CHRIST THE KING – 2016

In his book The End of History, Francis Fukuyama suggests that with the coming of democracy, the world has entered a safe, steady state in which human events such as we have known them throughout history, will come to an end. 

It is certain that large numbers of people regard anything that smacks of authoritarian rule as deeply suspicious. But Even in modern democracies, matters are hardly as dull and predictable as Fukuyama suggests. Look at the dramatic “upset” in the United States with the unexpected election of Donald Trump as an example, and the extreme responses it has brought forth. And if the result even of a democratic election such as this can cause such reactions, what does today’s feast have to say to modern people, with its image of Jesus Christ as an absolute monarch, the King of all Creation?

The feast of Christ the King was brought into being in 1934 by Pope Pius XI in his encyclical Quas primas. Why would he do this in that particular year? 1934 was a fateful year in the world. Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin ruled as absolute dictators in their respective countries of Germany and the Soviet Union. In Mexico, a terrible civil war was raging, leading to a tyranny which was hostile to the Church and persecuted and killed priests and lay people alike. In the East, both Japan and mainland China were likewise in chaotic situations and slipping into an authoritarianism controlled by powerful military interests. Governments were taking on an authority and total power of an almost infallible character for themselves.

Against this, Pius XII asserted the real and ultimate source of authority in the world, the Kingship of Jesus Christ, as the Irish constitution has it, “from Whom is all authority and to Whom, as our final end, all actions both of men and States must be referred.” All authority to rule by earthly powers is, in fact, subject to the benign Lord Jesus Christ. They rule by his authority, and are accountable to Him for all that they do, whether they acknowledge Him or not. God, who created human beings, has placed us under the gentle rule of his Son, whose “yoke is easy, whose burden is light.” Jesus is a humble King who, far from ruling over us from a throne high above, descended to be one amongst us, to place himself, at the end of his earthly life, in the hands of human beings, under human authority.

In today’s feast, Jesus is presented as the Suffering Servant of God, the “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world,” whose authority is not of this world, but something greater and higher, despite his apparent powerlessness and helplessness in the hands of Pilate, who represented the universal, absolute and apparently unstoppable power in the world in Jesus’ time, the Roman Empire. We should note that in the gospel Jesus speaks, not of his kingdom, but of his “kingship” or reign. Jesus is King, not of place or time, but wherever human beings have responded and turned to Him for salvation. Where He is loved and obeyed, where his power is uppermost in human hearts; this is his kingship.

There is no earthly power, from the Roman Empire of his day to the powers-that-be and colossal economic forces in the contemporary world, that can defeat Him. And while it sometimes seems as though the victory is theirs, as long as He reigns in our hearts, the ultimate victory is his; and ours. To this hope we must all cling, no matter what comes our way; for we know that to Him belongs the victory and glory and the power, for ever and ever. In the words of the Latin hymn for Christ the King, “Christus vincit! Christus regnat! Christus imperat!”“Christ conquers! Christ reigns! Christ commands!”

Fr. Phillip 

33RD SUNDAY OF THE YEAR – 2016

In 1987 there was a massive drought in Natal, so much so that water was not merely restricted, but actually rationed to 400 litres per day per household. When it broke, there were extremely violent thunderstorms, such as we had not seen for a very long time. I remember it vividly, for I had the terrifying experience of flying through one in a little Boeing 737 on my way back to Durban to be ordained to the priesthood. One of the striking things about those storms was how, well after the skies had cleared, the seas continued to batter the coast. The sea was by no means calm once the storms had abated.

We can miss this detail in the story the gospel, where Jesus rebukes the storm and it subsides. We are told that “the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.” A sceptical person might see Jesus’ rebuke and the cessation of the storm as coincidental. But there is nothing natural about the sudden calm. As the storm ceases, the energy of the waves subsides. Since there were fishermen amongst the disciples in the boat, men who knew the sea of Galilee well, this would not have been lost on them. Look at their response: “…even wind and waves obey him.” They are in awe at the sheer scale of the work that Jesus has just performed, and of what that implies about who he is.

Jews, and therefore Jesus’ disciples, were not at all sceptical about miraculous events; indeed, these were acknowledged signs of the presence and reality of God’s power. But the miracles of the Jewish healers consisted largely of healings and exorcisms. Already in the multiplication of the loaves, as well as later in the raising of Lazarus described in John’s Gospel, Jesus shows extraordinary powers over nature, far beyond those of his contemporaries. But to calm a storm and the waves of the sea with merely a command? Only God is capable of such power, and they realise it in no uncertain terms. Those of them who were familiar with the book of Job would have recognised in this event the words of God to Job: “Who shut in the sea with doors…and said, ‘thus far shall you come, and no further’.” Or perhaps the words of Isaiah, “…if you pass through raging waters in the sea, you shall not drown…” The suddenness with which the violence of the waves subsided was witness to them of the total power of God over his creation.

We would do well to recognise this truth in our daily lives. We all pass through storms; in our families, our work, our finances. We are confronted with crime, violence, all the threats to our children. Sometimes these figurative seas threaten to capsize us. It is essential not to forget that Jesus, now as then, is with us, even though he seems to be asleep in the stern as our little boats are tossed about by the storms that surround us. But he blesses and protects those whom he loves, and who love him. The answer is total surrender to his will. We need to place our whole lives in his hands, to follow and obey him in all that he asks of us. In his own words, as we have them in John’s gospel: “In the world you will have sorrows. But be brave; I have already conquered the world.” 

Fr. Phillip

32ND SUNDAY OF THE YEAR – 2016

Do you remember, as a young schoolchild, being given an assignment for the following week; how far away it seemed? There was so much time before the task had to be handed in; there was no hurry. And then, suddenly, it was the evening of Wednesday and the assignment was due on Thursday morning, and there just was not enough time to do it justice. So, either you had to make a lame excuse as to why it was not done and face the consequences, or face the equally unappetising consequence of a poor mark for a rushed job. Did you ever wish, in such a situation, that you had not wasted the time of the previous week when you could have been preparing thoroughly for the due date of that task?

In the letters of Paul to the communities of the early Church, there is always a sense of this urgency. The day of the Lord could come at any moment; are you ready to meet him when he comes? In Paul’s era, the expectation was that the Lord could come again at any moment; He was, in fact, expected to return quite soon after his Ascension. As time passed, they realised that this was not the case, that Jesus’ return might be quite some time later than originally expected.

This did not alter the urgency with which they regarded his return. Like the early Christians, we do not know when or how Jesus will return, only the fact that he will, that it will be unexpected; as the Lord himself put it, “It is not for you to know the times or places”. Paul is quite clear, as is Jesus himself in the Gospels, that we must be ready to receive the returning Lord whenever he might appear. Whether there will be a great judgement of all human beings at the end of time, or whether each one of us will pass through individual judgement at the time of our own death, we do not know, and there is evidence for both in Scripture. But the only way to be ready to receive the Lord Jesus when he comes again is to be ready to receive him at all times. A half-baked, rapid prayer at the last moment may not be enough if our hearts are not prepared to receive him.

In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, he encourages us to be prepared through our love and attention to prayer, our care for one another, our dedication to supporting and encouraging one another in readying ourselves for his coming. He urges us to sobriety and constant prayer “with all our hearts.” If we want Jesus to place us amongst the saints in his kingdom, then we must give him pride of place in our own hearts. There is no such thing as a “basic minimum” to get into heaven; we are either all for Jesus, or not at all. In our daily lives let us heed Paul’s wise words, and in everything that we do, let us keep ourselves ready to receive Jesus, whenever he might return.

Fr Phillip

31ST SUNDAY OF THE YEAR – 2016

The prophet Amos is often referred to as the great social justice prophet of the Old Testament. In the modern world, we are inclined to split off social justice from its Jewish-Christian source. We talk about “principles for a just society.” We refer to “gospel” or “kingdom” values, as though these can be lived out in isolation from the God who makes them possible. We have, in many ways, lost the essential link between acting justly and being just, or if you will, holy, as though just actions were something external to us or our faith.

This was not so to the people of the Old Testament. For them, loving God and loving neighbour were two sides of the same coin, forming the unity we know as the Great Commandment. In Amos, how frequently God promises justice to those whom Israel mistreats, how often does he warn Israel to act justly? But it is not quite so simple, for the Old Testament emphasises the holiness of God, who calls his people to be like him. In the New Testament Jesus expresses it like this: “Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

Amos is unsparing in his attack on Israel for its injustice to the poor and needy: “They have sold the upright for silver, and the poor for a pair of sandals; they have crushed the heads of the weak into the dust, and thrust the rights of the oppressed to one side!” A powerful, angry message; yet Amos’s primary interest is not social, but religious; the core of his message is not only “act justly” but especially “be just [or holy].”

In Amos’s time, Israel had been divided into two kingdoms. The Northern Kingdom had been tainted by a long period of pagan infiltration, and its worship had become corrupted. It is this that Amos attacks. Worshipping ISRAEL’S God, the one true God, the God of truth and justice, makes one just and truthful. Worshipping the other false gods, makes one become unjust and false. In the words of the Psalm, makers and worshippers of false gods “…will come to be like them, and so will all who trust in them.” For Amos, the true need is not for just-ice, so much as just-ness [or holiness]. Only just-ness leads to true just-ice, and justness can only come from true worship of God.

We become like the gods we worship. Like the people in Amos’s day, we are faced with this big question: do we worship the God who said “Let us make man in our own image,” or the one of whom man says, “Let us make god in our own image.”?

We are blessed in receiving the whole truth about God through the Lord Jesus Christ in his Church. This truth is before us whenever we need or wish to discover it. Through the Church we can remain in a relationship with God. In the terms of modern technology, our relationship with God is not a dial-up connection, but a perma­nent open line. We can be in no doubt as to whom the true God is, what we are to believe of him, and how we are consequently to live.

But every time we put brackets around some aspect of God we find difficult, or do not like, and change his teaching to suit ourselves, we are recreating God in our image. And the more we recreate God in our own – sinful – image, the further we move from his truth and his justice. We become ultimately like the god we have created out of our own desires, false and unjust. Even justice, when it becomes more important than Truth, ultimately ends by becoming unjust.

We can only serve God in justice by serving him in truth; by following him and his teachings with all our hearts. We must allow God to recreate us in his image. Only when we have been made just, or holy, by God, will we be able to act with true justice. Let us ask him today to bring us to holiness, to transform us, that we might be “perfect, as [our] heavenly Father is perfect,” that we might not merely act justly, but become people of true justice.

Fr Phillip

 

30TH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR – 2016

One of the most striking teachings in Paul’s letters is the image of the Christian Soldier in Ephesian 6: “Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil. Therefore, put on the full armor of God. 

Stand firm, with the belt of truth around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. Take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.”

The Christian is seen as a soldier in the army of Jesus Christ, who marches before us as our general to a victory which is inevitable, a victory against the power of Satan. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood,” Paul tells us, but against spiritual powers far beyond our human strength. That is why we need the spiritual armour Jesus provides for us in the passage quoted. In the world of Paul’s day, the Roman soldier was a familiar daily sight, and it is his armour that inspires this passage. The Roman armies were considered unstoppable, which must, like the armour, form part of the human picture on which Paul’s image is based.

When the Romans celebrated a victory, there would be a triumphal procession through the streets of Rome with the victorious general following in his war chariot at the end, a crown woven of laurel leaves on his head. The laurel wreath was a sign of victory awarded also to poets and athletes (Dante Alighieri traditionally wears one in his portraits); in other words, a crown that was won rather than inherited, as was the gold-and jeweled diadem of a king. Paul sees himself as a soldier in Christ’s army, sharing in the triumph of his victorious general, which is why he speaks of receiving the “crown of righteousness” in his Second Letter to Timothy, from which we read today.

A soldier is fit, well-trained, motivated and obedient. The last of these is essential if victory is to be won. A soldier must act as an extension of his general’s tactics. A Christian soldier becomes fit through prayer, which brings him close to God and prepares him for battle against the enemy, Satan. His training is knowledge of the faith and the ability to communicate it. His motivation is the sure knowledge that Jesus has won the victory over Satan by rising from the dead. 

And if we are to share in his victory, we must be obedient to his Word. 

A soldier does not choose where he is to fight; he goes unquestioningly where his general sends him. So must we. We must keep fit through constant prayer, well-trained through ongoing learning about our faith. That same faith must sustain us in confidence of Jesus’ victory over Satan. We must listen to God and obey him at all times, no matter what he asks of us or where he sends us so that we, too, may one day share in his victory, that each one of us, too, might receive the “crown of righteousness” which He has prepared for us.

Fr Phillip

29TH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR – 2016

Paul is for a large number of Catholics a closed book. We are used to the Jesus of the Gospels, which are usually the Scripture of choice for Sunday homilies. But the dense, almost indigestible chunks of Paul that form the main content of the Sunday Second Reading? What does he really have to say to us?

It is hard for us to conceive that the last Paul’s letters pre-date even the earliest of the Gospels, Mark, by at least five years. Paul was the great missionary, the one who spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, throughout the known world of his time. The Church which wrote the Gospels between about 700-100 AD had already been brought to faith in Jesus Christ by Paul’s missions and his missionary letters.

Paul’s language is dense, often difficult, and like the rabbi he once was, he thinks and argues in circles, coming back to the same ideas over and over in the course of a single passage. Yet it is Paul who holds so many of the keys to our faith. Today’s reading from the Second Letter to Timothy, is a case in point.

Paul has some quite powerful things to say about scripture and the faith it inspires. And for Paul, faith is not some kind of vague belief, like the insipid modern idea of “believing in yourself”. For him, the only faith worth having is faith in “Christ Jesus.” He expresses this unequivocally: “Take your stand upon this; proclaim the Good news of Jesus Christ risen from the dead, in or out of season.” Going for the overkill, he says, “I tell you, admonish you, exhort you to teach these things patiently.”

Do the words addressed by Paul the Apostle to a bishop 2 000 years ago have any meaning at all for us today? Most certainly. He calls us, in the same way, to stand firm in our faith, to believe in the great Christian truths we have been taught from our youth. He calls us to be His unflinching witnesses to Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, in and out of season. He “tell, admonishes and exhorts” us to attend to the Scriptures, which can “teach, refute error, correct and discipline” us.

If we are ever to convince the world that Jesus is Lord, we have to believe it ourselves, and bear witness to him at all times. The world, though it might hate us, must be able to say of us, “they really believe in something” – or rather, someone. In the world in which we live, it is time for us all to put aside the easy compromises we so often make, to lay down the exceptions to the Church’s teaching about faith in Jesus Christ which we reserve to ourselves. We must leave the Church Comfortable and become once more, like Paul, members of the Church Militant. Like Paul, we must become utterly convinced by our Faith in the Risen Lord Jesus. God will give it to us if we really ask him, if we truly want the superlative gift of Faith that he gives.

Fr Phillip