As long as it is day

(To the Sources)

‘… As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me.…’ (John 9:4)

From John 9:1-49 (Year A: Lent 4)

Talk of night, day, light, darkness, seeing, blindness, etc are common in the Gospel of John. The reader has to think, read and pray behind the surface of what is being said.  A slice of 49 verses from the 9^th Chapter for this Sunday reading would be challenging for someone like a reporter or blogger. The Chapter reads like a running argument involving a blind man, a Prophet/Healer, the religious authorities, the family of the blind man and a crowd of bystanders thrown in. An executive summary might run like:

• God reigns
• People matter
• Faith works

And there we have it. 

Except that the story carries implications for us now. ‘As long as it is day’ suggests two things: today is the only certainty we have and our opportunity to walk in the light any day including tomorrow is therefore time bound.  Sometimes, religious folks worry about the ‘day after today’ as in ‘life after death’. They might be advised to take Jesus’s example and attend to ‘life before death’ and live in the Light that Jesus lives by. That way death will lead to life, blindness to sight and the ‘night will be as clear as the day’.

In the imitation

(To the Sources)

‘… Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman.…’ (John 4:27)

From John 4:5-42 (Year A: Lent 3)

Talking to people who are very different by reason of background, orientation, status or outlook in life says something about us. Not infrequently to be seen talking and associating with the wrong people – people do not belong to ‘us’ or who come from the opposite or even enemy side in whatever stance, struggle or contestation ‘we’ are part of – attracts negative comment. Taken to its extreme expulsion or marginalisation may be the price of ‘talking to the other side’.

The unfortunate aspect of many human associations and belongings is that such belonging can be exclusive, excluding and sectarian. We are right; they are wrong. Justice and truth is on our side; wickedness, folly and betrayal is on the other, so it goes.

For Jesus, a Jew, to associate with a woman, a Samaritan was a big No, No in the Palestine of his day. Even today, many who claim to follow Jesus operate like as if they are part of a doctrinally pure, liturgically valid-only and error-excluding self-contained island. The One True Island with the drawbridges pulled up and everyone safe and cosy on the inside.  Sharing the Table of our Master’s Word let alone his Bread is seen as betrayal of first principles. One must ask what principles and whose principles?

In that famous spiritual classic much loved by generations over the centuries it is written ‘I am the worst of all sinners’ as in the first letter of St Timothy (1:15).  Perhaps a ruthlessly honest appraisal of where one is at is the best antidote to sectarianism, superiority, presumption and exclusion.

We would do well to aim to live by the Wesleyian maxim of ‘friends of all; enemies of none’ even if it is not possible to fulfil this at all times and with all peoples. It is worth the try.

Nuair a ghlaonn Dia / When God calls

‘Ach iad siúd, d'imigh siad leo agus chraobhscaoil siad i ngach áit, agus chabhraigh an Tiarna leo ag neartú an bhriathair leis na comharthaí a lean é’ (Marcas 16:20)

‘Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it.’ (Mark 16:20)

ó Mharcas 16:15-20 (Bliain A: Lá le Pádraig)

from Mark 16:15-20 (Year A: St Patrick)

Léitear an sliocht seo ag deireadh soiscéil Naomh Marcas. Uaireanta bíonn faitíos orainn glacadh le cuireadh Dé. An mbeidh neart agam é a chomhlíonadh? Cad a cheapfaidh daoine eile?  B’Fhéidir nach bhfuil Dia ag glaoch orm? Tá mé ró-óg. Nó tá mé ró-aosta.

Ach nuair a ghlaonn Dia tugann sé an grásta dúinn é a dhéanamh.

Cuirtear tús le Faoistin Naomh Pádraig mar seo

‘Ego Patricius, peccator rusticissimus et minimus omnium fidelium et contemptibilis sum apud plurimos’.

‘Mise Pádraig, peacach ró-thuatach, an té is lú de na fíréin go léir agus an té is lú a bhfuil meas ag a lán air’

This passage of today’s Gospel is the very end of the Gospel of St Mark. Sometimes we are afraid to catch hold of God’s call. Will I have enough stamina to fulfil it? What will peole think? May be God is not calling me? I am too young. I am too old.

But when God calls he give us the grace to do it.

The Confession of St Patrick begins thus:

‘I am Patrick, a sinner, most unlearned, the least of all the faithful, and utterly despised by many…..’

Watch/listen to Liam O’Flynn playing ‘The Bridge’ from ‘The Piper’s Call’

The Vision Thing

(To the Sources)

‘…Don’t tell anyone what you have seen, until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.…’ (Matthew 17:9)

From Matthew 17:1-9 (Year A: Lent 2)

Frequently in the middle of a tense thrilling film there is a lighter episode characterised by relief from the drama.  Visions, clouds, appearances, voices and joy mixed with fear appear in this story of the ‘Transfiguration’. The account varies a little bit across the synoptic gospels. The key element of the story are there including the natural follow-up (or preceding part in Luke) which is not inserted into this Sunday’s reading - namely that Jesus must suffer

God knows we need relief at times from the journey not least when we know major challenges lie ahead – be it pending surgery and other matters or just the business of growing old year by year and drawing closer to ageing, sickness and death – three things we can be certain about in life.

But if we are certain about these three things we can be encouraged and empowered by three other things: trust, hope and love. These make all the difference to us as disciples on the mountain with others, in a cloud, anxious at times but surprised by joy in the presence of someone greater than our worries, uncertainties and horizons.  The disciples may not have seen too far that day with the cloud (mist?) on the mountain. It might have been like climbing Croagh Patrick to find mist and rain at the top and not a sight of Clew Bay.  However, they are the presence of mind to suggest erecting three tents (one for Moses, one for Elijah and one for Jesus).

Perhaps we could think of these three tents as being for (1) Peace (2) Contentedness and (3) Freedom. Who doesn’t want these things deep down – for themselves and their others?  

This is the Vision Thing. Keep moving towards it.

Until we meet again

Words of appreciation for my mother who died on 7th March 2014 (abridged)

‘I am going to prepare a place for you – I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am’ (John 14.3)

These words spoken by Jesus in the 14^th chapter of the Gospel of St John read earlier could also be put into the words of my mother.  She could be saying this to each one of us ‘I am going to prepare a place for you …’.

Hospitality, kindness, warmth, wisdom, tact, patience and wit are all words we could associate with her as we knew her over her long life.

If I could sum up what it was like to know my mother, to talk with her and listen to her – I would say that

she would put you at ease.

In other words, she was a person of peace. I think that this was so for three mutually-reinforcing reasons:

• 1.      She lived at peace with herself;
• 2.      She lived at peace with others; and
• 3.      And above all she lived at peace with God to whom she has now returned in a special way.

Another way of describing her was provided by my late grand uncle who once told her, in jest, that she was ‘disgustingly cheerful in the mornings’.

The song by Marty Haugen ‘Dona Nobis Pacem’ from the album ‘The Silence and the Song’ is for me, significant.  I will read out the words because every word and every sentence I am going to speak tells of particular moments or enduring traits evident in my mother’s life.

Peace be yours when dawn is breaking.

Peace be yours when shadow fall

May your restless heart be cradled in the One who holds us all

Peace when storms surround and shake you

Peace through wind and hail

Know that God will not forsake you though your heart and spirit fail.

Peace be yours through pain and sadness

Peace when hope seems at an end.

May the God of Joy and Gladness

God’s own peace be ever with you

May your spirit dwell in mine till the Day beyond tomorrow

Till the dawn beyond all mind

And therefore it is time to move along but not to say farewell but rather

‘Until we meet again’

A subtle temptation

‘…Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.…’ (Matthew 4:4)

From Matthew 4:1-11 (Year A: Lent 1)

This is one of those challenging passages in the Gospels. Why would the (Holy) Spirit lead anyone into a place where they would be tempted? It seems to read as being led into temptation (‘to be tempted’) – reversing the petition towards the end of the ‘Our ‘Father’ prayer.

The reality is that temptation is a constant feature of our lives. If God did not want us to be susceptible to temptation then there would be no scope for growth, conquest, trust, surrender.  The sources of temptation are many and varied. They are not necessarily of the fleshly type. They can be subtle, insidious and out of sight. None so blind spiritually as those who are already blind but think they can see something.

The area of employment or career is one such subtle temptation. Here is what Thomas Merton wrote:

You are probably striving to build yourself an identity in your work, out of your work and your witness. You are using it, so to speak, to protect yourself against nothingness, annihilation. That is not the right use of your work. All the good that you will do will come not from you but from the fact that you have allowed yourself, in the obedience of faith, to be used by God's love. Think of this more, and gradually you will be free from the need to prove yourself, and you can be more open to the power that will work through you without your knowing it.

From a letter written by Thomas Merton to Jim Forest dated February 21,1966. The full text of this letter is published in The Hidden Ground of Love: Letters by Thomas Merton edited by William Shannon, published by Farrar, Straus, Giroux. 

Put oil on your head

(To the Sources)

‘…But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting.…’ (Matthew 6:17-18)

From Matthew 6:1-19 (Year A: Ash Wednesday)

It’s that time of year again. The triple initiative of prayer, fasting and almsgiving is not unique to Christianity. Most religions facilitate times of special dedication, purification, discipline.  The Christian expression of such time is linked to the death and resurrection of the One who was tempted, tried, pursued, brought down and … lifted up.

In the Gospel of the day the traditional order: prayer, fasting and almsgiving is reversed by Matthew. It is almsgiving first and then prayer and fasting.  Following on from the sermon on the mount we are reminded that acts of discipline and self-denial always start in relationships to others and end there. Everything has a social as well as a divine purpose. Otherwise prayer and fasting become exercises in spiritual self-indulgence with no content.

We do well to remember that giving time and effort to prayer, fasting and almsgiving is a mark of choice and of privilege. Many in the world this day have no such choice because they are starving or because to engage in a public expression of their faith will invite persecution.

The key to Lent is love – a positive care for others and for the creation with which we are gifted. The world waits for good news – not long faces and an outward show or false piety but joy, love and service.  Let this lent be a time of renewal for everyone – above all those who await hope and meaning.  Let each one begin every day anew with:

A joyful heart;

A clear conscience;

A quiet mind; and

A firm resolve

Embrace the only reality

‘…Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.…’ (Matthew 6:34)

From Matthew 6:24-34 (Year A: Lent -1)

A child plays on the sand making castles. She is completely absorbed in the pleasure of task. The past is not relevant. The future is not there. Just now.  That child is you, me, us.  Now we see the child as an adult – racked by the past and the future and everything besides. Unable to focus properly, to listen, to receive, to give.

To live the present moment is to live in that moment in freedom and G.R.A.C.E – Grounded, Relaxed, Attentive, Centered and Enthusiastic. Self-mastery is the fruit of living thus.  But, worry can never be exorcised – at least not entirely.  Only trust in a better future, in a noble purpose and in a higher Being can carry me along. In this way, the past is healed, restored and transformed in the here and now.  The future is created only in the present moment. The present moment is the sacrament of God’s loving presence. No need to travel far, to undertake onerous spiritual exercises, to engage in many prayers, to strive and strive again. Rather, see, taste, breathe, hear, touch the present moment.  There God meets us – really.