Category: Homilies

From Ordinary to Extraordinary

(Gen.2:18-24; Heb.2:9-11; Mk.10:2-16)

‘It’s not good for a person to be alone,’ the Bible tells us, and the reason is clear: we were all made for love.

We know this is true because we’ve all been made in God’s image and likeness (Gen.1:26-27), and God is love itself (1Jn.4:16). Indeed, God in his Trinity is never alone.

Love and relationships, therefore, are at the very heart of our human identity, and our deepest purpose is to love and to be loved in return.

The story doesn’t end there, however, because in today’s Gospel Mark reminds us that God also created us male and female, and He established marriage as the sacred bond within which a man and a woman are to express their deepest love. 

This love, however, isn’t meant to be temporary or inward-looking. It’s meant to be exclusive and long-lasting, and it’s meant to grow beyond itself, giving birth to new love. For that’s what true love does: it always looks beyond itself, expanding outwards, creating and nurturing new life and new love.

In essence, this is what marriage is all about. Marriage is a life-long commitment of love between a man and a woman, freely entered into, that generates new life and new love. 

But what about Christian marriage? How is that different?

The Catechism tells us that Marriage was ‘raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a Sacrament’ (ccc.1601). What does that mean?

When a man and woman are baptised, they become members of the Church, the ‘Bride of Christ’ (Eph.5:22-33). Jesus loved his bride so much that he even died for her, and this sets the standard for every married couple. Ideally, the love between the spouses will be as deep as the love of Jesus for his bride.

Of course, building such a relationship is always a challenge, especially today, and this is where the Sacrament of Matrimony is particularly valuable.

St Augustine described the sacraments as ‘outward signs of an invisible grace.’ They are signs of God’s sacred presence in our midst today, and through them God gives us the graces we need in our journey through life.

In the Sacrament of Matrimony, the grace God imparts is his own supernatural power to live a life of love, compassion and mercy. This means that God is always embedded in the couple’s relationship.

Like the three persons of the Trinity, there are three persons in a Christian Marriage: the husband, the wife and God himself.

That’s why Christian Marriage is called a Sacrament.

And it’s because of God’s sacred presence that Christian Marriage is much more than a contract. It’s a Covenant.

A contract is a legal agreement between two parties, which basically says that I’ll keep up my end of the bargain as long as you keep yours.

A Covenant, however, is a sacred commitment made before God between two equals, and it’s a commitment that they will always be there for each other. It’s a one-way agreement, focussed on the good of the other, and it doesn’t depend on what the other person does.

This is the commitment Jesus made to us when he said ‘I will never leave you or forsake you’ (Heb.13:5).

Mother Teresa often talked about the sacredness of marriage and the importance of the family as the basic foundation of society. She called it the ‘domestic school of love,’ which gives children what they need to become mature and responsible adults.

But we know that married life has its challenges. In Amoris Laetitia, Pope Francis describes the family as a ‘challenging mosaic made up of many different realities, with all their joys, hopes and problems.’

Mother Teresa also used to say that it’s easier to love people far away than those close to us. But, she said, home is where our love needs to start. This isn’t always easy to do, and that’s why we always need God and his sacraments.

His graces make all the difference.

My dear parents, Esmé and Gerald, were inseparable – they were married for almost 76 years. Not long before they died, they said that the Church had always been the foundation of their marriage, and that everything they did, they did with God.

Even in their toughest times, God always came through with his graces.

They also shared a secret – that the difference between an ordinary marriage and an extraordinary one is the little extra that you give each day – with the help of God.

The Parable of the White Birds and Black Birds

Tierno Bokar was a Sufi wise man who lived in Mali, in West Africa, early last century. He liked teaching with stories.

In his Parable of the White Birds and Black Birds, he taught that a good thought is always better than a bad one, even when thinking about your enemies. And the best thing you can do is to pray for your enemies.

‘Why?’ asked one student. ‘Don’t we look stupid praying for our enemies?’

‘Only in the eyes of those who don’t understand,’ Tierno replied. ‘We wrong ourselves more by speaking ill of our enemies than by blessing them.’

He then told the story of the White Birds and Black Birds.

People are like walls facing each other, he said. Like a dovecote, each wall is full of holes where white birds and black birds nest. The black birds are bad thoughts and bad words. The white birds are good thoughts and good words.

Because of their different sizes, the white birds can only nest in white-bird holes. The black birds can only enter their own black-bird holes.

Now, imagine that two men, Yousef and Ali, are enemies. One day, Yousef thinks Ali is wishing him evil. Yousef gets angry about it and sends Ali a nasty thought.

How does he send that nasty thought? By releasing a black bird from its nesting hole in his wall. That black bird flies towards Ali, carrying that bad thought along with it. That bird then looks for an empty hole in Ali’s wall where it can leave it.

But if Ali hasn’t had any bad thoughts, he won’t have any empty holes. All his black birds will still be at home resting. And when Yousef’s bird finds nowhere to stop, it will have to return home to its own nest, taking the evil thought back with it.

That evil thought will then start festering in Yousef’s own wall, slowly eroding and destroying it. Why? It’s because evil is like acid – it always eats away at whatever it touches.

But if Ali had had a bad thought, he would then have an empty hole where Yousef’s bird could leave his evil thought. That evil would then start eroding Ali’s wall.

In the meantime, Ali’s black bird would have flown towards Yousef and the empty hole left in his wall.

The two black birds would then have achieved their goal: each depositing something nasty in the opposite wall. But again, evil is like acid, so each wall would slowly start to disintegrate.

Once their job is done, the birds always return to their original nest because, it is said, ‘Everything returns to its source.’

But the evil is not exhausted – there’s always some left – so each black bird takes some back to its own nest. That evil then turns against their authors and gradually eats away at them, too.

The author of a nasty thought, a bad wish or an ill-spoken word is therefore attacked by both the enemy’s black bird and his own when it returns to him.

Now, it’s the same with the white birds.

If we only ever think good thoughts about our enemy, while the enemy only thinks bad thoughts about us, the enemy’s black birds won’t find anywhere to stop in our wall and will return to its sender.

And the white birds we send carrying good thoughts – if our enemy has nowhere to receive them, they will simply return to us, charged with all the positive energy they’re carrying.

Thus – and this is the point – if we only ever emit good thoughts, no evil, no ill-spoken words can ever touch us, because we’re not open to them.

That’s why we should always pray for blessings for both our friends and our enemies. Not only might the good thought reach its destination, but it also always comes back to us carrying its positive energy (Mk.4:20). [i]

Why do I share this story with you? It’s because in Mark’s Gospel today, Jesus says that whoever thinks, says or does something nice for someone else – even as little as offering them a glass of water – will be rewarded.

That’s because the good you do always comes back to you.

But whoever does the opposite, whoever does something nasty towards someone else – even if it’s only a bad thought – will suffer for it.

Why? It’s because evil is like acid. It eats away at whatever it touches.

And everything always returns to its source.

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[i] https://www.themathesontrust.org/papers/islam/Teaching%20Stories%20from%20Tierno%20Bokar.pdf

Being Different

(Wis.2:12,17-20; Jas.3:16-4.3; Mk.9:30-37)

Most people don’t like being different. They’d rather fit in than stand out from the crowd.

That’s because our society values sameness. It loves the familiar. Early in life, we all learn that if you’re too different you’ll be teased, ridiculed or excluded in some way. So, most of us try hard to fit in, and we do this by adopting the fashions and culture of the time.

This is what got Peter into trouble in last week’s Gospel. He objected to Jesus talking about His coming death and resurrection, and Jesus replied, ‘Get behind me Satan! You’re thinking not as God does, but as humans do.’

Peter was shocked. He had been taught that success is all about ambition, power and putting yourself first. That’s what our world teaches us today, too, but God doesn’t think like we do (Is.55:8-9).

In today’s Gospel, Jesus again talks about his coming Passion, but none of his disciples hears or understands Him. Instead, they argue about which of them is the greatest.

So, Jesus tells them straight: if you want to be My disciple, you must be different. If you want to be first, then put yourself last. If you want to achieve greatness, then make yourself small. And if you want to become masters, then humble yourself by becoming the servant of others.

All this is very counter-cultural.

To emphasise His message, Jesus places a little child in among His disciples, and tells them that it’s time to stop worrying about themselves. Instead, they should focus on the little ones – the most vulnerable in society, because that’s how you welcome the Messiah and the Father who sent Him.

Many people are puzzled at this point. To develop a good spiritual life, they wonder, must I give up everything and turn my back on the world?

The answer is no.

Consider this story. There was once an old monk who prayed for years for a vision from God to strengthen his faith, but it never came. He had almost given up hope when one day a vision appeared. The old monk was overjoyed.

But then, right in the middle of his vision, the monastery bell rang. That bell meant it was time to feed the poor who came to the monastery gate each day.

It was this old monk’s turn to feed them. If he didn’t show up, those poor people would leave, thinking that the monastery had nothing for them. He was torn between his earthly duty and his heavenly vision.

But, before the bell stopped ringing, he decided. With a heavy heart, he left the vision and went to feed the poor.

An hour later, the monk returned to his room. When he opened the door, he could hardly believe his eyes. The vision was still there, waiting for him. As the monk dropped to his knees in thanksgiving, the vision said to him, ‘My son, had you not gone off to feed the poor, I would not have stayed.’ [i]

The message here is that if you want divine inspiration, if you want spiritual joy, the best thing you can do is to serve God by helping someone else.

In today’s second reading, St James says there are two kinds of wisdom. The first is worldly wisdom, but embedded deep inside it are jealousy and ambition, which simply cause misery. 

The second kind of wisdom, however, comes from above. It comes from God. This wisdom is pure and genuine, and it brings peace. It’s kindly, considerate and full of compassion, and it’s only concerned with doing good.

How do we get some of this wisdom? St James tells us: by praying, and by being different. By understanding that it’s time to stop trying to be like everyone else.

By accepting that if you want to be first, then make sure that you’re last of all and servant of all.

Statue of William and Charles Mayo

Let’s close with a little story. In 1914, Dr Charles Mayo started the famous Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota with his father and brother. At one time, a group of European medical experts were guests at Dr Mayo’s home.

Following the custom of the day, the guests placed their shoes outside their bedroom doors to be polished during the night. Dr Charles was the last to retire. As he went to his room he noticed the shoes.

It was too late to wake the servants, so with a sigh he gathered up all the footwear, took them into the kitchen and spent half the night polishing them. [ii]

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[i] Michael Hayes, Homilies for the Whole Community, Year B, Twenty-Third Publications, New London CT, 2005:158-159.

[ii] Gerard Fuller, Stories for All Seasons, Twenty-Third Publications, Mystic CT, 1997:83-84.

A Lively Faith

(Is.50:4c-9a; Jam.2:14-18; Mk.8:27-35)

Have you ever tried to buy a drink from a vending machine, only to find the can empty?

Or bought another product at a supermarket, only to find the package contained nothing but air?

This is essentially what St James is talking about in our second reading today. He’s talking about people who claim to have faith, but never actually do anything about it. And he asks the question: is faith alone enough to get you into heaven? Or should that faith lead to good works of some kind?

There were huge arguments about this issue at the time of the Protestant Reformation. They called it Sola Fide (‘by faith alone’), and it’s no less relevant today because many people think of themselves as Christian – they might even go to church – but it has no practical effect on the way they live their lives.

Indeed, one man I knew used to loudly and publicly proclaim his Christian faith, while privately he was often callous, and sometimes even cruel, towards others. He thought that just believing in Jesus was enough to earn his salvation.

In 2014, Pope Francis said that understanding God’s commandments and church doctrine is useless if these truths aren’t put into practice. ‘A faith without bearing fruit in life, a faith that doesn’t bear fruit in works is not faith,’ he said.

‘You may know all the commandments, all the prophesies, all the truths of the faith, but if this isn’t put into practice, if it’s not translated into works, it serves nothing.’

As St James says, even the demons know the Creed, but that doesn’t mean they have true faith.

‘Having faith isn’t having knowledge,’ the pope said. Rather, it’s ‘receiving God’s message’ as brought by Christ. For ‘Faith is an encounter with Jesus Christ, with God,’ and it always leads to action of some kind. [i]

In 2008, Pope Benedict XVI described faith as ‘looking at Christ, entrusting oneself to Christ, being united to Christ, conformed to Christ, to his life. And the form, the life of Christ, is love; hence to believe is to conform to Christ and to enter into his love.’ [ii]

True faith, therefore, can never be static, because real love (which is the Spirit of God Himself) is never static. It’s meant to keep flowing, nourishing all around.

Richard Leonard puts it this way: ‘Christian Witness has two component parts, one much more important than the other: what we say and what we do.

‘For all the complexities of philosophy and theology, the Christian message is quite simple: to be a follower of Jesus, we have to love God, love our neighbour, and love ourselves.’ [iii]

Our faith, then, is not something that can be confined to our heads, for love is not just a theory or an idea. Love is a verb, an action that is born of life and that leads to life.

Our Christian faith stems from and is directed towards Jesus who is love itself. Its rightful home is deep in our hearts, and our response must always be an active, lively faith.

As St James says, ‘For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead’ (Jas.2:26).

Let’s close with some wisdom from Peter Kreeft, who says that the life of faith is a river that must keep flowing.

‘We are meant to be like the Sea of Galilee, not the Dead Sea,’ he says.

‘The same water, the Jordan River, flows into the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea. But the Sea of Galilee is still alive with fish and fishermen today, two thousand years after Jesus was there, while the Dead Sea lives up to its name: it’s dead; no fish can live in it.

‘Why? It’s because the Sea of Galilee not only receives the fresh water of the Jordan River at its inlet, but it also gives it away at its outlet, where it flows south to the Dead Sea. The Dead Sea has an inlet and no outlet (because it’s at the lowest point on earth). That’s why its waters are dead.

‘That’s true of souls as well as rivers.

‘And that’s the difference between spiritual life and spiritual death.’ [iv]

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[i] https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/francis-chronicles/pope-professing-faith-without-good-works-just-spouting-hot-air

[ii] https://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/audiences/2008/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20081119.html

[iii] Richard Leonard, What Does it all Mean? Paulist Press, Mahwah NJ, 2017:184.

[iv] Peter Kreeft, Food for the Soul – Year B, Word on Fire, Elk Grove Village IL, 2023:685.

Ephphatha Moments

(Deut.4:1-2, 6-8; Jas.1:17-18, 21b-22, 27; Mk.7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23)

In our noisy and crowded world, it can be hard to find the peace we need to engage with our deeper, spiritual selves.

This is why we often yearn to withdraw to somewhere quiet for rest, reflection and healing. It’s a natural desire, and it’s reflected in Mark’s Gospel today.

Jesus is in Gentile territory, and a man who is deaf and cannot speak is brought to Him for healing. Jesus could have cured the man then and there, but instead He takes him to a quiet place where He gives him His undivided attention.

Jesus touches the man’s ears and tongue, and helps him feel what he cannot hear or say. Then in Aramaic Jesus says, ‘Ephphatha!’ – ‘Be opened!’ The man’s ears, lips – and his heart – are all opened, and his life is transformed.

Thankfully, most of us have little trouble with our eyes, ears and speech. However, today’s Gospel does raise the question of how well we use these gifts. Can we see as Jesus sees? Can we hear as He hears? And can we speak as Jesus speaks? Or is there room for improvement?

In 2012, Pope Benedict XVI spoke about this. He said, ‘…we all know that closure of man, his isolation, does not solely depend on the sense organs. There is an inner closing, which covers the deepest core of the person, what the Bible calls the “heart.”

‘That is what Jesus came to “open,” to liberate, to enable us to fully live our relationship with God and with others. That is why… this little word, “Ephphatha – Be opened,” sums up Christ’s entire mission.

Pope Benedict continues: ‘Jesus became man so that man, made inwardly deaf and dumb by sin, would become able to hear the voice of God, the voice of love speaking to his heart, and learn to speak in the language of love, to communicate with God and with others.’ [i]

What so many of us struggle with, then, isn’t so much our eyes, ears or speech, but our hardened hearts (Mt.13:13-15). It’s our stony hearts that hold us back.

Like Pharaoh and the Pharisees, many of us tend to be too concerned about ourselves, too disinterested in others, and too distant from God. This is what St James is talking about in today’s second reading.

It’s also what Jesus wants to heal.

Today, Jesus is offering us our own Ephphatha Moment. But what is an Ephphatha Moment? It’s a personal encounter with Jesus Himself. It’s a mystical and grace-filled moment when Jesus gently touches us and speaks to us in some way.

When this happens, our heart softens and we are surprised to find ourselves seeing and hearing new things, and even speaking in new ways.

Through the ages, many people have had Ephphatha Moments. St Paul had one on his journey to Damascus. That’s when Jesus confronted him, asking: ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ That question went straight to Paul’s heart and it led to him becoming one of the greatest of saints.

St Augustine also had an Ephphatha Moment. His stony heart had been stifling his search for spiritual growth. However, after visiting St Ambrose, the bishop of Milan, his heart began to soften and then he overheard a child say, ‘take up and read.’ He looked around, saw a Bible and started reading it. The experience totally transformed his life. [ii]

Thomas Merton had also struggled to find his spiritual self. After a fruitless search of Eastern traditions, he experienced his own Ephphatha Moment when a Hindu Monk said to him: ‘There are many beautiful mystical books written by the Christians. You should read St Augustine’s Confessions and The Imitation of Christ.’ He read those books. They opened his heart and he became a Catholic mystic and best-selling author. [iii]

The Sacrament of Baptism includes an Ephphatha Rite in which the minister touches the person’s ear and mouth, and says, ‘The Lord Jesus made the deaf hear and the dumb speak. May he soon touch your ears to receive his word and your mouth to proclaim his faith, to the praise and glory of God the Father.’

This is such a beautiful blessing, but unfortunately many of us have become deaf and blind to our spiritual selves because of our sin, selfishness and stony hearts.

How, then, might you experience your own Ephphatha Moment? By carving out some quiet time and space for yourself, and asking Jesus to whisper ‘Ephphatha’ into your soul.  

Be patient; Jesus doesn’t always respond immediately. But ask Him to open up your heart so that you may see, hear and speak, just as he does.

For an open heart is the way to healing, holiness and hope.

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[i] Pope Benedict XVI, Angelus Address, 9 September 2012, https://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/angelus/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_ang_20120909.html

[ii] St Augustine of Hippo, Confessions, Penguin Books, London, 1961.

[iii] Thomas Merton, The Seven Storey Mountain, Harcourt, NY, 1998.

Lip-Syncing Through Life

(Deut.4:1-2, 6-8; Jas.1:17-18, 21b-22, 27; Mk.7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23)

‘Lip-syncing’ occurs when someone silently mimes someone else’s pre-recorded words or song.

It became common at the end of the silent movie era, when many film stars didn’t quite have the right speaking or singing voice.

But it has been controversial. Many people felt cheated when they learnt that Audrey Hepburn had lip-synced her songs in My Fair Lady. And in 1990, when the world discovered that Milli Vanilli didn’t sing their own songs, people were outraged. The real singers were two former US soldiers who apparently didn’t have the right ‘look’.

Milli Vanilli had to return their Grammy Award for ‘Best New Artist.’

When people are expected to be authentic, lip-syncing is often considered dishonest.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus accuses the Pharisees of lip-syncing to the Old Testament. The Pharisees have been demanding to know why Jesus lets his disciples eat without washing their hands. But Jesus knows they’re not really interested in hygiene or in God’s commandments. Their real concern is ensuring that the people obey their own rules about ritual purification. 

Jesus is annoyed. The Pharisees are mouthing the right words, but they are not genuine, so He quotes Isaiah’s prophecy, ‘This people honours me only with lip-service, while their hearts are far from me. The worship they offer me is worthless…’ (Is.29:13).

It’s quite easy to put on a false front to hide what’s really in our hearts. One man was very good at this, at least for a while. He filled his speeches with Christian references. He spoke of God’s blessings and the importance of Christianity to his new government. He even held up a well-thumbed Bible, explaining how it had inspired him. But such hypocrisy is not sustainable, and the world soon learnt who Adolf Hitler really was.

In our second reading today, St James says that there’s a vital connection between faith and love. Genuine religion, he says, is about caring for suffering widows and orphans, and making sure that our hearts are not corrupted by our selfish world.

In other words, our Christian faith is about genuinely loving God and each other, in both word and deed, for the heart is fundamental to everything we do.

Indeed, our hearts are at the very core of our human identity, and when our words and actions don’t connect with our hearts, we lose our integrity. And when we lose our integrity, people stop trusting us. They turn away.

For our words to ring true, they must come from the heart. For our actions to be authentic, they must be inspired by the heart. And for our faith to be genuine, it must be embedded in our hearts.

We know this, don’t we? Without our heart, our welcome is hollow, our words are empty and our faith is false.

Indeed, Flor McCarthy tells us that it’s only with the heart that we can see rightly. To see with the eyes only is to be no better than a camera.

It’s only with the heart that we can hear rightly. The cry of a needy person may reach our ears, but unless it reaches our hearts we will not feel that person’s pain, and it’s unlikely that we’ll respond.

It’s only with the heart that we can work rightly. If our heart is in our work, the work becomes a joy and we put our best into it. But if our heart is not in it, we are working under the severest handicap of all.

And it’s only with the heart that we can forgive rightly. If forgiveness does not come from the heart, it will not bring us peace, nor will it result in true reconciliation with the other. [i]

The message for today, then, is that if you’ve been lip-syncing your way through life, it’s time to stop. It’s time to get real and engage with your heart.

Let’s close with a little story.

A humble gardener presents his king with the greatest carrot he has ever grown. The king is touched and responds by giving the gardener a large plot of land.

A nobleman witnesses this event, and decides that it would be advantageous for him to present the king with his finest horse.

He does just that, but the king merely thanks him for the horse.

Seeing the nobleman quite confused, the king explains to him, ‘That gardener was giving me the carrot. But you were giving yourself the horse.’

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[i] Flor McCarthy, The Gospel of the Heart, Dominican Publications, Dublin, 2005:167.

 

The Choices We Make

(Josh.24:1-2a, 15-17, 18b; Eph.5:21-32; Jn.6:60-69)

We make choices every day. Most are small, like what to eat or wear, but some are big, like where to work and who to marry.

Knowingly and unknowingly, we make choices all the time. They shape our existence, and every good choice helps us live our very best lives.

Victor Frankl, the psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor, described our ability to choose as ‘the last of the human freedoms’. He once wrote that everything can be taken from a person but this one thing, the ability to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.

Because of this, Frankl said, every human being has the freedom to change at any instant.[i] Even in our darkest moments, we always have the power to choose how we respond to our situation.

How well, then, do we exercise our power to choose? Do we do it well, or do we tend to be more passive, perhaps avoiding decisions altogether or leaving them to others?

Samuel Beckett’s play Waiting for Godot tells the story of two men, Estragon and Vladimir, who spend all day every day waiting under a tree in the countryside for someone named Godot to arrive.

They aren’t sure if he’s coming, but they hope that when he does, he’ll bring meaning and purpose to their lives. So, they wait for Godot, and as they wait, they eat and argue, and they talk about all sorts of things. But nothing changes, and they just keep waiting. And waiting. And waiting. [ii]

A fruitless and empty life can lead to very deep regrets.

In 2012, Bronnie Ware published a book about her work in palliative care. In it she reveals the five biggest regrets her dying patients shared with her:

• I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
• I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
• I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
• I wish I’d stayed in touch with my friends, and
• I wish I’d let myself be happier. [iii]

No-one likes regrets, so how can we ensure we always make the right choices?

Firstly, by understanding our values (what we believe is fundamentally important in life) and always using this as a sound basis for daily decision-making. Much like the wise man who built his house on rock (Mt.7:24-27).

And secondly, by making sure that all our choices are consistent with our values.

In John’s Gospel today, Jesus concludes His Bread of Life Discourse. This is the talk he gave in the synagogue in Capernaum, just after feeding the 5,000.

Essentially, He’s saying, ‘I am the Bread of Life who came down from heaven to give life to the world. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood will live forever.’

In other words, ‘Come to me for spiritual food that will nourish and transform your existence. Come to me if you want eternal life.’

Here, Jesus is giving his listeners – that’s us – a choice: are you going to believe me and accept my Eucharistic self, or will you reject me?

Many of Jesus’ disciples do reject Him. They can’t understand how someone who turned water into wine can also transform bread and wine into His own flesh and blood. So, they turn away, and only the original Twelve choose to stay.

It’s not much different today; so many people would rather sit on their hands than choose Jesus. They’d rather follow the false gods of our day. But take note: Jesus never forces us into anything. He always lets us choose for ourselves.

In our first reading today, Joshua is the man who replaces Moses after the Israelites enter the Promised Land. Joshua is getting old, and he calls on the leaders of the twelve tribes of Israel to choose: either to remain faithful to the God who gave them their new home, or to follow the false gods of their new land.

Joshua says he plans to serve God, and his people agree to do the same.

Today, Jesus is offering us a sound and sensible foundation for our lives; one that actually leads to eternal life. He’s inviting us to follow Him.

Right now, Jesus is asking, ‘What about you, do you want to go away, too?’

Peter replied, ‘Lord, who shall we go to? You have the message of eternal life.’

What is your reply to Jesus?

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[i] Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning, Beacon Press, Boston, 2023.

[ii] Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot, Grove Press, NY, 1954.

[iii] Bronnie Ware, The Top Five Regrets of the Dying. Hay House, Inc., Carlsbad, CA, 2012. 

The Road to Hope

(Prov.9:1-6; Eph.5:15-20; Jn.6:51-58)

As a young boy growing up in Hue, Vietnam, in the 1930s, Francis-Xavier Nguyên Van Thuân was fascinated by the Holy Eucharist. He knew it was something special.

It led him to the priesthood and to Rome where he studied Canon Law. And in 1975, just before Saigon fell to the communists at the end of the Vietnam War, he arrived as its new archbishop.

There was no-one to greet him, and soon afterwards he was arrested and imprisoned in Nha Trang, the place where he’d earlier served as bishop (1967-75).

He spent the next nine years in solitary confinement.

The archbishop feared he’d never be able to celebrate the Eucharist again. However, when he was allowed to write to his family, he asked for clothes and toiletries, and added, ‘Please send me a little wine as medicine for my stomach ache.’

They understood what he meant, and sent him some wine in a little medicine bottle, and hosts hidden in a torch. He used these things to secretly celebrate Mass in his tiny cell, every day at 3 pm, the hour when Jesus died on the Cross.

Relying on his memory, he consecrated three drops of wine and a drop of water on the palm of his hand, along with some host-crumbs. And as he lapped up the precious Eucharistic blood in his hand, he asked for the grace to drink the bitter chalice and to unite himself to Christ’s shedding of blood.

Extending his arms to form a cross, he joined his sufferings to that of Jesus on the Cross. His hand became his altar, his cell became his cathedral.

He later described these as the most beautiful Masses of his life.

After nine years in solitary confinement, he was sent north to a ‘re-education camp’ for another four years. There he was locked up with fifty prisoners in a crowded room. Each day at 9.30 pm, in the dark, he celebrated Mass over his bed, and under a mosquito net he gave tiny pieces of the sacred host to the other Catholics.

Wrapping tiny particles of the blessed sacrament in cigarette foil, he and the other prisoners took turns adoring Jesus secretly. Their worship not only helped them to survive; it also helped them to heal.

The archbishop’s gentle manner and the Holy Eucharist changed the lives of many of these prisoners. Even the camp guards began to confide in him. But the suspicious authorities changed the warders regularly to avoid them being ‘contaminated.’

During his imprisonment, Nguyên Van Thuân often felt useless and feared losing his mind. He also wondered how he could care for his flock, but God helped him to see how he could offer ‘five loaves and two fish’ of daily prayer for the good of his people.

He also began writing a few words of wisdom on scraps paper from old calendars, and gave them to a brave Catholic boy who passed by. That boy’s parents copied them into a notebook, and eventually his 1,001 thoughts were published in a book called The Road to Hope: A Gospel from Prison.

That book did much to bolster the faith of the Vietnamese people during the worst of the Communist repression.

Not surprisingly, many of his wise words were about the Eucharistic Jesus, nourished by his prison experience. For example, he wrote:

• The whole of the Lord’s life was directed toward Calvary. The whole of our life should be oriented toward the Eucharistic celebration; and
• As the drop of water put into the chalice mingles with the wine, so your life should become one with Christ’s.

In 1991, Archbishop Nguyên Van Thuân was released and allowed to leave Vietnam, but never to return. He travelled to Rome where Pope St John Paul II warmly greeted him. He was made a cardinal in 2001, but died the following year.

In 2007, he was declared ‘Venerable’, the first step on his path to sainthood.

In John’s Gospel today, Jesus says, ‘Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.’

Nguyên Van Thuân understood this well. He said that the only thing that helped him survive so many years of torture and dehumanisation was the Holy Eucharist. It gave him life and he used it to love his fellow prisoners and even the guards who abused him. Some of these men were so moved by his faith that they, too, became Catholics. [i]

The Eucharist (Greek for ‘thanksgiving’) means so much more than just ‘receiving Communion.’ It’s about consuming Jesus Himself, combining our life with His, so that we might draw life from Him.

And not just eternal life, but also the strength we need to survive – and thrive – here on earth.

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[i] https://slmedia.org/blog/cardinal-van-thuan-canonization-cause

La Dolce Vita

(1Kgs.19:4-8; Eph.4:30-5:2; Jn.6:41-51)

La Dolce Vita – ‘The sweet life.’ Have you ever seen that movie?

It was made in 1960 by Frederico Fellini. In the opening scenes, a statue of Jesus is carried by helicopter across Rome, first over some old Roman ruins, and then over a big new construction site.

At one point it’s carried above some beautiful bikini-clad women sunbaking on a rooftop, and they wonder where Jesus is going.

Then we see the helicopter lowering the statue onto St Peter’s Square. As the statue comes down, the camera zooms in for a close-up of Jesus with his arms extended, and He’s safely delivered to the Pope in the Vatican. [i]

Fellini made this film at a time when Italy was pulling itself out of the ruins of World War II. It’s the simple story of a man (played by Marcello Mastroianni) searching for a way out of the shallowness and spiritual desolation of his life.

For a while this film was banned because of its depiction of the seven deadly sins. But what Fellini was doing was offering a powerful commentary on the way the world was changing after WWII.

Instead of learning from the mistakes of the past and cherishing our Christian heritage, Fellini saw too many people turning towards the shallow self-indulgence of modern-day secularism.

When Martin Scorsese saw this film, he said it showed the world ‘moving from decadence to despair with nothing in between.’

The scene of Christ being lowered by helicopter onto St Peter’s Square was Fellini’s way of showing how the world is trying to lock Jesus away, confining him to within the walls of the Church.

He makes the point that if you remove Jesus from daily life, then spiritual decay will follow and hope will disappear.

So, what happens when hope does disappear? Let me tell you another story.

Before WWII, three famous Jewish psychiatrists lived in Vienna. They all spent years trying to understand human behaviour, to learn what makes people tick.

One was Sigmund Freud. He believed that the most basic drive in human beings is the desire for pleasure. He thought that everything we do in our lives is based on our need to feel good. In Fellini’s movie, that’s reflected in the image of the women sunbaking.

The second psychiatrist was Alfred Adler, who disagreed with Freud. He argued that what motivates people is the desire for power, the need to control things and to feel important.

The third man was Victor Frankl, who was younger than the other two. When the Nazis invaded Austria, Freud and Adler managed to escape. But Frankl was arrested and he spent four long years locked up in concentration camps, including Auschwitz and Belsen.

Victor Frankl

While he was there, Frankl noticed that those who survived weren’t the ones you’d expect. Very often those who were physically strong wasted away and died, while those who were much weaker managed to grow stronger and survived. Why?

Well, it wasn’t pleasure that kept them going. There was no pleasure in those horrid camps; it was all misery and murder. And it wasn’t power that kept them going, either, because the prisoners had no power. They were treated like animals.

What Frankl noticed was that the people who survived had hope. They never gave up their belief that life had meaning, despite everything that happened to them. They kept going.

In his film La Dolce Vita, Frederico Fellini had some serious comments to make about the shallow, self-indulgent secularism of our age. For it’s not the desire for pleasure that will sustain us, and it’s not the pursuit of power that will give us a better world.

What’s far more important is hope and meaning, and as Christians we know exactly where real hope and meaning are to be found. 

As Jesus tells us in our Gospel today, He is the Bread of Life that came down from heaven. Only Jesus has the power to satisfy our deepest hunger, our hunger for spiritual meaning. Only Jesus offers us hope for eternal life.

In Isaiah (55:2-3), the prophet asks, ‘Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread? Why do you labour for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me,’ he says, ‘and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.’ 

And what is this rich food that satisfies? It’s the Bread of Life. Jesus Christ. 

Whoever eats this bread will live forever.

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[i] See the opening scenes at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uo84caBoToQ

The Bread of Life

(Ex.16:2-4, 12-15; Eph.4:17, 20-24; Jn.6:24-35)

In 1995, someone set a world record by making a loaf of bread, from harvesting the wheat through to baking, in 8 minutes 13 seconds. That’s fast!

In biblical times, breadmaking took much longer. The typical housewife got up early before dawn to start grinding the flour by hand. Grinding 800 grams of flour took an hour, but if she had five or six people to feed, she would have had to spend three hours grinding.

In those days bread was an important part of the diet, much like today, but it always meant hard work. Ordinary families had to plough and sow, seed and hoe, reap and thresh, winnow and sift, grind and sift again, knead and moisten, light the fire and then bake. Only then could they have a piece to eat.

It’s not surprising, then, that bread became such an important symbol around the world. Today it’s an icon of nutrition, wealth and comfort, and breaking bread has become an important symbol of peace.

It’s also not surprising that Jesus added bread to the Lord’s Prayer. When the early Christians prayed ‘give us this day our daily bread’ (Mt.6:11), they didn’t just pray for a good harvest or for enough flour. They also prayed for the strength to keep making their own bread each day.

In John’s Gospel today, the crowds of people that Jesus had fed earlier go looking for Him. They want more of His bread, and we can understand why. It was nourishing, it was easy and it was free.

But Jesus thinks the time’s come to offer them something even more precious.  He says, ‘do not work for food that cannot last, but work for food that endures to eternal life, the kind of food the Son of Man is offering you’.

He invites them to look beyond their ordinary lives and to start focussing on more profound things. We’ve all been created by God to live with Him forever, and Jesus has come to show us what to do. 

All we need to do is believe in Him and follow His way, and eternal life will be ours. That’s why Jesus is called the Bread of Life.  

But the crowd doesn’t understand. They ask Jesus for a sign, and He tells them that the God who fed Moses and the Israelites in the desert all those years ago is the very same God who just fed the 5,000 on that hillside. 

Then He tells them straight: ‘I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.’

What Jesus is offering them isn’t just a full belly. Rather, He’s offering them the way to personal fulfilment. He’s offering them the answer to the riddle of life.

Many people in our world today regularly eat their fill and have all they need, but still feel ‘empty’ inside. They’re hungry for something more in their lives, but don’t know what to look for.

Some people think the answer is to focus on looking good and surrounding themselves with nice shiny things. They spend lots of time and money on their appearance; they’re obsessed with their image and possessions. But at the same time they’re ignoring their souls.

They’re ignoring God.

This is what Jesus is trying to teach us. He cares about physical hunger, but He cares even more about our spiritual hunger. He’s telling us that only He can satisfy our yearning for a life of peace, love, purpose and joy.

In our second reading today, St Paul says that if we accept the nourishment that Jesus offers us, our lives will be transformed. That’s when we’ll find that we’re no longer satisfied with full bellies and empty hearts and minds.

Paul encourages us to put aside our old lives, and instead put on a new self, nourished by the goodness, holiness and truth of Jesus Christ.

For He is the Bread of Life.

The kind of bread that Jesus offers us involves effort, but of a different kind. It means taking the time we need to develop a personal relationship with Him, by getting to know Him and allowing Him to nourish and transform us from the inside out.

When next you pray, ‘… Give us this day our daily bread,’ remember that Jesus is our daily bread. He is our Bread of Life, and He’s freely available to us all.

Please take as much as you need.