24th Sunday Year B

24th Sunday 2024

Isaiah 50:5-9; James 2:14-18; Mark 8:27-35

Ouch! There’s not much for our comfort today, is there? We begin with one of the Songs of the Suffering Servant from Deutero-Isaiah (Second Isaiah) a fairly clear prophecy of the sufferings of Jesus: “I made no resistance, nor did I turn away. I offered my back to those who struck me, my cheeks to those who tore at my beard. I did not cover my face against insult and spittle”. That prophecy was to be fulfilled in practically every detail.

Then we have St. James warning us that faith without good works is dead. If faith is not “fruitful in good works” a phrase which you may remember from the old Prayer for England, then it isn’t faith at all: it is pretence. There we have a good basis for an examination of conscience: does my faith, my worship of God, have practical consequences? Does it lead me to love and serve my brothers and sisters? If not, we shall find ourselves in the position of the “Lord Lord” people whom Jesus dismisses in the Gospels, saying “I never knew you. Get away from me, you evil people”.

Finally, we have the Gospel in which Jesus prophesies His Passion, and then proceeds to demand of us a renunciation of self, the taking up of our Cross, and the following of Him. Failure to do that will have eternal consequences.

Even St. Peter receives a brutal shock. According to St. Matthew, Peter’s declaration that Jesus is the Christ results in his being named as the rock on which the Church is to be built. He is to lead the Church, and he seizes the first opportunity to demonstrate what a good leader he will be. When the Lord and Master speaks of His Passion and Death, Peter takes Him in hand.

Notice how Peter takes Our Lord to one side. He is in charge now, and a quiet word from him will put things right. Jesus needn’t worry: His rock, Peter, will make sure that these things don’t happen. WALLOP! Instead of thanks, Peter hears “Get behind me, Satan!” So much for his outstanding leadership.

What is actually happening here? You may recall that, after the temptations in the wilderness, the devil left, “to return at the appointed time”. This is one of those appointed times. Satan is using Peter’s voice, the voice of a friend, to tempt the Lord to find an escape route. What is more seductive, when we are faced with something which we would prefer to avoid, than a trusted friend saying to us “No, you don’t have to go through with it”?

Jesus feels the force of the temptation. “Turning, and seeing His disciples” says Mark. Our Lord is turning away from the voice of the tempter, and in doing so He sees the disciples, and knows that He must go ahead, must undergo His Passion, and He rejects Satan’s temptation, recognising it for what it is. This is not Peter speaking: it is Satan speaking through him. Jesus is not calling Peter Satan: He is calling out Satan who is using Peter.

Here, incidentally, we see the meaning and the limitations of papal infallibility. In proclaiming the Messiahship and the divine paternity of Jesus, Peter was allowing God to speak through him: “It was not flesh and blood which revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven”. When the Father speaks through Peter and his successors, they are infallible: when that divine inspiration is not at work, when they think “not in God’s way but man’s” that infallibility is absent. Allegedly, there were a couple of occasions when Cardinal Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI, pointed out to St. John Paul II that he would not be able to claim infallibility for his planned pronouncements.

Jesus now re-commits Himself to Hs mission from the Father, which will entail profound suffering, death, and finally, resurrection. Then He has a mission for each one of us: a call to renounce self, to take up the Cross, to follow the Master. Is this indeed a message of doom and gloom?

There have been periods in the history of the Church when it has been interpreted in those terms. Think about it, though! What it amounts to is a call to discover our true selves. We were not created to be selfish: we were created in the image and likeness of God. In the Incarnation, God reveals the implications of this. To be created in the image and likeness of God is to be Christ-like, to be rooted in love of God and others, to grow daily closer to Christ. This will involve the Cross, but it won’t matter, because, in accepting whatever Cross God gives us, we shall become more authentic, more true to ourselves, more the people we were created and called to be.

Is it true that today’s readings tell us naught for our comfort? No, they tell us how to be our truest, fullest selves.

23rd Sunday Year B

23rd Sunday 2024

Isaiah 35:4-7; James 2:1-5; Mark 7:31-37

I am not going to talk about my first Sunday, as a newly minted priest, the oil still wet on my hands, as a member of staff at Upholland College, which occupied the equivalent Sunday to this in 1976, because I have spoken of it before, and one or two of you may even remember it. Instead, it seems a good idea to reflect on Jesus’ role as the fulfilment of the prophecies and the inaugurator of the Kingdom.

Notice first, though, the initial word of Isaiah’s prophecy, which is “Courage!”, allegedly a favourite word of Pope St. John XXIII. Courage, the root of which is the Latin word for heart, is something we all need. In everybody’s life, there will be times when courage seems in short supply. At some point, probably at several points, everybody will face obstacles, which may seem insuperable, overwhelming. At those points, we need to remember that word “courage” and to be aware of its basis.

That basis is the gift of God, for courage, like all good gifts, comes from God. Why does Isaiah call the people of Israel to have courage? It is because “God is coming….He is coming to save you”. Devotees of Doctor Who will recall the Fifth Doctor’s frequent rallying cry to his companion Tegan “Brave heart, Tegan!” recognising the relationship between the words “courage” and “heart”, though not perhaps noticing that God is the origin of that courage. All of us need courage at times: all of us can rely on that courage, since it is a gift from God, indeed the presence of God within us.

Signs of God’s coming, according to Isaiah, include the opening of the eyes of the blind, the unsealing of the ears of the deaf, the singing for joy of the tongues of the dumb. In the Gospel, Our Lord gives the people two of those signs, as He cures the man of his deafness and of his speech impediment.

Those who witness this healing recognise the power and the goodness of Jesus, but apparently fail to realise that this is the fulfilment of the prophecies. They praise Jesus, but praise is not what He wants. Jesus does not proclaim Himself: instead, He proclaims the Kingdom, and His miracles are signs of the Kingdom.

What do we mean by “the Kingdom”? Scripture scholars tell us that a better translation would be “the reign” of God, the fulfilment of God’s intention for creation, when all will be reconciled in Him, and He will be all in all.

Has that Kingdom or reign come? “Certainly not!” you may reply. “If it had, we would not still be praying for it, saying each day ‘Thy Kingdom come’. In any case, all you have to do is to look around the world to see what a mess it is—famines, droughts, global warming, the degradation of the planet, war and violence everywhere, between nations, within nations, even within families. Even the poverty, and still worse, the discrimination about which St. James writes can still be seen, even within the Church. How could we say that God’s will is being done, that He is reigning?”

There is a great deal of truth in that assessment. Evil and suffering are prevalent throughout the world: does that mean that the Kingdom or reign of God is absent, to be realised only in some unimaginable future?

Look again at what Jesus did. He cured some deaf people, some dumb people. some who were blind, some who were lame, and He proclaimed the Kingdom. The vast majority of deaf, dumb, lame or blind people were not cured. Yet Jesus declared “The Kingdom of God is entos humon—“within” or “among” you: probably both.

Clearly, God does not yet reign on earth, and yet His Kingdom is within us and among us. It is within us because the Holy Spirit has been given to us, and the Father and Son have, Jesus promised, made their home within us. It is among us because God has dwelt on earth in the person of Jesus, and remains with us in His word, and in the sacrament and sacrifice of His Body and Blood.

It is among us too wherever good is done, whether people recognise God’s hand at work or not. It is present when there are advances in medicine, in agriculture, and in knowledge generally, when people feed the hungry, serve the poor, and give them the means to develop their own gifts, to feed themselves, to build their own dignity. It is present when communities come together to repair the damage done by rioters, to guard vulnerable people and vulnerable places, to say “Stop!” in the face of violence, injustice, and discrimination.

Has the Kingdom, the reign of God, come? Not in its fullness, clearly; but in embryo it is here, because it was inaugurated by the Incarnation, by Jesus’ life and His miracles, by His death and resurrection, and by His sending of the Spirit. The Kingdom is to come, and it is here. We pray for its fulfilment, and, like Isaiah, we say to ourselves and to others “Courage!” (Brave Heart!)

22nd Sunday Year B

22nd Sunday 2024

Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-8; James 1:17-18, 21-22, 2; Mark 7:1-23

Many moons ago, standing with a group of Year 10s (4th Years in old money) at Castlerigg Stone Circle, I commented to one lad “The Bee-Gees had a photograph taken here for an LP cover”. His subsequent question took me by surprise, as he asked not, as I had expected, “Who are the Bee-Gees?”, but “What is an LP cover?”

You, I assume, know what an LP cover is—perhaps I should have said “album cover”—and most of you will remember the Bee-Gees. They were three of the Gibb brothers, Anglo-Australians, who burst onto the musical scene in 1967 with the song “Massachusetts” and who continued, despite the death of Maurice Gibb until a second death, that of young brother Robin, around a dozen years ago.

Today’s readings put me in mind of a song of theirs: “How deep is your love?” All three readings raise that question for us. Moses, in entrusting the Law to the people of Israel, commends it as a demonstration of God’s closeness to them. “Indeed,” he asks “what great nation is there that has its gods so near as the Lord our God is to us whenever we call to Him?”

In other words, the Law is a gift from God, intended to express God’s love for His people, and to draw that people closer to Him. It must therefore take root in their hearts. It is not to be a collection of arbitrary rules to be observed for their own sake, but an expression of mutual love between God and His people. It will show the pagan nations how close God is to Israel, but only if the people strive to be close to Him, assisted by the Law, which must always be a means to an end, not an end in itself. The question which Moses implicitly puts to the people in confiding the Law to them is “How deep is your love?”

How are the people to answer that question? St. James points the way to an answer. They must have the Law, and the subsequent words of Jesus “planted in them”: the original Greek word means implanted by nature. In other words, it must be part of their, and our, being—something as natural to us as breathing—and it must lead us to action. “You must do what the word tells you, and not just listen to it” says James.

He goes on to give an example of a response to the word, a response which we can give only if God’s word has taken root deeply within us. “Pure unspoilt religion in the sight of God our Father is this: coming to the help of orphans and widows in their need and keeping oneself uncontaminated by the world.”

What happens though, if the Law and the rules generally, instead of being a means of drawing us closer to God, and expressing the mutual love between God and ourselves, become an end in themselves? We see that in the Gospel, where the scribes and the Pharisees, instead of opening their hearts and minds to the presence of Jesus, focus on finding fault, on nitpicking. “Why do your disciples not respect the tradition of the elders?”

How often do you or I nitpick? How often do I look for an opportunity to criticise the little things that people do or say, instead of recognising the good things, and reaching out in love? I remember a teacher at Our Lady’s saying to me “If some people on the staff realised what some of these pupils have to go through in their everyday lives, they would marvel that they ever make it to school at all, rather than complain if they occasionally step out of line”.

There is another danger, namely of seeing the rules as the maximum to which we aspire, rather than as a foundation for deepening our relationship with God. I have, I suspect, told you before of an experience in a two priest parish, where I went on an errand while the parish priest was saying the evening Mass, but timed my return to be able to greet the people as they left the church at the end of Mass.

As I approached the church on my way back, I was taken aback to see people already leaving, and assumed that I had mistimed my return. Not so: they were living by the old rule that to “fulfil the Sunday obligation” we had to be present for “the offertory, the Consecration, and the priest’s communion”. The priest had received communion, so they were off, having fulfilled the obligation. How deep was their love? How deep is my love? How deep is your love?

21st Sunday Year B

21st Sunday 2024

Joshua 24:1-2,15-18; Ephesians 5:21-32; John 6:60-69

We have had a couple of fruitful weeks with the Letter to the Ephesians, with a fair amount to ponder. Today’s extract, though, is rather more contentious. “So is the husband the head of his wife, and as the Church submits to Christ, so should wives to their husbands in everything.”

Er….no. That is definitely a notion of its time, expressing the values and social conditions of its time, and not something to which we can subscribe today. Before we risk throwing out the baby with the bathwater, though, take note of what follows. “Husbands should love their wives just as Christ loved the Church, and sacrificed Himself for her to make her holy.”

The husband is to sacrifice himself for his wife: he is not to lord it over her. Today, we would want that to be expressed more in terms of mutuality and equality. Both parties in a marriage should have a Christlike love for the other: each should sacrifice him/herself for the other. That is how both the Second Vatican Council and the current Code of Canon Law speak of marriage, describing it as a covenant of equals, echoing the covenant between Christ and His Church. The scripture passage then goes on to speak of marriage, as did Our Lord Himself, as two becoming one body.

Present day society is quick, and rightly so, to reject the idea of male superiority, but it fails to take into account the positive aspects of this letter. Sex is trivialised so as to become an element in dating, or even in a casual encounter: consequently the concept of marriage as two in one body is lost. The downgrading of sex to a mere gratification of desire, something which occurs at the beginning of a relationship rather than as its culmination, inevitably weakens the uniqueness of marriage, and therefore its durability. If sexual intercourse is something which you can have with anybody at any time, it loses its unitive and sacred power.

As with the last few weeks, though, the focal point of the Liturgy of the Word is chapter six of St. John’s Gospel, which today wraps up the Bread of Life discourse. It does so in a startling manner, with a rejection of Jesus’ words, even by many of His followers, who part company with Him.

We have encountered Scribes, Pharisees, and others who refuse to accept Jesus, but here we are told specifically that it was “many of His disciples” who grumbled, and then went away. Furthermore, Jesus is prepared to lose even His core followers, the Twelve, if they are not prepared to take His teaching on board.

This shows how fundamentally important are Jesus’ words about living bread, about eating His flesh and drinking His blood.  If people reject that, then they reject Him. There is no compromise on Our Lord’s part. He declines to elucidate His doctrine, to explain it more clearly, to appeal to His followers to stay.

It strikes me that there are two issues here. Firstly, there is the centrality of Our Lord’s eucharistic doctrine: those who do not accept it cannot be His disciples. Secondly, there is faith in the person of Jesus, brought out in Peter’s response.

Here, as so often, Peter represents the Church and speaks for the Church, as his successors have frequently been required to do, down through the ages. Remember that the Last Supper has not yet taken place: Peter, at this point, has no more understanding of Jesus’ words than do those who walk away. Yet he is prepared to put his trust in those words because he puts his trust in Jesus. If Jesus speaks those words, then they must be true, even if they are, for the present, incomprehensible.

“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the message of eternal life, and we know: we believe that you are the Holy One of God.” That is complete faith in Jesus, the faith of the Church, on whose behalf Peter speaks. May we always have that same faith in Jesus, the Holy One of God, and may He ever deepen our faith in, and our devotion to, His eucharistic presence as our food, and our pledge of eternal life.

21st Sunday Year B

21st Sunday 2024

Joshua 24:1-2,15-18; Ephesians 5:21-32; John 6:60-69

We have had a couple of fruitful weeks with the Letter to the Ephesians, with a fair amount to ponder. Today’s extract, though, is rather more contentious. “So is the husband the head of his wife, and as the Church submits to Christ, so should wives to their husbands in everything.”

Er….no. That is definitely a notion of its time, expressing the values and social conditions of its time, and not something to which we can subscribe today. Before we risk throwing out the baby with the bathwater, though, take note of what follows. “Husbands should love their wives just as Christ loved the Church, and sacrificed Himself for her to make her holy.”

The husband is to sacrifice himself for his wife: he is not to lord it over her. Today, we would want that to be expressed more in terms of mutuality and equality. Both parties in a marriage should have a Christlike love for the other: each should sacrifice him/herself for the other. That is how both the Second Vatican Council and the current Code of Canon Law speak of marriage, describing it as a covenant of equals, echoing the covenant between Christ and His Church. The scripture passage then goes on to speak of marriage, as did Our Lord Himself, as two becoming one body.

Present day society is quick, and rightly so, to reject the idea of male superiority, but it fails to take into account the positive aspects of this letter. Sex is trivialised so as to become an element in dating, or even in a casual encounter: consequently the concept of marriage as two in one body is lost. The downgrading of sex to a mere gratification of desire, something which occurs at the beginning of a relationship rather than as its culmination, inevitably weakens the uniqueness of marriage, and therefore its durability. If sexual intercourse is something which you can have with anybody at any time, it loses its unitive and sacred power.

As with the last few weeks, though, the focal point of the Liturgy of the Word is chapter six of St. John’s Gospel, which today wraps up the Bread of Life discourse. It does so in a startling manner, with a rejection of Jesus’ words, even by many of His followers, who part company with Him.

We have encountered Scribes, Pharisees, and others who refuse to accept Jesus, but here we are told specifically that it was “many of His disciples” who grumbled, and then went away. Furthermore, Jesus is prepared to lose even His core followers, the Twelve, if they are not prepared to take His teaching on board.

This shows how fundamentally important are Jesus’ words about living bread, about eating His flesh and drinking His blood.  If people reject that, then they reject Him. There is no compromise on Our Lord’s part. He declines to elucidate His doctrine, to explain it more clearly, to appeal to His followers to stay.

It strikes me that there are two issues here. Firstly, there is the centrality of Our Lord’s eucharistic doctrine: those who do not accept it cannot be His disciples. Secondly, there is faith in the person of Jesus, brought out in Peter’s response.

Here, as so often, Peter represents the Church and speaks for the Church, as his successors have frequently been required to do, down through the ages. Remember that the Last Supper has not yet taken place: Peter, at this point, has no more understanding of Jesus’ words than do those who walk away. Yet he is prepared to put his trust in those words because he puts his trust in Jesus. If Jesus speaks those words, then they must be true, even if they are, for the present, incomprehensible.

“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the message of eternal life, and we know: we believe that you are the Holy One of God.” That is complete faith in Jesus, the faith of the Church, on whose behalf Peter speaks. May we always have that same faith in Jesus, the Holy One of God, and may He ever deepen our faith in, and our devotion to, His eucharistic presence as our food, and our pledge of eternal life.

20th Sunday Year B

20th Sunday 2024

Proverbs 9:1-6; Psalm 33 (34); Ephesians 5:15-20; John 6: 51-58

Once again, the Letter to the Ephesians has a message for us: “This may be a wicked age, but your lives should redeem it”. Ours may be considered a wicked age: war, violence of many kinds, abuse, persecution, extremism, demagoguery, tyranny, racism, and many other -isms and phobias abound. In these respects it probably differs very little, if at all, from every other age; the main differences being that technology has enabled the wickedness to become more sophisticated, while mass communications have spread awareness of it.

This thought set me off on a consideration of the opening of Charles Dickens’ “A Tale of two Cities”: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness. It was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity. It was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness. It was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. We had everything before us, we had nothing before us. We were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way. In short, the period was so like the present period….” Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose, as they say in Yealand.

If then we agree that this age, like any other, has its share of wickedness, can our lives indeed redeem it? We would say, of course, that Christ has redeemed it, but to what extent can we play our part by co-operating with His grace? We can claim to have seen an example of this over the past week, as thousands of our fellow citizens have turned out to support, with practical help and by peaceful marches, the victims of neo-Nazi violence.

All of us need, in our daily lives, to resist any temptation to fall in with wickedness, to choose the good always, to demonstrate that a better way is invariably possible. Further than that, these recent events have shown that there may be times when we are called to be more active in support of the good, that we should be prepared to step outside our comfort zone.

As was the case last week, though, the main focus of the Liturgy of the Word is on Jesus’ claim to be the Bread of Life. Bread has long been regarded as THE staple food, “the staff of life” as it has been called. Thus when personified Wisdom, in the Book of Proverbs, calls the fool to amend his ways, she invites him to eat her bread. Consequently when Jesus speaks of Himself as the Bread of Life, and as Living Bread, He is identifying Himself as essential to life.

His reference to bread might, at first sight, appear to be a metaphor for giving life, but the statements which He adds do not allow us to remain at that level of interpretation. Jesus insists, not once but repeatedly, on our eating and drinking. What are we to eat and drink? His flesh and blood, we are told. “My flesh is real food, and my blood is real drink”, is as bald, as plain, and as categorical a statement as we could wish.

“Eat and drink…..eat and drink….my flesh and my blood….real food and real drink”: Our Lord hammers the message home and reinforces it by his comparison with the manna, a thoroughly literal form of bread. Until the Last Supper, where John left it to St. Paul and to the writers of the Synoptic Gospels to describe the transformation of bread and wine into that flesh and blood, Jesus’ words would remain mysterious and puzzling. We are privileged to be granted understanding through our knowledge of the Last Supper, in conjunction with the words reported by John. We are more privileged still to be able to eat that flesh and drink that blood, repeatedly and, indeed, frequently.

19th Sunday Year B

19th Sunday 2024

1 Kings 19:4-8; Ephesians 4:30-5:2; John 6:41-51

Today’s Second Reading provides an important charter of “don’ts”. It would be a useful examination of conscience for each of us to ask ourselves “Do I ever bear grudges, lose my temper, raise my voice, indulge in name calling, or allow any kind of spitefulness?” Perhaps I should end the homily here and allow five minutes for silent self-examination.

I am not going to do that however: there is too much important material in the First Reading and Gospel. In the latter, we are drawn more deeply into the Bread of Life discourse, which will reach its climax next Sunday.

Today, Our Lord expands on His call to us to come to Him, by declaring that this can be achieved only by our being drawn by the Father. The initiative is not ours; it comes from God, and so we must be open to God, allowing Him to draw us ever closer to Christ. Openness, responsiveness, are key; without them we will fail to recognise and to respond to that drawing which brings us to Christ.

Jesus goes on to make the remarkable claim that “Everybody who believes HAS eternal life”. Notice the tense: not “will have” but “has”. If we allow God to draw us, if we let ourselves be drawn to Christ, then we are already living in eternity: we are already sharing in embryo in the enjoyment of life in God, no matter what difficulties or weaknesses may assail us.

At this point Jesus repeats His assertion “I am the Bread of Life”, one of those “I am” statements by which He identifies Himself with the God of the burning bush, whose declaration to Moses was “I am who am”. Jesus is that God, and He will give Himself to be eaten as bread. Thus we are drawn (to use that word again) into a Eucharistic understanding, one which will be made clearer in next week’s Gospel passage.

This is the heart of today’s Liturgy of the Word, but it will be helpful to consider Elijah as well. He is given bread which will sustain him on his journey, and we can see this as a prelude to the life-giving bread, Jesus Himself, whom we shall receive to sustain us on our journey through life.

For me, though, this passage has a special resonance, which I have mentioned before, and which I have no hesitation in, and make no apology for, mentioning again, because it is a subject which is dear to my heart. To me, this episode presents a clear example of clinical depression, and offers some pointers towards dealing with it.

We are told first that Elijah went into the wilderness. A wilderness is a place where we are not at home, where we wander helplessly, with no direction markers; an accurate description of the depressive’s condition. “Sitting under a furze bush” we are told “he wished he were dead”.

Spot on! You don’t so much want to die, as to wish, with every fibre of your being, that you had never been born. Your only desire is for non-existence, to be without consciousness or feeling, and the only respite comes in sleep. Gerard Manley Hopkins, the great nineteenth century Jesuit poet, himself a prey to depression, wrote “all life death does end, and each day dies with sleep”.

There is a problem, however: at some point you will wake up, and realise, to your horror, that consciousness has returned. Here, for Elijah, an angel intervenes. Anyone in that situation needs an angel, someone who will simply be there, offering what is needed, but not forcing the issue. Elijah’s angel encourages him to eat and drink, encouragement which may well be necessary, and proves to be a wise angel, in recognising that Elijah is not yet ready to move on. So s/he allows him to lie down again, not chivvying him, but realising his need.

Only when the time is right, does the angel wake Elijah again. Notice that the angel touches him, a gentle touch, a touch of encouragement, which enables him to take the next step, to resume his journey, a long journey, probably through a dark tunnel which appears endless until a pinpoint of light appears.

Our journey too may be through a long dark tunnel, but despite appearances, it is a tunnel which has an end, from which we will eventually emerge. During that journey, we may need the support of at least one wise angel, and sometimes we may have to be prompted to eat. Never forget that Jesus too is making the journey with us; that our suffering is a sharing in His, and so is helping to redeem the world; that the more often, on our journey, we are able to eat the Bread of Life, the better.

18th Sunday Year B

18th Sunday 2024

Ezekiel 16:2-4, 12-15; Ephesians 4:17, 20-24; John 6: 24-35

Would you believe it? The Israelites in the wilderness are grumbling. Who would have thought it? Actually, it seems sometimes as if they did nothing else, and God is more than once reported as losing patience with them, as those of us who use the Roman Breviary remind ourselves every morning when we pray the Invitatory Psalm 94(95): “then I took an oath in my anger—never shall they enter my rest”.

Grumbling is one of the most destructive of human activities. It takes away our own peace of mind, and the peace of mind of others, whether we grumble to them or about them. Eventually, negativity becomes deep rooted in us, and we create hell for ourselves, by making ourselves incapable of seeing the good. What chance have we of experiencing heaven if we see everything as bad, miserable, “gone to the dogs”?

Yet how common is that mindset? I remember in the 1950s my grandmother, never the most positive of people—God rest her—complaining how terrible everything was compared with the good old days, by which she meant the end of the nineteenth century, when she was a girl. Now, if you are unwise enough to look at Facebook, you will see that it is those same 1950s which are the “good old days”, compared with the dreadful days which are our own. Or it may be the 60s, 70s, 80s, or 90s, which are the good old days, depending on the age of the complainant.

St. Augustine, writing in the late 4th and early 5th centuries, was aware of the exact same phenomenon. “The reason you think those days were better” he comments, “is that you aren’t living in them”. I would be inclined to add “and that you were young then, and now you are not”. This mindset seems deeply rooted in the human condition. It shows gross ingratitude to God, a failure to recognise His gifts, and it turns us into negative, unpleasant people who build hell for ourselves. If you find yourself doing it, stop at once; kick the idea of “the good old days” into touch; and be people of gratitude who can thereby transform the world.

We, above all others, have an obligation to be people of gratitude, because we are a Eucharistic people, and Eucharist, as you know, means “thanksgiving”. If we are not grateful people, if we are grumblers, then we are living a lie.

And the source of our gratitude, and much of its focus, is the Eucharist itself. God gave the grumbling Israelites bread from heaven: Jesus points out that He is the true bread from heaven. Where is that true bread to be encountered and received? You know the answer to that: the true bread which is Jesus is encountered in many places, but it is received literally in the Eucharist, in the Mass, where we are given the bread of life, which is Jesus, as our food—no longer manna, but God Himself.

That aspect of eating and drinking doesn’t feature in this early part of the Bread of Life Discourse: we shall build up to it gradually. Today we hear Jesus use two other words: “come” and “believe”. “The one who comes to me will never be hungry: the one who believes in me will never thirst.” We have to COME to Jesus: we have to BELIEVE in Him.

Some months ago I was shocked by a letter which I read in the Tablet, a Catholic periodical. A gentleman was describing how he had followed Mass online during the pandemic, and how he intended to continue doing so, because the liturgy and the homilies were better than in his own parish. He appeared to imply that this online viewing was to be instead of, not in addition to, his attendance at Mass in person.

I was flabbergasted. What understanding of the Mass did this person have? Did the presence of Christ in the gathering of His people mean nothing to him? Was he somehow going to receive the Eucharistic Christ through a television screen? Where for him did COMING to Jesus fit in? Perhaps He believed in Jesus, but he apparently took Jesus’ call very lightly.

All of us, I am sure, would love top quality liturgy, heart stirring preaching, but in the last analysis, that is not why we come to Mass. We come to Mass because Jesus calls us—calls us to come, calls us to believe. He calls us to encounter Him in the gathering of His people, great grey and unwashed as those people may be, in His word, in the sacrament and sacrifice of His Body and Blood. Only in this way can we be true to ourselves, as a Eucharistic people, a thankful people, giving thanks to God for His gifts, and especially for the greatest of them all, His gift of Himself.

17th Sunday Year B

17th Sunday 2024

2Kings 4:42-44; Ephesians 4:1-6; John 6: 1-15

You may have noticed that we are having a break. “Great stuff!” I hear you cry. “No homily, just like the days of town holiday fortnights!” (Many of you will recall the tradition of suspending preaching during Lancaster Holidays, or Preston Holidays, or Wigan Wakes, or whatever town you were in when the factories closed for their annual fortnight’s leave. I still recall the consternation of my parish priest when he discovered that my ordination was to fall on the middle Sunday of Lancaster Holidays, which would necessitate a homily.)

Unfortunately, that is not what I have in mind. We are having a break from following St. Mark’s Gospel, and instead spending five weeks reading the Bread of Life discourse from chapter six of St. John.

Except that we are not—spending five weeks on the Bread of Life discourse, I mean. That will not begin until next week. Today we are at the beginning of John chapter six, with no mention of the Bread of Life. Instead we have an earthly feeding, with no direct reference to Jesus’ gift of Himself in the Eucharist.

Yet John, in setting his account of the Feeding of the Five Thousand at the beginning of this chapter, intends to establish a link. This will become clear next weekend, when Jesus makes particular reference to this feeding with earthly bread before launching His account of giving Himself as the Bread from Heaven. Why should this be so?

Throughout the scriptures we are told how God fed, and indeed feeds, His people. The clearest instance is the Manna, the Bread from Heaven which, we are told, sustained the Israelites on their forty year journey through the wilderness to the promised land. Earlier still there was the account of Joseph relieving the famine by feeding the people, including Jacob and his sons, with bread from the granaries of Egypt. Similarly, there are frequent references in the psalms, such as today’s, to God meeting the needs, not only of His people, but of all creatures, for earthly food.

We see a clear precedent for the Gospel’s miraculous feeding in the story of Elisha, who also distributed barley loaves, and found himself with a surplus. We also have the prophet Isaiah speaking of the Messianic banquet, when the people of God will sit down with the Messiah to enjoy a banquet of rich foods and fine wines.

All of these passages, in speaking of God’s feeding of His people, help prepare us for the Feeding of the Five Thousand, but Isaiah’s account of the Messianic banquet takes us further. All our earthly food is a preparation for our sharing in the banquet of the Messiah, and Jesus’ miraculous feeding on the hillside is the first stage in that banquet. Clearly, though, there is more to come: this is not the rich food and fine wines promised by the prophet.

In His Bread of Life discourse, Jesus promises that “MORE”, when we are to eat His flesh and drink His blood in the Eucharist, which is itself, as St. Thomas Aquinas was to point out, “a pledge of the glory to come”. That glory will be revealed, according to the Book of the Apocalypse, in the marriage supper of the Lamb, when the Messiah, Jesus, the Lamb of God, is united eternally with His bride, the Church. Thus, the Feeding of the Five Thousand is the foretaste of a foretaste, as the Eucharist looks forward to that ultimate banquet, whilst being itself a part of it, as we consume the “real food and real drink” which are the flesh and blood of Jesus Himself.

So far, so Eucharistic, but is there more to be said? It seems significant that, before speaking of heavenly food, Jesus first meets the need of the people for earthly bread. We, as His Body, the Church, must do the same. From the time of the apostles, the Church has always recognised the call to feed the physically hungry, as well as the spiritually hungry. In the Acts of the Apostles, we read how those whom we regard as the first deacons were given the task of distributing food, while Justin the Martyr, in the earliest written account of the celebration of Mass in the early Church, describes how the food brought to the altar at the Offertory was to be distributed to “all who (are) in need”. It was the handing over of this food which led the priest to wash his hands before proceeding to the altar, a practical need which preceded any spiritual significance at the lavabo.

Soon, money was substituted for actual food, but the message was the same: if we are to share in the Eucharistic banquet, we must contribute to the feeding of the poor and needy. Thus, whilst today’s Gospel may not be specifically Eucharistic, its connection with the Mass is clear: and there is more to come.

16th Sunday Year B

16th Sunday 2024

Jeremiah 23:1-6; Ephesians 2:13-18; Mark 6:30-34

Oh heck! Jeremiah tells us naught for our comfort or, to be precise, he tells me naught for my comfort, or for the comfort of priests, bishops, or anyone who has pastoral responsibilities in the Church. As you probably know, “pastor” is simply the Latin word for shepherd, so none of us who have shepherding roles can hear Jeremiah’s words without a certain degree of discomfort.

We can hardly deny that the sheep have been scattered. Some time ago, I revisited the area of Barrow-in-Furness known as Old Barrow, where my mother grew up. As a child, on holiday, visiting our Barrow relations, I would be taken to Sunday Mass at St. Patrick’s, close to the shipyard, and set among a phalanx of terrace houses and sandstone tenements where the working class employees at the shipyard lived with their families. St. Patrick’s was buzzing, served by three priests, and packed to the doors for Sunday Mass, and later for Benediction.

The shipyard is still there, though admittedly on not quite the same scale as in its heyday. The tenements and terrace houses are still there, though Egerton Buildings, where my grandmother brought up her family of nine in a two bedroom flat, is now nationally notorious as a centre of the drugs trade. St. Patrick’s, however, is no longer there, turned into housing years ago. Of my army of cousins, offspring of my mother’s siblings, though they are fine and generous people, very few retain any connection with the Church.

All over Great Britain—indeed over western Europe—the pattern is the same. We have lost what we might still call the working class, formerly the backbone of the Church in this country. We have also lost the young. In 1990, at St. Mary’s Kells, a parish comprising three council estates on a hill above Whitehaven, I carried out the funeral of an elderly lady. When it came time for Communion, none of her (middle aged) children came forward, because they knew that they were “lapsed”. Their children, on the other hand, came forward, having no concept of “lapsation”. Those children will have young adult children of their own now: I would lay odds that the latter have no contact with the Church.

Is it our fault? Will the Lord pronounce doom for us? Certainly, the abuse crisis has done immense damage, but that is far from being the whole story. I may have quoted before my conversation with a relatively young mother, when I noticed that she and her friends had disappeared from Mass at St. Gregory’s, Preston, in the mid 90s.

“Ey, Debbie, what’s happened? Is it me—something I said or did?”

“Oh no, it’s nothing like that. Well, you know that the blokes never came. Now most of the women have got jobs, and it’s all over my head, so it must be over the kids’ heads. And with all that’s going on in the world, you can’t really believe it, can you?”

I assured her that I could, whilst sympathising with her difficulties. Yet I had always prided myself, perhaps wrongly, on taking account of the capacity for understanding on the part of the people in church when I preached, and the parish provided a well organised Children’s Liturgy of the Word. The Diocese had a thoroughly professional Youth Service, and there had even been Catholic Youth Centres in Blackpool, Preston, Lancaster, and Barrow. We had genuinely tried, and were trying, but it wasn’t working—and isn’t!

What is the issue? A huge amount, I am convinced, is down to changes in society. What we might term “tribal Catholicism” for better or worse no longer exists, as Catholics have assimilated more into the world around them. My parents’ generation saw the parish as the fulcrum of much of their lives: that is no longer the case.

Two developments have struck heavy blows to all the Churches, namely the Sunday Trading Laws and the transfer, if you’ll pardon the pun, of youth football from Saturday afternoon to Sunday morning. Sunday is now much the same as any other day: or, if it differs, it is as a day for pursuing leisure activities. Meanwhile, religion, as a source of cohesion in society, with its practices and its taboos, no longer has a hold on a more materialistic population, which prizes what it sees as “freedom” and “choice” above all other considerations.

What is to be done? “Trying harder” is, I suspect, not the answer. Perhaps, in one sense, we need to try less hard. We need to remember, as the Psalm tells us, that the Lord is our real shepherd. He knows what we need, and our own shepherding is, in the last analysis, not our own work, but a channelling of His Spirit. In His earthly life, Jesus the Good Shepherd called the apostles to “come away and rest for a while”; to take time off from being God; to allow Him to do the work.

If that is not the beginning of an answer, might it be, at least, a clue to the beginning? We must put our focus on God, and on the Risen Christ: we must allow the Spirit to work on us and through us. We may not be very good shepherds, but He is. Let us be more receptive, less convinced of our own ability, and even of the extent of our own responsibility. BUT IF YOU HAVE ANY BETTER IDEAS, PLEASE LET ME KNOW.

15th Sunday Year B

15th Sunday 2024

Amos 7:12-15; Ephesians 1:3-14; Mark 6:7-13

A little over thirty years ago, it was decided by the powers-that-be to offer the priests of the Lancaster Diocese a support programme. We were offered the choice of two, one of them called the Emmaus Programme, the other Ministry to Priests. The two programmes were presented to us on different days: Emmaus by a couple of American priests, Ministry to Priests by two priests of the Diocese of Westminster, immaculately turned out, speaking perfect “received pronunciation” English, and bearing unmistakeable signs of having been trained at the English College, Rome.

Unanimously, we opted for Emmaus. We may not have been too keen on being told what to do by Yanks, but they were seen as infinitely preferable to people regarded as “posh Southerners”, especially “posh Southerners” from the English College.

There is something similar to be seen in Amos’s rejection by Amaziah, the priest of Bethel. Amos may not have been posh, but he was definitely a Southerner. He came from the southern Kingdom of Judah, and he was preaching in the northern Kingdom of Israel. Hs accent would have given him away, and he was told in no uncertain terms to clear off back where he came from. No one, I expect, enjoys taking instruction from outsiders, especially when those outsiders are relatively close neighbours.

Yet the reason which Amaziah puts forward for giving Amos the bum’s rush is bizarre: “We want no more prophesying in Bethel; this is the royal sanctuary, the national temple”. Excuse me, Amaziah, but isn’t a temple the very place where you would expect prophecy? Ah, maybe not, because prophecy is disturbing, and none of us likes to be disturbed, especially where religion is concerned.

I still recall, as may some of you, the alarm caused by the Second Vatican Council, or rather by the way it was reported. No doubt the theologians, and those well versed in the history and inner workings of the Church were delighted, but for the average person in the pew, the response was frequently one of confusion. Everything seemed to be changing, and no one appeared capable of explaining why, least of all the parish clergy, who were as ill-informed as anybody. Reading the Council documents, one can see what a powerful and indeed prophetic event it was, but who, at the time, had ready access to the Council documents?

The priests and religious should all have been given copies, and guidance on how to read them, in order that they could interpret them to the rest of us, but I am fairly confident that they weren’t. I was introduced to them only when I entered the seminary, six years after the end of the Council, and I found them a revelation, a joy, a delight. Most of the laity, however, had to rely on crumbs of information, often shaped by the prejudices of those who passed them on, and who were themselves frequently relying on rumours and half truths.

We are still, I suspect, a long way from grasping fully the prophetic call of the Council, and some of those who believe that they have understood it have rejected it, because it is too disturbing, too demanding. Only a week or so ago, Archbishop Vigano, the former nuncio to the United States, was excommunicated for publicly rejecting the validity of the Council, and the authority of the Pope. In that rejection, it is possible to hear an echo of Amaziah’s complaint: “We want no more prophesying in the Church. This is the house of God, the possessor of eternal truths”.

Yet it is in the house of God that prophecy must begin, because the Church is the Body of Christ, and a body must have breath if it is to remain alive, and that breath is the Holy Spirit who will inspire us, but who, in inspiring us, will disturb us, will not allow us to drift along comfortably, giving notional assent to our faith, what a former parish priest of mine used to refer to as “an occasional nod to God”.

Jesus warned His apostles that their message would be too disturbing for some, and would be rejected, as He Himself was to be rejected. Their message was to be of repentance, of casting out evil, of anointing and healing the sick. Ever and again we need to hear and respond to that call to repentance both as individuals and as the Church, however much it may disturb us.

14th Sunday Year b

14th Sunday 2024

Ezekiel 2:2-5; 2Cor 12:7-10; Mark 6:1-6

We know, do we not, that St. Paul could be a real pain in the neck? (Well, I am convinced of that, even if you aren’t.) That should never cause us to forget, however, how much he achieved in terms of spreading the Gospel, building the Church. Nor should it cause us to overlook his courage, his determination, his single-minded commitment to the Lord.

Furthermore, we shouldn’t ignore the deep insights which he offers us into the Christian life. Remember that, in the First Letter to the Corinthians, he gives us the earliest written account (since his letters were composed before the Gospels achieved their written form) of the institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper, and that it was he who combined a recognition of the role of the one bread of the Eucharist as the Body of Christ in establishing the Church as the Body of Christ.

Today’s extract from the Second Letter to the Corinthians provides deep wisdom as we strive to understand our own relationship with Jesus the Christ. Paul tells us that he himself was given a thorn in the flesh which caused him immense difficulty. The word which he uses—skolops—actually means a stake, or pointed stick, which would be many times more painful than a thorn, though the English idiom of a thorn in the flesh comes more naturally to us.

What was this thorn in the flesh? Some people think that it was epilepsy; one translation renders it as a “physical ailment”, though I see no reason why it should not have been a mental affliction such as depression. The exact nature of this sharpened stick does not matter: what counts is the suffering which it caused and God’s refusal to remove it.

Notice the Lord’s response to Paul’s prayer: “My grace is enough for you; my power is at its best in weakness”, a reply on which Paul builds and elaborates. He more or less admits that, without this affliction, he might have become too proud, attributing his success to his own wisdom and ability. The thorn pulls him up short; causes him to realise his limitations; and also makes him aware both of his need of God’s grace, and of its sufficiency.

What about you? How gifted, how powerful, are you? Can you conquer the world by your own efforts, or do you have weaknesses? Do these weaknesses depress you, derail you, as they can easily do, or do they cause you to turn to God, to seek His grace and His help? Do you (do I) become disheartened, or do we have the gumption to recognise our dependence on God, our need of Him, and His willingness and ability to compensate for our deficiencies?

Paul goes on to say that he will gladly boast of his weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may stay over him, and adds that it is when he is weak that he is strong.

That is fundamental to our self-understanding, and to our understanding of our relationship with God. We do not come closer to God by achieving great things. Indeed, we are closest to Him when things are a mess; when we realise that we are struggling, even that we have failed, messed up, sinned badly, for then we become conscious both of our need of God, and of His presence and His power available to us.

Many years ago, I recall a team of priests conducting a mission at Lancaster Cathedral. One of them was a pleasant enough character, and it was impossible to disagree with the content of his sermons. Unfortunately it was impossible also to become excited by them or moved by them: the word which best described them was “bland”. A fellow priest, a recovering alcoholic, who heard them, commented to me: “You know the problem with this man. He has never needed a saviour.”

I suspect that he was right. The missioner knew his doctrine, presumably said his prayers, but appeared never to have cried out to Christ from the depth of his need, never to have suffered a sharp stick or a thorn whether of distress or of failure, not to understand with real depth that claim of St. Paul “It is when I am weak that I am strong”.

(As a counter to that, my writing of this homily has just been interrupted by a phone call from someone in the midst of a deep bout of depression, to whom I was able to say “THIS is what I am doing at the moment” to which he replied that he aways identifies with those words of St Paul. How opportune was that?)

One final point: according to Mark, Jesus COULD work no miracle because of the people’s lack of faith, whilst Matthew states simply that “He worked no miracle”. Even the Son of God, in His human nature, could be handicapped by people’s lack of faith, a reminder to us to keep our faith strong, a faith in the God whose power is at its best in weakness.

Election reflection

Westmorland Gazette July 2024

2024 is a huge year for elections around the world. Discounting the farcical re-election of Vladimir Putin in Russia, ruling parties have taken hard knocks in India, (the world’s largest democracy) and South Africa. Voters have also gone to the polls in the EU, in Slovakia, and in one or more Scandinavian countries. President Macron has staggered France, and particularly his own party, by calling a snap election in our continental neighbour.

In autumn, the world will hold its breath as the USA elects a President—what a terrifying thought that either Biden or, even more alarmingly, Trump, will once more be entrusted with breathtaking power—and, of course, there is the United Kingdom, us, you and me.

Tapping out these thoughts towards the end of June, I can say that I was given pause for thought by this morning’s Gospel reading. “Do not store up treasures for yourselves on earth” said Jesus “for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

Where are the hearts of the UK’s electorate? If the politicians are to be believed, they are rooted very firmly on earth, among earthly treasures. How many of our would-be political leaders have appealed to our generosity, our large-heartedness, our compassion, our concern for others, even to our moral sense? Some may have done so, but they appear to be a minority. Everywhere, we read and hear promises of wealth and prosperity beyond our imagining. Are we, as a nation, really no better than that? Is that really where our hearts lie?

St. Peter and St. Paul

Ss Peter and Paul 2014

If you were founding a Church, would you choose to found it on the basis of Saints Peter and Paul? If you were calling disciples, would Peter and Paul be among the front runners? Somehow, I doubt it.

Let’s look at the evidence. Peter was impetuous, a bit of a loudmouth, better at promising than at delivering, with more than a hint of cowardice about him. Paul was difficult, prickly, not the sort of person you would choose to go on holiday with: and if you did go on holiday with him, it’s odds on you would have been returning home sooner than you had planned.

Think of some of Peter’s failures. He sees Jesus walking on the lake. “Lord, if it is you,” he cries, “bid me come to you across the water”. Yet when he begins to walk, his nerve fails him, and he has to be rescued by the Lord, who chides him for his lack of faith.

Then, immediately after the incident in today’s Gospel, when Our Lord has named him as the rock on which the Church is to be built, he opens his mouth and puts his foot in it. Jesus begins to speak about His impending Passion, so Peter sets out to prove what a good leader of the Church he will be, by taking control of the situation. “No, no,” he interrupts, “that isn’t going to happen,” the implication being that the Lord can rely on him to prevent it, just about as unfortunate a  misreading of his role as you can imagine.

How many times does he promise to stand by Jesus, to die for Him if the occasion demands it? And then how drastically does he let Him down? Falling asleep in Gethsemane, when the Lord has need of his support, cutting off the ear of the High Priest’s servant—the wrong reaction again; finally suffering complete failure by his three fold denial, as the crowing cock mocks the total collapse of the man of straw.

Even after that, and after his tears of repentance, there were slips and stumbles to come. Peter was too slow on the uptake to understand why the Lord questioned him three times about his love, failing to grasp that a threefold assertion was needed to offset the threefold denial. Finally, there was his moral cowardice when he abandoned his principles and stopped eating with the Gentile Christians, earning a holier-than-thou rebuke from Paul.

What about Paul? Leaving aside his pre-conversion zeal in persecuting the Church, there are enough charges against him in his days as a disciple to cause eyebrows to rise and lips to purse. Take his criticism of Peter for starters. Certainly Peter was in the wrong in failing to stick to his guns in the face of criticism from Jewish Christians, but what about Paul’s reaction? Our Lord left very clear instructions that correction was to be carried out privately and quietly, a principle totally abandoned by Paul as he brags in the Letter to the Galatians of his moral superiority in giving Peter a dressing down. I have always felt that Peter would have done us all a favour if he had taken Paul round the back and given him a good smack in the mouth, thus taking him down a peg or three.

Yet Paul himself was extremely touchy if he was criticised, displaying what could almost be described as temper tantrums in some of his letters, and giving hints that he wasn’t immune to the very fault which he condemns in Peter, as he struggles to rebut the charge that he was strong in his letters, but weak when he encountered people face to face.

And isn’t there something questionable in the character of someone who falls out with one companion after another: Demas, Mark, even Barnabas, who had worked so hard to ensure Paul’s acceptance by the Church at large? Over all, I think it is fair to say that Paul was not someone you would have wanted your daughter to marry.

Yet these two deeply flawed characters formed the foundation stones of the Church, Peter recognised as the first Pope, and Paul spreading the Gospel throughout the Mediterranean world. The Church built on these bases has endured through two millennia, not without stumbles, failures, and grave sins: and the Gospel has been preached the length and breadth of this planet. Our presence in this church today is testimony to the work of Saints Peter and Paul—and to God’s ability to write straight with crooked lines.

Maybe that last point is of particular importance to us. Do you and I have flaws in our characters? Without a doubt. Would Christ have chosen any of us as foundation stones for His Church? Would He heck! But has He chosen us, with all our faults, to be members of that Church, to play our part in building the Kingdom and spreading the Gospel? Indeed He has! Can we wriggle out of our responsibilities on the basis of our weaknesses, our inadequacies, our sins? ‘Fraid not. If God could build a whole Church on such flawed characters as Peter and Paul, then He can certainly achieve His purposes with and through us, and we have no excuses which will allow us to evade our responsibilities, to ignore our own individual call.

12th Sunday Year B

12th Sunday 2024

Job 38:1, 8-11; 2 Cor 5: 14-17; Mark 4:35-41

In your mind’s eye, where do you see that episode on the lake taking place? If you have been to the Holy Land, you will probably be able to envisage a storm springing up on the Sea of Galilee. I haven’t been there, but I did spend two years in Keswick, so I always picture the boat struggling against the wind on Derwentwater.

Generally, do you form a mental picture as you read or listen to the Gospel? It seems to happen automatically for me. St. Ignatius Loyola took this a stage further in developing a method of prayer, which many people find helpful. I have to confess that it is a method which doesn’t really work for me, but that is neither here nor there. It is important THAT we pray; the method is secondary, and we should pray in a manner which works for us, though there is no harm in having to struggle with prayer at times—indeed, I would say that it is inevitable.

Basically, St. Ignatius proposes inserting yourself into a biblical scene, and accepting whatever follows. Allow yourself to take in the sights, the sounds, the smells of your imagined surroundings. Let yourself be absorbed by the scene and allow the Holy Spirit to take you wherever the Spirit wills. A vivid scene such as today’s may be fruitful territory for such a way of praying.

Leaving that aside, what do you make of this incident? Jesus is with the disciples in the boat: He IS with them. When the storm springs up, they panic, even though they are in His presence. They shake Him awake and yell at Him, and He answers their prayer, though He also rebukes them for their lack of faith. What does this passage have to say to us?

Firstly, it is inevitable that there will be storms in our lives. I cannot imagine that anyone goes through life completely undisturbed. It may be a serious illness, a job loss, a bereavement, an uprooting from one place to another, a financial crisis, problems in a marriage or in a family, depression, a moral dilemma—you name it, there will be something. Panic may be a natural response, but it is never a helpful one.

Secondly, Jesus will be there. He will not have deserted us, however grim things may seem. Indeed, He will probably be at the heart of the storm, as in that that other account when, walking on the water, He spoke out of the very situation which frightened the disciples saying “Courage! It is I. Do noy be afraid”.

When our initial panic subsides, we need to ask “Where is Jesus in this seemingly overwhelming storm?” What is He saying to us? What is He asking of us? Is He teaching us something, and, if so, what?

Very often, our times of crisis, of struggle, of suffering, prove to be our times of greatest growth. In them and through them, God may be showing us a new truth about ourselves, a new direction for our lives, a strength which we didn’t realise that we had. In those times, He may be giving us a share in His Son’s Agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, from which Jesus emerged with a new determination, and a new strength to face the trials which lay ahead. Remember too that we are told in the Letter to the Colossians (1:24) that our sufferings are helping to complete Jesus’ own sufferings, and consequently are helping to redeem the world.

Whilst accepting that Jesus is with us, we may feel that He is keeping His head down, as He did literally on the boat while He slept. What do we do then? When the disciples woke Him, He rebuked them, not for disturbing His rest, but for their fear, and for their lack of faith. The implication is that, had they trusted Him, He would have brought them safely through the crisis.

Perhaps then we should attempt to develop a serenity of trust in the Lord, recognising that He is with us, and relying on Him to keep us from harm. That, it seems, would be the ideal approach. Yet notice something: even though He criticises them, He does what they ask. Perhaps their behaviour has been second best, but it has achieved the desired result. They may have lost the opportunity to learn more—hence their question at the end—but at least they are still alive, and will learn further lessons in the future: lessons which they will still fail sometimes to take to heart.

This brings up the question again: what is this incident saying to us? Ideally, we should keep a deep trust in Our Lord to do what is best, but if we cannot rise to that, then we should take the second best course. We should shake Him awake, we should bellow in His ear. Don’t be afraid to use the disciples’ prayer: “Master, do you not care? We are going down.” When the crisis is overwhelming, and serenity is beyond our grasp, then it is worth risking a little annoyance on God’s part by giving Him a good yell.

11th Sunday Year B

11th Sunday 2024

Ezekiel 17:22-24; 2 Cor 5:6-10; Mark 4:26-34

I have known a number of great men and great women in my time. When I say “great”, I don’t mean “famous”: I mean possessed of integrity, goodness, inner strength. Some have been laypeople, some have been religious sisters, not a few have been priests.

Among that third group, I would count Mgr. Lawrence McCreavy, professor of moral theology and Canon Law at Ushaw, the Northern seminary, now sadly closed. It wasn’t for the quality of his teaching that I rate Bomber, as he was known—that was by no means of the highest rank, and belonged to a different epoch—but for his personal qualities. He was a man of deep prayer: whatever time I arrived in chapel to pray before Mass, I could be certain that Bomber, along with several other members of staff, would be there before me.

He was aware of his own shortcomings: he would admit, publicly and humorously to his short fuses, commenting in a homily on the feast of St Jerome, that “it is good to know that irascibility and sanctity are not incompatible”, and his homilies were always directed, first and foremost, at himself. He took a personal interest in every student both present and past: On a return visit to Ushaw, I received a thump on the back which almost drove me through the wall, as a prelude to a fusillade of questions from Bomber as to my progress and wellbeing.

One incident which stands out in my mind is a reunion at which Mgr. McCreavy was heartily applauded on attaining his 80th birthday. His response came with typically self-deprecating humour: “I don’t see why one should be congratulated on longevity. It has nothing to do with us, and if we are created for the beatific vision, why should we rejoice because it is being delayed?”

In that, he was echoing St. Paul, whom we have heard declaring “We are full of confidence, I say, and actually want to be exiled from the body and make our home with the Lord”. Those of a certain vintage will recall the catechism question and answer “Why did God make you?” “God made me to know Him, love Him, and serve Him in this life, and to be happy with Him forever in the next.” It is easy to forget, yet important to remember, that we were created, not for this life only, but for eternity.

The story, probably apocryphal, is told of a conversation between the Heads of a public school and of a Catholic school. “We prepare our pupils for life” declared the former, to which the other replied “And we prepare ours for death”. A facile response, and almost certainly invented, and yet it contains a grain of truth. We ARE preparing for death, and for what lies beyond, which depends, as St. Paul reminds us, on how we have lived our lives, on whether or not we have responded to God’s call to us and his purpose for us.

Have our lives been selfish and self-interested, or have we attempted to fulfil God’s command to love Him above all things and our neighbour as ourself? Incidentally, that question should influence our vote in the impending General Election. It is tragic that so many politicians are appealing to our self-interest, and beyond that to a rather narrow, nasty, and exclusive nationalism. Are we, as citizens of God’s Kingdom, capable of rising above that to seek the values of that Kingdom? Do we live each day as if it is to be our last? One of them will be, and how will we stand before the face of God?

It is clear that a response and an effort is required from us, yet today’s First Reading and Gospel remind us that the initiative is God’s. He it is who “stunts tall trees and makes the low grow”; He who is going to “plant the cedar on the mountain of Israel”—perhaps a reference to the sending of the Messiah—to provide fruit and shelter, as it is He who enables the mustard seed to grow beyond all imagining.

Returning to the topic of the seminary, I recall a retreat led by Fr. Simon Tugwell OP in Lent 1974. One of his themes was that we should take time off from being God, and allow God to be God. Both the crops of Jesus’ first parable and the mustard seed of His second require an initial sowing, but then they should be left alone until they grow. If the farmer were to keep digging and poking, examining them for signs of progress, he would kill them; and we sometimes interfere with God’s work by our own prodding and poking.

As some people are aware, I am not an enthusiast for programmes and projects, of which the Church, both nationally and locally, has endured more than can be shaken at by the proverbial stick. “A time for building”, “The Church 2000”, the National Pastoral Congress, “Renew” in some dioceses, “New start with Jesus” and “Fit for Mission” (better known as “Brave New Start” and “Fit to Drop”) in our own have come and gone: all attempts to do God’s work for Him.

Can we not leave it to God to provide the initiative? He is better at it than we are, and has had more practice. Meanwhile, we can concentrate on responding to His call, striving to achieve that love of God and neighbour which He has commanded, and remembering that we live each day in the light of eternity, doing our job, and allowing God to do His.

10th Sunday Year B

10th Sunday 2024

Genesis 3:9-15; 2 Cor 4:13-5:1; Mark 3:20-35

I don’t know whether you have noticed, but the only creature to emerge with any credit from today’s Genesis story is the serpent, since he is the only one not to attempt to evade responsibility. The man says “It wasn’t my fault: it was the woman’s—the woman YOU put with me (so it’s her fault, and YOURS)”. The woman says “It wasn’t my fault: it was the serpent’s”. And the serpent says “I haven’t got a leg to stand on”.

Does all that sound vaguely familiar? Is it characteristically human to try to shift the blame, to evade responsibility? “I didn’t wreck the economy. It was the Deep State.” “I didn’t invade Ukraine. I have just gone to rescue my compatriots from Nazis.” “I m not suppressing freedom in Hong Kong. I am simply stopping people from destroying unity and the rule of law.”

What about you and me? Can any of us look into ourselves, and claim honestly that we have never attempted to excuse ourselves by shuffling off the blame onto someone else? It is a fault so deeply rooted in human nature that I wonder whether it, rather than humankind’s initial disobedience, is the real original sin. If Adam and Eve, representatives of the human race, had been honest, had admitted their guilt, would their original transgression have been blotted out, as our transgressions are blotted out by a sincere and honest confession? A metaphorical window had been opened for both the man and the woman to confess and to repent. They slammed it shut by their refusal to own up, and this has been the pattern of human behaviour ever since.

As a matter of interest, what was their fault in the first place? “Disobeying God’s command” we might say; “going against His will”. Certainly that is the root of all sin, but do we have to be a little more nuanced, to examine things rather more deeply? Ronald Rolheiser, the Canadian spiritual writer, describes it in terms of taking something which should have been received only when offered. In that sense, it was theft, but also the basis of rape, a word whose root is rapio the Latin for “I seize”. We have no right to seize anything, especially the sexual integrity which is crucial to a person’s identity.

To identify original sin simply with disobedience is to head down a dangerous road. I have been puzzled at times, in the confessional, to hear an elderly lady confess to being disobedient. Perhaps I should have asked them what they meant, but I have never had the nerve. I suspect that they were confessing to not doing what their husbands told them, to which I should have asked “Why should you?” This attitude is probably rooted in the old promise now, thank God, removed from the marriage service, “to love, honour, and OBEY”, a promise which, I suspect, has given rise to a huge amount of domestic abuse in its time.

Obedience is a tricky concept. Members of religious orders take a vow of obedience; secular priests and deacons promise obedience and respect to our bishop. What does this mean? The word obedience comes from the Latin obaudire, of which the audire part means “to hear”. In other words, obedience entails hearing what the other person says and responding appropriately. Despite what many superiors, I imagine, and many bishops, definitely, have tended to claim, it does not entitle them to tell people to do anything and everything, and to expect them to do it. Blind obedience may be necessary on a battlefield, where everyone’s life may depend on an instinctive response—though even there soldiers have been punished for obeying unjust orders—but it has no place in Holy Church, where all parties must act in accordance with conscience, which must have its basis in the will of God which never condones or demands unjust behaviour.

Another thought: is it reasonable, indeed necessary, to assume that God would have, at some point, freely given human beings the fruit of the tree of knowledge? Without it, human beings would have been trapped in an eternal childhood, innocent, but essentially without free will. Our Lord tells His disciples that they must have the simplicity, the openness, the enthusiasm, the spirit of wonder which children have, but He also warns them to be as shrewd as serpents. At some point, the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil had to be eaten: the fault lay in seizing it, instead of waiting to receive it as a gift.

Taking, receiving, thinking, acting, speaking, ordering, obeying, must all be in accordance with the will of God. Hence, Jesus says that anyone who does that will is His brother, sister, and mother. Why His mother? Because she is the only one to have fulfilled that will perfectly, as expressed in her response to the angel: “Let it be done to me according to your word”. Thus, she who was “fully graced” renewed her total commitment to God’s will. If we were able to live a similar commitment, we should be as close to Jesus as is Our Lady.

People also wonder who the brothers and sisters of Jesus may have been, causing some to question Mary’s perpetual virginity, others to make Joseph a widower with children at the time of his betrothal to Our Lady. This displays the limitations of the western world’s concept of family. A Ugandan priest who lodged with me told me that he would be greeted by strangers in a village with the words “I am your brother/sister. My father is such and such, my mother is such and such who is related to your father: I am your brother.”

Notice too that, at the foot of the cross, there stood, according to St. John, “His mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas”. We surely cannot assume that Joachim and Anne, if those were indeed the names of Our Lady’s parents, were so lacking in imagination that they had two daughters and called them both Mary. Mrs. Clopas must be, at best, Our Lady’ cousin. No one needs to get their nether garments in a twist over the “brothers and sisters” of Jesus.

Corpus Christi

Body and Blood of Christ 2024

Exodus 24: 3-8; Psalm 115 (116); Hebrews 9:11-15; Mark 14: 12-16, 22-26

Many many moons ago, during my days at university, I recall the chaplain, the late Fr. Richard Incledon, commenting that a lady had come to him after Mass, seeking reassurance that the chaplaincy really was a Catholic church. Her unease was created, not by any liturgical oddities, but by observing that practically everybody went to communion. Apparently, this was not the norm in her own parish.

If that lady were still around, and were to come to Mass at Hyning, she might ask a similar question. Again, this would not arise from liturgical deviations, but because so many people receive the Precious Blood. (By the way, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE never say “Take the wine”. We do not take wine: we receive the Precious Blood.) From my experience of parishes, I have been surprised how few people in them receive from the chalice.

Of course, there is no obligation to receive from the chalice. We know that Jesus Christ is received whole and entire, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity under either species—either under the appearances of bread or under the appearances of wine—which incidentally makes a nonsense of an instruction received some years ago from some half-baked Roman congregation that, at a concelebration, priests who have consumed the Sacred Host and move forward to receive from the chalice at the altar, should genuflect before receiving. As my father pointed out to me when I was a small boy, once I have received the Host, I am a walking tabernacle. Consequently, if I then genuflect to the tabernacle (or to the chalice) it is as if Jesus is genuflecting to Jesus.

As soon as we receive the Host, we receive Jesus fully, but to receive Him also under the appearances of wine makes the sign complete, and it is how Jesus first administered His Body and Blood. Therefore, it is appropriate both to eat and to drink, and it is sad that the opportunity was denied to the laity for so many centuries.

In recent weeks, I have been surprised to discover that many parishes have still not restored the chalice to the laity in the wake of the pandemic. No lay person is obliged to receive from the chalice, but they have the right to decide for themselves, and I am puzzled by the ongoing delay in many parishes.

This issue is particularly striking this year, when the readings focus particularly on the Blood. The Book of Exodus quotes Moses as saying “This is the Blood of the Covenant” as he throws the blood of the sacrificed animals towards the people. Jesus takes up Moses’ terminology at the Last Supper: “This is MY blood, the blood of the Covenant, which is to be poured out for many”. Here we have the New Covenant, foretold by Jeremiah, sealed in the Blood, not of bulls or goats, but in the Blood of Jesus, made present and offered to us.

Similarly, the author of the Letter to the Hebrews focuses on the Blood of Christ, which he specifically identifies as belonging to a New Covenant. Jesus, he tells us, took His own poured out Blood into the Holy of Holies, into the presence of the Father, and that Blood is given to us.

Even today’s Psalm focuses on a Cup of Salvation, which is linked to a sacrificial death. It is evident that all the Readings today, in Year B of the three year cycle, have been chosen to emphasise the importance of the Blood of Christ, both in this Feast, and in our Eucharistic lives. Yes, of course that Blood is present when we receive the Host, but its presence—His presence—is made more obvious when we obey His injunction to eat and drink.

Our reception of Jesus brings us into communion not only with Him, but with one another, as we not only receive the Body and Blood of Jesus but become what we receive. We are part of the Body of Christ, brought into the Communion of Saints, united with the whole Church, not only throughout the world, but also throughout the ages, one body with Our Lady and with all the saints, and with all who share today in the Body and Blood of Christ in every corner of the world.

That communion is made visible in the congregation gathered here at the altar, as we represent the whole Body of Christ. Consequently, we are privileged today to welcome Rachael into full communion with the Catholic Church, one Body with Jesus, one Body with us, and with the whole Communion of Saints. Let us take a moment to reflect on this awesome union and Communion, which we have the privilege to receive, and to which we have the privilege to belong.

Trinity Sunday Year B

Trinity Sunday 2024

Deuteronomy 4:32-34, 39-40; Romans 8: 14-17; Matthew 28: 16-20

I have invented something. Actually, I probably haven’t: no doubt thousands of people have come up with this idea before I did, but never mind—I thought of this without assistance from anyone, and so I am going to claim it. “What is it?” you may ask. It is a classification of feasts under the headings “static” or “dynamic”.

Bear with me. By “dynamic”, I mean those feasts or seasons which celebrate something which happened and/or is happening, and which constitute the vast majority of feasts and seasons throughout the Church’s year. Thus, the Church’s year begins with Advent, which expresses our never ending longing for God who came, who will come, and who is coming at every moment of our lives.

This leads into the feast of Christmas, the rejoicing in the Incarnation, the coming of God in our human flesh; and then into Epiphany, the showing forth of that same Son of God to the nations, represented by the wise men; as Beloved Son of the Father at His Baptism, and as one who shared the glory of God, revealed at the marriage feast at Cana.

Soon we move into Lent, as we enter into the wilderness journey of Jesus; and Holy Week, when we travel with Him to the Cross, before keeping vigil, awaiting the greatest feast, the Easter celebration of the Resurrection. The Easter season encompasses the Ascension, and culminates in Pentecost, recalling and re-living the descent of the Holy Spirit. All of these are what I would call dynamic feasts and seasons.

Now, however, we have a series of what I term “static” feasts, celebrating something which IS, rather than something which happens. These are Trinity Sunday, Corpus Christi, and the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart. The Trinity IS: the Body and Blood of Christ ARE. Admittedly the Body and Blood are given to us, consecrated in every Mass, but that feast marks their reality, not their origins, which are recalled on Holy Thursday. The Sacred Heart shows us an aspect of Jesus the Lord, rather than something which He did, and the liturgical year is rounded off with the anachronistic Solemnity of Christ the King, which was already outdated at the time of its institution in the 1920s, when kings were already fading from the scene.

Why do we have these static feasts? They remind us of truths which we might take for granted, or even forget. We shouldn’t forget that God is a Trinity, three persons in one Godhead: after all, we assert it every time we make the Sign of the Cross, and the Church uses a Trinitarian formula, addressing the Father through the Son in the unity of the Holy Spirit—God—at the conclusion of most of our liturgical prayers. Yet, when something is done regularly, it may sometimes fade in importance, become part of the background: consequently we are given this annual reminder of the central truth of our faith.

The Trinitarian reality of God is too vast a subject to tackle in a Sunday homily. The early Christian Fathers wrote volumes on the subject, and if you suffer from insomnia, I suggest that you try reading some of them. Today I would like to focus on one aspect of the Trinity, namely community and/or communion.

In the first account of creation, in chapter 1 of the Book of Genesis, God tells the sea creatures, the birds, and finally human beings to be fruitful and multiply. In the different account provided by chapter 2, God comments that “it is not good for the man to be alone”, and out of man He creates woman. Solitariness is seen to be not a good thing.

Why should this be? It is because God Himself is not solitary, though He is not part of a pantheon of various gods as pagan cultures believed. Instead, His whole nature is a community, a community and a communion of love, the Father begetting the Son through the Holy Spirit, who forms the bond of love between them.

If then we are to share the life of God, we too must be communitarian: we are made for one another. In the opening chapter of Lumen Gentium, the Second Vatican Council’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, we are told that the Church is “a kind of sacrament or sign of intimate union with God, and of the unity of all humankind”. Lumen Gentium goes on to state that God’s plan was to “dignify human beings with a participation in His own divine life”.

All humankind is created to share “intimate union with God”, and the Church “subsisting in the Catholic Church which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in union with that successor” as the document states, exists to be an effective sign of that union. That is the case because God Himself is unity, community, and communion. The Trinity reveals that to us, and gives us our own nature and the point of our striving.

Pentecost

Pentecost 2024

Acts 2:1-11; 1 Cor 12:3-7; John 20:19-23

I don’t know about you, but I tend to think that you need the gift of tongues to get through that First Reading, with all those names of ancient peoples to pronounce. I recall a young man at Castlerigg Youth Centre launching into that reading: we held our breath to see how he would cope, and he received a round of applause at the end, the shoals safely negotiated.

What is described is the reversal of the Old Testament incident at Babel, when God confused the languages of the earth: what is needed is a new gift of tongues, so that the people of the earth may speak a common language of justice, of peace, of faith, and of mutual love. We need Palestinians and Israelis, Muslims and Jews, Russians and Ukrainians, factions within such countries as Sudan, Syria, Iraq to learn to speak together, putting aside the language and the spirit of violence and hatred; and we need a similar gift from the Spirit to the Church, where polarisation so often raises its literally diabolical head. Perhaps that should be our first prayer today, for a new version of the gift of tongues to descend upon all the peoples of the earth.

(That isn’t how I originally planned to begin my homily. Did the Holy Spirit stick an oar in—assuming   that the Holy Spirit has an oar—to change things around? I do not know.)

My original plan was to raise the question “Did you receive the Spirit?” a question raised by St. Paul on his visit to Ephesus, and adopted as a book title by the Dominican scholar Fr. Simon Tugwell more than fifty years ago. It is a question which, initially at least, we can answer without difficulty. “Yes, we did receive the Spirit,” when we were baptised and confirmed, and we have continued to receive the Spirit throughout our lives.

After that answer, I would like to raise a second question: “How did you receive the Spirit?” Was it the Pentecost, or the Easter Sunday evening giving of the Spirit? The Spirit’s descent at Pentecost was spectacular—all bells and whistles: a loud and powerful wind, tongues of fire, and the gift of languages.

On Easter Sunday evening, by contrast, the Spirit was breathed gently into the disciples by Jesus, the Risen Christ, and the Spirit’s gift was the power to forgive sins. So how have/do you experience the Holy Spirit’s descent upon you?

Speaking personally, I have never been involved in the Charismatic Renewal, so I am not in a position to speak about it. People who are involved appear to experience the Pentecost Spirit, with powerful and exuberant reactions. Indeed, the Charismatic Renewal is sometimes called Catholic Pentecostalism.

I suppose that I am not naturally given to exuberance, unless I am watching football or cricket, where I do recall throwing my school cap in the air when Lancaster City scored their ninth goal against Prescot Cables on a December Saturday afternoon in 1962. Temperamentally, I am more at home with the Easter Sunday bestowal of the Spirit, the gentle breathing which has equally powerful though less spectacular results.

Traditionally, that event has been seen as the origin of the sacrament of Reconciliation, Penance, Confession, whatever we wish to call it, and that is a legitimate interpretation. The power of that sacrament, when used prayerfully, thoughtfully, and wisely, is immense; it is a sacrament in which the Holy Spirit is manifestly at work.

Are there, though, wider implications? Just as the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost was a gift for the whole Church, and not merely for those gathered in the Upper Room, so the breathing of the Risen Christ at Easter was not limited to its immediate recipients. The apostles and their successors were indeed empowered to be ministers of sacramental forgiveness, but the whole Church was enabled to be a forgiving people. The Holy Spirit has been breathed into YOU in order that you may share God’s forgiveness in and with the world.

As baptised and confirmed Christians, you have been literally INSPIRED—breathed into—to be a people of forgiveness, people who do not bear grudges, people who encourage others to forgive. The Holy Spirit has enabled the Church to minister God’s forgiveness to the world, and we must be, not a people who condemn, but a people who forgive, and who help others to receive and to share the gift of forgiveness.

What else does the Holy Spirit give to us, and through us, to others? What are the further implications of both Pentecost and the evening of Easter Sunday? You may recall, as you were preparing for Confirmation, learning lists of the gifts, and even the fruits, of the Holy Spirit. That is fair enough, but those lists mustn’t limit us. The gifts of the Spirit are, in fact, innumerable, and may differ, as St. Paul tells the Corinthians, from person to person.

“The particular way in which the Spirit is given to each person is for a good purpose” he writes. Firstly, you have been given the gift of saying “Jesus is Lord”. After that, the sky is the limit. One task for you this Pentecost is perhaps to ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to you your own spiritual gifts. And then all of us must pray for a new outpouring of the Spirit throughout the Church and throughout the world.