5th Sunday of Lent A 22 March 2026 Sermon

5th Sunday of Lent 22 March 2026  Life triumphs

We have desire for two things, somewhat opposed but both valid.

One is to go to Heaven, the other one is to stay here. We are happy to die if it is somewhere out there, a remote event, but not if it is today or tomorrow!

If we die at an unwanted time and it means we go to Heaven, we can come to like that.

We are supposed to trust the will of God. He knows His timing and He may have different ways of dealing with each person. For example, a short life or a long life, who can tell?

We try to cure sickness, of course, but we give way to the inevitable. Much is beyond us.

God is not as worried about death as we tend to be, because He is Lord of the living and the dead. (Rom 14,9). He knows both sides.

We know that God is concerned more with the state of the soul than that of the body, so He works for a closer union with each person. He wants people to know and love  Him; to come to a life that cannot die, and which will  bear much fruit in doing Gods will.

My greatest aim is to please God, we can say, but in practice it is more likely we please ourselves while trying not to offend God.

If God created us and designed the whole universe, and how everything works, we can trust in His being able to handle our life and death.

What Jesus did with Lazarus was unusual, but entirely within His power.

We ask the Lord to give us the right balance in dealing with these things.

Ph 1,20-26 :I am happy to live happy to die, whatever God wants, I want.

We see this with Jesus himself. He died to please the Father, while also fulfilling His own will, over which He had perfect control.

We should take reasonable care of our health and try to live as long as possible, but not clinging to life through fear.  The martyrs show us the way. They could see Heaven more than earth as they gave up their lives.

It is alright to want these things, which are really different stages of the same reality.

So it is natural if I pray for a safe trip, or a good result to the medical test, but we will be able to cope with whatever happens.

I want to be as good a disciple as I can be. And that is the basis for a happy death.

We will not resent dying but will see it as primarily a joyful thing,  as we go to a better state.

We wish this for others whom we love, that each person will come to the full spiritual understanding of his own death and what is involved.

The miracle of Lazarus was just God’s way of  demonstrating the power that he has, and the goodwill He has towards us.

Who can raise the dead by a word? He whose voice will bring forth the dead (Jn 5,25).

He is teaching us two things. Let go of those you love, and do not doubt that there is enough Life there to receive them.

We are now in the last two weeks  of Lent and we will have deeper thoughts on these matters at this time.

The Crucifixion looks like the end of the road and the crushing of all  hope; yet so quickly is that position reversed.

Life overpowers death, and we must get used to that idea. Only three days in the tomb, a great many more days outside!

More generally this is how God deals with us. We  think He has forgotten us etc, but then He reveals His hand and we realize He has never left us.  How slow we are to adopt that message; can we go a little faster this final stage of Lent?

 

 

4th Sunday of Lent A 15 March 2026 Sermon

4^th Sunday of Lent  A  15 March 2026 Live in the light

If we had to form a visual concept of heaven, I don’t think many people would  think of heaven as ever being in the dark. No dark, not even shadow.

By the time we get to Heaven we will have finished with darkness. You were darkness once, but now you are light in the Lord… have nothing to do with the futile works of darkness. (Ep 5 ,8-14  second reading)

Our Lord gives the man sight, for the first time. It was an exercise of that same power by which He created all things.

He was showing how powerfully and how rightly God can intervene.

And the man would have received perfect vision too. God does all things well!

What does this miracle mean for us?

Jesus is restoring our spiritual sight, so that we can tell night from day when it comes to right living, making right decisions.

We see with the eyes of faith, and things previously strange suddenly seem to make more sense (like the need for the sacrifices we make, for instance.)

If we had perfect spiritual sight we would never sin; our judgment would be accurate at all times and in all matters.

This is how it would have been for Our Lady, the perfect eyes of faith leading to the best possible way of living this life.

Our adherence to moral truth would work the same as with physical sight we keep to a well-defined path and do not go toppling off to the side

Somehow it is different when we get to moral sight; we wander off the path quite freely and do not seem to consider that a bad thing.

Due to there being so much sin in the world there is much distortion when it comes to perceiving reality. Wrong judgments are made, and many wrong turnings, leading to much disorder.

Jesus shows us the difference between good and evil, leading us to choose the good which eventually becomes obvious.

In Lent especially we are looking for the light which is eternal and infinite, to be ‘children of light, so that our deeds are good’ (Ep 5,8)

How can we acquire so much clarity?  Different elements come together - . prayer, good works, sacraments, study, discipline etc.

All these things will restore our sight, and make it easier for us to take the obvious right course.

We break free from all distortions and come to see our need for grace and mercy from God.

Whatever truth we grasp we can build upon and habitually make better choices.

We will have eyes to see the glory of God, as much as our nature can absorb.

It is the light that God Himself emanates. It will have a beauty beyond anything we can see or imagine here.

The city lights will lose their appeal -  the passing and often false lights of our world. We will seek instead the purer light of Heaven.

Heavenly light inspires us with its beauty, greater than any earthly light.

Lord, that I may see (Mk 10,51)- the blind man by the side of the road.

3rd Sunday of Lent 8 March 2026 Sermon

3rd Sunday of Lent  8 March 2026 The right God

We worship in spirit and in truth, Our Lord says to the woman at the well (Jn 4,23-24).

The Samaritans had a hazy idea of God, other nations even hazier still; but the Jews had the real God and the right God.

Their response to God was not brilliant but it does help, if we are having a conversation, to know whom we are addressing.

People have formed all sorts of notions about God – that there is more than one god, that gods are not much different from humans when it comes to faults and passions; they plot murder and revenge etc They were likely to get angry and demand obedience from the people.

In the absence of revelation from the real God mankind would struggle, though some of it was their own fault for not obeying. St Paul has put it that all people should be able to work out at least basic truths about God, from the signs around them. (Romans 1,19-20)

Coming to our own time, by now we know a lot about God because He has come down from Heaven to tell us!

We know this many things about God: because He has told us, shown us, or taught us through the Church, the wisdom and example of many saints.

1) God created us to share in His life. He is not cruel as past ages often thought. He wants us to be happy, always happy, and intervenes to help us towards Heaven, with as much Heaven as can be had in the present world.

When we say, God loves us, that is what it translates to – He seeks to maximise our happiness, take away all sorrow.

2) God has revealed Himself carefully as humans have only limited capacity, can only take in so much at a time. So Our Lord clarified much of the Old Testament teaching, not to abolish it, but to fulfil it (Mt 5,17).

3) There is only one God, who is eternal, all-powerful, all-knowing; has no beginning or ending. There cannot be any other god, because the one we worship is infinite. We cannot have half of infinity; it has to be all.

There is no part of time or place outside of the reach of God's knowledge and power.

4) God was not just for the Jews; the kingdom of God was not a political kingdom. It was spiritual and meant for all people, of whatever tribe or race.

The battle for clarity, for truth in worship has been going on ever since.

There is only one real God, and here He is, in this church, with us who profess union with Him. We become one with Him in filial obedience, trust and love.

And then the matter of loving others, what God does so much better than we do, but we learn as we go. We hate no one, reject no one, while we do insist on truth in worship and all dealings with God.  If we seek Him in humility of heart, we will get to know God better and eventually claim Him in Heaven.

Meanwhile, the woman went and fetched her neighbours to see this remarkable man (Jn 4,28-30). We must do the same insofar as we want everyone to know what we have experienced.

Plus we need those neighbours to take their place here with us, and supplement the Church’s presence and activity in such urgent times.

2nd Sunday of Lent 1 March 2026 Sermon

2nd Sunday of Lent 1 March 2026 Consolations 

God expects us to believe and trust Him even when there is not a lot of direct evidence of His closeness.

He expects us to believe and trust Him when the chips are down, when adversity seems to be winning over prosperity.

He wants us to get beyond a faith which rises with good fortune and sinks with ill fortune.

We are tempted to declare there is no God, especially when a number of things go wrong about the same time.

What should we do under adversity? Not condemn God, but rather seek His will, both as understanding it and living it.

We are never tempted beyond our strength, we are told (1 Co 10,13).

It might seem like we are so tempted, but God is ever true to His word, and His arm is not shortened’ (Is 59,1)

Today’s Gospel speaks of the Transfiguration. This event is understood as strengthening the faith of the apostles, so that they would be able to cope with future adversity, especially Good Friday.

Jesus had told them He would rise again, and they should have believed Him by now, but not quite.

The crucifixion looked like a defeat, but it was a victory over sin and death.

We spend too much time doubting when we could be believing. We need lots more faith spread through the Body of Christ. We can encourage each other, and that is one reason why we come here to Mass.

We don’t look for special consolations but we are glad to take them when they come. The Transfiguration is one of those, for the whole Church.

Much of the gospels convey the sense of the tables being turned: those who weep now shall laugh, the last shall be first, the humble shall be exalted, he who loses his life will save it  etc.

We can be happy in this life, by living in this deeper level of trust. We will be able to negotiate any difficulty if we focus on the sameness of God, rather than the changeable tides of present circumstance.

We do  not make light of genuine sufferings but call down the power and goodness of God to make what is wrong right and what is right better still!

Lack of faith leads people to want ‘results’ all the time. If they see no result they will stop praying, and that makes for a weaker aggregate faith throughout the whole Church.

We repeat Easter in particular  to focus on the most important build-up of faith, that of life over death. We drive the point home a little more each time.  Those realities are fixed but our response needs bolstering.

God stays His hand. He could bring events to a head very easily, but He is working to His own time scale. We are glad just to be part of the process.

One of these days it will be Easter every day, in the full glory of being one with God.

Lack of understanding does not mean it is not real. People will say that there cannot be a God given the suffering in the world. We don’t have to understand God's exact purposes  to know He is there.

But if everyone turned to that one God there would be no wars, or similar troubles, because many would come to belief, and there would be no wars started.

God wants us to know him better, such that we are familiar with His ways; and if we do not know everything we know enough as to the course of events.

Such faith as we have, put it in storage, and do not lose it. It will be there when we need it. We reaffirm our stock of faith  every day and build on it.