VIII Sunday of the Year

JUDGE NOT

Sirach 27:4-7; 1 Corinthians 15:54-58; Luke 6:39-45

Readings for the VIII Sunday of the Year

A friar in a monastery committed a fault. The superior called the council to decide his punishment. The council assembled, but Friar Joseph, a senior monk, was not present. The superior sent someone to call him. When Friar Joseph came, he was carrying a leaking jug! When the others saw this, they asked him what it meant. The wise friar said: “My sins run out behind me, but I do not see them. And today I am coming to judge the error of another?”

This anecdote sums up the thrust of today’s liturgy: judge not.

The gospel is a continuation of the Sermon on the Plain and Jesus’ injunction to not judge. What Jesus forbids is not judgment per se, but negative/destructive judgment. Our judgments should be like those of Jesus: judging to save and help, not to knock down and destroy. We must not pass judgment without understanding the person and his/her situation, and without an awareness of our faults. Much of our criticism is, perhaps, a form of self-defence or a pre-emptive strike! To offset our feeling of insecurity, we pull others down. 

“Judge not” is not a cover for immoral behaviour; not a prohibition on admonishing others; not an endorsement of moral relativism. 

“Judge not” is an elaboration of the Golden Rule—we should treat others the way that we want to be treated. Given that God will judge us, what kind of judgment do we want? We want a judgment done with mercy, compassion, and forgiveness. That’s the way we ought to treat others: with mercy and compassion.

Do I see the worst or the best about others? When I judge others, am I aware of my faults and shortcomings? Am I merciful and compassionate?

After a pastor preached on spiritual gifts, a lady told him: “Pastor, I believe I have the talent of criticism.” He asked her: “Remember the person in Jesus’ parable who had the one talent? Do you recall what he did with it?” She replied: “Yes, he went out and buried it.” With a smile, the pastor suggested: “Go thou, and do likewise!” 

May we bury our negative and destructive criticism and use our gifts of love and compassion.

VII Sunday of the Year

LOVE YOUR ENEMIES

1 Samuel 26:2, 7-9, 12-13, 22-23; 1 Corinthians 15:45-49; Luke 6:27-38

Readings for the VII Sunday of the Year

Martin Luther King Jr wrote (in/from jail!) about loving enemies: “This is not practical; life is a matter of getting even, of hitting back… We have followed the so-called practical way for too long, and it has led inexorably to deeper confusion and chaos. Time is cluttered with the wreckage of communities which surrendered to hatred and violence. For the salvation of our nation and the salvation of humankind, we must follow another way. This does not mean that we abandon our righteous efforts. With every ounce of our energy, we must continue to rid this nation of the incubus of segregation. But we shall not in the process relinquish our privilege and our obligation to love. While abhorring segregation, we shall love the segregationist. This is the only way to create the beloved community.”

Luther was commenting on the “impractical” way Jesus preached in his sermon on the plain. Love of enemies is contrary to every natural impulse. Jesus teaches us to remain loving even when others treat us in an unloving manner. There will be times when we need to protect ourselves against evil. But in and with love.

A massive challenge! How can we love people who have hurt/ oppressed us? How can we love our enemies when everything inside us makes us want to hurt them back?

The response, indicated by scripture and by the life of Jesus, is that we can love those for whom we feel no love when we decide to do so. Love is not a feeling; it is a choice and a decision to do right even when wronged; to do good even when bad is done; to bless even when cursed; to forgive even when condemned.

Love is a commitment to the good of another. We have an example in the First Reading: David refuses to harm Saul, to put a spear through the heart of his sleeping enemy. 

How do we love our enemies when we do not feel like loving them? In the way that we wake up in the morning when we feel like sleeping; in the way that we work when we feel like relaxing. We just do it. We decide and follow through. Authentic love is hard work!

Who are my enemies whom I need to love? Will I choose and decide to love them and follow through on that decision? How will I manifest my love for them?

VI Sunday of the Year

BLESSED VERSUS CURSED

Jeremiah 17:5-8; 1 Corinthians 15:12, 16-20; Luke 6:17, 20-26

Readings for the VI Sunday of the Year

A preacher asked for a show of hands from all in the congregation who would love to be poor, hungry, weeping, and hated. No hand went up. Then he asked of those who would love to be rich, well fed, laughing, and well-spoken of. All hands went up. What would my response be?

Popular culture is quick to counsel us that we will be happy if only we can get that latest gadget, the new house, the swankiest vehicle, and so on.  It is seductive.

Yet, in today’s Gospel, Jesus declares a blessing on those who are poor, hungry, weeping, and hated. He then pronounces a woe on those who are rich, well fed, laughing, and well-spoken of. 

Does Jesus mean poverty is a sign of divine approval and prosperity a sign of divine disapproval? Certainly, not! Poverty, hunger, weeping, and hatred are all misfortunes; no good parents would want these for their children. Neither would God, our loving parent, want these for us. 

How are we then to understand the beatitudes? 

The first key is at the end of the last beatitude: “on account of the Son of Man.” Those who accept these as the price for following Jesus are the blessed ones. The passage immediately preceding today’s gospel is the call of the twelve. Today’s text is like an appointment letter; it has the terms and conditions of being apostles! The beatitudes are the direct consequences of discipleship. To be an apostle of Jesus meant instant membership in the club of the poor, the hated, the reviled, the excluded.

The second key is in understanding “poor”. The poor are the ‘anawim’ – a small group of people who, despite difficulties and trials, have been faithful to God’s covenant. They have no resources to meet their needs, recognize their total dependence on God, and trust in him. Those who are ‘blessed’ have put their trust in God; those to whom Jesus says ‘woe’ trust in the material. 

Jeremiah prophesies in the first reading: “cursed is the man who trusts in humans… blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord.”

The liturgy today challenges us with choices: blessed vs cursed; trust in God vs trust in myself. What’s my choice?

V Sunday of the Year

CALLED!

Isaiah 6:1-2a, 3-8; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11; Luke 5:1-11

Readings for the V Sunday of the Year

A man in the choir couldn’t sing well. The conductor asked him to leave the choir. He refused. The conductor complained to the pastor: “You’ve got to get that man out of the choir; else I’m resigning.” The pastor spoke to the man and gently suggested that he leave the choir. The man asked: “Why?” The pastor said: “Four or five people have told me you can’t sing.” The man replied: “That’s nothing! Fifty people have told me you can’t preach!” 

Competence is not a criterion the Lord uses when he calls people. He often calls the most unlikely people! Today’s readings describe the call of Isaiah, of Paul, of Peter; each felt unworthy in God’s presence. When they confessed their inadequacy before God, God made them ready to serve him. A seraph touched Isaiah’s lips with a burning coal from the altar and said: “Your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” To Simon Peter, Jesus said: “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” 

Availability and the readiness to follow God’s directives are other qualities these three have in common. Isaiah promptly responded to the Lord: “Here am I; send me!” Paul was full of zeal and worked harder than all those who were called before him. Peter and his partners “left everything and followed” Jesus.

When we follow the guidance of the Lord, we achieve mind-blowing results. Peter and his men toiled all night long and caught nothing. When they followed the Lord’s guidance which, humanly speaking, did not make much sense (fishermen did not set the net in broad daylight), the result was a miraculous haul of fish.

The Lord continues to ask: “Whom shall I send?” He still needs messengers (like Isaiah) to proclaim his Good News in the temple; (like Paul) to announce it in foreign lands; (like Peter) to speak for him in the workplace and bring one’s coworkers to follow the Lord. 

I may feel unworthy and incompetent for the work of God. But… am I available? If so, the Lord will qualify me for his mission, as he did with Isaiah, Paul, and Peter.

The Presentation of the Lord

RECOGNIZING THE EXTRAORDINARY

Malachi 3:1-4; Hebrews 2:14-18; Luke 2:22-40

Readings for the Presentation of the Lord

In November 2003, Elizabeth Gibson noticed a painting between garbage bags set out for collection. Ms Gibson, who knew little about modern art, said she took it home because “even though I didn’t understand it, I knew it had power.” That painting was Rufino Tamayo’s abstract masterpiece “Tres Personajes” which had been stolen twenty years earlier. On 20 November 2007, Sotheby’s auctioned it for more than one million dollars. Several people must have seen the painting (and one even trashed it) but only Ms Gibson recognized the extraordinary.

Something similar happened a couple of millennia ago in Jerusalem.

The busy temple of Jerusalem must have been filled with hundreds of people—priests and scripture scholars, pilgrims and worshippers… and many of them must have seen an infant with his parents. Only two senior citizens—Simeon and Anna—recognized the extraordinary in the ordinary infant and his ordinary parents who made the ordinary offering of the poor.

Simeon and Anna were the “anawim” who had neither power nor prestige but had deep faith. Simeon was “righteous and devout… and the Holy Spirit was upon him” and Anna “worshipped night and day with fasting and prayer”. This rootedness in God and their faith enabled them to recognize the extraordinary in the ordinary and the divine in the human.

Each one of us is ordinary; yet, we have in us the extraordinary and the divine. Do you and I recognize the extraordinary and the divine in ourselves and in others? Or do we treat ourselves and others as trash?

May the Spirit in us and our eyes of faith help us recognize the extraordinary and the divine in us!

III Sunday of the Year

THE MESSIANIC MISSION:
BRINGING GOOD NEWS TO THE POOR

Nehemiah 8:2-4a, 5-6, 8-10; 1 Corinthians 12:12-30; Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21

Readings for the III Sunday of the Year

A Franciscan was assigned to be guide to Mother Teresa on her visit to Australia. Thrilled at the prospect of being close to this great woman, he dreamed of how much he would learn from her. Although he was constantly near her, he never managed to say one word to mother Teresa.

Tour over, she was to fly to New Guinea. In desperation, the friar told her: “If I pay my own fare, can I sit next to you on the plane so I can talk to you and learn from you?” Mother Teresa asked: “You have enough money to pay airfare to New Guinea?”

“Yes,” he replied eagerly. She said: “Then give that money to the poor. You’ll learn more from that than anything I can tell you.”

 

Mother Teresa understood that Jesus’ ministry was to the poor. This is the thrust of today’s gospel.

The Gospel describes the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry with his inaugural sermon in his hometown. He entered the synagogue, stood up to read, unrolled the scroll of Isaiah and found the passage about the “anointed one”. He was searching for this passage! He read two verses (Isaiah 61:1-2) and delivered probably the shortest homily in history: “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing”! 

With this loaded one-liner, Jesus announces his mission. He is the “anointed one” whom God has sent to bring good news to the poor. The second verse makes explicit this content of this good news: to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.

Right through his gospel, Luke will present Jesus bringing the good news to the poor. Several events/parables found only in Luke’s gospel—restoring to life the son of the widow of Naim, forgiving the “sinful woman” in Simon the Pharisee’s house, healing a crippled woman on the Sabbath, the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, the cure of the lepers, the encounter with Zacchaeus—are instances of this mission.

 

Jesus’ mission is our mission as individuals and as a community. Through baptism and confirmation, the spirit of the Lord is upon us. We, too, are called and sent to proclaim the good news to the poor… using the many gifts that God has given us as individuals and as a church as St Paul describes in the second reading.

How will I proclaim the good news to the (materially, spiritually, emotionally…) poor and broken-hearted today? In what way can I free the captives?

II Sunday of the Year

THE FUTURE IS NOW

Isaiah 62:1-5; 1 Corinthians 12:4-11; John 2:1-11

Readings for the II Sunday of the Year

“The Future is Now” was a 1955 short film that went inside government research laboratories to showcase products that would be used in the proximate future: computerized assembly lines, nuclear- and solar-powered batteries, industrial uses for television, video telephones, gadgets for instant home movies, irradiated food, fully automated kitchens… Products used in the future?! Well, the future is now (and has been for decades already)!

 

That title could well apply to the readings of the day!

The first reading was written after the exiles’ return from Babylon. The hopes with which they had returned home were dashed by the massive task before them: the physical rebuilding of Jerusalem and the spiritual renewal of the people. 

But Isaiah looks beyond the present to the end-time, when Israel will be “a glorious crown in the hand of the Lord.” He announces that day as a wedding with God as the bridegroom and Israel as the bride.

In the gospel, by making the turning of water into wine at Cana the first of Jesus’ signs, John announces that the future has arrived. Three indicators!

Jesus worked the sign in the context of a wedding. In the bible, weddings symbolise the era of salvation (Isaiah 54:4-8, 62:4-5; Matthew 8:11, 22:1-14; Luke 22:16-18). 

Jesus gave an abundance (120 gallons!) of choice wine. The Old Testament describes the end-time as an era when there is an abundance of wine (Amos 9:13-14; Hosea 14:7; Jeremiah 31:12). Thus, the sign signifies that the era of salvation has arrived; the future is now!

Jesus changed the water meant for purification rites into wine. He transformed jugs, unwieldy symbols of the old way, into wineskins, harbingers of the new. The time for ritual cleansing has passed, the time for celebration has begun; the future is now!

 

But wait! If the future is now, if the era of celebration and rejoicing is here, why is there so much suffering and sadness? Why is there so much despair?

Perhaps, we do not allow the Lord to enter our lives. The Wedding of Cana portrays the outcome of the combination of human and divine activity. Human beings can fill water jars; only God turns water into wine. Human beings do the ordinary and commonplace activity; God brings it to life. God transforms whatever and whomever he touches. 

We need to bring God into our lives. We need to “do whatever he tells” us. Then, for us, too, the future will be now!

The Baptism of the Lord

EXPERIENCING UNCONDITIONAL LOVE

Isaiah 42:1-4, 6-7; Acts 10:34-38; Luke 3:15-16, 21-22

Readings for the Baptism of the Lord

Martin Copenhaver, in Whispered in Your Ear, writes: I don’t remember the first time I walked, but it was probably something like this: I stood with my mother; my father was three steps away. I set out, wobbling and stumbling, but made it from one set of arms to the other… on my own. Then perhaps my father lifted me high in the air with great joy as if I were the first in human history to walk! After numerous hugs and exclamations, I must have felt like the most loved, greatest boy in all the world.

After some time, I could walk with more assurance and grace… but I didn’t receive much praise. In fact, I can’t remember the last time someone praised me for walking across a room. So I had to do other things… to get back to that feeling: of being valued, of being picked up with delight, of being affirmed and loved. 

So it goes through life. We don’t have many experiences of unconditional love, and so we try to create conditions which will make people love us. We forget an all-important fact: if people love us for our achievements, it is not love! 

On the feast of the Baptism of the Lord we celebrate the unconditional love of the Father of his beloved Son.  The readings of today affirm this. 

The Gospel ends with the words: “You are my Beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.” Since it comes at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, this affirmation is not because of his achievements. The Father says: “I love you.” Period! Total, unconditional love! 

The first reading is the first servant song in Isaiah. God calls, forms and commissions his servant for a specific mission. The emphasis is not on the mission but on God’s love for his chosen.

The Father, who loved and affirmed his Son totally and unconditionally at his baptism, does the same for us, his beloved children at our baptism. God values you and me, not because of our achievements but because we are his beloved. All that you and I must do is to listen to him affirm us!

But human as we are, we need to hear this declaration of love often (Jesus needed to hear that affirmation again at the Transfiguration). So, you and I need to love and affirm one another. This is a concrete way of living out our baptism – by sharing and communicating our experience of God’s love for us.

Am I aware that I am a beloved son/daughter of God? Have I experienced his love for me in a concrete and tangible way? And do I share that experience with others so that they, too, may experience the Father’s love for them?

The Epiphany of the Lord

A SURPRISING ENCOUNTER

Isaiah 60:1-6; Ephesians 3:2-3a, 5-6; Matthew 2:1-12

Readings for the Epiphany of the Lord

A religious sister, travelling from Chennai to Guwahati, got off at Kolkata. Exhausted after the long journey, she fainted. When she revived, she found herself lying on a bench. Her luggage was by her side. So was a porter, wiping her forehead with a damp cloth. He brought her a cup of tea and some biscuits, and waited till she had recovered. She thanked him and gave him some money; he brushed it aside, saying: “Sister, it is nothing. You would’ve done the same for me.” She had tears in her eyes because she knew that wasn’t true; and because she had encountered God in an unexpected place and person. A surprising encounter!

Today we celebrate a surprising encounter between Christ and the magi. This encounter involved two moments: God’s initiative and human response. 

The magi’s coming to Bethlehem was a response to God’s initiative. It is not we who search for God, but God who searches for us and manifests himself to us; he draws us to an encounter with him. God makes use of the most surprising ways to draw us to him! He drew the magi to himself by a star. It was something they understood, something that was part of their culture and religion, and therefore, part of their lives. This is what he does… uses parts of our lives to draw us to him. 

Today’s Gospel presents three responses: Herod’s fear and hostility; the total indifference of the chief priests and the scribes; the adoring worship of the magi.

We can get so used to this story that we underestimate the faith of the magi. We take for granted that they saw what they were looking for. What did they see: A palace? Visible signs of power? They saw just “a child with his mother.” And they adored; no questions asked. The result: they were filled with great joy. Matthew is emphatic: “They rejoiced exceedingly with great joy.”

God uses surprising, unlooked-for ways to draw us to himself: a star, a motley group of fishermen, the seemingly insignificant bread and wine…  

How does he come to me today? Am I open to his surprising ways? Or am I so sure of the way God comes that I fail to recognize him when he comes in unexpected ways? 

We need to discern the stars in our lives. Then like the magi, we can “rejoice exceedingly with great joy.”