Day 44, Holy Thursday, 1 April Covenant

 

RETREAT IN LENT 2021

Day 44, Holy Thursday, 1 April

Covenant

A covenant is, literally, a coming together – like two people when they marry; they pledge themselves to each other forever. God made a covenant with Noah, with Abraham and with the people of Israel. The sign of this covenant was the Passover meal in Egypt when ‘a lamb without blemish’ was sacrificed and shared by each family (Exodus 12:1-14). Later, in the desert, the implications of this sign were spelt out in the law given through Moses.

Today, Holy Thursday, the day before Jesus dies, we are given a new covenant, a new meal, the sharing in the bread and wine, signs of his sacrifice, of his presence among us and of our union – communion – with him (1 Cor 11:23-26).

The implications of this sign are spelt out in an action that shocks the gathered disciples. Jesus deliberately rises from the table and goes down on his knees before each of them and washes their feet. A little gesture? No, something highly significant and Peter and the others know it. They are appalled; ‘you will never wash my feet!’  Jesus is blunt with them. ‘If I do not wash your feet, then it is all over between us’ (John 13:1-15). ‘If you cannot grasp that my whole life has been one of service to you and to the world then we can’t go on. It is over.’ These are dramatic words but this is a dramatic moment. Jesus is about to enter into the greatest act of service of all: his willing offering of himself in suffering and death for the salvation of the world. Peter does not understand but his love for Jesus is such that he immediately withdraws his refusal.

The new covenant is one of service; our service of one another, our opening our hearts to people who are different from us, maybe even hostile to us. It means breaking down the barriers that divide us; it means a new heaven and a new earth.

Day 43, Wednesday, 31 March ‘I made no resistance’

 

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Day 43, Wednesday, 31 March

‘I made no resistance’

Explicit in today’s Servant Song from Isaiah 50:4-9 are these words. ‘I made no resistance. And it is true, at no point in the passion do we find Jesus protesting or resisting. He submits himself knowing that from the human power point of view he cannot resist but, much more importantly, from the divine mission he is given he has to submit. This is the only way, when you think about it, he can save the world. He has to go through what his sisters and brothers go through. That is what the Incarnation, the ‘dwelling among us’ means.  

Then there is that awful fulfilment of what has been hinted at for some time; the betrayal of Judas (Matt 26:14-25). How the centuries have loved to hate Judas and lay on him so much guilt and blame, without pausing to reflect how much we all share in one way or another in that betrayal, starting with Peter. True, his betrayal was brutal and clear. Ours is more subtle and hidden.

    

Day 41, Monday, 29 March The Servant Songs

 

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Day 41, Monday, 29 March

The Servant Songs

Isaiah (42:1-7) here and later gives us what we call the Servant Songs, a description of the Messiah, the promised one who will lead his people to true freedom. Through various pictures and poetic expressions we build up an image of a servant who suffers for us. The steady purpose of God over centuries now reaches it goal. He is the one ‘in whom my soul delights’. He does not cry out or waver until he brings through justice. He submits himself to the weight of the world’s burden. The islands (I come from an island!) are waiting for him. He will open the eyes of the blind and free the captives.

It is a song of triumph but full of references to the Passion. The accompanying gospel (John 12:1-11) tells us of the anointing of the body of Jesus, something that could not happen after his death – because there would be no body! So it is done before! All of this is fiercely confident. The early Church knew what it was writing about.

We have entered a week of intense sorrow and will stand by the cross with Mary on Friday. But it is a week of intense confidence for us in the one in whom we delight.

Day 42, Tuesday, 30 March ‘I have exhausted myself for nothing’

 

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Day 42, Tuesday, 30 March

‘I have exhausted myself for nothing’

Today we read another ‘Song of the Servant’ (Isaiah 49:1-6), expressing the suffering of Jesus, this time the mental anguish, ‘I have toiled in vain; I have exhausted myself for nothing.’ In the gospel (John 13:21-38) Jesus is ‘troubled in spirit’ as he knows what Judas will do.

We know so many stories of people struggling alone; women whose husbands have died or left them and they have to struggle to bring up their children alone. Or people in war zones – Yemen, Tigray, the east of the Congo and now northern Mozambique. We see pictures of them. We feel their anguish. The People of God now sing the Song of the Servant in so many corners of the globe. Even in developed ‘settled’ countries there is the anguish of loneliness, imprisonment, drug addiction. This is the passion of the world.

When Jesus went to his passion, he knew he was embracing this other passion – ours. Desolate and exhausted that he was, he knew that he would inaugurate a new age in which the suffering of the world would be overcome. When people of faith share in the suffering of others and do not hide from it in comfortable cocoons, there is the promise of overcoming it.

In the year that has passed since last Easter the world has woken up to know that ‘Black Lives Matter’, that Covid knows no boundaries and that the earth is warming to a degree that is almost out of control. Everywhere there are signs that people are ‘pushing back’ against the evils connected with these things.

May we have the grace this Holy Week to labour in the sure belief that we do not labour in vain or exhaust ourselves for nothing.

THE LITTLE BIRD STRAINS TOWARDS ITS MOTHER

 

THE LITTLE BIRD STRAINS TOWARDS ITS MOTHER

Theologians and mystics speak of the utter ‘otherness’ of God. He cannot be known as we know other people. We have some knowledge of him but it is far, far from the reality. We can love God and, in that sense, we can know something of him. You cannot love one you do not know. The Book of Genesis says we are ‘made in his image’ and the psalms speak of us as ‘a little lower than the angels.’

 

What does all this amount to? Two things. One, God is infinitely beyond our reach. When we are talking about God and ourselves in the same breath, we are speaking about two completely different realities. Neither science or any other rational activity can grasp God. So we hold on to his utter otherness. But then, two, God wants to come to us, to share his life with us, his joy, his love. ‘He has made us for himself,’ says Augustine. He has made us with a capacity to receive his life. He cannot give us what he wants to give us until we open our beak like a newly hatched bird in the nest. They strain upwards to receive the food the mother wants to give them.

The food we receive carries a weighty message. Jesus gave us the Eucharist to enable us to share in his suffering and death. We have to do more than open our beaks. Receiving Holy Communion in the Eucharist commits us to the ‘way’ that Jesus lived. The early Christians called themselves people ‘of the Way’, that is, people who, as followers of Jesus, tried to live as he lived. This would mean, as we constantly see this week in the readings from John, opposition, virulent opposition. It would also lead, for many early Christians, to physical suffering and even death.

If we open our beak and strain towards God, this may happen to us. But we understand, do we not, that this is getting to grips with the real issues of our life in this world. The more we touch suffering in ourselves and in others, the more we sense that this is a reality that can lead us to God if we can be open to it. No one wants suffering but countless people will acknowledge that it enables them to ‘touch the hem of his garment’ and grow into the fullness of life.  

This is real knowledge even if imperfect and it opens the way to love. We have entered Holy Week. Will we let it go by and be absorbed in our usual business? Or can we open our beak and be fed by the life and death of the Suffering Servant whose life on earth reached its terrible climax in the days we are now entering?

28 March 2021     Palm Sunday   Is 50:4-7  Phil 2:6-11  Mark 14:1-15:47

Day 40, Palm Sunday, 28 March

 

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Day 40, Palm Sunday, 28 March

We accompany Jesus today from the welcome with palm branches, and the cries of ‘Hosanna’ and ‘Blessings on the coming kingdom’, to his death and burial. Mark, (in Ch 14 & Ch 15) paces it out like our practice of the Stations of the Cross and we can consider each step:

·        The chief priests and scribes look for a way of getting rid of Jesus before the people even know what is happening (14:1-2).

·        Jesus is anointed by a woman before his death and, despite the complaints of wasting money, he honours her (3-9).

·        Judas delights the chief priests by offering his help to get him arrested (10-11).

·        Jesus celebrates the Passover with his disciples, his last great act of fulfilling the old covenant (12-16).

·        He foretells his betrayal (17-21).

·        He celebrates the first Eucharist of the new covenant (22-25).

·        Jesus foretells Peter’s denial that he ever knew him (26-32).

·        In Gethsemane, Jesus is overcome by sorrow and distress (32-42).

·        Judas leads armed men to the spot and Jesus is arrested and his disciples scatter (43-52).

·        Jesus is tried before the Sanhedrin. At first, he is silent but when solemnly asked if he is the Christ, he replies, ‘I am’ (53-64).

·        In response they spit on him and mock him (65).

·        Peter denies him three times and when he realises what he has done burst into tears (66-72).

·        Jesus is taken to Pilate where, again, he remains silent. The chief priests incite the crowd to demand his death and the mob cry, ‘Crucify him!’ To placate the crowd Pilate has Jesus flogged and orders his death (15:1-15).

·        The soldiers mock him and lead him away to Golgotha (16-22).

·        They strip him and nail him to the cross and hang him on it (23-27).

·        Again Jesus is mocked and taunted (28-32).

·        Jesus feels desolate and abandoned, even by God (33-36).

·        He dies at the ninth hour (3.00pm) and the centurion believes and calls him ‘a Son of God’ (37-39).

·        Many women were there to give Jesus comfort (40-41).

·        Joseph, though a member of the government, bravely takes the body for burial (42-47).

 

Day 39, Saturday, 27 March Gathering what is scattered

 

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Day 39, Saturday, 27 March

Gathering what is scattered

It is Ezekiel’s turn to give a dream of the future (37:21-28). God will ‘gather’ his people and they will become one nation and will live in peace. The starting point is the divided kingdom of Israel but the vision goes far beyond that. The high priest Caiaphas now, unknowingly, makes a prophecy; Jesus would ‘die for the nation and not for the nation only but to gather together in unity all the scattered children of God (John 11:45-57).

We are moving closer to a fuller understanding of what God is planning and what ‘Thy Kingdom come!’ might mean. God is creating unity. Today’s media and our past history is littered with attempts to create unity among people, to ‘gather’ what is scattered. The United Nations. I can think of my country of origin, Ireland, which is crawling painfully over decades towards unity. We can think of Germany, once divided, now united. We can think of Zambia: one Zambia, one Nation. Zimbabwe and so on.

We can think of families and the struggle to reconcile estranged relatives. We can think of our laws, how they try to bring people to harmony and so on. We are all caught up in a world moving together, ‘gathering’ and God is in the midst of it struggling with us. His death is a death to the old divided world. His rising is a sign of the gathering of all nations.