gentleness and humility from me,” (cf. Mt
11:29), it would put all other knowledge aside in order to acquire that
heavenly knowledge.
Human beings do not know the strength of Christ’s humility, and they
desire the things of the earth. But a person cannot come to the power
of these words of the Lord without the Holy Spirit. The person who has
plumbed them no longer leaves them, even if all the treasures of the
earth are offered to him… The person who has tasted that love of the
infinitely gentle God can no longer dream of the things of the earth;
he feels constantly drawn by that love.
But we lose it through our pride and our vanity, through our enmities
and our judgment of our brothers; we abandon it through our greedy
thoughts and our proclivity towards the earth. Then grace abandons us
and the troubled, depressed soul desires God and calls him, like Adam
when he was chased from Paradise. My soul yearns and I seek you with
tears. See my affliction, enlighten my darkness so that my soul might
have joy. Lord, give me your humility so that your love might be in me
and that the fear of you might live in me.
(Selected by
"The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I was moved by the heartfelt
petition that came from your lips: My God, my only desire is to be
pleasing in your sight; nothing else matters to me. My Mother
Immaculate, may I be motivated exclusively by Love.
(The Forge,
no.1028) -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why is this sacrament called Holy Orders?
Orders designates an ecclesial body into which one enters by means of a
special consecration (ordination). Through a special gift of the Holy
Spirit, this sacrament enables the ordained to exercise a sacred power
in the name and with the authority of Christ for the service of the
People of God. (CCC 1537-1538)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.323) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ash Wednesday II
(February 21) St. Peter Damian,
bishop and doctor of the Church (1007-1072). Born at Ravenna,
after completing his studies he taught for a short while but then gave
it up and became a hermit at Fonte Avelllana. He was elected
Benedictine Prior of the community and strenuously promoted religious
observance both there and in other parts of Italy. In the difficult
times in which he lived he helped the Popes by his writings and acted
as papal legate to reform the Church. He was created a Cardinal and
Bishop of Ostia by Stephen IX. He was the author of many important
works on liturgy, theology, and morals, and supported St Gregory VII in
his struggle for the rights of the Church. On his death in 1072 he was
immediately venerated as a saint. (Saints)
Scripture today:
Joel
2:12-18; Psalm 51:3-4, 5-6ab,
12-13, 14 and 17;
2 Corinthians 5:20—6:2;
Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18
Jesus said to his
disciples: “Take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that
people may see them; otherwise, you will have no recompense from your
heavenly Father. When you give alms, do not blow a trumpet before you,
as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets to win the
praise of others. Amen, I say to you, they have received their reward.
But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right
is doing, so that your almsgiving may be secret. And your Father who
sees in secret will repay you. “When you pray, do not be like the
hypocrites, who love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on street
corners so that others may see them. Amen, I say to you, they have
received their reward. But when you pray, go to your inner room, close
the door, and pray to your Father in secret. And your Father who sees
in secret will repay you. “When you fast, do not look gloomy like the
hypocrites. They neglect their appearance, so that they may appear to
others to be fasting. Amen, I say to you, they have received their
reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that
you may not appear to be fasting, except to your Father who is hidden.
And your Father who sees what is hidden will repay you.” (Matthew 6:1-6,
16-18)
Ash Wednesday marks
the special liturgical season of Lent, and Lent is the time for
spiritual renewal when we unite ourselves with Jesus as he approaches
his death and resurrection which is celebrated at the end of Lent
during Holy Week. A time of renewal involves renewing the
foundations. In Christian spirituality there are three great supports
to a life of union with God: they are prayer, self-denial and
works of mercy towards others. They are stressed in both the Old
Testament and the New Testament, and here in our Gospel passage today (Matthew
6:1-6, 16-18)
our Lord comments on them. The danger in any good deed is that we can
do it for the wrong reason. For instance, a father can take great care
of his son not so much for his son’s benefit as for his own. The danger
with religious practices too is that we can do them for the wrong
reasons. We can spend time in prayer in order to appear good and
religious. We can give alms in order, at least partially, to gain the
admiration of men - without being fully conscious that this is our
motivation, and all admire a generous helping of the needy. Likewise we
can engage in self-denial for a similarly self-serving purpose. In our
Lord’s teaching about the religious life that is given in our passage
here he chooses to stress that in our religious life we ought indeed do
these things, but for the right reason. We ought do them, that is to
say, for God. So then, if we wish to make progress in our union with
God we should use the time of Lent to ask ourselves what exactly we are
doing about our spiritual life, and just why we are doing it anyway?
The question of why
we are doing what we do is particularly important. It is the one our
Lord raises before us in his teaching today. What is motivating our
life, including our religious life? If we do not attend to this
issue our inherited fallen condition will incline us to do what we do
for self-serving and all too often for sinful purposes. We should
strive therefore to purify our motives and do all for the love of God.
On one occasion when asked, our Lord said that the first and greatest
commandment was to love God with all our heart, all our soul, all our
mind and all our strength. God’s command is that we love him first and
foremost in everything we do. Well, are we loving God and making him
the true object of our life and of our religion in all that we do? When
we think then of Lent we ought think of a time when we make an
altogether special effort to see God in everything and do what he wants
us to do and do it for him alone. If we emerge from Lent with a purer
love of God in the midst of our ordinary life we shall have had a
very beneficial Lent indeed. And let us notice a further detail in our
Lord’s words of instruction today on the practice of religion. It is
that we ought do all in the presence of our Father in heaven - our
Father. That is precisely what our Lord himself did, as the Son of the
Father. Who did our Lord serve throughout his life? He served his
heavenly Father. We are called to do the same in union with Jesus and
by the grace of the Holy Spirit. So our Lord’s words exhorting us to
live our spiritual life for God and not for other reasons, not for
ourselves, have an emphatic Trinitarian emphasis. Lent ought be a time
of special immersion in the life of the Holy Trinity and a renewed
appreciation of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
So let us ponder
our Lord’s words on prayer, self-denial such as fasting, and works of
mercy such as almsgiving. Let us take to heart our Lord’s instruction
that we do these very important things, yes, but that we do them for
God and for his honour and glory and not for our own. Let us also
resolve to live our human and religious life in the presence of God the
Father, in union with Jesus his Son and by the grace of the Holy
Spirit. Let us make the Holy Trinity the object and centre of our life.
(E.J.Tyler)
In the
secret of the
heart John Paul II, pope from
1978 to 2005 (Homily
for Ash Wednesday 1983)
Lent is the time to come back to our self. It is a time of particular
intimacy with God, in the secret of the heart and of the conscience. It
is in this private intimacy with God that the essential work of Lent is
accomplished: the work of conversion.
And in this inner secret, in this intimacy with God in the full truth
of the heart and of the conscience, words like those of the psalms of
today's liturgy resound as one of the most profound confessions that
man has ever done to God: “Have mercy on me, God, in your goodness; in
your abundant compassion blot out my offense. Wash away all my guilt;
from my sin cleanse me. For I know my offense; my sin is always before
me. Against you alone have I sinned; I have done such evil in your
sight that you are just in your sentence, blameless when you condemn”
(Ps 50,1-6).
These are words that purify, words that transform. They transform man
from the inside. Let us recite them often during Lent. And above all,
let us strive to renovate the spirit that leads them, the inspiration
that has rightly so given these words a force of conversion. For Lent
is essentially an invitation to conversion. The works of alms of which
the Gospel speaks about today open the way to this conversion. Let us
practice them as much as we can. But first of all, let us try to meet
God interiorly in our whole life, in all it is made of, so as to reach
this conversion in deepness, of which the penitential psalm of today's
liturgy is filled.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
What place
does the sacrament of Holy Orders have in the divine plan of salvation? This sacrament was prefigured in the Old
Covenant in the service of the Levites, in the priesthood of Aaron, and
in the institution of the seventy “Elders” (Numbers 11:25). These
prefigurations find their fulfillment in Christ Jesus who by the
sacrifice of the cross is the “one mediator between God and man” (1
Timothy 2:5), the “High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek”
(Hebrews 5:10). The one priesthood of Christ is made present in the
ministerial priesthood.
(CCC 1539-1546, 1590-1591)
“Only Christ is the true priest, the others being only his ministers.”
(Saint Thomas Aquinas)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.324)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Feast of the Chair
of Saint Peter, Apostle
(Thursday after Ash Wednesday)
(February 22) This feast of the Chair of St Peter
brings to mind the mission of teacher and pastor conferred by Christ on
Peter, and continued in an unbroken line down to the present Pope. We
celebrate the unity of the Church, founded upon the Apostle, and renew
our assent to the magisterium of the Roman Pontiff, extended both to
truths which are solemnly defined “ex cathedra” and to all the acts of
the ordinary magisterium. (Saints)
Scripture
today: 1 Peter
5:1-4; Psalm 23:1-3a, 4, 5,
6; Matthew 16:13-19
When Jesus went
into the region of Caesarea Philippi he asked his disciples, “Who do
people say that the Son of Man is?” They replied, “Some say John the
Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”
He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter said in
reply, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Jesus said to
him in reply, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood
has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to
you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the
gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you
the keys to the Kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be
bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in
heaven.”(Matthew 16:13-19)
We could say that
our passage from the Gospel of St Matthew today is one of the high
points of the Gospel. Our Lord asks his disciples, those who lived with
him constantly, those who constantly heard from him his words and his
teaching, who they consider him to be. In the person of Simon Peter
they give him the right answer, that he is “the Christ, the Son of the
living God.” This is a great achievement of faith on their part
and it is a great consolation for our Lord himself in his efforts to
form them. They had attained that faith which if lived consistently
will save a man. Just before he ascended into heaven our Lord commanded
his disciples to go to the whole world and make disciples of all the
nations. Our Lord told them that he who believes and is baptized will
be saved, and he who refuses belief will be condemned. They themselves
had attained this faith, and now they were to spread it. So the faith
which the disciples manifested and professed on this occasion was of
critical importance in our Lord’s public ministry and it had far
reaching implications for human history to come. It allowed our Lord to
take his next step which involved a further decisive revelation. Christ
had been preaching the arrival of the kingdom of God and its nature.
The kingdom of his Father was the object of his preaching. Now he tells
Simon that his name is now the Rock, Peter, and that he will build his
Church on this Rock His explicit reference to instituting, establishing
and building his Church is a new element in his teaching. It is clear
that in the divine plan Christ will establish the promised kingdom of
God through his Church. It is in and through the Church that the
kingdom of God - embodied and active in his own person - will be
present among men. His Church will be the seed and instrument of his
kingdom.
Moreover this
Church which is the seed and beginning of God’s saving kingdom will
stand successfully against the powers of hell. The way Christ expresses
it suggests that the Church will be buffeted unceasingly, but will not
fail. Just as Christ was assailed continually by his enemies who did
not prevail, so too will the Church be similarly assailed. Very
importantly, and again as a new revelation, his Church will be built on
Peter, for “on this rock I will build my Church.” It is to Peter that
Christ will also give the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Of
course, in entrusting to Simon the keys that provide access to his
kingdom, Christ is entrusting them to the Church, but it is Peter who
holds and uses them in a special and official way. How those keys are
to be used is entrusted to the discretion of Peter: “I will give you
the keys to the Kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be
bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in
heaven” (Matthew
16:13-19).
He directs his words specifically to Peter, as the head of the Twelve.
That this entrusting of the keys is the granting of an enormous power
is indicated in the next sentence, in which Peter is empowered to bind
and loose and whenever he does so his decision will be ratified in
heaven. He will carry the authority of Christ. So we see in our passage
today our Lord making more explicit and concrete his doctrine of the
kingdom of God. Christ will establish God’s kingdom on earth through
his Church which will be its seed and beginning, and it is to Peter,
the rock of this Church which he will build, that Christ entrusts the
keys. He is being given the authority to open and close the doors to
this kingdom by his teaching and ministry, and the exercise of this
authority will carry the sanctions of heaven. The general doctrine of
the kingdom has become much more explicit.
Today is the feast
of the Chair of St Peter. That is to say, today we think of the
explicit authority granted to Peter by Christ to make accessible to all
the riches of the kingdom of God. In effect this means that Peter has
and will have till the end of time when Christ comes again a unique
role in bringing man to the knowledge of Christ, for it is in Christ
that the kingdom of God is to be found. Peter lives in the midst
of the Church in the person of his successors, and it is in them that
he uses the keys Christ has entrusted to him. Let us renew our
appreciation of this divinely established Chair that teaches and guides
all to Christ, the fount of salvation.
(E.J.Tyler)
"Peter
will be the rocky foundation on
which he will build the edifice of the Church" Pope Benedict XVI (General audience,
7 June 2006)
"You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church.... I will give
you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, and whatever you bind on earth
will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed
in heaven". In themselves, the three metaphors that Jesus uses are
crystal clear: Peter will be the rocky foundation on which he
will build the edifice of the Church; he will have the keys of the
Kingdom of Heaven to open or close it to people as he sees fit; lastly,
he will be able to bind or to loose, in the sense of establishing or
prohibiting whatever he deems necessary for the life of the Church. It
is always Christ's Church…
This pre-eminent position that Jesus wanted to bestow upon Peter is
also encountered after the Resurrection (Mk 16:7; Jn 20:2.4-6)…
Then, Peter was to be the first witness of an appearance of the Risen
One (cf. Lk 24: 34; I Cor 15: 5). His role, decisively emphasized (cf.
Jn 20: 3-10), marks the continuity between the pre-eminence he had in
the group of the Apostles and the pre-eminence he would continue to
have in the community born with the paschal events… Moreover, the fact
that several of the key texts that refer to Peter can be traced back to
the context of the Last Supper, during which Christ conferred upon
Peter the ministry of strengthening his brethren (cf. Lk 22: 31ff.)…
This contextualization of the Primacy of Peter at the Last Supper, at
the moment of the Institution of the Eucharist, the Lord's Pasch, also
points to the ultimate meaning of this Primacy: Peter must be the
custodian of communion with Christ for all time. He must guide people
to communion with Christ; he must ensure that the net does not break
(Jn 21:11), and consequently that universal communion endures. Only
together can we be with Christ, who is Lord of all. Thus, Peter is
responsible for guaranteeing communion with Christ with the love of
Christ, guiding people to fulfil this love in everyday life. Let us
pray that the Primacy of Peter, entrusted to poor human beings, will
always be exercised in this original sense as the Lord desired, and
that its true meaning will therefore always be recognized by the
brethren who are not yet in full communion with us.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
My God, when will I love you
for yourself? Although when we think about it, Lord, to desire an
everlasting reward is to desire you, for you give yourself as our
reward.
(The Forge,
no.1030)
What are the degrees that
make up the sacrament of Holy Orders?
The sacrament of Holy Orders is composed of three degrees which are
irreplaceable for the organic structure of the Church: the episcopate,
the presbyterate and the diaconate. (CCC 1554, 1593)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.325)
(February 23) Saint
Polycarp, bishop and martyr. Polycarp was a disciple of the
apostles and bishop of Smyrna (Izmir, in Turkey), as well as a friend
of St Ignatius of Antioch. He went to Rome to confer with Pope St
Anicetus about the celebration of Easter. He suffered martyrdom about
the year 155 by being burnt to death in the city stadium. (Saints)
Scripture today: Isaiah
58:1-9a; Psalm 51:3-4, 5-6ab,
18-19; Matthew 9:14-15
The disciples of
John approached Jesus and said, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast much,
but your disciples do not fast?” Jesus answered them, “Can the wedding
guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come
when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.”(Matthew
9:14-15)
Our Gospel scene
today shows the disciples of John the Baptist coming to our Lord with a
point that perplexed them. They did not see in our Lord’s disciples
certain elements of strictness of life observed by them and by the
Pharisees. For instance, our Lord’s disciples did not fast. Why was
that? Our Lord in response did not deny that his disciples
did not make a notable point of fasting. They did not fast as much as
the disciples of John and the disciples of the Pharisees. Nor did our
Lord deny that fasting was important. His reply to them was, let us
take one thing at a time. The time for his disciples to fast in that
fashion was not now, but the time would come when they would indeed
fast and that would be when he was gone from their sight. The important
thing for his disciples at this stage was his presence among them and
their learning deeply from his teaching and coming to a firm faith in
him. He likened the situation to the presence of the bridegroom.
“Surely the bridegroom’s attendants would never think of fasting as
long as the bridegroom is still with them.” (Matthew 9:14-15)
Fasting would be a
distraction from “the main game” which was to be filled with the person
of Jesus, to get to know who he really was, to understand his true
mission in the world, and above all to attain a profound faith in
him. Our Lord’s reply reminds us that the object of the Christian life
is the person of Jesus himself. All else that finds its place in our
religious life must have the person of Jesus as its nerve centre, and
must aid us in our relationship with him. Prayer, fasting and works of
mercy must flow out from our relationship with him and sustain,
strengthen and support it.
Intimately
connected with this very point is the significant word which our Lord
uses to denote his very self in this passage. He is the bridegroom, and
his disciples are the bridegroom’s attendants and friends. They are in
his company as he arrives for the wedding. That is to say, our Lord is
telling the good-willed disciples of John that in him the longed-for
moment in God’s dealings with his chosen people has arrived. The time
for the wedding has come and the bridegroom has arrived. In referring
to himself as the bridegroom our Lord was conjuring up in the minds of
his listeners the figure of the bridegroom in the prophetic literature,
such as in the prophet Hosea. God is the bridegroom and Israel is his
spouse. He is the husband, and his chosen people is his wife - and all
too often an unfaithful wife at that. One can even see a hint of this
notion in the very name of Yahweh which God revealed to Moses as his
name. God is the transcendent “I am”, but as One who is always there in
the midst of his people. The entire Old Testament looked forward to a
time when there would be a true marriage between God and his people, a
covenant of love, and when a heart of flesh would replace the heart of
stone in the people. God would be Emmanuel, God-with-us. In veiled
fashion our Lord is insinuating that he is the bridegroom of the Old
Testament come to effect the marriage. It would be effected in his
blood, in his death and resurrection. Then he would be taken away from
them, and then indeed they would fast. So our Lord’s words in today’s
brief passage place the person of Jesus at the centre of the life of
the entire Church and of the life of every Christian.
Let us resolve to
make our religion a religion of love, because God is love and he wishes
there to be a relationship of love between him and us. Pope Benedict in
his Lenten Message for 2007 makes the point that God’s love is both
agape and eros. He loves with a love that serves us in totally
disinterested fashion, and yet he is profoundly interested in gaining
our love. He wants us to love him. He is the bridegroom, we the Church
his bride. Let us ponder on this and live accordingly.
(E.J.Tyler)
«Then
they will fast»(Matthew 9:14-15) St Leo the Great (?-about
461), pope and doctor of the Church (6th Sermon for Lent,
1-2)
Always indeed, dearly beloved, “the earth is full of the Lord's
kindness” (Ps 32,5)...But when he comes around to those days which more
especially mark the mysteries of human Restoration and precede in close
order the Paschal Feast, a still more careful preparation of devout
purification is called for...This is in keeping with the Paschal Feast,
that the whole Church should rejoice at the remission of the sins,
which happens not in those only who are reborn in holy Baptism but also
in those who have long been numbered among the adopted.
Although the washing of regeneration chiefly makes “people new” (cf.
Eph 4,24 – Col 3,10) nevertheless, because there is still for all of us
a daily renewal against the rust of mortality and in the path of
progress there is no one who ought not always to be better, in general
we still have to struggle so that in the Day of Redemption no one may
be found in sins of long standing.
What therefore, dearly beloved, any Christian ought at all times to do
should now be pursued more carefully and more devotedly, to fulfill the
apostolic institution of forty days of fast, not only by scant food,
but especially by fasting from sins...To these reasonable and holy
fasts nothing is joined more carefully than the works of alms giving,
which in the one name of mercy include many praiseworthy acts of
devotion, so that the spirits of all the faithful can be equal, even
with unequal means.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
What is the effect of episcopal ordination?
Episcopal ordination confers the fullness of the sacrament of Holy
Orders. It makes the bishop a legitimate successor of the apostles and
integrates him into the episcopal college to share with the Pope and
the other bishops care for all the churches. It confers on him the
offices of teaching, sanctifying, and ruling. (CCC 1557-1558)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.326)
(February 24) Today let us think of St. Ethelbert(Saints)
Scripture today:
Isaiah
58:9b-14; Psalm 86:1-2, 3-4,
5-6; Luke 5:27-32
Jesus saw a tax
collector named Levi sitting at the customs post. He said to him,
“Follow me.” And leaving everything behind, he got up and followed him.
Then Levi gave a great banquet for him in his house, and a large crowd
of tax collectors and others were at table with them. The Pharisees and
their scribes complained to his disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and
drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus said to them in reply,
“Those who are healthy do not need a physician, but the sick do. I have
not come to call the righteous to repentance but sinners.”(Luke 5:27-32)
As is the case so
often in the Gospels, here we have a scene of tension between Christ
and the Pharisees and their scribes. Christ invited Levi the tax
collector to follow him, which he did. There then followed “a great
banquet for him in his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and
others were at table with him.” The all-holy Christ who taught the way
of holiness was to be found fraternizing with numerous “tax collectors and sinners”.
The religious leaders demanded an explanation for this behaviour, and
our Lord in answer explained that he had come as a physician for the
sick, as one who calls sinners to repentance. So this is what the God
of holiness is like. In the Old Testament God says to us, “Be holy, for
I am holy.” He commands us to “love the Lord your God with all
your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your
strength”. We are to have no other gods in our life but him. And yet,
as St Paul puts it in the Letter to the Romans, all men are under the
power of sin. God responds by coming to us to heal us from the sickness
of sin and to call us to repentance. Let us imagine the recognition
which Levi had of his own sinfulness, and his recognition as well of
our Lord’s love for him. His immediate response to our Lord’s call to
him to follow him shows how deeply he prized the love of our Lord. Let
us imagine too the delight of the “large crowd of tax collectors and
others” who “were at table with him” during the “great banquet for him
in his house.” (Luke 5:27-32) It implied that they
recognized the profound holiness of Jesus, his great power before God,
and that he loved them. They knew that he expected them to repent.
Christ who now
lives in our midst expects us to repent. He wants us to recognize, as
did Levi and the “large crowd of tax collectors and others”, that we
are sinners and that we are loved by God. He wants us to be like Levi
who “got up and followed him.” By his grace we can leave behind the
sins that cling to us on our journey through life. How can we do this?
To begin with, we must understand that repentance is not just a one-off
action, even though there can be unique moments of special response
during life. Levi’s response in today’s Gospel was a very special
moment when he left all for our Lord, but that was not the end of the
matter. He had to follow through on this same pattern time and again in
life when the call came to him to follow our Lord in ways he had never
foreseen. His life as a disciple of Christ had only just begun, but the
pattern and the need of repentance would remain. So too with us.
Whenever we detect - through a constant and daily examination of our
conscience - that we need to repent from some venial sin or from a
sinful attachment, there and then in our hearts we ought repent of it.
If we strive to live constantly in the presence of God with a lively
and sensitive conscience, we shall during the course of each day be
enlightened by the Holy Spirit as to the sins that are present in our
hearts. Whenever we become aware of some moral fault or some sin
however slight it may appear to us, we ought repent of it there and
then. In large measure holiness will depend on constant repentance from
venial sin. The following of Christ involves a habit of repentance
which includes purpose of amendment. Let us never allow sin to remain
accepted in our life. Rather, let any sin that is unmasked, however
slight it may be, be renounced there and then.
The fact is that,
of ourselves, all of us are under the power of sin. Christ has come for
all because all are sinners. The problem is that this is not
recognized. The sense of personal sin has been lost and so the
appreciation of the person of Christ is very easily lost. Let us every
day place ourselves among the sinners in our scene today and hear
Christ’s call to us to come and follow him.
(E.J.Tyler)
"I
have not come to call the righteous to repentance but sinners."(Luke 5:27-32)
Latin Liturgy (Hymn "Audi benigne Conditor")
O
Kind Creator, how Thine ear; Mark Thou our prayer and
contrite tears, Unto Thy throne of mercy raised, Through holy fast of forty days.
Our hearts are open before Thee, Searcher of our infirmity; Now as we turn to seek Thy face, Pour down on us redeeming grace.
As sinners we offend indeed, Yet spare those who still trust
in Thee; And for the honor of Thy name, Our languid souls to life
reclaim.
Let now the body be put down; By sense and sin the same
unowned: We ask of Thee, do Thou concede, That fasting hearts from vice
recede.
Grant, O most Holy Trinity, One undivided Unity, That by the bodies' fasting
blest, Thy faithful souls in Thee may
rest. Amen.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New
Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
What is the office
confided to a Bishop in a particular Church?
The bishop to whom the care of a particular Church is entrusted is the
visible head and foundation of unity for that Church. For the sake of
that Church, as vicar of Christ, he fulfills the office of shepherd and
is assisted by his own priests and deacons. (CCC 1560-1561)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.327)
Filled with the
Holy Spirit, Jesus returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit
into the desert for forty days, to be tempted by the devil. He ate
nothing during those days, and when they were over he was hungry. The
devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to
become bread.” Jesus answered him, “It is written, One does not live on
bread alone.” Then he took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of
the world in a single instant. The devil said to him, “I shall give to
you all this power and glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I
may give it to whomever I wish. All this will be yours, if you worship
me.” Jesus said to him in reply, “It is written: You shall worship the
Lord, your God, and him alone shall you serve.” Then he led him to
Jerusalem, made him stand on the parapet of the temple, and said to
him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it
is written: He will command his angels concerning you, to guard you,
and: With their hands they will support you, lest you dash your
foot against a stone.” Jesus said to him in reply, “It also says, You
shall not put the Lord, your God, to the test.” When the devil had
finished every temptation, he departed from him for a time.(Luke 4:1-13)
Among the
various disciplines of study and preparation for professional life is
one that is important but which is often undervalued. I refer to what
are called the humanities - such as languages, history and literature.
In particular the study of literature and history are important because they
involve the study of man in history with his values and works. But
important as they are, each of these two fields of writing, reading and
reflection on man are subject to the influence of various
presuppositions. One can write or read history as a Marxist or as an
Islamic scholar. That is to say, the fundamental views and values of a
historian or novelist will have an enormous effect on what he writes
and how he writes it. Part of the evaluation of any work of history or
literature ought be the evaluation of the author’s starting points and
where he is coming from. For instance, in the histories and novels and
works of literature that have been written, much consideration is given
to wrongdoing. But let us ask this. To what extent is this wrongdoing
recognized as sin? Sin involves wrongdoing, but wrongdoing considered
precisely as an offense against God. Wrongdoing features greatly in
history and literature, but sin features hardly at all. That is to say,
wrongdoing is presented as having little or nothing to do with God.
Sin, considered as that which displeases a holy and moral God, is
largely absent from the description of man and his history as it is
presented by writers of history and literature. This failure in the
humanities to recognize sin is a product and a partial cause of the
loss of the sense of sin in our world.
In fact, there is
nothing more ominous than the presence of sin in the heart of man and
the world. Yet the world and man
were not created with sin as part of the scene. Sin was a visitor that
arrived and stayed. The arrival of sin was heralded by
temptation. If one asks how it is that one has a visitor in the house,
the answer is that the visitor came to the door and knocked. That
knocking on the door heralded the arrival of the visitor. You heard the
knocking, you opened the door and you invited the person in. When a
person is being tempted, sin is knocking at the door. At the dawn of
human history, temptation to sin knocked at the door of mankind when
Adam and Eve were tempted by Satan to eat of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil. The hand that knocked was that of Satan. Our first
parents opened the door and invited the visitor in, and the visitor
stayed. That visitor was sin, rebellion against God. The critical
moment for every man and for the whole human race throughout history is
the presence of temptation. When temptation knocks at the door, sin is
prowling at the entrance wanting to come in. If man gives in to
temptation, sin enters and the serpent sets up its home within. All
this is to say that the critical thing for each man and woman and
indeed for the whole world, is to recognize temptation when it knocks
at the door, to avoid and resist it, to refuse it any entry, and to be
delivered from all wrongdoing and any sin. The issue facing mankind and
the world is the temptation to any sin no matter how venial it be, and
behind the temptation is Satan, the evil one. This is rarely recognized
in the writing of history and literature.
Jesus
Christ is the shining jewel of the human race. He is the perfect model
for every man and woman, and the source of all progress towards
holiness. As we read in our Gospel today (Luke 4:1-13), in the plan of God he
too was allowed to be tempted. His temptations did not spring from any
inordinate desire within him for pleasure or power or possessions, for
there was no inner disorder in him. All that could come from within him
was the pure desire for holiness and the glory of his Father. Rather,
temptations were directly posed to him from without by Satan and we see
this happening in today’s Gospel. Christ had come to conquer the world
for his Father, and Satan even put to him that he do so the quick way
by worshiping him, Satan, and then receive from him the kingdoms of the
world in return. The point is that Christ our model and redeemer was
tempted too, and he utterly rejected all temptations. We too must
resolve to reject all temptations. We must pray to our heavenly Father
to keep us from temptation, to help us recognize it and resist it, and
to deliver us from all moral evil and sin. Let us always contemplate
Christ being tempted and rejecting all temptation, and understand that
this is the issue that faces us every day. This is the issue of life.
Life will be a success or a failure depending on our response to the
temptation to sin. Let us pray to avoid and resist all temptation, and
by the grace of the Holy Spirit to be delivered from sin and all moral
evil.
(E.J.Tyler)
Further Reading:
The Catechism of
the Catholic Church, no.2846-2854
Strengthened
by temptations (Luke 4:1-13) St John
Chrysostom (345 – 407), Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Homily 13 on Matthew,
1)
"Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness, to be tempted
of the devil."… For since with a view to our instruction Jesus both did
and underwent all things; he endures also to be led up thither, and to
wrestle against the devil: in order that each of those who are
baptized, if after his baptism he have to endure greater temptations
may not be troubled as if the result were unexpected, but may continue
to endure all nobly, as though it were happening in the natural course
of things. Yea, for therefore you took up arms, not to be idle, but to
fight.
For this cause neither does God hinder the temptations as they come on,
first to teach you that you are become much stronger; next, that you
may continue modest neither be exalted even by the greatness of your
gifts, the temptations having power to repress you; moreover, in order
that that wicked demon, who is for a while doubtful about your
desertion of him, by the touchstone of temptations may be well assured
that you have utterly forsaken and fallen from him; fourthly, that you
may in this way be made stronger, and better tempered than any steel;
fifthly, that you may obtain a clear demonstration of the treasures
entrusted to you. For the devil would not have assailed you, unless he
had seen you brought to greater honor.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
Make those
reflections of your friend your own. He wrote: “I was considering how
good God was to me and, full of interior joy, I was ready to shout out
loud, there in the street, for everyone to know about my filial
gratitude: `Father! Father!' And though not in fact shouting out loud,
I kept calling him so —`Father!' — in a low voice, many times, quite
certain that it pleased him.
I seek nothing else. I only want to please him and give him Glory.
Everything for him. If I desire my salvation and my sanctification it
is because I know that he desires it. If in my Christian life I hunger
for souls, it is because I know that he has this great hunger. I say
this in all truth: I will never set my sights on the prize. I don't
desire a reward: everything for Love!”
(The Forge,
no.1033)
What is the effect of ordination to
the priesthood?
The anointing of the Spirit seals the priest with an indelible,
spiritual character that configures him to Christ the priest and
enables him to act in the name of Christ the Head. As a co-worker of
the order of bishops he is consecrated to preach the Gospel, to
celebrate divine worship, especially the Eucharist from which his
ministry draws its strength, and to be a shepherd of the faithful. (CCC
1562-1567, 1595)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.328)
Jesus said to his
disciples: “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels
with him, he will sit upon his glorious throne, and all the nations
will be assembled before him. And he will separate them one from
another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will
place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Then the king
will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my
Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the
world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you
gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed
me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’ Then the
righteous will answer him and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry
and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a
stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you
ill or in prison, and visit you?’ And the king will say to them in
reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least
brothers of mine, you did for me.’ Then he will say to those on his
left, ‘Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire prepared for
the Devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I
was thirsty and you gave me no drink, a stranger and you gave me no
welcome, naked and you gave me no clothing, ill and in prison, and you
did not care for me.’ Then they will answer and say, ‘Lord, when did we
see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or ill or in prison,
and not minister to your needs?’ He will answer them, ‘Amen, I say to
you, what you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do
for me.’ And these will go off to eternal punishment, but the righteous
to eternal life.” (Matthew
25:31-46)
Though it cannot be
said to be the case now, the greatest centre of thought and innovation
in the English speaking world during the nineteenth century was - as
was to be expected - England. This included religious and philosophical
thought, and the foremost religious mind of England during the
nineteenth century was John Henry Newman. One of his dicta was that the
first principle of religion was the thought of a judgment as
contained in the feeling of conscience. He himself always claimed that
his own conversion at the age of fifteen marked the beginning of his
religious life in its genuine sense, and so we can presume that the
thought of a future judgment played an important part in that
conversion. This “future judgment” was the judgment of God as revealed
by Christ, to be followed by either heaven or hell. Newman also states
in his Apologia
that the writer that had greatest influence on him as a
youth was Thomas Scott (1747-1821). If one reads Scott’s The Force of
Truth, which includes the account of his gradual acceptance of
the
doctrine of the Trinity, one can see that for Scott it was the thought
of a future judgment which aroused his conscience to bring him to the
practice of serious religion. These instances of Scott and Newman
remind us of the importance of Christ’s revelation that he will come
again to judge the living and the dead. I suspect that in a great
number of cases the thought of the transience of life, of the
unavoidable fact of death and of God’s judgment to follow it, is what
brings many persons to take religion seriously. I also think that, as
was the case with both Scott and Newman, these considerations are
accessible to youth. They are able to look ahead in view of what God
has revealed will assuredly come, and choose to begin to live in light
of it, knowing that God will judge on each person’s observance of his
commands.
This effect of the
thought of God’s judgment as present in the feelings of conscience
shows the importance of our Gospel passage today (Matthew 25:31-46). In it our Lord teaches
about the general judgement of all men. All will be judged on how they
have lived, and the result of that judgment will be heaven or hell. The
good will go to heaven and the wicked will go to hell, and either
way it will be for ever. Let us remember that just as the thought of
God’s judgment on the wicked can bring a conversion to the wicked, so,
we might say, the thought of the judgment of God brought about the
Incarnation. God sent his Son to save the world from damnation and to
offer it the gift of abundant life. In St Ignatius of Loyola’s famous
Spiritual Exercises
he has a well known Meditation on the Incarnation. He describes the
three persons of the Blessed Trinity
observing very many souls “going down to hell” and they “decree in
Their eternity that the Second Person should become man to save the
human race. So when the fullness of time had come, They send the Angel
Gabriel to our Lady” (no.102). The divine judgment is
at the forefront of the
mind of God himself, and this is evident in the teaching of our Lord
throughout the four Gospels. The salvation of souls was what drove our
Lord and his description of the judgment in our passage today has
resounded down the centuries. Christ will come as the King - the King
of kings - and will be the judge of the whole world. Buddha will appear
before him for judgment, as will Confucius, as will Mahomet, as will
Plato, Aristotle, Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar and every great
mind and teacher and leader, and as will each and all of us. No one
will escape it. How great a benefit to man it is that the
judgment of God has been revealed! The fact of a judgment has not been
a universal doctrine of the religions of man, but we who are disciples
of Christ are in a position to announce it to all and sundry, for it
has been revealed by God.
Let us think long
and often of the last things which we shall all have to face. Cardinal
Newman wrote at the end of one of his greatest books (The Development
of Christian Doctrine) that life is short and eternity long.
Eternity
will be spent either in heaven or in hell. Where it will be will depend
on the judgment of God, and the upshot of that judgment will depend on
how we live every day. Let us then take to heart the teaching of our
Lord in the Gospel passage of today.
(E.J.Tyler)
“Come.
You have my Father’s blessing!
Inherit the kingdom prepared for you”(Matthew 25:31-46) 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”
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
How that
sick woman whom I tended spiritually loved the Will of God! She saw her
many, long-lasting and painful illnesses (not a single part of her body
was healthy), as a blessing from Jesus and a sign of his special love.
Although in her humility she used to say that she deserved punishment,
the terrible sufferings that she felt all over her were not a
punishment, but a mercy.
We spoke
of death. And of Heaven. And of what she was going to say to Jesus and
to Our Lady. And how she would be working much more from up there than
she could down here. She was ready to die whenever God wanted|... but,
she exclaimed, full of joy, ``If only it could be today!'' She looked
forward to death with the same joy as one who knows that when we die we
go to meet our Father.
(The Forge,
no.1034)
How
does a priest carry out his proper ministry?
A priest, although ordained for a universal mission, exercises his
ministry in a particular Church. This ministry is pursued in
sacramental brotherhood with other priests who form the “presbyterate”.
In communion with the bishop, and depending upon him, they bear
responsibility for the particular Church. (CCC 1568)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.329)
Jesus said to his
disciples: “In praying, do not babble like the pagans, who think that
they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them.
Your Father knows what you need before you ask him. “This is how you
are to pray: Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy
Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us
this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive
those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but
deliver us from evil. “If you forgive men their transgressions, your
heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive men,
neither will your Father forgive your transgressions.” (Matthew 6:7-15)
It scarcely needs
to be said that the obvious sign of religion is prayer. If a person
professes to be religious and yet rarely if ever prays or is rarely
seen to be praying, the natural thing is to doubt that he is religious.
If a community or a society or a culture does not pray very much one presumes that
that society is not a very religious society. In fact, man does
characteristically pray, and in the broad sweep of human history
societies are found to be religious and to pray. Indigenous societies
pray, Hindu societies pray, Islamic societies pray, as do Christian
societies, although the degree to which they do can vary according to
the level of penetration of currents of thought which undermine
religious belief. Many societies that have been traditionally Christian
have been profoundly affected by non-Christian philosophical
assumptions and values, and this has greatly lessened the religious
character of those societies. The same has happened in many
non-Christian societies. Russia, China and various other Asian
societies have been deeply influenced by atheistic currents of
thought (such as Marxism) and the result has been a spread of
secularism across the world. Where this has happened religion and
therefore prayer has retreated from its natural place. The point I am
making, though, is that prayer is the natural sign of religion. The
further question is, what is the character of prayer as it is taught by
the masters of the religions of the world? I have not researched
comparative studies of prayer in the various religions of mankind, but
obviously the prayer of a religion will reveal the character of the
religion itself and the image of God that marks it. Our Gospel passage
today presents us with Christ’s teaching on how we are to pray. It
reveals the character of the Christian religion as God has revealed it
and the image of God which shapes it.
There are many
notable things about the Lord’s Prayer in today’s Gospel (Matthew 6:7-15), and countless
commentaries have been composed on it. But an immediate observation to
be made is its emphatic insistence on forgiveness. Christ teaches us
his prayer, and immediately afterwards provides a decisive comment on
one component of that prayer, a part of it that comes towards the end.
We pray to our heavenly Father that he will forgive us our sins against
him, and immediately following this we promise to forgive those who
have acted offensively against us. Our Lord having finished the prayer
straight away returns to this petition asking forgiveness and promising
to give it. His words make it clear that this promise to forgive is not
just something we choose to do from the goodness of our heart. It is a
condition of receiving forgiveness from God. It is an obligation he
lays down. If we do not give forgiveness we shall not receive it. Now,
one of the things we note in the great religious writings of
Christianity and indeed in the lives of all true Christians, is the
sense of personal sinfulness. In the Christian tradition, as a person
gets close to God he becomes more conscious of his sins. He
understands that he is a sinner and that if he is ever to make headway
in his relationship with God, God will have to forgive him his sins.
The good news is that God will forgive him if he is truly sorry and
intends to amend. If this had not been revealed, we could not have
assumed it. But there is, we discover, this condition. He must forgive
others their transgressions against him and if he refuses to do this,
God will refuse him his forgiveness. Very many Christians do not live
up to this requirement. Nevertheless that is the requirement and it
says as much about God as about what we should do. God reveals himself
in his commands. The image of God in Christianity can be compared with
the image of God in other religions by comparing what God is said to
command in each of them. The important thing, though, is that those who
are Christ’s faithful understand clearly that a requirement of
following him is that, like him, we forgive those who injure us.
Forgiveness of
others is one of the crunch points of true Christianity. It is a test
of the extent to which we love Christ and are truly following him.
Forgiveness is something which others may see, but it is also something
they may not see because it goes on in the deepest recesses of the
human heart. It is out of sight of men, but not out of the sight of
God. He sees all and he will see any refusal to forgive that goes on in
our heart. If we forgive he will forgive us. What a wonderful thing to
be able to say on our deathbed that I have forgiven from the heart
everyone who has hurt me!
(E.J.Tyler)
The
prayer of the children of God
(Matthew 6:7-15)Blessed
Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997), Foundress of the Missionary
Sisters of Charity
(No Greater Love)
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 marvelous 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 neighbor. 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 neighbor (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.
(Selected by
"The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
Try to get used to the fact of
death: peer into your grave often, looking at and smelling, and
touching your own rotting corpse there, a week, no more, after your
death. Remember this especially when you are troubled by the impulses
of your flesh.
(The Forge,
no.1035)
What is the effect of the ordination
to the diaconate?
The deacon, configured to Christ the servant of all, is ordained for
service to the Church. He carries out this service under the authority
of his proper bishop by the ministry of the Word, of divine worship, of
pastoral care and of charity. (CCC 1569-1571, 1596)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.330)
(February 28) Today let us think of St Oswald of Worcester(Saints)
Scripture today:
Jonah
3:1-10; Psalm 51:3-4, 12-13, 18-19;
Luke 11:29-32
While still more
people gathered in the crowd, Jesus said to them, “This generation is
an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign will be given it,
except the sign of Jonah. Just as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites,
so will the Son of Man be to this generation. At the judgment the queen
of the south will rise with the men of this generation and she will
condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the
wisdom of Solomon, and there is something greater than Solomon here. At
the judgment the men of Nineveh will arise with this generation and
condemn it, because at the preaching of Jonah they repented, and there
is something greater than Jonah here.”(Luke 11:29-32)
In the Old
Testament book of Jonah, the prophet Jonah is presented as (very
unwillingly) going to the pagan city of Nineveh and preaching
repentance. He announced that “Only forty days more and Nineveh is
going to be destroyed.” The response of the population was immediate:
“the people believed in God; they proclaimed a fast and put on
sackcloth, from the greatest to the least.” So did the king. The text tells us that
“God saw their efforts to renounce their evil behaviour. And God
relented: he did not inflict on them the disaster which he has
threatened” (Jonah 3). In the inspired story Jonah works no miracle to
authenticate that he was speaking on God’s behalf, and yet the people
of Nineveh were convinced that what he said was coming from God. They
could see that he was a sign from God. The implication is that their
consciences told them plainly that their lives and behaviour were evil,
and the preaching of the prophet was unmasking the true situation.
Despite their sins their hearts were sufficiently disposed to accept
with readiness the truth when it came. In our Gospel passage today (Luke
11:29-32)
our Lord berates very many for their refusal to accept him and his
preaching, and in particular for refusing his call to them to repent
and believe what he was saying. They did not have the readiness of the
pagan Ninevites of the inspired story in the Scriptures. Nor did they
have the readiness displayed by the queen of the south to come and
listen to the wisdom of Solomon. Their hearts were disposed to refuse
and so they demanded from him a sign despite the exalted nature of who
it was who was speaking and preaching to them, and the manifest truth
of what he was saying.
As we think of our
Lord’s unfavourable comparison between many of his contemporaries and
the dispositions of the Ninevites and the queen of the south as
presented in the Old Testament, let us be reminded of the incomparable
uniqueness of the person of Jesus and of the necessity of a right state
of heart if we are to respond to him as we should. As our Lord said,
“there is something greater than Solomon here”, and “there is something
greater than Jonah here.” Indeed, there is no one in the entire
Scriptures who can possibly compare with Christ. As his heavenly Father
said at his Transfiguration, “This is my Son, the Beloved. Listen to
him.” Our Gospel passage today invites us to resolve to contemplate the
person of Jesus in the light of the testimony of Scripture and the
Church’s living tradition, and to contemplate him in this way long and
persistently. We must come to a profound recognition of him such that
signs and wonders will not be necessary. It will involve having the
right fundamental dispositions and starting points, and for these we
ought pray to God. Cardinal Newman wrote towards the end of his life
that usually our starting points, our first and basic principles, our
fundamental presuppositions are out of our sight. But on them
everything depends. If they are wrong they will result in spiritual
blindness, and if they are the right starting points they will lead to
religious vision. That is to say, we shall be able to see. Newman goes
on to say that we ought pray to God that he will give us the right
starting points. Jesus tells us in the beatitudes that “blessed are the
pure of heart, for they shall see God.” St John in the prologue of his
Gospel writes that he came unto his own and his own did not receive
him. They failed to see, and it was due to the state of their hearts.
Let us pray for the
clarity and purity of heart that will enable us to see the truth of our
Lord and his teaching, and the grace to place our faith entirely in
him. Our Lord’s parable of the sower going out to sow speaks of the
good soil producing a harvest. Our hearts need to be good soil, soil
that will accept our Lord and his teaching. Let us pray perseveringly
that God will make us so.
(E.J.Tyler)
The
Sign of Jonah (Luke 11:29-32) Saint Irenaeus of Lyons
(about 130-about 208), bishop, theologian and martyr (Against Heresies
III, 20,1)
Long-suffering therefore was God, when man became a defaulter, as
foreseeing that victory which should be granted to him through the
Word. For, when strength was made perfect in weakness (2Cor 12,9), it
showed the kindness and transcendent power of God.
In fact, it was for man as it had been for Jonah. God had permitted
that Jonah be swallowed by the whale, not that he should be swallowed
up and perish altogether, but that, having been cast out again, he
might be the more subject to God, and might glorify Him the more, He
who had conferred upon him such an unhoped-for deliverance, and might
bring the Ninevites to a lasting repentance, so that they should be
convened to the Lord, who would deliver them from death, having been
struck with awe by that portent which had been wrought in Jonah's
case...In the same way God, from the beginning, permitted man to be
swallowed up by the great whale, who was the author of transgression,
not that he should perish altogether and disappear; but because God was
already arranging and preparing the plan of salvation, which was
accomplished by the Word, through the sign of Jonah. This plan of
salvation had been prepared for those who held the same opinion as
Jonah regarding the Lord, and who confessed, and said, "I am a servant
of the Lord, and I worship the Lord, God of heaven, who hath made the
sea and the dry land" (Jon 1,9).
God wanted that man, receiving an unhoped-for salvation from Him, might
rise from the dead, and glorify God, and repeat that word which was
uttered in prophecy by Jonah: "I cried by reason of my affliction to
the Lord my God, and He heard me out of the belly of hell;" (Jon 2,2).
He wanted that man always continue glorifying Him, and giving thanks
without ceasing, for this salvation he received from Him.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
When he bared his soul to me he
said, "These days I have been thinking about death as a rest, in spite
of my crimes. And I thought that if I was told: 'The time has come for
you to die', I would gladly reply: 'The time has come for me to Live'.''
(The Forge,
no.1036)
How is the sacrament of Holy Orders
celebrated?
The sacrament of Holy Orders is conferred, in each of its three
degrees, by means of the imposition of hands on the head of the
ordinand by the Bishop who pronounces the solemn prayer of
consecration. With this prayer he asks God on behalf of the ordinand
for the special outpouring of the Holy Spirit and for the gifts of the
Spirit proper to the ministry to which he is being ordained. (CCC
1572-1574, 1597)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.331)
Jesus said to his
disciples: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find;
knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks,
receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the
door will be opened. Which one of you would hand his son a stone when
he asked for a loaf of bread, or a snake when he asked for a fish? If
you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children,
how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who
ask him. “Do to others whatever you would have them do to you. This is
the law and the prophets.” (Matthew
7:7-12)
If one considers
the range of the religions of the world, one is struck by the enormous
variety of imagery and doctrine about God, or the gods, or the powers
beyond, which characterizes them. The spiritual powers to which man
looks for aid in the religions of man are in many ways profoundly
different. In a great many cases they are even contradictory. Now, if
we apply the simple philosophical principle that no two assertions
about something (say, about God) can be simultaneously correct which
contradict one another under the same aspect, then we realize that a
great number of people in the world must be very wrong about the
divine. That is to say, the religious scene which confronts the
observer as he looks out upon the world cries out for a divine
revelation. Man in the concrete tends to be blind when it comes to his
conception and image of God. Into this valley of darkness which
constitutes much of the religious life of the nations, has come the Son
of God made man. He has come to reveal who God is and what he intends
to do for man. He has come to reveal the true God and what he is like.
He is a God who loves us utterly for our own sakes, and who wants us to
love him in return. It has been said that while the God of Islam is a
transcendent Master, the God of Christianity is a Father who loves us.
There is a different image of God at work in the two religions. As St
John points out in one of his Letters, and as Pope Benedict reiterates,
God is love, and our passage from the Gospel today is a case in point.
In it our Lord tells us what we should expect whenever we pray -
provided we truly pray, and provided we are conscious of who we are
praying to whenever we address our prayers to the God and Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ.
In our Gospel
passage today (Matthew 7:7-12)
our Lord reveals to us
the attitude of God towards us whenever we direct a petition to him.
His disposition is to give us what we ask. Of course, we must take into
account what our Lord taught and did on other occasions. For instance,
he instructs us in the Lord’s Prayer to ask our heavenly Father for
forgiveness, and here in our Gospel today he tells his disciples that
whatever they ask for they will be given. But in the Lord’s Prayer our
Lord makes it clear that forgiveness will not be given at all unless we
forgive those who have hurt us. So we have an immediate qualification
on the teaching of today’s Gospel. Or again, in the Garden of
Gethsemane our Lord prayed earnestly that his cup would be taken away
from him. God did not do this, and so this is a qualification on
today’s Gospel passage in which our Lord lays it down that whatever we
ask of God we shall receive. Nevertheless, our Lord’s statements in
today’s passage are very clear, and they imply unambiguously that God
our Father wants to give us what we ask him for. “Ask and it will be
given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened
to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds;
and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. Which one of you
would hand his son a stone when he asked for a loaf of bread, or a
snake when he asked for a fish? If you then, who are wicked, know how
to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly
Father give good things to those who ask him” (Matthew
7:7-12). Our
Lord encourages us to ask for what we truly need because God our Father
loves us. God is love and love desires to give generously. Knowing this
as we do, we ought bring our needs before our heavenly Father with the
utmost confidence.
Let us look on our
Lord’s instruction on confidence in prayer as revealing the love of our
heavenly Father for us. Perhaps the most distinctive thing about
Christianity is that it insists, on the basis of a revelation, that God
is love. This fact shapes our prayer, and it fills our Lord’s teaching
about prayer to our heavenly Father. God loves us to such an extent
that he wants to give us what we ask for, unless, of course, our
petition is not in our true interests.
(E.J.Tyler)
«Knock
and the door will be opened to
you»(Matthew 7:7-12) John Tauler (about
1300-1361), Dominican (Sermon 54)
Everything that is not God, and God only, in which man seeks his rest
is worm-eaten. Everything in which man finds peace with delight and
that he considers his, all this is rotten. What matters is to simply
and purely plunge in this simple, pure, unknowable, ineffable and
mysterious good that is God, by denying oneself. It is in God that we
must put our rest, without seeking delight or illumination...
“I set my dwelling place in my Lord's domain”. There are two domains we
must live in. One is temporal, and it is where we should be now. It is
the admirable life and passion of our Lord. The other domain is the one
we are waiting for; it is the glorious heritage of the all-delightful
divinity. He promised us that we would be his coheirs and that we would
be forever with him at his table.
The wounds of our Lord are all healed; except for the five sacred
wounds that must be left open till the last day. The glory of the
divinity that comes from them and the joy that the angels and the
saints receive from them, all of this cannot be expressed by words.
These five doors have to be, here on earth, our part of inheritance of
our Father's domain. Of these doors, the sweet porter is the Holy
Spirit. His tender love is always ready, if we knock, to open to us and
let us enter, through these doors, the everlasting heritage of our
Father. For, surely, the man who goes through these doors, as it is
advisable, cannot get lost on his way.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
To die is
a good thing. How can anyone with faith be, at the same time, afraid to
die? But as long as the Lord wants to keep you here on earth, it would
be cowardice for you to want to die. You must live, live and suffer and
work for Love: that is your task.
(The Forge,
no.1037)
Who
can confer this sacrament?
Only validly ordained bishops, as successors of the apostles, can
confer the sacrament of Holy Orders. (CCC 1575-1576, 1600)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.332)
Jesus said to his
disciples: “I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the
scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the Kingdom of heaven.
“You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, You shall not kill;
and whoever kills will be liable to judgment. But I say to you, whoever
is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment, and whoever says
to his brother, Raqa, will be answerable to the Sanhedrin, and whoever
says, ‘You fool,’ will be liable to fiery Gehenna. Therefore, if you
bring your gift to the altar, and there recall that your brother has
anything against you, leave your gift there at the altar, go first and
be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift.
Settle with your opponent quickly while on the way to court. Otherwise
your opponent will hand you over to the judge, and the judge will hand
you over to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison. Amen, I say
to you, you will not be released until you have paid the last penny.”(Matthew
5:20-26)
When we think of
the life of the religions across the face of the earth over the ages,
very largely it appears to be a matter of fulfilling various external
practices. Religious rituals are studiously observed and by means of
these efforts it is hoped that the Powers above will be impressed,
satisfied and propitiated. Indeed enormous spiritual energy can be
invested in the performance of the practices of religion, especially
those of prayer both public and private. I am referring to
these practices as external things to be done rather than, say, the
development
of abiding inner dispositions of mind and heart that form the soul of
true religion. All this is to say that the tendency of mankind is to
practise a religion of external
performances rather than a religion of the heart. But this is not at
all what Christ wishes to see in his disciples, and it is not the
religion he revealed and established. For this reason his words in
today’s Gospel begin with the warning that “unless your righteousness
surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into
the Kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:20-26) The “righteousness” he
requires is not just a dutiful performance of the practices of religion
which can, in any case, be done for a variety of motives, but a
religion involving a righteousness of the heart which will then, of
course, manifest itself externally. The scribes and the Pharisees our
Lord is referring to were very observant of the observable duties of
religion, but he tells us elsewhere that “all they do is done to
attract attention.” Our Lord tells us that it is not enough simply to
refrain from injuring another physically, but “whoever is angry with
his brother will be liable to judgment,“ and “whoever says, ‘You fool,’
will be liable to fiery Gehenna.” Christ calls his disciples to a high,
consistent and inner holiness, a holiness of the heart.
This high holiness
is the one necessary thing in life. It is the project for every human
life. If this fails, life has failed. The one thing necessary is that
we be good in the sight of God, and more than good, for our
righteousness has to exceed that which many would take as being
religious. Holiness is the common calling of all Christ’s faithful,
whatever be their particular vocation within the life of the Church. It
is the vocation of every man and woman, and Christ is the one from whom
this calling comes and he is the one who makes true holiness of the
heart possible. For its achievement we must in the first instance keep
our sights on the person of Jesus. He is the utterly holy one of our
race, the model of all holiness and the source of all holiness for
every other created person. How blessed mankind is to have such a
brother! He is not just mankind’s model of what it means to be holy, he
is the one who offers holiness to those who accept him and choose to
follow him. We must therefore all our days be contemplating the person
of Jesus who said, “Come to me, all you who labour and are
overburdened, and I will give you rest. Learn from me for I am meek and
humble of heart.” We must come to Jesus and learn from him if we wish
to acquire the holiness of heart, the holiness of thought, the holiness
of word and the holiness of deed in the sight of God to which he calls
us in today’s Gospel. Some ninety years ago a famous book was published
written by the German philosopher and student of religion, Rudolf Otto.
It was entitled The
Idea of the Holy. Well now, our idea of the holy
and what is involved in being holy comes above all from one source,
from
Jesus of Nazareth. As even the devils cried out in the Gospels, he is
the Holy One of God, and he came to offer holiness to those who throw
in their lot with him.
Let us think of our
Lord’s words today warning us that “unless your righteousness surpasses
that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the Kingdom
of heaven.” (Matthew 5:20-26)
In those words our Lord
is requiring of us a commitment to holiness of the heart, holiness of
our innermost soul, a holiness which is the special gift of grace and
that grace comes from him. Let us approach him and make the perfect
following of him the project of our life, for in that lies the path to
human holiness.
(E.J.Tyler)
«If you bring your gift to the
altar, and there recall that your brother has anything against you…go
first and be reconciled with your
brother» (Matthew 5:20-26) St
Cyprian (about 200-258), bishop of Carthage and martyr (The Prayer of the Lord,
23)
"With what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again" (Mt
7,2). And the servant who, after having had all his debt forgiven him
by his master, would not forgive his fellow-servant, is cast back into
prison; because he would not forgive his fellow-servant, he lost the
indulgence that had been shown to himself by his lord (Mt 18,23s). And
these things Christ still more urgently sets forth in His precepts with
yet greater power of His rebuke. "When ye stand praying," says He,
"forgive if ye have aught against any, that your Father which is in
heaven may forgive you your trespasses. But if ye do not forgive,
neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive you your
trespasses" (Mc 11,25).
For God commands us to be peacemakers, and in agreement, and of one
mind in His house, and such as He makes us by a second birth, such He
wishes us when new-born to continue, that we who have begun to be sons
of God may abide in God's peace, and that, having one spirit, we should
also have one heart and one mind. Thus God does not receive the
sacrifice of a person who is in disagreement, but commands him to go
back from the altar and first be reconciled to his brother, that so God
also may be appeased by the prayers of a peace-maker. Our peace and
brotherly agreement is the greater sacrifice to God,--and a people
united in one in the unity of the Father, and of the Son, and of the
Holy Spirit.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
Who can receive this sacrament?
This sacrament can only be validly received by a baptized man. The
Church recognizes herself as bound by this choice made by the Lord
Himself. No one can demand to receive the sacrament of Holy Orders, but
must be judged suitable for the ministry by the authorities of the
Church. (CCC 1577-1578, 1598)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.333)
(March 3) Today let us think of St. Cunegundes and St. Katherine Drexel(Saints)
Scripture today:
Deuteronomy
26:16-19; Psalm 119:1-2, 4-5,
7-8; Matthew 5:43-48
Jesus said to his
disciples: “You have heard that it was said, You shall love your
neighbour and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies, and
pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your
heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and
causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust. For if you love those
who love you, what recompense will you have? Do not the tax collectors
do the same? And if you greet your brothers and sisters only, what is
unusual about that? Do not the pagans do the same? So be perfect, just
as your heavenly Father is perfect.”(Matthew 5:43-48)
In our Gospel
passage today our Lord provides us with one of the distinguishing tests
of the Christian spirit. From the natural point of view few would
expect a good person to treat his enemies with love, as they would in
respect to his
friends and neighbours. Consider some “good” person you know and ask
yourself how his attitude towards his neighbour compares with his
attitude towards one who has caused him injury. Is there not a
(perhaps considerable) difference between his attitude to the one and
his attitude to the other? Our
Lord says, “You have heard that it was said, You shall love your
neighbour and hate your enemy.” (Matthew 5:43-48) Whatever about the Old
Testament directive to which our Lord here alludes in part, our Lord’s
use of it shows up the normally clear-cut difference between our
attitude towards our “neighbour” on the one hand and our
attitude towards our “enemy” on the other. But our
Lord makes it clear
that this will never do for those who wish to regard themselves as his
disciples. His disciples are to love their enemies and pray for those
who persecute them. Very clearly this requires and manifests a virtue
far beyond the ordinary, and our Lord is not just referring to how his
disciples are to treat their enemies, but how they are to regard them.
He is referring to the thoughts we allow to be going on in our hearts.
We are to fill our hearts with love always, no matter how we are
treated. How can we ever hope to do this? Well, firstly we must want to
do it out of love for Jesus our Master. Then we must keep Christ before
us as our constant inspiration, asking him to help us with his grace.
With his example and grace we shall find that gradually we shall be
able to put on the mind of Christ.
This introduces the
second great feature of our Gospel passage today, what it says about
God. It is only when we love our enemies, when we pray for those who
persecute us that we shall be living as children of our heavenly Father
“for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to
fall on the just and the unjust” (Matthew
5:43-48).
Our Lord is telling us that God our heavenly Father is a father to all,
to the bad and to the good alike. To the bad he gives many good things
even though they greatly offend him by their lives and their attitude
to him. The course of nature demonstrates this, for “he makes his sun
rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and
the unjust.” Why does God seemingly treat the bad with the same
consideration as the good - and perhaps with even more? Our Lord
implies
here that it is because he is a Father to all, a loving and
compassionate Father, one who is patient and who awaits the repentance
of the bad while there is still time. We ought then take this cue from
our Lord and use it to throw light on the course of human history,
current affairs and on the problem of evil and why it is allowed. At
the heart of the universe is compassion, love and patience in the face
of wrongdoing. We as children of our heavenly Father must act likewise.
For “if you love those who
love you, what recompense will you have? Do
not the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brothers and
sisters only, what is unusual about that? Do not the pagans do the
same? So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect”
(Matthew 5:43-48). All men understand
that the good man loves others, but Christ teaches that this must
include love for one's enemies.
Let us contemplate
the example of Christ and what he teaches about our heavenly Father.
Christ loved his enemies. St Paul writes that Christ is the image of
the unseen God, and our Lord told his disciples that the one who sees
him sees the Father. The Father too loves those who disregard and even
hate him. Let us strive to be like our heavenly Father, asking for the
grace of the Holy Spirit to transform our hearts into the likeness of
the heart of God.
(E.J.Tyler)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ «He
makes his sun rise on the bad and
the good» (Matthew 5:43-48) St Isaac the Syrian (7th
Century), monk at Nineveh (Discourse, 2nd
series, 38,5 and 39,3)
There is no changing of intentions in the Creator, neither before nor
after: there is neither hate nor resentment in his nature, nor is there
a bigger or a smaller place in his love, nor a before or an after in
his knowledge. For if we all believe that creation began to exist as a
consequence of the goodness and love of the Creator, we know that this
first motive will not die down nor will it change in the Creator,
following the disorderly course of his creation.
It would be quite obnoxious and really blasphemous to believe that hate
and resentment exist in God – even towards the demons – or to imagine
other weaknesses or passions in Him. On the contrary, God acts towards
us always in ways he knows being profitable for us, that these may be
for us cause of suffering or of consolation, of joy or of sorrow, that
they may be insignificant or glorious – all are oriented towards the
same everlasting goods.
(Selected by "The Daily Gospel", New Hope, KY 40052. USA.)
You became very serious when
you heard me say: I accept death whenever God wants it, the way he
wants it, where he wants it; and at the same time I think it is too
easy to die early, because we should want to work many years for him,
and because of him, in the service of others.
(The Forge,
no.1039)
Is it necessary to
be celibate to receive the sacrament of Holy Orders?
It is always necessary to be celibate for the episcopacy. For the
priesthood in the Latin Church men who are practicing Catholics and
celibate are chosen, men who intend to continue to live a celibate life
“for the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 19:12). In the Eastern Churches
marriage is not permitted after one has been ordained. Married men can
be ordained to the permanent diaconate.
(CCC 1579-1580, 1599)
(Compendium of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.334)
Pope Benedict
XVI's
religious practice was
almost universal in ancient and prehistoric times. All the evidence
that is available suggests the same for traditional Aboriginal culture
in Australia during the thousands of years of its history. Higher
supernatural beings were acknowledged and ritual and myth shaped
society. There is one thing, though, that seems to me to be worthy of
further study in respect to the non-Christian religions of the world.
It is whether the higher supernatural powers of this or that religion
were understood as truly transcending the world, or whether basically
they were part of it, though occupying a much higher place in it. My
own reading suggests to me that the supernatural beings of, for
instance, traditional Aboriginal religion did not really transcend the
world, but fundamentally were part of it. Whether or not this is so, at
least the question reminds us that because we come to know things in
the first instance through our senses, there is the tendency to accept
as real only that which is part of our world. For many years prior to
his conversion St Augustine could not shake off his image of God as
material. There are serious philosophies that do not allow for anything
that cannot be confirmed empirically. While we reject this notion and
insist on a God who transcends the world, nevertheless it could be that
we barely realize the transcendence of God. That is to say, we need to
work at realizing that God our Father is not on earth but in heaven.