In the last several weeks, I have been describing the Mass we attend weekly (or some of us more often) as a celebration of our union with the Holy One, God our Lord, our divine Spouse. We often hear of the Church called the Bride of Christ in the New Testament of the Bible, but every human soul is also a bride of Christ. One of the reasons the Church takes marriage so seriously is because of the comparison of Christian marriage to this marriage of Christ to the Church, and of God to each human soul.
Last week, I drew a picture of us being invited to a type of dinner party and being drawn into a dining room which is also the sacred space within a large Temple. But, when we get to that sacred space, we find ourselves at the foot of a cross, twenty centuries ago, outside Jerusalem. Standing near us is the Blessed Virgin, leaning in distress upon the support of her nephew S. John the Evangelist, surrounded by her sisters, her cousins and friends. For her Son is dying upon the Cross.
As we kneel before the vision of the Holy One in His agony, other Christians of all ages, all assisting at Mass also appear around us, until countless men and women of all places and all times are gathered before the Cross. The Holy One says to His Christians, Behold, I have given My life for you, now give yourselves to Me. Then comes the ninth hour, 3.00 in the afternoon, and He has completed His work for the destruction of sin and death, and He says, It is accomplished. And within this sacred space in the Temple into which we at Mass have been drawn, the ministerial priest begins the words of the Eucharistic Prayer.
Remember our gift of bread and wine at the offertory, as well the gift of ourselves. So the priest says, To you, therefore, dear Father, we humbly ask through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord, that you accept and bless these gifts, these offerings, praying at the first for your holy Catholic Church, in her chief governor Francis our Pope and in our local governor Patrick our Bishop, and all the others who cooperate with them in handing on the Catholic faith.
All this is recited soon after the song of the angels, the Holy, Holy, Holy. And perhaps those of us who read the first reading this weekend will be putting things together. The prophet Isaiah was probably a priest of the Temple in Jerusalem, and had entered to offer incense there – one of the primary duties of the Hebrew priests – for the narrative talks for the Temple being filled with smoke. All of a sudden Isaiah who had entered a stone Temple on the mountain in Jerusalem finds himself in the heavenly Temple, with the angels singing the Holy-Holy-Holy.
“In the year of king Ozias’ death, I had a vision. I saw the Lord sitting on a throne that towered high above me, the skirts of His robe filling the temple. Above it rose the figures of the seraphim, each of them six-winged; with two wings they veiled God’s face, with two His feet, and the other two kept them poised in flight. And ever the same cry passed between them, ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts; all the earth is full of His glory.’ The lintels over the doors rang with the sound of that cry, and smoke went up, filling the temple courts. ‘Alas,’ said I, ‘that I must needs keep silence; my lips, and the lips of all my countrymen, are polluted with sin; and yet these eyes have looked upon their King, the Lord of hosts.’ Whereupon one of the seraphim flew up to me, bearing a coal which he had taken with a pair of tongs from the altar; he touched my mouth with it, and said, ‘Now that this has touched thy lips, thy guilt is swept away, thy sin pardoned.’ And now I heard the Lord say, ‘Who shall be My messenger? Who is to go on this errand of Ours?’ And I said, ‘I am here at Thy command; make me Thy messenger.'”
Prophecy of Isaias, 6: 1-8 [link]
Again, remember where we are when at Mass. Isaiah may as well have been kneeling before the Cross at this moment, and his words could be ours at Mass, Wretched am I, a sinner, for here I am in the presence of the Holy One. Again, as in the gospel story, when S. Peter falls before the Holy One now clothed in human flesh, Who tells him that grace brings great things from humble souls. The same glory that shone upon Isaiah, that shone upon S. Peter, now shines upon us as well, at Mass.
“…He said to Simon, ‘Stand out into the deep water, and let down your nets for a catch.’ Simon answered Him, ‘Master, we have toiled all the night, and caught nothing; but at Thy word I will let down the net.’ And when they had done this, they took a great quantity of fish, so that the net was near breaking, and they must needs beckon to their partners who were in the other boat to come and help them. When these came, they filled both boats, so that they were ready to sink. At seeing this, Simon Peter fell down and caught Jesus by the knees; ‘Leave me to myself, Lord,’ he said; ‘I am a sinner.’ Such amazement had overcome both him and all his crew, at the catch of fish they had made; so it was, too, with James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were Simon’s partners. But Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid; henceforth thou shalt be a fisher of men.’“
Gospel of S. Luke, 5: 4-10 [link]
And we begin the Eucharistic Prayer to thank God for His generosity to us, baffled in a way that the Ancient of Days should trouble Himself with little old us, overcome like the Fisherman was by the extraordinary miracle of the fish. So we huddle around the Bishop, and around the Successor of that Fisherman, the Holy Father in Rome, whose names we mention, and we ask God to accept the poor offerings we have just made. And (as we shall see when we talk about the end of the Mass) He has a mission for us, poor sinners though we are.
We might as well use S. Paul’s words in the second reading this weekend: I am the least of the people to be sent out by You, Lord, for I have been a great sinner, and I hardly deserve the name Apostle, but by your grace I shall be fruitful, by your grace I shall be an apostle. Then, as per the first reading, we continue: You have cleansed me of my sins, as the angel touches the coal to my lips.
And the Sacred Heart looks upon us and says, Be not afraid, you are to be apostles of My love, and through your love, you will catch and bring souls to Me.
“Of all the apostles, I am the least; nay, I am not fit to be called an apostle, since there was a time when I persecuted the Church of God; only, by God’s grace, I am what I am, and the grace He has shewn me has not been without fruit; I have worked harder than all of them, or rather, it was not I, but the grace of God working with me. That is our preaching, mine or theirs as you will; that is the faith which has come to you.”
First letter of the Apostle S. Paul to the Corinthians, 15: 9-11 [link]
Catholic Louth and Mablethorpe 