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4th Sunday of Easter Good Shepherd Sunday

JESUS
THE GOOD SHEPHERD

Today we gather on the fourth Sunday of Easter which is also known as Good Shepherd Sunday it is   the day when we pray that the Lord will send inspire people young and not so young to take up the vocation of service as priests or religious. One of the gentle images that we find applied to God in the Old Testament is that the Lord is the shepherd of his people. We Christians apply this title to Christ the Lord. He is the good Shepherd who knows his sheep and lays down his life for them. That is to say that Jesus is our Good Shepherd and he knows us intimately and down his life for us. We may find this language of sheep , flocks and shepherds strange, but beneath the imagery the belief it points to is at the heart of our faith: a gentle God who is concerned about and caring for everyone.  

 In today’s Gospel we hear Jesus says “I am the good shepherd. The Good Shepherd seems to be calling to His sheep to follow Him into the unfamiliar pastures.  Most of us, upon listening to our own recorded voices, wonder if that is really us! What we sound like to others is not the exact way we sound like to ourselves. People who are visually impaired learn quickly who is who by their footsteps, pace, noisiness as well as their voices. Jesus is telling us that He will keep calling in the same voice and when we begin to follow, He will keep leading us on to fresh and green pastures. And what will Jesus be saying to us his followers to you and me he says I am the Good shepherd follow me. There will always be other voices, from within ourselves and from outside. How will we ever learn to recognize His voice as different from our self-cantered voices!

A lot of people just want what they want not thinking about the true implications for themselves and the rest of those around them and this is why the calling of the Good Shepherd is so very different. Jesus the Good Shepherd seems to be calling always to His sheep to follow Him into the unfamiliar, the pastures, yonder, over there. And that is what Jesus is calling us to on this day and every day to follow Him into the unfamiliar territory which will lead us along the roads of faith that will; bring to the fullness of faith and life.  Many in our world are now fascinated by another voice, that of Pope Francis, who urges us to bring the power of our love and concern to the poor, the persecuted, and the powerless of this world to bear on the world. When we hear his voice, we recognize the authentic voice of Jesus Himself. May we heed his voice especially in the months and years ahead he acts in persona Christi our good shepherd.

Finally on this day we remember all those who were affected by the horrendous events of the past week in Boston, we pray for them that Jesus the Good Shepherd will give them the strength to continue their lives in the love god. We also pray in a particular way that those who have died will rest in the peace of the kingdom of God.

“The Good Shepherd is risen!He who laid down his life for his sheep,Jesus The Good Shepherd who died for his flock, he is risen, alleluia.”

SECOND SUNDAY OF LENT

Moses and Elijah
on the Mountain with Jesus

On this second Sunday of Lent, the Church invites us to contemplate  the mystery of the Transfiguration of the Lord Jesus. It is a privileged moment which prepares us to relive the Passion of Christ at the time of the Great Week: Holy Week, that  comes to a close on Easter Sunday. For at the time of the Transfiguration, Jesus appears in Glory. Now, if Jesus appears in Glory, and if his disciples see him in this sublime state, it is precisely so that these same disciples may be comforted by this celestial vision before passing through the tragic test of the Passion of the Savior.”Now Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep, and when they wakened they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him.”What the disciples of Jesus saw and heard on that day was an anticipation of the Resurrection of Christ. In advance, and to comfort them before the moment of his Passion, Jesus allowed his disciples to enjoy a few instants of the divine glory that is his own. Also, it was not acceptable to speak of it as long as Christ had not yet returned to life. Saint Matthew relates the following words of Jesus to his disciples: “Tell no one the vision, until the Son of man is raised from the dead.” (Mt. 17:9) .We too shall see, with the eyes of faith, the glory of the Resurrection of the Saviour: today, during the celebration of the Eucharist, we are going to contemplate Jesus in his sacrament, seeing him, through faith, as he is now, in the glory of Heaven! So, already comforted by his Resurrection, we shall be able to participate joyously in his Sacrifice of Calvary: we are going to proclaim the Death of Christ in the expectation of our own Resurrection in the end times! May Mary, who was present at the foot of the Cross, while having within her, through faith, the fullness of the Spirit of God,  come to help us today and always!

On Friday past  22^nd February we celebrated the feast of the Chair of St. Peter, it struck me that just one week down the road from there on Friday 1^st March  the chair of St. Peter would be vacant after the resignation of Pope Benedict at 8pm   the previous evening. There are so many people saying this that and the other about where the Cardinal Electors will go to elect the new Pope. In reality  none of us really know where the new Pope will come from or who he will be, that is why we should pray that the Holy Spirit will be the  Cardinals guide  during the time of the Vacant See (Sede Vacante) and the election (Conclave) so that will  of God will happen in the Church through the successor of Saint Peter our new pope and shepherd of our souls.

And so as a Christian community we pray:

O God, eternal shepherd,
who govern your flock with unfailing care,
grant in your boundless fatherly love
a pastor for your Church
who will please you by his holiness
and to us show watchful care.

Through Christ our Lord

THE FIRST SUNDAY OF LENT 2013

Here we are at the first Sunday of Lent at the end of what can only be termed as an extraordinary week, or as one person put it to me that was the week that was and from my perspective this certainly was true. With the Pope’s Resignation on Monday I think most of the Catholic world was left a bit gob-smacked to say the least as this was the first time that a pope had resigned in 600 years. In less than two weeks time the Catholic Community throughout the world will be like sheep without a shepherd as the Pope resigns the See of Peter at 8pm on the 28^th of February. We pray for the outgoing Pope Benedict 16^th that he will have a good retirement and we also pray that the Holy Spirit will inspire the Cardinals in their choice when we come to  the conclave in March. Meantime the year of faith continues as we stop to think about the readings for this Sunday.

We are now as you know in the liturgical season of Lent, preparing for Easter, at this time three things are traditionally recommended to us: Prayer, Fasting & Almsgiving. Lent is a time of sober reflection, reassessment and rededication of our lives to God and to the faith we profess. We review our lives, seek forgiveness, do penance and recommit ourselves to Christ. This is all done within the context of the Passion of the Lord, which we are constantly reminded of during Lent as we build up to the solemn re-enactment of the passion and resurrection of Christ during Holy Week and   Easter. The forty days of Lent is the people of Gods annual retreat in imitation and remembrance of Jesus’ forty days in the wilderness. We are called to journey with the Lord in a particular way with prayer, fasting, almsgiving,  repentance, and renewal as we prepare to celebrate the feast of Easter, the Christian Passover. The Lord gives us spiritual food and supernatural strength to seek his face and to prepare ourselves for spiritual combat and testing. We, too, must follow in the way of the cross in order to share in the victory of Christ’s death and resurrection.

As human beings, we will always be confronted with the temptation to do wrong.  We are going to be tempted to seek joy in places where the Lord is not found and there may well be no longterm joy or happiness. In our Gospel reading for today Jesus himself was tempted by the devil to accept the pleasures of the world rather than remain united to the Father. The temptations of Jesus in the dessert point back to the temptations of Israel in the past, and point forward to the trials that the Church and all its members will undergo in the future. It is now we who are in the wilderness, with no lasting city, on a long journey to the Promised Land.Even to our dying day  each trial that life brings is a crisis, but is also an opportunity to trust more completely that the Lord is with us, and that we do love God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our might. All of us should be  confident that we will triumph in our trials of faith, not because of our own strength, but because Jesus has given us his holy Spirit to be with us. As we begin this holy season let’s ask the Lord for a fresh outpouring of his Holy Spirit that we may grow in faith, hope, and love, and embrace his will more fully in our lives.  Then we can pray with confidence in the words our saviour has given us: Our Father, do not let us be defeated by temptation, but deliver us from the evil one

3RD SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME

AND ALL EYES WERE ON HIM AS HE BEGAN TO SPEAK

Luke tells us that Jesus began his public ministry in his own land of Galilee where he was raised as a child. Just think about it for a moment Jesus’ first public words in his hometown synagogue amazed both his family and townspeople. I wonder do these same words amaze us in the here and now of today because more often than not they are  an accurate description of what we are and what we are not in our modern world.  In the time of Jesus It was customary for the president of the synagogue to call on different people each week to read from the Hebrew bible and say a few words. Jesus read the text from the prophet Isaiah that explained how the Messiah would come in the power of the Holy Spirit to bring freedom to those oppressed by sin and evil (see Isaiah 61:1-2). Jesus told his audience that he himself had been anointed to fulfil this prophecy.

Now the way Jesus works today in 2013 is through his mystical body, the church that is through you and me in our own time and place. Through each of us and all who are baptized into his body, Jesus strives still to live out his mission, bringing good news to those who don’t have any, setting free those chained in captivity, opening the eyes of the blind, helping the oppressed and exploited find their life, and unrolling the floor plan that sets out God’s reign where justice and peace prevail.

Jesus did these things while he walked upon the earth and still does these things, because we his church do them. The poor gain hope, whether it’s their souls or their bodies that are starved. The captives experience freedom, whether they are prisoners in a jail or prisoners in a mansion and there are many more types of prisoners than these. The blind receive sight, whether it’s cataract surgery at the local   hospital or the scales of prejudice falling off the eyes of a bigot. The oppressed are set free, whether oppression is a political regime or a chemical dependence of any sort. When Jesus read  that passage in the Nazareth synagogue, he announced a mission statement for himself and for us members of the church.

As we strive to keep faithful to those words Jesus read aloud in the synagogue and lived out in his life, let us remember the words he said relating them to ourselves and our lives.

The Spirit of the Lord is upon us.

The Spirit of the Lord has anointed us to bring and be good news to the poor.

The Spirit of the Lord has sent us to proclaim release to the captives and there are many more captives in our world of today

The Spirit of the Lord has sent us to help the blind recover their sight and that may be physical or maybe even spiritual.

The Spirit of the Lord has sent us to free the oppressed.

The Spirit of the Lord has sent us to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour and for those of us who are Catholic we have our year of faith. But the year of the Lord’s favour is open to all who will accept it.

Today, this scripture has been fulfilled in our hearing and seeing through Christ the Lord. Amen.

The Baptism Of The Lord

This Sunday we celebrate the baptism of the Lord, when Jesus was baptised in the river Jordan by John. None of us remember when we were baptised when we were infants having said that I have had the privilege of knowing two adults who were baptised in our parish in the last year and I wish them well for their future faith journeys.

 It may seem strange, but this is a Christmas Feast. Not if we think of Christmas only in terms of the Baby in Bethlehem, but if we have followed the ideas of the Feasts of Holy Family and especially Epiphany, and have seen the Season in terms of the growing manifestation or appearing of the Son of God: first to the shepherds and then to the wise men from the East. Now in the River Jordan, Jesus, Son of Mary, is revealed to all and everyone as the fullness of all God’s promises: “This is my Son, the Beloved“. On this day we stand before the revelation of God’s love for us, such that he would send his only Son into the world. Christmas without the Baptism of the Lord, and the words that are spoken from heaven, would be incomplete, since it is only in them that we fully see the wonder of what happened in Bethlehem, that we fully understand the reason for the joy with which we celebrated Christmas Day.

As we come to the end of Christmas time we do so having been shown who it is we listen to: the only Son of God, the Beloved in who the father is well pleased. As 2013 unfolds, will it be truly a Year of Faith for us and a new opportunity for truth and love to overcome the evil that surrounds us? Light always has power over darkness, especially when it comes through Jesus Christ  who is the way the truth and the life and His followers that means you and me. let us not be afraid to show the light of Christ to others in the months ahead.

THE THIRD SUNDAY OF ADVENT

This Sunday is called “Gaudete” Sunday — it is the Sunday during advent in which we rejoice of course we are supposed to rejoice on every Sunday as we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus in our liturgies. The rejoicing we are talking about today comes from the today’s readings, and it underlines an important point. In the Gospel, we hear John the Baptist telling different groups what to do – they must repent, and change their lives. We might think of this as a rather joyless thing – something which is hard and unrewarding. In many of our Churches this weekend we will light the pink candle and the president/presider may be wearing rose or red colored vestments. The message of this Sunday is one of repentance that is repentance in order to change our lives so we are really able to welcome Jesus and this is something richly joyful as we make our Christmas Preparations. When we are planning to welcome anyone to our homes, we set about cleaning and preparing for their visit with enthusiasm – nothing is too much trouble for someone we care for greatly. Even scrubbing the bath or polishing the furniture can be a happy and joyful thing yes you did read scrubbing the bath! The message of this Sunday is that preparing to welcome the Lord – even though it may involve hard work – is something joyful, because of our love for Him, and His love for us for great in our midst is the holy one of Israel.

A sensible way to prepare for Christ’s arrival is to learn from the example of other people who have prepared well while they awaited his arrival. There are many such examples in the Bible and John the Baptist is one of the most striking. John’s preparation for the Messiah’s arrival was characterised by his preaching. He preached a message of hope and repentance to dejected people   whose land was occupied by foreigners, who were often exploited by their religious leaders and who had become spiritually enslaved to sin. John also fasted and did penance in preparation for the coming of the long-awaited Messiah and he urged other people to do the same.

John learnt that the only way to become disentangled from sin is through repentance and conversion. Thus his preaching focused on the urgency of repentance and he reassured the people about God’s providential care and complete fidelity towards them even when, at times, they were unfaithful and sinful. They could be certain that God’s promise to send the Saviour would soon be realised. We are asked to emulate John’s example by being people who are repentant for our sins. We are invited to encourage other people to become repentant too. We cannot truly meet Christ as he comes into our lives each day unless we are without sin because it imprisons us and prevents us from recognising him. Nowadays, people have lost their sense of sin and the damage it can do to the individual and our communities.

Many people mistakenly think that sin does not exist and as we all know SIN certainly exists in our modern world. Many people presume that they can do whatever they wish and as we know all our actions have consequences. In effect, God gave us free will so that we can choose good instead of evil. In addition, the Church’s teaching guides us in our beliefs and practices so that we can prepare adequately for eternity with God.  There is so much in our lives in these days of instant communications to make us anxious worried and afraid. Anxious and worried about the present times and afraid of the future but we have to remember in him that is in God in whom we live, and move and have our being nothing is impossible. I know that there is a great spirit of rejoicing for many people for many reasons all over the place whilst there is also a spirit of fear and trepidation for many more in these uncertain times. Let us remember as we continue our daily lives not to be anxious about anything the Lord is very near to us as we journey along our pilgrim path. So then let us rejoice in the Lord, not in the world; that is, rejoice in faithfulness and not in iniquity; rejoice in the hope of eternity and not the brief flower of vanity that is part of our  daily lives. Rejoice wherever we are for the Lord is very near: do not be anxious about anything our hope and our salvation are at hand. Let us go forth in peace and joy to meet the Lord when he comes.

First Sunday of Advent Year C

Well here we are at the start of the Advent season and the new liturgical year.  In our Churches on this Sunday we   light the first candle on the Advent Wreath and put the first leaves on the Jesse Tree. Advent like Lent is a time of preparation of body mind and spirit though it is a good bit easier than the six weeks of Lent for so many reasons. The word ADVENT comes from the Latin and it means coming and that is what advent is about the coming of Jesus into the world. Yet with all the flurry and hurry of December it can be so easy for us to lose the short time that we might have during each day to pray and listen to what god is saying to each of us.

The Scriptures of Advent open this year with an appeal for justice and security. Our society longs for a better life the same way ancient Israel and Judah did. We long for safety within our borders. We long for leaders of blameless conduct. We long for these blessings to last.

During Advent we want to see the fulfilment of God’s promises. God promised peace. God promised safety. God promised good leaders.God promised food, drink, and strength. During Advent we anticipate the fulfilment of God’s main promise: salvation. We await the annual celebration of the birth of Jesus, whose name means Saviour and whose mission brought redemption. God gives us a different grace in every liturgical season and God has a grace to give you and me this Advent. If Advent is only a time of consumerism and buying gifts for people that they don’t really want or need, it is flying in the face of what Jesus is all about. There is only one gift at Christmas, that gift is Jesus. Jesus is the grace that the Father wants to give to us this Advent. Let us spend time with God to receive this grace. As we examine our consciences this Advent and see our shortcomings we are privileged to receive the mercy of God in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. When Jesus was entering Jerusalem for the last time he cried because the people of Jerusalem did not recognize the time of their visitation (Luke 19:41-42). Let us not miss out on the grace God is offering us this Advent and remember when we get to our Christmas Celebrations that Jesus is the reason for the Season.

33Rd Sunday Of Ordinary Time

This Sunday we celebrate the 33^rd Sunday of the year as we head towards the end of the Churches liturgical year at the feast of Christ the King and  then we go into  the Advent and  Christmas seasons (Dare I mention CHRISTMAS?) As always at this time of year, we begin to contemplate the end of the world ‑ a theme that carries us over into next Sunday’s feast Christ the King and then  into Advent. Such a contemplation is not gloomy or morbid: throughout the ages (and especially in the early days) Christians have been utterly posi­tive about the coming end of all things, because we know what will happen  the phrase that gives this away is in the Gospel: “Then… he will send his angels to gather his chosen from the four winds.” This gathering of God’s children to­gether will be a truly wonderful event, when we will all be completely enfolded in that love of God that we hear so much about.

Jesus’ teaching today reminds us that there is nothing really permanent in all the structures of this world. Jesus cuts straight to our desire for immortality with these disquieting words “All will be thrown down.”   These are the words that echo the great prophetic tradition of the Jewish people. No doubt this raised the anxiety of the disciples who press him for answers of “when will this be?” They press him for signs of the end.

In Jesus’ day, and down throughout the ages to our own time, there are plenty of people out there who look for signs, as if knowing when the end will come will somehow change its coming. Our faith tells us there will be a time when all things will come to an end; does knowing exactly when it will happen really give us any mastery over it? I don’t think that it does.

In the larger context of Mark’s gospel, these words from Jesus come just before he enters Jerusalem to be crucified. These words about the destruction of the temple and upheavals to come are a prefiguring of his own death – the very destruction of his own body. “All will be thrown down” is a promise that all things of this world will fall apart, disintegrate and die. However  Jesus reminds us that our job in this present time isn’t to know exactly what will happen, how it will happen, or when it will happen; rather our job is to be faithful, patient and keep awake, because God is working out the plan of salvation and has not abandoned us. Everything will be all right because God is in charge. This isn’t to say things will be easy and that hardships and suffering won’t befall us because they will. It isn’t an empty optimism promising things will get better for our lives; they may or may not be better and more often they may well be worse. It is a promise that God is in charge regardless of anything that happens to us.

Christ promises us that things will be all right because God has the last word. When death on the cross appeared to be the end, it certainly was not God had the last word at an empty tomb on the third day,  the day of resurrection.

Throughout our lives, we will experience death and resurrection many times over as the neatly arranged structures of our lives are thrown down. In faith and because of faith we will not be disappointed god is with us and there will be many times in the future as there have been in the past and are in the here and now of today when we see that everything will be all right because God is in charge and God is  working out the plan of salvation for all of us and has not abandoned us. So let us trust in the Lord who made heaven and earth and remains with us in happy and sad as well as the good and the bad times .