19 September 2010

Amos 8.4-7
1 Timothy 2.1-8
Luke 16.1-13

I once attended the First Communion Mass of a 9-year-old daughter of good friends of mine. Back at their home for a celebration the little girl started to busy herself opening the gifts she had received. She focused on opening the envelopes. All but the last one she opened had money in it. She shook the offending empty envelope but to no avail and declared: ‘this one doesn’t work’. A child of our times alright, but in what way has she been brought up by us. Will the parents educate her to have a proper attitude to money? Today’s readings are about money, wealth and various attitudes towards them.

Before I went to Nigeria I was invited by a former classmate to go for a meal. He had a very important job as the Financial Manager of a company. He seemed to be very well off financially. When I returned to Ireland for my vacation I asked about him. I was shocked and very saddened to be told that he had been sentenced to 5 years in prison for fraud and stealing company money.

He reminded me of the dishonest steward in today’s gospel. Sadly, the gospel parable seems to jump out at us directly from today’s newspaper headlines. Quite often we hear of managers and others being accused of and dismissed for squandering money entrusted to them. Accounts of falsified documents, forgery, misuse of funds, scams – it seems Jesus is speaking of our time as well as his own.

What surprises us about today’s gospel is that at first Jesus seems to be praising the dishonest steward for what he has done. Rather, we would expect Jesus to condemn the actions of the dishonest steward. What Jesus praises the dishonest steward for is not his dishonesty but his astuteness or prudence in reacting to the situation when his master finds him out. He uses his imagination in a creative way to secure his future. He knows he is not strong enough to dig; he would be ashamed to beg. An important aspect of the parable then is that in the face of a crisis, of total loss he acts immediately and decisively. The crisis he finds himself in demands instant action and he responds.

Jesus compares the ‘children of light’, his followers, with the ‘children of this world’, those who live according to worldly values only. As the steward prepares for one form of ‘after-life’ when he is dismissed, Jesus invites us to be as decisive in preparing for our ‘after-life’. Jesus is not commending any form of dishonesty but rather invites us to take advantage of life’s opportunities to choose real life.

‘Use money to win you friends’ – money is there to serve us. Jesus invites us to use mammon, that is, money or material goods to share them with others, our families, friends as well as those less well off. There is a big difference between being a steward of the wealth and talents God has blessed us with and being at their mercy. Instead of us controlling them we can allow them to control us. For St. Luke, helping the poor and needy is the best way for us to serve God and not mammon.

This is what the prophet Amos speaks about in the first reading. He condemns those who are already well off but seek only to make themselves richer by exploiting the poor and the lowly. Religion can never be relegated to the purely private and subjective sphere, but must be assertive in the search for social justice.

The dishonest steward solved his problem by relying on the mercy of his master. How much will our loving God help us in our crises if we depend and trust in his mercy? Thus, the real point of the parable is to confirm the kindness and generosity of the master.  He did not send the steward to prison but only dismissed him.  He would honour the lower amounts the dishonest steward negotiated with the debtors.  Jesus is saying – ‘this is your God.  He could really punish you for your sinful ways but is merciful and compassionate to you like the master in the parable. He accepts a lot less from you than he is entitled to receive because of his incredible goodness to you’.

But Jesus is also challenging us. ‘Wake up’, he says. Be more decisive and imaginative in your Christian vocation so as to use your talents, money and the material goods of this world as is worthy of children of God. We don’t know what time remains for any of us. The terrible evil terrorist attacks we see daily on our TV screens should be a warning to us not to be complacent. God is so generous with us in spite of our dishonest ways. It is an invitation to us all to examine ourselves to see if we act honestly. Do we need to repent in any way and turn back to him using our talents and material goods to build his kingdom?

‘Heavenly Father, we are all dishonest stewards in one way or another. Thank you for your great patience in accepting far less in return from us than you deserve. Change our hearts so that we can be more loving and generous in our response to you. Amen.’      

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

5 September 2010

Wisdom 9.13-18
Philemon 9-10,12-17
Luke 14.25-33

Oliver was 25 years old when he fell in love with an Italian who had come to Ireland to study English. Eventually they decided to get married. But her mother was seriously ill and needed to be looked after.  Maria told Oliver that they would have to live in Italy as she needed to take care of her sick mother. She was an only child and her father was dead. It meant Oliver had to give up a good job here and search for one there. He has been living in Italy for the last 15 years, would love to come home to Ireland to live but is unable to do so as Maria’s mother is still alive and needs caring. Because of his love for his wife he is prepared to make sacrifices to be with her and their 2 children.

Using the language of today’s gospel he had chosen ‘to hate’ his family and others. How could Jesus who spoke so much about love, compassion and forgiveness be talking about hating and especially hating those closest to us? This sounds shocking to our ears. In order to understand the text properly we must realise that his use of the verb ‘to hate’ is a ‘Semitic’ way of speaking that was typical of the cultural background of Jesus. Then the meaning of ‘hating’ would have been the equivalent of the verb ‘prefer’ or ‘to love less’ as we might use them today. So to be a true disciple of Jesus means putting him in the first place. It does not stop us loving, caring for, and delighting in our parents, family or friends.  It means that our relation to Jesus, to God has to have first place like the man put his wife in the first place. Are we capable of putting Jesus in the first place in our lives?

Jesus had one great goal in life; namely, to carry out the task his father had given him.  That’s what he lived for. And he was prepared to pay whatever price was demanded in order to fulfill his goal. It meant leaving home at about 30 years old.  He gave up a sure job as a carpenter to take up another way of living. His total commitment to his Father’s will eventually cost him great suffering and a terrible death.

For us too discipleship may be quite costly. We can draw encouragement from the life of the apostles. The gospels show that they struggled at every point to follow Jesus yet he didn’t write them off.

When I see certain families who have an autistic child or a child suffering from cancer or a badly paralysed or mentally handicapped child and their total dedication to looking after them in very demanding circumstances I say to myself ‘there is discipleship of totally committed people’.  Some of these may not be Christian or even be believers at all but they certainly fulfill the command of Jesus

To return to the gospel – whom was Jesus addressing? The gospel says that ‘great crowds accompanied Jesus on his way and he turned and addressed them’.  So it was not only the 12 apostles but also a great number of people. We know who these people were from other gospel passages: fishermen, farmers, housewives, tax collectors, prostitutes, lepers, scribes and Pharisees and all other kinds of people. It is to this great number of all kinds of people that Jesus was speaking. And to us too.

This is the Good News of today’s gospel. Each and every one of us is called to be a disciple of Jesus.  ‘Carrying the cross’ as Jesus asks of us is another way of speaking of following him. ‘Great crowds accompanied Jesus on his way’ – to be on the way of Jesus, to follow him means that it is a lifelong journey. Discipleship is more than a one-time decision.  It is a process.  It takes time.

Discipleship means more than doing some good things for the Lord – it means committing ourselves to him as he did to us. To be a Christian means we have a goal, we are going some place, we are following Someone. Jesus does not ask the impossible of us. He knows that it takes time to follow him closely.  We need to learn his ways.  Above all, we need to depend totally on the help of the Holy Spirit.  This is the great gift Jesus promised us before he went back to his Father in heaven.

The two little stories that end today’s gospel are reminding us that it costs to follow Jesus. It is not easy. But if we wish to follow Jesus on this long journey we are asked to let go of whatever in life attaches us too much to ourselves, our comforts, our status, possessions and so on.

Do I ever sit down and ask myself: am I on the right way? Am I doing the best I can with my talents and gifts?  Do I give a helping hand to others needing my help? Do I share what I have with the poor, at least sometimes?  Where is my focus – at least on Jesus at times, on others or always on myself?

Jesus calls each of us to follow him closely.  And I am sure you try to live out the demand of Jesus for discipleship. For a husband or wife, it will be their love and concern for each other and their children as well as for others. For a doctor or nurse, it will be their care of the sick. For priests and religious – to share with others their love for God in faithful, loving service. Jesus calls us all to discipleship.  He calls us to greatness.  He knows we are capable of it despite our sinfulness, limitations and failures.  He won’t give up on us.  He keeps calling us. He wants disciples to help him?  How will we answer his call?

“Lord Jesus, you are the Way. With the help of your Holy Spirit enable us to be your true disciples as we follow you closely along this way. Amen.”      

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

29 August 2010

Please remember to pray for Fr Kieran O’Reilly SMA who will, this afternoon at 3pm, be ordained Bishop of Killaloe, Ireland. Fr Kieran was, until his appointment, the SMA Superior General. May the Lord bless him abundantly with the fruits of the Spirit that he may wisely lead the People of God in Killaloe.

Sirach 3.17-18,20,28-29
Hebrews 12.18-19,22-24
Luke 14.1,7-14 

One time the late Princess Diana was in Japan and they held a banquet in her honour. Only the rich and important people were invited.  It seems that afterwards in discussing the banquet those invited judged their importance by how near or far they were seated from where she was placed.

At one stage I was invited to a wedding and a government minister had been invited also.  Before the ceremony began he arrived with his wife and they sat down near the front of the church.  When the church began to fill up with other guests he was asked by one of the attendants to go back four or five rows. The front rows had been reserved for family members and for some handicapped people. The government minister was clearly embarrassed by being asked to move back.

In today’s gospel Jesus noticed the invited guests choosing the places of honour. Here Jesus is warning people like that and maybe ourselves too that our real importance does not come from external signs.  God isn’t at all impressed by the games people play to try to show to others how important they think they are. It seems the more fragile we are inside, the more we lack real self-esteem, then the more we will want to prove to others and ourselves by external signs that we are important.

If, as Christians we want to be important or first among others, then let us be first in terms of loving service to those who need us.  This is precisely what Jesus did.  To show to others what importance in the kingdom of God is, he got down on his knees and washed the feet of his disciples. He was constantly serving others.  He did not seek to impress others or try to prove that he was important. He knew God was his Father, as he is ours. He was known as coming from Nazareth in Galilee, a place that had little importance in the world of the time.  He worked until he was about 30 years old as a village carpenter, unknown, unsung, unheralded.

So real humility comes from the awareness and acceptance of who we are before God. The word humble comes from the same word as human and humus, which means soil or earth. Humility is tied in with inner freedom. If we are content and happy with who we are as God’s beloved children then there is no need to prove exteriorly that we are important people. Humility is also related to gratitude and honesty.  We accept our gifts as well as our limitations and weaknesses believing God loves us as we are, not as we would wish to be.

Pride results from forgetting or denying the truth that we are children of God. We depend for our very life breath from God second by second. Sadly many of us continue to play games with others and ourselves that we are important using worldly standards like social status, physical beauty, money, talents, academic qualifications, possessions, where we live, designer labels etc.

Each Sunday we are invited to a banquet – the Banquet of the Eucharist. Here Jesus is the host and we are his guests.  Here there are no special places.  You can sit where you wish.  Here privilege, status, rank have no meaning. Differences don’t count. This is because before God all of us are equal.

Some people get quite upset if they are not addressed by their titles even in the Church: bishop, father, sister or for others architect, engineer, professor etc.  There is nothing wrong with having these titles but if we need them to impress others then maybe we need to take today’s gospel to heart. Jesus resisted all attempts by people to call him the Messiah or when they tried to make him king. (John chapter 6)

That is why the second observation Jesus makes today in the gospel is about those who are important in God’s sight.  He has a preferential option for the poor.  These know they are not important in the world’s eyes. So he is drawn to them just as parents feel called to give special love and care to a handicapped child. It was interesting that in the story at the beginning, the couple being married worked with handicapped people and so gave some of the front seats to these. These could pay nothing in return; there was nothing to be gained but the satisfaction of their joy at being present at the wedding. 

  Obviously Jesus is not telling us in the gospel that we should not invite our relatives or friends or even well off friends to a meal. He is using a Semitic way of speaking. He is exaggerating for effect. The deeper meaning of what he is saying is that gratuitous or freely given love is the standard in God’s kingdom. Do we share gratuitously sometimes with those less well off in society?

The Good News then is that we all are invited to take part in the banquet of the kingdom of heaven. We are invited by God to accept his gift freely acknowledging his great love.  Humility and gratitude go hand in hand. The humble are truly grateful people who know that all they have received is from their loving Father. The kingdom is for the humble, the grateful, the gentle, those who freely accept God’s gifts. Is the fact that I am a child of God the most important identity I have?

  “Jesus meek and humble of heart, make our hearts like unto Yours.  Free us from any kind of pride. Amen”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

22 August 2010

Isaiah 66:18-21
Hebrews 12:5-7,11-13
Luke 13:22-30

One time I was on my way to visit a Nigerian family I knew but got lost so I stopped at a house to ask the way. The man who came to the door was a Muslim. He greeted me kindly and immediately invited me in to share their evening meal that they were having at that moment. I was obviously not a Nigerian.  He didn’t ask me if I were Muslim or whatever, whether I believed in Allah or was I an atheist.

He just welcomed and invited me to join them. He did not set any conditions for me to belong.

In the gospel today when Jesus is asked ‘will only a few people be saved?’ he does not answer with a ‘yes’ or ‘no’. Rather he invites people to enter the narrow gate. What does he mean? Well, the opening of today’s gospel gives us the key to understand Jesus’ answer. He is making his way to Jerusalem where he will die. Regardless of the cost he is determined to do his Father’s will. Those who try to do likewise and attempt to be true to what Jesus asks will join him in heaven.

The little parable that follows uses the image of a door. The master has locked the door and people come along and ask that the door be opened for them. Twice the master replies that he does not know where they come from. Jesus says they will claim they ate and drank in his company and he taught in their streets. But that is not enough. In Matthew’s gospel Jesus says “Not everyone who says to me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of my Father but he/she who does the will of my Father in heaven”. In 1 John 3.18 we read that ‘our love is to be not just words or mere talk but something real and active’.

Jesus is telling us clearly that labels are not enough: those like Catholic, Jew, Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist etc. can lead us to be complacent, and to take things for granted because we bear a certain religious label. Jesus was telling the Jews of his time that they were in danger of being locked out of the kingdom because they did not heed the call to repentance. All this is important for us. We must not repeat the mistake of Jesus’ contemporaries who thought they had a divine right to enter the kingdom of God, that they belonged to the club, so to speak. The gospel message is meant for us too: but when we are inclined to think that someone is ‘not one of us’, we might remember the teaching of Jesus – that no one is beyond the mercy and acceptance of God.

Remember Jesus was speaking to his Jewish hearers and especially to the religious leaders like the Pharisees, the Scribes and the Pharisees. These were convinced beyond doubt that only Jews could be saved. Not only Jews but the Jews who followed the Law exactly as they interpreted it. That is why they were determined to get rid of Jesus. He was acting like an outsider. He broke the Sabbath from time to time, he did not always uphold their religious traditions. He touched lepers and ate with people they called public sinners. He allowed women to go about publicly with him.

We might think that Jesus was giving us a new teaching in this regard but the first reading today from the Old Testament prophet Isaiah says that the Lord will come to gather the nations of every language. And he is not talking just about Israelites.  In 1 Tim. 2.4 we read ‘God wants all people to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth’. The Good News of today’s gospel is that God wants all people to be saved, irrespective of religious labels. Anyone who acts in a loving manner, following his/her conscience and is guided by the Spirit, even if not formally acknowledged will be part of God’s kingdom.

Each one of us has the capacity to allow Jesus Christ into our hearts or keep him out. The choice is ours. God doesn’t lock anyone out of his house. We do it ourselves by the choices we make in life.  It is not enough to say we heard of him, knew about him. To enter demands going through the narrow gate – the gate of love, forgiveness, compassion, living in peace with others, sharing what we have when this is possible. All this is far from easy.

But entry into God’s house by the narrow gate is possible for each one. The secret is to have the humility to knock on God’s door and ask God to allow us in. The narrow gate reminds us that salvation cannot be obtained through our own strength alone.  When Christ knocks on the door of our hearts he is asking us to allow him in and to journey with us, to call on his help freely offered.

God passionately wants us all to be in his kingdom. Jesus tells us not to worry, that in his Father’s house there are many mansions. There is enough room for us all. But we can refuse the invitation to enter. If we truly appreciate God’s incredible love for us, we will try with the help of the Holy Spirit to enter by the narrow gate, to follow him closely, that is, to do God’s will. It is the best way of saying ‘thank you’ to him for his call and choice of us as well as the many gifts he lavishes on us daily in life.

The Eucharist is the way in which we show that we are at least trying to be one with God and the other people with whom we celebrate and by extension all others, each of whom is a child of God.

“Lord, never let us take you for granted.  May our lives of service, of following you closely. be our thank you for your choice of us. Amen”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God

15 August 2010

Revelation 11:19, 12:1-6, 10
1 Cor 15:20-26
Luke 1:39-56

Two missionary priests made an agreement that whoever died first would contact the other about what happened. Some years later one of the priests had to go back to Ireland for medical treatment. Then one night the priest still on the missions woke up during the night convinced that there was someone in the room with him even though he couldn’t see anyone. Later he heard that that was the very time the other priest had died. One may not believe this or may dismiss it as pure coincidence. Whatever the reality we don’t have to base our trust in the resurrection on things like that.

In faith, today’s solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary is telling us that God did indeed assume Mary body and soul into heaven at the end of her earthly life as a promise of our own resurrection from the dead after we die.

Mary’s greatness comes from her faith. Elizabeth, in today’s gospel says of Mary: ‘Blessed is she who believed that the promise made her by the Lord would be fulfilled’. Mary’s response is to give all the praise and glory to God who made it possible. Mary does not proclaim this song of thanksgiving as an isolated person but as the daughter of a people. This is clearly Luke’s intention. With her people, Mary sings the greatness of God whose power is revealed through history in his people by way of his saving deed.  Mary’s greatness is not based on a blood relationship with Jesus but because she was above all, the woman of faith who accepted God’s plan for her, even though it would involve a lot of suffering. She is someone very human like us experiencing many of the ups and downs of life as we do and so she knows what we go through having many of the same experiences, if not in the same detail, but certainly with the same joys and struggles of being human.

Mary is truly a model of the Christian life. Sometimes saints can be presented in such a way that we feel they are almost superhuman beings, almost angelic whom we could never imitate. This is certainly not true and especially it is not true of Mary. Mary is the greatest of all the saints because she never sinned.  She was sensitive to the call of God and lived her life in total obedience to that call. Hopefully, most of us Christians try to live in obedience to God’s will in our lives but the obvious difference is that we sin from time to time, Mary never did. 

Yet in many ways her life was very similar to the life of most women. She was married, gave birth to a child, and did her best to raise him as she believed. But there were times as in the case of all mothers when there were great misunderstandings between her and her son. When he was 12 years old and went missing for 3 days, she and St. Joseph must have been frantic with worry. The answer he gave was hardly satisfying on a human level. ‘Did you not know that I must be busy with my Father’s affairs?’

At the age of about 30 when he decided to leave home to be an itinerant preacher how would his mother have reacted?  She most probably questioned him about the wisdom of it – where would he sleep, eat, what would support him etc? Of course, if we don’t really accept Jesus being fully human then we can give easy answers. At the wedding feast of Cana would Mary not have been like any other woman there, out dancing, enjoying the company, delighting in the newly wed young couple until her sensitivity to the lack of wine made her approach Jesus and ask his help. It shows the power of Mary’s intercession with her son.

So Mary was no plaster saint, totally different from other humans. She never heard confessions, celebrated Mass or performed miracles in the ordinary sense of the term. But hers was the greatest miracle of all – never to have sinned, never to have resisted God’s will. And she was faithful to the very end. She followed Jesus to Calvary and saw him crucified cruelly.

Today’s solemnity then is, above all, the triumph of God’s grace over evil and sin in a human being, Mary. The first reading from revelation is simply telling us that God is victorious in the struggle with evil and sin. The Assumption is the celebration of what God can do for us humans if we allow him

For a long time this thanksgiving song of Mary was seen in terms of a spiritual hymn only. But in recent times the emphasis is also very much on God’s preferential option for the poor, the underprivileged, and the marginalised. This is a theme running right though the bible and Mary’s song highlights it. In effect it speaks of God turning the ordinary way of looking at things upside down. ‘God pulls down the mighty from their thrones and exalts the lowly; the hungry he fills with good things, the rich he sends empty away’ etc. This, of course, was what Jesus proclaimed and carried out during his public ministry.

St. Paul says ‘eye has not seen nor ear heard what things God has prepared for those who love him’. What must have been like for Mary, when she was assumed into heaven by God’s choice, to have come face to face with Jesus whom she had last seen physically hanging on a cross before being put in the tomb. What an incredibly joyful encounter it must have been.   

Today’s solemnity is a reminder to us that we too are called to the same destiny as Mary – to be with her Son forever in heaven. However in the meantime, we need to pray often for a great increase of faith and trust in God so that like Mary we will be faithful to the call each of us has from God. We too are called to work for justice – to let go of prejudices against any group of people, like AIDS victims, immigrants; to be those who are concerned for the underprivileged to the extent that we can be.

“Lord Jesus, thank you for the gift of your mother Mary.  May she continually intercede for us.  Amen”

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

8^th August 2010

Wisdom 18.6-9
Hebrews 11.1-2, 8-19
Luke 12.32-48

Some years ago a friend of mine went on a plane journey for the first time. When the air hostess asked those on board for their attention to the safety instructions he paid great attention, not having heard them before. He heard the hostess telling them where the emergency exits were, how to use an oxygen mask should there be a drop in cabin pressure, where the safety jackets were and how to use them. The idea behind all the instructions was to help passengers to be prepared for the unexpected.

In the gospel and readings today Jesus gives us some instructions regarding the flight of life, that is our journey through life. We hear in the first reading that just as God came to the rescue of the Jews in Egypt, so he will save those who put their trust in him. In the gospel we are asked to be prepared for the unexpected. We are called to be ready whenever the Lord returns to take us with him.

The whole point of today’s readings is not to frighten or threaten us. It is the very opposite. The opening lines of the gospel give us the good news when Jesus says to his disciples and that includes us: ’There is no need to be afraid little flock, for it has pleased your father to give you the kingdom’. So the kingdom is a sheer gift from our loving God. He does not want us to get involved in any kind of lifestyle by which we could get sidetracked by a false value system or to forget our goal.

Just as a business man will invest wisely or get involved in projects which will ensure a good return we are asked by Jesus to do the very same to ensure our future happiness. The best down payment we can make towards being assured of our heavenly home is almsgiving and whatever lifestyle or good deeds that are demanded of us because of our vocation. That is why Jesus advises us to get purses that do not wear out, treasure that will not fail us. For where our treasure is, Jesus says, there will our heart be.  What really is treasure for us?  Where, in fact, is your heart and mine?

As life goes on we may become increasingly aware of how fleeting it is. And how precarious our hold on life is. An incident some years ago taught me this lesson. I read about a young man who was shot in Dublin, Ireland because he was mistaken for someone else whom the gunmen were seeking. Neither he, nor his family foresaw his totally unexpected and sudden death. Who would have foreseen his unexpected death? Nearly all of us know of people who die as a result of cancer which attacks them out of the blue. Our lives hang by a thread. Life can be taken away from us in the twinkling of an eye.

Jesus was aware of the uncertainty of life. His parable stresses the fact that death can come at any moment. It isn’t that God tries to catch us unawares like a thief breaking into a house. That would be unthinkable. Death, not God, is the thief that robs us of life.

The uncertainty of life should not prevent us from enjoying life in the present. And we don’t know if we will have that chance to live long. What we do have is an opportunity to be faithful to our responsibilities and commitments on a daily basis, like the good and wise steward Jesus spoke about. Then we can go forward into the unknown like Abraham did, trusting in God’s gracious and loving care.

One day a monk was sweeping a floor in the monastery when someone asked him what he would do if he knew he was going to die within the hour. ‘I’d go on sweeping the floor’, he replied. In other words he was attending to the duty of the moment.

What we are talking about is faith, the faith Abraham showed in the second reading. The letter to the Hebrews reminds us: “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things unseen. (Heb.11.1). Ultimately faith is about trust. Will we trust that Jesus will come again and in the meantime try our best to live as good servants of his in this life.

It is easy and tempting to think of the coming of the Lord at the end of time, when our own lives will most probably be over.  It is more challenging to imagine that perhaps the Lord comes to us in less dramatic ways, in our daily dealings with each other, in situations that call for personal honesty and integrity.  The clearest and surest ways that the Lord enters our lives is when we celebrate the Eucharist together, when we receive the food which sustained the Israelites of their journey in the desert.

It is amazing that the Lord when he finds his servants doing their work faithfully when he returns, will actually sit them down at table, put on an apron and wait on them hand and foot. This is really something! Being raised up all because our head was focused down on the task given.

Let us pray for a renewal of faith in our own day, a faith that will enlighten our way, enabling us to travel lightly as pilgrims, choosing to live more simply that others may simply live.

“Lord Jesus, help us to believe totally that you are our treasure that no thief can reach nor moth destroy. Give us a great increase of faith and trust in you that especially in dark and difficult times we will be faithful to you and to your promises.  Amen.”      

Fr. Jim Kirstein SMA

1st August 2010

Ecclesiastes 1.2, 2.21-23
Colossians 3.1-5, 9-11
Luke 12.13-21

A certain rich man, who had never married, inherited a large amount of money at the age of 79. He consulted a number of friends who were investment bankers to know where best to invest his money so that he could get the best return. They suggested a number of different options, different companies.  Despite all his money, he spent a lot of energy and time worrying about which would give him the most interest on his investment. Whilst he was doing this he died suddenly. Because he was always well off it never seemed to have occurred to him to share with people less well off.

The readings today focus on our priorities and attitudes in life. Nowhere in today’s readings or in the Bible does it say that having possessions is wrong. The question is what importance do we give them in our lives? The first reading today is from the Book of Ecclesiastes. When he says that ‘all is vanity’ he is using the word ‘vanity’ in the sense of ‘illusion’ or ‘mist’. He says that it is an illusion to think that wealth or possessions in themselves can give true happiness and especially if we put them in the place of God so that they become idols. We then act as if we are independent of God.

In the gospel Jesus refuses to get involved in a dispute regarding an inheritance between two brothers.  He takes the opportunity to warn people against avarice or greed of any kind. Greed can become an idol because it consists in putting our trust in something other than God. Jesus is not talking only about material possessions. He is talking about anything that can become an idol for us.  It might be drugs, drink, sex, work etc. Today computers and modern technology may take up so much of our time that we haven’t time to pray or go to Mass as we used to.

In the parable Jesus speaks about a man who is already rich. He wants to pull down his barns and build bigger ones. It is clear that the focus is on himself. He is self-centred. He doesn’t seem to consider the needs of those less well off. Jesus is saying that riches are a blessing when they are shared and a violation when they are stored up for personal identity or security.

Gandhi, the Indian leader, repeated many centuries later what the early Fathers or theologians of the Church had taught. “Even if it is not stolen, something is to be considered stolen if one keeps it without needing it. The rich possess a great abundance of superfluous things they do not really need and that therefore remain unused and are lost, whilst millions die of hunger because for them there is no food”. Gandhi says clearly what Jesus speaks about in the gospel today. Maybe it is a call for each of us to examine our conscience about what importance our possessions have in our lives. Do we use them for our own needs but also to help others in need?

The other fact about the man in the parable and the man in the story at the beginning was that both acted as if they were God, as if they had control over the length of their lives. No one has any guarantee about how long he/she will live. A friend of mine was always in perfect health and one day without warning at the age of 34 he died suddenly. Could a sudden death not happen to any of us?  

Basically the man in the parable was preoccupied with the success of his farming business that it consumed him. It caused him to have a wrong perspective of life. Instead of recognizing and living every moment of his life not knowing what the future would be he begins to plan a long life. So his success had led him to the point that God no longer played a primary and guiding role in his life.

Isn’t it so easy to be distracted by the things of this world? We must call on the Holy Spirit often to prevent this from happening to us. Let us pray to maintain a primary focus on the will of God and not allow success, good management, pleasure etc. to be the cause of neglecting His role in our lives.

The Good News of today’s readings is a gentle reminder that we are here on earth only for a short time and that our true home is in heaven as St.Paul says in the second reading. The real riches that we take with us to heaven are those we have given to the poor or whatever we have shared with others here on earth. Jesus is reminding us of this so that we might have the freedom that gives us a deep peace and joy now. Money can become devalued very quickly. It is the opposite with God. God never becomes devalued! In fact the opposite is true – the more we trust in him and follow his ways with the help of his Spirit the more peace and joy we will have now and later too.

Those who try their best to share with others and are conscious of their call to help those less well off enjoy much peace and joy in their lives.

“Lord Jesus, we thank you for the many ways you have blessed us with.  Every good gift comes from our Heavenly Father. Help us to use these gifts in a Christian manner for our own good and for others less well off when this is possible.  Amen”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein SMA

25 July 2010

Genesis 18.20-32
Colossians 2.12-14
Luke 11.1-13

Once a bishop friend invited me to his family home for supper. His parents were still alive. I was very touched by the way he called his parents ‘Daddy and Mammy’. They in turn treated him simply as another child of theirs calling him by their nickname for him.

Maybe that is the most important thing to say about prayer, that we are addressing someone in a very childlike and trustful way. The Aramaic word that Jesus used was ‘Abba’ or ‘daddy’ just like the bishop addressed his own father. Perhaps prayer is a bit like that. The readings for this Sunday invite us to reflect on the dimension of prayer in the Christian life. Above all it is an attitude of trust in God our kind Father who is always ready to listen to his children but who doesn’t always give us what we want because it would not be best for us. St Luke delights in frequently presenting Jesus praying. In all the important moments of Jesus’ life, Luke never forgets to point this out.

Jesus in teaching us about prayer underlines the model of all prayers. It is not to be longwinded, drawn out – we may need to listen more than we normally do and give God a chance to speak to us.

Is this not telling us that first of all prayer is about a relationship – one between our loving heavenly Father and us his children? It is interesting to note that this model of how we ought to pray puts the focus first of all on God our loving Father. We start by calling God, “Father”, not just my father but our Father.

Of the 5 petitions in the Our Father today the first two focus on God. We are told to pray: ‘may your name be held holy’. For the Jews a name was the same as the person. Thus we are asked to adore, honour and glorify our Father in heaven. Before mentioning any of our requests, praise and adoration of God are foremost. Then, in praying ‘your kingdom come’ we are told the how this might be carried out in our lives. Working to bring about his kingdom is more than just words. It calls upon us to be peacemakers, to work against all injustices, to live the truth of God’s love and forgiveness in our lives. We are called to do this wherever we are, in our homes, with our families, in our workplaces etc.

The next three petitions allow us to pray for our own needs and those of others.

They represent all time: the present (give us this day our daily bread), the past (forgive our sins, that is, all we did that was contrary to God’s kingdom), and the future (do not put us to the test – that is ‘do not demand more of us than we are capable of doing).

So in asking our generous Father for our daily bread we are asking him to give us what is best for us – we may not get what we think is best for us. Or now may not be the best time to get it as God knows. Nigerians have a saying: ‘God’s time is best’. Not a bad motto when we come to pray. Of course, God may want to give us certain gifts but others may refuse to cooperate with God’s plan. Forgiveness is mentioned quite a number of times in the gospels and it is included here. It is the only petition with a condition attached. We promise God we will forgive others as he does us though this is not always easy. That is why in the second parable that follows, Jesus tells us that God’s best gift to us is the powerful Holy Spirit who enables us to do what God asks of us to bring about his kingdom and forgive others. Our Father knows that will power is not enough, we need Spirit power to live as God’s children and to act accordingly.  

The first of the little parables that follow the Lord’s Prayer tells us of the need to persevere in prayer and not to give up if at first we don’t receive what we ask for.

I knew a woman whose husband left her. She prayed daily for his return. Then one day he walked into her house again. This was after 19 years. She really persevered in prayer and believed God would answer her.

Jesus tells us that there are 2 conditions needed to have our prayers answered by God. In John’s Gospel chapter 14:13 he says

–                  1) ‘whatever you ask for in my name (that is according to my will) I will do

–                  2) ‘so that the Father may be glorified in the Son’ (that it will give glory to God).

Many times we forget this and want God to respond to our demands without taking these into account.

Sometimes, of course, we try to bargain with God: ‘If my sick husband lives a few years longer, I will go to Mass daily and pray a daily rosary’. Yet God doesn’t think this is foolish. In the first reading we heard about Abraham bargaining with God. He trusted God enough to bargain all the way. It doesn’t mean we will always get what we want but it does show a great trust in God and I feel God appreciates this bargaining as we take him seriously as he does us.

Ultimately prayer is about a relationship of trust. We trust we have a loving Father who passionately cares for us. More than anything he hopes we will develop an ever greater intimacy with him and he asks us to work to bring about his kingdom. He takes all this so seriously that the best gift he can give us now is the Holy Spirit who can empower and enable us to respond to his invitation.

“Lord Jesus, thank you for teaching us how to pray by giving us the best model in the Our Father. May we say not only the words but also put them into practice in our daily lives. Amen”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA – 14 July 2010

18 July 2010

 Genesis 18:1-10
Colossians 1:24-28
Luke 10:38–42

One time there was a football competition organized in Paris and one of the African teams arrived to find that no accommodation had been arranged for them. Later the journalists in the daily newspapers in Paris were amazed that this did not constitute any problem. Being non-Africans they found it hard to understand. Fellow countrymen of the football players immediately put them up in their own homes without the slightest problem. Hospitality is so much part of their culture that they saw it as very normal.

In the first reading today we read about Abraham welcoming three strangers with great hospitality. He doesn’t realise it then but in welcoming them he is welcoming God himself. Later on in the gospels Jesus will say, “whoever welcomes you welcomes me and whoever welcomes me welcomes the One who sent me”. It seems hospitality and welcome were the ground base of Jesus’ ministry. Where do we stand on this? How often do we advert to this in our daily lives wherever we find ourselves. Is not God’s welcome and hospitality revealed to us by others? How aware are we of this? Maybe a gift to pray for.

The gospel tells us of the welcome given by Martha and Mary to Jesus. Martha is the one who actually welcomes Jesus into her house and appears to be the cook and organiser. Jesus would have appreciated having a good meal after his journey. It was her way of welcoming Jesus. Mary on the other hand welcomes Jesus by sitting at his feet and listening to him. These are two different ways of welcoming someone. What Jesus meant by saying that “Mary had chosen the better part” was that at that particular moment that was the best response for her.  At another time she might need to take on the role of cook and organiser.

Here we touch on a deeper meaning in the incident. At the time of Jesus only men sat at the feet of the Rabbis or Teachers of the Law. It was not the place for women. The cultural roles would have been quite rigid as regards the role and place of women in society. So Jesus is emancipating or freeing women to be equally entitled to do this. Is he not the first real feminist? He is saying that God’s love and word is addressed to everyone, men and women alike.

Mary, and in fact every woman, has the right to listen to the Word of God. House tasks must not suppress that interest. This is a woman’s right which is still not recognised in many cultures even in the so-called developed countries. By his words and deeds Jesus liberates women from a concept which maintains them in a role with no other possibilities to develop themselves.

Jesus then is teaching us that an active life which leaves no time for prayer and listening to God will soon becomes dry and barren. On the other hand a relationship with God that does not bother with the neighbour is nothing but cult worship that may keep a person away from the realities of life.

How can we tell what our priorities are? The best way to recognize our actual priorities is to reflect on our normal behaviour. What gets most of our energy? These are our priorities. It’s the easiest thing in the world to get our priorities wrong. When the late Cardinal Joseph Bernadin of Chicago, learned that he had terminal cancer he said: ‘I came to realize that what consumes much of our daily life is trivial and insignificant.’ A period of non-doing is essential to nourish the soul. Action and contemplation are not meant to be contrasted. Both are necessary and have to be integrated into life.

According to Gandhi ‘prayer is not just asking. It is a longing of the soul. It is an admission of one’s weakness.’  Maybe the highest form of worship is silence. Because then we have a greater chance to hear God speaking to us. And is not listening a great form of hospitality? We all know when some people are speaking to us or we to them maybe they or us are not really practicing hospitality. We are preparing our replies or are elsewhere in our thoughts.

Ultimately really listening to God in prayer must lead to action. So the listening of Mary would have had little effect if it did not motivate her to action. Likewise if we are really listening to God in prayer it should motivate us too to action. It can be as simple as visiting someone in need in the area where we live.

At a superficial glance it might seem that Mary’s part was easier – all she had to do was sit there and listen – and Martha’s the harder. But on reflection we can see that at least sometimes Mary’s part is the harder of the two. It is not easy to set aside one’s own work and give one’s undivided attention to another person. But it is tremendously fruitful spiritually.

Is there not a Martha and Mary in each of us? As the Book of Ecclesiastes says: “there is a time for everything under heaven”. 

“Lord Jesus, give us the gift to truly listen to you speaking to us and at each moment may we be guided by the Spirit “to choose the better part”.  Amen.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA – 14 July 2010

11^th July 2010

 Deuteronomy 30:10-14
Colossians 1:15-20
Luke 10:25-37

In a certain city people were coming out of the church after Mass. Many saw a man lying at the side of the road bleeding. He had fallen from his bicycle as someone had tried to steal it from him. Nearly all kept walking by afraid of becoming involved. A young homosexual couple, both suffering from AIDS saw the man and immediately went and helped him, arranging to take him to the nearby hospital. Don’t we know in the gospel who acted in the way Christ invites us to respond?

Today’s gospel is about the essence of our religion: faith in God is expressed in concrete acts of love.

This gospel starts off with a lawyer trying to trap Jesus by asking him what he had to do to inherit eternal life. Jesus asked him what was written in the law. He quotes the law stating ‘you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself’. But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus: “And who is my neighbour?’

Jesus instead of going into the details of the law and quoting from the Hebrew Scriptures tells the poignant story of the Good Samaritan. Very cleverly Jesus points out the difference between ‘knowing the law’ and ‘fulfilling the law’. For him the most important thing was not church worship but love. Church worship is important but if at times there is a clash between the two, then love has absolute priority.

In the story the first to see the half-dead man is the priest. If the victim were a non-Jew or dead and the priest touched him he would have been defiled or ritually impure and would have had to go back to Jerusalem for purification. So he passed by on the other side. The Levite, (a member of the tribe involved in Temple worship) came next and followed the example of the priest. He also passed by on the other side. Next came a Samaritan trader who took care of the victim.

The Jewish listeners of Jesus would have been appalled that the hero of the story was not a Jew but a member of the hated Samaritans. For a long time there was ‘bad blood’ between these two peoples. This hated enemy is the one who shows compassion. He bandaged the wounds of the victim, then lifted him on his own animal meaning he had to walk himself and took him to an inn and cared for him. He paid the innkeeper and said he would pay whatever else was necessary on his way back. He really put himself out for the victim. The Samaritan was a carer. Carers are special people, they are the salt of the earth. They don’t care out of a sense of duty but because their heart will not allow them to do otherwise.

Jesus does not tell us in the story if the man robbed was a Jew or a non-Jew, whether he even believed in God. Was he a good or a bad person? The lawyer who asked the question at first focused on himself and on the need to justify himself.  He is prepared to debate the question of ‘who is my neighbour’ in an abstract way. But Jesus deals with his questions in a very concrete manner. He is not interested in a vague question like ‘who is my neighbour?’ The danger with that is we may limit neighbour to those we know and live close by, those with the same religious beliefs or skin colour. Jesus is telling us very clearly that what makes us neighbours is our generous attending to anyone in need. He is inviting us to go beyond labels or names like Christian, Catholic, Muslim, those who have AIDS, divorcees, and women who may have had an abortion. He is asking us to cross borders and boundaries we may have grown up with. There are very few of us who don’t have some prejudices. At times, don’t we all pass by on the other side? The sins of the priest and Levite were those of omission, not commission. The former may be our worst sins even if we don’t always think of them as such.

Do we recognise ourselves in the priest and the Levite? We can attend Sunday Mass, pray daily yet may not get involved with people in need especially if we can help. The story at the beginning is an indication of how we can make a distinction between loving God and loving our neighbour. As we read in 1 John 4.20 – Anyone who says ‘I love God and hates anyone is a liar, since not to love the person that he can see, cannot love God whom he has never seen’. This leaves no room for doubt.

In real life, Jesus lived out to the fullest what it means to be a Good Samaritan. As the second reading says: “He is the image of the unseen God”. His whole life was a concrete response to whoever the neighbour in need was – Jew, Samaritan, adulterous woman, prostitutes, Roman centurion, tax collectors, sinners etc. He still wants to be the Good Samaritan to each of us. He wants to bind up our wounds which may be our fears, our anxieties or whatever. It was costly for the Good Samaritan to look after the man who fell among robbers.  It actually cost Jesus his life to help us.

‘Who is my neighbour?’ asked the Samaritan. Jesus’ answer was: anyone in need of my help.  What kind of a neighbour am I?  And who am I willing to treat as my neighbour?

“Lord Jesus, praise you for being the Good Samaritan for us at all times if we allow you to help us.  May the Holy Spirit enable us to be Good Samaritans for those we meet and can help. Amen.”

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA – 10 July 2010

4 July 2010

 Isaiah 66.10-14
Galatians 6.14-18
Luke 10.1-12, 17-20

Many years ago at the height of the ‘Troubles’ in Northern Ireland, a Catholic priest went across the road to the local Protestant church to wish the minister and his congregation a happy Christmas. The minister received him warmly, reciprocated his greeting and later made a return visit. However, some of the elders of his church reacted angrily and took steps to have the minister removed from the parish. These two clergymen were only doing what Christ would want them to do – to be instruments of peace in a divided and troubled society.

In the gospel today when Jesus sends out the 72 disciples he says that their first words on entering a house were to be: ‘Peace to this house’. They were to be ambassadors of peace and goodwill. Of course, true peace must be based on justice.

Peace is not a negative thing. It is not just the absence of war or enmity. Peace is a positive thing. It implies openness, tolerance, friendship, goodwill, hospitality and reconciliation. Neither does it mean just a feeling of well-being but above all the peace between God and man / woman. Peace is especially a gift from God. God’s great gift is peace. It is a source of joy for all people. In John’s Gospel, Jesus says: “my own peace I give you, a peace the world cannot give, this my gift to you.”

In Matthew’s Gospel when Jesus gives us the Beatitudes, in verse 10:9 he says: Happy the peacemakers for they shall be children of God’. So peacemakers are those who reconcile and are reconciled. In Hebrew the word for peace is ‘Shalom’ which means to be complete or to experience wholeness. It does not mean the absence of difficulties or even suffering but deep down one is at peace. A God gifted peace ultimately means real liberation. We are at peace because we are free or detached from many things which could enslave us.

Working for peace means welcoming people who are close to us, those who annoy or disagree with us, even those who cause anguish within us. Shortly before Communion the priest invites us to offer each other a sign of peace. The hand that we reach out to our neighbour is the same hand with which we receive Jesus in Communion.

It is interesting that when Jesus sends out his 72 disciples he sends them out in pairs, meaning they cannot be effective ministers to others unless they are at peace and in communion with each other.   We are called into community. It is about living in right relationships with all others. 

Where are you and I in all this?  Do we pray to God for the gift of peace, not only for ourselves but also for others and for the world at large? Is there anyone we are not presently at peace with? Are we sharers of God’s gift of peace not only with those near us at Mass but also with others at all other times? Are we peacemakers in our world as the Beatitudes speak about?

In St. Luke’s gospel, ch.9 Jesus associates the 12 Apostles with his mission. In today’s gospel he associates 72 others. Little by little he will call on the help of more and more people to assist him. Today’s gospel is a gospel for all people, not just for priests and religious. Every baptised Christian and indeed all people of goodwill are invited by Jesus to work with him against all that is opposed to the kingdom of his Father which he came to establish on earth. Each one of us is called by God, depending on our particular vocation, to spread the Good News.

Jesus emphasises the importance of freedom for the disciples. ‘Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals’ (v.4), in other words do not trust your possessions, do not rely on them too much. He is not saying we should get rid of all we possess. But he is warning us against carrying too much baggage with us on our journey through life. Possessions may tempt to compromise us. If we truly believe that we are totally and unconditionally loved by God, and this is not as easy as it seems, then that is where we are invited to get our peace and joy from and no one can take away that conviction if we truly believe it. Then we can be free of the baggage we may have put too much trust in before – what others think of us, our possessions, our academic qualifications or our status in society etc.

At the end of the gospel the apostles return from their mission overjoyed at their success. But Jesus warns them that miracles are no guarantee that it is God’s work. He cautions them against putting too much emphasis on the successes of their pastoral ministry. If they are following the guidelines of Jesus sooner or later they will face opposition. People get tired of miracles as Jesus himself experienced.  Despite all people had seen they still crucified him. The real Good News as Jesus tells them is that ‘their names are written on heaven’. This is a totally free gift on God’s part. He offers it to us freely also.

“Lord Jesus, we may lose our possessions, our health, the good name we have but your love for us is total and constant. May we allow you to use us to bring about your kingdom here on earth.  Amen”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA 

27 June 2010

1 Kings 19:16, 19-21
Galatians 5:1, 13-18
Luke 9: 51-62

Jackie Hewitt chairman of the Loyalist / Protestant Shankill Community council in Northern Ireland was driving back to Belfast from a town where he had been at a war memorial ceremony. He was listening to his car radio when the news came in that a bomb had gone off in his area in the Shankill Road. Three people were dead. Blinded by anger he thought to himself ‘that’s it, we need a bomb now in the Nationalist / Catholic area of the Falls Road. As he neared the city he heard another news flash on the radio saying that seven were now dead. And he thought to himself ‘we need two bombs on the Falls Road’. But when he got to the scene, and stood amidst the anger and grief of his community, his own thoughts haunted him’. “When I heard other people saying what I was thinking, it frightened me.”

Over the subsequent years both Protestant and Catholic people came to realise that retaliation, revenge and violence are never the solution. Ultimately it was only the negotiation, courage and determination of people on both sides that brought about a peace deal. But it cost them a lot as their families and houses suffered due to hardliners on both sides.

In the gospel today the disciples of Jesus, James and John wanted to retaliate in a violent way to the refusal of the Samaritans to make them welcome as they were going to Jerusalem. They wanted Jesus to respond by calling down fire from heaven on the entire village. At that time Samaritans and Jews were hated enemies. Here we see the example of tribalism, of great prejudice. To follow Jesus’ teaching of non-violence and non-retaliation requires exceptional strength and a strange kind of love. Evil must be resisted but not by doing further evil. The perfect example for us is Jesus on the cross. The Jewish leaders, the Roman soldiers and others present hurled their abuse and hatred at Jesus but instead of retaliating in like manner he broke the cycle of violence and returned love for hatred.

Are we prejudiced in any way? How do we respond? Do we hold grudges and try to retaliate by like attitudes or actions? Or do we ask for the grace which Jesus won for us on the cross to return love for hatred. It is far from easy. That is why the help of the Holy Spirit is so necessary.

The other key point in the gospel today is the total commitment of Jesus. We are told that Jesus ‘resolutely took the road to Jerusalem’. Jerusalem is the place where Jesus’ journey will meet its goal and completion: his Passion, Resurrection and Ascension. Going up to Jerusalem with determination and commitment expresses the free decision of Jesus to surrender faithfully to the will of the Father and never to give up despite the cost.

In one sense each of us who claims to be a disciple of Jesus has to journey to his/her own Jerusalem. It is a journey to be faithful to whatever commitment we have made in life – be it marriage, priesthood, the religious life or a vocation to the lay state etc. Each of us will meet certain obstacles along the way, certain temptations to face.

The gospel today is a clear call to each of us from Jesus to be his disciple. To be a real disciple of Jesus is not easy especially in today’s world where there are so many voices calling us. It costs to be a true disciple of Jesus.

There is a call to do what we choose without reference to God; there is the voice of pleasure, of making money even if it means bending the rules and being dishonest.  We may justify this by saying ‘after all, aren’t many others doing the same thing? Then there is the call to have the latest technological gadgets. These in themselves can be very good.  But the danger is becoming enslaved by them. Yet Jesus has a dream for each one of us. He sees our capacity to accept the cost of discipleship, our ability to be faithful despite our occasional failures. He will be with us every step of the way. He knows how hard it is since he has gone the way before us.

St. Paul writes in the second reading today: ‘When Christ freed us he meant us to remain free. Stand firm then and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery’. Some may feel free now of the Church and its calls saying they were enslaved by its rules. Yet cannot many instead become enslaved by all the modern world offers with its consumerism and materialism? We may have tried to live by the world’s value system and found it wanting.  It is never too late to turn to Jesus. He is waiting to welcome us with open arms. But since he created us and loves us he is trying to warn us against seeking our security only in what is temporary and passing.

In the first reading we see the total commitment of Elisha who gave up all to follow the prophet.

The three incidents in today’s gospel are not telling us that we have to give up all we possess but that our only real security is Jesus. Neither is Jesus saying that we cannot attend the funerals of our parents or loved ones or that we cannot say goodbye to our family and friends. It is a Semitic or Jewish way of saying that our call to discipleship is not a part-time affair but that it calls for commitment and determination to be faithful. Our relationship with Jesus must be total. Having his values or attitudes should determine how we live our lives.

All this is not easy. At times it is quite difficult especially when we are tempted to seek happiness elsewhere or act selfishly. Why not pray to Jesus to give us the Holy Spirit to open our eyes to the things or relationships in our lives that cannot give us the peace and joy we seek? With this freedom hopefully we will become more sensitive to the needs of others also and care for them. Being a friend of Jesus demands we are truly centred on him, on others and not just on ourselves.

“Lord Jesus, free us of all that would prevent us from being your disciples, your friends and living as such”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

20 June 2010

Zechariah 12.10-11, 13.1
Galatians 3.26-29
Luke 9.18-24 

A certain elderly woman who lived overseas rarely visited her brothers and only sister who still lived in the country of their birth. On one such visit she commented to a friend that she was not very impressed by her sister’s husband as she felt he was rather impatient and moody. When her sister heard about these comments she replied: ‘obviously she doesn’t know my husband very well as she rarely visits us.  I have lived with him for 30 years. I know him very, very well and he is a marvelous husband. Like all of us he has human limitations but I am really happy I married him’.

In the gospel today we have something like that. Jesus asks the disciples who do people say that he is. They replied that there were different opinions about him. Because they don’t know Jesus that well some said John the Baptist, others Elijah and others one of the ancient prophets come back to life. It is clear that there was not a general agreement about his real identity. All these saw Jesus as a holy man like the ones the people mentioned. But when Peter is asked he doesn’t quote what others say of Jesus but in answer to Jesus’ direct question: ‘who do you say I am’ Peter replies ‘the Christ of God’.

Peter sees Jesus as much more that a holy human person. The word ‘Christ’ means the Anointed One of God, the Messiah, someone who has a very special relationship with God. It is only after the resurrection that the full truth of who Jesus is was revealed to the apostles and disciples.

Of course, Jesus is asking each one of us the same question he asked of Peter. “Who do you say I am?”  What is our answer? We may quote some of the saints and what they say about Jesus or maybe a pope or other holy people. But Jesus wants a personal reply from each of us. Jesus is really asking ‘Who am I for you? What is your most cherished way of naming me? Who do you want me to be for you? It is never enough to know what others are saying about Jesus. Jesus asks for a personal answer.

The wife in our story knew her husband, through and through. Why? Because she was living with and therefore very close to him. Is there really any other way to know a person than to spend much time with that person as Peter did with Jesus? Hearsay is not enough. It is very interesting that the text tells us that Jesus himself sets the pattern of getting to know him and the Father. Today’s gospel passage opens with the statement that it was just after he was praying alone in the presence of his disciples that Jesus posed the question about his identity. Jesus the human being because he spent a good amount of time in personal prayer to the Father knew him intimately. He is telling us that this is the best way. Do you and I spend personal time in prayer, not only repeating vocal prayers, rosaries or novenas which are very good prayers but do we also spend time in quiet prayer to Jesus, to God, listening to them, talking to them about our own personal lives, joys, sorrows and needs.

So far in the gospel episode maybe what Jesus asks isn’t too disturbing but then he really makes a radical statement which the disciples or we would prefer not to hear. Following Jesus involves carrying the cross, not anyone’s cross, even the cross of Jesus, but my own cross. The gospel passage spells it out clearly. “If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let them renounce themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me”.

One of the medieval mystics wrote ‘Jesus does not ask us to take up his cross!’ This simple statement – only a matter of underlining a different word from the one we usually underline – has been a source of insight and support for me for many years. My cross will not at all look like the cross of Christ! It will look more like me! We are our own crosses. To carry ourselves along, with all our fears, compulsions, laziness and sinfulness: that alone could make many of our days Good Friday! Add to it all the people we try to help, who make demands on us, or those we lend a shoulder to in order to carry their crosses’.

As we know one doesn’t have to be a Christian to be a disciple of Jesus. Millions are without knowing it. Just look at the television news any day and see the explosions, the bombs, the famines, the civil wars and all those displaced and starving – there is the cross in its stark reality. These tragic people do their best to survive in their living hell concerned about families, friends and fellow victims. If we feel like complaining about our own crosses hopefully these scenes might make us count our many blessings and see our own crosses in perspective.

The gospel passage ends today with Jesus telling us: ’whoever would save his/her life will lose it, and whoever loses it for my sake will save it’. That certainly is the greatest paradox of our lives. We gain life by losing it. Why? Because by doing so we become sharers in the life of Christ himself.

“Loving Father, your Son Jesus offered his life for our sake. Grant me the grace of offering my own life to you.” 

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

13 June 2010

2 Samuel 12: 7-10,13
Galatians “:16, 19-21
Luke 7:36-8:3

Jesus always sees things as they really are; we don’t. We generally see things from our own point of view. We pick and choose the bits we want to see, or believe. And so we live our daily lives with a distorted and incomplete knowledge of ourselves, of others and, of God.

One of the ways we do this is by giving everything a title or a label. And we can then relate to people in accordance with the label we’ve assigned to them.

The first reading is the story of Nathan telling King David about a rich man, who had a huge herd of sheep, decides he wants the one lamb that someone else owns. David expresses his anger that such a thing should happen in his kingdom. And Nathan’s reply: ‘But YOU are that man!’ “You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword, taken his wife for your own, and killed him with the sword of the Ammonites.” (2 Sam 12:9)

King David was badly caught, and it was his own fault. Nathan showed David the reality of the situation of what he had done. David had a different reality, according to his way of seeing things. But, to his credit, David acknowledged he had done wrong. I have sinned against the Lord.

God was pleased that David acknowledged his sin. What he did was terrible, but his immediate repentance pleased God.

Maybe you don’t feel so good in the presence of God, because of the way you live your life today or because of some situation in the past. Well, the readings today give us a lesson that no matter how bad things might be between us and God, we are always welcomed back. St Peter also failed but he too acknowledged his denials of Christ and he was still chosen by Christ to lead the Church. St Paul was no great shakes before that famous “fall from a horse”.

No matter how often I sin, I can always turn back. That does not mean that I can sin and then say ‘sorry’ and then go back to sinning again. Remember the woman caught in adultery: ‘Has no one condemned you’ asked Jesus of the woman. ‘No one, sir’ she replied. And his loving response: ‘Neither do I condemn you. Go!’ but then he adds the key bit: ‘But do not sin again.’

In the Gospel story, Simon the Pharisee was probably unaware that inviting Jesus to eat with him was going to lead to a major change in his life. The woman who ministered to him was a known sinner. Simon was horrified to see this sinner touching Jesus, weeping on his feet and drying them with her hair. All Simon could see was the fact that she was a woman of ill repute, but Jesus could see the truth behind the woman who was at his feet.

Simon had another label which he used quite easily: good name, bad name… The woman had a bad name and Simon believed he had a good name. Jesus too had a good name and shouldn’t be associating with such a woman, as Simon saw it.

Am I guilty of imitating Simon in my relationships? Do I relate to others by the labels already ascribed to them, by society in general or by me in particular?

When Jesus speaks to Simon about sin, forgiveness, love etc he is inviting Simon to move beyond his set views / labels and open himself up to looking at others (in this case, the woman) in a new light. Jesus wants Simon to look at the woman as Jesus does.

The Gospel doesn’t tell us how Simon responded. Did he take a step back and look at things in a new, Christ-like, way? Did he let go of his prejudices?

The same Jesus who invited Simon to let go of the labels he lived with is the same Jesus who invites us today to look afresh at the world around us. And remember the label we have on ourselves – the false face we present to others – does not fool God. And even with our disfigured self, God still loves us. So why can’t you love others as God loves you?

Martin Kavanagh SMA, 11 June 2010

30 May 2010

Proverbs 8.22-31
Romans 5.1-5
John 16.12-15

Two women were discussing their marriage. One said to another: ‘After all these years of marriage I think I will never fully understand my husband. What he did recently really surprised me. I never knew he could be so creative’. No doubt men say similar things about their wives. I remember my good father shaking his head from time to time as he saw some aspect of my mother’s personality that was new to him.

Isn’t this really the experience of each of us? No matter how long we live with another in a family or in a community, people will continue to surprise us by new ‘revelations’ of their personality. If this is so true for us on the human level should we be surprised if God is like that, continually revealing himself to us in new ways. My father would have said to me more than once:  ‘you know your mother is a great mystery to me at times’. If that is true of us humans how much more true is it of God?

Mystery in the religious sense means that we cannot know everything about God.

But we can know more and more about God than we did at an earlier stage as he progressively reveals himself to us. Our God is a revealing God. There are many things that parents cannot tell a 6-year-old daughter. Yet 10 years later they know she is now ready to hear them. The parents are not being difficult. They are being wise. Is it not even truer of God who is Wisdom itself?

We can tie ourselves into all kind of knots if we try to give a mathematical explanation of how there are Three Persons in the One God. Various examples were given to help us explain this. Like in a catechism class the teacher would light three matches at the one time and say: ‘Look, only one flame etc” – meaning three persons in the one nature of God. But I think it is much better to show from Scripture what God has already revealed to us about himself.

So in the gospel today Jesus says to the disciples: ‘I still have many things to say to you but they would be too much for you now.  When the Spirit of truth comes he will lead you to the complete truth’. Now that Jesus has gone back to his Father he has given us the powerful Holy Spirit who will make known to us and to successive generations the meaning of what he revealed when on earth to his apostles. There would have been little point in Jesus speaking about ‘cloning or genetic engineering’ to his disciples. But now the Spirit is with us to help us give a Christian response to this reality of the 21^st century.

What then are some of the things we can say about the Blessed Trinity that have been revealed to us already?

God is not a loner, someone so far away in the heavens that we cannot dialogue with him. Also, using human language God is a community of love, totally focused outwards toward the other and towards all others. In the gospels, Jesus does not focus on himself. He tells us a number of times in the gospels – ‘I have come not to do my own will but the will of the one who sent me’. He also says that the Holy Spirit will reveal all things to us. Thus Jesus focuses on the Father and the Holy Spirit.

When the Father’s voice is heard on the mountain and at the baptism of Jesus at the river Jordan he refers to the Son: “This is my beloved Son, listen to him”. So the focus of the Father is the Son. Jesus himself tells us that the Spirit will not focus on himself but will reveal to us more and more who the Father and Jesus are.  God therefore is always concerned for the other. When Jesus came he lived out the same dynamic. He never worked a miracle for himself. He was concerned only to show God’s loving concern for us by healing, forgiving, feeding the crowds etc. Jesus’ focus was on others and their greatest needs.

In the gospel today therefore Jesus has announced the kingdom and love of the Father. Jesus came as a life-giver, his message is life-giving. Its demands, which the Spirit will make known to us, are always new and surprising. The Spirit is always at work in us to develop our potential and he invites us to work to make the world a better place to live in by having the attitudes of Jesus. This is the work of the Trinity inviting us.

Jesus shows us the way to the Father, and says the Spirit will be with us on our journey. The Spirit will sometimes lead us in ways we have not foreseen. Our Superior General, Fr Kieran O’Reilly SMA, has just been appointed a bishop in Ireland, the first ever. It is not what we in the SMA expect to happen. When asked about it, he said: “To say that it was a surprise would not be an understatement!” I know a Frenchwoman who after the death of her husband decided to work as a lay in missionary in Africa. So the Spirit blows where it wills.

The Spirit may lead us paths we have not foreseen. This can make us afraid and distrustful. We would prefer to be settled, to live with the security of the known, of the tried and trusted. But the same Spirit empowers us with courage and hope. If we cling to our own paltry security how will we be in solidarity with all those in need: the poor and needy, prisoners, those with AIDS, unemployed etc. Convinced that the Most Holy Trinity wants us to participate in its life of love and service let us be people of hope in our world today. Glory be to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

“Lord Jesus, help us return to the source of hope – You, the Father and the Holy Spirit. Help us to believe the words of St.Paul that hope in you will not disappoint us because ‘your love has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit that you have given to us.  Amen”

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

23 May 2010

Acts 2.1-11
1 Cor 12.3-7, 12-13
John 20.19-23

When I was working in Nigeria, outside one of the big stores were a number of beggars. One of them had been there a long time and was well known to the customers. Then one day he did not appear in his usual place, nor for the following two days. The other beggars thought he may have been sick and went to visit him. Sadly, he was dead when they reached his place, a small shack made of corrugated sheets and cardboard. It was far from comfortable. After his burial they went to clean the place and were amazed to find a great amount of money hidden in an old sack. Instead of using it to have a better life he just hoarded the money and failed to enjoy it. He had left his treasure unused.

At times I wonder if we Christians are not like that. We have a great treasure, the Holy Spirit and yet do we use and live out of the power of this Spirit or is He the forgotten Person of the Holy Trinity? How often do you and I call on the Spirit in our daily lives? He is the life-giving Spirit of God. Yet where do you and I go for life? The Spirit is the life-giver as well as the giver of peace and joy.

We could call today the Feast of the Holy Spirit.

The death of Jesus, his execution on the cross, produced terror and fear in those who had followed him.  All the gospels speak of the fear that these events caused. The gospels tell us that the opposite of faith is fear. Having faith means trusting. So instead of announcing the message of Jesus, the disciples had gone into a house and locked the doors because of fear. They were closed in on themselves. You can imagine their amazement and delight when Jesus comes and empowers them to leave their locked room, the room of their fears and go forth into freedom with the encouragement, the power, the peace and joy the Spirit gives to preach the Good News to others. This is their mission. It is the mission of the Christian Church. Are we bringers of peace, joy and encouragement to others, starting with those around us?

In the Acts of the Apostles we read that on the day of Pentecost, (The word ‘Pentecost’ means 50 – 50 days after Easter) the disciples were gathered in one room and suddenly the noise of what sounded like a powerful wind from heaven filled the entire house. Then something appeared to them that seemed like tongues of fire which came to rest on each of them and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. So Pentecost is the celebration of the gift of fire being given to the Church so that she will be empowered to live the life of the Gospel and proclaim it to the ends of the earth.

We are told by St. Paul that the coming of the Holy Spirit is accompanied by a variety of gifts to animate the life of the Church to go forth on its mission.

Without Pentecost the Church would be left in the position of knowing what it should do but powerless to carry out its mission. Pentecost makes the Christian life possible in the midst of a world that in many places does not know God. Pentecost is like a birthday celebration in which each of us according to our needs receives some of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Let us then open our hearts to these gifts, the power of the Holy Spirit, which are free. Like the beggar in the story we Christians have a great treasure too that is available to us, the Holy Spirit who wishes to lavish us with many gifts but often we choose not to exercise them. It seems that many of us are not aware of these gifts or maybe we expect too little from God.

Let us then make 2010 different from the ones that have gone before and do our best to embrace the gifts God gives us and  use them on a regular basis in our personal lives and in our families and communities. Let us ask the Spirit to reveal to us the gifts that are given to us according to our calling. Let us use the gifts of the Spirit we received at Baptism and Confirmation.

Also, in the Acts of the Apostles, the Holy Spirit inspires the disciples to find suitable language for the proclamation of the Good News. The text provides us with an important detail which contradicts a superficial, though frequent interpretation. It is not a matter of using only one language but rather of being able to understand one another. All those present from the different nationalities understood in their own language the message of the disciples, empowered by the Spirit. Cultural differences did not prevent the message of Jesus being understood by all. His message was a cause of unity, not disunity. Today we see how the use of the vernacular in the liturgy has been such a gift. Sadly, we all know that people who speak the same language can be bitterly divided because of ethnic differences or prejudices. The Spirit comes to unite and bring peoples together.

“Come O Holy Spirit and fill my heart with the fire of your love. May I use your gifts to make Christ present in the world. Help me to see Christ in others, particularly the poor and needy. And recognizing you in them, may I reach out to help you in your need.”

Fr. Jim Kirstein SMA

16 May 2010

Acts 1.1-11
Ephesians 1.17-23
Luke 24. 46-53

A certain man was telling his friend that his wife whom he loved had many marvelous qualities but one thing she did which really frustrated him was that she could not throw out anything from the house even if it were of no further use. ‘She just keeps clinging on to everything we have, unable to let go’, he said.

The Ascension is the feast of letting go.

After he appeared to Mary Magdalene she clung to his feet so that he had to say to her: ‘Do not cling to me’ (John 20.18). The amazing fact in today’s gospel is that the apostles, after seeing Jesus ascending to his Father, went back to Jerusalem full of joy and were continually in the temple praising God. One would have thought that they would have been quite depressed and sad having seen Jesus departing. But no, they now fully accept that it was necessary for him to go, so that the Holy Spirit would be given to them. They did not cling to Jesus but accepted their call to be witnesses relying on the powerful Holy Spirit.

Neither did they feel themselves orphaned or abandoned by Jesus when he ascended to heaven. For the apostles the Ascension was an ending. One stage was over and another had begun. Formerly Jesus was with them physically. It was also a beginning. They were to take the place of Jesus and continue his work. The Ascension gives the disciples the certainty that they had a friend not only on earth but also in heaven. That same Jesus who on earth was so marvelously kind, compassionate and forgiving, awaits them and us. To die is not to go out into the dark. It is to go to him.

The Ascension does not lament the absence of Jesus. Rather it celebrates the new way Christ becomes present to his people through the gift of his Spirit. He is closer to us now than he ever was before. When Jesus was on earth he was limited like us in space and time. This is no longer true of him. He is, so to speak, out and about. He is present to us in an equally powerful but different manner. We can turn to him in any place, in any situation knowing he is there for us. It is important to realise that the apostles and disciples never regretted the departure of Jesus after his Resurrection and Ascension.

In Acts 1.8 we heard: ‘you will be my witnesses …even to the ends of the earth’. So today’s Solemnity, like that of Pentecost is a feast of Christian maturity. It is a call to each of us to continue Jesus’ mission in today’s world amid the difficulties we face there. The power of the Spirit is with us. In the reading from the Acts of the Apostles, Jesus warned his disciples to stay in Jerusalem until they were clothed with power from on high, the promise of the Father. It is as if Jesus were saying to the disciples: ‘please don’t claim to be working on my behalf as my witnesses unless you wait for, receive and live out of the power of the Spirit.  If not, you will fail’.

So we should pray often, even daily: ‘Come Holy Spirit’.

We must not keep looking up to heaven lamenting the absence of the Lord like the disciples did in the first reading. Of course, heaven is our goal eventually. We must face here on earth what God asks us to do and keep our feet firmly on the ground. We must set out to bring his gospel, his Good News to the ends of the earth. This is why any attempt to keep Christians in an attitude of dependency and immaturity without real responsibilities and voice in the Church is contrary to the meaning of the feast we are celebrating today. The Second Vatican Council strongly emphasized this.

And it is happening. In comparison to when I was growing up when the priest did everything, now in very many countries we have Lectors, Eucharistic Ministers, and the Laity as members of Parish Pastoral Councils etc. In some countries because of the absence of priests, the laity do even more, like conducting funeral services, preparing people to be baptised and confirmed etc. But we need to pray more and more to the Spirit to lead us into the way of all truth and to have the courage to let go of traditional practices which no longer are meaningful today. Will we have the courage to follow the lead of the Spirit, painful as this may be if it is not what we would like to see happening ourselves?

Rather then than seeing the Ascension just as the departure of Jesus, we should see it as the sending of the Church on mission (in place of Jesus). Rather than seeing the Church as an orphan as a result of the Ascension of Jesus it needs to be seen as being given adult status by God, as being given responsibility to witness to Jesus Christ through the power of his Spirit.

And as St. Paul tells us there is a variety of gifts, that is, a variety of ways of being Church be it as laity, priests or religious. No one group is called to dominate the others since we are all brothers and sisters of our one heavenly Father who uses each of us in different ways. If we want to compete with each other let it be in the area of service to the poor, forgiveness of our enemies, love of all God’s children no matter what unfortunate labels they are given such as – those with AIDS, immigrants, prostitutes, homosexuals, alcoholics, drug addicts, divorced people etc.

‘Lord Jesus, Give us your Holy Spirit to be real witnesses of your loving concern in our world. Amen.’

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

9 May 2010

Acts 15.1-2, 22-29
Revelation 21.10-14, 22-23
John 14.23-29

A certain couple had 5 children and the dream of the parents for them was to show them as much love as possible, give them a good education which hopefully would lead to a good job and that whatever choice they made in life would leave each of them satisfied and happy. Obviously, this would be the dream of other parents too. But no matter how much the parents wanted to make their children happy it also depended on the desire of the children to be open to receive such love and help.

In fact, one of their sons did not respond positively and got involved in drugs, alcohol and got in with some bad companions. He spent some time in prison for stealing. He was a very unhappy person. The parents never gave up on him and were always there for him should he turn to them. They were wise enough to know they couldn’t force their love on him. The choice was his.

In the gospel today we have something similar. Jesus knows that he will die soon and that his disciples will need support after he has gone. He offers them some marvelous gifts that they will need when he goes – that the Father and Jesus will make their home in them; the Father will give them another Advocate who will teach them everything and remind them of all Jesus said; that Jesus will give them his peace which is not the peace the world offers. He will have to go away but shall return. But Jesus knows he cannot force his love, his gifts on them. Like the boy above, the disciples have to be open to receive the gifts Jesus is offering them. So in this passage he consoles them for the difficult times ahead. In promising the Advocate which is the Holy Spirit Jesus gives them / us the very best. We all know that in a court of law it is very important to have a good advocate or lawyer to plead our case so as to obtain justice.

Jesus assures us that this Spirit will teach us everything that we will need in difficult times. Even more, he will remind the disciples of all that Jesus had been teaching them. The Spirit is the interpreter of what Jesus is about. In going back to his Father Jesus did not leave them / us alone. The Spirit takes the place of Jesus, not in a physical sense but by a divine indwelling. With the Spirit’s help we will be able to discern in each subsequent age what God wants of us so as to be courageous in following Jesus and having the gift of knowing the way forward depending on the challenges of the time.

We see a practical application of this in the first reading. There was disagreement among the early disciples about what should be asked of the Gentiles wishing to become Christians. It is a measure of the extraordinary openness of the leaders of the Jerusalem Church that what has been called the First General Council of the Church came out with a very liberal decision. These church leaders, Peter and the other apostles, were living in Jerusalem. Despite the Jewish faith and practice which they themselves had grown up with and which they still revered they decided it was not necessary for converts to the Way of Jesus to follow all the Jewish Mosaic Laws, especially all the ritual aspects of it.  So pagan converts didn’t have to follow all the laws about the washing of hands, eating pork etc.

What they were asked to follow as regards the Jewish Law was kept to a minimum: ‘to abstain from anything polluted by idols, from blood, from fornication and from the meat of strangled animals’. That was all, no dietary regulations, no obligatory circumcision etc. In the situation of the time this was a revolutionary decision. When it was proclaimed, the elders of the Church used a very significant phrase:  “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us”. They didn’t appeal to tradition alone to justify their decision but to the Spirit. They trusted the Spirit would guide them to make the correct decision.

Today’s gospel is one of consolation, a gospel of encouragement. But like the boy in the story will we be open to receive all the gifts God wants to give us especially those mentioned above? Just as a container cannot be filled up with pure clean water if there are many dirty leaves, bits of wood etc in it neither can we benefit from all the gifts God wishes for us if parts of our hearts are closed off from God. For example, my heart may be partly occupied with selfishness, unforgiveness, anger, fear, undue anxiety, infidelities regarding my primary relationship, my vocation etc. It is not that God will not give us all that is possible but we can reduce our capacity to receive the Spirit by whatever in our lives is contrary to God’s will. This can fill up the space in our hearts that the Holy Spirit wants to occupy.

Let us pray often for the gift of the Holy Spirit to soften our hearts, to open our minds, to convert where necessary so God can lavish us with his love and other gifts as he so desires. Like the parents above he has even a more marvelous dream for each of us. Will we allow him to realise it in us?  

“Lord Jesus, thank you for the free gift of the Holy Spirit. Help us to call often on this Holy Spirit and to trust more and more his guidance in our daily lives.  Amen.”

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

FIFTH SUNDAY of  EASTER – YEAR C

2 May 2010

Acts 14.21- 27
Revelation 21.1-5
John 13.31-35

Mark was a young man of 25 who had been working in an office for 4 years when he contracted a blood disease. He was told by his doctors that he would have to get a complete change of blood which would probably clear up the problem for him. He had an unusual blood type but amazingly 2 of his coworkers had the same blood type. In spite of the amount of blood involved they were able to give the necessary quantity of blood. What surprised Mark most was the fact that he didn’t know the 2 donors very well at that time.

The 2 blood donors put into practice what Jesus commands us all to do in today’s gospel: ‘I give you a new commandment: ‘Love one another just as I have loved you’. What is really new in this commandment? Already in the Old Testament, God’s chosen people were given the commandment to love – ‘you must love your neighbour as yourself’. So is there any difference? Yes, there is – it is the measuring standard of love. Jesus’ love is the model and the measure of how we should love our neighbour. This is what he asks of each of us who claim to be disciples of his.

What is typical of this love of Jesus?

• It is a serving love. Jesus himself said ‘I came not to be served but to serve and give my life as a ransom for many’. Jesus summed up his whole life’s attitude in the humble act of washing his disciples’ feet, in serving, in stooping down. He stoops down to all who are weak especially the poor, the hungry, the sick, the pagans, the non-Jews of his time. Above all, he cared for those whom society marginalised. He showed what attitude a true disciple of his must have in relation to women, to different ethnic or religious groups or to those whose skin colour is different etc. Jesus’ command to love is quite simple but very demanding.

It may be easy to love our families, our friends, those we like. But he commands us to love those we do not like, people who may have hurt us, people we have prejudices against, other ethnic groups etc. In Matthew’s gospel Jesus is realistic enough to know that we cannot love all others with the same affection as we love family and friends. Love at its very least means not to wish or do any harm.

• Jesus’ love is a merciful, forgiving love. He is not someone who came to seek revenge: ‘Father, forgive them they do not know what they are doing’, he said on the cross as he prayed for his enemies. He came to witness to us who our Heavenly Father really is. He is not a God who seeks revenge when we sin, not a God who wants to punish us or send us to hell. Our own choices decide that – not God’s desire. God asks us to respond to his incredible love for us, not out of fear but because of gratitude by loving others.
• The love of Jesus is a constant, dedicated love. He is not a moody God, who one day is in good form and at another time is in bad humour, seeking to chastise us for our wrongdoing. Jesus’ love was a total lifelong commitment to love, service and forgiveness even when the going got very difficult.

I know a man whose wife has Alzheimer’s disease – that is, she has lost her memory completely and now cannot be left alone. So he gave up his job and is constantly there at the service of his wife’s needs. It is a very demanding life for him now. But it reveals the true love that Jesus himself lived out in practice. This man, in fact, does not believe in God but he is living a life of service and love. Going to Church, to Mass, praying rosaries, attending novenas are no guarantee of being a true disciple of Jesus unless they lead us to practise the kind of love Jesus himself lived whilst on earth.

Hopefully most of us do this daily in our family lives, in our homes even if we fail from time to time. Or do my actions witness to a lack of love, with a focus on my own selfishness etc. Jesus is not trying to frighten us or threaten us with punishment but he is saying that we and those we relate to will only have real peace and joy here and now by living his command to love. Putting it as simply as possible:  ‘If you want to be truly happy here and now, seek and work for the happiness and the peace of others.  If you want to be unhappy, seek your own happiness and peace only’.

In the second reading today we heard how Paul and Barnabas were faithful to their mission in spite of much persecution and suffering. Theirs was a costly love. The writer of the second reading today speaks of his vision of a new heaven and a new earth, something not yet achieved. Will you and I respond to the invitation of Jesus in bringing it about by cooperating with him in loving our brothers and sisters in our daily lives?

“Lord Jesus, it is not easy to love always as you did.  It is hard to forgive those who hurt us. It is easier to be selfish at the expense of others.  Help us to realise that we cannot do it alone. Give us your Holy Spirit to help us bring about your kingdom here on earth.  Amen”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

25 April 2010

Acts 13.14, 43-52
Revelation 7.9, 14-17
John 10. 27- 30

A certain young man was studying at the university as he wanted to become a teacher. After he qualified he had great joy in working as a teacher. It gave him a lot of satisfaction. What saddened him was that he met some of the others who had been at university with him who were also teachers. But they told him they had no great love of teaching. They did it because it was a well paid job. Obviously their hearts were not in it.
Today is traditionally known as Good Shepherd Sunday when the Church asks us to pray especially for vocations to the priesthood. Perhaps the need to do this has never been greater. We need priests whose hearts are in it, who are truly good shepherds to the people God has entrusted to them. I feel that I am particularly blessed by God because I really enjoy being a priest and all that this involves.
As parents you are asked to be shepherds of the family God has given you. It is the same for teachers, farmers, fishermen, doctors, lawyers, etc. Is our primary concern to care for and help others to a better quality of life? If we are in it just for our own good then no matter what title one has one is not a shepherd with the heart of Jesus. Don’t we all have a great responsibility?
Sometimes it may cost a great amount if we try to listen to what we believe we are called to do and put it into practice. In the gospel today Jesus is speaking to the Jews and he says ‘the sheep that belong to me listen to my voice; I know them and they follow me’. This does not just apply to priests but to all who would like to be real disciples of Jesus. The theme of the Good Shepherd unfolds against a background of conflict and the threat of death as is more clear in the verses in John that follow today’s passage. 
Down through the ages up to our own time anyone trying to really listen to the voice of God and put it into practice will suffer in one way or another. It will make demands on us. We see people who try to be faithful in marriage despite difficult relationships, others who withstand the pressure to have an abortion, others again who refuse to give or take bribes etc. This is in no way a condemnation of anyone who may have given into temptation on any level. In fact, haven’t we all at some stage or other?
In our world today there are many voices calling out to be heard. Either on television or radio, by advertising, on the Internet, pressure from well meaning friends, peer pressure etc. There is also the voice of God calling us. Which voices will we listen to? ‘My sheep hear my voice’, says Jesus. Many religious leaders of his time refused to listen to Jesus. They thought they were honouring God by killing Jesus and that they were saving religion by multiplying sacrifices, commandments, prohibitions etc. Isn’t it much safer and more secure to follow the law and tradition slavishly instead of risking following Jesus, who spoke about love, service, forgiveness, compassion etc being the core of true religion? 
A friend of mine has a fish tank in which he has some small fish. He also keeps some canaries in a big cage. The fish and the birds belong to him. But in a sense he belongs to the fish and birds.  If he doesn’t care for them they die. But I know he takes great care to feed them daily and clean their tank and cage from time to time. So they live longer and he gets great pleasure from them as Jesus does from us. Jesus says in the gospel that the sheep that belong to him listen to his voice. So in belonging to Jesus, he belongs to us and we know from experience that our belonging to him means that he does all he can to care and love us if we allow him.  Very often we don’t. We stray away to follow other voices. Yet he keeps inviting us back to the true path that alone gives real peace and joy. This is the Good News.
To whom do we as Christians belong? It is not enough simply to say that we belong to Jesus. What we do and think will give us a good idea. Are we regular in going to Sunday Mass, to some daily prayer? Are we forgiving to those who may have hurt us or to those who think differently to us? Do we pray to put our trust in him and allow ourselves to be guided by his will?
He says also in this very short gospel: ‘I give them eternal life’, which for John the Evangelist does not just mean just life after death. Rather it involves the beginning of eternal life now – that is, a quality of life which gives peace, freedom, joy, but will also involve suffering and trial if we follow the Good Shepherd. It is especially about our relationship with God which begins here and continues into eternity.
In spite of your and my weaknesses Jesus gives us the great promise that as his brothers and sisters no one can steal us from him because the Father who is greater than anyone will not allow this.
Like any true shepherd Jesus will pull out all the stops to love and care for us. He does this especially through the friends and other disciples he gives us to care for us now. 
‘Lord Jesus, true Shepherd of your flock, thank you for sharing this vocation with each of us.  May your Spirit enable us to be true life givers and carers of your flock, those you have entrusted especially to us. Amen’.
Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

18 April 2010

Acts 5:27- 32, 40- 41
Revelation 5:11-14
John 21:1-19

Two men who were very good friends for a long time had a serious disagreement and stopped talking to each other. Three months later one of them phoned the other and admitted the major fault had been his and invited the other to a meal which was accepted. His friend forgave him totally and they had a great reunion.
Today we hear about the forgiveness of Jesus in relation to Peter and the other disciples despite their betrayal of him and their infidelity. In fact, he calls them ‘friends’.
The disciples had been out fishing all night and caught nothing. It was obviously dark. Now Jesus the Light of the world appears on the shore and having been told they had caught nothing suggested they cast their nets again and they catch a huge number of fish. Obviously he did not withhold his forgiveness and compassion from them despite their infidelity and betrayal of him. We see that Jesus was concerned to save them from the embarrassment of returning home to tell their families they had failed to catch anything. Also it was during their normal work that he appeared to them. This is important for us to know. Jesus does not try to embarrass us when we betray him by our sins and he is concerned and cares for us that our daily tasks would go well. He is with us if only we are aware of this. We also see the concern of Jesus in providing a meal for them. They had worked hard all night without success and were probably cold and tired so he calls to them and says ‘Come and have breakfast’. He invites us to the Eucharistic meal always too. 
When the disciples came ashore after the miraculous catch of fish they found a charcoal fire ready with fish cooking on it. You may remember that it was around a charcoal fire when Peter was warming himself that he betrayed Jesus 3 times. Now Jesus is telling Peter that he is fully forgiven for his betrayals but before Jesus can allow him to shepherd the flock he wants to hear directly from Peter if he loves him. 
Jesus asks Peter 3 times ‘Do you love me?’ This threefold question and answer do not imply that Jesus has doubts about Peter but that Peter’s love for Jesus is sincere and that he has the devoted love for Jesus, which is at the heart of all true discipleship. Jesus wants to hear the reply from Peter himself.  Jesus then tells Peter to feed his lambs (the weaker members of the community), to feed his sheep (the stronger ones) and to care for all of them.  This is the role of the shepherd.
This is a very important exchange because it reveals to us what the essence of Christianity is. Is it not true to say that Christianity is a person, Jesus Christ and so it is about our relationship with him and all that involves?  So why do I go to Mass on Sunday or why do I try and keep the commandments? Is it because I think I may go hell or that God will punish me, which is untrue?   Or is it because of my relationship with Jesus?  If so who is the Jesus I relate to? Who really is Jesus for me?  How well do I know him?  Can I have a deep relationship with someone if I do not know him/her very well? How do I deepen any relationship?  Is it not by spending time with the person and getting to know him/her?
That is why Jesus came – to offer us a deep personal relationship with him. He wants us to be his friends as he says in John’s gospel. Firstly he reveals himself to the 7 disciples. He is constantly trying to reveal himself to us in the ordinary events of each day, through our friends, in prayer etc
If we can see Jesus in this light as someone doing all he can to invite us into his friendship then we might want to be his disciples not because of any law but simply because we would like to.  Christianity was never meant to be a religion of fear and threats of punishment if we didn’t measure up. It was meant to be a relationship between Jesus and us and, between God whom Jesus revealed and us.  The Laws and Commandments were given to help us avoid trouble. So if I kill and get caught I may be hanged or electrocuted so God says – Don’t kill.  If I steal and am caught I may end up in prison, etc.
It is by living according to the value system of Jesus, attending Mass, by personal prayer, celebrating the sacraments and reading scripture that we deepen our relationship with Jesus. Jesus invited the disciples to a meal after the catch of fish.  If we could only understand and accept how passionately and unconditionally Jesus loves us then the more we would respond out of love and not fear. His death on the cross sums up this love. But it isn’t easy.  Peter was told by Jesus at the end of today’s gospel that he would suffer if he tried to be faithful to him.
‘Lord Jesus, thank you for your invitation to us to a deep, personal friendship with you. With the help of your Holy Spirit, help us to be more aware of this and to respond generously. Help us to forgive others as you forgive us always if we ask you. Amen’.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA. 12th April, 2010

4th April, 2010

Acts 10:34, 37-43
Colossians 3:1-4
John 20:1-9

Not too long ago at the funeral Mass of a certain man, the priest in his homily said of him ‘he went around doing good. In fact he spent most of his life doing good’. 

These are the very words that Peter used in the first reading today about Jesus. And this was because God had anointed Jesus with the Holy Spirit. Whilst alive among us before his death Jesus preached the Good News that God was an incredibly, loving, forgiving and compassionate Father. Jesus healed many people and freed many from the power of what enslaved them-their fears, their sinful way of life etc. But despite going around doing good, the Jewish religious leaders eventually arranged the death of Jesus because the God they proclaimed was one who was a very demanding, judgemental God who was totally the opposite of the God Jesus proclaimed. Having got rid of Jesus these Jewish religious leaders thought it was the end of Jesus but we know otherwise and today we celebrate the great event of His Resurrection.

Perhaps Easter Sunday is something like that. Up to the moment of the Resurrection, after the terrible death of Jesus on Good Friday, the disciples were devastated. The One they had leaned on was gone. They never imagined Jesus would have been taken prisoner and crucified. In that instant their dreams evaporated. The disciples experienced a dreadful loss and were shattered Their hopes were gone. The Jesus they believed was crucified. For them at that terrible time, they never expected the sun to shine for them again in their lives.

Now in today’s gospel, a woman no less, Mary of Magdala reports to Peter and John that the tomb is empty. In many of the Resurrection accounts, it is the women who first experience the Risen Jesus. Women at that time, as in many places still today, were looked down upon. It seems that the proclamation of the Risen Jesus starts with the very people who were marginalised and who counted for little in society. In any case the curiosity of the 2 is awakened and they run to the tomb. Peter sees the linen cloths on the ground in the empty tomb. He did no more than see what was there. However, it is said of John that he ‘saw and he believed’ even though his own faith was not yet perfect because the full impact had not yet dawned on him. It took Thomas even some days to surrender and accept – very consoling for us. To discover fully how rich faith is takes time and growth and God is incredibly understanding and patient.

Like Mary Magdalene, Peter and John who all eventually came to believe, faith is a sheer gift from God that enables us to accept God’s revelation in Scripture and in the lives of the first witnesses to the resurrection that Jesus is alive, is out and about in our world today.

This is my experience of resurrection. Whilst the empty tomb has its importance I know that I have experienced much freedom because of the gift of faith in the resurrection of Jesus God gives me and the experience of Jesus working in my life now. Anywhere I see love in action in life I see the power of the Risen Jesus at work. Mary Magdalene went in the dark and found an empty tomb.  Since Jesus was not there it was indeed darkness, but later in meeting Jesus a new light dawned for her and all other believers.

The resurrection doesn’t mean that we gloss over pain, suffering and difficult daily life situations, but it does give us a new vision of life. It gives us the freedom to face the dark side of life, and even death with confidence knowing that Jesus broke the bonds of human limitation and death.

For Christians resurrection is now, not just after we die.

If we are faithful despite the great difficulty of these times, we believe Jesus is there with us then and he will surely help us experience the sun shining again. Not only that we will begin to develop talents and gifts we never knew we had because fear gives way to trust in Jesus. This empowers us to break free of former limitations.  With Jesus risen and gone from them the first apostles and disciples developed courageous leadership and other skills they never knew they possessed.

In the gospel today we heard that on approaching the tomb in the still darkness of pre-dawn, Mary Magdalene’s thoughts were centred on a stone to be rolled away as she was convinced that the dead body of Jesus was inside. It was all she had eyes for, as it were. Nor did she check on whether the tomb was empty or whether her beloved Lord was still there. Perhaps in reflecting on our own experience we might think about the many stones that need to be rolled away. What is it that keeps us unfree?  Where are we closed in from what or whomever?

I imagine that you are at Mass today because you are anointed with the Holy Spirit. You are empowered to go around doing good. The Lord invites us to continue this work which he did during his life on earth. He chooses to use us, human and failing at times as we do. We are that important to God and let us never forget that we are resurrection people, empowered to witness to a God who has raised Jesus from the dead and is by our side to strengthen us at all times.

“Thank you, Lord Jesus for the gift of our faith in your resurrection.  May we be witnesses of gospel joy and peace to others still searching and doubting.  Amen”. 

Fr. Jim Kirstein SMA – 2 April 2010

An Easter Reflection

All the major religions have their holy sites. The holiest Christian site is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. We can’t be certain but scholars are agreed that it is the site of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. The original church was built by the emperor Constantine. His mother Helena is credited with finding the true Cross. The original building had a pagan shrine built over it and many churches were built and destroyed on the site. The present building is the result of major renovations that were undertaken in the 1950s. It is a major centre of pilgrimage for Christians. 

I was there for Easter Sunday 2005 and concelebrated Mass with priests of many different nationalities under Calvary and in front of the Tomb. The chants and prayers in different languages added solemnity and helped reflection on the enormity of the event we were remembering. 

The resurrection of Jesus changed everything. The Father called him out of the darkness of the tomb of death to a new triumphant risen life. He is alive. He is with us. He has risen from death. We now look on death in a different way. It is not a destructive end. It is an opening to new life. His death looked disgraceful and final. But Mary and the disciples were surprised and delighted to see him alive on that first Easter Sunday. 

He appeared to them a number of times before the Ascension and it completely changed their lives. They believed and they shared their faith with others. They witnessed, by their preaching and the way they lived, that Jesus had risen.

St. John says, ‘The night is over and the real light is already shining. Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother or sister is still in the dark. (1 John 2:8-9). We can now live ‘in the light’. Life can be full of difficulties, we can be buffeted from all sides with bad news, everything can seem dark, but Jesus has risen, there is now hope and meaning to our moments of darkness and difficulty. Jesus went from the despair of death on the Cross to the triumph and joy of the resurrection. If we faithfully follow him we too can triumph over our weakness and difficulties and come to glory with him.

We are challenged to change and live in a new way. ‘Since you have been brought back to true life with Christ you must look for the things that are in heaven where Christ is seated at God’s right hand. Let your thoughts be on heavenly things not on things that are on the earth because you have died and now the life you live is hidden with Christ in God. But when Christ is revealed, you too will be revealed in all your glory with him.’ (Colossians. 3:1-4).

The people who visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre this Easter and every Christian who worships in their own church will be celebrating new life and pledging to live that life to the full in their community.

–  Fr John O’Brien SMA, SMA House, Ranelagh, Dublin 6

PALM SUNDAY – YEAR C

28^th March, 2010

Isaiah 50.4-7
Philippians 2.6-11
Luke 22.14–23.56

One night a man went to a pub for a drink.  Later he saw two other men arguing seriously and it began to get worse.  Then one of them pulled a knife from his pocket and was about to stab the other.  Luckily he was disarmed.  Many TV films or movies today have a lot of violence in them.  Even the struggle between good and evil in them is very violent. Does ‘popular culture’ in East or West see no alternative to the use of force for asserting rights or overcoming malice?

The ancient time into which Jesus came was similar to our own time. Large armies carried out the will of emperors and kings over smaller armies and kingdoms.

As we begin Passion Week today we will see the confrontation between Jesus and the Jewish religious leaders, the scribes and Pharisees coming to a climax. He was witnessing to the ways of God which were very different to the usual way of dominating others by violence and battles.  And he expected that his followers would do likewise.  Unfortunately some gospel texts can seem to say that violence is alright.  One such text is that of Luke 22.36 when Jesus says, in view of the oncoming confrontation with those determined to condemn and kill him, ‘if you have no sword sell your cloak and buy one’. The disciples take this literally but what Jesus is really saying according to scripture scholars is ‘prepare seriously for the coming events, especially by prayer’, as he did in the Garden of Gethsemene.  It certainly was not an incitement to violence or to armed force, but that their very lives would be at stake.

On Palm Sunday, Jesus riding on a donkey is proclaimed by the crowds as ‘the king who comes in the name of the Lord’. Certainly not a king who was coming with a powerful army. Yet five days later he is being mocked, scourged and crucified.  Probably some in the crowd on Palm Sunday were shouting for his death only a number of days later.  It raises the question for each of us – are we as faithful in following Jesus in time of trial, temptation and suffering as we are when life is going well for us?  Do we pray to thank God as much in good times as we do when we ask for help when life is difficult and painful? 

The focus of today’s celebration and indeed for all the readings of Holy Week is on Jesus, the faithful one. During all this week we are celebrating his fidelity not only when he was being praised and honoured by the crowd as a king but also during the terrible times of suffering and crucifixion. The first reading today is from the prophet Isaiah. He foretells the mysterious One who is to come whom we know now as Jesus, by saying ‘I gave my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who plucked at my beard, my face I did not shield from blows and spitting. The Lord God is my help, therefore I am not disgraced’. This was exactly what Jesus did.  He trusted that his Father would strengthen him to be faithful to the end especially when suffering. The Good News is that God our Father will strengthen us also.

In the accounts of the Passion of Jesus what the Gospel writers focus on is not the scourging, the whips, the nails, the physical pain but emphasize rather that, in all of this, Jesus is alone, misunderstood, lonely, isolated, without hardly any support.  What is emphasized is the agony of a heart that is extra sensitive, gentle, loving, understanding, warm, inviting, hungry to embrace everyone.

On the surface it would seem that that the death of Jesus was a defeat for Jesus. But it really was a victory. It was the triumph of good over evil, of love over hate, of light over darkness and of life over death as the resurrection proved.

Recently a young woman was walking along with her 2-year-old son. He fell and started crying.  Immediately she picked him up and embraced him absorbing his pain and fright. She did not scold or condemn him for falling. Shortly afterwards he stopped crying and was fine again.  I feel that this is a good image of Jesus on the cross. He is there with his arms outstretched, absorbing the pain, the suffering, the hatred and violent intentions of others. He absorbs the pain into himself and returns it to us all as love, forgiveness, compassion and healing if we will but accept these. Jesus breaks the cycle of violence and instead of returning hatred for hatred as we see so often done in our world today, as with so many suicide bombings, murders, stabbings etc. he offers only total love in the hope we will imitate his incredible example. Jesus absorbed all the violence, transformed it and returned it as love and forgiveness.

So the liturgy of Holy Week is telling us of the incredible love of a God who will never give up on us no matter if having praised him in good times we will forget his love in hard times.  It is very important to note that nowhere in any of the gospel readings of this week does Jesus condemn anyone. Neither does he condemn you and me.  The ultimate proof of this is that whilst hanging, in terrible agony on the cross, Jesus prays: ‘Father, forgive them, they do not know what they are doing’. 

But Jesus is the totally disarmed one, as the Letter to the Philippians says.  He actually emptied himself and took on the condition of a slave, humbling himself even unto death, death on the cross.  Jesus did not act out of a power stance or with any superior force but met bitterness with gentleness, hatred with love, rejection by accepting the others in their anger.  How hard for us to imitate his example.

To follow Jesus faithfully is not easy. It is much easier to go to Mass, pray the rosary or say novenas.  All these are very good.  But Jesus asks us above all to follow his example by living daily with the same attitudes that he lived by.  This is the way that leads to real peace and joy. That is why prayer too is very important. We need it to strengthen us in times of trial.

“Lord Jesus, thank you for breaking the cycle of violence that you were confronted with. Give us the Holy Spirit to follow your example and to be always faithful in following you. Amen.”

                                     Fr. Jim Kirstein SMA, March 22, 2010

FIFTH SUNDAY of  LENT – YEAR C

21^st March 2010

Isaiah 43.16-21
Philippians 3.8-14
John 8.1-11

Recently one of the newspapers showed a photo of a young woman being buried up to her neck in the earth.  She had been caught committing adultery and was about to be stoned to death for it. What a horrific way to die. As in the gospel there was no sign of the man. The gospel scene could have ended up in a very ugly manner. If Jesus had gone along with the script of the Scribes and Pharisees the woman would have died a horrible death. Who would have benefited from that? Instead, thanks to the understanding and compassion of Jesus, she was able to put the past behind her and make a new start.

Today’s gospel is primarily about who God is and how he treats us. Jesus gives the woman caught in adultery another chance. Instead of allowing her to go to her death, Jesus gives her life. Jesus is clearly telling us who God is and how he acts towards each one of us. God is a life-giving God, not a death-giving One. What Jesus is saying is ‘If I look on you with God’s pure gaze of love, with God’s forgiving attitude then you are totally and freely loved and forgiven’. It is God who decides all this. We cannot make God’s love and forgiveness depend on our worthiness or goodness.  Unfortunately it is not our human experience.  Don’t we often want to exact revenge or punish those who hurt or wrong us?  Not so God – it is so far from the God Jesus is witnessing to. That does not mean if God loves me like that I can sin merrily.  In fact it is the very opposite – realising how very much God loves me so unconditionally I will do my best to please him in doing likewise to others. We should pray often for this gift. 

The first reading from Isaiah briefly recalls Israel’s past and tells them that ‘God is doing a new deed’. Our God is not a God who keeps reminding us of our past sins.  His focus is much more on what he can still accomplish in our lives from now on no matter what our past has been. God is the God of the second chance or however many chances we need.

In today’s gospel Jesus offers a new way of looking at life.  We notice that Jesus did not ask the woman to look back, to publicly account for her sins. He merely asks that she go on with her life and not sin again.  With Jesus what is past is past.  Others may condemn us but God never does.

This is what St. Paul the onetime Pharisee and a radical upholder of the Law discovered.  Because of his own experience of God’s passionate, forgiving love for him he can now say as we heard in today’s second reading – ‘I believe that nothing will happen that will outweigh the supreme advantage of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord’.

This was the experience of the woman caught in adultery. In meeting Jesus she heard; ‘Has no one condemned you, neither will I condemn you. Go away and don’t sin anymore’.  This is perhaps the greatest thing that ever happened to the woman – the experience of being accepted, of being heard, of being treated as a human person.  At this stage of the story Jesus is kneeling down and looking up at the woman.  The Pharisees who had departed full of shame had merely looked down on her with scorn and rejection.  How humiliated and fearful she must have felt before Jesus enters the situation.

Yet Jesus did not treat her sin lightly.  He didn’t deny she had sinned.  Sin carries its own punishment. It is not God who punishes us but sin.  He knew that if she did the same again he would not necessarily be around and she would indeed be stoned to death.

The Scribes and the Pharisees exposed the woman to the most humiliating kind of shaming – a public shaming. People have been known to commit suicide rather than face a public shaming.  They didn’t show the slightest concern for the woman as a person.  She was someone they thought they could use to entrap Jesus.  She was to them what bait is to a fisherman.

Jesus could see the double standards they applied to themselves.  He knew that they were sinners like everyone else, yet they were able very conveniently to forgive and be easy on themselves whilst condemning the woman. In fact, the only person in the scene who had a right to condemn her, Jesus, had not the slightest interest in doing so.  And when all had left Jesus is left alone with the woman.  As St. Augustine puts it, only misery and mercy remained.

Yet in regard to the Scribes and Pharisees there is something marvellously gentle and subtle in the way Jesus dealt with them. He had outwitted them but he did not condemn or humiliate them. He exposed them, but did not spell it out in public.  He didn’t even judge them.  Rather he invited them to judge themselves. Instead he simply tells them that those without sin should cast the first stone.  Immediately the accusers become excusers.

Jesus shows how God deals with sinful people, that is, with each of us. He is a God of incredible, unconditional compassion and loving forgiveness. He changes our view of God.  At the same time he asks us to change our view of sinful people.  Each one of us, no matter what our sins are, has the capacity to change. Our sins are not the sum total of who we are.  They are parts of who we are, for sure.  But God can do a new deed for and in all of us if we allow him.  We heard in the First Reading from Isaiah the words: ‘See I am doing a new deed’.  This is indeed very consoling for us.  It is God who will do in us it if we allow him.

But God from whom we receive total and absolute forgiveness expects us to do likewise for others.  Is that true of us?

“Lord Jesus, thank you for not condemning us. We do not deny that we sin and yet you constantly give us new opportunities to change. Help us to be ever ready to excuse others for their failings as you do ours. Amen”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA.March 15^th, 2010

FOURTH SUNDAY of  LENT – YEAR C

14^th March 2010

Joshua 5.9-12
2 Cor 5.17-21
Luke 15. 1-3, 11-32

A certain young woman Mary was the youngest of a family of 8. Her father had died when she was quite young. One day she visited her aunt Julie who had just found a bag of old photographs in her attic. A number of them were photos or portraits of her father whom Mary never got to know because of his early death. Aunt Julie was the brother of Mary’s dead father. She showed Mary the photos, some of which were portraits of her father. Julie explained that some portraits weren’t a good likeness of her father while others were. Then she came to one old portrait and said to Mary.  ‘Now that is as good a resemblance you’ll ever see of your late father’.

The readings today paint or reveal to us an excellent portrait or likeness of who our heavenly Father is. A clear theme runs through the three readings: God’s incredible mercy and forgiveness for sinners.

In the First Reading we have the beautiful words God spoke to his people – ‘I have taken the shame of Egypt away from you’. The shame of sin and slavery are behind them. Yahweh their faithful God had freed them and looked after them on their journey through the wilderness to the Promised Land.  This despite their often turning aside from worship of Yahweh.

Then in the marvellous Second Reading we heard how God has reconciled us to himself through Christ, not holding our faults against us. It is important to note that it was God who did the reconciling.  As the text says: ’It is all God’s work’. So it is not because we gained God’s favour by our good deeds. Rather it is God’s incredible love that reconciled us to himself. Our good deeds are always simply a ‘thank you’ to God for his wonderful compassion and love for us.

Now that we have been reconciled to God he actually wants us to be his ambassadors or witnesses to tell others that they too are reconciled or can be, simply by turning back to God no matter how badly we have sinned or how long we have stayed away from God. 

But what kind of God have we that he is inviting us to be reconciled to?  And Jesus who knows the Father intimately paints this incredible portrait of the Father to us.

Just as any ambassador is expected to know his country’s policies and priorities and how best to represent them, so too with us called as we are to be ambassadors for God

So who is the God we are expected to reveal to others? It is the God whose portrait Jesus paints in the gospel today. Jesus reveals this to us by means of a parable. Some people have called it the parable of the ‘Good Father and his two sons’ because it focuses more on the father than on the two sons. The parable which is probably the best known and loved of all Jesus’ parables tells us the story of two sons and how each acted and then the response of the father.

Isn’t it hard to believe fully the parable of Jesus? What human father would have acted in that way? We would call him a crazy father since he knew what type of character his younger son was and yet he gives him his share of his inheritance. Since people did not get the inheritance until the Father was dead the younger son is basically saying – ‘as far as I am concerned you are dead’. The son is true to form and spends his inheritance wastefully on a life of debauchery.  What is unexpected is not so much that the father welcomed him back but that he holds a great feast for him.

In the culture of the time to have accepted the son back, to begin things again as they were before would be most unusual. But to organise a feast, to kill the animal that was being kept for the big occasion, to give the son a cloak, a ring (a symbol of enormous trust) and sandals – these are almost impossible to imagine. The son is restored to his former position.

The parable does not speak in a way we human beings do things or are accustomed to act. The parable is speaking of God’s ways. It is God the Prodigal Father who runs towards the lost son, clasps him in his arms, not asking for any explanation, neither giving him a scolding nor criticising him. For a father of his time to have run to and embraced the son would have been very unusual.

To tell us who God really is, Jesus tells us this story and invites to be participants. God is so different from what we expect God to be. But we are not God and our ways are not God’s ways which is exactly what Jesus is trying to get us to accept.

God is extravagant. He is extravagant in his love and mercy towards us. He comes to meet us as we are, sinners, often so undeserving of his love. Jesus is trying to help us to have a different way of looking at God.

Yet some people maintain it is an unfair story. They feel sorry for the older son, convinced he got a raw deal. They believe that the younger son got away with doing terrible things. He should have been punished. He should have been taught a lesson. So it is not difficult to understand the reaction of the elder son who refused to participate in the feast for his younger brother. But others would say that he was too hardhearted and unforgiving towards his brother.

So the parable is really about hearts: selfish hearts and generous hearts, closed hearts and open hearts, cold hearts and warm hearts, unrepentant hearts and hard hearts.

Which of the two sons in the parable do I identify most with, the younger son or the older one?  Maybe there is part of each in me.

The most important question of all is this: Who is the God I believe in? Is it the Prodigal Father Jesus describes for us today? Will we be ambassadors/witnesses of this Good News or of a false God of fear and sanctions?

“Lord Jesus, help us to accept fully the great Good News that God is our loving and compassionate Father who is as you describe him in the parable today. Help us to spread this message by the way we treat others and live our lives as Christians. Amen”.

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA. 8^th March, 2010

SECOND SUNDAY of LENT – YEAR  C – 28th February, 2010

 Genesis 15. 5-12, 17-18

Philippians 3.17 – 4.1

Luke 9.28-36

One day a poor man living in a hostel for homeless people was walking along the main street of a big city. At a certain point he found himself outside a church. Before he realised it, he was inside. He couldn’t recall whether or not he said any prayers. But his soul was flooded with light.  His depression lifted and a great peace descended on him.  He felt he belonged on the earth after all. He felt close to God and loved by God. The experience didn’t last very long. He said later he would give anything to have had a similar experience.  For one short moment he tasted glory.

However, when it was over he found himself on the street again going about as aimlessly as before. Several times he went back to the church in the hope of a similar experience but it never happened. The homeless man wanted to hold on to that experience. He wanted to go backwards to it instead of forwards. He might have used the experience to illuminate the darkness of his life and go forward more hopefully and courageously.

Was it not something similar for St. Peter in today’s gospel? He made the same mistake. Having seen the transfiguration of Jesus on the mountain he wanted to build some tents there and so hold on to the experience and not go back down the mountain to the struggles and trials of daily life. Not only that but Peter didn’t focus on the dialogue between Jesus, Moses and Elijah. Their topic of conversation was about the future passing of Jesus which he was to accomplish in Jerusalem. Peter, as usual was generous but misguided as he wishes to hold on to the experience.  He allows the uniqueness of Jesus to slide away and he blurs what Jesus had said – that the suffering of the cross had to be before the advent of Messianic glory. 

In all that will happen the disciples’ faith in him as the ‘Christ of God’ will be severely tested. But even then they must keep faith until the true nature of Jesus is again confirmed in the final conclusive glory of his resurrection on the third day. On the mountain Jesus’ loving Father says to the 3 disciples: ‘this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. Listen to him’. That is, just don’t focus on his coming glory but remember the suffering he will have to undergo first. The mountaintop experience was given so as to strengthen them in time of trial

And how much they needed that strength. For there would come another day and another hill. This time the sky would be dark. The face of Jesus would be covered with sweat and blood. His clothes would not dazzle. They would be taken from him. For his companions he would have two criminals.  There would be no voice from heaven only the voices of mockers and scorners. The disciples would be shattered and would want no part of what was happening.

In a sense we all have somewhat similar experiences in our daily lives. People who are married remember the joy of their wedding day and their honeymoon. But they can’t hold on to that experience. They must move on to the life that follows. And during that time there may be tensions in the marriage, sicknesses, unemployment etc. That is the time when we are asked to be faithful. And of course there will be other ‘transfigurations’ like wedding and birthday anniversaries, the birth of their children and so on. 

For others it may be to hold their first newborn baby in their arms and see the smiling face of their own flesh and blood reflected back to them. Later, there may be difficulties with the children, the normal growing tensions but also very good times.

On this Sunday we read about the Transfiguration of Our Lord. It is important to realise that Jesus went up the mountain to pray. We need to remember the great importance of prayer especially in times of difficulty. Remember that Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemene to strengthen himself for the coming ordeal of his Passion and death.

We who are followers of Jesus are reminded that we have a goal, a harbour where we are going. Our faith tells us this. This world is not the end of things. We too will be transfigured as the second reading today tells us. St. Paul reminds us that our homeland is in heaven, that here we have no lasting city. Since our homeland is in heaven, ‘it is from there will come the Saviour we are waiting for, Our Lord Jesus Christ, and he will transfigure these wretched bodies of ours into copies of his own glorious body’.

The Transfiguration was the harbour for Jesus, so that no matter how big the waves were or how violent the ocean might be, Jesus would have the confidence to face all that lay ahead of him. He knows that death will not be the end, a final defeat but the way that leads to glory.

The episode of the Transfiguration reminds us that our being Christians means living in the midst of the ups and downs of daily life. We all have our own personal experiences of how difficult life can be. We know that we may have to face sickness, unemployment, being misunderstood, the sudden death of a loved one etc. God is no less with us at these times though it is harder to see and be aware of this. However, even if we are promised the fullness of the kingdom after we die, it has already here if we respond to God’s call. Little by little as we try to do God’s will a deeper peace and joy invades our lives.

We must never forget that our God is a faithful God. In the first reading we heard about an ancient ritual whereby the parties bound themselves to fulfil the agreement between them. In the reading we hear about God’s making the covenant with Abraham, our father in the faith. God is saying that he will always be faithful to his promises even we fail, as we do from time to time,

“Lord Jesus, Let us never lose sight of You who were transfigured. You are our safe harbour.  Give us the courage to be faithful to the end especially in time of trials and difficulties. Amen.”

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

21^st February, 2010 – Year C

Deuteronomy 26.4-10
Romans 10.8-13
Luke 4.1-13

In a certain African country a young woman went to see a priest. Her boyfriend belonged to another Christian Church. He told her that if they were to marry she would have to give up the practice of her Catholic faith that was of great importance to her. She came from a poor background whilst he was very rich. The priest asked her: ‘If your boyfriend loves you so much would he demand that you abandon your faith which you say is very precious to you? Would he give up his faith to become a Catholic?’ The priest never saw her again so never knew how she responded to the temptation to give up her faith in order to marry her boyfriend.

Lent is not so much about denying oneself as acknowledging God.

In the First Reading we heard that through the ceremony of offering the first fruits, the Israelites had recognised all that God had done for them in the past, especially in the Exodus. The writer exhorts the people to ‘remember’ and ‘not to forget the events of their history’. Even when they forgot God and strayed from him by idolatry God was always their faithful God (as he is ours).

During Lent the Church invites us to embark on a journey, the journey of Lent, a journey towards Easter. We are a baptised people but haven’t yet lived fully the life of a Christian. Lent calls us to a change of heart and a fuller living of the gospel. In today’s gospel we see Jesus struggling against temptation. He will help us in our own struggles with temptation.

All three readings today are about the faithfulness of God. All of us are weak and prone to evil. This may be a disturbing truth, but it is one which we ignore at our peril. One of the great problems of our times is our failure to know ourselves, to recognise evil and deal with it within ourselves. We are born with conflicting desires so that doing good is always possible but never easy. The hardest victory of all is over oneself.

Shortly before his temptations Jesus had been baptised in the river Jordan by John the Baptist. There he had shown his solidarity with us sinners. Now he is showing again his solidarity with us humans as he allows himself to be tempted.

Luke tells us that Jesus was a long time in the wilderness. There he experienced three types of temptations:

v           The first temptation is to put trust in material things. Here for example it is to change stones into bread as Jesus is hungry. The word ‘bread‘ can mean material things in general. In our world today riches, wealth, possessions can be great temptations.

v           The second temptation is to power that will be his if he worships the devil. Jesus is tempted to act as a political messiah. If Jesus had all the power and glory look how important he would become and what good he would do. Jesus dismisses the devil by saying ‘You must worship the Lord God and serve him alone’.

v           The third temptation is to popularity. It is a call to do something spectacular. If Jesus would just throw himself down from the top of the Temple, over 400 metres high, people would be amazed.  What popularity he would have and he could so much good! Yet he did work many miracles and look at what happened in the end. Popularity does not last long. Today they cry Hosanna! Tomorrow, Crucify him!!

Ultimately the devil is trying to make Jesus forget who he is as a human being (fully like us), with its limitations, totally dependent on his Father to care for him. He is tempted to act from a power stance and not from the will of God. The devil tries to tempt Jesus to cheat on his humanity and satisfy his hunger and to use his power to deny his Incarnation. Satan is tempting Jesus to deny his true humanity. Jesus will not call on his power as God when the going gets tough. He wants to be in total solidarity with us, allowing himself to be tempted just as we are and struggling to overcome the temptation. This was especially so in the Garden of Gethsemene when tempted not to go through with his Passion and death since he foresaw the terrible suffering and rejection it would involve.

The example of the gospel is clear: In his life Jesus proclaimed the primacy of God and his kingdom. We cannot use our gifts and talents for our own personal prestige or to dominate others politically, materially or spiritually. The attitude of Jesus must be ours and that of the Church. Its message and its power are not to serve itself but to serve God and his chosen ones, especially the poor and the marginalised.

In a remarkable phrase in today’s gospel we read that having failed to tempt Jesus, the devil left him to return later. So the temptations in the wilderness were not a once off trial for Jesus.

Like us temptation was an ongoing reality in his life. So he can understand us when we are tempted and what it means to struggle. It is important to note that Jesus is a human being, like us in everything. He did not overcome temptation because he was God but because he prayed and reflected on scripture.

One of the invitations during Lent is to spend more quiet time in prayer and to become more familiar with the Bible. It was this deep reflection on scripture that gave Jesus the strength in the wilderness.  Let us pray often to Jesus when tempted to overcome the temptation.

“Lord Jesus, it is never easy to overcome temptation. Help us not to rely on ourselves but to pray often for the gift of the Holy Spirit to be with us.  Amen”

Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA – 16^th February, 2010

Isaiah 6.1-2, 3-8

1 Cor 15.1-11

Luke 5.1-11

In today’s gospel passage Jesus meets people at their place of work. Seeing first the fishermen and then their boats he uses both to further his message. The boat becomes a pulpit, a place from where his word is proclaimed. The congregation is drawn from those who are close at hand and willing to journey to hear the word.  It is a reminder to us that God’s word is not reserved for church or cathedral.  Isn’t there a danger that we will do this and fail to experience the many ways in which our loving God comes to us in our daily experiences?  Where have you and I experienced God coming to us recently outside of church?

Isn’t there something reassuring in today’s readings insofar we are reminded that God is not looking for perfection but rather willingness to try to do better?

We could call this 5^th Sunday, “Good Excuse” Sunday.  In each of the three readings – Isaiah, Paul and Peter feel they have very good excuses for not accepting God’s call. None of them feels worthy or capable enough:

• ·Isaiah’s reply is “What a wretched state I am in, I am a man of unclean lips”.
• ·Paul says that he hardly deserves the name of apostle, being the least of the apostles because of his persecution of Christians.
• ·Peter tells Jesus after the miraculous catch of fish: “Leave me Lord, I am a sinful man”.

Each knows that he is in the presence of the Holy One and they believe that they are totally unworthy of God’s choice of them.

They experience what we might call ‘Spiritual Inferiority’.

This, of course, is whole point of today’s readings. God chooses us because he is good and not because we are worthy. Jesus does not deny what Peter says about being a sinful man but he calls him in the hope that Peter will realise that the work Jesus is entrusting to him could never be accomplished by man or woman without the powerful help of God’s Spirit.  It will take Peter, as it does all of us, a whole lifetime to realise how totally we need God’s help.  So here Simon as he was then called gets a new name, Peter, a new job and a new image. All three take time to complete their transformation.

This is indeed Good News for each of us this Sunday. In that we are baptised, we too like Peter, are called to witness to God in the world. We may immediately reply that we are not worthy and that we are sinners, maybe even great ones – another case of spiritual inferiority!!   But God considers us worthy and that is all that counts.

It is not Isaiah, Paul and Peter who choose God.  It is the very opposite.

Maybe we don’t want to be called. Perhaps we can see the demands involved. We might prefer to opt out. If that is our choice then God will leave us free to do so if we wish. But we will never have the deep peace and joy we seek if we search for it in other places apart from God.

We must remember that each of us share a common vocation: the vocation to be a Christian. Because we are born into Christian families, sometimes we fail to appreciate our Christian vocation sufficiently. Our faith is given to us personally by God. We have the responsibility to both cherish and nourish it. We are also responsible for the faith of others, particularly those who are near and dear to us. Christ has entrusted his mission not just to the Church, but also to us individually.  There is still work to be done. Let us never underestimate the difference we can make. It doesn’t have to be perfect but it does have to be real.  How will you and I respond to the challenge?

God sees the marvellous potential in each of us.  Some of the great saints like Teresa of Avila, Charles de Foucauld etc lived mediocre or in the case of the latter very sinful lives early on.  But God then touched them and they responded.

Do we not pray in the part of Eucharistic Prayer 2 after the consecration ‘we thank you Lord for counting us worthy to stand in your presence and serve you’. If God considers us worthy who are we to object? We each have different roles to play in God’s plan to bring about his kingdom of truth, justice and forgiveness here on earth, be it as parents, priests, religious, teachers, or farmers etc. 

Peter had worked hard all night and caught nothing.  Jesus asked him to try again.  He could have objected saying he was exhausted or that there were no fish where they had failed to catch any.  However, he responded to Jesus and tried again. Look at the result.

Sometimes we too may get tired of trying to be good Christians. We may get bored, disillusioned with what we sometimes see going on in the church.  We may want to give up on ourselves or on others who disappoint or even betray us. 

To all of us Jesus says, ‘try again’. I am with you. I count you worthy. You have great potential.  But we must like Isaiah, Paul and Peter realise deeply that we cannot succeed alone. Like Peter we may fish all night in darkness, but Jesus the Light invites us to call on his help. He will make our efforts fruitful in his own way and in his own time. When Jesus was not with them, they caught nothing.  But when he was with them, what a difference? Not only a catch of fish but a great abundance. Their obedience was rewarded.

“Lord Jesus, we thank you for counting us worthy to stand in your presence to serve you and others. Amen”.             

                                               Fr. Jim Kirstein, SMA

4th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2010

Jeremiah 1:4-5; 17-19   –   1 Corinthians 12:31 – 13:13   –   Luke 4:21-30

Each of the readings given for today are sufficient for several reflections. I will just share a thought that comes from Jeremiah and 1 Corinthians.

Jeremiah 1:4-5: How amazing it is to think that BEFORE I was born, before even my parents knew each other, God KNEW ME! And not only did God know me but God consecrated me. And the consequences of that are that God loves me, no matter how I think I am in the sight of God.

1 Cor 13:4 and 6: Replace the word ‘love’ with ‘God’ and how does it read: God is patient, God is kind … God does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth – or as Jesus put it to the woman accused of adultery: Woman, neither do I condemn you, go, and do not sin again. God always loves the sinner but never the sin.

So God has chosen and consecrated me; and even if I have sinned God will not give up on me. He is patient, kind and will always welcome me back.

God only sees the possibilities for good in me. Shortly before his death one old SMA missionary put it beautifully: God has confidence in me.

May you may feel the loving presence of God within you.
No matter what troubles you may have at this time
may God’s loving embrace give you warmth and strength. 
May you have that same confidence that God has in you.

John 2: 1 – 11

We have moved from the joy of the Christmas season into the ‘ordinary’ time of the year, though there is nothing ordinary about the miracle Jesus worked at Cana.

Imagine the embarassment of the young couple when they learn that the wine has run out. We must remember that a wedding feast in the Jewish tradition took place over a number of days. It’s not the one day event we are used to in Ireland or most parts.

People won’t remember this wedding for the beautiful bride or the wonderful food. No! It will be remembered as the wedding where the wine ran out!

The Church views marriage as a Holy Sacrament that invites a man and a woman to mirror the love of Christ for his Church. The prophet Isaiah in the First Reading saw it all when he wrote: ’As the bridegroom rejoices in his bride, so will God rejoice in you’. ACCORD, the Irish Catholic marriage care service, calls their marriage preparation programme: ‘Marriage: a journey not a destination’. And the sacrament of marriage reminds us that this journey is best walked in the presence of the Lord, who as St. John says, is love itself. God has a special interest in the couple’s happiness.

In taking up the theme of a wedding in the gospel today, John the evangelist presents not only Jesus’ first miracle but he calls it a ‘sign’, as he does all the other miracles in his gospel. For John the miracle of Cana is a sign that points beyond itself to a much deeper meaning. This is the new creation and we share it. Jesus is replacing the old Jewish religious rites with the new wine which is himself. It is the best wine that is saved until now.

What Jesus did at Cana was not a once-off thing. It pointed to what would happen all through his ministry. The changing of water into wine is a symbol of what he was about. Everywhere he went the old is made new. For the widow at Nain whose son had died and whom Jesus raised up again to life, he changed tears into joy. For the thief on Calvary he changed despair into hope. And on Easter morning he changed death into life.

Like the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, there was at Cana a superabundance of wine. Not a stingy or small amount as some humans might give out but God’s lavish generosity. It is saying that our God is a God of life, life that is abundant, and still more and more abundant life that we call eternal. It begins now, according to St. John, but will reach its fulness in eternity.

If Jesus can change something like water into wine as a sign of his love for the young couple, can he not change us too into the kind of people that we are called to be?
Do you believe this? 
Do you offer yourself to him for this transformation or change? 
After all, isn’t this what we celebrate each time at the Transformation or Consecration of the Mass?

We believe that God through his Holy Spirit changes parts of creation like bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Jesus. 

Pray that God can do the same with other parts of creation, you and me, to be better persons, better members of his family

He can use us, working together in the community of disciples, to make our world a better place.

Lord God, filled with the grace of the Holy Spirit, may I become more and more in the image of Jesus your Son. And may I help make this world more in the image in which you created it. Amen.