St Mary Magdalen - 22 July

Readings: Song of Songs3:1-4 or 2 Corinthians 5:14-17; Psalm 63; John 20:1-2, 11-18

The story of Mary Magdalen involves conspiracy, religion, and sex. She always has a place in the (fictional) conspiracy interpretations of Christianity. Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code was just the latest in a line of such interpretations. They usually involve also the Knights Templar, the Holy Grail, the Priory of Sion, other secret societies, corrupt clergy, secret information, and a Catholic Church desperate to keep hidden some knowledge about its beginnings that would destroy it and bring its historical mission, finally, to an end.

Conspiracy itself is part of the excitement. It seems that we prefer to believe that some of what happens in organisations and institutions is the result of conspiracy (thoughtful and clever planning) whereas what we are trying to explain is often simply the outcome of incompetence, bad management, and disorganisation. But there seems to be a 'paranoia gene' in the human mind that prefers conspiracy. Or perhaps it is a childish wish for security, that somebody somewhere knows what is going on, even if they are not telling us about it. If the conspiracy can be attributed to the Catholic Church, this makes it even more compelling, it seems.

The other two ingredients essential for this kind of best seller are religion and sex. That combination always catches the eye and has a particular frisson that either by itself would not generate. Once again, if the religion involved is the Catholic Church, then it is of even greater interest. If Jesus and Mary Magdalene did get married, and had children who were the ancestors of the Merovingian kings of France, then it is certainly a story worth telling. The predictable reactions of condemnation from the Church usually serve only to generate greater interest in the book or film.

Today we celebrate the feast of Saint Mary Magdalene. And her story, as we see from the gospel reading, really does involve conspiracy, religion, and sex. The conspiracy - somebody somewhere knows what is going on; what is happening is the outcome of thoughtful and clever planning - is one hatched in the mind and heart of God before the ages began. This is how Paul speaks about the conspiracy or, as he calls it, 'the mystery'. The gospel is preached openly, the Word is broadcast for everyone to hear, and there is nothing esoteric in the teaching of the Church. But what that teaching means is continually being uncovered. There are always depths to be explored. There are hidden treasures in Jesus Christ, and our true life is hid with Christ in God. Only very slowly do we come to realise the truth of what is going on.

What better conspiracy could we be involved in? We do not yet know everything about it but we know enough of what it means for us, and we know enough about the One behind it, to embrace that teaching and to enter into that mystery, with confidence and enthusiasm, even if also with fear and trembling.

Mary Magdalen was also, clearly, in a love affair with Jesus. He became the centre of her life. And today's gospel reading is about the most intimate moment in that love affair. One of the readings recommended by the Church for today's feast is from the Song of Songs, in which the bride searches for her beloved, the one her heart loves, the one she has lost. In the early dawn, in the garden, with the guards hovering nearby, a tryst involving anxiety, desire and mystery: this is the atmosphere in which Jesus and Mary Magdalene meet again.

Lovers, we might say, create each other. Love enables us to be more fully, and more truly, ourselves. It creates the space in which the loved one can be, can flourish, and can grow. In the case of Mary encountering Jesus it is not just a matter of a new life - as Dante described the experience of falling in love with Beatrice - it is a matter of a new creation, a new world, a new human being with a new deepest happiness and fulfillment. The conspiracy is unlocked by Jesus saying 'Mary'. This is the magic word, to call her by her name. She recognises him, called by her name she is immediately taken into his world, and she begins to live as a creature of the Resurrection.

Tradition says that Mary Magdalene went on to be a preacher of the gospel at Marseilles before retiring to a cave in the mountains outside that city. In that moment in the garden after the Resurrection, she is the new woman encountering the new man in the garden of the new creation. This is the kingdom of which Jesus had spoken, where they no longer marry and have children, but in which a different kind of communion and fruitfulness are found. 'Do not touch me', Jesus says to her, 'for I have not yet ascended to the Father'. The plot thickens.

You see how the truth of this mystery is far more interesting than the fiction of the conspiracy theorists. You see how the religion and union of persons involved here is far more profound than anything novelists manage to describe. In a way she never expected, Mary Magdalene, searching for the one her heart loved, was found by Him. He called her by her name, 'Mary', as if he had said 'let there be Mary'. And in the light of His recognition of her, she saw the Lord.

Week 16 Tuesday (Year 2)

Micah 7.14-15, 18-20; Psalm 85; Matthew 12.46-50

Ephesians 6:2 says that the commandment to honour our parents is the first commandment to have a promise attached: ‘honour your father and your mother that your days may be long and that it may go well with you in the land which the Lord your God gives you’ (Deuteronomy 5:16; Exodus 20:12). The matter is taken very seriously in the Old Testament: ‘every one of you shall revere his mother and his father’ (Leviticus 19:3); to strike or even curse one’s parents is an offence punishable by death (Exodus 21:15, 17; Leviticus 20:9; Deuteronomy 27:16).

Jesus refers to this commandment in controversy with the Pharisees and scribes who, he says, have effectively rejected the commandment of God by introducing a ‘get out clause’ into their own laws: if somebody dedicated property for religious purposes then this freed him from his obligations to his parents. But this is corruption, says Jesus, all the worse for posing as piety: ‘you reject the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition’ (Matthew 7:10; Mark 15:1-9). We need to be careful that we do not end up doing something similar, giving more importance to human traditions than to God’s commandments.

At the same time Jesus makes it clear that faith in him is more fundamental even than our relationship with our parents. We are not to ‘prefer’ them to him if we are to be worthy of him (Matthew 10:32-40; Mark 10:28-31; Luke 9:57-62; 14:25-35). Blood is thicker than water, we say. The Book of Leviticus identifies this as the reason why cursing one’s parents is a capital offence: if you curse your parents ‘your own blood is upon you’ (Leviticus 20:9). But Jesus teaches that there is something thicker than blood. ‘Who are my mother and my brothers’, he asks when told that they are at the edge of the crowd seeking him (Matthew 12:46-50). Those who hear the word of God and do it, he replies. The woman who praises Mary – ‘blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts you sucked’ (Luke 11:27-28) – gets the same reply: ‘blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it’. This is the strongest bond of all, our becoming brothers and sisters of Christ, our adoption as children of the Father, our shared life in the Spirit.

The exchange between the adolescent Jesus and his human parents in the Temple at Jerusalem may seem shocking: ‘how is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?’ (Luke 2:49). But it serves to introduce the meaning of his mission, in which the old commandment remains in force while being taken up into the new commandment, to be given new power there. In Christ we are asked not only to honour our father and our mother, we are to love them. Whoever does the will of the heavenly Father is our brother and sister and mother – and that includes our brothers, sisters and parents who, when they share our faith, are even more deeply bonded with us.

Week 16 Monday (Year 2)

Readings: Micah 6:1-4, 6-8; Psalm 50; Matthew 12:38-42

 

There is something greater than Jonah here and there is something greater than Solomon here. Earlier in Matthew's gospel, with the giving of the new law in the sermon on the mount, we learned that there is something greater than Moses here. Throughout the gospels we are reminded that there is something greater than David here and something greater than Elijah. And so on. Jesus is understood against the backdrop of all the main figures of Old Testament history and theology. Because of who Christians believe him to be, he is greater than any of them.

Luke in particular tells us how, after his resurrection, Jesus himself took the disciples through the law, the prophets and the writings, to show how everything that was written in the scriptures was about him. This he did for the disciples on the road to Emmaus and again when he appeared to the early community back in Jerusalem (Luke 24:27, 44-45).

Today's gospel passage fits with this teaching. Something greater than Solomon means something greater than the wisdom literature of the Bible. Something greater than Jonah (why Jonah though, of all the prophets?!) means something greater than the prophetic literature of the Bible. Something greater than Moses and David means something greater than the law given to the people and greater too than all earlier acts in their dramatic and formative history.

Saint Jerome famously said that ignorance of the scriptures is ignorance of Christ. And he means the whole of the scriptures. They are all about Christ. He is the giver of the new law. He fulfills the ancient prophecies while bringing new promises and opening a new future. He is the teacher of teachers since he not only transmits the wisdom of God but is himself God's Word, God's Wisdom incarnate. And he is the leader of God's people, their king and shepherd, guiding them through the historical times and seasons that continue to test their faith and to form them in it.

We continue to look for signs in spite of all the signs we have been given, in creation, in history, in the remarkable lives of holy people. If they do not believe Moses and the prophets, the Lord says in the parable of Dives and Lazarus, are they likely to believe if someone rises from the dead?

It means we have been given all the signs we will ever need. If we have a Bible then we have access to all these signs. If we have a crucifix then we can contemplate the greatest sign of all. Reading through the scriptures we will see what it means to have something - someone - greater than Solomon or Jonah, greater than Moses or David. Our hearts burn within us as the treasures of the scriptures are revealed. And we will find there also the keys that allow us to interpret the other signs of God's presence that we find outside the scriptures, in creation, in people, in historical events and in the life of Christ's body, the Church.

For the presence of God and of Christ in creation the Irish poet Joseph Mary Plunkett sums it up beautifully in his poem I see His Blood upon the Rose for the sign of the cross is stamped on the whole of creation:

I SEE his blood upon the rose
And in the stars the glory of his eyes,
His body gleams amid eternal snows,
His tears fall from the skies.

I see his face in every flower;
The thunder and the singing of the birds
Are but his voice—and carven by his power
Rocks are his written words.

All pathways by his feet are worn,
His strong heart stirs the ever-beating sea,
His crown of thorns is twined with every thorn,
His cross is every tree.

Week 16 Sunday (Year A)

Readings: Wisdom 12:13,16-19; Psalm 86; Romans 8:26-27; Matthew 13:24-43

In the gospel reading for today Jesus offers three agricultural metaphors for the kingdom of heaven. Perhaps, to be more precise, at least for the first of these parables, it is 'the kingdom of heaven on earth' he is talking about, in other words the Church. Good and evil grow alongside each other in this stage of the kingdom's history. The 'puritan' temptation can be strong, at times very strong, the desire to root out the evil and purify the Church, make it to be only good like the heavenly Father in whom there is no shadow of darkness but only light.

But acting on such desires is not wise, Jesus says, because inevitably rooting out the evil will lead to undermining the good also. It is as if he were to say 'leave the work of separating to those who are expert in that work', 'leave the work of discerning between good and evil to those who are equipped to make such judgements'. Here he assigns the task to the angels, they are the harvesters of the parable who separate the wheat and the chaff at the end.

We might have thought that we had ourselves gained that ability to discern through eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It gives us experience of both, eating from that tree, in the first place in ourselves, and it is the confusion that this sets loose in us that makes it difficult for us to see now where to draw the line. Who are you to judge your neighbour? Who am I to judge anyone else when I cannot manage it for myself?

Best to leave judgement to God who sees more profoundly, who knows all things, and whose power, as the first reading says, is made perfect in mercy. The wisdom of the farmer in the parable is an expression of that mercy - give things time, be patient, wait. In another parable Jesus talks explicitly of the gardener's patience: 'give it another year, then we will see'. 

The second reading, from Paul's letter to the Romans, is along the same lines. God knows our weakness, not just in regard to discerning good and evil, but also in regard to praying (which may actually be simply another way of talking about the same thing). So the Spirit comes to help us in our weakness. It is the Spirit who knows thoughts and discerns intentions, and he will intercede on our behalf. The harvesting angels will be working under the supervision of the same Spirit.

The other two parables then testify to the work of the Holy Spirit in the Church. In spite of its many limitations and failures, and in spite of the evil that invariably gets entangled in its roots, it becomes a great tree in which the peoples of the earth can take refuge. The final parable is more culinary than agricultural, perhaps. The presence of the kingdom, at this stage of its history, is like yeast working its effect in flour. Small, quickly disappearing, it yet works a powerful effect in the whole thing. So holiness, wherever it is found, good people, wherever they are found, are working God's purpose out in the world.

We do not know for now where the lines are to be drawn. But we do know that holiness will make present in our world even now, however mixed in with other things it might continue to be, the kindness and patience, the mercy and even the power of God.

Week 15 Saturday (Year 2)

Readings: Micah 2:1-5; Psalm 10; Matthew 12:14-21

In response to the Pharisees making plans to have him killed, Jesus withdraws and warns people not to make him known. It is a natural reaction - lie low, head for a quiet place, and try to keep your whereabouts secret. At least for the moment it is like that.

We are told that this was to fulfil what Isaiah wrote in the first of the Servant Songs, Isaiah 42. It is not immediately obvious how withdrawing and staying hidden fulfils what we find in that passage. It talks about 'beholding' someone who will 'proclaim' something to the Gentiles, which makes it seem that he becomes a public figure again. Unless the reference to the Gentiles is the point: if Jesus takes refuge there, in pagan territory, it might be a safer place for him, at least for now.

Or perhaps it is what follows in the passage from Isaiah that is being fulfilled in Jesus withdrawing and lying low. The Servant is meek and very gentle, the essence of what we would today call non-violence. In poetry of great tenderness Isaiah tells us that he will not contend or cry out, nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets. He will not break the bruised reed or quench the smouldering wick. What is vulnerable and fragile, what is weak and tentative, he will support and sustain. It is like a first movment in the Servant's work which, in its final and climactic movement, will bring justice to victory and give the Gentiles hope.

For the moment, then, the music of Jesus' life is gentle and quiet. But already sounding within it are the darker and louder chords of what will be revealed later, when he does return to engage directly with the forces gathered against him. It can seem that those forces are the ones that are really powerful and they do wreak havoc in people's lives. The first reading from Micah describes that havoc as Amos described it last week: the accumulated fruit of our small injustices and petty lies is a disaster because once it is accepted that justice and truth may be ignored or subverted, in no matter how trivial the way, true communion between people is no longer possible.

The great struggle of the Servant of the Lord, which unfolds in the later songs of the Servant in Isaiah 49, 50 and 52-53, shows us just how powerful is the gentleness and meekness of the Servant. The scriptures bring us back to this again and again: the forces that are truly powerful will seem at first too gentle and too meek for this world, too fragile and too vulnerable for those other powers that seem really effective, really to count for something in this world, the forces that really get things done: economic, military, political, and all forms of violence and coercion.

But it is the power dwelling in the heart of the Servant, the Spirit of God, that is truly powerful, powerful beyond the boundaries of this world, even beyond sin and death. For the moment these powers will often be quiet, gentle, invisible. Perhaps - we will be tempted to think - too quiet, too gentle, too invisible. But in the end, in the dramatic and climactic final movement of the drama, it is these powers - justice and truth, love and compassion - that rise victorious. Long after tyrants and bullies are dead, the courage and goodness of their victims stands and shines. In that strength, in that light, justice is proclaimed to all the nations as all are called to hope in the name of Jesus Christ.

Week 15 Friday (Year 2)

Readings: Isaiah 38:1-6, 21-22, 7-8; Isaiah 38:10,11,12,16; Matthew 12:1-8

This is not a homily on today's readings but it might be of interest in reflecting on today's gospel reading.

Aristotle alerts us to this difficulty about knowledge, that there is nothing apart from individual things and yet knowledge is universal, drawing things into unity and identity. How there can be universal knowledge of particular things is the hardest difficulty of all, he says (Metaphysics III.4) .

The place where we see this difficulty most readily is in regard to moral action. St Thomas says that human acts are always singular and contingent, infinite in their possibilities. It is therefore impossible to frame a law which will cover all cases: 'it is impossible to institute a legal rule that will not be inadequate in some situation' (Summa theologiae II.II 120, 1). Legislators work with what generally happens but there will be cases where observing the law would be 'against the equality of justice and the common good', precisely the things laws are meant to establish and protect. Aquinas gives a couple of examples of situations where observing what the law requires would be bad: returning his sword to a lunatic, or his assets to an enemy. These are cases where following the law as it is given would be evil. The good, in such circumstances, is established and protected by ignoring the letter of the law (praetermissis verbis legis) in order to be faithful to 'the meaning of justice and to common utility'.

The virtue that enables us to make such decisions well is, in Greek, epieikeia, in Latin aequitas, in English equity. This virtue teaches us when it would be vicious to follow the letter of the law (art.cit., ad 1). It does not mean that we have become judges over the law but we are obliged to make a judgement in the particular situation in which we find ourselves (art.cit., ad 2). This virtue is needed therefore for situations of doubt, exceptional situations (art.cit., ad 3). Aristotle says that equity is a part of justice taken as a general virtue and so is higher than legal justice (Nicomachean Ethics V.10). St Thomas says that equity is thus a higher rule of human acts (superior regula humanorum actuum) than are the positive laws enacted by parliaments and monarchs (Summa theologiae II.II 120, 2). Equity is needed to moderate law which becomes cruel if it is not somehow moderated. (It is a crucial point: elsewhere St Thomas says that justice alone is cruel and must always be tempered by mercy.)

The great virtue of prudence is entirely concerned with the application of universal principles to particular situations and circumstances. It has an ancillary virtue called gnome which seems to be the basis for equity: gnome brings a perspicacity of judgement across the whole of the moral life, enabling a person to know when a higher principle takes precedence over a lower one (Summa theologiae II.II 51,4). Some of this is common sense. In England one drives on the left hand side of the road but if there is a person lying there one does not continue to drive on that side (as the law requires) and may even decide in the circumstances to drive on the right hand side: it is the reasonable thing to do thus serving the spirit of the law while ignoring its letter. Some situations will, however, be much more complex.

Does what Aristotle and Aquinas say about equity, prudence, and gnome, mean that there are no exceptionless norms governing human action? Some moral philosophers and theologians think it does, that one cannot say murder, adultery, rape and cruelty are always evil since circumstances might arise where one of these would be the right course of action. But such a view is only possible where moral norms are understood as purely legal norms, where natural law for example is understood as if it were exactly the same as positive law. There are things that the virtuous person will never do and if such a thing appears as a possible course of action he or she will immediately reject it. This is because moral norms are about more than social good or utility, they are about the values and goods without which human beings cannot begin to flourish and against which one ought never to act no matter what the circumstances.

At the same time what Aristotle and Aquinas say about equity teaches us something very important about the limits of legislation.

Week 15 Thursday (Year 2)

Readings: Isaiah 26:7-9, 12, 16-19; Psalm 102; Matthew 11:28-30

Living creatures that we are, we struggle to give birth and then bring forth nothing but wind. By contrast God's power raises the dead and by that same power the land of shades gives birth.

Chastening stuff. The gospel reading is more encouraging. Yes, the yoke is heavy and the burden is demanding but love makes it easy. Love makes all things easy. The most onerous tasks become easy when they are undertaken out of love. This is the divine power of a God who is love, a God who creates out of nothing and who can even restore the dead to life.

The yoke is used to refer to the law and its function of guiding the animal along the right path, keeping it moving in the right direction. The harness makes the animal obedient but it is an obedience imposed from outside, by another mind and another will. The new law, the gift of the Spirit, enables us to love the good so much that the work of pursuing the good and making it present no longer feels like work. It becomes a task, no matter how onerous, that is undertaken freely. Now obedience comes from within, from the mind and will of the one who acts. He is no longer like an animal needing to be kept in harness so that it stays on the right path and is more like the lover, who sees his beloved from afar, the one he wants to be with, and moving towards her he will overcome whatever obstacles lie in his path.

So much for the single yoke, the one made for one animal, and how its meaning is transformed by what Jesus says. If we think of it as a double yoke then our companion in it is Jesus himself. He asks us to take his yoke upon us, does he not? So it is the Cross, our participation in it, and when we look to see who is bearing it with us, who is our Simon of Cyrene, we see that it is Jesus himself. Once again love is making all things possible. As Isaiah says in the first reading today 'you have accomplished all we have done'. It is a key text on the mystery of grace. It is our work, of course, that remains clear. But it is not at all our work, that also remains clear. How can we say both? Augustine, the Doctor of Grace, jumps in to try to explain it but in the end gives up and says 'show me a lover, he will understand'.

This tremendous lover, Jesus, enters the land of death and sterility and he transforms it by his presence. It becomes the land of life and fruitfulness. We are called to share in this wonderful experience, this mystery of the transformation of all things by the power of the Divine Love. It is a land of peace and rest - and there is so much yet to be done by those who love Him.