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Exploring the word

02 Aug 2015 - Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

For the next four weeks, the whole church concentrates on a single chapter of John’s gospel. Its subject is Jesus, the Bread of Life. It’s rare in the liturgical calendar to provide such a prolonged emphasis, but our intent focus is a matter of importance to our lives as Catholic Christians. We gather weekly around this table of our Eucharist, hoping to discover ever more deeply its meaning. In John chapter six, we’re exploring the great mystery of what calls us here: What is the purpose of assembling each Sunday to confess our failures, listen to God’s word, ask for what we need, give praise and thanks, and receive the gift of Christ-life in the forms of bread and wine? If we spend a lifetime performing these actions on autopilot, without reflection, our liturgical life can devolve into a spiritual wasteland. Mass isn’t, as composer and retreat leader Tom Kendzia says, a matter of get-Jesus-on-your-tongue and leave. But if not that, then what? John’s gospel, with the benefit of 50 more years of reflection on the Jesus experience and the church’s practiced rituals than the Synoptics, delves deeper into the mysteries of the church than the other gospels did or could do. Here the “crowds” are contrasted with the “true friends” of Jesus. The crowds ask the wrong questions: “Rabbi, when did you get here?” “What sign can you do?”—focusing their attention on the shell of a miracle and never its meat. They also quote scripture without understanding them: “Moses gave them bread from heaven to eat.” And they ask for what they are not prepared to receive: “Sir, give us this bread always.” Jesus ignores requests for pointless evidence of his powers, or for superficial signs that don’t encourage faith but merely foster curiosity. He corrects their scripture citation: It was not Moses who gave manna to the people. It is God who gives the bread from heaven. Different source, different tense. Miracle food comes from God, and it’s being offered right in this moment. And in response to their request for the gift of this bread, which sounds so sincerely spoken, Jesus reveals himself: “I AM the bread of life.” This week’s passage is a cliff-hanger. We don’t hear how this bold offering is received. Will the crowds clamor to partake of this Jesus-bread? Tune in the next few weeks for the explosive sequel! For now, the gauntlet is thrown down before the skeptical crowds and the friends of Jesus alike. Turns out the bread from heaven isn’t an antique story about Moses in the desert years. The bread from heaven is right here, in our midst—every Sunday. We’re invited to take and eat it, consume and become it. It is God who gives this bread. What does it mean for us to take it? Related scripture links Significant “God-crossings”: Gen. 3:8; 15:17; 28:12-13; Exod. 3:4-6; 19:16-20; 33:18-23 Seven signs in John 1-12: Water into wine, official’s son, cripple at Bethesda, loaves and fishes, walking on water, man born blind, raising of Lazarus Manna ends at Cana: Josh. 5:11-12

Authors Alice Camille

Eucharist Gospel of John Bread

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Exploring the word

01 Feb 2015 - Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

Why do we have four gospels instead of one? Not to confirm the record, as is often said, but to exploit the advantage of four unique perspectives on the Jesus story. Mark’s take on Jesus is the first written down and closest to the period it describes: about 30 years after the fact. If we can believe the tradition that John Mark wrote it after hearing the story from Peter himself, then it’s a vital window on that founding community’s experience of Jesus. What’s most noticeable in Mark is the tone: breathless, urgent, with an immediacy that seems to underscore the psalm response for this morning: If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts! Mark jumps into the narrative at the start of the campaign: Jesus meets John, gets baptized, is tempted in the desert, and hits the ground proclaiming the Kingdom all in 15 abbreviated verses. Then Jesus summons followers, gives his first teaching, and displays his first miracle and we’re only halfway through chapter one! Is this the way the first disciples experienced life with Jesus? No wasted time, no missed opportunities. With Jesus, life seemed to quicken. Truth was spoken, hearts beat faster, people revealed their suffering, miracles snapped creation back into right order, and the world changed forever! This is what the crowds describe as “teaching with authority.” Not just good words, or even words backed up by scripture and tradition. The teaching of Jesus was confirmed by immediate action that did what he said it would do: reveal the Kingdom in our midst. This kind of action is particular to Mark’s gospel. Matthew’s account contains the most teaching (75 percent) but spends only 9 percent of his narrative on healing. By contrast, Mark delivers the largest swatch of real estate to healing: 20 percent of his story. It’s not that Mark (or Peter) viewed Jesus as more of a healer than the other three evangelists. It’s that Mark/Peter viewed healing as a definitive part of the teaching of Jesus. Healings are the periods at the end of his sentences, so to speak. Healings are the aspect of teaching that break into time and prove everything Jesus is saying is for real. How do we live this gospel today? We too stand in the crowd around Jesus, hungry for truth amid deceptive and empty phrases. We don’t have to wait long, because Kingdom urgency delivers the truth with lightning speed. Do our hearts quicken; do we bring our needs forward without hesitation or embarrassment; do we embrace and invest in actions that help snap creation back into right order? Do we trust that Kingdom is coming, right into our midst? Do we believe the world is already changed forever as a result?

Authors Alice Camille

Gospel

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Sign & sacrament

19 Jan 2014 - Second Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle A

The Gospel of John tells us that the Spirit came down and remained on Jesus. The wording is no accident. At one point or another each of us likely has had a powerful spiritual experience, a genuine “moment of connection” with the divine. Without diminishing the beauty and significance of such experiences, a single “peak experience” does not a spiritual life make. It is the day-in, day-out commitment to practice one’s faith that will create a deeply rooted spirituality. The Holy Spirit not only descended on Jesus, it remained with him. The results were evident in Jesus’ life, and can be in ours as well. For more “Sign & sacrament” material, search the Prepare the Word database by today’s scripture reading, a particular theme, or a special occasion.

Gospel of John

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Exploring the word

01 Apr 2012 - Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord, Cycle B

THE GOSPELS ARE not biographies of Jesus. That is most clear during Holy Week, when scripture recounts the Passion in all its brutal details. Nearly one-fourth of the synoptic gospels are devoted to the Passion; when it comes to John, make that one-third. Obviously the gospel writers were not as invested in the life of Jesus so much as they were dedicated to portraying and interpreting his death. It is in this final week, we understand, that the identity of Jesus is fully expressed. Miracles from his active ministry are often dismissed in a paragraph or two. In the Gospel of Mark particularly, teachings are brushed past in a sentence: “And Jesus taught them many things.” You’ll look in vain for his Sermon on the Mount. Mark doesn’t tell us what Jesus had to say because for Mark, Jesus the Teacher is more important for future disciples to grasp than any one lesson plan. Heaps of miracles and years of instruction had meaning for the individuals involved but not for us. All we need to know is Jesus the Healer, Jesus the Teacher—until we reach his final identity, Jesus the Obedient One. It’s no accident that the Passion narrative sounds almost pre-scripted. Jesus talks his way through it like a man in a dream he’s had before. He describes actions already set in motion: You’ll find a colt tied to a fence; you’ll meet a man carrying water. One of you will betray me. All of you will have your faith shaken. Peter will deny me. See, my betrayer is at hand. Everything that happens fulfills the prophecies of scripture. There’s no point in speaking at his trial, to Caiaphas or Pilate; Jesus already bears the weight of his cross, so words seem wasted. Although the Holy Week narratives sound premeditated, that’s not the same as saying that free will was revoked for one long dark week of history. People still make choices: the woman with the alabaster jar, the sleepy disciples in the garden, the young man who runs off naked—even Judas, who leaves the greatest supper ever served to sell out his host. Could Caiaphas have had a softening of the heart? Might Pilate have thrown out the case? Did the soldiers have a chance to let their prisoner escape? Was the Crucifixion in some cosmic sense inevitable? As we consider each critical character in this Passion play, we mustn’t lose sight of Barabbas. It’s become a Holy Week practice to wonder what each of us might have done differently, given the chance. Am I Peter, am I Judas, am I the anonymous one who runs away? At bottom, though, we’re all really Barabbas: the sinner for whom the Just One’s life was traded away. Related scripture links Destroying the Temple: Mark 13:2; 15:29; Matt. 24:2; 26:61; 27:40; Luke 21:6; John 2:19-21; Acts 6:14 What Christ emptied and regained: Col. 1:15-20 Servant model of surrender: Isa. 42:1-4; 49:1-7; 50:4-11; 52:13-53:12 The story of Incarnation: John 1:14; 2 Cor. 8:9 Catechism links The Passion of Jesus: CCC 571-618

Authors Alice Camille

Passion Palm Sunday gospels synoptic gospels Holy Week

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Exploring the word

01 Apr 2012 - Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord, Cycle B

THE GOSPELS ARE not biographies of Jesus. That is most clear during Holy Week, when scripture recounts the Passion in all its brutal details. Nearly one-fourth of the synoptic gospels are devoted to the Passion; when it comes to John, make that one-third. Obviously the gospel writers were not as invested in the life of Jesus so much as they were dedicated to portraying and interpreting his death. It is in this final week, we understand, that the identity of Jesus is fully expressed. Miracles from his active ministry are often dismissed in a paragraph or two. In the Gospel of Mark particularly, teachings are brushed past in a sentence: “And Jesus taught them many things.” You’ll look in vain for his Sermon on the Mount. Mark doesn’t tell us what Jesus had to say because for Mark, Jesus the Teacher is more important for future disciples to grasp than any one lesson plan. Heaps of miracles and years of instruction had meaning for the individuals involved but not for us. All we need to know is Jesus the Healer, Jesus the Teacher—until we reach his final identity, Jesus the Obedient One. It’s no accident that the Passion narrative sounds almost pre-scripted. Jesus talks his way through it like a man in a dream he’s had before. He describes actions already set in motion: You’ll find a colt tied to a fence; you’ll meet a man carrying water. One of you will betray me. All of you will have your faith shaken. Peter will deny me. See, my betrayer is at hand. Everything that happens fulfills the prophecies of scripture. There’s no point in speaking at his trial, to Caiaphas or Pilate; Jesus already bears the weight of his cross, so words seem wasted. Although the Holy Week narratives sound premeditated, that’s not the same as saying that free will was revoked for one long dark week of history. People still make choices: the woman with the alabaster jar, the sleepy disciples in the garden, the young man who runs off naked—even Judas, who leaves the greatest supper ever served to sell out his host. Could Caiaphas have had a softening of the heart? Might Pilate have thrown out the case? Did the soldiers have a chance to let their prisoner escape? Was the Crucifixion in some cosmic sense inevitable? As we consider each critical character in this Passion play, we mustn’t lose sight of Barabbas. It’s become a Holy Week practice to wonder what each of us might have done differently, given the chance. Am I Peter, am I Judas, am I the anonymous one who runs away? At bottom, though, we’re all really Barabbas: the sinner for whom the Just One’s life was traded away. Related scripture links Destroying the Temple: Mark 13:2; 15:29; Matt. 24:2; 26:61; 27:40; Luke 21:6; John 2:19-21; Acts 6:14 What Christ emptied and regained: Col. 1:15-20 Servant model of surrender: Isa. 42:1-4; 49:1-7; 50:4-11; 52:13-53:12 The story of Incarnation: John 1:14; 2 Cor. 8:9 Catechism links The Passion of Jesus: CCC 571-618

Authors Alice Camille

Passion Palm Sunday gospels synoptic gospels Holy Week

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Sign & sacrament

04 Mar 2012 - Second Sunday of Lent, Cycle B

When you hear or read a gospel story it can be easy to overlook the small but important clues the writers are giving you. As a college scripture professor once said, "Every word in the gospels is there for a reason." For example, in Mark's account of Jesus on the road to Jerusalem, when Christ was trying to make clear just what following him will involve for his apostles, we hear that Jesus "was walking ahead of them"; later he "called them" together to set the record straight. That Jesus was in front of the group doesn't only mean the apostles were keeping a respectful distance; it indicates rather that he is the one to follow. His calling together of his disciples says he's calling you, too to follow him wherever he may lead you.

gospel story call

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Who's listening?

29 May 2011 - Sixth Sunday of Easter, Cycle A

Today you can be sure that all people within earshot of your preaching have felt alone and lonely, abandoned by friends or loved ones at some point, and fearful of how they will make their way through financial difficulties, problems with their children, or personal illness. When the gospel is read, they will hear the good news that they are not orphans. Reinforce that message with your own reasons for hope, as Saint Paul suggests. Let them know that help is always available to us, no matter how desperate our situations may seem. All we need do is ask--God and one another.

Gospel Saint Paul message

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Homily stories

01 Aug 2010 - Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

"Why do I even bother?!?" A lot of what people do in the realm of the home is futile. They do the laundry, and in a week there's another big pile to be done. They buy the groceries, and in short order the cupboards are bare once again. Wash, sweep, scour, sort, iron, or straighten, and in no time the process begins again. "What profit comes from all the toil and anxiety?" Without an underlying meaning and purpose for all our actions—both the exciting and the mundane—all is in vain. What's your purpose in what you do? In the past decade two of the fastest growing industries have been the personal security industry (alarms, home security systems, body guards) and self-storage providers. What does this say about our culture? How might Jesus tell the gospel today in light of these changes?

security industry self-storage jesus Gospel

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