9th Sunday in Ordinary Time - Year A

Deuteronomy 11:18.26-28.32; Romans 3:21-25.28; Matthew 7:21-27

The Good News of the Kingdom of God, the Catholic Faith brought to us by the Apostles and their successors, does not depend for its validity on the holiness of those who announce it.

This may seem like a painfully obvious thing to say but we all know those who have left the Church, even after many decades of discipleship, because of the perceived sins of priests or bishops or other believers.

When a believer accepts the Catholic Faith as being a revelation from God himself he is liberated from the imperfections of those who are sent to announce it. This liberation, this freedom, is the hallmark of mature Catholic Christians. Though the whole world were to betray the Gospel they would remain faithful and, quite obviously therefore, this freedom is essential to authentic spiritual growth.

Do you have this freedom? Do you have this maturity? If you do, be grateful because all too many are not so blessed.

In the beginning stages of conversion the Faith is usually, though curiously, not always, transmitted only by authentic witness. This is because we all instinctively avoid and reject the words of a hypocrite. As Pope Paul VI said in Evangelii Nuntiandi §41: Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses. This is precisely why the Faith grew so vigorously after Pentecost, because of the power of the witness of the Apostles.

When word and deed are in harmony they speak convincingly to our hearts and, as today’s readings show, to the heart of God as well: It is not those who say to me, “Lord, Lord", who will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the person who does the will of my Father in heaven.

When we obey God’s word, in other words, when we put it into action, we demonstrate our faith in its truth. This has to do with the essential nature of God’s word, indeed, of God himself. As Dei Verbum §2 says: God’s deeds and words have an inner unity.

To put it simply, God always does what God says. As Jesus makes clear, it is the ‘food’ of the Word of God to do the will of God (cf John 4:34). Jesus the Word is the great ‘Act’ of God and he goes on doing what he hears his Father saying.

Even when, in our way of thinking, God delays to accomplish his word we know that the delay is only apparent. This conviction, too, is part of the faith of every mature believer. When the resurrected Lord tells us that he will come again in glory we know that however long he takes - he will surely come again!

The prophet Isaiah sums it up (55:11): …the word that goes from my mouth does not return to me empty, without carrying out my will and succeeding in what it was sent to do.

Revelation comes to us as word and deed having an inner unity. It seeks entrance into our heart; it wants to make its home in us. It is like the seed that falls in the farmer’s field. Its whole purpose is to bear a harvest. Some will welcome the word and say ‘Lord, Lord’ but the seed will not sprout; there will be no harvest. The word will not become deed and so, when the day comes, Jesus will say: I have never known you.

Word and deed are inseparably united in Jesus and must be so in us. We cannot go on pretending to ourselves. ‘I believe’ is the easiest thing in the world to say but are we bearing the fruit?

How can a Catholic say ‘I believe’ when:

• he slanders his neighbour?
• steals from others?
• lives unchastely?

Revelation is realised by words and deeds, otherwise we are building our house on sand and can expect it to come tumbling down.

Modern prophecy today would have us believe that many sent to announce the Good News of the Kingdom are not living according to the word they preach. This may be so, but the true Christian will persevere. He will say, ‘If the Gospel is not to progress through their witness - let it at least progress through mine’.

8th Sunday in Ordinary Time - Year A

Isaiah 49:14-15; 1 Corinthians 4:1-5; Matthew 6:24-34

I can much more easily believe that God exists than that he should love me. Now don’t be alarmed, I do know that God loves me, I have had ample proof of that over the years, but what I am saying is that God’s love for humans has always baffled me more than the truth of his existence.

Somehow I cannot begin to imagine that there is anything in us humans that should cause God to love us the way he does. Perhaps I could handle something more like the relationship an elderly person has with his pet dog or cat, or perhaps the attachment a child has to his parrot, but not this extravagant ‘passion sans frontières’ kind of love.

And yet, every word in Scripture bears testimony to the fact that this is precisely the kind of love God has for us. As a regular practitioner of Lectio Divina I can testify to this fact. Any page of any book of the Bible can be read as God’s unrelenting desire to tell us of his love, over and over and over – ‘I love you, I love you, I love you.’

I guess the trouble I and people like me have is that we think God’s love is not fittingly or reasonably based in anything within us. We see all that is wrong with us and limited in us and we say, ‘Naah, he couldn’t love us. He would be mad to love us!’ Well, we are right and we are wrong.

• It is true that God’s love is not fittingly or reasonably based in anything within us. God’s love is based in his goodness, not ours.

This is why we should all learn to say with confidence: Jesus, I trust in you! - not in my goodness or gifts or even, my sins, but I trust in YOU!

When I see my prayers and sacrifices and good works piled into an impressively large heap I should remember that Jesus, and only Jesus, is my Saviour. And when I see my sins piled into an equally impressive heap I should never despair of his mercy. I should acknowledge my sins and his power to save and say: Jesus, I trust in you.

• God’s love seeks all that he recognises as from himself and so he loves us because we are made in his image.

In each of us, no matter how sinful, there is the spark of the divine; we are made in God’s image. Like a parent who sees the mistakes and waywardness of their child there is both a recognition of self and of potential. Love seeks the flourishing of this potential and lives in hope of a return of love shown forth in a change of life.

• Therefore, for the sake of his life within us God loves us unconditionally and never turns from us.

God sees ‘all that is wrong with us and limited in us’ far more clearly than we do and yet he loves us. No matter what our sins God loves us as we are – wholly and entirely – ­because we belong to him. You are his child and his love for you goes infinitely deeper than your sins. So don’t ever make a god of your sins, a god who condemns you to hell. Turn to the true God, the one who loves you, and tell him: Jesus, I trust in you! – I trust in your mercy.

Today’s liturgy of the word is bursting at the seams with the words and deeds of this transcendent love of God.

• The entrance antiphon proclaims: He has led me into freedom. He saved me because he loves me.
• The opening prayer implores: Touch the hearts of all men with your love that they in turn may love one another.
• To those in desolation the first reading proclaims: I will never forget you.
• The responsorial psalm exhorts us: Take refuge in God all you people. Trust him all times. Pour out your hearts before him.
• St Paul in the second reading reassures us that he has discovered that God is to be trusted: I will not even pass judgment on myself … the Lord alone is my judge.
• And finally, every single word in the Gospel today urges us to commit ourselves to trusting God alone, to let go of fear and worry, and to trust our heavenly Father with all our heart.

In these strange days of fire and flood and cyclones and civil unrest and global change I can only invite and encourage you to read this Gospel over a few times in the coming days and to let Matthew’s words draw up this trust from deep within you until you can say: In God alone be at rest, my soul; for my hope comes from him. He alone is my rock, my stronghold, my fortress: I stand firm.

7th Sunday in Ordinary Time - Year A

Leviticus 19:1-2.17-18; 1Corinthins 3:16-23; Matthew 5:38-48

A few weeks ago I bought a Volkswagen Golf. Great car! Love it! Except for the indicator switch which is on the left hand side where the window wiper control should be. You’d think Mr Volkswagen would have … oh, never mind!

The point is that this little change has entirely brought me undone a number of times, especially in moments of pressure. Contrary to my instructions, my right hand continues to believe that it alone is permitted to turn on the indicators and habit is adamant there must be no change, no role reversal. To misquote St Paul: I fail to carry out the things I want to do, and I find myself doing the very things I hate.

Habit is a terrible prison because it runs so deep in us. Lately I’ve been trying not to say ‘Our Mass is ended; go in peace’. Someone reminded me the correct phrasing is not ‘our’ Mass but ‘the’ Mass. Do you think I can manage to remember the change? Only about once in every ten Masses – but I’ll get there in time because, like changing hands for the indicator switch, this change is only a very minor habit which will not require me to change my inner self.

If only every change were like that! But there are, as we all know from experience, habits that can only be changed by changing ourselves. Anyone who’s ever given up smoking or alcohol will know what I’m talking about. Changing these habits can be very, very daunting. They require motivation, will power, support from others and perseverance. They also require the virtue of hope: hope that the victory can indeed be won.

I gave up smoking 33 years ago and distinctly remember that horrible feeling of waking up to the awful realisation I could never put another cigarette between my lips again. It was like a death in the family. A dark void hovered over me which told me I would never be happy again. It was a lie, of course. Gradually that darkness began to break up and every now and then bits of sunlight broke through until, one morning, I woke up and knew I was free. And this brings us to the real reason for getting rid of bad habits and thereby changing our inner selves: so that we might be free.

So that a man might be free to love his wife faithfully Jesus last week taught that if a man looks at a woman lustfully, he has already committed adultery with her in his heart. In other words, learn to keep your eyes to yourself – become pure in your heart! How many of us have made a resolution to do this? How many have persevered in the struggle? Those who have will have experienced what St Paul really meant by the words: I fail to carry out the things I want to do, and I find myself doing the very things I hate.

So that we might be free Jesus says: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. How many of us have sincerely resolved to obey this command of the Lord? – to so change the inner composition of our unyielding, proud, revengeful hearts that we become capable of actually loving our enemies?

Lest we think this is impossible we should recall the opening words of last week’s first reading from Ecclesiasticus: If you wish, you can keep the commandments, to behave faithfully is within your power.

Naturally enough we will require the grace of God to achieve every inch of progress. Nothing is possible without God’s help and fortunately, he is always ready to give it.

There are so many areas of life we Christians blithely neglect, either because we think them unimportant or because we believe them impossible to achieve. How many prospective converts are turned away from a parish when they see the lack of inner conversion in parishioners who constantly gossip about one another; who judge others in their community with small-minded nastiness; who criticise whatever fails to meet with their personal approval?

Each of these sins is worthy of insertion into a good resolution to change.

The call to conversion is real; the need to respond is essential. Why? Because we are children of God and much of our behaviour is not worthy of our heavenly Father. Indeed, I imagine he would be ashamed to call many of us his children.

I have made a few resolutions in my life and some, like giving up smoking, I have kept. The Father has a resolution for each of his children and he requires that we give it our full attention. It is slightly more difficult than the one Mr Volkswagen requires of us but it's far more fulfilling: You must therefore be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect.

6th Sunday in Ordinary Time - Year A

Sirach 15: 15-20; 1 Corinthians 2: 6-10; Matthew 5:20-22, 27-28, 33-34, 37

Some time ago I had a lengthy conversation with a Catholic woman about the Church’s authority to teach in the name of Jesus. Her forceful response was ‘I don’t believe that!’ Of course this effectively scuttled the conversation and we moved on to other things.

I don’t believe that! How sad for a Catholic to even dare to say those words! Nevertheless, this is part of the freedom God gives every human being – to accept or to reject: He has set fire and water before you; put out your hand to whichever you prefer. Man has life and death before him; whichever a man likes better will be given him.

Fortunately no one can judge another person. We simply pray and trust that light will be given.

The world chooses very differently from the way a Christian chooses. That’s because the world has a different framework of judgment, and a different starting point. The starting point for making choices in the world is self-centred while for a Christian it is other-centred, the other being God.

The world’s choices are pragmatic, driven by money and ideology, and therefore, rather unenlightened and with a short use-by date. They depend on human intelligence and powers of reason, particular circumstances, anticipated outcomes, vested interests, external pressures, and a complex of other considerations, including what was had for breakfast that morning.

For a Catholic the starting point is the teaching of the Church as it comes to us through Scripture and Tradition. We live our lives guided by the Church because we believe she was founded by Jesus Christ. We live by her teachings, her moral precepts, her authority and her way of worshipping God. St Paul’s words to the Corinthians can be quoted here: The hidden wisdom of God which we teach in our mysteries is the wisdom that God pre-destined to be for our glory before the ages began.

The hidden wisdom of God, the keys to the kingdom of Heaven, was given by Christ to his Church. This is why a Catholic cannot turn away from the Church and claim to be still following Christ. For all the faults, the many faults, the horrible faults of her members, including the hierarchy, the Church is still the spotless bride of Christ for whom he gave his very life.

Those who have reached maturity have grasped this truth and have remained faithful; those who imagined that Jesus built his Church on the ‘goodness’ of his Apostles rather than on Peter’s ‘faith’, have discovered the weak link in their understanding and have quit the Church.

But how does an individual make a decision to entirely believe what the Church believes; how does one get to that point? The answer is one which the world cannot and never will understand - it is through the wisdom bestowed by the Holy Spirit. These are the very things that God has revealed to us through the Spirit, for the Spirit reaches the depths of everything, even the depths of God.

The Holy Spirit who knows the depths of God is given to us at Baptism and Confirmation so that we ourselves might come to know the depths of God. The Holy Spirit shares with us, to the extent that we are capable, the knowledge of God.

Now let me interrupt with some questions which I am imagining some of you might be asking: ‘I am a Catholic. I have been baptised and confirmed. How come I do not feel that I know God? How come my faith is still weak? How come I regularly have doubts?’

Having asked the questions on your behalf I must admit I cannot fully answer them, however, I do understand one or two things that are essential if, in the power of the Holy Spirit, we are to know God.

Firstly, the Spirit gives us a desire to know God, to ‘see his face’ as the Scripture puts it. Do you have this desire? Do you really want to know God, with all your heart? (I am assuming here, of course, that you are already a believer, that you have already found God and now wish to know him.)

Perhaps you were struck, as I was, by the opening sentence of the first reading from Zephaniah a couple of Sundays ago: Seek the Lord all you, the humble of the earth, who obey his commands. Somehow, seeking or knowing God always goes hand in hand with obeying his commands. If you really desire to know God you will be following his way - what Moses calls: the way I have marked out for you... .

The Holy Spirit is not given as warm fuzzy ‘I believe’ feeling. The Spirit is given also for keeping God's word. The response to the psalm today shows us what the payoff for doing this is: Happy are they who follow the law of the Lord. Jesus, too, repeatedly made this clear: Still happier those who hear the word of God and keep it! (Luke 11:28)

So, if you are feeling distant from the Lord, ask yourself if you are doing his will, especially as the Church proposes it. Do you believe with all your heart that the Church speaks with God’s authority? Do you dissent from important Church teachings? Are you behaving in a way contrary to those teachings? Perhaps it’s time to make a serious and mature examination of conscience about all this?