2 Sunday Advent, 8 December 2013, Matthew 3:1-12

Nelson Mandela, 1918 - 2013

Four years ago, in 2009, a film was released starring Morgan Freeman in the part of Nelson Mandela, and Matt Damon acting the part of Francois Pienaar, Captain of the Springboks, South Africa’s Rugby team. The film was entitled ‘Invictus’, a latin word meaning ‘unconquered’.

The film tells the story of Mandela’s 1990 release from prison, and his 1994 election as President. Specifically, the film focuses on the real tensions that remained between whites and blacks in a post-Apartheid South Africa. In the midst of this difficult situation, South Africa was about to host the 1995 Rugby World Cup.

Mandela was very aware that sport, and especially Rugby, could either unite South Africa as one nation, or divide it up along colour lines. So, he invites the Captain of the Springboks, played by Matt Damon, to come and visit with him at the President’s offices in Johannesburg. And so, the story goes on – Mandela convinced Captain Francois Pienaar to engage in a nationwide tour of solidarity in the run up to the World Cup. Mandela honoured the white history of the Springboks, which symbolised white supremacy in South Africa, but he called on the newly established, almost entirely black, national sports council to row in and support the Springboks as the national team. Mandela knows that the team have the capacity to unite white and black South Africa.

Obviously the story that I have just shared with you is inspired by the death of Nelson Mandela a few days ago. Remembering him inspires us to never give up hope. His address to the Houses of the Oireachtas (Irish Parliament) in 1990 drew on our Irish heritage of having overcome colonial oppression. He implied there that the Irish nation were an inspiration to him in his campaign for a more just and equal South Africa.

As we stumble into the Second Sunday of Advent, the death of such an inspirational person gives us pause to remember. To remember his 27 years in prison, unjustly placed there on trumped up charges. Gospel values, which were an important cornerstone of Mandela’s life, also give us pause to remember that we too must work hard to bring about the values of God’s Kingdom. Values like justice and equality for every person, values like the dignity of every human being, values like the dignity of human work, besides much more.

As we prepare for the great festival of Christmas, for the moment of God become one of us, for the feast of the incarnation, the enfleshing of God, we need the story of the gospel to give flesh to the values we have been speaking about. The stories we tell define who we are. And the gospel, for us Christians, is the most definitive story of all. Listening to the story of the gospel forms us into the full human beings that Jesus wants us to be.

‘Repent’ is the key verb in the gospel for this Sunday: “Repent,” John the Baptizer says, “for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand.” As the Lord approaches, so also does his kingdom, i.e. God’s way of living – this is God’s ‘House’, or family, in the world; [the oikonomia (economy, literally house-rules)] the Church of Jesus Christ that every human being is invited to be a part of.

Repentance is never a looking backwards to some previous ‘perfect’ time. Repentance is about being forward-looking, it is about shaping our heart to God’s heart more and more. It sometimes entails a frank acknowledgement, confession and contrition for wrong-doing on our part. We may also need to make satisfaction for what we have done wrong by doing some penitential act, and of course receiving the Sacrament of Confession. But that negative aspect of repentance is only one side of the coin. We may turn away from our sinful preoccupations, but if we do, we are also turning in hope to the God who compassionately loves each and every one of us.

This turning again to God we can do in many ways: by praying and meditating on Scripture, which we can easily do by use of the Rosary in our daily prayer. We can begin to allow the gospel values of preparation, of hope and of joy to shape our family life, and also our workplace activities. We can choose to be upbeat about the future, all the while remaining grounded in our own history and our own story. We can choose hopefulness, much like Nelson Mandela chose to be hopeful, every day of those 27 years behind bars.

Invictus

by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

1st Sunday Advent, 30 November 2013, Matthew 24:37-44

In the summer of 2007 I had just been ordained as a deacon. It was the summer before my ordination as a priest. During that summer I spent a month in a parish of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in California. Spending a month in America was about killing two birds with one stone; I wanted to get a holiday and I also wanted to get some parish experience.

One night, about two weeks into my stay, I was brushing my teeth before going to bed. Suddenly the bathroom window began to shake and rattle. I didn't know what was going on, and at first I thought that someone was trying to break into the house.

Then, I saw the mirror over the sink. It was swaying in and out from the wall. It was then that I realised that I was experiencing my first earthquake! It measure 4.1 on the richter scale and it woke up many people in the neighbourhood.

In California earthquakes are commonplace. But, even though I knew that, I just presumed it would never happen while I was there. I presumed wrong. If it had been a more serious quake I wouldn't have been at all prepared, and God only knows what might have happened.

The Gospel call on this first Sunday of Advent, is to become prepared, to stay awake because we do not know when the time will come. The day and the hour of the gospel, this is God's time. It is a time that we are not ready for, a time that we need to become ready for. And for us believing Christians, we are reminded today that this really should not be a surprise for us. God’s time and God’s actions may not be predictable; but that God is with us, communicating himself to us is surely no surprise to us. We have been learning about this since our earliest days.

Advent is not about staying awake to wonder when the end of time will be. Advent is about recovering that which has become hidden in us over time. It is about waking up from our spiritual darkness and assuming a position of waiting, of waiting, fully prepared for the coming of the Lord. It is like ‘reheating’ our spiritual selves. We are to come awake again out of the slumber of our everyday existence. What we know in our minds, we must allow to come alive again in our hearts. God is with us. God chose to send his Son among us, as one of us. It is in and through our encounter with God in the readings, in Eucharist celebrated and Communion shared; in prayer, and in the Sacraments, that we are prepared for our ultimate encounter with the Lord, face to face.

So, our readings today are all about time, and about coming awake again in time. Maybe today is a good time to remember all that has happened over this past year, to remember the tragedies and failures, the successes and joys. As we light each candle on our Advent wreath, we mark both the year that has been and the time that is to come. Lighting the candle is lighting up our hope again.
To pray, remember and give thanks to God for all that has been, and to look forward with hope to the coming Kingdom of our Saviour, Christ Jesus the Lord.

Solemnity of Christ the King, 24 November 2013, Luke 21:5-19

Christ the King - A Modern American Tapestry

Friday the 22nd of November 2013 was quite a day for memories.

It marked fifty years since the assasination of President John F Kennedy in Dallas. On the same day, 22 November, 1963, CS Lewis died in Oxford, aged 64. Also, on that day in Rome, the bishops of the world voted on the first document of the Second Vatican Council, the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy. It would be promulgated a few weeks later, on 4 December, 1963.

And on the 22nd November 2013, Fr Alec Reid died in hospital here in Dublin. He is rightly known primarily for his role in building a lasting peace in Northern Ireland. As someone said somewhere on Friday, the 22nd of November must be a day when all the greats die.

In the Church’s liturgical calendar, the 22nd November is the memorial of St Cecelia, virgin and martyr, and the patron of musicians, especially musicians involved in the service of the Church.

Why am I mentioning all of these things as we gather to celebrate the Solemnity of Christ the King? I mention them because all of them are inspirational characters that encourage us to sing a new song.

Fr Alec Reid sang the song of peace, and more than once paid the price of being a peacemaker. We remember him as one who persevered, seemingly against all odds, in shaping a community of love, of peace, and of mutual respect.

President John F Kennedy adorned the walls of many homes here in Ireland – he, along with Pope John XXIII and the Sacred Heart made up a kind of Catholic, small ‘t’, trinity, of the 1960s. His horrific death was a strike against one who also stood for peace and for the rights of marginalised groups in society.

CS Lewis is remembered for his books, especially his children’s books, the Chronicles of Narnia. They confirmed that we are all called to greatness, that every child is called to occupy the seat of a prince or a princess in the Kingdom of God. His writings told a story of our real place in God’s family – as sons and daughters of God, we must gather our courage, accept Christ’s grace, and strive to be nothing less than the best that we can possibly can be.

So, as we celebrate this solemnity of Christ the King, may we be reminded of our real situation in the Kingdom of God, both here and now, and beyond this life. We are to live according to that dignity which was bestowed on us at baptism; as nothing less than the sons and daughters of God.

Perhaps, with the good thief, we too can say: ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’

33 Sunday Ordinary Time, C, 17 November 2013, Luke 21:5-19

Philippines - Trocaire.org

As we approach the end of the Church’s year – next Sunday is Christ the King, the last Sunday of the year, before the following Sunday which is the first Sunday of Advent – as we approach the end of the Church’s year, the readings are all about the end times. The gospel that we have just heard is about the end of time.

For many people in the Philippines last week, it must have seemed like the end times had come. Or indeed, in Syria, where the ongoing war has left whole populations as refugees, relying on their neighbours, relying on the world, to reach out and help them in their strife.

Thankfully, for most of us, such events are a very rare occurrence. We live in a privileged part of the world because of the peace, stability and prosperity that we enjoy. We may have hit hard economic times over this past few years; we may blame many different groups in society for getting us into our economic mess – but as some people say: that’s a first-world problem. We still live in a part of the world that is blessed with a high standard of living, low disease and mortality rates, freedom to practise our religion, democracy that may not be perfect, but is certainly good.

This Sunday, we are asked to remember people in two parts of the world that need our prayers, and need our financial help. Why should we be generous to them? Because, they are our brothers and sisters. Even if they are not Catholic, or not Christian – they are still our brothers and sisters by our common humanity. And they need us. Our faith teaches us that buildings; Churches & temples, will come and go. But the bonds of care, the bonds of love, reach way beyond buildings.

The bonds of care call us to act justly, to love tenderly, and to walk humbly with our God.

32 Sunday Ordinary Time, C, 10 November 2013, Luke 20:27-38

Model of the Second Temple in Jerusalem

You know, they say that, when we’re in the pub, we shouldn’t speak about religion or politics. The folk wisdom of our time suggests that these aspects of life are what divide us, and that the time we have a few drinks on us is not the time to sort these divisive issues out! No, the place to sort these things out is in their respective places – religion belongs in the Church and politics belong in the party offices (so, the wisdom goes).

Of course, that really isn’t true because both religion and politics are fundamentally about people. So, perhaps the proper place for any discussion of religion or politics is wherever people are. That leaves us back in the pub then… Maybe it is one of the places where we should discuss religion! I don't know.

Either way, today’s gospel story takes place in the temple, a very important religious centre for Judaism at the time of Christ. Jesus was teaching the people in the temple, probably in the courtyard around it. Various groups attempted to challenge his teaching, mainly because the people were amazed by him and wondered at him.

The chief priests and the scribes and the elders have arrived to listen to him, and they have sent in a few ‘questioners’ in an attempt to trap Jesus. The question about whether the people should pay taxes to the emperor had just come up. Jesus gave a fantastic answer: "whose face is on the coin? On the denarius? The emperor’s? Well, then, give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God, what is God’s!"

Orthodox icon of the Resurrection

Then we get to the gospel story for this morning. In the temple, teaching the people. Causing both a religious and a political disturbance. People are talking, not just in the temple, but down the road in the inns and in the boarding-houses of Jerusalem. Who is this man? What does it mean?

One of the titles that we have for Jesus is ‘Teacher’. This part of the gospel is not the only part where Jesus occupies the place of teacher. There is the sermon on the mount in Matthew’s gospel, from which we have the beatitudes. And many other places besides.

This morning, Jesus is challenged about ‘resurrection’. It comes in the guise of a question about marriage, but the real issue is the resurrection. Do you believe in the resurrection? From the gospel, we know that the Saduccees don’t believe in the resurrection. But, they are very religious. They take religion very seriously. And, either they want Jesus on their side, or they want to scapegoat him and show him up as a false teacher. But that doesn’t happen. Instead, Jesus takes them very seriously, and proposes a ‘right-teaching’ for them on the doctrine of the resurrection.

And so, right teaching comes into the arena. It is brought out by the Lord who calls all people to himself. If we have right-belief, and if we live from it, then hope is ours. No matter what happens, the future, especially the future that lies beyond this world, cannot be taken from us.

The resurrection is central to our faith. Can we prove that there is a resurrection? No. Our faith is not built on proofs. Our faith is built on hope. Our faith is built on life. Our faith is built on the rock that is Christ. And, if we believe in the resurrection, then we believe that there is a future for us. There is a future for all people. If we believe this, our lives will never be the same again.

This is about death and life. Do we deal in death or celebrate life? Are we hopeful for the future, conscious that the future is in God? Are we at rest in our souls about what the future holds? Or, do we listen to the script about the horrors of the present time, and the horror of the time to come? Are we people of hope? Or people of despair? Are we people of life? Or are we people of death? Do we believe in the resurrection promised us in Christ? Or do we stubbornly hold onto our belief that there is nothing after this life? 

31 Sunday Ordinary Time, C, 3 November 2013, Luke 19:1-10

Defining his work, Alfred Hitchcock once said that “some films are slices of life. Mine are slices of cake.” He went on: “what is drama, after all, but life with the dull bits cut out.” (http://www.ajkeen.com/2006/01/27/life_with_the_d/)

The TV series ‘Love/Hate’ is achieving incredible viewing figures at the moment. Almost a million viewers tuned in to the first episode of the latest series. The fifth episode of the series will be on tonight.

Good story-telling that people can relate to, makes ‘Love/Hate’ a very successful production. Whatever we may think of the violence, the series appears to be real to life. We hear every day on the news about gang violence on the streets of our cities. ‘Love/Hate’ gives us the safe, dramatized, insider view of the violence on the streets of Dublin. We see people getting killed or attacked, and become immersed in the story of why that happens. The drama of the story is the drama of real-life.

The gospel this morning is something like that. We can connect with Zacchaeus because he is this flawed, human character. If the gospel is a drama, a representation of real-life, then today we are introduced to Zacchaeus. Key pieces of information are offered: name, profession, and wealth. He is short and can run. He can climb trees. Already he is a complex character. He is keen to impress. He is impulsive.

He seems to be a career-driven, wealthy, young man, who imagined himself going places. Maybe tax collecting hasn’t turned out the way he imagined that it would.

Zacchaeus is a wonderful character in the story of the gospel. We are all characters in the story of the Christian journey. Our lives are complex, comfortable, sinful, rich. But, perhaps, like Zacchaeus we are not really alive. Not really whole. Maybe the perfect life that we dreamed up for ourselves hasn’t quite worked out. Like Zacchaeus, we ache for the fullness and freedom of life that is salvation in Christ Jesus. Our hearts ache for the fulsome salvation that is offered by the Lord.

Zacchaeus is ‘anxious’ to meet Jesus. He has heard of this man. And, in his anxiety, his heart overtakes him. He finds himself running ahead, climbing up the nearest sycamore. If Jesus was coming here today, wouldn’t you climb a tree to see him? When will Jesus arrive?

Real encounter with Jesus is a life-changing moment. Someone once described prayer as subversive. If we really pray, then we will encounter the Lord Jesus. And if we really encounter the Lord Jesus, then we will be changed by that. And if we are changed by that, our lives will speak loudly to the world. Evangelisation is nothing less than sharing with everyone the joy of having encountered the Lord.

So, you may ask, how are we to encounter the Lord Jesus? If we were Christians of another denomination, we might say that the real encounter with the Lord is to be found by reading the Word of God. We would carry our tattered, worn out Bible with us everywhere. We would seek to immerse ourselves in the Word of God, and offer the Word to other people, so that they too might encounter the Lord.

As a Catholic, we may feel that the answer to encountering Jesus is to be found in Eucharistic adoration. If we have made a pilgrimage to Fatima or Medjugorje, perhaps we will feel that we need to listen to the messages of Our Lady, in order to encounter the Lord. Or, maybe we are devoted to the prayer of the Rosary; or perhaps a devotion to St Anthony or St Jude. Maybe St Pio (Padre Pio). Or maybe we take time to pray through meditation.

For us in the Catholic tradition, we believe that it is in the Church that we encounter the resurrected Lord. “For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” (Matthew 18:20) We are baptized into the Church. We hear God’s Word in the Church. We celebrate Eucharist together as Church. Bishops and priests shepherd the Church. The Lord walked among us to gather us as one, in the Church. The word ‘Church’ means ‘gathering unto the Lord’ (ekklesia tou theou in the greek).

When we gather together, and encounter the Lord, we are moved to do what Zacchaeus promises to do in the gospel. We give away our material wealth to those who need it, because we realize that money in the bank is nothing compared to our wealth in Christ Jesus. It is no use being rich, if I cannot share my riches with others.

We are also moved confess and to make recompense for our wrongs. For Zacchaeus, his sins of cheating others came, perhaps, from a sense that he had to put himself first. Before his encounter with the Lord, perhaps he felt that he deserved the good life, and anyhow, who cares if that meant cheating a few people along the way. We know this element of the human story well. The encounter with the Lord not only changes Zacchaeus’ heart, he resolves to make recompense four times over! Zacchaeus is a character who discovers real freedom, real wealth, in the encounter with Jesus. He can afford to give up everything in the face of this moment. Like many of us, Zacchaeus impulsively and excitedly makes rash promises to Jesus. Does he keep them? Who knows.

“what is drama, after all, but life with the dull bits cut out.” Maybe we need to be a bit silly, a bit impulsive. Move beyond the comfort zone. Fail. Succeed. Fail. Try again.

“And Jesus said to him, ‘Today salvation has come to this house, because this man too is a son of Abraham; for the Son of Man has come to seek out and save what was lost.’”

30 Sunday Ordinary Time, C, 27 October 2013, Luke 18:9-14

When we approach God, we must do so as the poor man with a begging bowl.

God does not measure out his love based on our goodness, or on our capacity to live by the rules. However we might find ourselves saying with the Pharisee: ‘Look what I have done for you, look at the sacrifices I made, or the money that I gave away, or the rules that I have kept.’ We’re looking for brownie points.

But I am never in a position of strength when I come face to face with God. I am always in a dependent position, in a poor position, in a vulnerable position.

How can I convince you of this? Of the reality of our poverty before God? Perhaps life itself is a good place to start.

We cannot grant ourselves the gift of life. We were reliant on our own parents for life. Without them we would not be here; but they are only parties to a mystery. Even with all of our biological knowledge, we cannot understand fully the transmission of human life. It remains a mystery.

If life itself is a mystery, and we are alive – then each of us, and all of us, are a mystery. We stand as living statements of the mystery of human life.

And if we think like this, then a chink opens up in our armour. What is the ground of my being? Who am I really? Where did I come from? What is this that I share in as a human being? The fact of my own life points to something greater than me, greater than us.

And that is a hugely important spiritual fact. There is something greater than me, than you, than us. And maybe that’s where we stop: do you believe in something greater than yourself? A higher power?
Our faith is not a way to try to understand the mystery of life. Rather, the mystery of life opens us up to the possibility of God. But, it was God who chose to reveal himself to people. God revealed himself as the mysterious relationship of Father, Son and Spirit. And more, God became one of us. He crossed the divine-human divide; God let go of his greatness, in order to reveal himself to us.

God’s act, God’s revelation of himself is always in the first place. Our faith is always in the second place, always a response to God who has chosen to share his own life with us. So, our faith is not man-made; and nor is it individual, private belief.

Listen to that first line from the gospel today: “Jesus spoke the following parable to some people who prided themselves on being virtuous and despised everyone else”.

A fundamental of our faith is that we must love one another. I cannot be religious on my own. I may be able to keep some rules, to say some prayers, even come to Sunday Mass. But, if my faith is a participation in the true faith of Jesus Christ, then I never stand over others, I never despise others. Rather, I seek to serve others. The true faith of Jesus Christ calls us beyond attempts at perfecting our own individual virtue. Instead, we come more and more to recognize that it is with and through other people that we come to that deeper encounter with the Lord.

Why does the humble sinner, the tax collector in the gospel, go away at rights with God? I think he goes away at rights because he knows that he does not live the perfect relationship of peace, of service and of love towards his neighbour. And so, he approaches God seeking God’s mercy for that – and God, by whose grace it is possible for us to live in peace; God grants the humble sinner righteousness. It is God who brings him into right relationship with himself and with others.

The Pharisee, on the other hand, displaying his supposed virtue by compare and contrast to other people, is not open to that grace of God that would put him at rights. Instead his heart is full of his virtue, his generosity, his moral uprightness.

We can learn from both of them. Our starting point earlier was about the mystery of where we came from. We realised that God is greater than us. But also, we realised that God wishes to be in relationship with us. Now, however, we realise that it is only by the action of God, by God’s grace, that we can possibly fulfil that relationship of faith with himself and with other people that he calls us into.

We need God’s grace to be at rights. We must acknowledge our brokenness before the Lord: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” And through our brokenness, through our sinfulness, God’s grace enters erupts in our hearts. And once that happens, once we are aware of what God has actually done for us in Christ Jesus, then we cannot but respond.

Indeed our heart, bursting with faith, hope and love, has already bounded ahead of us with joy in the Lord. We become ready to give generously, even foolishly, to charity, to the Church, to society, to other people – we begin to desire to give generously of our time, our talent and our treasure. Not so that we can show off our good deeds to God or people. No. But to really give thanks to God for all. For life and creation; for faith and the Church; for redemption and salvation in Christ Jesus; for family and love in our lives. From this perspective we can learn from the Pharisee. The good life is important. We must live virtuously, but only as a sacrifice of thanksgiving to the Lord for all that he has done, in the hope of the salvation, mercy and forgiveness that he wishes to give us.

When we approach God, we must do so as the poor man with a begging bowl.