Here was a philosopher Pope, a questioning Pope, whose whole life proclaimed My Lord and my God. In the gospel reading, Jesus declares that he comes to us in the Eucharist so that we can draw life from him. In the gospel reading, the Lord worked powerfully through the small amount of food that a young boy made available to him. In the words of todays second reading, we can find ourselves being plagued by all sorts of trials in the season of Easter as much as in any other season. A locked door was no obstacle to him. She insisted that she was betrothed to Christ. The story of Pauls conversion in the first reading has captivated artists down the centuries. We need the Lords help. It has been the language of the church since its very earliest days. Elsewhere in the gospels, Jesus says, Give and it will be given to you. The gospel reading suggests that we respond by listening to his voice and allowing his word to make its home in us. When they find him, Jesus reveals to them what it is that motivates their seeking. Just click on the month of interest and scroll to the day required. Perth/Singapore/Philippines: 7am; Timor-Leste/Tokyo: 8am; New Zealand: 12pm; Los Angeles: Thursday 4pm; New York/Toronto: Thursday 7pm] to prayerfully reflect on the Gospel of the coming Sunday. It is a day when we remind ourselves that we are called. not like the bread our ancestors ate: The gospel reading suggests that even when we might cut ourselves off from others, we do not cut ourselves off from the Lord. The Acts of the Apostles suggests that as soon as the gospel began to be preached after Pentecost efforts were made by people in authority to suppress it. It is a very reassuring promise for all of us. Although Paul had seen the risen Lord in a unique sense, he didnt consider the members of the church to whom he wrote, including ourselves, to be any less privileged than himself. men have shown they prefer darkness to the light click to accept all cookiesAccept %CC% cookies. At some deep level, we are unhappy with the direction our lives are taking. Jesus seems to be saying to Nicodemus and to us that the Spirit of God is not something we can control. This is surely one of the most striking statements of Jesus in all of the gospels. Up until that moment, all the disciples of Jesus were Jews. We all have a role to play in calling forth the gifts of others by recognizing situations that would be ideally suited to them and by creating space for them in which to work. One of the features of Marks gospel is its very negative portrayal of Jesus first disciples, including Peter, those who were closest to him. If we do that, the gospel reading suggests that we can be assured that the Lord will do the rest. The story they told was a true story but it was not the whole story. It is to the Eucharist that we too will be lead as we open up our own stories to the Lords story in the Scriptures. They reveal a certain insight into what has happened, but very often a limited insight. That beatitude embraces all of us gathered here this morning. Jesus immediately challenges him to take a much bigger step towards him; he calls on Nicodemus to allow himself to be born from above, to be born of water and the Spirit. His last appearance in the gospel is alongside Joseph of Arimathea, as they both arrange for Jesus to have a dignified burial. Please check your email now and click the confirmation link to confirm your request. The Lord points to that relationship to express something of his own relationship to us. This message of Marks gospel that the Lord continues to work with his disciples today, in spite of past serious failings, is one the church needs to hear today. Yes, Father, for that is what it pleased you to do. Indeed, the shepherd leads us through the gate. According to the Book of Genesis, God created Adam by breathing into his nostrils the breath of life. The word of the Lord nurtures our faith in preparation for our encounter with him in the Sacraments. so that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.. Daily Reflection Archives | E- Mail Us. It appears that eating Jesus the bread of life is an image for believing in Jesus. Our fundamental vocation is to be a loving and caring people, with a mind through which the good Shepherd thinks, a heart through which he loves, a voice through which he speaks and hands through which he works. and as it is in my power to lay it down, God gives him the Spirit without reserve. He breathed new life into them; he recreated them in his love. And Jesus walked about in the temple area on the Portico of Solomon. Her life shows us very clearly that the life of faith has both an inward and outward dimension. It is the language of the Eucharist. The question the Jews ask in this mornings gospel reading - How can this man give us his flesh to eat?- is an understandable one. Unlike other religious orders in the West which are founded in direct historical lineage to a specific teacher (eg. He was anticipating what we see happening in the first reading. and the Son of Man must be lifted up We are called to encourage one another in the faith, to help one another to grow in our relationship with the Lord, to enable one another to be faithful. Such a life of communion with the Lord can be experienced here and now by all those who believe in him, who come to him in faith and who try to keep his word. We are being reminded that serious doubt and great faith can reside in one and the same person. We live out the call to be the Lords disciple in a way that is unique to each one of us. The story of Pauls conversion on the road to Damascus has captured the imagination of many people in the course of the centuries, including the imagination of many artists. There are a number of similarities between the story of the Ethiopian in todays first reading, from the Acts of the Apostles. The bread of the word is a necessary first course, as it were, that prepares us to receive the Eucharist well. Jesus went up on the mountain, and there he sat down with his disciples. The Lord calls each of us to be a good shepherd in some shape or form to others. The gospel reading suggests that just as a shepherd holds his flock together, it is the Lord who holds the church together, the community of his followers. Going out about nine o'clock, Just as shepherd will not allow any of his flock to be stolen, because he is so protective of them, the Lord will not allow us to fall away from him, because he is so protective of us, as long as we want to remain a member of his flock and do not deliberately walk away from him. The Carmelite Rule states that is basic for a Carmelite to "live a life of allegiance to Jesus Christ - how, pure in heart and stout in conscience, he must be unswerving in the service of his Master" [no.2]. We struggle to bring our prayers of petition into line with what the Lord wants to give us. Mark reminds us that living the gospel, following in the way of Jesus, is not easy; it makes demands on us; it stretches us. That statement has been a source of inspiration for many believers over the centuries. The general call of baptism to be the Lords disciple, which is addressed to us all, is then lived out in particular ways in response to the Lords very personal, daily call to each one of us. It was shortly before the Jewish feast of Passover. What is born of flesh is flesh and what is born of spirit is spirit. They set out that instant and returned to Jerusalem. He took the few resources that the young boy was generous enough to part with and, having prayed the prayer of thanksgiving to God over these small pieces of food, he somehow fed the enormous crowd. They seemed lost without Jesus. After a three year period of prayer and seclusion she set about serving her neighbours, distributing alms to the poor, ministering to the sick and to prisoners. The cardinals regretted their decision and elected a second Pope but could not persuade Pope Urban to retire. This is the bread come down from heaven; Unfortunately, we know very little. Every so often the Lord prompts the church to take a new step beyond where it has been. In todays gospel reading, Jesus speaks of the importance of eating his flesh and drinking his blood so as to draw life from him. Marks gospel assures us that even when we are unfaithful to the Lord, he remains faithful to us; even when we fail, he continues to call us to become all he wants us to be. Jesus wanted to draw all people to himself. If we come to him, having initially turned away, he will not turn us away because, as he declares in the gospel reading, it is his Fathers will that whoever sees the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life. We find a similar pattern in the first reading. He is the good shepherd who knows us through and through and who loves us so completely that he laid down his life for us. What is needed from us is what Jesus called for from Nicodemus, a readiness and willingness to surrender to the movement of the Spirit in our lives. However, Mark was the first person to put this material together into a narrative of the life of Jesus. He was sent because he was known to be a good man, filled with the Holy Spirit and faith. Philips proclaiming of the gospel moved the Ethiopian to ask for baptism. These cookies are necessary to let our website work. Those who attempted to extinguish Gods light shining in Jesus only succeeded in making that light of love shine all the more brightly. In various ways, calls are made upon our time, upon our gifts, upon our energies and resources. The gospel reading says that they were talking together about all that happened. The Lords unique call to each one of us is with a view to our being fully alive. It was while the first disciples were at prayer in the upper room on the Jewish feast of Pentecost that the Holy Spirit came down upon them in the form of tongues of fire. In this mornings gospel reading we are told that the disciples were preaching everywhere in response to the risen Lords call, and that the Lord was working with them. As a result of that initiative they came to recognize the stranger as Jesus at the very moment when he took, blessed, broke and gave the bread to them. However, that doesnt seem to have been true of the conversation the two disciples were having on the road to Emmaus. Yet, it is the language of Johns gospel. Sunday. No one can do that for us. We are much more security conscious than we were in the past. The city of Jerusalem had been a centre of pilgrimage for Jews for hundreds of years before the coming of Jesus. However, having fed the physical hunger of the crowd, some of that crowd now want Jesus to give them more of the same. The Eucharist is a very special expression of our communion with him and of his with us, but our communion with him is to extend beyond the Eucharist. However, the more fundamental confirmation is the Lord confirming us as we strive every day to follow in his way. There are various ways of practising Lectio Divina either individually or in groups but Guigo's description remains fundamental. The way the Lord related to those two disciples is how he relates to all of us. When the Ethiopian reflects on a passage from Isaiah, he begins to ask questions, Is the prophet referring to himself or someone else? He needed the help of a person of faith to answer this question, the help of the deacon Philip. The story of the stranger can have a lot to say to us. The people, seeing this sign that he had given, said, This really is the prophet who is to come into the world. Jesus, who could see they were about to come and take him by force and make him king, escaped back to the hills by himself. It was the time of the feast of Dedication in Jerusalem. When myself and my brothers were very small my parents used to tie a cloth around where the gate met the railings so that we could not open the gate. Certainly, Jesus did come that we may have life to the full beyond this earthly life, a sharing in his own risen life. In this moment of communion, heaven comes to earth and eternal life breaks into this earthly life. It was to him that they must submit, not to them. In one of the earliest documents in the New Testament, the first letter to the Corinthians, Paul says, the cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a communion with the blood of Christ? And their eyes were opened and they recognised him; but he had vanished from their sight. Do not work for food that cannot last, There were many other signs that Jesus worked and the disciples saw, but they are not recorded in this book. It follows that the Lord will never call us to something that would result in a diminishment of life for ourselves or for others. the usability. The gospel was perhaps intended as a word of encouragement to the church, assuring them that just as they had travelled and were still travelling the way of the cross, Jesus had travelled that way before them. Joseph reminds us that our own personal response to our own calling from God will always have huge consequences for others. The coming of the Holy Spirit at the first Pentecost wasnt sufficient for the early church. He respected where they were on their journey. The authors were the Nuns of the monasteries that were members of the Saint Teresa Association in 1990. The conclusion of the letter, which is the conclusion of todays first reading, sends greetings from your sister in Babylon. For this Liturgical Year: Weekday Reflections for 2019/2020 'The Word of God is Living and Active' available at messenger.ie & 'Journeying with Matthew' ~ Reflections on Sunday Gospel, Year A available at @veritas.ie . Gates seem to be less common in the more modern estates. He stops to read the Scriptures and he is very touched by a passage from the prophet Isaiah. Our story, the way we talk about it or write about it, is only one way of putting it. In the gospel of Luke, Zacchaeus goes looking for Jesus in broad daylight, even climbing a sycamore tree to see him. No-one has gone up to heaven except the Son of Man who has come down from heaven. If you would like to receive the Daily Reflection via email, please visit our sign up page. The spiritual person is the person whose life is shaped and directed by the Spirit. The sea was stirred up because a strong wind was blowing. Within that general call which we all share, we each have a particular call that is in keeping with our own unique gifts and limitations, our own distinctive set of experiences. He is clearly speaking about himself. The works I do in my Fathers name are my witness; He wanted them to know that he was at peace with them, in spite of the fact that they had abandoned him in the hour of his passion and death. The other evangelists took their lead from Mark. The Lord works in life-giving ways in what can seem to be desolate places. We are called to be contemplatives in action, like Catherine of Siena. He invites people to come to him and he promises those who do so that he will never turn them away. Our emotions can dull our memories and cloud our reasoning. As parishioners of the parish of St John the Baptist, we might think of ourselves as having a special calling to enable, to encourage, using our own gifts while also making way for the gifts of others. One of the tasks of life for each of us as disciples of the Lord is to try and listen to the particular call that the Lord is addressing to each one of us here and now. The church now had two Popes, one in Rome and one in Avignon, a situation that was to last for several decades. Charity Number CHY 5894 | Registered Charity Number RCN 20009656, Copyright 2021. Yes, he desperately wants us to have life and to have it to the full. The natural phenomenon of the wind can speak to us of the spiritual phenomenon of the Holy Spirit. Having been feed with bread in the wilderness, they wanted more of the same. He can offer himself to them as the Bread of Life who responds to the deepest yearnings of their heart, for truth, for a love that endures, for a life over which death has no power. When we find ourselves struggling with great religious doubts, and, as a result, maybe putting a distance between ourselves and the Lord and between ourselves and the community of believers, the Lord continues to engage with us and seek us out. Noticing that there was one small boy with five barley loaves and two fish, he asked, What is that between so many? However, the way Jesus spoke in response to the problem was much more inspirational. I am sure many of you who have lost loved ones will have been supported in your loss by the supportive presence of family and friends. The life which flowed from the side of Jesus as he hung from the cross, symbolized by the blood and water, is conveyed personally to each of us when we eat his body and drink his blood. In the gospel reading this morning, Jesus declares that on one will ever steal one of his followers from him or from his heavenly Father.
