Fifth Sunday of Easter, Year C (Gospel: John 13:31-33a, 34-35) 'Love one another as I have loved you'

 

If all the bibles in the world were destroyed except one, and even if that one was badly damaged so that only one page was left. And even on that page if you could only read three words, if those three words were the words in John’s Gospel which say, ‘God is love’, then the whole message of the bible would be saved.

 

This is what the whole teaching of our faith is about and what the whole bible is about, that God loves his people in a way that we really don’t understand and can’t make a whole lot of sense of. But it is from the love of God that we ourselves learn to love. We are only able to love God because He loved us first. He loved us before we loved him. He made himself known to us before we discovered him. And God is constantly teaching us how to love and what it means to love. He teaches us through married life, through religious life, through single life, through relationships and dealing with other people.

 

I once worked in a jewellery store and I learnt that there is a method used to polish precious stones where they are put into a container together with grit and then they are shaken at high speed and they polish each other. They knock the corners off each other, so to speak. I think this is a good analogy for our own lives. We are continually going through different trials and struggles and all of them are forming us for better or worse, depending on how we respond to them. We knock the corners off each other and hopefully come out sparkling. We are formed and shaped by our relationships with each other.  We rub off each other, but that is how we grow.

 

I have often noticed in hospitals that younger people are more demanding. Older people were generally more patient. They have been through so much and it has formed them into better people.

 

Today, the meaning of love has been greatly distorted. Through social media we are mostly being told that love is mainly about erotic, or sexual love and that if you are not sexually active, you cannot be fulfilled. We are not told as much about love as self-giving love: sacrificing ourselves for the other. We are told that love is about my fulfilment and if I am not fulfilled, then I should move on. That is one of the reasons why marriage vows in a church, and religious vows, are so important. It brings God into the equation. When we are struggling, we turn to God and ask God’s help to give of ourselves. Sometimes I say that to a couple when they are getting married: ‘Do you realize that your marriage is not about your fulfilment? It is about you sacrificing yourselves for each other; laying down your lives for each other.’

 

This is what Jesus was teaching the Apostles: ‘Love one another as I have loved you.’ Jesus’ love was all-giving for the other, for us and the ultimate sacrifice of shedding his blood. We tend to say, ‘What’s in it for me?’ Even coming to mass on Sunday, the thinking is often the wrong one. We ask, ‘What’s in it for me?’ That’s the wrong question. The mass is not about what’s in it for me, even though we receive Jesus himself in each mass, but it’s about making the sacrifice of our time to worship and acknowledge God. God asks us to give of ourselves.

 

Our mission, from God, is to love one another. ‘Love one another as I have loved you.’  That is our main task as followers of Christ, to love the people around us.  And Jesus tells us that that is how other people will recognise us as Christian, by the way we love.  It makes us different from many other people, but that is what God calls us to do.

 

Our country and our world is becoming increasingly materialistic and selfish.  Everything is for me only, never mind anyone else.  That is  the opposite of what God teaches us. Does it mean that we have to give away everything we own and join a religious order? Of course not. Only a few people are called to do this. Most of us are simply called to live wherever we find ourselves and bring Christ to people by the way we love.  It is easy for us to be afraid to help or look out for others because it might put us at risk and this is true.  But God asks us to take that risk. 

I remember reading about a man who was visiting Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) and was appalled at the poverty he saw. When he got back to his hotel he lay on his bed almost despairing at what he saw and little could be done about it.

At the same time a young religious sister was walking in the slums of Calcutta and came across a group of children. She asked them if they would like to learn how to read. They joyfully said yes! So she took a piece of chalk and began to write on the ground, teaching them how to read. This was Mother Teresa at the beginning of her work in Calcutta. The man was despairing about the whole situation. She began with small steps.

Kolkata

We cannot change the world and all its problems: the poverty, wars, etc. But we can affect the people around us. It is easy to become cynical and say that there is no point, because the problems are too great. But there is always a point, which is what God is teaching us. We are where the Lord has put us and we do what we can in the situation we find ourselves. That is what God calls us to do.

I would like to finish with this reflection, which I think sums all this up. I think it is a great prayer or thought, especially when you find yourself starting to get cynical about everything.

Anyway

(From a sign on the wall of Shishu Bhavan,

the children’s home in Calcutta.)

 

People are unreasonable, illogical and selfcentered.

Love them anyway.

 

If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.

Do good anyway.

 

If you are successful, you win false friends and true enemies.

Succeed anyway.

 

The good you do will be forgotten tomorrow.

Do good anyway.

 

Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable.

Be honest and frank anyway.

 

What you spent years building may be destroyed overnight.

Build anyway.

 

People really need help, but may attack you if you help them.

Help people anyway.

 

Give the world the best you have and you’ll get kicked in the teeth.

Give the world the best you’ve got anyway.

 

You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God; It was never

between you and them anyway.

 

(from the book, ‘A Simple Path’)

 

 

 

4th Sunday of Easter (Gospel: John 10:27-30) The New Pope: Leo XIV

 

 

It is always fun to be part of major historical events, positive ones at least. When Pope Benedict was elected in 2005, I had the privilege of being in St. Peter’s square when he came out onto the balcony for the first time. All the cell phones crashed because everyone was trying to use them at the same time.

 

On Thursday we were blessed with a new pope, Leo XIV and from the US too, which is something to be proud of. What does this mean for our Church? Could he make drastic changes? No. Church teaching does not change easily. The basic teachings of our faith do not change, but we are all the time getting a deeper understanding of our faith.

 

Many people thought that Pope Francis changed Church teaching, but in fact he did not. He often gave opinions which unnerved people, but opinions are not the same as Church teaching. He also went into a lot of gray areas, which people didn’t like, but that was also what Jesus did and was heavily criticized for by the religious authorities.

 

In St. John’s Gospel (16:12-13), Jesus said to the Apostles, ‘There is so much more I want to tell you, but you cannot bear it now. However, when the Spirit of truth comes, He will guide you into all truth.’ God continues to reveal himself to us and to help us grow in understanding, not just as a Church, but individually too. The more we are, the more the Lord will teach us, because He wants to teach us, just like a parent wanting to pass on their knowledge to their children.

 

In one of the encounters that Jesus had with the Apostles, He asks them, ‘Who do you say that I am?’  It is Peter who says, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.’ Jesus realizes that the Father in heaven has revealed this to Peter. He didn’t come to this conclusion by himself and Jesus knew Peter was the one to lead his Church. Then Jesus goes on to say:

‘You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.

I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, whatever you loose on earth, will be loosed in heaven.”

 

St. John’s Gospel says something similar, ‘The light shines in the darkness, the darkness has not overcome it.’ (John 1:5). God’s Church is indestructible, because it is from God. It will often take a beating because of the human side of it, but it cannot be stopped because it is from God.

 

In St. Luke’s Gospel Jesus says, ‘Whoever listens to you listens to me. Whoever rejects you, rejects me.’ (Lk 10:16)

 

The order of grace

There is an order to God’s creation. It works a certain way. If we listen to and are obedient to what God teaches us, commands us, it works. If we recognize our boundaries as human beings and don’t try and play God, creation works as it should and humanity blossoms. If we decide we know better and step out of that order, we are on our own and the order begins to break down, which is what we see happening around us right now.

 

·       I am the Lord your God. You shall not have strange gods before me. But we worship, money, knowledge, science, as gods and treat the Lord God as an optional extra. God is not an optional extra. We are.

·       Remember to keep the sabbath holy. Many people don’t think it’s necessary to give time to worship God at all. It’s my world and I’ll do what I want.

·       You shall not kill: but now we are deciding who lives and who dies: abortion, euthanasia.

·       God created them male and female. Now we are deciding what is male and female.

 

When I was ordained a priest, I knelt before the bishop and he asked me: ‘Do you promise respect and obedience to me and my successors?’ As long as I do my best to remain obedient to my bishop, I remain in the order of God’s grace, the order which God has established. If I step out of that order and begin to do my own thing as a priest, I am on my own.

 

The word obedience means ‘to listen intently.’ So when we are obedient to God, it means we listen carefully to what God is saying to us and with good reason, because that is what will help us the most, both as individuals and as a society.

 

I suppose none of us like to be told that we have to be obedient to anyone. We feel that we should be able to do whatever we want. We can do whatever we want, but that is not what will lead us to the greatest happiness and fulfillment. What will bring us to the greatest inner freedom, is being obedient to God. The order that God shows us, works.

 

I always find it inspiring to see how many people really wanting to do the right thing and live the right way before God, because many people do.

 

Infallibility

What about infallibility. Isn’t the pope infallible in everything he says? No. The teaching of infallibility is not what people think and in fact has only been used twice in history, both times in declaring teachings on Our Lady: The Immaculate Conception and the Assumption of Our Lady into heaven.

 

What it means is that when the pope, in union with all the bishops of the world declare an official teaching of our faith, it cannot be in error since they all agree on it and believe it is from God. Also, that would be a teaching that has been believed for centuries and is now made an official teaching or dogma, for that reason.

 

Name change

Finally, why do popes choose different names? A pope doesn’t have to take a different name, but most popes have. In the bible, the change of a name is usually an indication of a new mission. Abram became Abraham. Simon became Peter, Saul became Paul. A change of name also indicates the direction the pope hopes to take the papacy. Pope Leo XIII was very focused on social justice and wrote various encyclicals to deal with situations of injustice, better conditions for workers, etc. So Pope Leo XIII would seem to indicate that he hopes to follow in the same direction.

 

Even though popes are human and make mistakes like everyone else, it is ultimately God who is leading the Church, which is why it is unstoppable.

You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church.

3rd Sunday of Easter, Year C (Gospel: John 21:1-19) 'Do you love me...?'

 

 

I always find it both amazing and amusing how in the presidential election they will go through the history of each candidate with a fine-tooth comb in the hope of finding some small thing to discredit him, or her. It’s as if they are looking for the perfect person who is not allowed to have any defects. If they do find anything in their past such as smoking dope when they were a teenager, or something similar, they present this as a reason for him or her to be unsuitable for president now, as if you could find someone who didn’t have defects. Modern day media tends to do the same, gloating over the sins of an individual while showing no mercy to that person for the mistakes they have made.

 

In contrast to that we have almost the opposite presented to us in today’s Gospel. Peter is confronted by Jesus in a loving but painful way, when Jesus asks him three times ‘Do you love me?’ Why did Jesus do this, since He knew that Peter loved him? Jesus was making Peter face his own weakness, the weakness that caused him to publicly swear that he never knew Jesus. This happened during Jesus’ trial when Peter tried to stay close to Jesus, but he was overcome with fear when individuals realised he was one of Jesus’ followers and then he denied ever knowing Jesus. After this happened it says that Peter went outside and wept bitterly, because of course he didn’t want to do this, but he was overcome by fear. 

 

In asking Peter three times ‘Do you love me,’ Jesus was helping him to heal, but also making him face his sin, his denial. Jesus wasn’t going to pretend that this never happened, because if He did, it would have continued to haunt Peter for the rest of his life. Had God really forgiven him. Would this scandal come to light? Instead, Jesus confronts Peter with it and makes him face it. And then Jesus makes this same Peter the first pope. Jesus was saying, ‘I know you let me down because of your own weakness/fear; but that is not an obstacle for me. Now face it and then I can really work through you.’  It is an extraordinary thought that Jesus wasn’t afraid to make Peter the first pope, even when he knew that Peter had denied him. Our weaknesses are not an obstacle for God.

It is because the Lord loves us that he challenges us with our weaknesses.  We want to just gloss over them and pretend that mistakes never happened, but that doesn’t really help us.  If we are to heal and grow then we must face up to our weaknesses, which is difficult and painful, but it’s also what helps us to grow. 

 

In the 12 step program of Alcoholics Anonymous, the first step to recovery is to acknowledge your weakness/addiction and that you are powerless over it. Only then can you begin to continue in the right direction. This is also one of the reasons the Lord gives us the gift of being able to confess what we have done in total secrecy, so that we can heal. The idea that all our sins are totally forgiven by God if we ask for forgiveness, is a hard thing to grasp, and many of us struggle to believe that this could really be so. And yet that is what the death of Jesus on the cross is all about: the forgiveness of sins. That forgiveness has already been won for us; we just have to ask for it.

 

There is a lot more freedom in admitting that we are weak when we come before God, than in trying to prove we are perfect. If we had to be perfect it would put enormous pressure on us. Part of the freedom that our faith gives us is to realise that it’s ok to be weak, to have made mistakes. Ultimately we rely on the power of God and not on ourselves and that certainly is a relief. It also means that I don’t have to reach a certain standard of perfection to be pleasing to God. All God asks me to do is try and when I fall to repent of it.

 

That is also why God gave us confession, because in his wisdom He knows that we need to confess, to name the sins we have committed. If it was enough to just tell God you are sorry yourself, then why do people come after decades to confess a serious sin and then cry when they hear the words of absolution. They will have told God many times that they are sorry, but it is the naming of those sins that brings the healing. Also it takes humility to come before a priest, God’s instrument, to confess. That humility is part of the healing.

 

At the last supper Jesus also referred to Peter’s fall:

‘Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift each of you like wheat, but I have prayed for you Simon that your faith will not fail. And when you have turned back you must strengthen your brothers.’ (Luke 22:31-32)

 

Jesus knew Peter would fall, but that fall also served its purpose. It humbled Peter, so that he would be more aware of how much He depended on God’s strength, not his own. It also meant that he would be able to sympathise with the other Apostles who also betrayed Jesus. He would be able to encourage them, as he had the same experience himself. If he hadn’t fallen, he may well have looked down on the others who had betrayed Jesus, but on the contrary, he understood them and was able to strengthen them.

 

In his letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul writes:

Praise be to God… who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble, with the same comfort we have received from God. (2 Cor 1:3-4)

 

This is why the Lord keeps inviting us to come back to him, to confess what we have done wrong, so that we can be free and so that we can live in peace. The weaknesses we struggle with, serve their purpose. They keep us humble.

 

We generally tend to think that the less sins we commit, the more pleasing we will be to God and that God is disappointed with us when we sin. I have heard so many people use that word disappointed. God is not disappointed with us and God doesn’t love us any less. In a mysterious way the Lord allows us to struggle with certain weaknesses, as they serve a purpose.

 

Think of St. Paul, who was a highly educated and high energy kind of person. We would call him a high achiever. Through his work many people were converted and many extraordinary miracles were worked, including at least one person being brought back to life. And yet he talks about a ‘thorn in the flesh,’ some weakness that he had, which caused him great humiliation. Like most of us, he felt that he would serve God and be more pleasing to God, if he could get rid of it. He says that he prayed, begged, God to take it away from him:

Because of these surpassingly great revelations, so to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me, but He said my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ (Cor 2:12-7-10).

 

‘My power is made perfect in weakness.’ What a strange thing to say. To our way of thinking it makes no sense. How could our weakness be useful to God? Because as long as we are aware of our weakness, we are also aware of how much we need God. That is why we should never become discouraged by our weaknesses. Satan tries to discourage us and convince us that we are displeasing to God, a disappointment, but the Lord says the exact opposite. What is important is that we try.

 

‘Peter do you love me?’  ‘Lord you know everything, you know that I love you.’

 

2nd Sunday of Easter (Gospel: John 20:19-31) Peace be with you

 

In December 2005 it was announced on the news that a man called Denis Donaldson, one of Sinn Féin’s top men (Sinn Féin was the political wing of the IRA), confessed to having been a British spy for the previous twenty years. People were shocked that this could have happened. It seems that he could not live with this secret any longer and so he went public and confessed what he had done. He then had to go into hiding, and sadly, though not surprisingly, he was found and murdered four months later. God be merciful to him. I remember thinking at the time that he must now be living in terrible fear: fear of being hunted down and killed. He had betrayed many and now he would be afraid of what they would do to him. I couldn’t help feeling sorry for him.

 

2000 years earlier on Holy Thursday night, out of fear, the Apostles had all abandoned Jesus, who they believed was the Son of God. Judas had betrayed him for money. Peter tried to be faithful but ended up publicly swearing that he never knew Jesus. They all betrayed him. Now after Easter they are locked in the upper room, afraid. Why are they afraid? First because they could face the same punishment as Jesus since they were his close friends and disciples. If you remember in St. John’s Gospel, after Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, it says that some time later they had a dinner for him. Many people came, not only to see Jesus, but also to see Lazarus who had been raised from the dead. Wouldn’t you?! But it also says that the authorities decided it would be best to get rid of Lazarus as well as Jesus. Tie up any lose ends, as we would say. So, the Apostles had good reason to be afraid, from a human point of view.

 

Perhaps they were also afraid of what God might do to them. They had betrayed the Son of God. It is a very human response to be afraid of God when we feel we have betrayed him in some way, by the way we live, or by something we have done. Remember what Jesus said about Judas, whom he knew was going to betray him. ‘The Son of man indeed goes [to his fate] as it is written of him. But woe to that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed. It would be better for that man if he had never been born’ (Matt 26:24). They are frightening words.

 

Then something beautiful happens. Jesus is suddenly standing with them in the room and he says: ‘Peace be with you.’ The first thing he does is to take away their fear. There are no words of condemnation for having abandoned him a few days before. There are no words of judgement, about how they were unable to be faithful. Instead: ‘Peace be with you.’ ‘It’s alright.’

 

I don’t know about you, but I can certainly say that I have often felt that I have betrayed Jesus and indeed sometimes wish I was not a priest, when my own sinfulness gets the better of me. And in case you think I am just trying to be pious by saying this, I am not. I am a sinner, just like anyone else. I struggle and get tempted, just like everyone else. That is one thing that God has left me under no illusions about. Sometimes I think it would be better for me not to be a priest as I would not have to deal with the sacred. It would be easier to run and hide, so to speak. Think of Peter when Jesus worked the miracle of the great catch of fish. Peter’s reaction was, ‘Leave me Lord, I am a sinful man.’ He was afraid because he was aware of his sinfulness in the presence of someone holy and what was Jesus’ response? ‘Do not be afraid.’ Now, after the resurrection, after the betrayal, injustice, panic, when Jesus appears to the Apostles, the first thing He does is to put them at ease. ‘Peace be with you.’ 

 

Each time in the mass when we recall this wish of Jesus to give us his peace—which is not just a universal prayer for peace, but a reminder of what Jesus said to his followers—He is saying, ‘Do not be afraid, because I am not here to condemn you, even if you deserve to be condemned. Peace be with you.’ God only wants us to draw us closer to himself and to know that He is not going to act as we do to each other, with frowns, or giving out. He knows what we are like. He knows that we betray him, but He still tells us to be at peace, as long as we are willing to repent. I find that very comforting. Remember the good thief on the cross. In the last few moments of his life, he asks Jesus to remember him and Jesus promises him paradise that day. What a wonderful reminder of the mercy of God.

 

Think too of Thomas, who in his grief at the death of Jesus, would not allow the words of others to convince him that Jesus was alive. When you are grieving you don’t want someone else to give you false hope, because it is too painful. And then when Jesus did appear to him, He was so kind in helping him to believe. No giving out, but instead Jesus offered Thomas to put his finger into his wounds, so that he would believe. No condemnation for not believing; only encouragement. That is so characteristic of how Jesus dealt with people. Always with compassion, mercy, love and encouragement.

 

Today is also known as Divine Mercy Sunday, a day when we focus on the infinite mercy of God. God is perfectly just, but God is infinitely merciful. God will not be mocked by those who presume on his mercy: ‘I can do what I want, so long as I repent at the last minute.’ That is presuming on God’s mercy and is a mockery of God and God will not be mocked: ‘Do not be deceived. God will not be mocked’ (Gal 6:7). But God is infinitely merciful to anyone who sincerely asks for his mercy.

 

The Emperor Napoleon had a rule that any soldier who deserted would be shot if captured. This rule was enforced without exception. One young soldier who was tired of war, deserted, but was caught. He was to be executed. He also happened to be the son of Napoleon’s cook. When he was captured, his mother begged Napoleon for mercy. She told him that she was a widow and he was her only son. If he was shot she would lose everything, her only reason to live. He said, “Woman, your son doesn’t deserve mercy.” She replied, “Yes, of course, you’re right. He doesn’t deserve mercy. If he deserved it, it would no longer be mercy.” Napoleon responded, “Well, then, I will have mercy.” And he spared the woman’s son.

 

Mercy is a gift. God’s mercy is a gift. We don’t deserve it, but God longs to show us his mercy and that is one of the reasons He appeared to St. Faustina and asked her to spread this devotion to his mercy, because God does not want us to live in fear, but to be assured that any effort on our part to live as He asks, is enough. We will never manage to live perfectly, but as long as we are striving to grow closer to God, that is enough. God has created us to be with him and God has done everything to make that possible. There is nothing we can do which God will not forgive if we ask him. That is God’s promise to us. All we have to do is reach out to him.

 

‘Peace be with you. It is I. Do not be afraid.’

 

 

 

Easter Sunday

 

 

The greatest desire that everyone has, is to find happiness/fulfillment and to be with the ones we love again. This is what Easter is all about.

 

We believe that God created everything we know: the visible universe and the invisible world of the spirit that we cannot see yet, which was created before the material world. We will see it when we die. Some people get glimpses of it in this life.

 

We also believe that God’s greatest creation was the human being, because we were made in the image of God, with the gift of free will, the ability to love and the ability to suffer. God created us because He wanted us to share in his happiness. When you have a time of celebration, such as a wedding, the birth of a child, a graduation, or something like that, our natural instinct is to reach out to others that they may share our happiness. It is the same reason why God created us, to share in his happiness. When God originally created us, He gave our first parents that happiness, which is explained through the story of Adam and Eve in the garden of paradise. It says that they had everything they could ask for.

 

God gave them one restriction: they were not to eat of the tree of good and evil. In other words, they must not play God, deciding what is right and wrong, good and evil, male and female. Only God is to determine that. They needed to recognize their limitations as human beings. But Satan deceived them and talked them into playing God and going against what God told them. He said, ‘If you eat of the tree of good and evil, you will be like God. You can play God, deciding what is good and evil.’ And they gave into that temptation and stepped across that boundary that God had forbidden them to cross. The reason why God had commanded them not to do this, was because they were not able to play God. It was too much for them. God had told them this for their own good. He showed them their limitations as human beings. If they tried to go beyond their limitations, it would only bring suffering.

 

Why would Satan, who is a being far more powerful than any of us, want to deceive us? Because he hates God and what God created, especially the human being, because we are created in his image and also because we can rise higher than the angels in heaven. Our Lady is higher than any of the angels and Satan hated this idea that he would have to bow down to a human being. So, to get at God, he tries to destroy what is precious to God, that is, us. Satan has no interest in us and in fact despises us.

 

The problem with the sin of our first parents, was that there was no way that they could undo the damage. They could not reverse it. They had opened the door to sin and suffering in our world. It says that after the Fall, sin began to happen, beginning with the murder of Abel, by Cain. And then it spread and spread, because our first parents did not listen to God and respect the parameters which God had given them.

 

However, because God loves his creation, He would not let it remain that way. So, God the Son, took on human nature in the person of Jesus and atoned for that sin. His sacrifice atoned for that sin and undid the damage, thereby reopening the possibility of happiness once more. But because God respects our free will, He doesn’t force that on us. Rather, God offers it to us: ‘I have done this for you and this happiness awaits you if you want it, but you must choose it.’ It is a free choice and a very real choice and we must make that choice. Jesus spoke about this choice many times. It is a real choice and one we must take seriously.

 

Baptism is the most important way of making that choice. When we are baptized we are saying, ‘Yes, I believe this, I accept what God has done for me and is offering me. Let me have it all. Let me be soaked in it, baptized in it.’ But this is a choice that all of us have to make. That’s why as part of baptism the person is asked, ‘Do you reject Satan and do you believe in God the Father almighty creator of heaven and earth,’ etc.

 

Then you might ask, ‘Why baptize an infant, since an infant doesn’t know what is happening?’ We baptize an infant, because we want the grace of baptism, the possibility of heaven for them, from the beginning of their life. But an infant is baptized on condition that the parents promise to teach them the faith as they grow up. Otherwise it is hypocrisy. So if you have had your child baptized, remember that you made a promise to God to teach that child all about God and God will hold you accountable for that promise.

Easter is all about the choice of baptism, because the death and resurrection of Jesus was what reopened the possibility of heaven for us and we must accept that or not, but it is a real choice. God will not force anything on us, because He has given us free will. We must choose.

 

If we look around at our world, we can see what happens when we try and play God. There is chaos. We cannot handle it. Today we are deciding what is good and evil, who lives and who dies, what is male and female. If we listen to God, then we do not do that, because we know that only God can do that. When we live by what God teaches us, commands us, then our life works, our society flourishes in the right way. When we ignore those Commandments, we end up with chaos, which is what we are seeing right now. There is an order to God’s creation and if we follow it, it works.

 

If you think all this is just silly religious stories, then Jesus was lying, the resurrection was pointless, the mass is meaningless, because this is what Jesus taught. Jesus taught that God is real, heaven and hell exist and we must choose what we want.

 

There is a modern error which says, everyone goes to heaven. That’s not what Jesus taught. Jesus said, ‘It is not those who say, “Lord, Lord,” who will enter the kingdom of heaven, but those who do the will of my Father in heaven.’ (Mat 7:21)

‘But I’m a good person and I love God.’ But do you do God's will?

 

So it keeps going back to what Easter celebrates, not just the death and resurrection of Jesus, but also the choice to accept that or not. To accept it, is to recognize what God is offering us, the possibility of happiness and being with the ones we love once more. Jesus continually spoke about this choice in all that He taught. It is a real choice and all of us are free to make it. We either accept or reject God. We must take it seriously, because God takes us seriously and when we die, we will be given what we have chosen: life with God, which is what we call heaven, or without God, which is what we call hell and if you think the idea of hell is ridiculous, then Jesus must have been lying when He spoke about hell and Satan. It is a reality.

 

That’s what the event that began at Christmas and culminated 33 years later with the resurrection is about: the promise of happiness that we long for, if we choose it.

 

‘Look, I am coming soon. My reward is with me and I will give to each person according to what they have done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.’ (Rev 22:12)

 

Palm Sunday . On the need to forgive

 

 

Almost every time I celebrate the mass, there is one phrase that often seems to stand out. It is at the consecration when the priest says: ‘This is the chalice of my blood which will be shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.’ That phrase summarizes the death and resurrection of Christ, the mass and the heart of our faith. God has gone to the greatest lengths, so that our sins can be forgiven. He has won that forgiveness but we must ask for it.

 

One of the things that seems to cause the most division that people so often tell me about in confession, is division in families over things like wills, where land or money has been left to someone and others in the family feel hard done by; sometimes over children who won’t forgive parents for their mistakes, or parents who won’t forgive their children, but especially over wills. It is very sad, but it is amazing how much of it exists. We decide that we can’t forgive, or won’t forgive, because we have been hurt too deeply. Unforgiveness is probably the single biggest obstacle to God’s grace helping us in this life. If I refuse to forgive someone, I am preventing the Lord from helping me, because this is one thing that the Lord tells us to do. 

 

No doubt all of us here expect to be forgiven by God when we die. That’s what our faith teaches us, but I wonder do all of us feel that we also have to forgive those who have wronged us. This is what the Lord tells us we must do, if we hope to be forgiven ourselves. We say it every time we pray the Our Father: ‘Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. Jesus used many parables to emphasize this. One parable is this:

[Mat:18:²³ “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. ²⁴ As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. ²⁵ Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.

²⁶ “At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ ²⁷ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.

²⁸ “But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.

²⁹ “His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’

³⁰ “But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. ³¹ When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened.

³² “Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. ³³ Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ ³⁴ In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.

³⁵ “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart.”]

 

That last line is quite frightening: “And that is how my heavenly Father will treat you, unless you forgive your brother from your heart” (Matthew 18:23-35). The smallest sin we commit against God, is infinitely greater than sins we commit against each other, because there is an infinite distance between God’s holiness and our sinfulness.

 

There is also a common misunderstanding about forgiveness, and it is this: many people have the idea that in order to forgive someone who has hurt me, I must feel like forgiving them. In other words I must have got to the stage where I no longer feel the hurt, and so therefore I can forgive. That is not how it works. If most of us were to wait until we actually felt like forgiving someone who has hurt us, we would probably never forgive. This is where people get stuck: forgiveness is not based on how you feel, but is a decision of our will. I decide to forgive someone, because the Lord asks me to and by doing that I then open the door to allow the Lord to begin to help me get over the hurt. Or to put it the other way around: if I refuse to forgive someone, I am preventing God from helping me to be healed of the hurt. I will not begin to heal as long as the unforgiveness remains.

 

‘Lord I forgive John, please help me to heal.’ When we decide to forgive, we are not saying that what happened no longer matters, or that it wasn’t wrong, or that we no longer feel the pain. We are choosing to forgive the person, so that we can heal. We are letting go of the resentment. We may have to say those words many more times throughout our life, but as long as we do, then we will begin to heal. If I refuse to forgive someone, I become consumed with the hurt, the resentment and anger. It eats away at me like a cancer. I am the one who suffers. You may feel that by refusing to forgive, you are punishing the other person. The truth is they may not even be aware of the hurt they have caused. You are the one who is suffering and the key to healing is in your hands.

 

The deeper the hurt, the harder it is to forgive and the Lord knows that. That is why Jesus spoke about it so many times. When the Apostles asked Jesus to teach them how to pray, He gave them the Our Father. The Our Father is a way of praying, not just a prayer and two whole lines of it are to do with forgiveness. ‘Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.’ If we expect to be forgiven, we too must forgive.

 

It is a terrible thing to meet someone in the later years of their life who has refused to forgive. You can see it in their face. They are angry and bitter and they are not at peace about anything. That is not what the Lord wants for any of us and so He shows us the way out. The key is in our own hands.

 

When you find yourself angry with someone, it usually means you need to forgive them. I doubt if there is anyone who doesn’t need to forgive someone and so many of the stories people tell me are about serious injustices. The bigger the wrong we have experienced the harder it is to forgive. But remind yourself, it is not about how you feel. It is a decision, a choice.

 

St. Maria Goretti died just before her 12^th birthday, in 1902. Her family were poor farmers and shared a house with another family, a father and two sons. One of the sons, Alessandro Serenelli, continually tried to seduce her, but she refused. One day he managed to get her on her own and tried to rape her. She refused and wouldn’t give in to him. Then in a fit of rage he stabbed her fifteen times. She died the next day from her wounds. Initially when Alessandro was imprisoned, he was unrepented and bragged about what he had done. Some years later she appeared to him in a dream and gave him fifteen lilies. He realized that each one represented each of the times that he had stabbed her and that she had forgiven him. From then on, he became deeply repentant, so much so that he was eventually let out of jail early (after 27 years) because of his exemplary behaviour. After he was released he went to her mother to beg her forgiveness. His mother said to him, ‘If Maria can forgive you, then I must forgive you too.’ I can’t imagine the grief and anger that her mother must have gone through, but she forgave Alessandro and I have no doubt that will have brought her peace and set her free.

 

When you are dying, will the injustices carried out against you still matter? Will you still refuse to forgive? The Lord tells us that we will not get into heaven until we forgive those who have wronged us. What is important is that we try, as opposed to refusing. The key to healing is in our own hands, but it is a choice, not a feeling.

 

‘And that is how my heavenly Father will deal with you, unless you forgive your brother from your heart.’

 

4th Sunday Lent Yr C (Gospel: Lk 15:1-3, 11-32) The Prodigal Son

 

St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274)

How do we talk about God? In one sense it is impossible, because God is completely beyond our understanding and yet we have to try. St. Thomas Aquinas (13^th C.) was a great genius and wrote one of the greatest works of theology called the Summa Theologica, which is still used today. Towards the end of his life, he had a vision of God, or heaven, and after that he stopped writing and referring to his own work he said, ‘It’s all straw,’ we don’t know anything!’ St Paul says he was taken up to the third heaven and ‘heard words not to be spoken, that no one can utter (2 Cor 12:4). In other words, it was beyond human understanding and not even possible to put into words. This is one of the reasons why Jesus spoke in parables, to try and give us some idea of what God is like. Today’s parable of the Prodigal Son is a particularly beautiful one. The beautiful thing about parables is that they invite you to think about them to understand what God is saying. It is a reminder that God respects our free will and our intelligence. He doesn’t force us to believe, or to do anything.

 

This story could also be called ‘The parable of the forgiving Father.’ We usually tend to focus on the rebellious son. In asking for his inheritance, the son was basically telling his father that he wished he were already dead and so he wanted his inheritance now. Having insulted his father in the greatest way possible, he leaves with his inheritance, but soon discovers that it doesn’t bring him the happiness he had hoped for. In the end, when he has lost everything, he comes back to ask forgiveness. Jesus says an interesting thing: ‘When he came to his senses.’ He is telling us that we are only complete when we are in God. Only God can fulfil us. The son realized he could come back. All the wealth he had led to nothing. Earthly things won’t bring us happiness. Only God can do that.

 

The son focuses on all he has done wrong, all the sin, the insults to his family and he prepares his speech of apology. The father looks beyond the sin and delights in his return, because he just loves his son. He does not condemn him, he does not ask for an apology, he doesn’t do anything that you would expect him to do. He just celebrates and loves his son. Maybe it should be called ‘The parable of the foolish Father.’ You know how people are, if we have been greatly offended, or betrayed by someone, we may forgive them if they ask for forgiveness, but it is often with caution, because we feel that we cannot trust them, or they need a time of making up for what they have done. In the parable, the Father does none of this.

The robe he gives his son is a symbol of honor. The ring is the symbol of power, the equivalent of being given the power of attorney. The sandals meant he was one of the family. Slaves did not have shoes. He was completely restoring his place in the family, as if nothing had happened. It also says that the father ran to meet his son. In that culture it would have been considered shameful for a father to run in that way, because it would mean that he would have to lift up his robe and expose his legs. The father didn’t care. In that culture it was also possible for a community to disown anyone who had rejected his family in that way. They would have come out and met him outside the town before he entered. But the father ran to get to his son before that could happen. The father humbles himself, out of his love for his son.

 

When I think of myself before God, I tend to do as the younger son did. I usually think only of the sins I have committed and my failings, my inadequacies, rather than my strengths. But from the parable I realise that God’s approach to me is very different. God is not interested in my sin, or my weakness, or what I could have done better. God is interested in me as a person, and He rejoices and celebrates every time I come back to him, especially if I have drifted away from him. God rejoices in the child before him, like you would with a young child. You don’t focus on what a small child has done wrong, you just see the child that you love and delight in that child.

 

Then there is the older brother. Maybe we are more like the older brother. We probably haven’t done anything too outrageous; we may even have been quite faithful to our duties throughout our life. But we may well despise those who have apparently walked away from God and especially those who obviously do what is wrong and get away with it. Think of someone you may have read about in the news who has done terrible wrong. Would you be happy to know that God completely forgives them if they repent, or would you resent it? Maybe we would rather see them punished. It is easy to resent the fact that God loves them. This is exactly what the Pharisees were doing. They said, ‘Why is this prophet hanging around with those people. They are sinners, they do everything wrong.’ This was what the older brother did. He resented the Father’s forgiveness, but the Father also loved him, forgave him and reached out to him. 

 

Through the parable, Jesus is showing us that God does not act as we do and that is a hard thing to grasp, because we have probably never experienced that kind of unconditional love from another human being. Think of Jesus dying on the cross, in unimaginable pain. In that pain He prayed for the people who were torturing him, that the Father would forgive him. He promised paradise to the good thief who asked Jesus to remember him.

 

God is not interested in what we have done wrong. His desire is just that we are reconciled to him, so that we can enjoy all that He has done for us and all that He has created for us. His design for us is that we find happiness. We have been created for happiness, which we will hopefully experience some of in this life, but only completely in the next. That is also why in the second reading the Apostles are at pains to point out that we have already been reconciled to God, through the death and resurrection of Jesus. There is nothing we can do that God hasn’t already forgiven, so long as we turn to God and ask for that forgiveness. That is why we talk about forgiveness and repentance so much, especially during Lent, because this is what God asks us to do. God’s forgiveness awaits us, but we must repent and ask for it. ‘Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, so that you may be healed’ (James 5:16). In the parable the father didn’t go after the son. He waited for him and hoped he would return, but the son had to choose to return and ask forgives. The Lord is constantly calling us to repent and ask for forgiveness, so that we can be healed of the damage we have done to ourselves through our own sin. We must confess our sins. God has given us the beautiful gift of confession, where we can experience his forgiveness and his healing, but we must choose to use it.

 

"What we are appealing to you before God is: be reconciled to God."