6th Sunday of Easter A

Towards the end of last week’s homily I made a brief reference to what Ignatius Loyola considered the basis of all christian ministry. He called it spiritual conversation and saw it as the fundamental way in which Jesus’ command to teach all nations is carried out in society. We do it, he says, by engaging with the people we meet along the way, talking to them, as Jesus does on the road to Emmaeus, about what’s going on in their lives and, when appropriate, when they bring the subject up, speak to them about the things of God. And St Peter says the same in today’s second reading. ‘Always have your answer ready’ he says, ‘for people who ask you the reason for the hope that you all have.’ You don’t have to preach at people, he is saying. But, when they ask you, have your answer ready, and give it with courtesy and respect, words that are echoed in Pope Paul V1’s great 1975 document on Evangelization. In it, he lists eight ways in which the world of our day will be re-evangelized, and spiritual conversation, even if he doesn’t call it that, is first among them. So what exactly is our reason for the hope that we have, and, more importantly, how are we going to express it in a way which makes sense to people today? Because an explanation which people cannot understand, which makes no sense to them, is not an explanation at all. Well, that’s our subject this week.

For many christians the answer to both questions, the reason for our hope and the way to explain it to others, lies in the Bible. But, while the Bible is the inspired Word of God, there’s no point in offering it as the reason for the hope we have. And this is because it is a circular argument. We cannot give the Bible as the reason we believe to people who do not themselves believe in the Bible and expect our answer to satisfy them. If we are serious about answering their question, then we have to start from some common ground. And the Bible simply is not that common ground, especially when it’s associated in the minds of many with creationism and other forms of christian fundamentalism. So, if the Bible won’t do, where do we go next?

Well, for many Catholics the next stopping point is the teaching of the Church: the ‘My God I believe in thee and all thy Church doth teach’ approach to things. But again, this is a circular argument and so useless as a starting point for evangelization. For one thing, even when what the Church teaches is true, it’s often expressed in language that’s completely foreign to the modern mind. An example of this would be Transubstantiation, an idea that depends on the philosophy of Aristotle, a way of thinking which is completely at odds with what we know today about the physical world. And so in his encyclical letter on the Eucharist, written over forty years ago, Pope Paul VI invited theologians to find other ways of expressing the truth of Jesus’ presence in the Eucharist which were faithful to the truth but which reflected modern ways of thinking. Just as with the Bible, you cannot say that what the Church says is true because the Church says it. It’s an absurd argument which convinces only the already convinced. So where next?

Well, for many, the next stop is reason, the idea that we can convince people and justify what we believe by logic and reasoned argument. And up to a point this is true. Faith is not stupid. A lot of it makes perfect sense and there are plenty of people in the world writing very learned books to illustrate this. Some of them may even convince a few people. But reason can only go so far. You can, if you like, take the horse to the water but you cannot make it drink. As a means of knowing God and the things of God; as a way of reaching out to the world with the message of the Gospel, reason and logic in themselves are as inadequate as the Bible and Church teaching. It’s not that there is anything wrong with them in themselves. Far from it. For men and women of faith they are vital and essential. But as a starting point for explaining to those who ask the reason for the hope we have they simply will not do. They take too much for granted and so what we need to do is find some common ground where we can all meet and that common ground is personal experience.

We live in an age of personal experience. This is the I’ve been there, done it, bought the tee-shirt age, an approach to truth which, of course, raises its own difficulties. It often leads to the kind of relativism John Paul II and Benedict XVI have warned against for years; the idea that truth is what an individual thinks it is or wants it to be. This is the age of a thousand competing versions of the truth and we have reflected often on the need for discernment in the face of such a culture. We need to be able to tell truth from falsehood and, for men and women who already believe, this is where the Bible, the Teaching of the Church and reason come in.

But for the millions who do not yet believe, the answer lies elsewhere and is powerfully expressed by Pope Paul VI when he says in his document on Evangelization, ‘Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses.’ There’s the key. That’s how to respond to those who ask the reason for the hope we have. We live it. We show people what the love of God is like by loving them the way God loves. We open people up to the teaching of Jesus by living it both as individuals and as parish communities. We don’t go down the town and preach at people on the street corners. We feed the hungry, clothe the naked, work for peace, show tolerance to others in their weakness, refuse to judge or condemn any human being, and when people ask us, ‘Why do you do this? What is the reason for the love and the hope that you have?’ then, with courtesy and respect, we tell them.

For many in Peter’s day, as we heard earlier, doing this was a crime punishable by death. And so I leave you with the old question. If it were a crime today to witness to Jesus, would there be enough evidence to convict us either as individuals or as a parish?


BIDDING PRAYERS

It is only possible to give an answer to those who ask us about the reason for the hope we all have if we have that hope in us personally in the first place. And so we ask the Spirit of God to stir the gift of hope in us today, drawing us beyond the fear and pessimism about the world which so often fills the hearts of religious church-going people. We ask God to enable us instead to be for all the people we meet in the course of our lives a source of joy and encouragment…………………....Lord hear us

The call to be witnesses to the presence of Jesus in the world is lived out first and foremost – not in doing unusual or extraordinary things – but in the ordinary events of our lives. We are called to make Jesus present in our homes, in the places where we work, in the streets where we live and in all our encounters with the people around us. We do this by living the values of the gospel in a prayerful and reflective way, seeking to serve rather than be served, give rather than receive, and we pray for the grace we need to do this…………………Lord hear us

St Peter reminds us in today’s second reading that in all our dealings with others we must treat them with courtesy and respect. And so we pray for the grace we need to do this, always respecting the views and opinions of others, never acting arrogantly towards them, never judging or condemning them, always speaking well rather than badly of them and, in every circumstance, putting the best interpretation possible on what they say and do……….…………………..Lord hear us

St Peter in the second reading is writing to people who knew from experience what it was to be persecuted for their christian faith. Things today are very different, although in today’s world people continue to suffer for what they believe. Many, like our ancestors in faith, are imprisoned and some, like the early martyrs, die for their beliefs. And so we pray for them and for the courage to face whatever little sufferings come our way, remembering, as St Peter says today, that it is better to suffer for doing right rather than for doing wrong…………….…………………….Lord hear us

Thursday of this coming week is the Feast of the Ascension and the Feast of Pentecost is just two weeks away. And so, in this week’s gospel, we hear Jesus speak of how he will send us another Advocate, the Spirit of truth. And so we pray for the grace we need to recognize truth in today’s complex world, knowing how to distinguish it from the many falsehoods that surround us………………...Lord hear us

If we are to re-evangelize the modern world – the great challenge of our time – then we must learn to express the great truths of faith in a language that the men and women of our time can understand. We must enter into their world rather than expect them to enter ours. We must speak their language rather than demand that they speak ours. We must make the first move rather than wait for them to do so. We must reach out to them rather than wait for them to come to us. And so we pray for the generosity of spirit we need to do this…………….Lord hear us