The Dedication of the Lateran Basilica

    Although the Pope lives in the Vatican and in the shadow of St Peter’s Basilica, the Basilica of St John Lateran is The Cathedral of the Most Holy Saviour and of Saints John the Baptist and the Evangelist in the Lateran is also known as the Papal Archbasilica of Saint John.  It is considered the mother church of the Roman Catholic faithful, traditionally the Pope’s church.

    The Basilica Today: St. John Lateran is the cathedral of the diocese of Rome where the Bishop of Rome presides, especially on Holy Thursday for the Chrism Mass. One of Rome’s most imposing churches, the Lateran’s towering facade is crowned with 15 colossal statues – Christ, John the Baptist, John the Evangelist and 12 doctors of the Church. Beneath its high altar rest the remains of the small wooden table on which tradition holds St. Peter himself celebrated Mass.

    Relevance of the Feast: We are all members of our own local church, work for the universal kingdom of Christ, and are also members of this “mother-church” in Rome.  The dedication of churches can be traced back to the Jewish practice of dedicating the Temple in Jerusalem to God. Once the Temple had been dedicated, there was a feast each year to celebrate the anniversary of the dedication. This feast was celebrated not only in Jerusalem but in every synagogue as well. Similarly, every Western Catholic church observes the dedication of the Lateran Basilica in Rome.

    This feast helps us move beyond our narrow geographical confines to a sense of the universal Church.

Stop looking for the perfect church.

It does not exist. Even if it did exist,

the moment you or I joined it ,

it would no longer be perfect.  (Nicky Gumbel)

Fr. Martin Hogan

Your word is a lamp for my feet and light for my path

I always find November a somewhat sombre and difficult month. The golden colours of autumn are quickly giving way to the barrenness of winter. As the month progresses, the days will get gradually shorter and darkness will increasingly make its presence felt. We lose the colours of nature and the life-giving quality of light. It is a month I associate with loss. It is perhaps fitting, then, that November is the month when we reflect upon more personal experiences of loss, the loss of significant people in our lives, people who have journeyed with us, who gave us love and whom we loved in return. The commemoration of All Souls is a day when we do that in a special way.

Although nothing is more painful than the loss of a loved one in death, our faith gives us this hope-filled vision in the face of death. St Paul says that ‘hope is not deceptive, because the love of God has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us’. Our hope is grounded in God’s love for us now, a very personal love that is poured into the hearts of each one of us through the Holy Spirit. God’s love, revealed in Jesus and poured into our hearts through the Spirit, continues to hold on to us when we pass through the door of death. As all authentic human love is always life-giving for the one loved, God’s love is supremely life-giving for us, even in the face of our bodily death. What God’s love has already done for us through his Son and the Spirit in this life is the assurance of what God’s love will do for us in eternity. As Paul says in the second reading, ‘Now that we have been reconciled [to God], surely we may count on being saved by the life of his Son’.

It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins.

~2 Maccabees 12:4 ~

Martin Hogan

The Pharisee’s boast

This is one of these stories of people who didn’t like each other, and brought the worst out of each other. The Pharisee was strict on religion, and the tax man was a greedy sinner. Each made the other feel awful about themselves, especially before God.

The Pharisee started boasting about his religious fervent observance. The tax man just swallowed his prejudice and admitted to God that he was a sinner. The Pharisee would look good in any religious line-up, and the tax man would be in the corner of the line-up, almost cowering in the back of the prayer-place, hoping nobody would see him.

But he knew who he was before God; he admitted his weakness. The Pharisee pretended religious fervour and looked down on the tax man, one of God’s favourites.

Jesus comments on the story that everyone would recognise, and we recognise ourselves in both people: the proud and arrogant person at times, and at other times, the one who feels a total failure.

He just says – in admitting who you are, you are high in the sight of God and high at God’s table.

Just to be oneself before God can be difficult. Many gospel stories are about this reality. We need to give those few silent moments each day to an awareness of being loved by God. In that we are humbled, that one as good as God could love us so totally, and so we are exalted.

We are gifted by God’s grace and if we can enjoy our identity as a child of God we will find happiness in life.

Lord teach me to know you more,
to love you more and
serve you faithfully in my life.

Donal Neary SJ

Mission Sunday – A passionate spirit

Irish people have long memories of helping the missions – collecting stamps, mission groups in schools, maybe aunts and uncles ‘out foreign’. It is an essential part of the Church, because Christ is missionary, sent not just to one, but to all, to make a better world, founded on the gospel of Christ. Even if people are not baptised, the Church wants to point out the way to a truly human life – in the way, truth and life who is Christ, and committed to the world of justice

With so much hunger, ill health, and lack of education, the missionary spirit is passionate about wanting to improve things with the message of the gospel.

Today we pray for all our voluntary missionaries, religious, clerical and lay men and women. They are helped by our prayers in what is often a lonely life for them.  Maybe we might even think about giving some time in volunteering in the poorer world;  or decide to vote for people who are concerned for the developing world and who will maintain our aid to the world in need; and we can encourage the young to think globally.

We pray for courage for our people overseas and also for ourselves that we can live as Jesus in different ways.  All are missionaries, as Pope Francis says – ‘Each individual Christian and every community is missionary to the extent that they bring to others, and live, the Gospel, and testify to God’s love for all, especially those experiencing difficulties. Be missionaries of God’s love and tenderness! Be missionaries of God’s mercy, which always forgives us, always awaits us and loves us dearly.’

May our lives be lived in love and service of you, Lord God, and of each other.

Donal Neary SJ