Light for the journey   

In faith and in hope we begin Advent this week with its first candle. With Mary and Joseph we wait for Christ. The candles are lighting the way for them – and for us! The coming light of Jesus lights both our waiting and our journey in life. May it shine the light of Christ into the darknesses of the year since last Christmas – bereavement, illness, depression, disappointments?

We prepare best for Christmas by spreading this light. The way to celebrate Christmas is rooted in our following of the gospel. Among our ways are caring more for the poor, some focused daily prayer, and the wish to forgive more and be forgiven.

All the different images of Christmas prepare us for this birth
– the carols we hear and sing, – the lights in the streets, – the star over the church and our Christmas trees and the ways we pray with anticipation and remem­ber other Christmas days with joy.

Everything of this month can remind us of God. The Christ­mas trees, lights, cards, carols, parties, Santa hats, the houses lit up with reindeer and all the things we see about Christmas, all remind us that God is near.    We welcome the lights in the spirit of Pope Francis:
‘Those who have opened their hearts to God’s love, heard his voice and re­ceived his light, cannot keep this gift to themselves. Since faith is hearing and seeing, it is also handed on as word and light’ (The Light of Faith, 37).

Spend a little time this Advent remembering some people or family memories that make you grateful for Christmas. Thank God for these in your own words.

Come, Lord Jesus. Come into our world of gold and grey,which needs you so badly today.

Donal Neary SJ

Feast of Christ the King

Jesus couldn’t do much for the man on the cross… his own hands were nailed.  He couldn’t take him off, but he gave him more than he could ask for.  He gave him paradise.

Where is God in our suffering? What sort of hope can we find this week in our country? What with so many horrible atrocities taking place, and the economic situation we have. What has God and the Church to say? God in his love for his people, and the Church with its social teachings – have they any message of hope?

Where is God? God did not cause the recession nor the murders. We may learn a lot through it and good may come later or now. Our suffering at the moment is of human making. Not of our making, but of some of our leaders and bankers, mostly through greed. God is with us suffering like he was with the thief. He didn’t cause the suffering of the man on the next cross to him. He wants our happiness and wants justice and prosperity for all.

God is with us, holding our hands, asking us to support each other. The Church will offer a place and space to find the love of God, and its social teaching will ask us to look for the common good in the future. It offers also a place where we can hear the Church’s approach to our economic future, reminding us all the time of the needs of the poor and the ordinary in education, medical care, housing and the ways in which the very old and the poor will suffer most in a situation which has been none of their doing. We are the Church and called on to make our voices heard for those who, like the man on the next cross, have little voice except to ask for help.

Lord, may thy kingdom come.

Donal Neary SJ

The Feet of the Sun

The imagery of the readings today is frightening and cannot be easily understood. Maybe one aspect is of the contrasts we live with terror and violence among ourselves and the Earth, and also the healing and gentle power of God. ‘The sun of justice will shine with healing in its rays‘. When we see the terrors of the globe, it is a sign that God’s power is also in our midst: ‘Do not be frightened‘, we are told.

If you look at the sun in the evening, you often see the rays of light hitting the Earth. In Irish they are called ‘cosa na greinne‘ or ‘the feet of the sun‘. We can think of them as God’s feet walking along our scorched and wounded earth: through the poverty and the illness of his world, through fields full of landmines and unexploded bombs, the rays of light take their pilgrimage from heaven through our world, which needs the light of God so badly.

Even in persecution the presence of God is near. Even in betrayal and in the conflicts that arise over the word of God and how to live the gospel, God is near. He never abandons his people. We can almost sum up the message of the prophets as ‘God does not abandon us‘.

In years when the Church throughout the world was stripped of almost all except its relationship with Jesus, we know that despite the faults, sins and weaknesses and the huge need for renewal, God is near in the word of Jesus Christ. It is in listening to his word and interpreting it together for today that we will find our true way forward as his community.

Lord Jesus, may your kingdom come
and your will be done on earth as in heaven.

Donal Neary SJ

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