First Sunday of Advent 2014

You know that feeling of waiting for something or someone? It is a feeling of excitement or maybe anxiety. It can be a creative time, a time of high alert, where we may even be more aware of ourselves. Our senses are heightened especially when we are waiting for important news or results or waiting on a loved one to call or to arrive. Waiting is not always seen as a good thing but it can be a time for growth. And so, we enter into the season of waiting: Advent.

These weeks are weeks of great hope and joy and we celebrate God entering into our lives once more. This short passage from Mark reminds us to be alert, to use this time to prepare. What will our preparations be like? God is with us in many different ways, trying to catch our attention in the midst of our crazy, busy days. As we fight our way through the queues in the coming weeks, can we use 5 minutes, 7 minutes, 20 mins… to stop, be still, to ask God to enter into our hearts and lives once more.

What kind of King?

The Feast of Christ the King is the final Sunday in the liturgical calendar. To understand more fully what this feast means we need to lay aside a lot of the cultural baggage about Kings and Kingdoms. Jesus’ Kingship is very different to the kind we are familiar with. There are no trappings, no palaces, no pomp and ceremony. The picture painted by today’s Gospel shows us Jesus as a King who is found in those considered to be on the very fringes of society. This passage comes at the end of Matthew’s Gospel and it is a challenge, a call to be Christ to others and to see Christ in others.

With so much brokenness in the world, so much unrest, so much war and displacement, the Christian community are called to him by giving our own lives in service to those around us; we are called to be transformative through radical solidarity. There are no shortage of causes, whether it be Gaza, Iraq, Syria, climate justice, austerity, local poverty, visiting the sick or those in prison, community initiatives… Jesus’ Kingdom is built on a different kind of foundation.

“If now we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten how to see God in one another. If each person saw God in his neighbour, do you think we would need guns and bombs?” Mother Teresa

Talents ~ Sunday 16th November

The parable we read today is not a lesson in capitalism. We must bear in mind that Jesus is frustrated with those who had been entrusted with ministering to His people. They had excluded the people and laid heavy burdens upon them. When we read the parable in this sense we can understand the exasperation of the Master. The talents should have been used to transform people’s lives; used for embracing those on the margins; for standing up against injustice and inequality in the world. Yet many were afraid or blind to this, so they hid the talents and did not multiply them. It is a safer place to be.

Compare this outcome to the other servants. There is a beautiful verse in both cases which reads “enter into the joy of your master”. Is this not what happens when we find that path that is right for us? Joy! When we use our talents and gifts in work or projects that are life giving and meeting the needs of our communities? Joy is a fantastic emotion; a sign of God’s grace. Despite the frustrations of whatever work we are involved in, the presence of joy is one sign that we are on the Kingdom track. The challenge is not to be afraid to go out there. Pope Francis asks that we have the ‘smell of the sheep’ and calls us to “be courageous. A Church that does not go out of itself, sooner or later, sickens from the stale air of closed rooms”.

Sunday November 9th 2014 ~ Cleansing of the Temple

Today we celebrate the dedication of the Basilica of St. John Lateran, historically the oldest church in Rome. It was the residence of the Pope for centuries and remains his cathedral. It is considered the mother of all churches! Our Gospel passage for this feast almost seems to be in contradiction as it recalls Jesus cleansing the Temple in Jerusalem.

The theology of the Temple was such that to get to God you had to qualify culturally, socially and in terms of ‘purity’. The goods sold in the Temple markets were used in sacrifices so that people could meet the requirements to be ‘closer’ to God. You can understand why Jesus was angry and challenged this model. He tells people early on in John’s Gospel that HE is God’s Temple. God cannot be confined. Jesus’ words are too controversial for his listeners and challenging such powerful structures comes at a price.

We can take away many reflections from today’s feast: we celebrate the church as a place of encounter with God; we are also reminded that God is not confined to one building or the structures placed around it. We gather as community in prayer and worship in our churches united with Christians all over the world, yet we remember that it is the people who gather there in Jesus’ name who are the real church. The Temple of God is the Christian community, the body of Christ with Jesus as its foundation. This is pre-echoed in the second reading today from St. Paul when he says: “For the Temple of God is holy and you are that Temple”.

“Come to me… and I will give you rest” ~ Remembering

In all our lives we carry many burdens. Sometimes we carry them in such a way that they help us grow, at other times we allow them to eat away at us, making them very heavy indeed. Jesus is not saying that we will not have burdens to carry. But He is telling us to find rest in Him. Jesus is offering refreshment and peace. Even when those we love pass into eternal life, we are consoled in knowing that they are at peace and that we will be united with them again.

We perform many rituals in remembering the dead, especially in the month of November. Today we might light a candle, say a prayer, visit a church or grave, look at old photographs. We can be thankful for the many ways in which our loved ones shaped us, cared for us, and who are with us as we continue to journey through life.

“We are who we are today and we are where we are today, because of those whose lives have touched ours and who have let our lives touch theirs. God, in the magnificence of things, does not intend us to be neutral when we lose those who have loved us. So, our grief has to be tinged with gratitude for lives which have shaped us, for hands that have held us, for voices that have inspired us, for eyes which have beheld us, for ears that have listened to us.” (Unknown Author).

Nov 1st All Saints Day Matthew 5:1- Blessed are the peacemakers…

Sister Megan Rice is eighty four years old and is currently seven months into a three year prison sentence for breaking into a US Security Complex in Tennessee. She, and her co-conspirators, sprayed bible quotes and blood on the walls of the heavily guarded, $500 million Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility. When guards came to arrest them they found them singing hymns and were offered the chance to break bread and read the bible with the intruders. The offer was declined. Sister Megan's actions are rooted in the call to "hammer swords into plough shares", i.e., convert weapons into peaceful tools (Isaiah). Their action has been called "the biggest security breach in the history of the [USA’s] atomic complex." At her trial, she was asked if she had anything to say, she replied, "I regret I didn't do this seventy years ago."

Sr. Megan is a peacemaker, what some would call an ‘urban saint’. Saints are all around us, pointing the way for us, teaching us something about God through their lives. They persevere in all they do for their families and communities, especially those on the margins. They are the blessed ones. The Megan Rice’s of this world are an inspiration for us to strive to live the beatitudes in our daily lives. Matthew’s community would have been very familiar with what it means to be persecuted because of their beliefs and the final beatitude calls for perseverance. Perhaps that is the making of all saints.