Friday, 17 October 2014

17th October 2014

We are supposed to be getting an earthquake from Rome and today's Catholic press is not going to let us forget it. It seems that Kasper, the unfriendly ghost, has blown himself away by his disastrous comments about homosexuality and Africans. I thought it was only our English hierarchy that had problems with their mouths and feet. I think he might actually know that dealing with disease and grinding poverty is a much more pressing problem than pandering to the perceived needs of those who cannot accept the results of their choice of sin. I think he must know that and I hope that his head hangs in shame. Our own prime (ex-primate ) example of foot and mouth disease appears to have been dining with a well known author at what is laughingly described as a gentleman's club. I think Groucho had something to say about those sorts of club, and probably someone else before him.

Those first bishops and priests who knew Our Lord, were insistent that what they taught was the truth that had come from the Word. They did have discussions and meetings that are recorded in the Acts etc. but they did journey and preach alone or with one or two companions. What did they say when they arrived in the strange city and walked to the synagogue? Did they discuss the place of their church in the modern world; did they think what could be done to provide care for those who broke the commandments "There, there"  This falseness of sympathy was not with them. They taught that we who wish to know and share the love that comes from God have to make right choices; and that their Good News was and is that the Father loves us all but we can only share that Love if we do keep his words and commandments ever as the governors of our lives.

I cannot receive  the Grace of Christ's Body and Blood in the Sacrament if I am not already without Mortal Sin. There is a magnificent simplicity in this teaching of the Church. The Sacrament is not magic, although the words of consecration have been blasphemously parodied in the English Language, the real Body & Blood of Our Saviour feeds my soul; but my body and mind and soul need to be free from Mortal Sin before I can benefit. How can some Cardinal or Bishop or Priest or an infinite number of the same change this essence of our religious life. Its totally impossible and they were taught this as children (I hope) so why do they think it is possible today.

Today, 1900 years ago, St Ignatius pleaded with his disciples not to make eye-contact with him as he was taken away to die in the arena; he was afraid that his resolve to accept death as the gateway leading to Our Lord would be broken if he saw a possibility of help. Ignatius not only followed St Peter into the Church as a structured institution but was also a disciple of St John, who with Mary is the Apostle of Love.

Today's reading from Malachi warns us what The Lord thinks of those who divorce. Have the leaders of our Church taken note?

Maybe the new elevangelisation is not so different than the old. It seems that St Paul's fiercest opponents were his old colleagues of the synagogues.

The Crusader Facade fronting St Peter's Church in Antioch 


First Reading

Malachi 1:1-14,2:13-16

The word of the Lord to Israel through the ministration of Malachi.
    I have shown my love for you, says the Lord. But you ask, ‘How have you shown your love?’ Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? – it is the Lord who speaks; yet I showed my love for Jacob and my hatred for Esau. I turned his towns into a wilderness and his heritage into desert pastures. Should Edom say, ‘We have been struck down but we will rebuild our ruins’, this is the reply of the Lord of Hosts: Let them build! I will pull down. They shall be known as Unholy Land and Nation-with-which-the Lord-is-angry-for-ever. Your eyes are going to see this and you will say, ‘The Lord is mighty beyond the borders of Israel.’
    The son honours his father, the slave respects his master. If I am indeed father, where is my honour? If I am indeed master, where is my respect? the Lord of Hosts asks this of you, priests, you who despise my name. You ask, ‘How have we despised your name?’ By putting polluted food on my altar. You ask, ‘How have we polluted it?’ By holding the table of the Lord in contempt. When you bring blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you bring the lame and the diseased, is that not wrong? Try offering them to your high commissioner, and see if he is pleased with this or receives you graciously, says the Lord of Hosts. Now try pleading with God to take pity on us (this is your own fault); do you think he will receive you graciously? says the Lord of Hosts. Oh, is there no one among you who will shut the doors and stop you from lighting useless fires on my altar? I am not pleased with you, says the Lord of Hosts; from your hands I find no offerings acceptable. But from farthest east to farthest west my name is honoured among the nations and everywhere a sacrifice of incense is offered to my name, and a pure offering too, since my name is honoured among the nations, says the Lord of Hosts. But you, you profane it by thinking of the Lord’s table as defiled and by holding in contempt the food placed on it. ‘How tiresome it all is!’ you say; and you sniff disdainfully at me, says the Lord of Hosts. You bring a stolen, lame or diseased animal, you bring that as an offering! Am I to accept this from your hand? says the Lord of Hosts. Cursed be the rogue who owns a male which he has vowed to offer from his flock, and instead sacrifices a blemished animal to me! For I am a great king, says the Lord of Hosts, and my name is feared throughout the nations.
    And here is something else you do: you cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping and wailing, because he now refuses to consider the offering or to accept it from your hands. And you ask, ‘Why?’ It is because the Lord stands as witness between you and the wife of your youth, the wife with whom you have broken faith, even though she was your partner and your wife by covenant. Did he not create a single being that has flesh and the breath of life? And what is this single being destined for? God-given offspring. Be careful for your own life, therefore, and do not break faith with the wife of your youth. For I hate divorce, says the Lord the God of Israel, and I hate people to parade their sins on their cloaks, says the Lord of Hosts. Respect your own life, therefore, and do not break faith like this.






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