5th Sunday after Easter 26 May 2019 Sermon

5^th Sunday after Easter 26.5.19 Through the Son

In Our Lord’s time on earth He regularly prayed. Given that He was God it may seem a strange thing for God to be praying to Himself!

God the Son is equal to God the Father, but Our Lord was praying in His humanity, in which role He approached God in humility, showing us what we should do.

We can be certain that God the Son’s prayer was of the most perfect quality. It would have contained the most essential ingredient of prayer: a unity between the one praying and the one receiving the prayer.

When we pray we should not be strangers to God. We are not people who pray only when there is trouble; we pray all the time, every day, rain or shine.

When we pray we are hoping to achieve perfect union with God and His holy will. Yet we tend to want things to happen according to our plans, not His.

Our Lord would have known the mind of His Father because He had the same mind. They both knew everything!

When we pray, however, we are often in the dark as to what God wants us to do, or what is going to happen next.

In such cases we pray in trust, that God will know what is best even if we do not; and that whatever He wants will happen (Thy will be done); if I started out wanting something else, then I will come to be of one mind and heart with Him.

When we pray to God we are aware of His divinity, far beyond our reach. But we are also aware that we now have the humanity of God the Son to break through to the distant heavens.

If we unite ourselves with Our Lord in His humanity He will take our prayer to the Heavenly throne, and our prayers will be effective.

God has given us this link (the humanity of Christ) as the main approach road to Himself.

He wants us to take advantage of it. It is as though we remind the Father that the Son has taken us up as His friends! Can we come in please? It is like turning up at a palace, and the king does not know us. But we say, Oh, but your son has invited us!

The Father sees us as one with the Son.

It helps if we are trying to live like the Son. But even so, He is willing to forgive for the sake  of His Son’s sacrifice.

Christ has taken on human nature and has saved us in that nature.

He has demonstrated all the best human qualities: perfect obedience, humility, charity…. All this improves the human nature, and gives us something to build upon.

We engage with His humanity as we hope that His perfection will have a good effect on us, purifying, us, sanctifying us,

If I can but touch the hem of his garment (Mt 9,21).

Implicitly in every Mass and sacrament we are praying this: Lord, in Your humanity heal mine.

And to the Father: please receive me in the light of how You see Your Son.

And then the Son, in His divinity, takes us to His own throne. We are absorbed into the inner life of the Trinity, happy to receive anything They decide to give.

We learn to pray with greater accuracy as to what is needed; and with greater fervour to bring it about. We become one in mind and heart, knowledge and will – with God Himself.

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4th Sunday after Easter 19 May 2018 Sermon

4^th Sunday after Easter 19.5.19 Obedience

The world usually thinks it can do without God and generation after generation falls into the same traps, committing sins and creating disorder.

If we would simply follow the way God sets down it would go much better for us.

The Israelites took forty years to cross the desert because of their sins, and very few made it across.

If they had obeyed from the start and been humble and compliant they would have shot across that desert, but they had to make it hard for themselves. And we have been doing the same ever since.

We do this when we turn God's commands on their head and declare they no longer apply, refusing to bow down before any authority higher than ourselves.

For all this God does not turn away. He still extends Mercy even though we have done  everything possible to remove Him.

He give us the chance to regroup. If today you hear his voice harden not your hearts (Ps 94(95) – a psalm that begins every Lauds, a daily reminder that this day is a new start.

This can apply to a nation as well as individuals.

We have just had an election (in Australia). We pray for good government. People elected to govern should first honour God. This has not been the case in the last few centuries. Man has decided he can rule himself. We can see from history how successful this has been!!

We must let God be Lord; it is His world after all. Everything comes from Him and is under His authority. He is literally the Author.

The Holy Spirit will make all necessary things clear. His light will penetrate the spiritual fog and some at least will see. In the light from Heaven we can see the clear path again, the path across the desert.

We look forward to the time when Brother has no need to teach brother, Learn to know the Lord. (Jer 31,34)

If we cannot heal the world we can at least heal the Church

If we cannot heal the Church we can at least heal ourselves.

God will work through certain individuals to achieve certain effects, as with salvation history – people such as Abraham, Moses, David, St Joseph…

We put our bit into the mix and trust the God will multiply our efforts, like the boy who brought the five loaves.

The solution is not difficult - at least to understand; it may be difficult to reverse all our sins, but at least we know which way we are pointing.

It is Back to Basics. Behold your God. Here He is and here you are. Obey is the key word.

Whatever He says, just do it.

If we do obey then all else falls into place; if not, read today’s News! The News is what we get if we do not obey.

Christian beliefs are being attacked at present, re-named as hate speech.

And it might get worse.

We must not dilute our beliefs to fit in with others.

Not only will we not change but we will seek to change those who would change us.

And the many who have lost faith or hope through being confused or demoralized - to them we offer the sure path to happiness. Obedience to the Lord.

A few can help many.  We can help bring order where there has been chaos.

3rd Sunday after Easter 12 May 2019 Sermon

3^rd Sunday after Easter 12.5.19 Reward

People talk fairly freely of heavenly reward, pronouncing that this or that person has now gone to Heaven.

Heaven is a place we greatly desire yet we do not know much detail about it. Some have had visions; and we can use a little logic and a little imagination.

The consensus of all the spiritually wise is that Heaven is not just a place of earthly pleasures extended forever.

There will be much pleasure very likely, but the main point of Heaven, the main source of happiness is the possession of God, to be able to see Him.

To worship God is not a burden, as many would see it, but a delight, once we come to know Him as the Source of all love and goodness.

Many would see the pinnacle of earthly happiness as discovering union with another person.

That is to stop too soon. It is union with God that we need to seek. He is greater and more desirable than any merely human person.

Union with God is the reward that awaits us.

In today’s Gospel: you shall be made sorrowful but your sorrow shall turn to joy. We will be rewarded for all our trouble. One part of that reward is to go to Heaven. That is no small thing.

The other part of the reward is here and now, and follows from the same reasoning; that the greatest happiness we can have is to be close to God in all our doings.

If we seek God, we will experience in increasing amounts the joy of knowing and dealing with Him.

Anyone who gives up father mother etc… will receive a hundredfold in this life (Mt 19,29).

What does it mean? Not a hundred times what we gave up but a hundred times more happiness, at being that much closer to God, the source of all joy; at knowing what our lives are for, having a sense of purpose and direction.

It is often observed that a person can be surrounded by riches and yet be very unhappy; conversely someone can be poor economically speaking but rich in happiness.

While on our way to the eternal reward we gain mastery of our various desires and appetites, and find ourselves able to keep balance between them all.

As to other people we will love them more if we love God first. Loving God first gives us the right starting point. Then, any other love, of people or things, will be in the right proportion -

even to the most difficult neighbour.

We are drawing charity from the furnace; we then have enough to be able to disperse to others.

We can love anyone, once having taken a draught from the springs of salvation (Is 12,3).

It is no longer a burden to love others; we become people who can love, through our union with God. It comes naturally.

The reward ‘now’ is that we are on the team; we are part of God's family, doing His bidding, making His kingdom appear wherever we happen to be.

He will work through us to achieve His kingdom. There is suffering, but we do not focus on that. Just as the joy of a birth exceeds the pain of bringing it about, love does not count the cost.

All the while we are preparing for Heaven. We will be ready for it by the time we get there.

And we are at least improving the state of the world around us.

We are not just chasing the peripheral aspects of happiness, as worldly people do, but the central meaning of it all.

We are content to rest like a child, trusting in God's providence… Ps 130 (131). We do not seek to overrule Him, or improve on what He can do, but let Him work through us.

This is our reward – to discover God progressively, in everyday life, till the full possession of Him in eternity.

                                      

2nd Sunday after Easter 5 May 2019 Sermon

2^nd Sunday after Easter 5.5.19 The Good Shepherd

The Duke of Orleans in Shakespeare’s Henry V - in the midst of losing the battle of Agincourt - maintains that the French could still win if only some order could be established. (Act 4, Scene 5). The French did not manage to get that order and so lost the battle.

We are still fighting our battle, that of the Church, in seeking to claim the world as our rightful territory, to win people over - without swords and spears - to a joyful union with Christ our Saviour.

Our Lord, among his many titles is called the Good Shepherd. In this role He gathers people around Him, protecting them from evil, forgiving them. Eventually, when enough confidence has been restored, He will send them out again to gather in others.

This process has been repeated ever since His Resurrection.

The lack of order, in our case, means that much of the time the opposite is happening. People are moving away from the Good Shepherd, deserting Him, and His Body, the Church.

The Church, it seems, has a revolving door; people come and go at the same time. We want to keep them coming, but not going!

It is Christ who draws them; When I am lifted up I will draw all men to myself (Jn 12,32),

We are drawn to Him as we come to know Him better. We cultivate an awareness of Him; we want to be near Him.

Those who leave the Church over one or other setback have clearly not come to know Him.

If we know Him well enough we would never leave His side.

My sheep hear My voice… it is a voice that offers every comfort (Jn 10,27).

Images are limited in their effectiveness; we do not really sit on the grass around Jesus; that would be a lot easier than we have it.

In reality we live in a very complicated world, with things happening at a great rate. It is hard to keep one’s balance in a world spinning wildly.

Part of the solution is to stay firmly within the Church as a refuge of truth; here we find all that matters defined for us.

There is much we do not understand; but at least we have the basics set out for us. The Church in this sense can be seen as a refuge, the ‘sheepfold’.

But there is more to come. We do not just stay in the meadow, grazing comfortably. Now we see ourselves under another image: the harvest is rich, but the labourers are few (Mt 9,35-38).

Now we are the labourers in the vineyard, whose work is to bring in the harvest (people); or, we are fishers of men (Mt 4,19).

Christ makes us one by drawing us to Himself; then He sends us out to bring others in as well. The oneness of the flock is meant to take in the whole world.

Christ gives us the power to do as He asks. We lack the strength as individuals to change the way other people think; but we can at least contribute to the process.

It is as if we faced a heavy door, and we were unable to break it down by ourselves; but with the help of hundreds of others we can succeed. Most of our problems are like that.

We can be discouraged; in which case we pray that others will pray with us; then we will be strong enough; then we will have the ‘order’ needed to win the battle.

A small number can achieve much if the power of Heaven is called upon.

God is not deaf, but some things need a lot more than one prayer, or one person praying

We need to gather people in - for their own sake, but also to help with the work.

Christ the Good Shepherd, continue to draw us to Thyself.

Low Sunday 28 Apr 2019 Sermon

Low Sunday 28.4.19 Faith

The Gospels record several post-Resurrection appearances of Our Lord. As well as these there were many others, over the forty days between His Resurrection and Ascension.

In the Gospel accounts, He is embarrassing the apostles for their lack of belief.

He had told them this would happen. Why did they not believe it? Even being told, and then having Him in front of them - they still doubted.

He was exposing the fragility of faith in the average disciple. It seemed like a dream to them. Things just do not normally go that well. We come to expect trouble just about all the time. Here is something that breaks right out of that and takes us to another dimension.

What about our position? We come so much later on the scene and have so much more evidence, miracles, wisdom… yet we still doubt.

It seems that it is easier to believe in the general than the particular. In general it is easy to say that God is in control, but when it comes down to specifics we doubt that this great God could think of ‘me’ in the midst of such a vast universe.

When we have a particular problem which requires help we can be consumed with doubt all over again - as though Jesus had never come, never died, never rose.

He can attend to each one of us at the same time with full attention. He is not limited as we are to our own little world.

If we believe in God who made the whole universe, we can believe in all His attributes, and His power to work miracles.

If He can make the whole universe He can raise from the dead.

He has complete authority over everything and everyone.

We bow down before him (like Thomas) - that is the way to strong faith and strong loyalty.

We are willing to receive whatever He wants to give us, or wants to do with us.

If we do this repeatedly, habitually, our faith should become stronger, so that we can see reality not just physically, but in its need for God to operate freely.

The Resurrection gives us a clearer way of seeing things.

What should the apostles have done instead?

They should have stayed with Him when arrested. They should have stayed by the Cross while He was being crucified. And they should have stood outside the tomb waiting for Him to come out.

They could and should have done these things.

And when He arose it should not have needed so many times to believe it was really He.

They missed out on all those points. But because He is so merciful, if we still don’t believe after so many chances He still loves us, and still enables us to get on board.

In 2000 years of the Church’s life many have come and many have gone.

This matches the vacillating nature of faith, that it can rise and fall with circumstances.

We need to take the high point of our faith, when we believed most strongly, and make that the reference point - that is the normal way to be.

For all their twists and turns the apostles did come to faith and they did grow in that faith.

This is what we must do – else the demons come back and our bad habits return (cf Lk 11,26).

With the Risen Lord to sustain us, may we have the same faith every day of the week, and in every circumstance.