Tuesday of Week 1 of Ordinary Time – First Reading

Commentary on Hebrews 2:5-12

Today we continue the discussion about the nature of Jesus. It seems clear that those to whom the sermon is addressed are having problems squaring the humanity and the suffering of Jesus with his position as Sovereign Lord and Son of God.

The author replies by emphasising the dignity of human beings in our world:

God did not subject the coming world, about which we are speaking, to angels.

Rather, he ‘subjected’ the world to ‘men’ (humans)—to one Man. The author quotes from Psalm 8 (4-5):

What are humans [Greek, anthropos] that you are mindful of them or mortals [Greek, huios anthropou] that you care for them? You have made them for a little while lower than the angels; you have crowned them with glory and honor,
subjecting all things under their feet. (see note.)

The psalm contrasts God’s greatness with man’s relative insignificance, but also stresses the superiority of humanity to the rest of creation, over which we were given stewardship.

Originally, the “son of man” was simply a way of speaking of humans in general but, in this context, there is clearly a reference to the Son of Man—Jesus Christ. Some believe the term, frequently used in the Gospel, comes from this psalm.

Although the human is put on a lower level than the angels, it is to humanity that governance of our world has been entrusted, “subjecting all things under their feet”. God left nothing outside humanity’s control. However:

As it is, we do not yet see everything in subjection to them…

Some translations use “him” instead of “them”, but ‘him’ here seems ambiguous—it can refer to humanity in general, or to Jesus in glory.

The first Christians, despised and persecuted, were still waiting for the coming of God’s reign on earth. Although Christ has already entered his glory, his reign on earth has to continue until he has conquered all his enemies; then we will share in his full and final triumph.

But the Son, who in his incarnation was—with the rest of humanity—made lower than the angels, is now crowned in supreme glory and honour precisely because of his sufferings and death. It was through his undergoing this experience that salvation came to the rest of humanity, because:

…by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

Christ was glorified because he suffered. His triumph seals the redeeming value of his death and guarantees unending life for us.

The all-powerful God, who is the source of all that exists, has brought many of his children to glory. He did this by making his incarnate Son, the “pioneer” of our salvation, perfect through his suffering. What seemed to the Hebrews to be a stumbling block in their acceptance of Jesus is in fact what makes him their Lord. By dying and fulfilling the will of God, Christ becomes the one perfect Saviour, responsible for the entry of human beings into the glory of God.

And it is this which brings Jesus and ourselves united together under one Father, so that Jesus, though our supreme Lord, is “not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters”. In support, the author quotes from Psalm 22:

I will proclaim your name to my brothers and sisters;
in the midst of the congregation I will praise you. (Ps 22:22)

What the author says here is something we have long become accustomed to accepting, and yet it is indeed a deep mystery—namely, that the glory of God and our salvation should be brought about, not just by God’s Son becoming one of us, but that he should go through such terrible pain and humiliation. The enormity of this mystery is that Jesus:

Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. (John 13:1)

This is proof of Jesus’ love—and hence his Father’s—love for us. So often, we see suffering as a punishment from God, but as is so clear in this text, very often it is in fact a source of grace. It was this the Hebrews (to whom the Letter was sent) found difficult to grasp.

With faith, we know that it was fitting for God to make Jesus “perfect through sufferings”, i.e. consecrated by obedient suffering. Because he is perfected as high priest, Jesus is then able to consecrate his people. If Jesus is able to help human beings, it is because he has become one of us; we are his “brothers and sisters”.

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Note: The pronouns are all actually masculine in the original Greek, but the word for ‘man’—anthropos—is  equivalent to the Latin homo. Both of these words indicate a human person, man or woman. And so  in the Nicene Creed we say of the Incarnation that Jesus ‘homo factus est’ (literally, ‘was made  human’). The Latin word for a male is vir (and for a woman, mulier). The Creed is then saying that Jesus shared his humanity with both men and women.

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Monday of Week 1 of Ordinary Time – Gospel

Commentary on Mark 1:14-20

We now begin our readings from Mark’s Gospel and we will be following him for the next several weeks. Today’s reading follows immediately on the short accounts of Jesus’ baptism and temptations in the desert that Mark gives. It is the beginning of his public ministry. The reading consists of two main parts—a summary of Jesus’ teaching and the first response to it.

As the passage opens, we are told that John (the Baptist) has been arrested (the reason for his arrest will be given later). The word for ‘arrest’ is literally ‘handed over’, a key word which will be used later of Jesus himself, his disciples, and indeed of many others down the centuries. The term is also used in our Eucharist when the celebrant at the consecration says:

This is my Body which will be given up for you.

Our translation of ‘given up’ represents the Latin word tradetur, which literally means ‘handed over’. Jesus is daily handed over to us, or rather, he hands himself over to us and expects us to do the same for our brothers and sisters.

Jesus begins his ministry by proclaiming the gospel, the good news, of God. It is summed up in the words:

The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.

It is a deceptively simple statement which, in fact, is rich in meaning. One can say that the whole of the gospel message is contained in those two sentences.

The following words require comment:

• time
• kingdom
• repent
• believe in

The time is fulfilled
In the Scriptures, ‘time’ is translated using the Greek word kairos. Specifically, kairos refers to a moment when something is ripe to happen, a serendipitous moment. And that exactly describes the appearance of Jesus, an appearance which the whole of the Old Covenant has been preparing for and leading up to.

The Kingdom of God is at hand
The whole of Jesus’ message centres round the idea of the ‘Kingdom of God’. It was the coming of that Kingdom which he proclaimed; it was the core of his teaching. Because of Matthew’s use of the term “Kingdom of heaven”, there is a possibility that we think of the ‘Kingdom’ as only belonging to the life after death. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The word ‘Kingdom’ translates the Greek word basileia, an abstract noun which is better rendered as ‘kingship’ or ‘reign’. Kingdom here does not refer to a place. It points to the ruling power of God, a power based above all on love. Wherever the love of God prevails in our world we can say that the Kingdom is there. Love essentially involves other people, so the Kingdom is not a place or an action, but a complex of harmonious and interacting relationships. Jesus came to call every single person to belong to such a world.

We need to emphasise that the Kingdom and the Church, or the Kingdom and Christianity, do not coincide. The role of the Church is to be a sacrament of the Kingdom. It fulfils that role with varying degrees of success. There are Kingdom people everywhere, that is, people who base their lives on love and justice, on peace and freedom, who are not Christians at all—but they are Kingdom people, because their lives reflect the spirit of God. Mere membership in a Christian group does not guarantee one is a Kingdom person.

Repent
Here we have the basic steps needed to become fully a Kingdom person. First, we need to repent. This is the most common translation of the Greek verb for the noun metanoia. It is not a very happy rendering. ‘Repent’, for most people means being sorry for something done in the past. That is not excluded here; rather metanoia looks much more to the future. Metanoia really means a radical change in one’s thinking, in this case, about the meaning and purpose of life, and how that life is to be lived. Jesus is calling here for a radical conversion, and for us to take to heart his vision of life.

Believe in the good news
And how is that metanoia to be achieved? It will come about by our believing in the “good news”, i.e. the gospel. For many Christians, ‘belief’ means the total acceptance of the teachings of Christ as interpreted for us by the Church. But something more is asked of us here. We are asked not just to believe, but to believe in. It is one thing to believe something is true, but that belief may not affect our lives very much. In calling on us to believe in the message that the gospel brings, we are being asked for a total investment of ourselves, and not just the accepting of doctrines as true. We are being called on to live our lives and pattern them on the model of Jesus himself. Again, we will see what that entails as we go through the Gospel in coming weeks.

The second part of the reading gives us a dramatic example of some people who did just what Jesus was asking. As Jesus walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother, Andrew, who were fishermen, casting their nets into the sea. They were doing their daily work. Jesus said to them:

Follow me, and I will make you fishers of people.

There and then, they dropped their nets, their whole means of livelihood, and went after Jesus. A little further on Jesus saw two sons of Zebedee, James and John, who were mending their nets. These two Jesus also called. They promptly left their father in the boat with his hired men and followed Jesus. Later Jesus will say:

Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:26)

Here we have that metanoia, that radical change of life, taking place. They follow Jesus with total trust. As they go off, they have no idea where they are going or what it will entail. They believe in Jesus, putting all their trust in him. They were to meet many trials and tribulations on the way, but they never regretted the step they took. Only by following their example will we too have the same experience. The only guarantee we have is that those who do take Jesus’ call seriously, and live it to the fullest, know that they made the right choice.

Finally, we might say that this story is to be read as a kind of parable. We say this because we know that later on, the disciples will still be in contact with their families and those boats will appear several times in the Gospel story. What is being emphasised here is the total commitment to the Way and vision of Jesus, which is symbolised by the total abandoning of the boats and family members.

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Monday of Week 1 of Ordinary Time – First Reading

Commentary on Hebrews 1:1-6

Today we begin reading from the Letter to the Hebrews. Although grouped with the Pauline letters, it was clearly not written by Paul. The style is very different, and it has the best Greek in the New Testament. The identity of the author can only be a matter of speculation. It is written more as a sermon than a letter, but does seem to have been sent to a distant congregation, possibly in Rome. It seems to have been written some time after 65 AD and perhaps around the time of the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD.  

Because of extensive quoting from the Old Testament, the words of this letter are taken as addressed to Jewish Christians. The community addressed may have suffered persecution, and there are signs of a falling away from the Church. Hence, the Letter emphasises strongly the role of Christ as the Way to God, a Way endorsed even by the Old Testament. There is the emphasis on faith and on Christ as the only High Priest.

The Letter opens with a magnificent statement of the role of Christ in the plan of God. In the past, God had spoken to his people in many different ways through the prophets. ‘Prophets’ here means all who spoke in the name of God, and would include some of the patriarchs, such as Abraham, Moses and Joshua, some of the kings, especially David, and other leaders, as well as others considered prophets.

Now “in these last days” God has spoken through his Son. The early Christians believed that the coming of Christ was a precursor of the final days and that all things would soon come to an end. As time passed, this conviction grew weaker, and this can already be seen in later writings of the New Testament.

This Son is the “heir of all things” and, through him, we too become heirs to all God’s promises made to us through Christ. He is in a totally different category from any of his predecessors, being not just a messenger but the very Son of God. Through Him also were all the “worlds” created.

In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God…All things came into being through him. (John 1:1,3)

“Worlds” in the plural here may refer to this world and the world to come or to the many heavenly realms through which Christ ascended (Heb 4:14; 9:24).

The role of Christ is then beautifully described:

He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being…

In these sentences we have the sophia (Greek, ‘wisdom’) and logos (‘word’) metaphors. The wisdom is totally shared between Father and Son, but the Son as Logos is made in some way distinct from the Father.

Jesus as Word is the manifestation, in human form, of our God. Jesus communicates, not just through what he says, but through his actions and his whole being. When we see Jesus and hear Jesus, we see God and we hear God. When Jesus speaks, it is God who speaks; when Jesus acts, it is God who acts. And yet, because of his humanity, in Jesus we see God only, as it were, in a clouded mirror. He is the Way we follow to the fullness of union with God, something not to be experienced fully in this life.

He sustains all things by his powerful word.

He is the Wisdom of God. Jesus’ word is not just something spoken; it is a creative word, a making word. Through the Word all things were made. On a lower level, our words too can be creative—whether it be through speech that galvanises people into action, or through the ‘word’ of a visual artist or a great musician.

When he had made purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high…

This purification was done through Jesus’ suffering and dying on the Cross. Jesus “emptied” himself as a manifestation of God’s unchanging love for us, even though we were in sin and because we were in sin.

He sits now at the right hand of the Father, sharing fully in his power and glory as Son, and far exceeding the angels in status and dignity. He has a “name” far more excellent than theirs. That name is “Son”, an ‘un-created’ Son who has been with the Father from all eternity:

Therefore God exalted him even more highly
and gave him the name
that is above every other name,
so that at the name given to Jesus
every knee should bend,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth… (Phil 2:9-10)

The reading today concludes with a series of scriptural verses. These come mostly from royal psalms and illustrate Jesus’ supreme status as an equal with the Father, far surpassing that of the angels. The once-humiliated and crucified Jesus has been declared God’s Son, and this name shows his superiority to the angels.

The reason for the author’s insistence on that superiority is, among other things, that in some Jewish traditions angels were seen as mediators of the Old Testament (see Acts 7:53; Gal 3:19). Jesus’ superiority to the angels also emphasises the superiority of the New Covenant to the Old because of the heavenly priesthood of Jesus.

Today is an occasion for us to express our deep thanks to God for the gift of Jesus his Son. Because of him, we have a better understanding of how we are to live our lives and how to foster and deepen God’s image in us. We do this by our assimilating our human way of living to that of Jesus who is the Way.

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The Baptism of the Lord (Year B)

Commentary on Isaiah 55:1-11; 1 John 5:1-9; Mark 1:7-11

We come today to the end of the Christmas season. And we have the third great ‘epiphany’ or showing of God in the human person of Jesus. The first ‘epiphany’ was at the birth of the child Jesus in the stable at Bethlehem when he was visited by the shepherds representing the poor, the marginalised and the sinful for whom Jesus had specially come. The second ‘epiphany’ was when the ‘wise men’ came from ‘the East’ to worship the newly born Jesus. They represented all those peoples and nations who were being invited to be numbered among God’s own people through the mediation of Jesus as Lord.

Today we celebrate the third great ‘epiphany’ of the Lord in Jesus Christ. The time is much later. Jesus is now an adult, probably about 30 years of age. We are brought to the banks of the River Jordan somewhere north of Jerusalem where John the Baptist, a cousin of Jesus, is living out in the desert. The desert in some ways is a place where God can be found, although for Jesus it was also a place of trial and temptation. For the early Fathers in the desert it provided both experiences.

John the Baptist leads a very austere life, dressed in the simplest of clothes and sustaining himself on whatever nourishment he can find in the vicinity. He has made a name for himself as a man of God, and large numbers come out to hear and be influenced by him.

Just prior to today’s Gospel passage we are told that John was:

…proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. (Mark 1:5)

It is important not to misunderstand the meaning of these words. It would be quite wrong to think that people simply had to come for baptism in the river for all their sins to be wiped out. That would be little more than superstition. The baptism itself was a symbolic act which had to be accompanied by an inner change.

The word for ‘repentance’ here is metanoia in Greek. It implies a radical change in the way we look at the meaning and purpose of life and how we live that life ourselves. It calls for much more than is normally connoted by ‘repentance’ which we normally understand as ‘being sorry’ for something we have done. Metanoia is much more than just feeling sorry. It calls for a total reorganisation of one’s attitudes so that such errant or hurting behaviour would simply disappear from one’s life.

And the ‘forgiveness of sins’ is more than God just wiping out the guilt and the threat of punishment that our sins might involve. In a sense, the damage our sins do often lasts for a very long time and cannot be undone. If I have murdered someone, they stay dead no matter how sorry I feel. If I have destroyed a person’s reputation, it may remain destroyed for ever. Hurtful words spoken cannot be called back.

Then, of course, like Jesus, our baptism brings with it a serious obligation to share our faith with others both by word and example. It involves much more than simply ‘saving our souls’ and ‘leading sinless lives’.

We are called to be living witnesses of the Gospel, to be the salt of the earth, to be a city on a hill, a candle radiating light in the surrounding darkness. We are called, in short, to be united with the others in our Christian community in the building up of God’s Kingdom. Sadly, one wonders how often this is the reality, when one sees so many Catholics acting like total strangers to each other at a Sunday parish Eucharist!

All those words of Isaiah from the first reading and applied to Jesus are to be applied to each one of us as well. Our baptism is not simply some past event recorded in some dusty parish register. It is a living reality which is to be constantly deepened and enriched.

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Saturday of Week 33 of Ordinary Time – First Reading

Commentary on Revelation 11:4-12

Today’s reading seems at first sight to be very obscure in meaning. After the eating of the scroll, it is a second digression by the author and describes two rather mysterious ‘witnesses’. They are referred to as “two olive trees and the two lampstands”, and they had been given authority to prophesy for 1,260 days or three and a half years, a conventional period for eschatological distress.

These titles originally were applied by the prophet Zechariah to Joshua and Zerubbabel, the religious and civil leaders respectively, who restored the Temple and the city of Jerusalem after the return from the Babylonian Exile. Here it is possible they represent the leaders of the New Temple and the New Jerusalem, namely Peter and Paul.

The descriptive images which follow link them to Moses and Elijah, representatives of the Law and the Prophets who appeared at the Transfiguration along with Jesus, endorsing his mission, suffering, death and resurrection. Anyone who attacks them will be consumed by fire. The fire that consumes enemies reminds us of how King Ahaziah’s emissaries to Elijah were twice destroyed by fire brought down on them by God through his prophet (see 2 Kings 1).

And the power to shut up the sky refers to the great drought that came on Israel in the days of Elijah (1 Kings 17). Their ability to turn water into blood and bring other plagues recalls how Moses brought the plagues to Egypt to make the Pharaoh repent and release the Israelites (Exodus 7).

But after they have completed their task of giving witness to Christ and the Gospel, the “beast” comes from the Abyss, overcomes and kills them. Their killer is the Antichrist. His coming from the Abyss indicates his demonic origins. Some see the beast as Nero, the emperor traditionally thought to have martyred both Peter and Paul. In any case, he stands for a ruler opposed to God’s people. The death of these prophets parallels that of their Master and Lord.

Leaving their bodies to lie in the street of a “great city” was a serious violation of all decency for people in the Middle East (see the burial of Jesus himself).

The “great city” may be either Jerusalem or Rome. Jerusalem is sometimes called Sodom by the prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel) for its moral wickedness, and Egypt for its idolatry and oppression. It is also, of course, the city where Jesus was crucified. However, Jesus could have been said to have been executed in Rome in so far as Jerusalem was under Roman rule and crucifixion was a Roman form of execution (the Jews preferred stoning). The two “witnesses” or prophets, if they are Peter and Paul, would have died in Rome.

The outrage against them is repeated as they are left lying unburied for three and a half days because the “nations” will not allow their burial (in the Middle East and generally in the Muslim world people are buried very soon after death).

Their death, however, is celebrated by the ”inhabitants of the earth” (the world), who found the teaching of these prophets a scourge. This, of course, was only to fulfil the teaching of Jesus about the fate that would await those who preached his Gospel (see Matt 10:16-23). Things have not changed in our own day.

However, this was not the end. After three and a half days, God gave them new life. They stood up (i.e. they ‘rose’, ‘resurrected’), and all who saw this were terrified. The killing of Christians, i.e. the making of martyrs, in the whole history of the Church has only brought new life, new energy and new courage. A striking example in modern times was the assassination of Bishop Oscar Romero while he was saying Mass in El Salvador. The Church thrives most of all in time of persecution.

At the end of today’s passage, the two prophets are called up to the very presence of their Lord and, like him, ascend in a cloud, the very symbol of God’s presence.

Let us hope that we, too, will be able to follow them. For that, we need to give witness to our faith, even in times of difficulty or when faced with opposition. Those are not times to hide our light under a bushel basket or to bury our talent in the ground. As a risen people, we are called on to stand up. How else can the Gospel message of truth and love be seen and heard?

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Monday of Week 2 of Easter – First Reading

Commentary on Acts 4:23-31

After they had been released by the Jewish leaders following their arrest and interrogation, and had been given strict warnings not to continue what they were doing, Peter and John went back to their community and related all about their experience.  This was possibly the same ‘upper room’ where the Apostles had met before and where the community may have continued to assemble.

The whole community then prayed.  They recalled the words of the psalmist who asks why the Gentiles and the princes of the world conspire against the Lord and his anointed.  Here we see in the unbelieving Romans the ‘Gentiles’, and Herod and Pilate represented by the ‘kings’ and ‘princes’.  They have gathered against the Lord and his anointed.  The word ‘anointed’ in Greek translates as ‘Christ’ (christos).  The Herod in question is Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee and Perea from 4 BC to AD 39.  He was the one who executed John the Baptist and before whom Jesus appeared during his trial.  Acts will later describe his rather gruesome death (Acts 12:20-23).  Pontius Pilate, of course, was the same Roman procurator who had Jesus crucified.

Yet they recognise that all of this had been foreseen by God. About Jesus’ enemies, Scripture says:

Have you not heard
that I determined it long ago?
I planned from days of old
what now I bring to pass… (Is 37:26)

It was not that God forced them to act as they did, but that their freely chosen decisions were foreseen by God and would become part of his plan of salvation.

They beg the Lord, as persecution is also extended to them, that God will be with them through:

…signs and wonders…performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.

It is good for us too to be aware that, when as individuals or communities, we are true to the living out of our Christian faith, we can expect to face criticism, opposition, abuse and ridicule. Then we must also pray for the Lord’s assurance, protection and guidance. We do not necessarily expect those against us to change their minds, but we ask for the strength to continue being faithful to our convictions and the search for truth and goodness.

Then, suddenly, the place where the community is praying begins to shake and they are filled with the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Father and Jesus. Their prayer for strength and courage has been heard. Jesus had said:

Very truly, I tell you, if you ask anything of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. (John 16:23)

It is a mini-Pentecost and enables them to go out and proclaim the Good News with renewed confidence, unafraid of the threats and dangers that await them.

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Friday of Week 22 of Ordinary Time – Gospel

Commentary on Luke 5:33-39

The call of the first disciples is followed in Luke by the cure of a leper and then of a paralytic. Then there is the call of Levi (who is called “Matthew” in Matthew’s Gospel) and the discussion with Jesus about his mixing with sinful and unclean people. It is the first of many confrontations between Jesus and the Jewish leaders.

We then come to today’s reading. Some scribes and Pharisees want to know why, when their disciples and those of John the Baptist regularly fast, Jesus’ disciples freely eat and drink. We know that John grew up in the desert and lived on an austere diet of locusts and wild honey. He also preached an austere penitential message and lived a highly disciplined life. The Pharisees also led a highly regimented and strict lifestyle. Jesus, however, together with his disciples, is frequently seen eating at the tables of Pharisees, tax collectors and in the houses of friends. But while Jesus rejected ostentatious fasting, we know he fasted (once for 40 days) and praised it together with prayer and almsgiving, provided it was done discreetly and not for display.

Jesus gives two answers to the question. First, he says that it is not appropriate for guests to fast when the bridegroom is still around. A Jewish wedding was and is a specially joyous occasion (plenty of wine needed, as we saw in Cana) and it could last for a week. It would be unthinkable to fast at such a time. Here Jesus is the bridegroom. There will come a time when he is not physically with his disciples, and then they will fast.

The second reason goes deeper and is presented in the form of a parable. One does not use a new piece of cloth to patch an old garment. At the first sign of stress, the new cloth will be stronger and the old cloth will tear out. Nor does one put new wine into old wineskins. The new wine is still fermenting and expanding. The old wineskins, made of goatskins, are already stretched and no longer flexible. When the new wine expands, the old wineskins will not be able to stretch any more and will burst. The result is lost wine and ruined wineskins. So new wine has to be poured into new wineskins.

In this Jesus is clearly saying that his whole vision of religion is new, and that it can only be accepted and adopted by people who are prepared to see things in a new way. His teaching and vision cannot be grafted on to the old religion. The old religion emphasised externals like observance of legal and ritual regulations and fasting; Jesus emphasises the interior spirit, which is the real measure of a person’s value.

This parable may also be read in conjunction with John’s account of the wedding feast at Cana, where Jesus produced new and better wine from the water in the ritual washing jars.

Jesus knows the difficulties his adversaries face:

No one after drinking old wine desires new wine but says, ‘The old is good.’

Those who had grown up with the ‘old wine’ of the Mosaic Law would find it difficult to switch to the ‘new wine’ that Jesus was offering.

Even in our Church today there are some who still hanker for the ‘old wine’ of the pre-Vatican II days. They have not made the inner shift which is necessary. They have not understood that Vatican II was much more than a change of external practices (such as have taken place in the liturgy). They nostalgically long for the Tridentine Mass in Latin and proclaim it preferable to the ‘new’ liturgy which they find superficial and lacking in reverence. But they do not seem to have grasped the thinking which is behind the liturgical changes. The new patch does not fit their old cloth. “The old wine is better,” they say.

Going forward, this thinking will not likely disappear because “the world writes the agenda for the church” and there will no doubt be other changes. The new wine will not be appreciated until the wineskins are also changed; otherwise we are in the same situation as the Pharisees were with Jesus.

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Easter Monday – Gospel

Commentary on Matthew 28:8-15

The women who had come to the tomb early on Sunday morning to embalm the dead body of Jesus were amazed to find the stone rolled back from the entrance and the tomb empty. Their reactions are a mixture of anxiety and joy. They are anxious that the body may have been stolen, but there is also an expectant joy. Could it be that he is alive? This is in contrast with the Gospel of Mark (16:8) where he tells us that the women “said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”

And, while still wondering what could have happened, they run to tell the news to the disciples with “great joy” (obviously they were having optimistic thoughts) and, at that point they encounter Jesus, who greeted them with an Easter greeting of “Peace!” (Shalom!).

As they cling to Jesus’ feet (like Mary Magdalene in John’s Gospel, they do not want to lose him again), they are told not to be afraid, an admonition that will be heard frequently during these days, but to go to the disciples and instruct them to go to Galilee where they will see Jesus.

There are various, and to some extent, mutually conflicting versions of the resurrection story and of how and where the Risen Jesus was seen and by whom. There are basically two types of experiences. Appearances to individuals (Mary Magdalene, the Emmaus disciples, Peter and Thomas) help prove the fact of Jesus’ resurrection. Appearances to several disciples together are accompanied by a mandate to continue the work of Jesus.

In today’s reading, the women are to instruct the disciples that they will see Jesus in Galilee, their own place. Galilee is their home ground, the place where they were born, grew up and worked. That is where the Risen Jesus is to be found. And, it is in our ‘own place’ we will expect to see him, too.

Jesus is saying the same thing to us. We do not have to go to Jerusalem or Rome or Lourdes or Fatima to find him. If we cannot find him in the place where we live and work, we won’t find him in those other places either.

As well as the distinction between individual and collective post-resurrection appearances of Jesus, there are two other distinct traditions: 1) those appearances that take place in Galilee (in the north) and 2) those in Judea (at Jerusalem, in the south). Commentators have pointed out that these seeming inconsistencies provide a better witness than any artificial uniformity to the antiquity of the evidence and its historical value. The physical details are not that important; it is the meaning that is all-important.

Meanwhile, the leaders of the Jews put another twist on what is happening. They also are reporting that the tomb is empty. All sides agree that the tomb was empty; the disagreement was over the why. Obviously, they are wondering what could have happened, but cannot accept the possibility of resurrection. The guards are bribed and told to say that the disciples stole the body while they were asleep. Guards who sleep on the job would be punished, not bribed. And, if they were asleep, how did they know what happened?

But when people do not want to believe something, reason and logic can often go out the window. We see such rationalisations frequently in those who find it inconvenient to continue living a Christian life.

Those who take the Gospel seriously and try to live according to its vision have all the confirmation they need that it is the recipe for a happy and fulfilled life.

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Tuesday of Week 2 of Easter – First Reading

Commentary on Acts 4:32-37

Today’s reading from Acts is one of three portraits of the early Christian community. It is probably more the expression of an ideal than a historic description, but it is no less valid for all that. The passage emphasises the communal ownership and mutual responsibility of the community members for each other.

We Christians are sometimes accused of being ‘socialists’. Perhaps it is not an accusation of which we should be altogether ashamed. The ideal of socialism as popularised by Marx is “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need”. If this were the essence of socialism, then it is hard to see how any follower of Christ could disagree with it.

However, what people often do is to confuse this stated ideal of socialism (and communism) with the way in which it was implemented, as well as the atheistic materialism which it proclaimed. As we saw so clearly during communism and Marxism at their height, an attempt to achieve justice without love does not work. We Christians must also remember that there cannot be true love without justice.

Four elements are mentioned in the first sentence of today’s passage:

• The believers form a community, a “group of believers”;
• They are of “one heart and soul”, deeply united with each other;
• “No one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common”;
• They gave “testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus” with great power, through signs and healings “and great grace was upon them all”.

The reading tells us:

There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold.

This was a voluntary sharing to provide for those who did not have enough for the essentials of living. Each one’s aim was to ensure that the needs (not necessarily the wants) of the others were met rather than each one looking only to their own needs.

It is important to note that this was possible because:

…the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul…

Their material sharing was simply an expression of the care which they felt for each other at a much deeper level.

The passage concludes with a striking example:

There was a Levite from Cyprus, Joseph, to whom the apostles gave the name Barnabas (which means “son of encouragement”). He sold a field that belonged to him, then brought the money and laid it at the apostles’ feet.

It is known that Jews had been living in Cyprus since the time of Maccabees. Generally, Levites did not own inherited land in Palestine, but the rule may not have applied in other areas. Or, the property may have belonged to his wife. Barnabas will later become a missionary partner with Paul.

Barnabas’ action will contrast with another couple, Ananias and Sapphira, who claimed to be doing the same, but who in fact only gave part of their possessions and kept the rest for themselves. They were severely punished. One after the other, they both dropped dead. Their story is told in the following chapter of Acts, but is not part of our Easter readings.

Do we find such sharing communities in our Church today? One obvious example are the many different communities of religious life whose misleadingly named “vow of poverty” is primarily, not a vow of destitution, but one of total sharing of resources coupled with a life of material simplicity. Clearly, some communities live this life more effectively than others. Additionally, we have to admit that many Christians, including religious, can be caught up in the individualism, hedonism, consumerism and materialism that dominates so many of our prosperous societies today.

Perhaps today we could reflect on our own attitudes to material goods: how we acquire them, how we use them, to what extent we share our material blessings with those in genuine need, and not just that of our surplus. This is something we need to reflect on as individuals, as families, and in our parish community. There should not be any people in real need in our parish communities; if there are, how can we speak of ourselves as a parish community?

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Saturday of Week 22 of Ordinary Time – Gospel

Commentary on Luke 6:1-5

Yet another confrontation between Jesus and some Pharisees is described in today’s Gospel. Following immediately, as it does, after the parable about the patch and the wineskins (Luke 5:33-39), it confirms what Jesus said about the gap between the traditionalists and his vision.

He and his disciples were walking through a cornfield and it was a Sabbath day. The disciples were plucking heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands and eating them. The Sabbath did not forbid walking short distances. And custom did not forbid ‘gleaning’, that is, taking grain left over by reapers. It did forbid reaping and threshing. Only a very narrow-minded interpretation could have described plucking as reaping and rubbing between the hands as threshing, but that seems to be what is happening here.

The disciples are asked:

Why are you doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?

Jesus answers very quickly and to the point. He makes no reference to the narrow-minded legalism that his critics reveal, the ‘old wineskin’ mentality. Instead, he throws at them an incident from the past. David and his men were hungry so they went into the house of God and, with his approval, ate the holy bread of the Presence which only the priests were allowed to eat (1 Sam 21:6). Each Sabbath, twelve loaves of fresh bread were set on a table in the Holy Place. The stale bread was eaten by the priests.

As king, David put himself above the law. Both David’s and the disciples’ actions involved godly men doing something forbidden by law. However, it is never a violation of a law to do what is good and to save life (eating for survival). In that sense both David and the disciples were within the spirit, though not the letter, of the law.

And Jesus, too, is above the law:

The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.

Jesus has the authority to overrule man-made laws concerning the Sabbath, particularly as interpreted by the Pharisees. This does not mean, of course, that Jesus (or even God for that matter) will do anything he feels like doing. Jesus will never go against anything that involves the True or the Good; with his Father he is the Source of all that is true and good.

But many of the Jewish laws (like civil laws) are ‘positive law’. In themselves, they involve matters which are neither good nor bad. In itself, it is neither good nor bad to stop at a green light or go through a red one. It is neither good nor bad of itself to abstain from work on the Sabbath. What makes these acts good or bad is the deeper good of which they are a sign. That deeper good may sometimes involve their non-observance. Hunger and survival may over-ride a rule to fast. In a matter of extreme urgency it may be necessary to drive (safely) through a red light. The letter of the law is violated, but not the good it intends.

As noted in the Jerusalem Bible, “some manuscripts of Luke contain a very pertinent [but likely spurious] saying at this point”:

On the same day, seeing a man working on the Sabbath day, Jesus said to him: ‘Friend, if you know what you are doing, you are blessed; but if you do not know, you are accursed as a breaker of the Law’.

That is a sentiment that goes with new wine and new wineskins. If truth and goodness are not violated by doing or not doing something, can we say there is sin or evil there?

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