Fullerton T

19th Sunday of the year

I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE

Today we hear all about Jesus as the Bread of Life. I live near a bakery in Belfast and up until a few months ago you always woke up in the early morning to the smell of the baking bread and cakes and it was so good. Also I remember the same smell when we had the soda bread baking in the oven here at home or wherever we might have been on holiday or whatever. There is nothing quite like getting the first bit of fresh crusty bread or the end of the soda loaf just out of the oven with LOADS of butter melting into it and maybe a bit of strawberry jam as well. The two staple parts of anyone’s diet in the western world always have been bread and milk. But the bread that the Gospel of today tells us about is so much more than the bread that we get from our local bakery , it is as Jesus puts it the bread of life which in reality is our spiritual nourishment.

How would you and I tell someone that we do not live by bread alone? What would we give or say to make them understand the idea of the bread of life in the sense of today’s readings? Our first thoughts would probably be to give them a lecture, or to try to arrange a spiritual experience. Or maybe to offer a really spiffy education class, with professional videos and worksheets and breaking into small groups to go over some discussion questions – maybe that would do it. How about it I know that I don’t do lectures and I certainly am not Spiffy.

In simple terms the Eucharist, the Body of Christ, stands as the greatest sign of contradiction against the culture of death and destruction that are so much the norm in today’s world. I think that I would tell them that Jesus is The “Bread of Life”, and he calls all of us to recognize our own dignity and the dignity of others as Sons and daughters of God. As Jesus continues his discourse on the Bread of Life in our Gospel reading today, he faces the complaints and criticism of the crowd, who take a very short-sighted view of what he says, and he affirms for them that true life, a life the will never end, is found in him, he is the one who has come from the Father, and so he simply is the living bread which gives life. There is an  explicit link between “belief” and “eating the bread of life”: the two lead to each other, and they both bring about that which man most desires ‑ to live forever in God. In our world today it is easy to be negative instead of being positive and for many faith filled people there is such negativity towards faith and people of faith. Negativity is an infectious disease, and the two old men who were on at the end of the Muppet  show set the bar high for holding a negative position, boy were those two a pair of old grumps. One negative thought leads to another. One negative person easily infects another.

We shouldn’t forget that above and beyond  all the negativity about many aspects of religion life and living we have been gifted with the antidote that is the Positive joy of Eternal Life which the Bread of life really is about. The eternal Word has become one of us. He who for all eternity is in intimate union with divinity, shares His life with us.

When we see only what is right in front of us in black and white and nothing else we are impoverished, we are living on the cold outside surface of our lives. To live by bread alone, that is food that will not last means to see no farther than the particular things themselves, and as a result we miss the presence the love and the call of God that are really a part of every piece of the spiritual bread we have. The bread that God gives us is seen in all we have for life and living – so that we may be drawn beyond all the passing things of life. Jesus says that he is the Bread that came down from heaven. He came to give his life for us. No one takes it from him. He freely gives it. The good news of the gospel is that the Father gives us this bread that draws us to our Father and teaches us all about him. This is the gift of faith that enables us to see that it is Jesus, given by the Father, who will satisfy our deepest hunger for eternal life.

 We believe God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son so that the hunger of every human being may be satisfied and that means you and me along with everyone else. May we not be afraid to partake of the bread of life.

EIGHTEENTH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR

“I am the Bread of Life.”

On this the eighteenth Sunday of the year we think about Jesus as the Bread of Life. Today’s Gospel takes place the day after the feeding of the five thousand. The people who had been fed search for Jesus. They really don’t want Him. They want the free food. Jesus uses this as an opportunity to speak about the food that really matters, the Bread of Life that God provides. He tells them about a gift of food that they knew very well, the gift that was the manna in the desert during the time of Moses. This was seen as the greatest gift of God. It was His daily testimony of His love and care for His People until they arrived at the Holy Place he would give them. Jesus mentions that they ate the manna, but they were still hungry. Jesus would provide food that would not leave them hungry, the Bread of Life. What do you and I most hunger and thirst for in life? Jesus addressed this issue with those who sought him after the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves. Where they simply hungry for things which satisfy the body or for that which satisfies the heart and soul? Jesus echoes the question posed by the prophet Isaiah:”Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which does not satisfy” (Isaiah 55:2)? Only God can satisfy the spiritual hunger in our heart and soul – the hunger for truth, for life, for companionship and love. So we come before the Lord seeking the bread of life this and hopefully on every Sunday, or perhaps for some of us, every day, and we say to the Lord, “Feed me.” But do we really want to be fed? The food that God gives demands a commitment to Him and what he calls us to be that is faithful and faith filled people. Let us compare spiritual nourishment to food for a moment. Eating out once a week in a restaurant is not unusual. But what if that was the only meal the person ate. Someone who goes back to their familiar seat in a restaurant week after week to enjoy their one meal of the week could never be nourished enough to make it through the remaining six days. In the same way, our worship in church on Sunday going back to the same pew or seat week in week out is meant to be an important part of one’s spiritual food and drink, if this is your whole game plan for feeding your spirit you will never get rid of our spiritual hunger. A good example of Spiritual nourishment for us when we were growing up was the nightly ritual of kneeling down as a family to say the rosary. The saying was that the family that prayed together stayed together and that was true for us as youngsters in Northern Ireland during the 70’s and 80’s. Much of this has now gone as well as family life and living as a family unit with a mother and father with the children but that’s for another time. So much of our lives are spent working for the food that perishes we only have to look at the state of the world and its peoples to realise this. Of Course we must work to earn money to buy the food we eat and pay for the roof over our heads and all the extras that make life enjoyable. But we need to realise that as well as the externals there is much more to life than the daily grind of life and living. For a fulfilled life, one should try to make time during the day for prayer and that is the food that endures for eternal life the gift of Jesus who came so that you and I might have life and have it to the full. In the Eucharist, we don’t merely listen to the words, “Take eat,” but we actually get up, come to the altar to take and eat the bread. It’s not just the bread that we take, bless, break and give. God took Jesus’ whole life, blessed, broke it and gave it to us. Jesus wanted those who followed him after having their fill of fish and bread to discover real spiritual nourishment so that they would never hunger again. “Our daily bread” contains many grains of nourishment.   It is about doing God’s will by receiving what God is giving us at any one moment and sometimes it can seem like crumbs, or crust, or  even quite stale. That Holy Bread, containing in Him all “sweetness” is God’s pledge that we will not be abandoned or left to go our own way grumbling that we did not get enough when in truth we have more than enough in material goods and if we stop we also have so much nourishment for our spiritual lives in the Eucharist, the Bread of Life and in our prayer life. Together, at the invitation of the Lord, let us go to him! For he says to us: “He who comes to me shall not hunger!” let us remember that we go to the Lord in order to fill our hunger and to satisfy the real desires of our soul the hunger for truth, for life, for companionship and love.

17TH SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME

Jesus took the Loaves and the Fishes

Here we are at the 17^th Sunday of ordinary time and our Gospel story tells us about the feeding of the 5,000. When we were growing up i’m sure it felt like the five thousand for my mother as we were a large family with 9 kids and mum and dad. With my  mum like so many others trying to make the food on the table go that wee bit further. I think that the apostles in the gospel were like that wondering how the five loaves and fishes would feed all those people and really knowing deep down that in this case it wouldn’t. A great multitude had gathered to hear Jesus, no doubt because they were hungry for the word of life. Jesus’ disciples wanted to send them away at the end of the day because they did not have the resources to feed them. They even complained how much money it would take to feed such a crowd ‘Two hundred denarii would only buy enough to give them a small piece each.’

 Jesus, the Bread of Life, took the little they had – five loaves and two fish – and giving thanks to his heavenly Father, distributed to all until they were satisfied of their hunger. The feeding of the five thousand shows the remarkable generosity of God and his great kindness towards us. When God gives, he gives abundantly and without question. about how or what or where or when. He simply gives more than we need for ourselves so that we may have something to share with others, especially those who lack what they need. God takes the little we have and multiplies it for the good of others. We see this in so many ways especially through the likes of Trocaire and the Order of Malta and the many other Church agencies that bring the love of God into the world at large.  The implication of this gospel for each of us is a simple one: Jesus wants to work the miracle of feeding a huge number of people who are hungry; but the miracle will not happen without someone to provide five barley loaves and two fish. Jesus must have loved the boy who was willing to share what was really his to eat.

The miracle of the gospel is as much about the boy as it is about Jesus as well as being about you and me. The boy in this gospel is each of us you and I one and all who have something to offer the Lord. Jesus did  not spiritualize the hunger of the poor, or postpone his love for them to the next world. Today the Lord asks all sorts of people to make their contribution to the well being of those who have little or nothing at all. We shouldn’t be afraid of what we are asked to do in the Lord’s name. What we are asked to do is to  give food to the hungry, shelter to the homeless and give some of our resources to the poor. May we not be afraid to show gods love remembering that He  gives more than we need for ourselves so that we have something to share with others, especially those who lack what they need to live their lives without Hunger with a roof over their heads and perhaps a few shillings in their pockets.

16th Sunday in Ordinary Time

I am the Good Shepherd

I always remember when on holiday in the country wondering how the shepherds knew their sheep. When we would go up to Donegal from Omagh where we stayed with granny We would sometimes go through the Barnes more Gap with the hills rising very steeply on both sides of the road, with the sheep dotted here and there all around those hills and sometimes the shepherds with them. The image of the shepherd is quite an ancient one with Jesus being portrayed as the Good Shepherd. Today’s Scripture is all about the Shepherd looking after his sheep. With the various violent events of recent times in the USA and in Syria and other places it is good to know that we have a good shepherd looking after us.

What does the image of a shepherd tell us about God’s care for us? Shepherding was one of the oldest of callings in Israel, even before farming, since the Chosen People had travelled from place to place, living in tents, and driving their flocks from one pasture to another. Looking after sheep was no easy calling. It required great skill and courage. Herds were often quite large, thousands or even ten thousands of sheep.  The flocks spent a good part of the year in the open country. Watching over them required a great deal of attention and care. Sheep who strayed from the flock had to be sought out and brought back by the shepherd. Since hyenas, jackals, wolves, and even bear were common and fed on sheep, the shepherds often had to do battle with these wild and dangerous beasts. A shepherd literally had to put his life on the line in defending his sheep.

Shepherds took turns watching the sheep at night to ward off any attackers. The sheep and their shepherds continually lived together. Their life was so intimately bound together that individual sheep, even when mixed with other flocks, could recognize the voice of their own shepherd and would come immediately when called by name.

The image of the shepherd tells us so much about Jesus the Good shepherd and about what he does for all of us who say we are Christians. Each of us is called to be a good shepherd to one another looking after the various needs that the people in the communities in which we live might have.  So too our Bishops and priests are also called to be good shepherds after the heart and mind of Jesus leading us along the  path that leads to the way the truth and the life.  Our own age also has many sheep without shepherds ‑ a great wandering crowd of gods people , seeking something, but not knowing what they are seeking. The Church is a sheepfold whose one and indispensable door is Christ the son of God.  It is a flock of which God Himself foretold He would be the shepherd, and whose sheep, although ruled by human shepherds; are nevertheless continuously led and nourished by Christ Himself, the Good Shepherd and the Prince of the shepherds, who gave His life for the sheep.

We stop on this day to spare a thought and a prayer for all those who have been affected by the events in Denver in the USA. We pray for the 12 people who have died and their families and we pray for the injured and all those who are close  to them at this horrible time. May God through Jesus the Good shepherd give them strength to continue their lives in his love.

THIRTEENTH SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME

The Gospel story for this Sunday tells us about the woman with the haemorrhage and the Synagogue official Jairus who pleaded with Jesus to come because his daughter was sick. As we know the woman and the Child were both cured. Today’s readings reinforce for us the undeniable reality that suffering is not unique to us or to our times, and that if the truth be told we know very little about the ultimate meaning of death as no one has ever come back to tell us where they have gone. Wars, hunger, economic disasters abound and bring us to despair; personal illness, pain, and loss in our families sometimes cause us to lose hope. Often times we feel as if we are alone in our pain; and as a result of this perceived loneliness we ask, Why me? There is so much fear around and about in our country and in the world today: fear of “the other person,” fear of losing a job and not being able to pay the mortgage and look after our families, fear of crazy people with guns, fear of not succeeding, oh, so many fears and perhaps not enough of the old reliable that is FAITH.

People in desperate or helpless circumstances were not disappointed when they sought Jesus out and we are not disappointed when we seek Jesus as well. What drew them to Jesus? Was it hope for a miracle or a word of comfort in their affliction? What did the woman who had suffered greatly for twelve years expect Jesus to do for her? And what did a grieving father expect Jesus to do about his beloved daughter who had died?  It was the same for them as it is for us today Jesus gave hope where there seemed to be no human cause for it because his hope was based in and directed to God. He spoke words of hope to the woman (Take heart, daughter!) to ignite the spark of faith in her (your faith has made you well go in peace!).A 4th century church father, Ephrem the Syrian, comments on this miracle:

“Glory to you, hidden Son of God, because your healing power is proclaimed through the hidden suffering of the afflicted woman. Through this woman whom they could see, the witnesses were enabled to behold the divinity that cannot be seen. Through the Son’s own healing power his divinity became known. Through the afflicted women’s healing her faith was made manifest. She caused him to be proclaimed, and indeed was honoured with him.

For truth was being proclaimed together with its heralds. If she was a witness to his divinity, he in turn was a witness to her faith…He saw through to her hidden faith, and gave her a visible healing.” Jesus also gave divine hope to a father who had just lost a beloved child. It took considerable courage and risk for the ruler of a synagogue to openly go to Jesus and to invite the scorn of his neighbours and kin. Even the hired mourners laughed at him in scorn. Their grief was devoid of any hope. Nonetheless, Jesus took the girl by the hand and delivered her from the grasp of death. Peter Chrysologus, a 5th century church father comments on this miracle: “This man was a ruler of the synagogue, and versed in the law. He trusted therefore in God that his daughter would be restored to life by that same hand which, he knew, had created her…He who laid hands on her to form her from nothing, once more lays hands upon her to reform her from what had perished.” In both instances we see Jesus’ personal concern for the needs of others and his readiness to heal and restore life. In Jesus we see the infinite love of God extending to each and every individual as he gives freely and wholly of himself to each  person he meets.

Every Sunday is a little ‘Easter Sunday’: because Jesus rose on Sunday, triumphant over death, we gather on Sundays. We gather to rejoice and celebrate his meal, the Eucharist: he died, yet he lives, he has departed from us, yet also he is here among us. To celebrate that Jesus rose from the dead is to celebrate that in him is our victory over suffering, pain, and death itself. In proclaiming that the Father raised Jesus from the dead, we are stating and restating our conviction that all those parts of life and living that strike us as annoying  and destructive are not part of the Father’s will for us:

Let us bring all our many fears and worries to god our Father through Jesus his Son who gives us hope and healing in our daily lives and living. May we be like the Woman with the haemorrhage and Jairus the Synagogue official who had faith and hope in their Hard times.

“Lord Jesus, you love each of us individually

with a unique and personal love.

Touch our lives with your saving power,

heal and restore us  to fullness of life.

And help us in our present hard times to

keep on going in faith and hope.

ELEVENTH SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME

Our Gospel story today is the parable of the sower and we see how the farmer (GOD) has sown a tiny seed (FAITH); we see how he watches and waits for it to bear fruit. Jesus makes a comparison between the small and negligible start and the extraordinary results and we see many of these results in the spiritual lives we are celled to lead. The farmer is in no hurry; he simply sits, waits and lets things happen having sown the seed. Whatever happens will take its own time and the farmer must certainly not hurry its growth. He does not try to find out how this happens, but allows things to develop as they will. From God’s perspective, things are often not what they appear to be at first. The tiny mustard seed may seem small and insignificant, but within it looms something so very valuable, a vital part of creation. This parable helps us to realize that size can be deceiving? It helps us to understand that out of a small thing can come something wonderful and Spiritually powerful. The Church grew from a small mustard seed into what it is today that is something wonderful and Spiritually powerful in every generation past present and moving on into the future.   Of course there are those within the Church who have let us all down in many ways and not least in recent years through the various scandals that have taken place, the life of faith is never easy. In this parable, Jesus spoke about the truth that smallness has its strengths, advantages and possibilities. Smallness is a theme to which Jesus returned again and again in his ministry. And we know, too, that smallness was the basis on which the church began and in which the church continues to flourish.The church operates best when it carries into larger ministries the insights and techniques of smallness. We are at our best when we engage as individuals in reaching out to the other person because we have but one ministry as an example – that of Jesus himself. He gathered around him a small band of followers, totalling at best two dozen people. He worked closest with a select band of 12 who gathered with him at the Last Supper and heard his message of servanthood. When the church began as a small mustard seed, it was empowered by the Holy Spirit on the first Pentecost to carry the good news of Christ out into the world. It found expression in a small group of 11 who became empowered by the risen Lord in the upper room and grew into such a faith filled group of people. The people Jesus chose to carry on his work were, by the world’s standards, small men – fishermen, unlearned, probably illiterate.   One was a despised tax collector. They were simple ordinary people. Some of his band of followers were the very rejects of society. By all outward signs and appearances, they were small people. This, of course, was based on the judgment and standards of quantity, wealth education and worldly power. But in God’s eyes, they can be seen as the greatest of people. And we learn that, in the midst of the world that has a culture that idolizes the big the bold and the beautiful whilst waiting on the next BIG THING to come along, for us Catholic and Christian people generally there is a faith that honours the smallness and stillness in life that is the kind of smallness and stillness with which Jesus worked. This smallness means maintaining concern for individuals, providing opportunity for looking after everyone, promoting a feeling of worth and good in everyone, we meet making sure that all are interconnected, so that, for example, there is somebody to miss you when you are absent for whatever reason and then somebody to say how are you, to ask where you have been and how you are doing when you return. The Stillness means that we stop from time to time to recharge the batteries of faith so that the Mustard Seed of Faith can grow as the father intended. From the right kind of “small thinking and stillness of soul and spirit” can flow the values and mission that Jesus gave to his first followers who have passed it on to us. down through every generation to the present time.

The parable of the sower is all about you and me when we stop to really think about things we see how God has sown a tiny seed that is the seed of faith within each of us and we see how he watches and waits for it to bear fruit in us and through us for other people. This particular parable reminds us it is not the size of the seed planted that is important, but what counts is what grows up from that tiny seed. And what grows up from the tiny seed should be a life filled and lived in Faith and hope.

As I write this we are in the middle of the 80th Eucharistic Congress Week. I hope that all who have taken part in the week by their attendance or for those who were unable to be there in person spiritually by their prayer will be richly blessed. The Church in Ireland that is one and all of us have begun our Journey along the road of renewal. Yes it is our journey along a road less travelled with all its bumps and turns good and bad some better than others and some simply awful. On this day we recommit ourselves to renewal of our faith renewal of spirit and Soul. The faith from the tiny mustard seed, The faith of the upper room, the faith of Jesus Christ this is such a rich inheritance for us in our time may we not be afraid to embrace it in our generation and pass it on so that future generations will have the faith, that is faith in God and one another

THE SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER

In our gospel reading for this Sunday Jesus tells his disciples, this is my commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. The language of commandment is deliberate; the author of John’s gospel is making an explicit reference to God as law-giver to accomplish at least two purposes: to affirm Jesus’ divine mandate, and to help readers to understand the weight given to loving one another. As Peter discovered when he went to the home of Cornelius, we do not have anything like exclusive access to God’s truth, God’s Spirit or God’s love. We have a piece of the puzzle, and others – people who in all likelihood don’t look or talk like us – have other pieces. God is bigger than we are, and by definition, not comprehensible in full by humans. It takes all of our puzzle pieces – and more – to begin to comprehend the reality of the Holy among us. There is a humility required of us if we are going to manage to love one another as we are commanded to do in this gospel reading. If a person believes that he or she has all the answers and there are many people in the Church, the country and the world at large who think in this way, those people have no need of community, except perhaps to make them feel superior as they lord it over other people.

If, however, we understand ourselves to be limited beings, loving an unlimited all loving God, we might choose to seek God wherever God might be found – in the least and the greatest, in the communities of which we are a part, and outside their borders.  We might find ourselves stretching our boundaries of mind and heart, to bother personally and in community, to include the multiple voices of so many harmonizing on the same theme: love of God and things of the spirit, and love of one another united body and soul in the church. It might be helpful to remember that Jesus loves us all and gave up his life for the love of his father and all of us. Jesus loved Peter, a Galilean fisherman with a tendency to speak first and ask questions later. Jesus loved Cornelius, a devout Roman soldier. Jesus loves you, and Jesus loves me with all our lumps and bumps and all the things that we don’t want other people to see and hear about us. Jesus doesn’t love me any more than you, or vice versa. By grace, we are all beloved, sons and daughters of the father and all have the opportunity to exercise that love in how we treat others. In the world of today and in our own country we see the Church getting such a hammering as a result of a number of clergy and religious doing so much damage from within. There are so many who have been hurt by the misdeeds of the few and we have a duty to remember them in prayer and in our care for their needs. Showing the love of God to all those who feel the hurt of betrayal, by our prayer and our action and reaction to all of them they will see the love of god given to all through us.

It is human nature to want to draw a circle around ourselves and maintain borders that define who is part of us, and who is not. It is the Holy Spirit’s nature to push us past our borders, and ask us to grow. If there’s a sure-fire test for whether the Spirit is prompting us or not, it’s this:

if we think we are called to shrink our borders, include fewer people, be more selective in our society, we can be absolutely sure that those feelings don’t come from God.

God’s desire for us is that we expand our understanding, make the effort to love people who are not like us and to accept with grace the fact that our vision of God and God’s kingdom is limited. We need to hear about the vision of others to broaden our perspective and perhaps eve broaden their outlook on the world. We need to stop and listen to the stories of those who were hurt in times that are long past in order to help them to heal their brokenness and in their brokenness we one and all will see the Church that we are meant to be an all caring place where everyone will be valued as a son or daughter of God. The film ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’ has a particularly good line spoken by one of the main characters several times during the film when things had not worked out quite as people hoped: ‘Everything will be all right in the end, so if is not all right then it is not yet the end.’ For us it is not the end for at this time we certainly are in a Mess but for us as people of faith all things will work out for the good of this we can be sure.

Being a person of faith is not easy at the present time but this is our calling as members of the Church, which is the body of Christ.  In June Ireland will host the 50th Eucharistic Congress, 80 years after the Eucharistic congress was held here in 1932.

There have been many changes in Ireland in the intervening period of the last 80 years and a great number of these changes were not for the better. The contemporary context of modern Ireland is very different in so many ways. The style, purpose and outcome of Eucharistic Congresses have also altered considerably over the years. In recent times an International Eucharistic Congress is more like a festival of faith, consisting of seminars, concerts, workshops, exhibitions and most importantly and above all else  the daily celebration of the Mass..  From the 10th to the 17th June many people will come to Dublin from all over the world in celebration of their faith that is faith in God in communion with Christ and one another. As I said at the start of this and I repeat this again In our gospel reading for this Sunday Jesus tells his disciples, this is my commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. This is what Eucharist is all about loving one another as Jesus loves us no one has ever sent his or her son into the world to die for all of us and yet that is exactly what our father in heaven did he sent Jesus his son into our world to give his life as a ransom for many, and though we are many we are one. We cannot forget the great sacrament of the body of Christ, Corpus Christi the sacrament Par excellence instituted on that first Holy Thursday in the upper room what love and joy there are within this great sacrament. This Sacrament of the Body of Christ truly shows the love of the Father not as some far off thing or person away out there somewhere but as a person that we can see in the eucharistic bread who has a part to play in our daily life and living.

My hope is that we will listen to the voice of Jesus in the broken hearts, and in the victims of our society the people out there who are hungry or lost, lonely or frightened, helpless or sick; and then in the days, weeks months and years ahead we can truly say that we are In loving communion with Christ and one another

In our gospel reading for this Sunday Jesus tells his disciples, this is my commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. The language of commandment is deliberate; the author of John’s gospel is making an explicit reference to God as law-giver to accomplish at least two purposes: to affirm Jesus’ divine mandate, and to help readers to understand the weight given to loving one another. As Peter discovered when he went to the home of Cornelius, we do not have anything like exclusive access to God’s truth, God’s Spirit or God’s love. We have a piece of the puzzle, and others – people who in all likelihood don’t look or talk like us – have other pieces. God is bigger than we are, and by definition, not comprehensible in full by humans. It takes all of our puzzle pieces – and more – to begin to comprehend the reality of the Holy among us. There is a humility required of us if we are going to manage to love one another as we are commanded to do in this gospel reading. If a person believes that he or she has all the answers and there are many people in the Church, the country and the world at large who think in this way, those people have no need of community, except perhaps to make them feel superior as they lord it over other people.

If, however, we understand ourselves to be limited beings, loving an unlimited all loving God, we might choose to seek God wherever God might be found – in the least and the greatest, in the communities of which we are a part, and outside their borders.  We might find ourselves stretching our boundaries of mind and heart, to bother personally and in community, to include the multiple voices of so many harmonizing on the same theme: love of God and things of the spirit, and love of one another united body and soul in the church. It might be helpful to remember that Jesus loves us all and gave up his life for the love of his father and all of us. Jesus loved Peter, a Galilean fisherman with a tendency to speak first and ask questions later. Jesus loved Cornelius, a devout Roman soldier. Jesus loves you, and Jesus loves me with all our lumps and bumps and all the things that we don’t want other people to see and hear about us. Jesus doesn’t love me any more than you, or vice versa. By grace, we are all beloved, sons and daughters of the father and all have the opportunity to exercise that love in how we treat others. In the world of today and in our own country we see the Church getting such a hammering as a result of a number of clergy and religious doing so much damage from within. There are so many who have been hurt by the misdeeds of the few and we have a duty to remember them in prayer and in our care for their needs. Showing the love of God to all those who feel the hurt of betrayal, by our prayer and our action and reaction to all of them they will see the love of god given to all through us.

It is human nature to want to draw a circle around ourselves and maintain borders that define who is part of us, and who is not. It is the Holy Spirit’s nature to push us past our borders, and ask us to grow. If there’s a sure-fire test for whether the Spirit is prompting us or not, it’s this: if we think we are called to shrink our borders, include fewer people, be more selective in our society, we can be absolutely sure that those feelings don’t come from God.

God’s desire for us is that we expand our understanding, make the effort to love people who are not like us and to accept with grace the fact that our vision of God and God’s kingdom is limited. We need to hear about the vision of others to broaden our perspective and perhaps eve broaden their outlook on the world. We need to stop and listen to the stories of those who were hurt in times that are long past in order to help them to heal their brokenness and in their brokenness we one and all will see the Church that we are meant to be an all caring place where everyone will be valued as a son or daughter of God. The film ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’ has a particularly good line spoken by one of the main characters several times during the film when things had not worked out quite as people hoped: ‘Everything will be all right in the end, so if is not all right then it is not yet the end.’ For us it is not the end for at this time we certainly are in a Mess but for us as people of faith all things will work out for the good of this we can be sure.

Being a person of faith is not easy at the present time but this is our calling as members of the Church, which is the body of Christ.  In June Ireland will host the 50th Eucharistic Congress, 80 years after the Eucharistic congress was held here in 1932.

There have been many changes in Ireland in the intervening period of the last 80 years and a great number of these changes were not for the better. The contemporary context of modern Ireland is very different in so many ways. The style, purpose and outcome of Eucharistic Congresses have also altered considerably over the years. In recent times an International Eucharistic Congress is more like a festival of faith, consisting of seminars, concerts, workshops, exhibitions and most importantly and above all else  the daily celebration of the Mass..  From the 10th to the 17th June many people will come to Dublin from all over the world in celebration of their faith that is faith in God in communion with Christ and one another. As I said at the start of this and I repeat this again In our gospel reading for this Sunday Jesus tells his disciples, this is my commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. This is what Eucharist is all about loving one another as Jesus loves us no one has ever sent his or her son into the world to die for all of us and yet that is exactly what our father in heaven did he sent Jesus his son into our world to give his life as a ransom for many, and though we are many we are one. We cannot forget the great sacrament of the body of Christ, Corpus Christi the sacrament Par excellence instituted on that first Holy Thursday in the upper room what love and joy there are within this great sacrament. This Sacrament of the Body of Christ truly shows the love of the Father not as some far off thing or person away out there somewhere but as a person that we can see in the eucharistic bread who has a part to play in our daily life and living.My hope is that we will listen to the voice of Jesus in the broken hearts, and in the victims of our society the people out there who are hungry or lost, lonely or frightened, helpless or sick; and then in the days, weeks months and years ahead we can truly say that we are In loving communion with Christ and one another

Fifth Sunday of Easter

Here we are at the 5^th Sunday of Easter soon we will come to Ascension(Jesus returning to the Father) and then the end of the 50 days of the Easter season at  Pentecost(The coming of the Holy Spirit sometimes called the Holy Ghost). The Gospel reading for  this Sunday speaks of Jesus as the Vine Dresser. The image of “vine”, “vine grower”, and “branch” is a tactile as well as visual aid. We are the receivers of life and the producers of “fruit” that is spiritual fruit.  This image of the people of God as “God’s vineyard” is a very old one, going back to the Jewish psalms, as well as other places in the Old Testament. Listen to part of Psalm 80: “You brought a vine out of Egypt; you drove out the nations and planted it. You cleared the ground for it; it took deep root and filled the land.” Again, notice that it is God who is doing all the planting here, not us. And think of all the other I AM statements found in the Gospel of John: “I AM the light of the world,” “I AM the gate,” “I AM the resurrection and the life.” The “Grower” is pictured as the One Who trims away those who have refused their identity as branches that is members of the church; perhaps they want to be the “vine” themselves. By the choices that they might make they are lost to the process of bringing life and nourishment through Christ, into this world. The Trimmer is seen to prune the branches so that even more fruit may grow. I do not like hearing this, because I do not like being shaped up. Many of us have many things that we do not want others to really know about, there are many lumps and bumps in our lives but we all need to remember that god loves us just as we are with all the things good and bad that are part and parcel of us and our lives.