33rd Sunday 2024
Daniel 12: 1-3; Hebrews 10: 11-14, 18; Mark 13: 24-32
Do you remember the early days of microwaves? There were dark rumours, whether justified or not I do not know, that they emitted radiation which could cause brain damage, and that they might interfere with other electrical equipment.
My father was in no doubt. Whenever their aged TV set spluttered and crackled, he would pronounce, ex cathedra, “Someone is using one of those microwaves”. In vain would my mother point out that the telly in question was past its sell-by date: any interference was caused by a microwave somewhere in the vicinity.
I should perhaps add that Dad’s increasing hearing problems had nothing to do with age, but resulted from people’s muttering, and, admittedly with tongue firmly in cheek, that the holes in his jumper were attributable to moths, and were totally unrelated to the sparks dropping from his pipe. He was NOT growing older.
All of us, I suspect, are reluctant to admit to the effects of advancing years. Our physical and mental powers develop and strengthen throughout our childhood, youth, and early adulthood, and we carry a sort of inner conviction, in the face of all the evidence, that they will continue to do so. When I was transferred, in my mid-30s, from parish and school chaplaincy to the Diocesan Youth Centre, I confidently quoted the Beatles’ song “When I’m 64”.
“When I get older, losing my hair, MANY years from now…” These eventualities lay so far in the future that I could cheerfully scoff at them. I would never lose my hair, and I could laugh at the question “If I came home at quarter to three, would you lock the door?” When did the age of 64 change from being an unimaginably distant event, and become a piece of ancient history? When did quarter to three move from 2-45am to 2-45pm?
At a certain point, the signs of physical and, sadly, mental decline begin to materialise, however much we may deny them. If you are slow to see them in yourself, look around your house. Are your furniture, your kitchen fittings, your paint or wallpaper, the same as thirty years ago? And, if so, are they still in the same condition? “Change and decay in all around I see”, however reluctant we may be to admit it.
Year by year, the readings for this Sunday, the penultimate weekend of the Church’s calendar, remind us of mortality, of the unwelcome truth that nothing in this world, even the world itself, is built to last. We, and all created things, have built in obsolescence. The Day of the Son of Man will come, and that will be closing time.
“Before this generation has passed away, all these things will have taken place.” They have not yet happened in time, but their course is determined in eternity; they are already a present reality. When that reality will occur for us as individuals or for creation as a whole, we do not know—nor, apparently, did the Son of God in His human form—but occur it will. Nothing is more certain.
How are we to react? Do we whistle a happy tune and carry on as if nothing has changed, or will change? Do we take fright, and lapse into pessimism? Neither of these courses really fits the bill. We DO continue with life as normal, because what will happen is normal. We remind ourselves, though, that we live each day in the light of eternity, that our eternity is actually being constructed daily from what we do each day.
What does this mean in practice? It certainly does not mean that we live in a state of constant fear, terrified of the Day of Judgement. Remember that God has created us for eternal life with Him: that, as St. John’s Gospel reminds us (3:16-17) “God loved the world so much that He sent His only Son….not to condemn the world, but so that through Him the world might be saved”, that God has “destined us, not for wrath, but to obtain salvation” (1Thess5:9-10). God is on our side.
It means rather that we are conscious of God’s presence in our lives, and of His purpose for us: that we seek to live each day in accordance with that purpose. It is interesting that, in today’s Gospel, Jesus illustrates His words about His return via a parable, not of decay, but of new life, the fig tree which blooms in the summer. However our bodies and minds may be faring, let us be spiritually alert, living fully each day in the light of God’s love, His call, and His eternal plan for each one of us.
