Week 11 Monday (Year 2)

Readings: 1 Kings 21:1-16; Psalm 5; Matthew 5:38-42

The 'second mile' is clearly recognised in Christian theology: Jesus is the one to speak of it, in today's passage from the Sermon on the Mount. Biblical critics might be quick to explain away these outrageous demands as hyperbolic language, the graphic speech of one who was, after all, a poet. They are not strictly 'laws' that Christians must obey - so the critic will continue. They are attempts to communicate the spirit of Jesus' own approach to people - a prodigal generosity, whose virtue lies in its freedom, precisely in the fact that it is not prescribed but is done out of love.

We do not depend on this one scripture text however to ground a 'theology of the second mile'. This is part not just of our Christian knowledge, of the tradition of what Jesus said, but is also part of our talk about God Himself, part of our theology in the deepest and simplest meaning of the word: discourse about God. Our God is a God who is always ready to walk a second mile with us.

The God we have come to know in Jesus Christ is, in one sense, an irrational lover. Anselm (in Cur Deus Homo II.13) speaks of the 'supreme wisdom' of the Incarnation, not just a reckless love. He is the God of the Old Testament, of course, Creator and Redeemer of Israel. He drove Adam and Eve out of Eden but himself made clothes for them before they left (Genesis 3:21). He punished Cain for his crime against his brother but marked him to protect him from being murdered in his turn (Genesis 4:15). The earth became so corrupt that God decided to annihilate it. Yet again he cannot finally desert man, for he calls Noah and saves him. He tells Noah what to do to escape the flood and when the time comes it is God himself who closes the door of the ark behind Noah and his family (Genesis 7:16).

When sin increased on the earth again God scattered the peoples of the world and separated them from each other. For the first time people spoke different languages. It is a way of explaining the emergence of different cultures, different mentalities, different traditions. It is a way of explaining the beginning of large scale mistrust, ignorance, fear, rivalry, violence. Yet it was precisely at this moment of deepest gloom, when the melting-pot of all the races of humankind emerged, that the Lord said to Abram, 'leave your country, your family and your father's house for the land I will show you. I will make you a great nation; I will bless you, and make your name great ... and by you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves' (Genesis 12:1-3).

This is the God of Israel. This is what He is like. He set in motion a great plan to win again the love of human beings. He called His special people out of slavery into a land of their own. He nurtured their life, protected them and made sure that they were safe to worship Him. Yet they sinned and turned from Him. They turned to gods with whom they could live in greater comfort. These were gods who would keep their covenants.

Their own God, Yahweh, did not keep His covenant. His love for His people prevented Him from implementing the curses which the covenant obliged Him to carry out in the event of their infidelity. He never did, although He was sorely tried. And when it seemed that His rejection of His people was total, and final, and they mournfully chanted by the waters of Babylon, He gave in again and made this exile the occasion for a new exodus, a new covenant, a fresh beginning for this promiscuous bride (Hosea, Ezekiel).

The story went on as before. The story goes on as before. God came again to a new beginning, a covenant which would this time be final because sealed in the blood of His Only Son - and what else is left? This was the fulness of God's time. It did not matter that men were still sinners - precisely in this was the love of God clearest, that it was while we were sinners that God sent His Only Son to be the sacrifice that takes our sins away. This was the 'second mile', the bit He did not really have to do - in fact there was none of it that God 'had to do', right back to the first stirrings of human life under the breath of God's mothering Spirit. John the Theologian draws the conclusion from God's 'second mile' - if God so loves us, we also ought to be loving one another in this way.

Week 11 Sunday (Year A)

Readings: Exodus 19.2-6a; Psalm 99/100; Romans 5.6-11; Matthew 9.36-10.8

The call of God is always particular and always universal. The call of Abraham is particular, the call of one man, but so that he would be a blessing for all the nations. Likewise the election of Israel is particular - they are to be God's special possession, a kingdom of priests and a holy nation - but once again in order that all the nations would, in due time, come to Mount Zion, would come to worship God in Jerusalem.

If we continue to think of ourselves as his people, the sheep of God's flock, this is never simply something for ourselves alone. Whenever the elect begin to think and act in that way they lose their place in the plan of God and oblige him to visit them again to set things right. The particular call of some is always so that God's name will be exalted among all the nations. Some are called first but so that through them all will hear the summons to attend to the Lord, God of all. God first revealed himself to Israel and entered into a special relationship with her but in the course of that relationship with his chosen people he revealed himself as more than just 'their God': he is rather the Creator of all things and the Lord of all history.

We see this order of things unfolding once again in the public ministry of Jesus. In today's gospel reading, coming immediately after the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus sees that the people are still lost and distracted, like sheep without a shepherd. His compassion moves him to take action, the 'tender love of the heart of our God' which has always been the engine driving the covenant history with Israel. And so in the first place Jesus sets about reconstituting the chosen people of God, choosing twelve apostles (representing the twelve tribes of ancient Israel) who are to expand his mission of preaching, healing and exorcism.

But it remains particular: this first evangelisation is for 'the lost sheep of the house of Israel' and for them alone. At least for the moment. Later the full universal scope of the mission of this new Israel will be revealed. This will be after his resurrection when he will send the same apostles, now fully formed and transformed by the events of his suffering, death and resurrection, to preach and to baptise all the nations.

So for ourselves, in our personal lives of faith, in the life of parishes and communities, and in the life of the Church. There is an order to be observed. First comes a strengthening of our own relationship with God so that we appreciate once again the gifts we have received. Then comes the inevitable missionary moment of reaching out, in faith and charity, to anybody and everybody, in order to bring the great good news of God's compassion to the whole of humanity. In doing this, by our witness, our words and our actions, we are being compassionate as our heavenly Father is compassionate.

The Immaculate Heart of Mary

Readings: Isaiah 61.9-11; 1 Sam 2.1, 4-8; Luke 2:41-51

The day after the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Church's liturgy honours the Immaculate Heart of Mary. There are two explicit references to Mary's heart in the Gospel of Luke. They speak of her keeping in her heart the things she was experiencing at the time of Jesus' birth along with the things that were being said about him (Luke 2:19; 2:51). She pondered these things, not surprisingly, for they were strange and wonderful things, what the shepherds had to relate about the vision of angels they had received, and what Jesus himself said to her and to Joseph when they found him teaching in the Temple at Jerusalem.

In the Bible the heart refers to the centre of the person, the deepest core of a person's being, from which originate all good and evil things a person does. It is the place of moral responsibility, of energy and life, the place where intentions are formed and commitments are decided. Hearts can be hard or soft, they can be open or closed, hearts can lose hope so that people need to be encouraged anew, to take fresh heart. The great commandment is to love, with your whole heart, God and our neighbour as ourselves. The seed that falls on good soil refers to those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and upright heart. Where a person's treasure is, there also is their heart.

All of this can be applied to Mary as we ponder in our hearts what we hear and read about her. She is contemplative, meditating on all that is happening. She is good soil, holding fast the word of God and bearing the fruit of that word. She is one who loves God deeply and tenderly, without compromise, with all her energy, life and commitment. 'I am the handmaid of the Lord', she said to the angel Gabriel, 'let what you have said be done to me'.

What is caught by adding the adjective 'immaculate'? Literally it means without sin, without spot or stain. We can gloss it to mean without deviation or distraction, without qualification or condition. Her heart is given, and it is given completely. Her heart is open and pliable, ready to be used for the work of her Son. We can imagine her saying 'did you not know that I must be busy with my son's affairs? So do whatever he tells you'.

Her son's affairs are the salvation of the world, the healing of the sick, the reconciliation of sinners. So she is fully given also to that work, the work of the Father. It is not unusual to meet a mother who is totally dedicated to the affairs of her son or daughter. There is something fierce and uncompromising in the natural love of a mother. Mary is at least as passionately devoted to her Son's mission, and is devoted in that way not just by nature but by grace. Her devotion is fittingly described as immaculate - pure, unconditional, absolute.

We can turn to her with confidence therefore for we are among those affairs with which Jesus is busy and so we already have a place in her heart. Let us do it using the oldest known prayer to  Mary, from the 3rd century, which already recognises her love, her heart, as immaculate -

Beneath your compassion we take refuge, Holy Mother of God. Do not despise our petitions in time of trouble but rescue us from dangers, only pure, only blessed one.

The Most Sacred Heart of Jesus (Year A)

Readings: Deuteronomy 7:6-11; Psalm 103; 1 John 4:7-16; Matthew 11:25-30

It was confirmed some years after her death (rip) that my mother was a Jesuit agent. Every month a small package was delivered to her house, containing 10-12 copies of a little red book which she delivered to friends and neighbours whose subscriptions to it she also collected each year. The little red book was not the thoughts of Chairman Mao but the Sacred Heart Messenger, a monthly periodical produced by the Irish Jesuits. It contained articles of religious interest, current affairs, devotional material and letters from readers telling of graces they had received through their devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Although that devotion in its modern form dates from just a few centuries ago, the biblical and theological foundations for devotion to the human heart of Jesus go back to the beginning of Christianity, and even beyond, into the Old Testament, in a kind of prophetic anticipation.

Today's first reading, for example, speaks of the heart of God, how it is set on the people he chose as his own. Already the notes of tenderness and mercy are there. Israel is first chosen precisely because it is a nation that evokes compassion and pity. The Lord's kindness is everlasting, says the psalm, in fact that kindness is abounding, so that God deals with people graciously and courteously.

Inevitably there is a reading also from the Johannine writings of the New Testament, where much attention is given to the theme of love. 'Love is of God', today's reading begins and it ends with the simple declaration, 'God is love'. The origin of all love is in God, in the love that God is and in how that love has been manifested in the human heart of Jesus Christ.

The gospel reading is also well known, a passage from the Gospel of Matthew which speaks of the intimacy there is between the Father and the Son, an intimacy into which we are invited. The condition of entry? To be meek and humble of heart as Jesus is.

Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, on the cross opened in love to the world, means devotion to the divine humanity of our Saviour. Does it refer to Jesus in his humanity primarily or in his divinity? A famous banner on view in Dublin streets during the Eucharistic Congress of 1932 read 'God bless the Sacred Heart!' It seems to opt for the humanity of Jesus as the place of that heart, his human love and tenderness. But of course it must refer also to the 'heart of God' which is revealed in Jesus, through his human love.

My mother, along with many of her generation, had great devotion to the Sacred Heart. The family home was consecrated early on to the Sacred Heart, long before many other things could be done to the house. It is a way of staying close to God in tenderness, entrusting everything to his heart's care.

Catherine of Siena speaks of God seeing us first in his own heart, falling in love with us there, and deciding we were too good not to be real! So God created us and created us to share one day his own life of love. It hardly needs saying that Catherine was not a Jesuit but she cheers on the sons and daughters of Saint Ignatius as they promote this devotion. So too Catherine and all the other saints of the tender love of the divine humanity, watch over all agents and messengers who distribute the little red book that continues to celebrate the graces flowing from the pierced heart of Jesus.

Saint Barnabas - 11 June

Readings: Acts 11:21b-26; 13:1-3; Psalm 98; Matthew 5:17-19

The apostles are sent by Jesus just as Jesus was sent by the Father. Similarly they are to be shepherds as Jesus was, and is, the Good Shepherd. One of the outstanding pastors of the early church, counted also as an apostle, is Barnabas.

Barnabas first appears in Acts 4 where we hear a bit about his background: he is a Levite, from Cyprus, called Joseph but nicknamed Barnabas by the apostles, a name meaning 'son of encouragement'. More than once he acts as mediator between Saul become Paul and the Christian community which is understandably suspicious of its ferocious one-time persecutor. At the very beginning he has to re-assure the community in Damascus about the legitimacy of Paul's conversion. In today's reading we see him working with Paul again, this time encouraging him back from exile in Tarsus to join the community at Antioch.

He seems like a pastor who has the smell of his sheep about him, throwing his lot in with Paul in his first great missionary journey in which together they preach and found churches across Asia Minor. Together they witness to the call of the Gentiles and together they are deputed to relay the decisions of the churches one to the other.

But they fall out. It happens so often between pastors and some of their people, between pastor and pastor, between sections of the parish and other sections of the parish. On the one hand it is re-assuring that even those who were first called Christians, when faced with the difficulties to which all flesh is heir, were as impotent as we sometimes are.

Why is it that so much energy goes trying to help people understand each other? Why is it that so much energy goes massaging wounded egos and cajoling people to keep going, or to make a change, or to work together again? Why is it that people cannot work together in the Lord's house even while professing the same faith and aspiring to the same charity?

Most of us will feel that Barnabas was in the right in his argument with Paul about taking John Mark with them again. Paul seems determined and relentless, too demanding for most people, but perhaps it was necessary for him to fulfil the vocation he had received. Barnabas on the other hand seems a more peaceful person, calm and encouraging, reconciling and helping.

Let us thank God for good pastors like Barnabas who console and encourage even while thanking God also for prophetic gadflies like Paul who provoke and stimulate. In the end such contrasting gifts are complementary within the one body of the Lord.

Week 10 Wednesday (Year 2)

Readings: 1 Kings 18:20-39; Psalm 15; Matthew 5:17-19

As children, at school, there was a lot to hold our attention in the stories from the Bible, especially from the Old Testament. There were so many big characters and colourful and dramatic stories. We had Moses and Samson, Joshua and Elijah, Jacob and David, supermen easily placed alongside Batman and Superman. There were mighty women also - Delilah and Deborah and Judith, to go with the super-heroines of the comics we read. It all fitted very easily with what we were also seeing in the cinema - cowboys and Indians, cops and robbers, heroes and villains.

'When I was a child I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child' (1 Corinthians 13:11). The world was enchanted but also dualistic (even though we would not then have understood the term!), the children of light engaging in warfare with the sons and daughters of darkness, to save the world, save civilisation, save humanity.

'When I became a man I gave up childish ways'. Well, did I, really? It is still much easier to think in dualistic terms and we see it being done all the time - rich and poor, north and south, black and white, Christian and Muslim, left-wing and right-wing, conservative and liberal. It seems that even when the world loses its enchantment for us, and we become more skeptical about the arrival of any heroic deus ex machina to save the day, we still go on thinking in dualistic terms. 

The story of Elijah's confrontation with the priests of Baal is therefore one with which we will be very comfortable, at least from the point of view of its simplicity. One faithful prophet against four hundred and fifty pagan priests. An absent and/or powerless god who can do nothing with a dry bull ('perhaps he is on the loo', Elijah taunts) compared with an always present, always powerful, always ready to act Lord, the God of Israel, to whose devouring fire the bull soaked in water presents no difficulty. There are goodies and baddies, and it is clear who they are, the odds are stacked against the goodies, but they have the Superhero of all superheroes rooting for them and so all is well - 'the Lord is God, the Lord is God' echoes along the slopes of Mount Carmel and across the beautiful valley of Jezreel. (You can still hear the echo if you visit there today!)

Fast forward to another Galilean hillside and another prophet, speaking to a crowd of followers and others. It is less dramatic, less colourful, less noisy or smelly, there is no bull. Very soon Jesus will make a series of contrasts between the old law and his new law - 'you have heard that it was said ... but I say to you'. It is all too easy to place this within the simple familiar pattern with which our minds are most comfortable - old is bad, new is good; Jewish law bad, Christian law good; ancestors limited, we enlightened; former times primitive, our times sophisticated.

But this prophet will frequently challenge, subvert, upend our easy, lazy, dualistic way of thinking. It is as if this is the heart of his preaching. Who goes home justified? Who is chosen? Who enters first into the kingdom of heaven? Who will be first and who last? Who wins and who loses?

So he prefaces this series of 'you have heard ... but I say' with a warning which obliges us to think again and to think hard. It  directly confronts our tendency to separate into 'goodie' and 'baddie', our childish way of thinking. We can say simply that it calls us to think, to think deeply and consistently, perhaps to think seriously for the first time. His mission is all about metanoia, a change of mind, a revolution in how we think. So do not imagine, he says, that I have come to abolish the Law and the Prophets. Think this instead: I have come to complete them, in every last detail. It you want to be great in my kingdom then keep these laws in every detail and teach others to do the same. (Is he being serious?)

It is not by being childish in our way of thinking that we are to be like little children so as to enter his kingdom, thinking the world is a showdown, understood simplistically, between the good and the bad (with you and I always among the good, of course).  It is all much more interesting, more complicated, more of a challenge to human imagination and thought, more dramatic spiritually - how to understand this world and the providence unfolding within it, how to stay with this prophet in all the confusion that can gather round, how to have 'the mind of Christ' and to stand with him as he brings all law, all prophets, all promises, all covenants, to unimagined completion.

Elijah and Moses, those two great superheroes of our childhood, will soon confirm this, appearing with him on yet another Galilean hill, pointing to him, only to fade away quietly, leaving only Jesus. And the quiet echo of the Father's voice, 'listen to him'.

Week 10 Tuesday (Year 2)

Readings: 1 Kings 17:7-16; Psalm 4; Matthew 5:13-16

Ernest Hemingway wrote a short story which consisted of just six words: 'For sale: baby shoes. Never used'. Another great author of the last century, John Steinbeck, pointed out how we use very short words for the most significant human experiences: war, peace, life, death, love, hate.

Today's readings are simple in this way. Elijah is hungry and thirsty, the woman offers him what she has, meal and oil. Add a little water and there is bread. Jesus speaks about salt and light, simple words and simple realities but things of great power.

We have the simplest words for the most important things: God, Abba, God is love.

And yet we move towards complication. Why do we need to complicate our lives so much? Is this something sin wants to do, to pull us away from a simple appreciation of the gifts we have?

I had a vivid experience of recovering the simple during a Holy Week retreat at Quarr Abbey some years ago. The place was cold, the hours of praying were long, and the food was Lenten. After two days the simple breakfast of homemade brown bread, butter and coffee was the tastiest and most satisfying meal imaginable. I knew again what it meant to be hungry. I knew again what it meant to be tired and appreciated sleep. I knew again what it meant to be cold and appreciated heat. And - this is what we hope for in going on retreat - I knew again what it meant to be without God, and appreciated the need to seek Him.

We are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. It is perfectly simple and so easy to understand. But something else enters in. The salt loses its savour. When we experience empty blandness again we return to appreciating salt. The light is allowed to weaken and even to go out. When we experience darkness again we return to appreciating light.

The widow of Zarephath, who helped Elijah, gets honourable mention in the preaching of Jesus. Her jar of meal and jug of oil have been taken to symbolise the sacramental life of the Church. These sacred mysteries are always on offer - reconciliation and the Eucharist - to restore and sustain our life, to make us salty again, to make us radiant again.