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SECOND SUNDAY OF EASTER DIVINE MERCY SUNDAY

DOUBTING THOMAS

Today is the Second Sunday of the Easter Season and it also known as Divine Mercy Sunday. In the Gospel reading for this day we see Thomas the apostle or as he is often called Doubting Thomas and I think  in many ways we are like doubting Thomas full of DOUBTS about what happens in matters of faith. In the Gospel Reading, the risen Jesus appears to ten of his apostles. Thomas is missing. The ten are convinced; but when Thomas rejoins them after Jesus has vanished, Thomas is highly sceptical as we would be if we were in his shoes. Thomas had trusted Jesus and believed he was the Messiah as we trust in Jesus and know he is the Messiah the Son of God.  The Romans killed Jesus and, with Jesus, the hope in Jesus that Thomas had. How much Thomas trusted before the crucifixion can be understood by the way Thomas hardened his heart against trust in the aftermath. “The bigger they are, the harder they fall,” we say. And the bigness of Thomas’s heart and the greatness of his trust in Jesus can be seen by how hard Thomas fell when he thought his trust was betrayed.

Thomas presents a contrast. He wants to physically probe Jesus’ body to confirm the miraculous. Yet when confronted with Jesus invitation to touch him (v. 27), Thomas backs off. He rapidly comes to his senses and confesses his faith: “My Lord and My God.” He accepts Jesus’ new invitation: “Do not persist in your disbelief, but become a believer.”Writing for a later generation of followers  who were gradually being deprived of apostolic witnesses by death, John composed the story of Thomas and the “beatitude” that concludes today’s episode: “Truly worthy of esteem are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”It is precisely because  we live by faith and in faith that we believe in the things unseen and we remember the words of Jesus in the Gospel when he said “Happy are those who have not seen and yet believe.”

Today we also celebrate the feast of Divine Mercy a feast in which we hear about the Merciful love that God has for each of us. The Messages of Divine Mercy were passed down to us through the Polish nun Saint Faustina.   Jesus Mercy is powerfully shown in today’s Gospel as the newly-risen Saviour appears to those who had betrayed Him, those who in weakness had run far away from the soldiers and from the mock trials—and from their Master in His three-hour agony and death. As Jesus showed His Divine Mercy to His apostles on this Sunday, the Church urges us to show our gratitude and belief in His never-failing forgiveness for our sins and betrayals of His love. He urges us to pray often for a world that has abandoned His commandments, ignored His words, shunned His healing, and rejected His love. 

HOLY SATURDAY AND EASTER SUNDAY

Having  completed our Lenten observance and after the liturgies of Holy Thursday and  Good Friday we  are now at the stage of celebrating the Easter Vigil and the day of resurrection that is Easter Sunday. Holy Saturday is about emptiness, ‘The cross is empty now Jesus lies in the tomb and everything around us is still.’ The heavens and the earth cry out with longing for the sinless one who is not to be found, if we stop to think for a moment we remember that Jesus died and rose again on the third day. We wait, as mourners beside a grave, unsettled, ill at ease, almost not knowing what to do with ourselves. The Church has only one thing to do today: to pray through the emptiness of Holy Saturday. Holy Saturday then is the day when we experience watching and waiting at the tomb as we await the celebration of the Resurrection which we celebrate in the Easter Vigil and the season of Easter. The Psalm for Easter Sunday says, “This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.”Above all days, Easter is a day of joy .

But what is joy? The answer St. Francis gave to this question is famous. St. Francis said to his Brother Leo, “When we come to St. Mary of the Angels [our house], soaked by the rain and frozen by the cold, all soiled with mud and suffering from hunger, and we ring at the gate of the place and the brother porter comes and says angrily: ‘Who are you?’ And we say: ‘We are two of your brothers.’ And … he does not open for us, but makes us stand outside in the snow and rain, cold and hungry, until night falls—then if we endure all those insults and cruel rebuffs patiently, … oh, Brother Leo, … perfect joy is there!”

Whatever we may think of St. Francis’s explanation of perfect joy, Easter reminds us that Francis’s kind of joy is not the end of the story. At Easter, we celebrate the other kind of joy, the kind each of us longs for, when every tear is wiped away, and there is no sorrow any more no more suffering from weather or hunger or hurtful human beings. As we sing in the much-loved hymn by Fr. John Foley, S. J., at Easter, “the cross and passion past, dark night is done, bright morning come at last!” When we ourselves rise to meet our risen Lord, in that bright morning we will hear him say, “Come away, beloved. The winter is past; the rain is gone, and the flowers return to the earth” (Song of Songs 2:10-12). In the loving union of that encounter, all the heart brokenness of our lives will be redeemed. That will be perfect  joy.

So in that same vein of perfect joy we say “this is the ‘day which the Lord has made.’ Alleluia!  let us take fresh hope,  with Christ our Passover everything is possible! Christ goes forward with us in our future!” Let us go forward together as Easter people rejoicing in the Resurrection.

Holy Thursday 2013

Today is Holy Thursday and the theme that runs through the entire day is one of service or more exactly humble service. This morning in the cathedral the priests con celebrated the Chrism Mass with our bishops. Holy Thursday is all about the  priesthood and the  institution of the Eucharist on the first Holy Thursday in the upper room. During this morning’s Chrism Mass our priests  renewed their commitment to serving the people of god in the parishes and the various chaplaincies that there are. We in our turn were asked to support our priests and our bishops by our prayers.

The evening Liturgy, marks the end of Lent and the beginning of the sacred “Triduum” (“three days”) of Holy Week, which culminates in the Easter Vigil, and concludes at Vespers on the evening of Easter day. The Evening Mass commemorating the Last Supper has, as its theme, service and sacrifice – which are aspects of the same mystery.  We see Jesus as one who serves, who gives himself. Just as he gives himself in washing the feet of his disciples, so he gives himself in the bread and wine he takes, blesses and hands to them. And in the same way he will give himself on the cross tomorrow.  All these acts of self-giving are the same act – that of the Son of Man who came ‘not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.’

The action of the Church that is our action on this night also witnesses to the Church’s respect for Christ’s Body present in the consecrated Host in the Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, carried in solemn procession to the  Altar of Repose. No Mass will be celebrated again in the Church throughout the world until the Easter Vigil on Saturday evening proclaims the Resurrection that is the light of Christ. In the words of the liturgy let us go forth to meet the Lord in peace and thanksgiving as we celebrate the three days of the Easter Triduum

PALM SUNDAY 2013

Today we celebrate Palm Sunday when Jesus entered his own city From the ashes on Ash Wednesday we have almost gone full circle through the six weeks of Lent and here we are at Palm Sunday with three more days to come as we head towards the last round up that is the Easter Triduum. On Palm Sunday, we celebrate the first joy of the season, as we celebrate Our Lord’s triumphant entrance into Jerusalem where he was welcomed by crowds worshipping him and laying down palm leaves before him. It also marks the beginning of Holy Week, with the greatest tragedy and sorrow and then the greatest triumph of the year on Easter Sunday.

There are so many different aspects to this particular week it is so hard to flag up all of them on this day and i’m not going to do that.   They each have their own emphasis and there will be time to comment on them later on in the week.  Holy Week and the events within it give all of us an opportunity to look at our lives and to accept responsibility for all that is within our lives good bad or indifferent. It is important that we who say we are Christians accept the truth about ourselves and then in our acceptance of the truth we will be able to look at the Cross and recognise the love of God our Father for us and for everyone.

This week  and indeed the whole of our Lenten Journey that we will soon finish give  us the opportunity to look hard at ourselves and see exactly where we have come from and where we are going and perhaps were we should be going. We have always to remember that Jesus came to take away our sins and to point us in the right direction that is towards our father in heaven and all that is good.  During this week we remember that Christ came to give his life as a ransom for many and as a result of this he points us to God. Christ took our sinful ways on himself because of his love for us. May the passion story inspire all of us to try to imitate in some small way the all loving all forgiving Jesus who went through betrayal to death and finally to resurrection for us so that we will have life and have it to the full.  Over the next few days let us prepare with greater intensity for the Easter Triduum and then we will really be able to enjoy Easter feast which we have been preparing for since Ash Wednesday.

THIRD SUNDAY OF LENT

Well here we are nearly at the midpoint of Lent the third Sunday, of course the midpoint is next Wednesday 3 weeks in with three more to go. With the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI, the thought that came into my mind on Friday was Here today gone tomorrow. After his resignation coming into force at 8pm on Thursday the popes name is automatically taken out of the intercession in the Eucharistic Prayer  and all other official references made of him in the Liturgy cease. In the same way when a pope dies his ring and seal are both smashed by the Cardinal Camerlengo and the papal apartments are sealed until the new pope is elected this all took place on Thursday evening. I’m sitting here just after 8pm on Thursday evening thinking has all this happened and as we know it has and so life goes on as we reflect on the readings for this Sunday

In this Sundays  gospel we hear again the urgent call of the Christ to change our way of life, to repent, to begin a new relationship with God our Father. The passage shows the compassion of Jesus, but this compassion does not exclude the need for repentance. To undergo resurrection in Christ is to undergo the judgment of God! Indeed, the time of Lent is nothing other than the time of the life of the Church: these forty days of repentance are the days given to the Church in order that she might prepare for her meeting with the risen Jesus, the Lord of Lords, He who is “the Alpha and the Omega” (Rev. 21:6). 

God, in his mercy, gives us time to get right with him, but that time is here and now not in the past and not in the future. We must not assume that there is no hurry. There is always a hurry when it comes to faith because a sudden and unexpected death leaves us no time to prepare to settle one’s accounts when we must stand before the Lord on the day of judgment. Jesus warns us that we must be ready at all times. The Lord in his mercy gives us both grace and time to turn away from sin, but that time is right now. If we delay, even for a day, we may discover that grace has passed us by and our time is up.  

As a Church, we learn from the lessons of history and we remind ourselves that we the people of god  and the Church  we are part of are always in need of renewal and purification. We are in the middle of Lent; it is that time of the year when we have a lot to think about but the message of today’s readings is clear. It is that the task that lies before us is one of repentance. This means that we need to examine our consciences carefully and admit to God our sin and unworthiness and in all humility seek his forgiveness.  In simple terms the urgent call of the Christ to change our way of life and leave all the sinful ways behind us as  we look forward in hope to a better life  the eternal life offered us by the risen Lord at Easter.

5th Sunday of Ordinary Time C

Here we are fast approaching Lent. Believe it or not next Wednesday is Ash Wednesday. We move forward as the Palm Branches left aside from last year are burned for the ashes and the Green vestments of Ordinary time give way to the Lenten purple. Here we go again comes to mind as it seems no time since we celebrated the start of the Lenten Fast in 2012. But whether we like it or not Lent starts on Wednesday and there will be much said about what we might do or not do   in the days ahead. That said back to today and our readings for this Sunday:

Why did Jesus perform the miracle of the great catch of fish? No doubt the great crowd of people who had pressed upon Jesus had something to do with this miracle. They were very hungry for God and were eager to hear his word are we that hungry when it comes to our weekly observance of our faith?

Jesus wanted to use this occasion to teach his disciples an important lesson.  Although Simon was wearied from a night of fruitless toil, he nonetheless pressed upon Jesus for his word of command: At your word I will let down the nets. When you meet disappointment and failure, do you press upon the Lord, like Simon, to hear his word and to receive his command? This incident tells us an important truth about how God works in and through us for his glory. God expects of us greater things than we can do by ourselves. When we cooperate in his works, we accomplish far beyond what we can do on our own for those who have faith all things are possible. When people respond to God’s word with faith and obedience they are changed and made “a new creation” in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17). God chooses ordinary people, like you and me, as his ambassadors and he uses the ordinary circumstances of our daily lives and work situations to draw others into his kingdom. Our lives in Christ depend upon an unlimited trust in the Lord, following his words with energy and hope even when his will for us leads into uncharted waters, when he commands that we “put out into the deep”,

even those well-plumbed depths which have in the past yielded up for us only empty nets will bear fruit in plenty. The readings today are all about vocation; the vocations of Isaiah, Paul and the Apostles. Each one of us has a vocation each one of us has been given the task of proclaiming the Good News in our daily lives, a calling from the Lord. Each one of us is commissioned through our baptism to be an Apostle of Christ in the world. Some are called to the very particular service of Priesthood or religious life but many others are called to the vocations of married or single life. There are so many other vocations I can’t think of them all but all of them have so much value in leading people to God. Whether we are helping in a food pantry in our local community, participating in mission trips across the world, or living amongst another culture for many years, it is the love for the other that is at the very heart and soul of the Christian notion of mission.

Having faith trusting in God, as Paul states in Corinthians, “We have such a hope, we act with great boldness.” We should have that boldness that comes from the realization that we are all Sons and Daughters of God and that God loves us all more than we can  imagine.  We are called, we are sent, to lead people to God.  Every action of our lives has purpose not just for ourselves but as beacons of hope for those who are seeking the Lord. The family Motto of my family is Light in the darkness we that is all of us are called to be the spiritual light that is meant to be set on hilltops so all can see.  We pray today for the courage to respond to the Lord’s summons to be his apostles with every action of our lives especially as we begin our observance of Lent during the Year of Faith.

4Th Sunday of Ordinary Time

This Sunday’s gospel passage is a continuation of last week’s reading when Jesus entered the synagogue and declared Isaiah’s prophecy fulfilled. In that declaration, Jesus referred to himself as God’s servant, the Chosen One upon whom God had given his Spirit. Jesus’ mission was proof of that claim; he preached, taught, and healed in the name of God’s Kingdom. His simple, straightforward declaration would cause controversy to those who thought they knew “Joseph’s son.”  They brought him to the brow of the hill and were about to throw him over the edge but as it wasn’t his time he escaped through them and went away.

When Jesus came to his home town of Nazareth and began to teach, the local Jewish community was quite proud of him. After all, they had heard of the things that he had done at Capernaum and were convinced that he was some sort of prophet from God. They believed that Jesus had just won the lottery, so to speak, and was about to shower them with God’s favour because, after all, he was one of them, so of course that is what he would do. Besides, they agreed with what he was saying – at least at first. But as long as they were pleased, they were proud and they wanted to seen in the light of special favour from God.

When Jesus speaks to his home town synagogue, he’s speaking to us in our home town church, too. Paul echoes Jesus’ message, “And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.” What does God’s love look like in your idea of church? Open the ears of your heart to listen for it, and your eyes to see and walk in grace to find out.

Prophets in every age are holy people that is people with God at the heart of their lives. They are uncompromising in their faithfulness to the word of God. They always speak the truth, regardless of the consequences, offering encouragement and hope to people who have no sense of meaning or purpose in life. They challenge people to repent for their sins and to seek God’s mercy. That is true compassion.

There is still a need for prophets in our society, men, women and even children who are faithful to their baptismal commitment. We need to listen to them and learn from them. Also, we need to remember that every Christian and that means all of us including you and me has to exercise the prophetic vocation in the world of work, leisure and family life, praying for the grace to fulfil this important part of our Christian life.

Being a Christian isn’t easy. Jesus never said that it was going to be an easy road to go along and we remember Good Friday and the Cross of Calvary.  Our faith as Christians calls us to live, to die to ourselves and be resurrected with Jesus over and over and over again.

With each time, our hearts get a little wiser, we know grace that much more deeply, and we are able to follow Jesus a little bit more down the road of love. Being a Christian is always going to have a cost no matter what way you look at it.  That is because good is always going to be opposed by evil and good always triumphs over evil and the evil that is within the world will never win. May we not be afraid of being what we are and that is people who are called by Jesus to follow him in faith.