All that stuff in the first reading about cutting a heifer, a goat and a ram in half and a firebrand passing between the halves seems at first sight to have very little relevance for us today. Indeed, it’s the kind of passage which often causes people to ask why we bother reading the Old Testament at all given that so much of it makes no sense to people. And yet, behind what is, admittedly, a rather unusual story, lies a truth which, if we could grasp it, would change the whole way we think about God. It takes us to the very heart of the difference between religion and faith and it’s for that reason that I invite you to look at it more closely today.
And what we find there is the very strange way in which people three thousand years ago sealed contracts and agreements. In the days before written documents, public ceremonies which emphasised the importance and solemnity of a contract needed to be developed. And in the reading we hear about one of them. The practice, strange as it seems to us today, was to cut the animals in two and for the two parties to the agreement to walk between the halves, the implication being that if either party reneged on the agreement they deserved the same fate as the animals. But in the case of God and Abraham this, if you noticed, was not what happened. Abraham, in fact, fell into a deep sleep and God alone, symbolized by the firebrand, passed between the halves. In other words, the Covenant which is being sealed here is not a quid prop quo agreement. It’s not a case of if you do this then I will do that in return. The Covenant God is making with Abraham is pure gift. It’s completely God’s initiative. Abraham has nothing to offer to God in return for it. All he can do – and all any of us can do in the end – is be open to what God gives, receive it, accept it and rejoice in it.
And yet how different this is from the kind of religion we are all so familiar with, a religion which, from its primitive origins right up to the present day, is rooted in fear and riddled with the idea that we have to keep God happy by doing the things that please him. Our ancient ancestors, in an attempt to exercise some level of control over the world around them, invented Gods who would send the rain when they needed it or protect them from disease. And the way to make sure this happened was to perform religious actions like offering sacrifice, performing ritual dances or chanting religious words. Jesus himself warns us against this, telling us that, when we pray, we should not babble like the pagans do. They think that by using many word they will make themselves heard – the underlying belief here being that the gods were at best uninterested or at worst hostile – but there’s no need for us to do that. And the reason is simple. God knows what we need before we ask, longs to give us what we need and like any good father would not dream of giving us a stone when we asked for bread or a snake when we asked for a fish. Our primitive ancestors were like slaves who lived in fear of their gods. But Jesus tells us that the relationship he wants to have with us is not one of slaves or servants but of friendship and an intimacy so deep that, in the Eucharist, he gives us himself as food and drink under the appearances of bread and wine. And yet two thousand years on the evidence of our pagan past in everywhere as millions of religious Church-going people still live in fear of an angry God and continue to perform religious actions in the hope of keeping him happy. Religion always was and still is about doing things for God while what we are called to is the kind of faith that is open to the amazing things God wants to do for us.
And we see it in the Gospel today too. Confronted with a vision from God which is utter gift, Peter’s reaction is a classic religious one. He wants to do something. He wants to build three tents. And did you notice what happened? Even as he spoke, Luke tells us, a cloud came and covered them with shadow, smothering Peter’s words even as they emerged from his mouth. God did not even respond to them. They were totally irrelevant. Peter’s role in this whole experience was to say nothing, do nothing and let God be God, which is ultimately what we, as men and women of faith as opposed to religion are called to do. Mary did it in the story of the Annunciation when she said to the angel: ‘Let it be done unto me according to your word.’ Jesus did it on the cross when he cried out: ‘Father into your hands I commend my spirit.’ And it is what we say every week, when we speak those words, ‘Only say the word and I shall be healed.’
But while we say things this, in reality many of our attitudes and the things we do belong still to the world of primitive religion. Many of us still see attendance at Mass as a duty and an obligation. We still see prayer as a way of persuading God to do the things we want. We still make deals with God along the lines of what one of my nieces said to me many years ago when I opened the door to her on Christmas Day – she was only three at the time – ‘We’ve got presents for you, have you got presents for us?’ And worst of all, many of us still live in fear of God and carry out religious actions – some of them little more than superstition or magic - to appease him and keep him happy. And the truth I invite you to see this week, and it is a very difficult one to understand, is that none of this is necessary. Ultimately, like Abraham who fell into a deep sleep and Peter covered by the cloud, we do not have to do anything. Everything that God gives is pure gift and our role is to receive it.
But if everything is gift and we don’t have to earn it, why live a Christian life at all? Or as many people have said to me over the years, if God loves everybody the same, why bother being good? Well, to answer these questions we need to explore the concept of a free and loving response, which, God willing, we will do next week.
BIDDING PRAYERS
In the first reading today,Abraham is told by God that his descendants will be as many as the stars in the heavens. Abraham believes God and in doing so becomes father in faith to millions of Jews, Moslems and Christians through the ages. At a time in his own life when he might have expected to be left in peace, Abraham was prepared to go where God led him and do what God asked of him, and in this age of change and transition in the Church, we pray for the grace to do the same ourselves...... Lord hear us
The book of Genesis speaks of how, in the presence of God, Abraham was seized with terror. And in the Gospel today, when the cloud came over them, the disciples, too, were afraid. In both cases they are completely overcome by a God who is greater than anything we can imagine and who cannot be adequately described by religious language or tied down to churches and holy places. This is the true God, the God who fills everything that exists and we ask that God to reveal himself to us here in this parish..........Lord hear us
As the story of the transfiguration unfolds, Jesus leads Peter, James and John up the mountain to pray. Throughout the Old Testament, the mountain was a place of prayer and encounter with God and it is there that Jesus chooses to reveal to the disciples the full truth of who he is. And so it will be with us. If we are to come to know who Jesus is in our lives, it will happen when we go up the mountain and learn the meaning of contemplative prayer. And so we ask God to teach us.........Lord hear us
In today’s story, Peter offers to build three tents, one for Jesus, one for Moses and one for Elijah. To have done so, however, would have been to create a religious shrine, and this was not what the Transfiguration was about. It was to prepare the disciples for what lay ahead and as soon as it was over it was time to go down the mountain again and get on with the work of preaching the Gospel. And so we pray that our prayer each week here in St Brides will lead us, too, to ministry in the midst of the world..........Lord hear us
One of the things that has happened in recent years is that many people who previously went to Mass out of fear or out of a sense of duty or obligation have become less afraid and more relaxed about such rules and regulations. And on balance this has been a healthy development. But now we need to go deeper and find more profound reasons for being here, reasons not based on fear or on rules, but on a new understanding of what Mass is about. And so we pray for this grace for the whole parish.............Lord hear us
Our Parish Week of Directed Prayer begins this evening. There are fourteen participants and four guides who are coming from other parishes in the diocese. And so we ask God to be with and guide both participants and guides over the coming days. We ask him to open up the Scriptures to them in a way which touches them deeply and give them the grace they need to go wherever God leads them. And we thank him for the generosity of those who give up so much time to be with us this week.........Lord hear us
Saturday, 27 February 2010
Saturday, 20 February 2010
First Sunday of Lent C.
In a consumer-driven society which encourages the instant gratification of every desire, it’s inevitable that Lent, with its emphasis on fasting and self-denial, will seem to many of our contemporaries like the relic of a by-gone age. The idea that we should willingly do without things we like and enjoy is beyond the comprehension of many today. It makes no sense to a generation born into a world dominated by the idea that material things have within themselves the power to make us happy. And yet what I want to suggest this morning is that, in the whole of human history, Lent has never been as relevant as it is today, and that the prayer, fasting and almsgiving which have been at its core for centuries, take us to the heart of the challenges facing our society at this moment in history. So what do I mean by this?
Well, that the world today needs the grace of conversion and renewal is surely beyond doubt. How can it not do, given what we see all around us? Something, surely, has to change if the world is to find its way out of the vicious circle of poverty, violence and injustice which has bedevilled it since history began. The world, as we saw last week and as I will never tire of reminding you, is a god-filled place. But mixed in with what is good, like darnel in a field, there are other forces at work too; dark, destructive forces which, like a deadly virus, move silently through our world poisoning and contaminating the lives of its people. Why else in this country of ours, at a time when, despite the recession, we have levels of prosperity and affluence never seen before, are we challenging for top place in almost every league table in Europe when it comes to things like drugs, heart disease, teenage pregnancies, alcoholism, suicides and virtually every modern evil you care to mention. And as men and women of faith, we are called upon to identify, challenge and confront these dark destructive forces, the first and most important tool we have at our disposal during Lent being prayer.
And by prayer I don’t mean asking for things. Intercessory prayer is an important part of our tradition and will always have a place in our lives, but there is far more to prayer than that. I have already quoted the Irish Jesuit, William Johnstone, who, in one of his excellent books on the spiritual life, speaks about the future of the Church in the 21st century. And what he says is very simple. ‘We must give people mysticism or die.’ Prayer in this ‘mystical’ sense is not so much about what we do as what God does in us. It is about making ourselves available to God in such a way that he begins to transform us from within until we see the full truth about the world, ourselves and who we are in relation to him. It is to see the world as God sees it and this comes through the quiet, reflective, contemplative prayer Lent is calling us to in a world where there is so much that is superficial, noisy and empty.
Take, for example, the role played in our lives by television. It can be a wonderful thing, but it is important that we recognize th dangers in it too. For years in the Third World television was deliberately used by oppressive regimes as a way of keeping the minds of the poor off the poverty and injustice they were living under. The theory was simple. Fill their lives with cheap soap operas and they it will keep them off the streets. And something very similar is happening to us. Commentators call it ‘dumbing down,’ and we see it everywhere. We see it in the lack of serious documentaries on main-stream TV which might encourage us to think about and question what is happening around us. We see it in the way News bulletins are so often dominated by things like the sexual misdemeanours of John Terry or Tiger Woods or the latest episode in the life of some pathetic casualty of our so-called ‘celebrity’ culture, at the expense of the really important things going on in the world. And we will see it more and more in the coming weeks as a general election approaches and our politicians address us through sound-bites and slick advertising rather than the kind of serious debate you would find in a mature democracy. And all of this is a world where there are huge issues at stake upon which we, as men and women of faith, are called to reflect and shine the light of the Gospel. And this simply cannot be done without the kind of deeper prayer and reflection William Johnston speaks of.
And then there’s fasting. Can there ever have been a time in the whole of human history when was as necessary as it is today. We eat too much and spend fortunes in gyms trying to burn off the fat. Obesity is a serious cause of ill-health costing the country millions. We consume oil and other energy resources at a totally unsustainable rate. Binge drinking, doctors tell us, is destroying the liver of millions of our young people. We are obsessed with possessing things, many of which are luxuries and gadgets we don’t actually need. The idea of waiting for something or saving up for it has been so abandoned that the world economic system may still collapse under the weight of debt caused by us all, individuals and governments, spending money we did not have. Is it any wonder people think fasting, self-denial and doing without things is old fashioned when, in reality, they are the only thing now that will save the world from its own excesses?
And then there is almsgiving. As we sit in front of our TVs eating crisps and watching celebrities no one has ever heard of, millions of our fellow human being are dying of hunger and poverty. The SCIAF Lenten boxes are one way of responding to this and well worth using, but, of course, the situation has gone far beyond almsgiving. What is required now is a massive re-distribution of wealth, sharing on a previously unimagined scale and what politicians like to call ‘a new world order.’ But this can only happen when we, the people of the developed world, put down our glasses of Rioja for a moment, switch off the rubbish we are watching on TV for ten miniutes and take seriously what is happening in the world around us. And that, in essence, is what Lent is inviting us to do. Prayer, fasting and almsgiving go to the very heart of the issues facing the world today and there’s nothing remotely old-fashioned about them.
BIDDING PRAYERS
In today’s Gospel, Jesus is led by the Spirit into the wilderness to confront the demons that live there and engage in spiritual combat with them. And so we pray for the grace to do that ourselves this Lent: to confront in our own individual lives the demons of greed and self-indulgence which, after initially promising the happiness we seek, soon turn sour and cause so much pain and suffering in our world. We pray that, by confronting them in our own lives we can diminish their power everywhere.............Lord hear us
If we are to confront the demons at work in our world today then we must become, in the most simple and basic meaning of the word, mystics. Only quiet contemplative prayer in which God opens up our minds and hearts from within, slowly but surely enabling us to see the world as he sees it, can prepare us for the kind of spiritual combat we see Jesus engaged in today. It means moving beyond what is superficial and empty in the culture around us and going deeper. And we pray for this grace...........Lord hear us
To go where God leads us requires inner freedom. But there are many things in our lives which limit this freedom. Some are addicted to drugs or alcohol which limit their freedom, but we can be addicted to other things too, like food, television, shopping, the internet, having our own way and may others. And so we pray for the wisdom we need to recognize our own personal areas of addiction or unfreedom and address them this Lent through a mature, adult use of fasting and self-denial...........Lord hear us
Up to its eyes in debt and continuing to burn up the world’s energy resources at a completely unsustainable rate, the developed world, - engaged as it is in an enormous binge – simply cannot carry on doing what it is doing. And yet we seem incapable of making the necessary changes in the way we live. Our wills are weak and we are hooked on a life-style which is destroying ourselves and others. And so we pray that the men and women of our time will finally see this and do something about it........Lord hear us
Constantly subjected to rubbish on TV, our minds become lazy and our capacity to engage with serious issues diminishes. And so we ask God to stir in us a fresh willingness to do so. Soon, we will be facing a general election, the result of which will have profound consequences for the lives of millions in our country, especially among the poor, and as men and women of faith it is our duty to reflect deeply on the issues involved and vote accordingly. And so we pray for the grace we need to do this.......Lord hear us
Giving to those in need has always been central to the message of the Gospel and still is today. It lies at the heart of what Lent is about and the SCIAF boxes each year provide us with a very simple, effective and safe way of giving. But the real challenge facing us as men and women of faith is to give, not out of what we have extra, but from what we need to live on. This is what the Gospel really asks of us and we pray for the generosity and freedom we need to respond accordingly this year........Lord hear us
Well, that the world today needs the grace of conversion and renewal is surely beyond doubt. How can it not do, given what we see all around us? Something, surely, has to change if the world is to find its way out of the vicious circle of poverty, violence and injustice which has bedevilled it since history began. The world, as we saw last week and as I will never tire of reminding you, is a god-filled place. But mixed in with what is good, like darnel in a field, there are other forces at work too; dark, destructive forces which, like a deadly virus, move silently through our world poisoning and contaminating the lives of its people. Why else in this country of ours, at a time when, despite the recession, we have levels of prosperity and affluence never seen before, are we challenging for top place in almost every league table in Europe when it comes to things like drugs, heart disease, teenage pregnancies, alcoholism, suicides and virtually every modern evil you care to mention. And as men and women of faith, we are called upon to identify, challenge and confront these dark destructive forces, the first and most important tool we have at our disposal during Lent being prayer.
And by prayer I don’t mean asking for things. Intercessory prayer is an important part of our tradition and will always have a place in our lives, but there is far more to prayer than that. I have already quoted the Irish Jesuit, William Johnstone, who, in one of his excellent books on the spiritual life, speaks about the future of the Church in the 21st century. And what he says is very simple. ‘We must give people mysticism or die.’ Prayer in this ‘mystical’ sense is not so much about what we do as what God does in us. It is about making ourselves available to God in such a way that he begins to transform us from within until we see the full truth about the world, ourselves and who we are in relation to him. It is to see the world as God sees it and this comes through the quiet, reflective, contemplative prayer Lent is calling us to in a world where there is so much that is superficial, noisy and empty.
Take, for example, the role played in our lives by television. It can be a wonderful thing, but it is important that we recognize th dangers in it too. For years in the Third World television was deliberately used by oppressive regimes as a way of keeping the minds of the poor off the poverty and injustice they were living under. The theory was simple. Fill their lives with cheap soap operas and they it will keep them off the streets. And something very similar is happening to us. Commentators call it ‘dumbing down,’ and we see it everywhere. We see it in the lack of serious documentaries on main-stream TV which might encourage us to think about and question what is happening around us. We see it in the way News bulletins are so often dominated by things like the sexual misdemeanours of John Terry or Tiger Woods or the latest episode in the life of some pathetic casualty of our so-called ‘celebrity’ culture, at the expense of the really important things going on in the world. And we will see it more and more in the coming weeks as a general election approaches and our politicians address us through sound-bites and slick advertising rather than the kind of serious debate you would find in a mature democracy. And all of this is a world where there are huge issues at stake upon which we, as men and women of faith, are called to reflect and shine the light of the Gospel. And this simply cannot be done without the kind of deeper prayer and reflection William Johnston speaks of.
And then there’s fasting. Can there ever have been a time in the whole of human history when was as necessary as it is today. We eat too much and spend fortunes in gyms trying to burn off the fat. Obesity is a serious cause of ill-health costing the country millions. We consume oil and other energy resources at a totally unsustainable rate. Binge drinking, doctors tell us, is destroying the liver of millions of our young people. We are obsessed with possessing things, many of which are luxuries and gadgets we don’t actually need. The idea of waiting for something or saving up for it has been so abandoned that the world economic system may still collapse under the weight of debt caused by us all, individuals and governments, spending money we did not have. Is it any wonder people think fasting, self-denial and doing without things is old fashioned when, in reality, they are the only thing now that will save the world from its own excesses?
And then there is almsgiving. As we sit in front of our TVs eating crisps and watching celebrities no one has ever heard of, millions of our fellow human being are dying of hunger and poverty. The SCIAF Lenten boxes are one way of responding to this and well worth using, but, of course, the situation has gone far beyond almsgiving. What is required now is a massive re-distribution of wealth, sharing on a previously unimagined scale and what politicians like to call ‘a new world order.’ But this can only happen when we, the people of the developed world, put down our glasses of Rioja for a moment, switch off the rubbish we are watching on TV for ten miniutes and take seriously what is happening in the world around us. And that, in essence, is what Lent is inviting us to do. Prayer, fasting and almsgiving go to the very heart of the issues facing the world today and there’s nothing remotely old-fashioned about them.
BIDDING PRAYERS
In today’s Gospel, Jesus is led by the Spirit into the wilderness to confront the demons that live there and engage in spiritual combat with them. And so we pray for the grace to do that ourselves this Lent: to confront in our own individual lives the demons of greed and self-indulgence which, after initially promising the happiness we seek, soon turn sour and cause so much pain and suffering in our world. We pray that, by confronting them in our own lives we can diminish their power everywhere.............Lord hear us
If we are to confront the demons at work in our world today then we must become, in the most simple and basic meaning of the word, mystics. Only quiet contemplative prayer in which God opens up our minds and hearts from within, slowly but surely enabling us to see the world as he sees it, can prepare us for the kind of spiritual combat we see Jesus engaged in today. It means moving beyond what is superficial and empty in the culture around us and going deeper. And we pray for this grace...........Lord hear us
To go where God leads us requires inner freedom. But there are many things in our lives which limit this freedom. Some are addicted to drugs or alcohol which limit their freedom, but we can be addicted to other things too, like food, television, shopping, the internet, having our own way and may others. And so we pray for the wisdom we need to recognize our own personal areas of addiction or unfreedom and address them this Lent through a mature, adult use of fasting and self-denial...........Lord hear us
Up to its eyes in debt and continuing to burn up the world’s energy resources at a completely unsustainable rate, the developed world, - engaged as it is in an enormous binge – simply cannot carry on doing what it is doing. And yet we seem incapable of making the necessary changes in the way we live. Our wills are weak and we are hooked on a life-style which is destroying ourselves and others. And so we pray that the men and women of our time will finally see this and do something about it........Lord hear us
Constantly subjected to rubbish on TV, our minds become lazy and our capacity to engage with serious issues diminishes. And so we ask God to stir in us a fresh willingness to do so. Soon, we will be facing a general election, the result of which will have profound consequences for the lives of millions in our country, especially among the poor, and as men and women of faith it is our duty to reflect deeply on the issues involved and vote accordingly. And so we pray for the grace we need to do this.......Lord hear us
Giving to those in need has always been central to the message of the Gospel and still is today. It lies at the heart of what Lent is about and the SCIAF boxes each year provide us with a very simple, effective and safe way of giving. But the real challenge facing us as men and women of faith is to give, not out of what we have extra, but from what we need to live on. This is what the Gospel really asks of us and we pray for the generosity and freedom we need to respond accordingly this year........Lord hear us
Saturday, 13 February 2010
6th Sunday of the Year C
I can never make up my mind whether it’s a blessing or a curse, but one of the things nature has given me is very sharp hearing. The result is that I sometimes hear things I am not supposed to hear and there have been times over the years when it would have been better if I hadn’t heard them. But it can be an advantage too. One of the obvious benefits is that you get insights into what people really think. And there have been one or two examples of this since I came here to St Bride’s. The words have not always been the same, but what they have boiled down to are things like, ‘I’m not sure about this man’ or ‘I don’t know what I think about the new priest.’ And I have no problem with this at all. In fact I welcome it and am pleased to hear it. As I told you the very first week I was here, I have not come to West Kilbride to please you, seek your approval, tell you what you want to hear or live up to your expectations of what a priest should be. I had a hard enough time with all that nonsense twenty four years ago in Kilmarnock and one of the reasons I am so happy here is that those issues no longer trouble me. I know now that I am here to be the priest God is calling me to be, ultimately whether you like it or not, and that will always be my aim. And so, to the person who said, ‘But we’ll soon knock him into shape’ my answer is. ‘Oh no you won’t.’ And to explain why I must never allow this to happen I will turn in a moment to a fundamental truth about the Christian life contained in today’s readings. But before that, I remind you of another important truth which underpins the one that follows.
And this first truth, one I have already spoken about several times, is that the world is a place filled with the splendour of God. There is no place in the heart of any person who claims to believe in Jesus for the negativity and pessimism found in so many pious, Church-going people who sit in judgement on the world every day and find it wanting. Salvation is not something awaiting us in the future. As St Paul says in the second reading, we are already saved by the death and resurrection of Jesus. God loved the world so much that he sent his only Son. God in the Genesis myth of creation looked at what he had made and saw that it was good and one of the first signs of the Spirit at work in us is a growing capacity to recognize that goodness and rejoice in it. Indeed, a sign of someone without faith, as described by Jeremiah in the first reading, is that ‘if good comes he has no eyes for it.’
But having said all that, it’s important to recognize that, although the world is filled with the goodness of God, not everything that happens in the world is good. This is very clear in today’s Gospel where Jesus, in St Luke’s version of Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount, contrasts the values of the world with those of the kingdom. And it’s very clear that they are not the same. The Second Vatican Council, in arguably its greatest document, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, committed itself totally and completely to the world saying, famously, that ‘the cares and concerns of the men and women of our time are the cares and concerns of the followers of Jesus too.’ But such a deep involvement with the world, along with the conviction of its fundamental goodness, makes it all the more important tha twe know the difference between what is of God and what isn’t. As followers of Jesus there’s a sense in which we will always be in the world but not of it. Deeply committed to the world, we will never be entirely at home in it. In one of his parables Jesus tells the story of the farmer who sowed good seed in his field only to have an enemy come along and sow darnel among the wheat. And as men and women of faith it is our task to live totally in the world while at the same time sifting through everything that happens to discern what is good seed and what is darnel. The person who does this, Jeremiah told us, is like a tree planted by the waterside while the person who does not is like a dry scrub in the wasteland. And it’s because there is so much darnel, so many areas covered in dry scrub, so many patches of wasteland in our otherwise fundamentally God-filled world that the preaching of the Gospel will always challenge and disturb us and, at some level, come into conflict with the culture of our time.
Not everything we hear on the Tele or read about in the papers, for example, is true. There are forces at work in our society which are deeply ungodly, the most obvious current example being the worship of money and the pursuit of material things at almost any cost which have almost brought the developed world to its knees and may still do so. Just look at Greece. Another area is the whole question of what constitutes truth. Truth in our day has almost become what any given individual wants it to be. Any concept of a truth which is greater than we are is in danger of being lost and as men and women who believe in a God who is the source of all truth we simply cannot allow ourselves to be seduced by such thinking Morality, too, what constitutes right and wrong, has become a kind of free-for-all in today’s society and anyone who dares to take a stand on anything is immediately vilified and treated as if they were some kind of dinosaur. And so it takes a person of genuine courage to do so. But, of course, the greatest manifestation of darnel in our field is the scandal of poverty and hunger in the world. In today’s Gospel, Jesus not only promises that the hungry will be satisfied. He also warns those who are rich – and on a world scale we all are – that we are having our consolation now.
And so the preaching of the Gospel can never be entirely comfortable. It cannot always be what we want to hear. It will challenge us. It will disturb us. And so there’s one thing I can promise you. I will always try to speak the truth to you, even if you don’t like it.
BIDDING PRAYERS
As followers of Jesus, men and women of the Gospel, we are called through our baptism to be in the world but not entirely of it; to be deeply committed to the world but to work at all times to bring about the coming of the kingdom within it. And so we pray for the grace we need to do this: to love the world and its people with a deep love but, at the same time, to challenge the world and, by the way we live, show them new ways of living and open up new possibilities rooted in the teaching of Jesus.....Lord hear us
To love the world begins with a deep sense of its fundamental goodness. In the first reading, Jeremiah reminded us that the man without faith is like “a dry scrub in the wastelands: if good comes he has no eyes for it,” words which are too often true in the lives of pious, church-going people. And so we ask God to lead us beyond the pessimism and negativity of many in today’s world and enable us to recognize all around us a world filled to overflowing with the splendour and goodness of God........ Lord hear us
To be able to see God in the world does not mean being naive about what is going on around us. To live discerning lives today means being able to see what is of God in the world without being blind to what is not of God and so deeply unhealthy and harmful for the world and its people. It is to be able to tell the difference between the wheat and the darnel and we pray, not only for the wisdom we need to do that, but for the courage to challenge what is not of God whenever we encounter it.........Lord hear us
The great sign today that something is profoundly wrong with our world is the economic chaos we see everywhere along with the still growing gap between rich and poor. For years we have worshipped the goddess money, lived by her commandments and sacrificed the lives of millions of our fellow human beings on her altar. And now we are paying the price for so much avarice and greed. So we pray that the world of today will come to see what it is we have been doing see the need for radical change.....Lord hear us
Lent begins on Wednesday when millions throughout the world will come to receive their ashes. But there is nothing special about these ashes. Since the earliest days of the Church they have been a sign of willingness to be converted and embrace change through prayer, fasting and almsgiving. Without this commitment, to receive ashes is little more than superstition and religious mumbo jumbo. And so we pray that the ashes we receive on our foreheads this week will be a sign of something much deeper.....Lord hear us
In just two weeks our parish Week of Guided or Directed Prayer will begin. Over the last twenty years, hundreds of people just like ourselves from all over the diocese have taken part in such weeks and benefited greatly from them. For a significant number of people they have become like an annual retreat. And so we pray that fear will not prevent anyone in this parish from taking part. We pray that those whom God is inviting to do so will recognize the invitation and have the courage to respond to it.............Lord hear us
And this first truth, one I have already spoken about several times, is that the world is a place filled with the splendour of God. There is no place in the heart of any person who claims to believe in Jesus for the negativity and pessimism found in so many pious, Church-going people who sit in judgement on the world every day and find it wanting. Salvation is not something awaiting us in the future. As St Paul says in the second reading, we are already saved by the death and resurrection of Jesus. God loved the world so much that he sent his only Son. God in the Genesis myth of creation looked at what he had made and saw that it was good and one of the first signs of the Spirit at work in us is a growing capacity to recognize that goodness and rejoice in it. Indeed, a sign of someone without faith, as described by Jeremiah in the first reading, is that ‘if good comes he has no eyes for it.’
But having said all that, it’s important to recognize that, although the world is filled with the goodness of God, not everything that happens in the world is good. This is very clear in today’s Gospel where Jesus, in St Luke’s version of Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount, contrasts the values of the world with those of the kingdom. And it’s very clear that they are not the same. The Second Vatican Council, in arguably its greatest document, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, committed itself totally and completely to the world saying, famously, that ‘the cares and concerns of the men and women of our time are the cares and concerns of the followers of Jesus too.’ But such a deep involvement with the world, along with the conviction of its fundamental goodness, makes it all the more important tha twe know the difference between what is of God and what isn’t. As followers of Jesus there’s a sense in which we will always be in the world but not of it. Deeply committed to the world, we will never be entirely at home in it. In one of his parables Jesus tells the story of the farmer who sowed good seed in his field only to have an enemy come along and sow darnel among the wheat. And as men and women of faith it is our task to live totally in the world while at the same time sifting through everything that happens to discern what is good seed and what is darnel. The person who does this, Jeremiah told us, is like a tree planted by the waterside while the person who does not is like a dry scrub in the wasteland. And it’s because there is so much darnel, so many areas covered in dry scrub, so many patches of wasteland in our otherwise fundamentally God-filled world that the preaching of the Gospel will always challenge and disturb us and, at some level, come into conflict with the culture of our time.
Not everything we hear on the Tele or read about in the papers, for example, is true. There are forces at work in our society which are deeply ungodly, the most obvious current example being the worship of money and the pursuit of material things at almost any cost which have almost brought the developed world to its knees and may still do so. Just look at Greece. Another area is the whole question of what constitutes truth. Truth in our day has almost become what any given individual wants it to be. Any concept of a truth which is greater than we are is in danger of being lost and as men and women who believe in a God who is the source of all truth we simply cannot allow ourselves to be seduced by such thinking Morality, too, what constitutes right and wrong, has become a kind of free-for-all in today’s society and anyone who dares to take a stand on anything is immediately vilified and treated as if they were some kind of dinosaur. And so it takes a person of genuine courage to do so. But, of course, the greatest manifestation of darnel in our field is the scandal of poverty and hunger in the world. In today’s Gospel, Jesus not only promises that the hungry will be satisfied. He also warns those who are rich – and on a world scale we all are – that we are having our consolation now.
And so the preaching of the Gospel can never be entirely comfortable. It cannot always be what we want to hear. It will challenge us. It will disturb us. And so there’s one thing I can promise you. I will always try to speak the truth to you, even if you don’t like it.
BIDDING PRAYERS
As followers of Jesus, men and women of the Gospel, we are called through our baptism to be in the world but not entirely of it; to be deeply committed to the world but to work at all times to bring about the coming of the kingdom within it. And so we pray for the grace we need to do this: to love the world and its people with a deep love but, at the same time, to challenge the world and, by the way we live, show them new ways of living and open up new possibilities rooted in the teaching of Jesus.....Lord hear us
To love the world begins with a deep sense of its fundamental goodness. In the first reading, Jeremiah reminded us that the man without faith is like “a dry scrub in the wastelands: if good comes he has no eyes for it,” words which are too often true in the lives of pious, church-going people. And so we ask God to lead us beyond the pessimism and negativity of many in today’s world and enable us to recognize all around us a world filled to overflowing with the splendour and goodness of God........ Lord hear us
To be able to see God in the world does not mean being naive about what is going on around us. To live discerning lives today means being able to see what is of God in the world without being blind to what is not of God and so deeply unhealthy and harmful for the world and its people. It is to be able to tell the difference between the wheat and the darnel and we pray, not only for the wisdom we need to do that, but for the courage to challenge what is not of God whenever we encounter it.........Lord hear us
The great sign today that something is profoundly wrong with our world is the economic chaos we see everywhere along with the still growing gap between rich and poor. For years we have worshipped the goddess money, lived by her commandments and sacrificed the lives of millions of our fellow human beings on her altar. And now we are paying the price for so much avarice and greed. So we pray that the world of today will come to see what it is we have been doing see the need for radical change.....Lord hear us
Lent begins on Wednesday when millions throughout the world will come to receive their ashes. But there is nothing special about these ashes. Since the earliest days of the Church they have been a sign of willingness to be converted and embrace change through prayer, fasting and almsgiving. Without this commitment, to receive ashes is little more than superstition and religious mumbo jumbo. And so we pray that the ashes we receive on our foreheads this week will be a sign of something much deeper.....Lord hear us
In just two weeks our parish Week of Guided or Directed Prayer will begin. Over the last twenty years, hundreds of people just like ourselves from all over the diocese have taken part in such weeks and benefited greatly from them. For a significant number of people they have become like an annual retreat. And so we pray that fear will not prevent anyone in this parish from taking part. We pray that those whom God is inviting to do so will recognize the invitation and have the courage to respond to it.............Lord hear us
Saturday, 6 February 2010
5th Sunday of the Year. C.
A strange thing happens to a priest when he is appointed to a new parish. It happened to me in 1980 when I went to Sanquhar, Kirkconnel and New Cumnock. It happened to me again in 1985 when I went to St Matthew’s in Kilmarnock. And it happened to me a few months ago when I was appointed here to West Kilbride. It is, I think, the nearest I could ever come as a priest to feeling what parents feel when a child is born. The baby is a complete stranger to them. They have never met him or her before. And yet, as soon as the child is born, they fall in love with it. They want everything that’s best for it. The baby becomes the focus of their attention and they dream of what he or she will become one day. They want their son or daughter to be everything they are capable of being, a feeling which comes from deep inside themselves and is almost a pain or an ache. And without being sentimental in any way about it, that’s how I feel about you. Since the day Bishop Cunningham asked me to come here I have felt that ache. In a very real sense, I have loved you and wanted so many things for you, a feeling which has increased rather than diminished in the intervening months.
But what is it that I want? What are these dreams I have for you? Well there’s a sentence in John’s Gospel which expresses this far better than I ever could and it’s when Jesus, speaking to the Samaritan woman about all the things that have happened in her life, says this to her: ‘If only you knew what it is that God is offering you.’ Today is Catholic Education Sunday. But in fact the word Catholic here is superfluous in that the education we are speaking about here is a life-long process the purpose of which, from a faith perspective, is to come to know what it is that God is offering, what it is to be a human being, and clearly this is for every person. And what God is offering is something truly mind-blowing and beyond our understanding. He has such dreams for us, so many things he wants to share with us, and as I have listened over the years to people like that woman at the well, talking about their lives, the longing for them to come to know what it is that God is offering them has often been almost physically painful. And with young people in particular, the focus of attention this weekend in parishes throughout Scotland, the pain is even more intense. Born into a world they did not create, a world filled with so many things which militate against their spiritual growth – like the materialism of our age and the shallow, empty, superficial consumer-driven culture that goes with it – I have found myself, time and time again when with young people crying out silently within myself those same words. ‘If only you knew what it is that God is offering you.’ And that, in the end, is what education is about. In the long run - I think it was the great economist John Maynard Keynes who said it - we are all dead. And it’s only when we see our Catholic Schools from the perspective of eternity that we can cut through all the politics that surround them in Scotland today and see that what they are really about is enabling our young people to begin to glimpse what it is that God is offering them and how much he values them. And if they only knew this, what an amazing difference it would make to their lives.
But, of course, the same is true of us and if we are to come to that same knowledge then, in some form or another, we all have to make the same journey Peter made in today’s Gospel. And the first thing Jesus tells him to do once he has got into his boat – in other words, once he has established the beginnings of a relationship with Peter – is push out a little from the shore. If we are to know what it is that God is offering us, then, as I suggested last week, we cannot just keep doing what we have always done. What used to be is not good enough. Something has to change. In some kind of a way, we, too, have to leave the safety and security of what we have always known and push out a little from the shore. And I invite you to take time this weekend to ask yourself what pushing out from the shore might mean for you at this moment in your life. It will be something quite simple. But if we are to know what it is that God is offering us then standing forever at the edge of the water, afraid or unwilling to take that first step, is not an option.
Having pushed out a little from the shore, however, Jesus then tells Peter to put out into deep water and pay out his nets. This is a much more serious and radical step to take and sometimes many years can pass before we are ready for it. Pushing out a little from the shore was one thing. Peter could understand that. But he was an experienced fisherman who had fished all night long and caught nothing and what Jesus was asking him to do made no sense to him as a fisherman. But he did what he was asked and was completely overcome by what happened. And so it is with faith. To launch out into deep water is to step out of our comfort zone, move beyond what makes sense to us and go where God leads. It often means turning human thinking on its head, but if we trust God enough to do it the results will astonish us too. To begin to glimpse what it is God is offering is to have the whole way we see the world transformed. It’s like moving from black and white to colour. It’s like being blind and suddenly being able to see.. It’s to find a depth of meaning in our lives previously undreamt of. It is, in effect, to begin to see the world as it really is for the first time and to live life as it was always meant to be lived.
But it starts with that pushing out a little from the shore. It means taking a chance on God. It means doing something we have not done before. And for some of you at least, putting your name down for the Week of Prayer at the beginning of March, might be the place to start.
BIDDING PRAYERS
Jesus’ words to the Samaritan Woman, ‘If only you knew what it is that God is offering’ are addressed to every human being who has ever lived. If only we knew the sheer depth of God’s love for us it would transform the way we see everything. And so we ask God to lead us slowly but surely from the empty world of religion into the rich, deep, satisfying but profoundly challenging world of faith and so open up our minds and hearts to the fullness of truth about who God is....................Lord hear us
If there is a God who loves the world, and if that God’s deepest desire is to share his life with us, not only after death, but now, as we make our way through life, then to live our whole lives and never know that love – never at least glimpse what it is that God is offering - has to be one of the saddest things that can happen to a human being. And so we pray for the world of our time that, having understandably rejected the God of religion, it will now discover the God of faith.........Lord hear us
It can take many years to come to know God. Mature, personal faith is not possible until mid-life. All we can do, therefore, with our young people is work with them to lay the foundations of adult faith and make sure that these foundations are strong and as free as they can be from distorted ideas that will prove an obstacle to healthy growth in the future. And so we ask God to be with the teachers and pupils of our schools and guide them as they engage in this important but challenging process.............Lord hear us
If we are to begin to glimpse what it is that God is offering then we must be prepared to push out a little from the shore. This is not as easy as it sounds. For many in the Church today it means letting go of ideas and ways of thinking which have been with us since childhood and which we cling to like a child with a favourite toy. But history does not stand still. The Church has moved on, and we pray for the courage we need to push out a little from the shore and move on with it..........Lord hear us
To put out into deep waters can only happen after we have pushed out a little from the shore. It means moving into an unfamiliar place where things are not what they used to be. What was important to us once is no longer so. Things that we took for granted in the past no longer seem so obvious. Our values change as God leads us beyond human logic and begins to teach us to see the world and its people as he himself sees them. And so we ask for the grace to be open to this change...........Lord hear us
Peter and his companions, completely overcome by the catch they had made, left everything and followed Jesus. In the first reading, the young Isaiah, in reply to God’s question ‘Whom shall I send’ answers, ‘Here I am, send me.’ And so we ask God to raise up from our Schools today many young people ready to answer God’s call to be witnesses to the Gospel and bearers of good news to the world of our time, who will become the foundations of a Church fit for the age in which we live................Lord hear us.
But what is it that I want? What are these dreams I have for you? Well there’s a sentence in John’s Gospel which expresses this far better than I ever could and it’s when Jesus, speaking to the Samaritan woman about all the things that have happened in her life, says this to her: ‘If only you knew what it is that God is offering you.’ Today is Catholic Education Sunday. But in fact the word Catholic here is superfluous in that the education we are speaking about here is a life-long process the purpose of which, from a faith perspective, is to come to know what it is that God is offering, what it is to be a human being, and clearly this is for every person. And what God is offering is something truly mind-blowing and beyond our understanding. He has such dreams for us, so many things he wants to share with us, and as I have listened over the years to people like that woman at the well, talking about their lives, the longing for them to come to know what it is that God is offering them has often been almost physically painful. And with young people in particular, the focus of attention this weekend in parishes throughout Scotland, the pain is even more intense. Born into a world they did not create, a world filled with so many things which militate against their spiritual growth – like the materialism of our age and the shallow, empty, superficial consumer-driven culture that goes with it – I have found myself, time and time again when with young people crying out silently within myself those same words. ‘If only you knew what it is that God is offering you.’ And that, in the end, is what education is about. In the long run - I think it was the great economist John Maynard Keynes who said it - we are all dead. And it’s only when we see our Catholic Schools from the perspective of eternity that we can cut through all the politics that surround them in Scotland today and see that what they are really about is enabling our young people to begin to glimpse what it is that God is offering them and how much he values them. And if they only knew this, what an amazing difference it would make to their lives.
But, of course, the same is true of us and if we are to come to that same knowledge then, in some form or another, we all have to make the same journey Peter made in today’s Gospel. And the first thing Jesus tells him to do once he has got into his boat – in other words, once he has established the beginnings of a relationship with Peter – is push out a little from the shore. If we are to know what it is that God is offering us, then, as I suggested last week, we cannot just keep doing what we have always done. What used to be is not good enough. Something has to change. In some kind of a way, we, too, have to leave the safety and security of what we have always known and push out a little from the shore. And I invite you to take time this weekend to ask yourself what pushing out from the shore might mean for you at this moment in your life. It will be something quite simple. But if we are to know what it is that God is offering us then standing forever at the edge of the water, afraid or unwilling to take that first step, is not an option.
Having pushed out a little from the shore, however, Jesus then tells Peter to put out into deep water and pay out his nets. This is a much more serious and radical step to take and sometimes many years can pass before we are ready for it. Pushing out a little from the shore was one thing. Peter could understand that. But he was an experienced fisherman who had fished all night long and caught nothing and what Jesus was asking him to do made no sense to him as a fisherman. But he did what he was asked and was completely overcome by what happened. And so it is with faith. To launch out into deep water is to step out of our comfort zone, move beyond what makes sense to us and go where God leads. It often means turning human thinking on its head, but if we trust God enough to do it the results will astonish us too. To begin to glimpse what it is God is offering is to have the whole way we see the world transformed. It’s like moving from black and white to colour. It’s like being blind and suddenly being able to see.. It’s to find a depth of meaning in our lives previously undreamt of. It is, in effect, to begin to see the world as it really is for the first time and to live life as it was always meant to be lived.
But it starts with that pushing out a little from the shore. It means taking a chance on God. It means doing something we have not done before. And for some of you at least, putting your name down for the Week of Prayer at the beginning of March, might be the place to start.
BIDDING PRAYERS
Jesus’ words to the Samaritan Woman, ‘If only you knew what it is that God is offering’ are addressed to every human being who has ever lived. If only we knew the sheer depth of God’s love for us it would transform the way we see everything. And so we ask God to lead us slowly but surely from the empty world of religion into the rich, deep, satisfying but profoundly challenging world of faith and so open up our minds and hearts to the fullness of truth about who God is....................Lord hear us
If there is a God who loves the world, and if that God’s deepest desire is to share his life with us, not only after death, but now, as we make our way through life, then to live our whole lives and never know that love – never at least glimpse what it is that God is offering - has to be one of the saddest things that can happen to a human being. And so we pray for the world of our time that, having understandably rejected the God of religion, it will now discover the God of faith.........Lord hear us
It can take many years to come to know God. Mature, personal faith is not possible until mid-life. All we can do, therefore, with our young people is work with them to lay the foundations of adult faith and make sure that these foundations are strong and as free as they can be from distorted ideas that will prove an obstacle to healthy growth in the future. And so we ask God to be with the teachers and pupils of our schools and guide them as they engage in this important but challenging process.............Lord hear us
If we are to begin to glimpse what it is that God is offering then we must be prepared to push out a little from the shore. This is not as easy as it sounds. For many in the Church today it means letting go of ideas and ways of thinking which have been with us since childhood and which we cling to like a child with a favourite toy. But history does not stand still. The Church has moved on, and we pray for the courage we need to push out a little from the shore and move on with it..........Lord hear us
To put out into deep waters can only happen after we have pushed out a little from the shore. It means moving into an unfamiliar place where things are not what they used to be. What was important to us once is no longer so. Things that we took for granted in the past no longer seem so obvious. Our values change as God leads us beyond human logic and begins to teach us to see the world and its people as he himself sees them. And so we ask for the grace to be open to this change...........Lord hear us
Peter and his companions, completely overcome by the catch they had made, left everything and followed Jesus. In the first reading, the young Isaiah, in reply to God’s question ‘Whom shall I send’ answers, ‘Here I am, send me.’ And so we ask God to raise up from our Schools today many young people ready to answer God’s call to be witnesses to the Gospel and bearers of good news to the world of our time, who will become the foundations of a Church fit for the age in which we live................Lord hear us.
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