Palm Sunday: The Passion from Luke’s Gospel

Palm Sunday this year we read the passion narrative from Luke’s gospel. Luke sees Jesus’ life, death and resurrection as a journey which begins in Galilee, then on to Calvary and finally, after his resurrection, continues when Jesus ascends into heaven. The journey is also a theme that describes the history of his church.

Jesus does not make the journey alone. From Galilee to Jerusalem he gathers disciples to accompany him. As he faces the mystery of death, he does not face it alone– his disciples are with him.  Simon of Cyrene and “a large crowd of people” including “many women who mourned and lamented him” go with him. All the world is with him on the way.

Luke notes that “after laying the cross on him, they made Simon carry it behind Jesus.” Simon represents every follower of Jesus who goes with him on this part of the journey. It’s not only the cross of Jesus Simon carries, it’s his own cross, his daily cross. This is a theme Luke emphasizes in his gospel:  “Then he said to all: ‘ If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.’”(Luke 9,23-24)

Jesus’ words to the women “who mourned and lamented him” are puzzling. Some say he offers them comfort, even as he goes to his death. But other commentators  see his words as a prophetic announcement of the judgment that inevitably happens after an injustice like his condemnation and death. Jerusalem will be destroyed as a consequence. Is Luke telling us that  every unjust act, every sin has consequences that cannot be waived away?

Two criminals accompany Jesus to Calvary, the place of execution just outside the city gates where many people passed. For the Romans it was the perfect place to display their fierce justice. Jesus would die at this hellish place of torture and death. Not a place one wished to be or to see.

Yet Luke, like the other evangelists, sees light in this place of death. Instead of harsh justice, suffering and death, Jesus offers God’s forgiveness and new life here: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

Here God is revealed, who not just forgives but brings to new life. The two criminals crucified with Jesus reveal God’s life-giving power at work.  One criminal mocks Jesus on the opposite cross. “Are you not the Messiah. Save yourself and us.” The other rebukes him and turns to Jesus with a plea to remember him. “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

More than simply remembering him, Jesus promises to take him on his journey to God. “Amen I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.” As he did so often,  Jesus reaches in tender mercy to one without hope.

Like Simon of Cyrene, the thief represents humanity. He’s been promised life and safe passage through the mystery of death. He dies with Jesus. He’s the first,and he is a reminder that eternal life is never denied to anyone.

The thief is a powerful sign of the promise made to us all. We will die, but we die with the Lord.  Calvary is where we best understand the mystery of death.

Tuesday, 3rd Week of Advent

The prophet Zephaniah spoke shortly before Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonians in 587 BC. Warning the people and their rulers, he sounds like Jeremiah. He speaks to all, rulers and people alike, not just to the rulers or some people. No one in Jerusalem is left out.

Jerusalem “hears no voice, accepts no correction.” Listening to her own voice or human voices she has fallen for, the city has become  blind to what’s wrong.

It’s always easy to blame the problems of the world on others, like politicians and different groups. Easy targets. It’s harder to ask how we’re part of what’s wrong.

Like other prophets, Zephaniah says that God will turn away from Jerusalem and let others take her place, “from beyond the rivers of Ethiopia and as far as the recesses of the north.”

God turns around and gives his gifts to someone else. That’s what happens in the gospel reading for today: the son who once didn’t listen, hears his father’s voice, and he receives his blessing.

Readings here. Homily here.

The Road Through the Wilderness

I’m preaching a mission at the Catholic chapel at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware this week.

Sometimes the best view you can get of the world in which you live is from above. Here’s a picture taken from a plane in the 1930s or so of the road up to Jerusalem from Jericho and the Jordan Valley. I add another from the ground of the road outside Jericho from more recent times.

 

Both pictures tell us the road to Jerusalem is a climbing, winding road. It wasn’t easy to take when prophets like Isaiah and John the Baptist knew it. Of course, today it’s easily managed by car or bus. But in those days you walked and you didn’t always know what to expect when you went through deserts and mountains and some fertile areas where there was water and crops were grown.

Isaiah and John the Baptist knew this road very well and they used it to explain our way to God. First, it’s an image that says life will never be easy.  On that road you are going to get hungry, tired, even wonder whether you will make it or not. Unexpected things can happen: you may get robbed like the man did in the parable of the Good Samaritan. That happened on the road up from Jericho to Jerusalem, you may remember. You might be blind, like the two blind men from Jericho who couldn’t find their way.

But if you want to get to Jerusalem and enter the house of God, you have to take that road. Jesus took it when he went up to the Holy City.

The message of Isaiah and John the Baptist, so beautifully expressed in our first reading for today (Isaiah 35,1-10), is that God will bring us there.

Praying with John the Baptist: Second Sunday of Advent

He looks forbidding, but don’t be put off by his appearance. John the Baptist was sent by God into the wilderness where you can’t wear fine clothes or worry how you look. It’s not an easy place to live; people may wander aimlessly and be afraid and lose hope there.

John’s father, the priest Zachariah, said: “You, my child shall be called the prophet of the most high, for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way.” John’s role was to guide those in the wilderness “into the way of peace.”  (Luke 1)

A wilderness seems like a godless place, but the Jews learned it was a place where you discover God.  When their ancestors wandered aimlessly from Egypt,

“God found them in a wilderness

in a wasteland of howling desert,

he shielded them and cared for them

as the apple of his eye.” (Deuteronomy 12, 1-12)

So God is not absent in the wilderness. From the temple in Jerusalem, the Prophet Isaiah said the holy mountain of the Lord can be reached through the wilderness.  Standing in the wilderness, John the Baptist claims it as a holy place and the way through it is holy too.  Though the hills are steep and the valleys deep, and the mountain of the Lord must be climbed,  “the way of the Lord” is there:

“A voice cries out:

In the desert prepare the way of the LORD!

Make straight in the wasteland a highway for our God!

Every valley shall be filled in,

every mountain and hill shall be made low;

the rugged land shall be made a plain,

the rough country, a broad valley.

Like a shepherd he feeds his flock;

in his arms he gathers the lambs,

carrying them in his bosom,

and leading the ewes with care.”

The Judean wilderness where John the Baptist baptized lay about 15 miles east of Jerusalem in the Jordan Valley north of the Dead Sea. Pilgrims coming from the north took an ancient road along the River Jordan and followed it as it veered right near the town of Jericho to ascend steeply about 3,500 feet  up to the Holy City, about an 9 hour walk. Near where the road begins to ascend, John baptized great crowds in the river’s refreshing waters.  He baptized Jesus and his disciples in these waters and then pointed Jesus out as “the Lamb of God” and told his followers to follow him as their Shepherd and Way.

He points Jesus out as our Shepherd and our Way this Advent. John was a voice in the wilderness. Where would he speak today? What would the wilderness be like where we would find him?

Sunday Homily: http://thepassionists.org/reflections/

The Testament of Mary

A new book called The Testament of Mary by the Irish writer Colm Toibin presents a very unorthodox picture of Mary, the Mother of Jesus. She’s an old woman  living in Ephesus telling two of Jesus’ disciples about the life and death of her son. One reviewer said of the book, “This is not the Mary your mother knew.”

That’s because Toibin pictures Mary as an embittered, vengeful woman who’s still grieving and angry over her son’s death. She can’t accept it and sees nothing good about it. Her son had been taken away from her.

Some reviewers in the secular press praise the book because they say it’s so human. That’s the way a mother would deal with a son’s unjust death, they say. But is it human to live angry and embittered? Are we human when we end our lives disappointed and with no hope? Is that what God means human to be? Was that really the way Mary was?

Not according to the gospels. The Mary they present certainly bears her cross. Christian devotion calls her the Mother of Sorrows and says that seven great sorrows pierced her heart. She stood by the cross of her Son. But she saw something beyond the sorrows and apparent failure. God was there in it all and a larger plan promised resurrection and life.  Mary was a believer and that made the difference.

It seems to me that Toibin’s gospel presents Mary as our secular culture sees all human beings, as if all life’s meaning comes from the here and now, and then there’s death. A cold dreary picture of being human.

But Mary represents humanity redeemed, as God means it to be. The mystery of her Immaculate Conception–which we celebrate December 8^th– far from isolating her from the rest of us, prepared her to be the first fruits of a new humanity, as she followed  the path of her Son. She was human as God meant human to be.

It I were writing a book like Toibin’s I think I would begin it in Jerusalem where St. Luke describes the disciples waiting after Jesus ascended into heaven. Among them were“…certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus.” (Acts 1.14) They were wondering when the days of God’s restoration of the kingdom were coming, even though Jesus had told them “It’s not for you to know the days.”

Still, there and then in Jerusalem, the disciples were sure the kingdom was coming soon, even though Jesus tells them to witness to him further “in Jerusalem, Judea and all Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1, 6-9) Luke charts that journey of the church in the Acts of the Apostles.

Did Mary at that time temper the expectations of the disciples by sharing her own experience of patient waiting, of her closeness to her Son, of God’s mysterious ways. “How can this be?” she once said to the angel. She knew what it meant to wait for God’s will to be done after the angel left her. God’s will is beyond our will and expectations.

There with the disciples in Jerusalem, Mary would be a thoughtful woman, who found answers to the questions she kept pondering in her heart in the scriptures and the feasts they celebrated in the temple. We can hear Mary’s voice in Luke’s Gospel, not a voice of anger or bitterness, but a voice proclaiming God’s goodness for the good things done through her. She was truly “blessed among women.”

“Full of grace,” she was full of humanity too.

A Mother’s Plans

Journey to Jerusalem

Our gospel yesterday recalled the visit of Jesus’ family as he spoke to the crowd and his response to them.

“While he was still speaking to the crowds, his mother and his brothers appeared outside, wishing to speak with him.[Someone told him, “Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, asking to speak with you.”]^*But he said in reply to the one who told him, “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?”And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother.” (Matthew 12,47-50)

Jesus’ family was not a nuclear family, a family unit that’s evolved only  in modern times.  He belonged to an extended family, and those who came to see him –“his mother and brothers”– represented his extended family. ”His brothers” doesn’t necessarily mean his blood brothers, but rather his male or female relatives– cousins or nephews or other relations. Jesus came from a closely networked family whose members helped and supported one another.

This is the family that descended on Jesus as he addressed the crowds.

Today is the feast of St James and the gospel for the Mass comes from a later part of St. Matthew. It’s the account of the mother of James and John asking Jesus for consideration for her sons, two of his most important disciples, and also his relatives. She’s doing what mothers of extended families always did– taking care of and promoting their own. Mother and fathers, families of all kind still do that today.

She sees an opportunity for her sons as they accompany Jesus to Jerusalem.  “Command that these two sons of mine sit, one at your right and the other at your left, in your kingdom.

Jesus reminds her that his followers are to serve and not be served. It’s a service that will cost them, even their lives. It’s not just what’s good of their family either. Like the Son of Man they have to give their lives “for many.”

We’re called by God to reach out, and reaching out can be hard, sometimes painful. It means going beyond those we call our own, our families and friends. It means reaching out to those we don’t know, maybe even to those we don’t like. It means going beyond what we’re used to.

Our church is a missionary church. It reaches out to the whole world. That’s what   Jesus last words in Matthew’s gospel tells us to do:  “Go out to the whole world, baptizing and teaching.”

Going out to the whole world is especially hard today when the world is changing and the future so uncertain. It would be impossible if we didn’t hear the words of Jesus. “I am with you all days.”

We’re celebrating the feast of St. Ann. Think of the changes she faced in her life; think of the changes her daughter faced.  Let’s ask them to help us too.

Praying with Mary and Ann

A few years ago I visited Jerusalem and the ancient ruins of the temple that once stood in the time of Jesus. Jewish women were fervently praying with their daughters before the temple’s western wall. Ann and her daughter Mary prayed here too in this holy place long ago.

Tradition says that Ann and Joachim were closely connected to the temple of Jerusalem and may have lived near it or in a town close by. The picture above is a model of the temple from the time of Jesus at the Israel Museum. The Pool of Bethesda where the present church of St. Ann stands is to the right of the temple.

The temple was the temple of God, who dwelt on this holy mountain, the Prophet Isaiah said; all the peoples of the earth would stream toward it when the Messiah appeared. It was the center for prayer. Feasts were celebrated here through the year recalling God’s graciousness to his people. God’s ways were remembered here.

Jesus’ disciples were awe–struck by the majestic building as they looked at it from the Mount of Olives. They would see it as we see it in the picture above.  Responding, Jesus spoke of himself as replacing it through the mysteries of his life, death and resurrection.

You met God here. The Jewish women fervently praying with their children before the ruins of the temple’s western wall were the successors of Ann and her daughter Mary who prayed here centuries ago.

How did they pray? They prayed the Jewish psalms. They prayed from the Jewish scriptures, remembering what they learned from them. God created the world and it was good. Evil also is at work in the world. There’s anger and violence in the world. Cain slew his brother Abel. There’s pride and jealousy and injustice in the world. Their own people became slaves in Egypt.

But God saves. God raises up the lowly; God works in unexpected ways. He raises up men and women, the poorest of them, to do great things. For God’s kingdom is to come, when God’s power and glory will be revealed to all peoples and all creation. Mary’s great prayer, the Magnificat, summarizes that belief in the God.  She surely shared that prayer with her mother Ann.

“Nothing is impossible for God,” the angel said to her announcing the coming of Jesus. Mary believed that message.

We ask the grace to believe and to pray as these two women did. We ask for their daring, their realism, their great vision.

Passing On The Faith

Basilica of St. Ann, Jerusalem, 11th century

Devotion to St. Ann began in Jerusalem, probably at a 5^th century basilica near the pool of Bethesda, where Jesus cured the paralyzed man waiting to get into its healing waters. Ruins of the basilica can be seen today in the ruins of the Bethesda pool. The present basilica of St. Ann, begun in the 12^th century, stands nearby.

Would the early basilica be near the place where Joachim and Ann lived in the city, or was its site chosen for convenience? The ancient stories of the Protoevangelium associate Mary’s family with the temple and describe Joachim participating in the temple sacrifices. I wonder if we dismiss these stories too quickly as “myths.”

The Protoevangelium says that Mary was presented in the temple and dedicated to God as a child. At the least, this indicates that Mary would be well acquainted with the temple, its worship and the teachings of Judaism. If we accept this reconstruction, Mary would be far from a peasant girl from Nazareth. She would be better formed in Judaism and particularly in temple worship than we sometimes think.

Mary’s family was related to the family of John the Baptist, whose father Zachariah is a priest in the temple. (Luke 1,3-25) They live in the hill country near Jerusalem. Mary’s visit before Jesus’ birth to Elizabeth, Zachariah’s wife, connects her closely with them.

Later, as a young boy Jesus engages the teachers of the law on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. (Luke 2,41-52) He amazes them with his wisdom. Could some of that  wisdom have come from a mother’s teaching?

“And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and grace before God and man,” (Luke 2,52)

Mary and Joseph, Ann and Joachim certainly contributed to his growth.

Today at the novena, I’m going to talk about how Mary and Ann may have taught Jesus about the temple and what to do there. Like them, we must pass on our faith to others, particularly to the next generation.

Basilica of St. Ann, Jerusalem

The Inhabitants of Jerusalem

In our lenten gospel for today from St. John (7^th chapter) Jesus goes up from Galilee to Jerusalem where some “ were trying to kill him.” He celebrates the feast of Tabernacles, a popular autumn feast that draws crowds of visitors to the city. At his return in the spring for Passover, his enemies will fulfill their plans. Now, he draws the attention of “the inhabitants of the city.”

 Who are they? They’re not the leaders who will later put him to death. They’re the ordinary public who
know what’s happening in the city, who follow the trends and pass the gossip. They watch Jesus with curiosity as he enters the temple area and begins to teach. “Do our leaders now believe he’s the Messiah?” “How can he be, because he’s from Galilee and no one will know where the Messiah is from?”

Here are the voices of those who go back and forth, the undecided who wait to see who wins before taking sides. Jesus cried out against them, because they think they know what’s going on but know nothing. They’re blind to the Word in their midst.

Unfortunately, whether we’re learned theologians, or practiced priests, or informed church-goers, we can be like the  “inhabitants of Jerusalem.”  We need to humble ourselves before God. Prayer helps us see what’s real; it’s a way of taking sides, the right side.

Philip and James

We celebrate a feast of the apostles each month because they’re the foundation stones of our church. “Every family wants to find out how it began. We go back to the apostles because they were at the beginning of our church,” the early Christian writer Tertullian says. Today we have two together, Philip and James.

We celebrate the two together because their relics were placed side by side in the Church of the Twelve Apostles in Rome, which was built in the 6th century. Philip was called by Jesus to follow him the day after he called Andrew and Peter, St. John’s gospel says. James, who is also called James the Less to distinguish him from James, the brother of John, was a cousin of Jesus who later became head of the church in Jerusalem and was martyred there in the year 62.

“Don’t forget where you come from!” That’s a good thing for us to remember and that’s why the church remembers those who first heard and believed, and then went out to tell the whole world about Jesus risen from the dead. They handed the faith on to us and we now have their message and their task.

We’re meant to tag our names onto the list St. Paul sent to the church at Corinth long ago.

For I handed on to you as of first importance what I also received:
that Christ died for our sins ?in accordance with the Scriptures;
that he was buried;?that
he was raised on the third day
in accordance with the Scriptures;
that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve.
After that, he appeared to more
than five hundred brothers and sisters at once,
most of whom are still living,
though some have fallen asleep.
After that he appeared to James,
then to all the Apostles.
Last of all, as to one born abnormally,
he appeared to me.