Fullerton T

PALM SUNDAY

This Sunday we celebrate Palm Sunday, and we will gather in our Churches for the Blessing of the Palms. As we gather we remember that last year we had begun the first COVID 19 lockdown and no one was able to be in Church for Palm Sunday and the Holy Week celebrations it was different to say the least. But as we know a year later we are slowly beginning to emerge from the pandemic but as we begin to get back to normal we must take our time and  be cautious as we go forward. So for us this year things will be different but they will also be the same and that is reassuring. Last Tuesday we marked the 1^st anniversary of the lockdown and we paid  tribute to all those who work  in the NHS and we prayed for all those who sadly lost their lives. may we continue to remember and hold in our prayers all those who have helped during the pandemic as well as all those families who have lost loved ones as a result of the pandemic.

Palm Sunday is just the start as we begin our annual Holy Week journey, from the Hosannas of today we go to the Upper room on Holy Thursday and then on to the denials of peter and the Cross of Good Friday. Then we come to Easter when all that seemed to be lost on Good Friday was redeemed and is redeemed every Easter. So now we stop and think for a moment about how we began our journey on Ash Wednesday and where we are now as we approach the life changing and life giving events of Holy Week. The entrance into Jerusalem is one of the very few events in Jesus’ life which is mentioned in all four gospels.  It is the only time that Jesus accepts and encourages public acclaim as Messiah.  He even goes as far as organising his entrance by telling the disciples to go and fetch the donkey. The key moment in God’s great plan of salvation is about to begin and Jesus knows exactly how it will unfold as he knew and understood what the will of the father would mean for him.The events of Palm Sunday were foretold thousands of years ago.

The first reading from Isaiah, speaks of a courageous and obedient messiah-figure, who says, “I have set my face like flint” against the beatings and scourging that lie ahead, “knowing that I shall not be put to shame.” The second reading from Philippians reminds us of Jesus’ total emptying of His divinity in order that He might identify Himself with the lowest criminal being led to His execution, “obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” And the reading continues but God raised him high and gave him the name above all other names. We move towards the heavenly Jerusalem because Christ himself made the journey to the Cross for us and now he offers to make it with us.  The full drama of the Gospel  begins with the crowd’s fickle acclamation of Jesus as King at the beginning of the reading. On Palm Sunday we feel embarrassed to cry out “Crucify Him” but we do. It reminds us of our own fickle response and our lack of courage in responding to His love and truth.

Yet we know that it was the sins of us all which brought Jesus to Calvary. Palm Sunday and Holy Week are all about Jesus suffering for our inadequacies and our own very real sins. Holy Week is a time for us to realize what we’re really like, and to find that the only remedy for our pains and our fears is love. That is Love of God, love of others and oneself. Are we ready to join our own pains and fears to the Master’s? Are we ready to add as much love as we can possibly muster to His boundless love? As God’s family, we are called to look out for one another. It’s not just about “me myself and nobody else.” It’s about “us and everyone else altogether and the covid 19 pandemic response  has really proved this over the last 12 months. Our journey during Holy Week is all about god’s love for all of us that is his great love that has no end. 

let us not be afraid to set out and go through the week we are beginning today so that we will be able to celebrate the bright light of Jesus present in our lives  at Easter having travelled the journey of Lent and Holy Week.

5th Sunday of Lent

we are now at the fifth Sunday of Lent,  with Holy Week and Easter on the horizon it is hard to think that we are going through lent at such a fast pace.  It will be good to celebrate the Liturgy of holy week with people in the Church as last year the ceremonies were online with no one present in the churches. It has taken us exactly one year from the beginning of the COVID restrictions in Northern Ireland on the 18^th March 2020 to where we are today and time has flown by. It has been a year in which all of us young and old have suffered in so many ways. We have been travelling along a long dark road but now the light is beginning to appear at the end of that road. We thank God that we have got through the various restrictions that COVID has brought and we pray for all those who have lost family members as a result of the pandemic.

We are an Easter People and this means that no matter how dark the darkness  may be the light of Christ will light up our lives and show us the road to take as we go forward with hope and joy in our hearts as we emerge slowly from this pandemic.

In the Gospel for this weekend some Greeks ask to see Jesus. Jesus responds by saying that anyone who loves his life will lose it; to gain your life, you have to be like a grain of wheat which brings forth much fruit only by falling into the earth and dying. The seed which must die to produce a harvest is a powerful image of Jesus death. The Greeks must have been baffled. They were baffled in much the same way that we are when we listen to the stories from scripture about Jesus and all the things that he had done. The gospel goes on to tell us that a voice is heard from the cloud, as at the Transfiguration in the other gospels, but here it speaks of the ‘glory’ that will come to Jesus for giving up his life. It is in his death and resurrection that he draws all people to himself, both Jew and Greek slave and free man.

Many Learned men and women have tried to put their interpretation on the Scriptures but if we listen with open hearts and minds to the scripture readings what the word of God means to us in our lives will become apparent. For many people including me God’s presence is not often thought of  at the time we say or do something but afterwards, when you look back at what has happened or what you have said you often see that the hand of God was with you at that point. I have often said things to people about situations that they were  in and thought to myself where did I get that from? Then on reflection I know that what I said was right and I was inspired to say and do the right thing in the right place.  As we come to the last few days of Lent as we begin to get back to normal living after coming through COVID 19  let us prepare with great intensity for Palm Sunday and the Easter Triduum and then we will really be able to enjoy the Easter feast when it arrives and don’t forget the Easter celebration lasts 40 days until Pentecost Sunday !!!

4th Sunday of Lent

This weekend we celebrate the fourth Sunday of Lent that is also known as Laetare Sunday and this mirrors Gaudete Sunday in Advent because the mood and theme of both days is one of hope and rejoicing. So what is the cause for rejoicing this Sunday? The cause for our rejoicing is that we are getting close to the great events of Holy Week and Easter that have brought us salvation. But on a more secular  note we are rejoicing because we are beginning to slowly emerge from the restrictions that COVID19 has imposed on us for the last year or so. We thank God that we are at this stage but as we are thankful r we pray for all those effected by the pandemic especially the families of all those who have died.

The Gospel reading from John tells us that a person is condemned because that  person did not  believe in the Son of God. God the Father has no desire to condemn, but people condemn themselves by putting God and the ideals of faith out of their lives.

Over many centuries so many people have said there is no  god or in situations that seemed hopeless  they have asked where is God and all of us have done this especially since the beginning of the COVID19 pandemic and we know in faith the God is with us. There are so many people out there in our so called modern world  who have turned out the light of faith in their lives permanently for many reasons.  I know people of all ages who have been brought up in the Faith and then have left it all behind and yet we as people of faith know that there is a  god and he is there among us in the people who are in our daily lives though sometimes we do not realize it . He is there in the good and bad times that we have in our lives and helps us to get through whatever happens. At the Easter Vigil we proclaim the risen Lord as Christ our Light and we celebrate with joy.  Jesus is God’s own Son given to us and for us, the one who wants to restore the people who are  in exile. He wants to bring light to those who live in darkness. He wants to bring life to those who are perishing.

This is the good news, “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.” This is the reason that we are trying to be faith filled people even though it is hard going. This past year has been hard going for everyone but we try to keep the faith knowing that God is with us in all our troubles. This Sunday is a cause for rejoicing in the midst of our Lenten efforts to renew ourselves so that we may bask in the light of Christ at Easter.

THIRD SUNDA OF LENT

This weekend we celebrate the third Sunday of Lent and we are almost at the 12 month point since the restrictions around COVID19 began here in NI. I get the feeling that we are coming out the other side with the slow return of all the things we value. When all this started we really did not know what was going on and all of  had to make the best of what has happened. Now as we begin our slow return to normal we are asked to hold firm and stay with the changes that have taken place as we do that we are also asked to be a friend to those around us who might be in any difficulty especially when life is not so good  during and after the pandemic.

This Sunday’s gospel shows us that Jesus was really tuned in to our human nature: He knew what was going on in the hearts of those around him. He knew what they thought. He saw what they did to the Temple. The Temple was supposed to be a place of celebration celebrating the spiritual presence of God in the world. The reading tells us that  the people changed the Temple into a marketplace when it should have been a place of spiritual encounter.

For many in our modern world the day of the Lord Sunday has been replaced with so many secular things taking the place of God religion and faith.  Jesus knew that people would see the signs that he worked, the miracles he performed, but the same  people would refuse to see the messages behind the signs and the miracles that were there if front of them in plain sight. Instead they would see him as a wonder worker, a superman, a good show and Jesus wasn’t about any of that. Many people have left the faith behind but in similar fashion many are returning again. It is often said that in order to really appreciate something we have to leave it behind and then go back to it again later on when we understand the thing we have left behind was a better deal than the place we went to.The portrait of Jesus in today’s Gospel is a world away from the storybook caricature of Jesus, the meek and mild figure. An equal caricature is to use this passage to make Jesus into a godfather of violence, a revolutionary willing to support annihilation for the sake of the cause and that was not the case. Jesus did use force in the Temple; he was certainly aggressive. But he did not use force because he was not a political leader. Nor did he use aggression to gain power for himself because his kingdom could not be established by violence.

Our faith is not about a good show instead it is about our relationship with God and how we bring the love of God to those around us. Jesus shows us  what real love is as he went on to die on the cross for us on Good Friday.  Our dying to ourselves during Lent is an identification with the power of Christ crucified. Our calling, then, is to be strong in faith, not weak. God gives us signs both people and places as anchors of faith even during this time of pandemic. We must trust the Lord to cut us free from everything that stops us going to him and allow him to guide us through the rough currents of life especially the ones we are going through these days. So we go forward with hope and certainty towards Easter as we do that we remember that our god is a god who is with us in good and bad times and he won’t let us down.