Since we are travellers and pilgrims in the world, let us ever ponder on the end of the road, that is of our life, for the end of our roadway is our home (St Columban, 8th sermon).
Showing posts with label Francesco Mochi. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Francesco Mochi. Show all posts
GospelLuke 3:15-16, 21-22 (English Standard
Version, Anglicised)
At that time: As the people were filled with
expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether
he might be the Christ, John answered them all, saying, ‘I baptise you with
water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am
not worthy to untie. He will baptise you with the Holy Spirit and fire.’
Now when all
the people were baptised by John the Baptist and when Jesus also had been
baptised and was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit
descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven,
‘You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.’
This is the beginning of the First Reading of today's Mass (Isaiah 40:1-3). The translation is that of the Authorized (King James) Version, used by Handel.
Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.
The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
With this Sunday following the Epiphany the Christmas Season draws to a close: the time of light, the light of Christ who appears, like the new sun on the horizon of humanity, dispelling the shadows of evil and ignorance. We celebrate today the Feast of the Baptism of Jesus: that Child, Son of the Virgin, whom we contemplated in the mystery of his Birth. We behold him today as an adult immersing himself in the waters of the River Jordan and thereby sanctifying all water and the whole world, as the Eastern Tradition stresses. But why did Jesus, in whom there is no shadow of sin, go to be baptized by John? Why did he perform that gesture of penitence and conversion, beside all those people who in this way were trying to prepare for the coming of the Messiah?
That gesture — which marks the start of Christ’s public life — comes in continuity with the Incarnation, the descent of God from the highest heaven into the abyss of hell. The meaning of this movement of divine lowering is expressed in a single word: love, the very name of God. The Apostle John writes: “In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him”, and he sent him “to be the expiation for our sins” (1 Jn 4:9-10). That is why the first public act of Jesus was to receive baptism from John, who, seeing him approaching, said: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (Jn 1:29).
Luke the Evangelist recounts that while Jesus, having received baptism, “was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form, as a dove, and a voice came from heaven, ‘Thou art my beloved Son; with thee I am well pleased’” (3:21-22). This Jesus is the Son of God who is totally immersed in the will of the Father’s love. This Jesus is the One who will die on the cross and rise again through the power of the same Spirit who now descends upon him and consecrates him. This Jesus is the new man who wills to live as the son of God, that is, in love; the man who in the face of the evil of the world, by choosing the path of humility and responsibility he chooses not to save himself but to offer his own life for truth and justice.
Being Christian means living like this, but this kind of life involves a rebirth: to be reborn from on high, from God, from Grace. This rebirth is the Baptism, which Christ gives to the Church in order to regenerate men and women to new life. An ancient text attributed to St Hippolytus states: “Whoever goes down into these waters of rebirth with faith renounces the devil and pledges himself to Christ. He repudiates the enemy and confesses that Christ is God, throws off his servitude, and is raised to filial status” Discourse on the Epiphany, 10: PG 10, 862).
Following tradition, this morning I had the joy of baptizing a large group of infants who were born in the past three or four months. At this moment, I would like to extend my prayers and my blessing to all newborn babes; but above all I would like to invite you all to remember your own Baptism, the spiritual rebirth that opened the way to eternal life to us. May every Christian, in this Year of Faith, rediscover the beauty of being reborn from on high, from the love of God, and live as a child of God.
Sistine Chapel, 13 January 2013
Traditional Latin Mass
The Epiphany of the Lord
The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 01-12-2025 if necessary).
GospelJohn11:1-45 [11:3-7,17, 20-27,
33b-45] (English
Standard Version Anglicised: India)
Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the
village of Mary and her sister Martha.It was Mary who anointed the
Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was
ill.So the sisters sent to him, saying,
“Lord, he whom you love is ill.”But when
Jesus heard it he said, “This illness does not lead
to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be
glorified through it.”
Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two
days longer in the place where he was.Then after this he said to the
disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.”The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now
seeking to stone you, and are you going there again?”Jesus answered, “Are
there not twelve hours in the day? If anyone walks in the day, he does not
stumble, because he sees the light of this world.But if
anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.”After saying these things, he said to them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him.”The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will
recover.”Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but
they thought that he meant taking rest in sleep.Then
Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died,and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may
believe. But let us go to him.”So Thomas, called
the Twin, said
to his fellow disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”
Now when Jesus came, he found that Lazarus had already been in the
tomb four days.Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles off,and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console
them concerning their brother.So when Martha
heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, but Mary remained seated in
the house.Martha said to Jesus,
“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will
give you.”Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”Martha
said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the
last day.”Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in
me, though he die, yet shall he live,and
everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe
this?”She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe
that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the
world.”
When she had said this, she went and called her sister Mary,
saying in private, “The Teacher is here and is calling for you.”And when she heard it, she rose
quickly and went to him.Now Jesus had not yet
come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met him.When the Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her,
saw Mary rise quickly and go out, they followed her, supposing that she was
going to the tomb to weep there.Now when Mary
came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to
him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also
weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled.And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.”Jesus wept.So the Jews said,
“See how he loved him!”But some of them
said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have
kept this man from dying?”
Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It
was a cave, and a stone lay against it.Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the
sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, by this time there will be an
odour, for he has been dead four days.”Jesus
said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you
believed you would see the glory of God?”So
they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me.I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of
the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me.”When he had said these things, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out.”The man who had
died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his
face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind
him, and let him go.”
Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary
and had seen what he did, believed in him.
Shorter form John 11:3-7, 17, 20-27,
33b-45(New American Bible)
The sisters of Lazarus sent word to Jesus,
saying, “Master, the one you love is ill.” When Jesus heard this he said, “This
illness is not to end in death, but is for the glory of God, that the
Son of God may be glorified through it.” Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister
and Lazarus. So when he heard that he was ill, he remained for two days in
the place where he was. Then after this he said to his disciples, "Let us go back to
Judea.”
When Jesus arrived, he found that
Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. When Martha heard that
Jesus was coming, she went to meet him; but Mary sat at home. Martha said
to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.” Jesus
said to her, “Your brother will rise.” Martha said, “I know he will rise in the
resurrection on the last day.” Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the
life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and
everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She
said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world.”
He became perturbed and deeply troubled, and
said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Sir, come and see.” And
Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him. ”But some of them
said, “Could not the one who opened the eyes of the blind man have
done something so that this man would not have died?”
So Jesus, perturbed again, came to the tomb. It
was a cave, and a stone lay across it. Jesus
said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the dead man’s sister, said to him, “Lord,
by now there will be a stench; he has been dead for four days.” Jesus said
to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believe you will see the glory of
God?” So they took away the stone.
And Jesus raised his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you for hearing me. I
know that you always hear me; but because of the crowd here I have said
this, that they may believe that you sent me. ”And when he had said this, He
cried out in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, tied
hand and foot with burial bands, and his face was wrapped in a cloth. So
Jesus said to them, “Untie him and let him go.”
Now many of the Jews who had come to Mary and
seen what he had done began to believe in him.
On Christmas Eve I met a friendly young Irishman working as a security guard in a Dublin hospital. He told me that he believed in Egyptian gods. I was somewhat taken aback as I had never met anyone before with such beliefs. Our conversation was very brief. Later, as so often happens, I thought of what might have been a helpful question: Which of those gods died for you?
In today's gospel we read: Jesus said to her, “Your brother will
rise.” Martha said, “I know he will rise in the resurrection on the last day.”
Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in
me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me
will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come
to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into
the world.”
So often I
have heard people, usually Catholics, say something along these lines: We're
all on the same road and we all believe in the same God. Not true. Jesus
says very clearly to Martha, I am the resurrection and the life. It
is only through Jesus Christ that we can attain heaven. Jesus teaches this to
us again in John 14:5-6, Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How
can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way,
and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except
through me.
In this incident Jesus is drawing his disciples - and us - to faith in him. He says that explicitly to them before they go to Bethany: Lazarus has died,and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe. He also draws Martha into her wonderful expression of faith: Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world. This is before he raises her brother Lazarus from the dead. Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him.
That faith in Jesus Christ is also faith in our bodily resurrection at the end of time. When we pray the Nicene Creed at Mass on Sundays and solemnities we pray, I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. We say the same thing if we pray the Apostle's Creed instead of the Nicene Creed, I believe in . . . the resurrection of the body and life everlasting.
Commenting on today's gospel in his Angelus talk on 9 March 2008, Pope Benedict XVI said, Christ's heart is divine-human: in him God and man meet perfectly, without separation and without confusion. He is the image, or rather, the incarnation of God who is love, mercy, paternal and maternal tenderness, of God who is Life.
Drawing our attention to Martha's expression of faith, Pope Benedict says, It is a question that Jesus addresses to each one of us: a question that certainly rises above us, rises above our capacity to understand, and it asks us to entrust ourselves to him as he entrusted himself to the Father. Martha's response is exemplary: 'Yes, Lord, I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world' (Jn 11: 27). Yes, O Lord! We also believe, notwithstanding our doubts and darkness; we believe in you because you have the words of eternal life. We want to believe in you, who give us a trustworthy hope of life beyond life, of authentic and full life in your Kingdom of light and peace.
May that too become the prayer of the young man I met at the hospital in Dublin on Christmas Eve and others like him.
I am the Resurrection
and the Life
Karen Davis with Steve Carpenter
Traditional Latin Mass
Passion Sunday
The Complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 03-26-2023 if necessary).
Note: In the New American Bible (NAB) lectionary you will find an alternative First Reading, Responsorial Psalm and Second Reading that may be used in Year C. The Jerusalem Bible version above gives only only what the NAB gives as alternative readings and psalm. The Gospel below is always read in Year C.
GospelLuke3:15-16, 21-22(Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition)
As the people were
filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning
John, whether he might be the Christ, John
answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is
mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to
untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.
Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been
baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy
Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from
heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”
This is the beginning of the alternative First Reading of today's Mass (Isaiah 40:1-3). The translation is that of the Authorized (King James) Version, used by Handel.
Comfort ye,
comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry
unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.
The voice of him
that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
The Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.
At our baptism the Father spoke the same words to each of us, his beloved sons and daughters. At Mass yesterday, Saturday, these powerful words of St John were read: In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins (1 John 4:9-10).
At our baptism, as at the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan the love of God was made manifest among us. What greater assurance can we have of God's love? In 1984 a young person in Belgium full of anger towards everything connected with religion wrote a letter to an older person, a layman, expressing his feelings. The older man replied, in part:
When I was still a teenager, I discovered that God, in the person of Jesus, loved us and loved me with a love that is foolish, but very real. He suffered the most excruciating torture in order to save us, to save me, to save each one of us personally from the grip of evil, and to enable us to share, if we so will, in his divine life. That, if we accept him, his Father will become our Father, my Father. That Mary, his mother, will also become my mother, our mother. From that day on my life changed. By that I mean my way of looking at things, because I'm afraid I'm still the same poor chap, with the same faults as before. But my weaknesses don't discourage me any longer: on the contrary, they provide me with a reason for trusting totally in the all-powerful strength of my Father who is also your Father.
The ‘same poor chap’ who wrote that letter was the late King Baudouin of the Belgians who died suddenly in 1993. In it he was taking to heart the words of the First Letter of St John: In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
And in recognising that he himself is still the same poor chap he is acknowledging that Jesus is not ashamed of him, no more than Jesus was ashamed of the sinners he lined up with to be baptized by John, even if he himself was utterly sinless.
King Baudouin wasn't ashamed of his subjects or of those who came to his country from elsewhere. The London newspaper, The Independent, carried an astonishing story about his funeral (I've highlighted some parts): A former prostitute paid an emotional homage to King Baudouin at the funeral Mass. One of a handful of people chosen to deliver orations, Luz, a Filipino, praised the King for his fight against the international sex trade. She stood in silence as a writer, Chris de Stoop, read aloud the words she had written. She had met the King when he paid a highly-publicised visit to a brothel in Antwerp, and De Stoop said both the King and Queen had wanted her to address the funeral. This was her homage:
Now my friend passed away, who else can help us? I come from Manila. My family is very poor. I was promised a nice job in Europe. But Belgian men put us in a sex club. Belgian men put us in prostitution. We cried and we refused. But nobody could help us. We were forced. We were treated like slaves. When I could run away, I was arrested by police. I had many problems.
Last year the King came to see us in Antwerp. We were five girls there. We cried again but it was different tears. The King was holding my arm. He listened to me. Only the King listened to us. He was shocked. There are too many victims here. From Manila. From Bangkok. From Santo Domingo. From Budapest. From eastern Europe. All looking for a better life in the West. All pushed into prostitution. The King was fighting against this sex trade. He was standing up for us. He was a real king. I called him my friend.
King Baudouin, living his faith in Jesus Christ, brought hope into the lives of people on the margins, the hope that Jesus brought into the world by standing with us sinners in the River Jordan. The King himself had suffered much in his lifetime. His mother, Princess Astrid of Sweden, died in a car accident when he was only five. He, his sister and brother, with their father King Leopold III were under house arrest during World War II and spent part of it in Germany. In 1951 Leopold, a cause of bitter division in Belgium because of his surrender to Nazi Germany in 1940, abdicated and his elder son took over, not yet 21.
In 1960 the young king married Doña Fabiola de Mora y Aragón from Spain. To their great sorrow, they had no children. Queen Fabiola had five miscarriages.
In 1990 King Baudouin asked the government to declare him temporarily unable to reign so that he wouldn't have to sign a bill legalising abortion. The government agreed. The King's stand was one of principle, though he was unable to stop the law coming into force.
King Baudouin went to Mass every day and to confession regularly. The baptism of Jesus by St John the Baptist might spur each of us on to avail of the sacrament of reconciliation often and to us priests to make ourselves available for it. The King would write a 'thought for the day' in his pocket diary, a text from the Mass.
And in that diary, after his death, this prayer was found:
Lord, make us suffer with the suffering of others.
Lord, let us never again keep our happiness to ourselves.
Make us share the agony of all suffering humanity.
And deliver us from ourselves, if that is in accordance with your will.
The king’s close friend and biographer, Cardinal Suenens, Archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels, wrote that Baudouin once confided to a friend his purpose in being King of the Belgians:
To love his country,
to pray for his country,
and to suffer for his country.
King Baudouin lived out his baptism as a disciple of Jesus, knowing that through baptism he was a brother of Jesus and of the Belgian people he was called to serve. He lived out the sacrament of matrimony by his great love for his wife and queen, Fabiola. He truly believed that Jesus loved him with a deep personal love.
Though none of us is a king or queen, Jesus, the beloved Son of the Father, loves each of us with that same personal love and draws us into the love of his Father as our Father. And we can adapt King Baudouin’s words in expressing his purpose in being king as our purpose in living out our baptism:
