I believe in angels

 ‘…I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven’ (Matthew 18:10)

Matthew 18:10-14 (Year A: St Michael the Archangel)

 I believe in angels – the human kind that does not have wings but  has kind voices, kind eyes, kind hearts, who appear out of the blue and disappear, who provide the right word at the right time and no more, who are present in the heat of battle and in the darkest hours. These types of angels are one in a thousand – may be one in 10,000. But they exist. I have met them on my journey. And who knows may be they signal the presence of other invisible spirits whom we call angels?

And we are called to be like messengers (angels) on the path of life to others – bringing healing of God (Rapha-el) and strength of God (Gabri-el) in moments of trial and great difficulty for others. In this way we are like the compassionate God (Micha-el).

Knowing our ground

 ‘…And who gave you this authority?’’ (Matthew 21:23)

Matthew 21:23-27 (Year A: Trinity+15)

In Ireland viewers of a late-night TV show are familiar with political controversy. It is a form of entertainment (and sometimes enlightenment). Typically, the interviewer exposes one of the interviewees (not infrequently a senior politician or some such person). The style is confrontational.

Being questioned about our beliefs and actions can sometimes be challenging.  From the banal every-day to the occasional moment of serious exchange on big ideas and profound beliefs we may encounter a certain degree of puzzlement – even hostility and derision. This is natural. We should never take ourselves and others that seriously.  In any case, there is always some ray of truth and learning in the other brought out in conversation.

But, this is not the point of today’s story in the Gospel of Matthew.  Jesus is getting a grilling by the religious authorities of his time. They want to know – they demand to know – on what authority he says and does what he says and does.  Jesus outsmarts them by throwing the question back – knowing well their lack of integrity and manipulative purpose. Throughout the entire gospel stories is a constant – the self-confidence of Jesus. Whether as a child in the temple taking and answering questions on weighty matters or in the heat of polemical discourse with ‘the chief priests and the elders of the people’ Jesus displays complete confidence in his mission and in his message. 

We, too, can take a leaf from this.  Notwithstanding our own uncertainties as well as our petty and not so petty betrayals we need to stand on firm ground. This is the ground of our truth, our knowing and our experience.  In harmony with that truth that embraces all human experience we can stand without shame or without the need to constantly justify ourselves to human authorities.

‘Know thyself’ is  wise and essential starting point for any mission.

Turning our sense of fairness upside down

 ‘…So the last will be first, and the first will be last’ (Matthew 20:16)

Matthew 20:1-16 (Year A: Trinity+14)

In the story of the vineyard we encounter a strange paradox. Expressed in contemporary language the metaphor involves a casual labour scheme where workers are hired at different wage rates: those arriving late get a significantly higher hourly rate and the same daily rate as those who started early in the day. A recipe for industrial strife, surely, if ever there was! 

And what sort of employer would give away part of his profits to pay one particular group of workers a higher wage rate for no reason than they arrived late. Rewarding indolence and encouraging conflict among the other workers? Not to be taken or applied in the workplace today, such a story was meant for a purpose – to shock and even scandalise the listeners. God’s rules of fairness, forgiveness and priority are not always aligned with our rules and norms.  Going after one sheep while 99 are left on the hillside is not what might be regarded as an efficient use of management time. Putting on a party to celebrate the return of a shrewd prodigal son is not exactly a motivator for the son who has been loyal and well behaved all those years. Forgiving a thief and admitting to heaven at the last hour without insisting on a lengthy prison sentence seems unfair to those who have gone the penal route.

Based on a theology of God as the Chief Accountant and Law Enforcer, human theories of divine justice and retribution speak of merit, reward and punishment. Merit, according to this school of thinking is based on an accumulation of virtuous actions and prayers. A net debit or a net credit is logged at the end of the earthly journey. The remaining debt is addressed in a theologically necessary purgatory from which debt relief and write-down is achieved (even counted in a precise number of ‘day’s although the temporality of a post-time state is challenging).

The metaphor of the vineyard in the 20^th Chapter of Matthew along with other parables turns this notion of the Chief Accountant God on its head. Moreover, it seriously challenges ‘normal’ human rules and expectations. It brings the listener back to the very idea of God as unlimited, unconditional love who invites us and gifts that love on each of us. In that sense and in the sense that Saint Augustine applied it we can say shamelessly:

• Christ alone
• Grace alone
• Trust alone

Because ultimately we do not stand on our own efforts and merit.

Against the tide

 ‘…forgive your brother or sister from your heart’ (Matthew 18:35)

Matthew 18:21-35 (Year A: Trinity+13)

• Which is easiest:
• Giving up your life for something or someone?
• Praying, fasting and doing good to everyone?
• Facing martyrdom (not uncommon these days in many parts of the world)?

Actually one of the hardest sayings of the Gospel is the call to ‘forgive your brother or sister from your heart’ (Matt 18:35). This calls for something completely radical and, fairly unique in terms of religious practice and general world outlook: to forgive those who hurt us, harm us and continue to harm us. To forgive not just once but again and again. This type of radicalism is sometimes seen as weakness, submission, even collaboration with evil. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Forgiveness does not come easily or naturally. Yet, the witness of many people over the ages stands. Forgiveness engenders healing in ourselves as well as, potentially, others.  It engenders a positive outlook and a positive pattern of behaviour.

Christ has set a high example.

Lifting up from the earth

‘… And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself’ (John 12:32)

John 3:20-35 (Year A: Exaltation of the Holy Cross)

Here there is a focus on the Cross as the central mystery and saving grace of people in the world. We are said to stand under ‘condemnation’. However, Christ by giving himself up to death on the cross ‘took the hit’ for us. By faith in his dying and rising we are said to be ‘justified’. Through faith and good works (here it can get a little contentious) we are said to be ‘sanctified’ or made whole. 

-  Faith works

-  God reigns
-  People matter

A famous French theologian and anthropologist, René Girard, once wrote in relation to the role of victimhood and rivalry between different groups:

[the victim] ‘is a substitute for all the members of the community, offered up by the members themselves. The sacrifice serves to protect the entire community from its own violence; it prompts the entire community to choose victims outside itself'.

Violence lurks in many parts of the ancient scriptures of various peoples. The Bible is no exception. It reflects the state of development and historical understanding of people. Violence is the means to assert control over a territory and its fruits. The ‘chosen’ ones believe themselves called to vanquish the others who are standing in the way of one’s own people. The quest to conquer and control is also bound up with a sense of moral mission to restore what is right, to uphold what is good and to suppress what is evil – all defined and understood from the point of view of those who contend. Tragically, history is written on tablets of violence and control. Open the newspaper any day or review the history of our own part of the world to see this.

The positive news is that the in the mystery of the cross we are lifted up and brought together. The Greek expression for this feast day is ‘Raising Aloft of the Precious and Life-Giving Cross’

Enmity has been broken down a new way has opened up. A sign of such potential is in the ‘Peace Process’ in Northern Ireland. Never finished, never perfect, always fragile and sometimes seriously set back, the Process goes forward in this land of complex social, religious and ethnic identity and memory.  The scandal of the cross is just that – innocence crucified, defenceless but ultimately victorious in overcoming division.

[A cross by the 'Peace Line' in Belfast, Northern Ireland]

Trusting in the only one when all else fails

 ‘…Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfil his promises to her’ (Luke 1:45)

Luke 1:39-45 (8 September Year A: Birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary)

Trust is like glass – so easy to shatter in one instance and so difficult if not impossible to re-assemble. Trust is a sense that someone will deliver on their word – that someone will do the decent thing, the right thing. Trust is fragile. It is often broken and, tragically, some born into an environment where trust is very limited.  How to trust in these circumstances? Strictly speaking the holy scriptures do not advise the reader to trust others (but rather to love them even when they hurt and harm us). It tends to be silent on the question of trusting others. Sometimes, we are encouraged not to place our trust in ‘princes’ and the powers of this world. But, we are invited to trust in a higher power and love. This was the rock foundation of Mary’s life.

Today, Christians in many traditions including some of the reformed churches celebrate the birth of our sister in faith Mary the mother of Jesus and the theotokos – literally the ‘God-bearer’, ‘the Birth-Giver of God’ or ‘the one who gives birth to God’ in English from the Greek. In many places it is simply translated as ‘Mother of God’. In the Gaelic language the name of Mary, mother of Jesus (Muire), is treated differently to the name Mary (Máire). Muire is uniquely so as Máire is Mary for others.  Whatever the traditional appellation or the source of today’s feast celebrating her birth, the figure of Mariam, Muire, Mary is an important one in the Christian story over the centuries.  Mary is also found in the Koran where the people of that Book venerate her as they do Jesus (as a prophet). Some years ago the Economist ran a story on Mary with the cover showing an icon (an unlikely place to find such an icon ?). 

If Mary lived a trusting attitude throughout her life and thereby was open to a divine plan, a divine adventure than perhaps in today’s world we can see in Mary the model of someone who stands near very different people encouraging, watching, praying and listening? A sign of hope and trust in a broken world. Let us follow in this way and be born again on this birth day.

Subversive gatherings

 ‘…For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.’ (Matthew 18:20)

Matthew 18:15-20 (Year A: Trinity+12)

This passage complements Matthew 16:13-20 (‘Who am I for you - Joining up the dots’).  Whereas the ‘binding’ and the ‘loosing’ in heaven as on earth refers to Peter as ‘primus inter pares’ (first among equals) the same ‘binding’ and ‘loosing’ applies to where ‘two or three gather in my name’.  The ‘primus’ and the ‘inter pares’ need to be in balance. At times over the last two millennia the balance has swung too far to one pole or the other.  However, the earth is balanced on two poles – not one.

Potentially, the gathering of two or three in his name is subversive and disruptive because where Jesus is so also the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit can gently wreck havoc on the best laid plans, assumptions and imposed structures. It is a gathering/ekklesia/church literally without walls. But, we need walls and structures, too, provided they don’t keep people out or keep people stuck in all the time.

If we were more conscious of the presence of Jesus ‘where two or three gather’ in his name we might review some of our attitudes and dispositions in daily life.  It comes back to daily living. Ecumenism in high places requires a change of attitude and heart at the local and specific levels where ‘two or three gather’ in his name whether for prayer, work, joint action, simple conversation or silence. At the end of our lives we might catch a momentary glimpse of situations where  God was present where two or three were gathered and we didn’t quite realise it at the time. And didn’t our hearts burn within us when he talked with us and when he opened the scriptures to us (Luke 24:32).