Monthly Archives: March 2013

Homily for Good Friday 2013

29 Friday Mar 2013

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Given at Our Lady of the Assumption & Saint Gregory, Warwick Street:

In a few moments we will participate in what, to the world, must seem to be a ritual which is at best peculiar, and at worst perverse. In solemn procession, the very instrument by which our Lord and Saviour was executed will be carried aloft through the body of the church, to be adored and venerated. We will kneel and we will kiss the wood of the cross to which, because of our sins, our Lord was nailed. It is a sign of extreme contradiction, calling the cross the Crux fidelis inter omnes – the ‘faithful cross above all other’, the ‘one and only noble tree’.

This contradiction, though, shouldn’t surprise us: the Christian life is full of such juxtapositions. Today we ‘sing the praise of him who died’; tomorrow we rejoice at the felix culpa, the ‘happy fault’ of Adam’s sin, and at the paschal waters of the baptismal font we even talk about dying in order to live. Such contradictions not only speak clearly of the truths of our religion – the way we understand the fundamental nature of the life we share in Christ – but they are the source of our hope. In the face of inevitable earthly death, we Christians are given the hope of eternal life, and so we look gladly towards that moment when this life will be changed into the life offered to us in Christ. In the face of every human fear and anxiety, we are presented with joy and hope because, in the action of Christ on the cross – the very thing we celebrate today – death has been put to death, and in his resurrection we can join with Mary Magdalene in the beautiful Sequence for Easter Day, as we say, Surrexit Christus spes mea – Christ my hope is arisen.

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Iugum meum suave est

28 Thursday Mar 2013

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From the homily of Pope Francis at his first Chrism Mass as Bishop of Rome:

The sacred robes of the High Priest are rich in symbolism. One such symbol is that the names of the children of Israel were engraved on the onyx stones mounted on the shoulder-pieces of the ephod, the ancestor of our present-day chasuble: six on the stone of the right shoulder- piece and six on that of the left (cf. Ex 28:6-14). The names of the twelve tribes of Israel were also engraved on the breastplate (cf. Es 28:21). This means that the priest celebrates by carrying on his shoulders the people entrusted to his care and bearing their names written in his heart. When we put on our simple chasuble, it might well make us feel, upon our shoulders and in our hearts, the burdens and the faces of our faithful people, our saints and martyrs.

Homily for Spy Wednesday

27 Wednesday Mar 2013

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Given at Our Lady of the Assumption & Saint Gregory, Warwick Street:

In traditional parlance, today is known as Spy Wednesday because we hear again the gospel passage in which Judas betrays the Lord for thirty pieces of silver. Judas becomes the ‘spy’ in the band of the apostles, the one who will betray the Lord with a kiss in the garden of Gethsemane.

In the midst of the apostolic gathering, it is Judas whose action creates disharmony and disorder. In this we are given a stark reminder. Although our sin may often be private, it is never simply personal. We are incorporated, by virtue of our baptism, into the mystical Body of Christ, and so when we sin, we mar the image of Christ in us and distance ourselves (by our own free action) from his presence in the Church. We, like Judas, betray the Lord and cut ourselves off from him and from the apostolic gathering and, in so doing, are doomed to a destiny without God’s love – not because he does not love us, but because he loves us so much that he gives us the freedom to choose to reject him. For the man in serious sin, it would be better if he had never been born.

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Another form of poverty

22 Friday Mar 2013

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Pope Francis addressed a gathering of diplomats this morning, saying:

There is another form of poverty! It is the spiritual poverty of our time, which afflicts the so-called richer countries particularly seriously. It is what my much-loved predecessor, Benedict XVI, called the ‘tyranny of relativism’, which makes everyone his own criterion and endangers the coexistence of peoples. And that brings me to a second reason for my name. Francis of Assisi tells us we should work to build peace. But there is no true peace without truth! There cannot be true peace if everyone is his own criterion, if everyone can always claim exclusively his own rights, without at the same time caring for the good of others, of everyone, on the basis of the nature that unites every human being on this earth.

Homily for Wednesday in Lent V

20 Wednesday Mar 2013

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As we prepare for the final leg of our journey toward the great events of Holy Week – the passion, death, and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour – today we celebrate a Mass for the Forgiveness of Sins (RM No. 38b; Preface of IV of Sundays in Ordinary Time), what is traditionally called a Missa ad petendam compunctionem cordis, for begging compunction of the heart, or a Mass for the Gift of Tears.

In the prophecy of Daniel which we have heard in our first reading, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego rebuke King Nebuchadnezzar, saying ‘If our God, the one we serve, is able to save us from the burning fiery furnace and from your power, O king, he will save us; and even if he does not, then you must know, O king, that we will not serve your god or worship the statue you have erected’. This is an excellent example of Christian courage. In the world in which we live we are presented not only with literal false gods, but with other idols that are presented to us as necessary for the fullness of life. When we sin through adherence to these false gods, we commit idolatry and sin against the first commandment.

When we do this, we distance ourselves – through our own free will – from the covenant which is established with the Lord through our baptism. In the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, we are incorporated into the Church. As members of the mystical Body of Christ, we are joined with the Lord in his passion and death, and also in his resurrection and glorification in the heavenly Jerusalem. Through our sin, we put that relationship to death, and break the bonds that bind us with the saints in the fullness of communion with the Most Holy Trinity. That is why such serious sin is called ‘mortal’.

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Homily for Lent V

17 Sunday Mar 2013

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Given at St Mary’s, Cadogan Street, on the fifth Sunday of Lent:

When we journey without the Cross, when we build without the Cross, when we profess Christ without the Cross, we are not disciples of the Lord, we are worldly: we may be bishops, priests, cardinals, popes, but not disciples of the Lord.

Speaking to the Cardinals who elected him as the 265th Successor of Saint Peter, these were the words of our new Holy Father, Pope Francis, in the Sistine Chapel on Thursday evening. Amidst the excitement of the past few days, even weeks, in these first words, our Holy Father reminds us not simply of the primary purpose of this season of Lent – which now enters a more intensive final phase – but of the Christian life more broadly. Without the Cross, we cannot hope for the resurrection; without the Cross, our sins are not taken away.

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Reform or Renewal

16 Saturday Mar 2013

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This article first appeared in the Catholic Herald and can be found online here.

Anybody following coverage of the events of the last month or so could be forgiven for having a rather pessimistic view of the current state of the Church. With a tone of infallibility that would be denied the successor of Peter, certain elements have given the impression that the Church is failing, rotten to the very core. Not only, we are told, is the Church rife with administrative and financial problems, but the very message we purport to promote is at best ineffectual, and at worst damaging, even dangerous.

The medicine prescribed for this terminal decline is, apparently, reform: by which is meant, bringing the Church into line with the liberal secular consensus found in contemporary politics and society. Failure to do so, it seems, will mean that the Church ceases to be a vehicle of moral authority and a source of good in the world.

I am not naïve about the situation we find ourselves in, but this is not the answer. What such calls for reform fail to recognise is that what the Church presents is not simply one path among many – a moral option for those who like that kind of thing – but, rather, the revelation of the truth of the person of Jesus Christ. Thus, the sins of those proclaiming that truth, and the institutional failures which they perform, do not affect the Church’s objective moral authority, merely her credibility. That, I would suggest, is something that we can and must change.

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Attractive & Persuasive

15 Friday Mar 2013

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Our Holy Father, Pope Francis, spoke these words to the College of Cardinals following his election as the 265th Successor of Saint Peter, Bishop of Rome, and Supreme Pontiff of the Universal Church:

Let us never give in to pessimism, to that bitterness that the devil offers us every day. Do not give in to pessimism and discouragement. We have the firm certainty that the Holy Spirit gives the Church with His mighty breath, the courage to persevere and also to seek new methods of evangelization, to bring the Gospel to the ends of the earth. The Christian truth is attractive and persuasive because it responds to the deep needs of human existence, convincingly announcing that Chirst is the only Saviour of the whole person and of all persons. This announcement is as valid today as it was at the beginning of Christianity when there was a great missionary expansion of the Gospel.

A moment of grace

13 Wednesday Mar 2013

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Judging by the excitement that black smoke has, twice, caused the world since yesterday, this is an extraordinary moment in the life of the Church. Again. For the past month the eyes of the world have, if not been fixed on Rome, at least occasionally glanced in her direction. We have several international media networks topping their 24 hour news cycles with shots of the Sistine Chapel and the famous chimney, and simply thousands of journalists have descended on the Eternal City to report on events. As I said yesterday, too, we have an unprecedented representation of Catholics in the social media arena, who are contributing well to the story and rhetoric and commentary of this event.

In the business of evangelisation, this is a moment of grace. We are in the spotlight and, despite the attempts – justified and otherwise – to bring the conversation back to the sins of a few, we are being given an opportunity to speak openly, confidently, and warmly of the love of Jesus Christ and the place he has, through Holy Church, in the contemporary world.

We are also being presented with a moment of grace as individuals. How reliant we are on the Holy Spirit! In this period of transition, we must be even more trusting of the Lord, even more dependent on his will for us and his Church. As I have said before, this really is a Year of Faith – forcing us to reflect on our lives, and on the need we have of the Lord. In prayer and in fasting, and in a good daily meditation – even a holy hour! –  we have the opportunity to draw closer to the Lord in this time, who is our guardian and guide. Amongst all the excitement and chimney-watching, let us united ourselves to the will God and, with the Cardinals in the conclave, make this prayer our own: Thy Will Be Done.

Conclave 2.0

12 Tuesday Mar 2013

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As the College of Cardinals gather to celebrate the Mass pro eligendo Papa in the basilica of Saint Peter, this morning, faithful from across the world will be tuning in to join them in prayer and in curiosity. Since the announcement of Pope Benedict’s resignation in early February, the Holy See Press Office, together with the Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, Vatican Radio, CTV – the Vatican TV service, and other communications agencies for the Catholic Church, have been servicing a massive worldwide audience, keen to know every conceivable detail of the conclave process.

What is new, even since the election of Pope Benedict XVI in 2005, is that this is being done more and more through electronic media. Social media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter are providing regular updates from the sources, as well as information from journalists. Most importantly, though, a new dialogue has formed between the Catholic faithful and the media, as snippets of information are gathered together from across the Twittersphere and from comment pieces on blogs and websites.

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