Christmas Day 2017 Sermon

Christmas Day 2017 Entering Joy

We have major feast days, where the Church rejoices. We may not feel as joyful ourselves as the feast would seem to require.

With a little effort on our part, and loads of grace, we can enter into the joys these major feasts convey.

Their reality is so great that there is room for us, like a big house where one can move from one room to another.

We cannot exhaust the richness, the mysteries of Christ, and His coming among us.

We do not allow the difficulties we face to limit us to just a one-dimensional approach. Rather we let the mysteries of Christ lift us to a higher plane of understanding.

Our problems may remain, and may take a lot of fixing, but we ourselves will be focussed more on the goodness of God and how He blesses us.

So we have in the Christmas season some of the main truths of our faith, which we can enter more fully.

One of these mysteries is that of the Incarnation, where God became Man, or the Word was made flesh.

This has been likened to one of us becoming an insect, living with other insects. Would we like that? And what about being killed by them as well?

God has lowered Himself more than that to take on our human nature!

If we maintain a proper sense of the scale of what He has done we are less likely to dismiss it.

It is important to remember the divinity of Christ. Many think He is just another man, just another long-haired prophet!

Or they will say He was just another religious figure, thus downgrading His importance.

Or that He did not really know what He was doing.

No, He was fully aware of what He was doing. There was always a perfect balance between his words and actions.

His death was not a mix-up, or miscalculation; it was planned all along for His own purposes.

This is not just a good man, giving us a few good ideas how to live. This is God Himself come to live among us.

God takes our nature, firstly to live it properly, free of sin; and then to offer Himself in atonement for sins against that nature, before and after His coming.

There should not be any sins after His coming but there have been a great many.

Some do not know about Him. Others know, but somehow it does not sink in far enough.

We need more depth. We become more grateful as we consider what we would have been if He had not come.

The Church today says, Rejoice everyone, because this is a good day for you! And the people might say, Is it? Yes, because you are being lifted up to something better.

Nothing in human history can match this. No war, revolution, tragedy, discovery, advance, accident, disaster can come close to the importance of God's intervention in our world.

Despite all the attempts to suppress Him, then and since, still the message goes out.

This is the one truth that prevails over all falsehood or part-truth. This is light on the hilltop.

All this we celebrate here, and we allow ourselves to be taken up into it.

Christmas takes in all those who do not know its importance, or would even fight against it.

God means to reach every person, regardless of nationality. He is God of the whole world, even if the world does not know.

It helps greatly if we cooperate with the process. Behold, I stand at the gate, and knock. If any man shall hear my voice, and open to me the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. (Rev 3,20)

Today we open that gate; we let the Saviour in, to do His work among us. We give Him our full, conscious, willing assent to all that He has in mind to do. He has been resisted too much. No more by us.

Christmas Vigil 24 Dec 2017 Sermon

Christmas Vigil 24.12.17 Desire

This is the age of instant gratification. People take what is due to them before it is due, and even if it is not due them, there are many who will still take.

The idea of deferring pleasure to a later time is not an easy one to sell – even if the delay will bring more happiness overall. For example, food seems a lot more satisfying after a fast than if we have been eating all along.

The Church, in her wisdom, has established seasons of penance before seasons of joy, and vigils before major feasts.

This gives us a chance to cultivate a hunger for what the feast is offering us.

In the case of Advent (and the Vigil of Christmas) our hunger is for the effects of Christ’s coming among us.

Christmas must be the easiest feast to miss in terms of other distractions. To miss, that is, the spiritual richness of the feast.

Those who come to Mass only at Christmas are missing out on necessary preparation. We have to give time to God to understand more deeply how He is saving us, and what He wants us to know.

One or two Masses a year will not be enough.

So we are here now, seeking to get this right for ourselves, and atoning for the general lack of enthusiasm in the human family.

We let our hunger for God be deepened. Like a lover seeking the beloved (cf Song of songs, Hosea, where God uses marriage imagery to describe His relationship with His people.)

The lover goes looking for her Beloved – an image of the Church, as bride, seeking the Bridegroom. The eventual discovery of him is more joyful for the fact that there was a time without him.

God looks at us like that. He longs to be united with us!  And we respond with stony indifference (in the main) – a one-sided love story. We need the other side to turn up!

It is worth something when even one more person can get into this view of what is really happening. This is Christmas, much deeper than all the trimmings.

One theme of Advent is, Look out for the Master in case he returns unexpectedly and you are not ready. That is a true consideration.

But we could also say, Look out for the Master simply because He is desirable to know. This is apart from any thought of reward or punishment.

Somehow this does not happen. Our desire has been spent on other things, less than God.

We desire the forbidden fruit, but not the One who made the whole garden.

Our desire is generally stunted or restricted to too small an area, and we spend our time and energy on filling that desire, not realizing there is an infinity of delight and goodness beyond where we are looking.

People who spend Christmas just partying think they are happy, and to some extent they are; but they would be a lot more happy if they were seeking God for His own sake; losing themselves in Him, like the Lover and Beloved.

This is the language of the saints, and mystics, and the Bible itself.

Instead, people ignore God, except to tell Him off for not running the universe properly.

We are here to set matters straight. We will celebrate Christmas with an increasing awareness of what it means (always with God's help).

We pray for the right understanding to grow everywhere; that people will grasp with sufficient awareness the importance of His Incarnation and other events.

That they will develop a taste for God, which will be good for them, and the whole Church.

We need Him to come among us to save us from sluggishness, deafness, blindness, etc….

He needs us to recognize that we are sluggish, deaf, blind etc! Come, Lord Jesus.

3rd Sunday of Advent 17 Dec 2017 Sermon

3^rd Sunday of Advent 17.12.17 Spiritual progress

The human race goes on, one generation after another. In some ways we make progress:

Technology, transport, communication, medicine…

In other ways we make little or no progress: we still have hatred, violence, neglect, greed etc

Morally or spiritually, each generation repeats the mistakes of all the previous generations.

God has led us all the way, from Eden to the present day, making a series of covenants with us - with Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, and finally Christ, each intervention showing a greater generosity on God's part; yet our response does not match it.

We should be smarter or more aware of moral matters than previous generations, but somehow we are not.

Why does spiritual progress differ from technological progress?

The spiritual aspect requires a deeper perception. Anyone can see the marvels of a mobile phone, but not everyone can see what is wrong with adultery.

Our Lord could have worked more miracles, even in our time, and keep people on track through frequent reminders of His closeness.

He is looking for something deeper on our part. He reveals Himself only to those who are humble, pure, and contrite enough to recognize Him – the poor in spirit, people such as Simeon and Anna, or John the Baptist himself. The last shall be first; the humble shall be exalted.

The proud are too preoccupied with themselves to see the work of the Messiah, let alone welcome Him. They are not looking in the right place, or in the right way.

Not recognizing the coming of Christ they do not change their lives.

Meanwhile they buy more gadgets for their home! They recognise one progress but not the other one.

The saying: Seeing is believing could be better put: Believing is seeing.

This is what God asks of us - to trust Him in advance, to believe His promises before we see them (such as the Second Coming), and then all manner of things can happen. Moses held out his staff and the waters parted. Five minutes before that event, it would have seemed highly unlikely, like most miracles. Miracles happen when someone obeys first.

If we can be like that we will escape the folly of the present and previous generations.

We will have the essential joy (Gaudete Sunday). Rejoice if you have such a stance with God, because you will directly experience His blessings.

Presently we are hemmed in by massive amounts of sin, doubt, fear, and the like, all of which threaten to submerge us.

It can be a battle to keep even our own faith, still more to try to convert others.

It is as simple as which road we take. So much depends on the decision.

It is all there if we want to know, the revelation of God, the story, the miracles - it is all there for public consumption.

There are mysteries in our faith, but the general thrust is clear. It is not classified information. Go to your local library, or to your very advanced phone! The data of our faith, the technical details are not hard to find.

The hard part is to be humble enough to recognize truth, and to desire it; to go down on our knees, from which position we are able to learn a lot.

Naaman the Syrian was told to wash himself seven times and he would be cured. He thought that was too easy. Yet, persuaded to do it, he was cured (4 Kings 5,1-19).

What we are asked to do to reach faith is not difficult, apart from overcoming one’s pride.

We pray we can unravel some mysteries, and finally we will get that long-overdue improvement across the generations.

Christmas Mass times

Christmas Mass times:

Monday 25 December: Mass 8am, St Monica's, Walkerville

Holy Name: Mass is at Midnight, 7am, and 9.15am
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Days following Christmas:
At St Monica's, Walkerville:

Tue 26  6.45am
Wed 27 6.45am
Thu 28  8am
Fri 29    6.45am
Sat 30   8am
Sun 31  8am* 
Mon 1   8am

*Also on Sunday 31 December, there is 5pm Mass at Sacred Heart Church, Hindmarsh.

Latest on weekday Mass

Latest news on Weekday Masses, as at Thursday 14th December:

All weekday Masses are now at St Monica's, Walkerville, at the usual times.

The renovations are mostly complete, but further interruptions may occur after Christmas.

Sunday Masses continue as normal: 8am St Monica's   and 5pm Sacred Heart. However, just for one Sunday (24th December) there is no Mass at Sacred Heart.

2nd Sunday of Advent 10 Dec 2017 Sermon

2^nd Sunday of Advent 10.12.17 Salvation

There is a deep longing in us for things to be right, to be as they are meant to be. We have an instinct to want justice, for example, or an end to cruelty and violence. Certain things we see or hear will immediately bring a reaction from us.

The same longing applies to ourselves, though it may not be so apparent. We would like to be as we are meant to be. This comes from the fact that God has planted in us a desire to be at one with Him. to share in His created order.

When God created the world He naturally saw how all things would fit in with each other. Sin has ruptured that order, but it can be retrieved, and that is the essence of Our Lord’s saving mission.

Christ came to help us to sort out our desires, to steer us in the right direction.

John the Baptist was a part of that process. He told the people what they wanted, even if they did not know they wanted it. He awakened in them, from somewhere deep down, this desire that they could be better. Even the wicked Herod liked to hear John speak (Mk 6,20).

We are torn between the selfishness we have inherited and learnt, on the one hand, and on the other hand a new freedom from sin, and purity of intention.

We choose between self-indulgent pleasure-seeking, or the ability to exercise restraint, working to a higher goal.

We know we would rather be the latter. But it takes a certain effort to sustain that vision.

Still it explains how we can be attracted to a harder life. It is not the ‘hardness’ we want, so much as the ‘betterness’. Thus we are inspired by the lives of the saints. They sacrificed so much, always driven by a higher goal.

Young people in particular feel this dichotomy. This would explain their willingness to make sacrifices, when sufficiently inspired: for example, the desire to join strict religious orders, and seminaries.

We get tired of too much pleasure, leading nowhere. As Our Lord points out to the crowd: You did not come out into the desert to see those who live in luxury. You came out to see a man who lived a severely penitential life, and who spoke the plain truth. This is what you are hungering for.

This applies to us with the same force as to the people in John’s time. We seek the better life, and we find it in more prayer, especially the Mass; doing penance, good works, pushing ourselves a little harder, and that continuously.

There is that inner voice calling each one to something great, or at least greater.

We can hear that voice if we turn off enough of the surrounding noise.

Whether old, young, or in the middle, we are always refining and deepening our response.

If we are life-long disciples (or most of our lives), it may seem a long time to stay faithful; but it becomes easier when the attractiveness of a holy life becomes apparent.

It is not giving up happiness to be miserable instead; but giving up one sort of happiness for a much better one.

John showed the way, and Our Lord took it further still. He shows us, and He equips us to take it.

We do not just admire holy people, as we might look at an exhibit in a museum; but rather we are stirred to imitate them, and so we present ourselves now, to be stirred into true discipleship of Christ.

To live a harder life for the sake of a better life.

1st Sunday of Advent 3 Dec 2017 Sermon

1^st Sunday of Advent 3.12.17 Welcoming Christ

It is very comforting, in the midst of all our troubles, to have the Faith, which enables us to believe that we will see victory in the end, no matter what reverses or disasters we might have to deal with first.

We have a Saviour, and a very active one at that.

He has come once, and done all sorts of good; and He will come a second time, and do even more good.

His second coming could be an occasion of joy or horror, according to each person’s stance towards Him. Some will be glad to see Him; others not so.

We want to make sure we are in the welcoming group.

The key to which group we belong is whether or not we are in union with Him.

Will He, in short, recognise us as belonging to Him? Or will He see us as hypocrites, or people who buried our talents; or who failed to forgive others…

Everything depends on Him. He is Creator and Saviour; meaning that the whole universe belongs to Him and all that is good comes from Him.

If we are in union with him we have access to all that is in His power, especially life. He keeps us alive now; He promises eternal life if we stay faithful to Him.

He is the resurrection and the life. To have Him is everything; not to have Him is the loss of everything, with the anguish of knowing what one has lost (thus, Hell).

If we are indifferent to Him, that equates with rejection.

Many think He is irrelevant, or can be kept in certain compartments (such as Christmas and Easter). No, He is relevant at all times, and in all places and circumstances. He is First and Last, Lord of the living and the dead….

This means our lives come under His dominion also. How we relate to Him is the most important characteristic about us.

We can classify people in many ways: gender, race, height, age etc; but the question that really counts is: how much do you love Jesus Christ?

All else that we regard as important – family, health, wealth, house, car, ambitions, interests…. These may be important, and they have their place, but all considerations are subservient to our union with Christ.

This is why Our Lord could say: if you love father or mother more than Me you are not worthy of Me (Mt 10,37).

We can love other people and things, but it must be less than we love Jesus Christ.

And the way we deal with every other person or thing will be in reference to Our Lord and His will.

This will serve to enrich everything else, not take away from it. We will love others more, not less, if we put Christ first.

So much human striving is off beam in terms of people’s setting the wrong goals, going about things the wrong way, misreading what is success and failure.

And this is all compounded by the fact that so many are doing the same thing, and have been for centuries.

All of this, however, can be set right with sincere repentance.

We realign ourselves with the true God, and then so much good can follow.

It is within our grasp. This is the message we put out to the world. Behold your God. You have ignored Him too long. He will still save, on request. Never mind what you have done. He has enough love to cover it.

All of which is why we welcome Him to come again. The closer He is the better off we are. If His coming interrupts our plans we will be going to something far better. We gain all happiness at once if we are ready to meet Him.

Our prayer for His coming will serve to make us more ready to meet Him. Come, Lord Jesus!