Christmas Day 25 December 2013

Fr. Gerard Kelly

The day has finally arrived!  For all of our planning for Christmas and preparation for its celebration, the time has now come.  This is the day to celebrate.  It is no longer just a list of things to do, or anxiety that all will work out well.  It is here and we are celebrating it.

The account of Jesus’ birth as we heard it in St Luke’s gospel also has this sense that the time has finally arrived.  After generations of waiting for the Messiah, something has happened.  Luke is quite particular about the details of how Jesus came to be born.  He locates it at a particular time, when a major census was being taken.  He locates it at a particular place, Bethlehem.  Today we celebrate that moment, that event.  Something happened long ago, back then.  Today we remember it.

As we hear the story of those events, like generations before us, we are fascinated to know their full meaning.  After all, this Jesus who was born went on to shape the course of world history.  His birth was a religious event like no other.  He is called Emmanuel, which means God is with us; he is called the Saviour.  His birth leads to an outpouring of praise of God.  Another way of saying this is to speak of God entering into human history.  God takes on human flesh like ours, a human nature like ours.  This is what makes Christianity unique: our God has visited us.  No other religion speaks this way.  Christmas points to the great gift God has given to the whole of creation.

If this is how God has acted, we will want to know how this gift was received.  The Christmas story tells us this.  We all know those famous words, “there was no room in the inn”.  Because there was no place for Mary and Joseph to lodge, they were forced to find a shed on the fringes of the town.  Think of the meaning of this.  God enters the world on the margins rather than at the centres of power.  I wonder what things might have been like if God had entered the world at the centres of power.  Might not the people there have thought that they could manipulate God for their own ends?  And in the end, might this gift of God among us have remained un-received in the world?  In fact, throughout history many have tried to manipulate God.  They claim God for their cause, and create God in their own image.  But Jesus was born on the margins, and from there God offers a precious gift to all people.  Jesus is this gift.  As one who is truly human, he is for us a model of authentic human living.  As one who is truly God, he foreshadows the divine life in each of us.  As St John puts it in his letter, “we shall be like him because we will see him as he truly is.”

Being born outside the town, Jesus was first revealed to the shepherds.  This first revelation of Jesus marks the beginning of a pattern that will unfold during his ministry.  He reaches out to the lowly, and the poor.  He encounters human misery, human frailty and weakness.  His actions will bring out the best in people.  He will lift them up so that they can live with all of the dignity that comes from being the sons and daughters of God.  The shepherds are the first ones to receive this gift of God.  Look at how this happens.  They search out this child they have heard about, and then they tell of his birth to others, astounding them with this news.  This too will become a pattern for Christian living.  The spiritual life of the believer entails seeking out our God who comes to visit us.  It involves seeking him out in the midst of shepherds’ fields, as it were.  In other words, seeking him out where we live our lives, and not in some imaginary world where we would like to live.

In the fields where the shepherds were – in this ordinary place – the angels of heaven sang their praise, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favours”.  They re-affirmed what we have already learnt about the birth of this child.  Heaven and earth meet; the world is beginning to be transformed.  Their message is one of peace – peace for the whole of creation.  This peace is not just an end to violence – and wouldn’t that be a wonderful gift in so many parts of the world and even on our own inner-city streets!  This is a peace that takes root deep in the human heart.  For each of us, it is a peace that springs from right relations with God and hence a deep sense of contentment with who we are.  Only a peace that is deep-seated in the human heart will provide the foundation for the peace promised to the world by the choirs of angels.

Yes, the day has finally arrived.  Christmas is here.  Today we remember and celebrate what God has already done in the world at the birth of Jesus.  Today we receive a remarkable gift from God.  God’s gift is never exhausted.  May the peace we experience this Christmas sustain our faith and hope that Jesus is truly our Saviour, the Saviour of the world.

4th Sunday Advent (A) - 22 December 2013

Mt 1:18-24

Fr. Ruben Areno, SSP

What am I suppose to do?

This is the question that Joseph, and many of us ask of ourselves when we are confronted with making a difficult decision in life.  What am I suppose to do today, next week, next month, or next year?

St Ignatius of  Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit Congregation, proposes three ways of making a discernment in answering that question. What am I suppose to do?

First method is to lists down the disadvantage and advantage why not or why yes you should do it.  The negative way, what are the factors and the conditions that prevent you from not doing it? The positive method, what are the plus advantages and projections for growth & development when you say yes you will do it?  After putting it on a balance scale, you finally sense the weight of the matter that will give you peace of mind when you decide on it.

The second way is to ask the experts, counselors, mentors, spiritual directors.  In the ways of the spirit, there are spiritual masters and directors with whom we can ask for advise.  These mentors, teachers, and spiritual guides can clarify us as to the purpose and goals upon which our actions are directed.  Since we cannot see all angles of reality, we need someone who will act as a mirror to clarify, to confront us, to make us accountable and responsible for the actions that we are about to take.

Third, when the decision is really difficult, St. Ignatius would say: “at deathbed situations, would you do the thing you are about to do, and face the Lord at the last judgment.” 

After passing through these ways of discernment we can truly say along with St. Joseph, that we are doing the will of God, and trying to abide by God’s plan in our history.

Daily we make decisions.  We also have to possess the readiness and disposition to act spontaneously at any given notice.  Readiness is virtue of Mary and Joseph to be at the service of availability for God.

To picture it for us, here is a story: Chin Lin has a small restaurant. Everyday before all the customers come, she would do a short meditation and picture all the customers coming in.  Then, she would write small notes and put them inside the fortune cookie. People would find the message or exchange it among themselves. One particular couple, after reading through the message, ate the message together with the cookie.  In the days when we participate in the Holy Mass, we hear the message from Scripture and break bread with Jesus.  The Word of God and the Eucharist are our daily bread.  We hear the word of God and put them into practice, and Word makes his dwelling amongst us.  Merry Christmas to all.

3rd SUNDAY ADVENT (A) 15 December 2013

Fr. Gerard Kelly

During this season of Advent we don’t just think about the birth of Jesus at Christmas, but we spend a lot of time listening to the Old Testament prophets, especially the prophet Isaiah.  His was a voice that called out to the people, sometimes challenging them, sometimes consoling them, but always urging them to think about the future.  We’re probably not as unfamiliar with this as we might think.  Prophets would urge the people to hold out until there was a new king or a new leader, or to wait until a drought ended and rains came, or just to wait until it was summer and the flowers would bloom.  Often the future they were speaking about was very close.  Our world also thinks in these terms, whether it be waiting for the dollar to fall or the draught to end or a government to change.

But the prophets were also capable of speaking of a bigger vision.  When Isaiah spoke of the wilderness and the dry lands exulting he was thinking of more than just the breaking of a drought.  Here was a vision of a new earth, marked by the abundance of water, and teaming with life.  It was as if God would re-fashion the earth and make it anew.  This new creation would also extend to human beings.  The blind would see, the deaf hear, and the voiceless would get a voice.  This was a vision that would not just encourage the people, but also strengthen their trust in God.  It was a vision that looked beyond a new leader or a new season.  It was a vision that looked to God ruling the earth in justice.  This did not mean, however, that the leaders were not important.  Isaiah was expecting the leaders to model their lives on God and to rule as God would rule, thus helping to usher in this new world.

Now Isaiah spoke nearly three thousand years ago.  Does he have anything to say to us?  I think our age has a fundamental problem with this type of prophecy.  We want something that seems to be better grounded in the present.  People who dream of a new world where the blind see, or where there is no more war, are often accused of having their head in the clouds.  I think Isaiah would respond to this by saying that unless there is a vision for the future we are doomed to a life of mediocrity or even misery.

Advent is a time to allow ourselves to listen to the voice of the prophet.  As soon as we do this we will find ourselves asking questions – questions like: when will this happen?  How long must we wait?  How do we get ready?  What are we to do in the present time?

I think these are the sorts of questions that John the Baptist faced as he sat in his prison cell.  He wanted to know who Jesus was – not just if he was new political leader, but if he was God’s anointed one, the Messiah.  In his state of imprisonment he probably wanted to know what his future might hold.  Perhaps he wanted to know if Jesus might be able to get him released.  Jesus sends back a message – it almost seemed to be in code.  He simply tells the messengers that the blind see again, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed.  This was a message that probably put John’s imprisonment in some sort of perspective for him.  God’s reign was breaking in to the world, the new creation was groaning as it came to birth.  I guess that as John heard these words his own fate took on a particular meaning as he sat in his prison cell.

We have to face our own questions for our own time.  Perhaps the first question is, “which voices do we listen to?”  There are voices calling out to us from everywhere.  Advertisers promise us health and beauty and prosperity and happiness – if only we buy their products.  These voices promise us immediate gratification or even instant success.  They fit well in an age when we want things right now.  Ours is not an age that displays a lot of patience.  We are probably becoming less and less able to formulate a long term vision for ourselves or for our society.  Jesus puts the question: what did you go out into the wilderness to see?  This is a question also for us: what do you want to hear when you listen to the prophets of today?

The words of St James can challenge us to think about this.  He urged people to be patient, and to wait for the long term.  He used the analogy of a farmer who waits for the rains to come and for the crop to grow.  For us city-dwellers who are probably more used to the speed of email and are frustrated if it takes any longer than a couple of seconds, to speak of waiting for something seems to be more and more irrelevant.  Yet, the message of St James is important.  This season of Advent gives us a lesson in patience, teaching us how to wait, and how to keep our focus on the great vision of a new creation.  It teaches us to think beyond the next few weeks or even the next few years.  It reminds us that if we allow the vision of the prophets to shape our lives then we will truly be participants in the coming to birth of the new creation and the new humanity that John the Baptist saw, symbolised in the blind seeing, the deaf hearing, the lepers being cleansed and the poor having the good news preached to them.