‘Rather, it is seen as the Lord’s most precious gift . . . and with it write a love story.’ (BXVI). Sunday Reflections, 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

 

Moses

Carlo Dolci [Web Gallery of Art]

Moses said to the people: “And now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the rules that I am teaching you, and do them, that you may live, and go in and take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers, is giving you." [First Reading].

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 (English Standard Version Anglicised: India)

Now when the Pharisees gathered to him, with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. (For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands, holding to the tradition of the elders, and when they come from the market-place, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels and dining couches.) And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?” And he said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written,

“‘This people honours me with their lips,
    but their heart is far from me;
 in vain do they worship me,
    teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’

You leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men.”

And he called the people to him again and said to them, “Hear me, all of you, and understand: There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him.

“For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

Still-Life of Kitchen Utensils

Cornelis Jacobsz Delff [Web Gallery of Art]

And there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups and pots and copper vessels . . . [Today's gospel].

This reminds me of all the rules and regulations that we have in our current Covid-19 world. I hope that they will not last long enough to become traditions. However, we cannot argue with the good sense of the Jewish traditions about washing utensils and washing hands before eating. 

Today's First Reading opens with these words: Moses said to the people: “And now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the rules that I am teaching you, and do them, that you may live . . . Moses is offering the Hebrew people life, life from God, through the commandments that God has given them through him, most basically the Ten Commandments. The people will have life if they observe them, even if on the face of it they are restrictive - Do not do this, do not do that.

In a homily he gave on the Solemnity of the Assumption in 2005 Pope Benedict echoed this: The fact that our first parents thought the contrary was the core of original sin. They feared that if God were too great, he would take something away from their life. They thought that they could set God aside to make room for themselves.

This was also the great temptation of the modern age, of the past three or four centuries. More and more people have thought and said: ‘But this God does not give us our freedom; with all his commandments, he restricts the space in our lives. So God has to disappear; we want to be autonomous and independent. Without this God we ourselves would be gods and do as we pleased’.

This was also the view of the Prodigal Son, who did not realize that he was ‘free’ precisely because he was in his father's house. He left for distant lands and squandered his estate. In the end, he realized that precisely because he had gone so far away from his father, instead of being free he had become a slave; he understood that only by returning home to his father's house would he be truly free, in the full beauty of life.

But human laws can become oppressive to the extent that people no longer experience the freedom that God's own law bring. That is what Jesus is addressing with the Pharisees and scribes questioning him. But Jesus wasn't questioning tradition or traditions as such, but those that had become oppressive.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church reminds us that our faith is based on Sacred Scripture and Tradition:

One common source

80 "Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture, then, are bound closely together, and communicate one with the other. For both of them, flowing out from the same divine well-spring, come together in some fashion to form one thing, and move towards the same goal."Each of them makes present and fruitful in the Church the mystery of Christ, who promised to remain with his own "always, to the close of the age".

. . . two distinct modes of transmission

81 "Sacred Scripture is the speech of God as it is put down in writing under the breath of the Holy Spirit."

"And [Holy] Tradition transmits in its entirety the Word of God which has been entrusted to the apostles by Christ the Lord and the Holy Spirit. It transmits it to the successors of the apostles so that, enlightened by the Spirit of truth, they may faithfully preserve, expound and spread it abroad by their preaching."

Tradition, with an upper-case 'T', is fundamental to our Catholic faith. But traditions, with a lower-case 't', can help us know and live our faith, can strengthen our sense of identity as a community of faith. Traditions too can give us a sense of identity as a family or a nation or any group to which we belong. Connected with traditions are symbols. National flags and anthems are examples. These help us to know who 'We' are. That doesn't mean being over and against others. When we are secure in our own communal identity we can honour and identify with other groups in theirs.

I am inclined to think that one of the reasons for the exodus from the Catholic Church and the rejection of the Christian faith itself in recent decades in the Western world is the abandonment of traditions and symbols by the Church after the Second Vatican Council (1962-65), none of them mandated by the Council. We abandoned the universal Friday abstinence from meat. We abandoned the Lenten fast. Catholics were encouraged to choose their own penances instead - Whatever you're having yourself, as we say in Ireland in a slightly different context. The communal aspect of traditions that had help bring the life of God himself to the Church for most of its existence was abandoned.

Eucharist in Fruit Wreath

Jan Davidsz de Heem [Web Gallery of Art]

Everyone used to kneel at the altar-rails to receive Holy Communion. Altar-rails were taken out of so many churches. I could go on. A 2019  study in the USA shows that only thirty percent of Catholics there believe that in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass the bread and wine become the 'body, blood, soul and divinity' of Christ. They see only symbols of Jesus Christ the Risen Lord in the Holy Eucharist. (The notes to the painting above touch on this).

This is not what the Tradition of the Church and Sacred Scripture teaches us. It was precisely on this issue that many of the disciples walked away from Jesus in last Sunday's gospel.

I'll conclude with the opening words of Pope Benedict's Angelus talk on 2 September 2012 when he spoke about today's readings, with my emphases: The theme of God’s Law, of his commandments, makes its entrance in the Liturgy of the Word this Sunday. It is an essential element of the Jewish and Christian religions, where the complete fulfilment of the law is love (cf. Rom 13:10). God’s Law is his word which guides men and women on the journey through life, brings them out of the slavery of selfishness and leads them into the “land” of true freedom and life. This is why the Law is not perceived as a burden or an oppressive restriction in the Bible. Rather, it is seen as the Lord’s most precious gift, the testimony of his fatherly love, of his desire to be close to his People, to be its Ally and with it write a love story.

Tradition from Fiddler on the Roof

Music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick

Sung by Topol, playing Tevye the Milkman

Based on stories by Sholem Aleichem.

This wonderful musical is set in a Jewish community living in a village in Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire in 1905.

And because of our traditions everyone knows who he is and what God expects him to do.

Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) 

Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost 

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 8-29-2021 if necessary).

Epistle: Galatians 5:16-24.  Gospel: Matthew 26-33.

Flowering Garden

Vincent van Gogh [Web Gallery of Art]

And for raiment why are you solicitous? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labour not, neither do they spin [Matthew 6:28],

Authentic Beauty

Authentic beauty, however, unlocks the yearning of the human heart, the profound desire to know, to love, to go towards the Other, to reach for the Beyond.

Kyrie (Missa Pange Lingua)

Setting by Josquin des Prez, sung by Siglo de Oro

Josquin des Prez died 500 years ago, on 27 August 1521.

The Kyrie (Lord, have mercy; Christ, have mercy; Lord, have mercy) is the only part of the Roman Catholic Mass in Greek. In the Traditional Latin Mass each line is sung / recited three times; in the New Mass twice.

'Taste and see that the Lord is good.' Sunday Reflections, 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

 

\

Scenes from the Life of Joshua

Italian Mosaic Artist [Web Gallery of Art]

Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel . . . “Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lorð” . . . Then the people answered, “Far be it from us that we should forsake the Lord to serve other gods”. [First Reading].

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel John 6:60-69 (English Standard Version Anglicised: India)

When many of his disciples heard it, they said,  “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offence at this?   Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?  It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.”

After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.  So Jesus said to the Twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”

 

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

My ordination day, 20 December 1967

With my parents John and Mary and my brother Paddy

My father, who was widowed in 1970, spent six weeks with me in the Philippines from mid-February to early April 1981. He spent most of that time in Tangub City, Misamis Occidental where I had been parish priest for a few months and from 1979 to 1981 was in charge of Paul VI Formation House, part of the seminary programme in the Diocese (now Archdiocese) of Ozamiz but serving the neighbouring dioceses also.

One evening, along with some parishioners, we went to visit a family who lived maybe 400 meters from the church and the formation house. When we were walking back later, at a slow, relaxed pace, someone remarked that my Dad and I were walking in exactly the same way, with our hands behind our backs. I had never noticed that before.

When I thought about it later, I realised that I must have learned that from Sunday morning walks when I was a child with Dad and my brother Paddy in the Phoenix Park, near where we lived in Dublin.

People's Gardens, Phoenix Park, Dublin

[Wikipedia; photo by Laurel Lodged]

The pond is knows to Dubliners as 'The Duck Pond' as there have always been ducks there along with some waterhens. On occasion, like countless other youngsters, I fed the ducks with bread.

My Dad often took me to soccer matches in Dalymount Park, about 20 minutes' walk from our home. This would be called 'bonding' today. But before I was of an age to attend football matches, when I was still a toddler, my Dad took me to Sunday Mass. My brother was a baby then and my mother would go to a later Mass. And on special days like Easter Monday and Whit (Pentecost) Monday Dad would take me to Solemn High Mass in the Dominican church or the Capuchin church. I didn't particularly appreciate that at the time, as I found those Masses very long. But I could see how important they were for Dad.

I also saw Dad go to early Mass every weekday morning before coming home to make his and my mother's breakfast. In the winter he would prepare the fireplace to be lit later in the day before cycling off to a long day's work on building (construction) sites. I was to join him on one of those during the summer before my ordination, when I was already a subdeacon. I saw there what I already knew, that he was a general foreman who respected the workers, never raised his voice to them and never swore, even though quite a lot of swearing went on. He led by example. And the workers deeply respected him, younger ones seeing in him a great mentor. 

The First Reading tells us that Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel put it to them to choose false gods or the God who had led them out of Egypt into the Promised Land. In the gospel we see Jesus challenging the Twelve Apostles after many of his disciples had walked away, unable to accept the teaching of Jesus: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day."

St Peter spoke on behalf of the Twelve: Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”

The Apostle Peter in Prison

Rembrandt [Web Gallery of Art]

The Hebrew people listening to Joshua accepted the One True God. They included many young children who would not have understood. But as they grew older they did and made their parents' choice for them their own. When I was a small child and my Dad took me to Sunday Mass I didn't understand very much but I was part of a believing community and as I grew older I made the choice my parents had made for me at baptism my own. The solemnity of the High Masses that Dad took me to has left a positive impact on me to this day even though at times the actual experience of what for me was a very long Mass wasn't entirely positive.

As I grew older I made my own choices in the faith I had received in baptism because of my parents' decision to raise me in the Catholic Christian faith. I knew what I was doing when I went to confession for the first time and made my First Holy Communion at the age of seven. I knew even more clearly what I was doing when I was confirmed at the age of ten, then the age for receiving that sacrament in Ireland. And when I entered the seminary at the age of 18 I knew I was preparing for a life-long decision. My parents had given me the example of their own faith and their faithfulness to one another in marriage, which St Paul speaks about so eloquently and deeply in the Second Reading, and left me free to make my own decisions for my Christian life.

In a homily on the Solemnity of the Assumption in 2005 Pope Benedict XVI said, This was also the great temptation of the modern age, of the past three or four centuries. More and more people have thought and said: ‘But this God does not give us our freedom; with all his commandments, he restricts the space in our lives. So God has to disappear; we want to be autonomous and independent. Without this God we ourselves would be gods and do as we pleased’.

Pope Benedict describes the contemporary Western world where God has to disappear, a world where each of us has to make the choice that Joshua asked of the Hebrews, that Jesus asked of the Apostles. We make this choice as individuals who are part of a believing community.

Benedict goes on to say, This was also the view of the Prodigal Son, who did not realize that he was ‘free’ precisely because he was in his father's house. He left for distant lands and squandered his estate. In the end, he realized that precisely because he had gone so far away from his father, instead of being free he had become a slave; he understood that only by returning home to his father's house would he be truly free, in the full beauty of life.

St Peter's choice and that of most of the Apostles led to their martyrdom, which they freely accepted. God doesn't ask that of most of us. He asks us to make daily choices in little things that come from our faith in Jesus Christ, God who became Man, the kind of choices I saw my parents make each day.

They and the many others like them whom I knew and who probably would not be able to articulate their faith in words were revealing to me where true freedom and authentic life lie. 

The response to the Responsorial Psalm today sums it up: Taste and see that the Lord is good.

Coronation of the Virgin

Blessed Fra Angelico [Web Gallery of Art]

Today is the the Memorial of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary but is not celebrated this year as it falls on a Sunday.

Ven y Reina, Madre de Dios

Come and Reign, Mother of God

Words and music by Jorge Álvarez

Towards the end of the song you will see the Sanctuary of the Immaculate Conception on San Cristóbal Hill, Santiago, Chile.

The video was produced by Canto Católico in Santiago, Chile.

Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) 

Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost 

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 8-22-2021 if necessary).

Epistle: Galatians 3:16-22.  Gospel: Luke 17:11-19.

Scenes of Jesus Healing

German Miniaturist, Codex Aureus Echternach

[Web Gallery of Art]

The bottom panel shows the incident in the gospel in this Sunday's Traditional Latin Mass.

Authentic Beauty

Authentic beauty, however, unlocks the yearning of the human heart, the profound desire to know, to love, to go towards the Other, to reach for the Beyond.

The Road Not Taken

Written and read by Robert Frost

Music by Chris Coleman

'Mary assumed into Heaven points out to us the final destination of our earthly pilgrimage.' Sunday Reflections, The Assumption

 

Assumption of the Virgin

Egid Quirin Asam [Web Gallery of Art]

This magnificent sculpture is over the High Altar in the Pilgrimage Church, Rohr, Bavaria, Germany.

The Solemnity of the Assumption

This takes the place of the Mass for the 20^th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B 

Vigil Mass

This Mass is used on the evening of 14 August, either before or after First Vespers (Evening Prayer) of the Solemnity. It fulfils our Sunday obligation.

 

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)

This page gives the readings for both the Vigil Mass and the Sunday Mass.

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel Luke 11:27-28 (English Standard Version Anglicised: India)

As Jesus said these things, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts at which you nursed!” But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

Mass celebrated on Sunday

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)

This page gives the readings for both the Vigil Mass and the Sunday Mass.

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel Luke 1:39-56 (English Standard Version Anglicised: India)

In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a town in Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, and she exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her from the Lord.”

And Mary said

“My soul magnifies the Lord,
     and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
    For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
    and holy is his name.
And his mercy is for those who fear him
    from generation to generation.

He has shown strength with his arm;
    he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
    and exalted those of humble estate;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
    and the rich he has sent away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel,
    in remembrance of his mercy,
as he spoke to our fathers,
    to Abraham and to his offspring for ever.”

And Mary remained with her about three months and returned to her home.

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

The Visitation

El Greco [Web Gallery of Art]

The Assumption is a feast that celebrates what we profess in the Nicene Creed, I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen. In the Apostles' Creed we pray, I believe in . . . the resurrection of the body and life everlasting. Amen. We rejoice in the fact that what we hope for at the end of time, the resurrection of our bodies in glory, has already happened to Mary.

It is very striking that the gospels for the Vigil Mass - Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts at which you nursed! – and for the Mass on the 15th are about the beginning of life, not the end of life. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, and she exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.  (Luke 1:41-44, ESVUK).  

Some years ago in the Philippines after celebrating Mass on the feast of the Visitation, when this same gospel is read, I gave a blessing to a girl in her late teens, unmarried and pregnant. She found it very difficult to accept the baby as her own. After I had blessed her and her baby she told me that she could feel the child moving in her womb and that she felt at peace with the situation.

The Second Readings in both Masses speak to us of the meaning of death for Christians: Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? (1 Corinthians 15:54-55, Vigil Mass) and But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. (1 Corinthians 15:20-21, Sunday Mass).

These readings and the Solemnity of the Assumption itself speak to us of the dignity of human life at its beginning and at its end. It speaks to a world that almost everywhere sees it as a ‘human right’ to destroy an unwanted human being in the womb. It speaks to a world that in more and more places sees it as a ‘human right’ to choose to end the lives of old people or persons, even children, with serious illnesses.

From the Angelus address of Pope Benedict in Castel Gandolfo, 15 August 2008:

Mary assumed into Heaven points out to us the final destination of our earthly pilgrimage. She reminds us that our whole being - spirit, soul and body - is destined for fullness of life; that those who live and die in love of God and of their neighbour will be transfigured in the image of the glorious Body of the Risen Christ; that the Lord will cast down the proud and exalt the humble (cf. Lk 1: 51-52). With the mystery of her Assumption Our Lady proclaims this eternally. May you be praised for ever, O Virgin Mary! Pray the Lord for us.

The Coronation of the Virgin

El Greco [Web Gallery of Art]

Beata viscera

Music by William Byrd, sung by Apollo5

Antiphona ad communionem  Communion Antiphon (Cf Luke 11:27)

Mass on the 15th

Beata viscera Maria Virginis quae portaverunt aeterni Patris Filium. (Alleluia).

Blessed is the womb of the Virgin Mary which bore the Son of the eternal Father. (Alleluia).

Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) 

The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary 

The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 8-8-2021 if necessary).

Lesson: Judith 13:22-25; 15:10.  Gospel: Luke 1:41-50.

The Virgin and Angels Singing the Magnificat

Jan Snellinck [Web Gallery of Art]

 Authentic Beauty

Authentic beauty, however, unlocks the yearning of the human heart, the profound desire to know, to love, to go towards the Other, to reach for the Beyond.

La Salve Rociera

Sung by El Coro Rociero de Vilvoorde, Belgium

I came across this by accident. It is a Spanish hymn in honour of the Blessed Mother. The lyrics, in Spanish and English, are here.

This was sung at the funeral of Queen Fabiola of Belgium on 12 December 2014. I take it that the choir consists of Spaniards living in Vilvoorde, Belgium, which has the oldest Carmelite monastery in the world and which I have visited. Some of the nuns there are from the Philippines. The hymn captures for me the joy I have often experienced at funerals, along with grief, because of the hope that our faith as Christians in the Resurrection gives us. The Assumption reinforces that hope. The hymn also expresses something of the warmth of the faith that Spain bequeathed to its former colonies and that I experienced in the Philippines, especially a tender love for our Blessed Mother. 

The hymn, especially as sung here, is another example of something that is part of the local identity of a people, in this case Spaniards, and, because of that, is something that all who have a strong sense of their own personal and communal identity can identify with.

Queen Fabiola was Spanish. She and her husband King Baudouin, who died in 1993, were devout Catholics with a great devotion to Our Lady. They became officially engaged on a pilgrimage to Lourdes. While Baudouin was alive they were known as the King and Queen of the Belgians. Those titles passed on to Baudouin's brother Albert, who succeeded him, and to Albert's wife Paola. Fabiola then acquired the title Queen of Belgium.

The Virgin of El Rocío - La Virgen del Rocío

Almonte, Huelva, Spain

[Wikipedia; photo by Martius]