Just over a year ago, the Bishop had suggested that I should include a little bit more of catechesis in homilies, in addition to anything on the Scripture readings at Mass. So, for Sundays this year I shall include a short discourse on the common Catholic experience before I get to the readings. You may have heard this countless times before, but let’s begin with the Mass.
The Mass is the festival of love – and I am clearly not talking about erotic or sexual love. This love of ours is the agape of the Greeks that becomes the caritas (charity) of the Latins. The love that gives of itself for the sake of the beloved, that when taken to its extreme dies upon a cross for the sake of the beloved. If you’re a spouse and certainly if you’re a parent, you have an idea of what agape is, of what supreme charity is. And yes, this is what the Mass is all about. That’s why the Holy One hangs crucified above our heads. He would have us learn how to love as He does.
Over the next few weeks, I shall go through the Mass in sections. Today we begin with the penitential rite: the first bit, where we call to mind our sins and make an act of contrition (the Confiteor, or I Confess) and ask for mercy with the Greek words Kyrie Eleison – Lord, have mercy. Charity is a love which is complete, given entirely. It is a love that needs to be purified constantly, so that it can be given entirely. Just as those of us who are married choose to periodically make acts of charity/love to our spouses, and many Catholic spouses arrange to remake or renew their marriage vows now and again in a semi-ritualistic manner… similarly, we call to mind even our smallest sins during the penitential rite, sins by which we have betrayed God’s love, and prepare to remake/renew our promises to Him. Remember when Christ said in the gospel that the angels in heaven greatly rejoice over a single repentant sinner. This is therefore a fitting moment for us to add the great Gloria, using the words of the angels to the shepherds on Christmas Day: Glory to God in the highest, and peace to all of good will.
“‘If any of you owns a hundred sheep, and has lost one of them, does he not leave the other ninety-nine in the wilderness, and go after the one which is lost until he finds it? And when he does find it, he sets it on his shoulders, rejoicing, and so goes home, and calls his friends and his neighbours together; Rejoice with me, he says to them, I have found my sheep that was lost. So it is, I tell you, in heaven; there will be more rejoicing over one sinner who repents, than over ninety-nine souls that are justified, and have no need of repentance. Or if some woman has ten silver pieces by her, and has lost one of them, does she not light a lamp, and sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? And when she does find it, she calls her friends and her neighbours together; Rejoice with me, she says, I have found the silver piece which I lost. So it is, I tell you, with the angels of God; there is joy among them over one sinner that repents.'”
Gospel of S. Luke, 15: 4-10 [link]
And speaking of Christmas, we cannot end our celebrations before the great festival of the kings from the east. The word we may read out as ‘mayjai’ is a plural of the Latin magus. So, magi. These were a species of learned men and even sorcerors, whether or not they were kings, and certainly knowledgeable enough about astronomy to know when a new light had appeared in the heavens. And when they had appeared in Jerusalem to find the Child, Jewish heads would have looked up at the mention of a new light shining out in the heavens, because of such prophecies as we have from Isaiah in our first reading today.
“Rise up, Jerusalem, and shine forth; thy dawn has come, breaks the glory of the Lord upon thee! What though darkness envelop the earth, though all the nations lie in gloom? Upon thee the Lord shall dawn, over thee His splendour shall be revealed. Those rays of thine shall light the Gentiles on their path; kings shall walk in the splendour of thy sunrise. Lift up thy eyes and look about thee; who are these that come flocking to thee? Sons of thine, daughters of thine, come from far away, or rising up close at hand. Heart of thee shall overflow with wonder and gratitude, to see all the riches of ocean, all the treasure of the Gentiles pouring into thee! A stream of camels thronging about thee, dromedaries from Madian and Epha, bringing all the men of Saba with their gifts of gold and incense, their cry of praise to the Lord!”
Prophecy of Isaias, 60: 1-6 [link]
Why else would Herod go with his sword for the innocent young boys of Bethlehem, seeking to destroy Christ? He, Herod, in his pride may have thought that he and his dynasty and nobody else was the light of Jerusalem, and the glory of the Israel. Herod was an Idumaean, not a Jew, but had contrived with the Romans to be called the king of the Jews. And the people disliked him for it. And suddenly, here are foreigners from the East, asking where the new King of the Jews is. Foreigners! What else does Isaiah say in our reading? Foreign nations (Gentiles) will come to Jerusalem, foreign kings to her growing light.
This was always the promise of the prophets: that the coming of the Messiah would bring non-Jews and people from other nations into covenant with the God of Israel. Hence the response to our psalm today: All nations on earth shall fall prostrate before you, O Lord. And S. Paul would obviously have taken this message to the Church in Ephesus with its growing number of Gentile Christians, for we have in our second reading his assertion that the pagans (non-Jews, Gentiles) now share the inheritance of the Jews, being welcomed into a Jewish covenant by the Apostles and their associates.
And so when we look upon a nativity scene with the Child and His mother and S. Joseph and the shepherds – all Jews – and then we see with them the three kings – all Gentiles – bent in adoration, we should see the Child look upon us as if to say, You are not Jews, but even so, you are Mine.
“You will have been told how God planned to give me a special grace for preaching to you; how a revelation taught me the secret I have been setting out briefly here; briefly, yet so as to let you see how well I have mastered this secret of Christ’s. It was never made known to any human being in past ages, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to his holy apostles and prophets, and it is this: that through the gospel preaching the Gentiles are to win the same inheritance, to be made part of the same body, to share the same divine promise, in Christ Jesus.”
Letter of S. Paul to the Ephesians, 3: 2-6 [link]
Catholic Louth and Mablethorpe 