EIGHTEENTH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR, B

Exod 16:2-4, 12-15;
Eph 4:17, 20-24;
John 6:24-35

 Christ– the Bread Life!

The readings of these past Sundays centered on Christ feeding the multitude. Today, in the Book of Exodus, Ephesians and in John 6:24-35, our Lord, who is yesterday, today and forever, is not backing down. He speaks to us again, physically and spiritually, and perhaps in symbols familiar to us. He is the bread of life–the source of new life, the giver of love and everything we need– spiritually and materially: peace, good health, jobs, vocations, clothing, housing, family life, – name them! He is our “Bread winner.” History proves this, as well.

 In the first reading, when the Israelites journeyed through the desert and were physically hungry, tired, discouraged, disillusioned, tempted, shaken in faith– they complained against Moses; “would that we had died at the Lord’s hand in the land of Egypt….but you had to lead us into this desert to make the whole community die of famine!”. This is human. This is who we are– easily shaken in our faith traditions, tired and thirsty on our life journeys, deserted of  the teachings of the Church, short memory, fail to see through beyond our narrow eye glasses, and short cuts;  prone to complaint,

SEVENTEENTH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR, B

2 kings 4:42-44;
Eph 4:1-6;
John 6:1-15.

Trusting in God for our Needs!

Last Sunday we were told that our Lord upon seeing the devastated crowd who came in search of him, set out immediately to share the word of God with them and he did this at length because he taught them many things (Mark 6:34). The gospel today from John (6:1-5) is actually a continuation of the event of last Sunday where we were told that our Lord upon seeing the devastated crowd who came in search of him, set out immediately to share the word of God with them and he did this at length because he taught them many things (Mark 6:34). At the end of his sermon, it was late and the people were clearly famished from the long trek in search of him as well as the long but interesting sermon on many things. The session over, the apostles were eager to send the people away so that they could actually get that rest the Lord recommended. Remember they were still to get rest after their apostolic work of last Sunday. They were not done yet with work; Jesus asked Philip where they could buy bread to feed the multitude.

After sharing the Word of God, Jesus is now extending his care from the soul to the body. This tells us that God has comprehensive care over us. The Psalmist asked "what is man that you have thought for him, mortal man that take care of him?" (Psalm 8:4). Psalm (27:10) says: "My father and my

SIXTEENTH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR, B

Jer 23.1-6; 
2 Eph 2.13-18; 
Mk 6.30-34)

My dear friends,

The readings this Sunday are a source of consolation and encouragement to all of us, especially those who feel that their lives have lost direction, and who feel let down by those whose task it is to give leadership and inspiration. The gospel is particularly relevant to those who are pressed for time with tons of work to do. The passage contains the counsel of Jesus, who knowing our human nature too well, counselled his first recruits who had a whole world to save to take a break for a little while. Jesus wants us back on the high road to heaven so he calls us in the gospel reading to break with our past, to break with the earthly things that have kept us from him.

It is a call to you and me particularly if, like sheep without a shepherd, we have wandered half-lost through life.  Jesus is calling us as always to come to him so that he will lead us to safe pastures. It is a great pity that we Christians who know how Christ has put us on the right path, on the road to heaven have often allowed ourselves to get caught up in the briars and brambles of earthly attractions.

I have often compared our lives to that of a poor man who had a great desire to go to the Holy Land. He was given a free ticket with all expenses paid.  He set out joyfully, say from a remote area here in Plateau State.  His first stop was Lagos.  Here he became enchanted with the hustle and bustle of Lagos city life.  He visited many movie pictures and stage productions and spent so much time that he missed the pilgrim place for which he was booked.  He soon discovered that he had not enough money to pay for a ticket to Europe on another plane and so missed seeing the Holy Land.  He ended his day in misery in Lagos, no longer enchanted by its attraction but driven to despair by the utter emptiness of what it had to offer.  That man's fate was but a shadow of the irreparable loss of the christian who lets the attractions of this world keep him from heaven.

We may find our days, our mind and our hands full of interesting worldly affairs, but we should realize that every time the clock strikes we are an hour nearer to our earthly end.  In our modern societies marked by hurry and worry, therefore, we must take some time off and be with God so that he may recharge us with spiritual energy and strength.  Otherwise, what explanation shall we offer when we arrive empty handed and totally unprepared at the judgement seat of God?  Will you plead ignorance or lack of time or what?  Jesus in his mercy and compassion is calling us ever ready to pardon us as he did the Galileans.  These Galileans we may want to know were not saints.  They were ordinary people like you and me, who were not over religious.  They cheated one another, they were often uncharitable to one another, they were not always chaste and pure, they prayed vey little and perhaps only when they wanted some material benefits.  Yet our Lord had compassion on them.

I was at the Diocesan Secretariat a few days ago.  A poster on the door of the Secretary to the Laity caught my attention.  It reads: 

"HELL EXISTS AND WE MIGHT GO THERE
  Preach to save souls not to please, be a stepping 
  stone for others to meet Christ by your life style"

It can happen to us unless we frequently take a good look at our way of living and honestly and sincerely measure our daily doings by the standard of the Gospel. The standard put before us today is one of God as a good shepherd creating new relationships between people, gathering as one people those who had previously been divided by enmity, gathering people across the divides which cause hurt or create fear.  All of us are called upon to be shepherds one of another.

In the first reading God was angry with the leaders he had appointed to look after his people.  The religious and civic leaders had brought afflictions and misfortunes on the people.  God intervened by casting them off and providing in Jesus one who will care for his people and changed our world.  Now that Jesus has come, heaven is our destination, our only purpose in life.  Now everything is secondary and only of transitory importance.  But how many of us have let these transitory things of secondary importance get such a hold on us so much so that we forget or ignore our one and only purpose in life?

In the second reading we find Jesus inaugurating a new humanity in which the differences between Jews and Gentiles are wiped out and through his death on the cross and his gift of the Spirit peace is made between God and human kind.  In the Gospel we see Jesus in a concrete situation showing his care and compassion to the members of his flock.  Jesus and his disciples whom he had sent out last Sunday were worn out and sought to get away from the crowds.  But the people, desperate for what Jesus had to give them, ran after him.  When Jesus sees the situation his primary concern was no longer his own need for rest but the needs of the people who are "like sheep without a shepherd." Although their plans for rest was frustrated by the impatient crowd, the story clearly exemplifies the necessity to take time off from the constant routine of duties.

We must realize that our Lord's invitation to rest is not just a pious gesture given only to a chosen few, but an indispensable call to all of us to find some needed time to rest. Unless we take off some time to rest as Christ and his disciples did, our activity will be without direction, our work will become a hardship and our life will lose its meaning.  Work six  days and rest one day is the advice given in the first chapter of Genesis. We all know that the body demands for sleep and how sluggish we feel after a restless night. In Rome the siesta time is religiously observed each day between 2 and 4 p.m. Mondays are days of rest with most stores and shops closed. We might think these people are unbusiness-like or lazy, but they reply "we work to live, not live to work". And this extends to many other things. An occasional dinner out for husband and wife can produce a continual bonding of their union. Obviously they would have food at home, which they could eat and save money, but that's not the point. There are greater things to save than money.

Today, it is very easy for us to blame our young people for their abuses.  But are they really to blame?  Young people may not like the older generation to force their opinions down their throats, and yet they are looking for direction.  I read recently of some young people in a major archdiocese. They pleaded for a counselling Center where they could go to discuss their problems and difficulties.  They went so far as to volunteer to raise the funds to provide the facilities, provided the archdiocese supplied the counsellors but up to the time they wrote nothing had been done about it. "Priests, religious, school authorities, parents are all too busy when we go to them. Who will help us face and live with our problems?" they ask.

The readings this morning, I believe give us a pointer as to the way forward. In the first reading, the prophet Jeremiah thunders in God's name, "doom for the shepherds who allow the flock to be destroyed and scattered...it is the Lord who speaks". This message of doom applies to all of us. As members of the body of Christ, we are all co-responsible for one another; we are our brothers' keepers and have to be shepherds to one another, as elders in this Church today - priests, religious, parents and parishioners, each in his own sphere of life and with his own contribution to make. All of us are called to be shepherds of the sheep .. of the young, of the students. Like Jesus in the Gospel reading today, we are expected to take pity on our young people who are looking on us to lead them, on the students who look on us to help them carry the burdens of life.

I feel so helpless when a mother comes with tears requesting for prayers for her son who is now a drug addict; I feel frustrated when parents come all hot and bothered because their children are carrying on with non-christians or indulging in liberties permitted only to the married. I feel lost when I am faced with young people who are complaining about lecturers and teachers harassing them and ensuring them of failures for non-compliance to their demands.

Many parents are also so busy doing a hundred and one things, and not having time for the only thing that matters - shepherding the flock in their own homes. The result is that the flock strays into forbidden pastures and the tears of the shepherd come too late. President of the United States, though he was, we are told that John F. Kennedy, whenever in the Whitehouse, made time to spend at least an hour in play with his young children. Are we more important or busier than the president of the United States?  Parents where are your children, now? Hove you bothered to know what is happening to them wherever they are?  It is a pity that some of our families are so selfish that they think that they are the reason for which God has not destroyed our world.  Some of our families are living in total self deception that we think that our family is the best and in fact that it is next to the holy family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph.  Some of such families have some members of their family steep in secret cult and are in fact a curse to themselves because of the havoc their members are causing to other families.  Some of you have secured places in the higher institutions of learning for your children but you have not bothered to know about their association in these institutions.  Some of your children spend late nights in meetings of secret cults planning how to maim and destroy others whom God has equally placed here by right simply because they must eliminate others.  They have been deceived to believe that belonging to secret cults will get them connected, assure them of beautiful girls, who are other peoples daughters and automatic success in exams.  My dear friends, it is only a highly mischievous, untrained and morally deficient student that would subscribe to such lies.  What manner of student are you that membership of a secret cult will enable you to short-circuit studies?  The fact is that there is no student without studies.    

Like Jesus in the Gospel, we are called upon by our less fortunate brothers and sisters who are enduring injustice and miseries to stand up and speak for them. I am reminded here of three stories in the Bible where the intervention of others in the face of injustice saved some would be victims. I recall in the first place the story of the beautiful woman Sussanna, the wife of Joachim in the Book of Daniel Chapter 13. Two lustful and wicked old men were selected as judges but they decided to abuse such office. They tried to blackmail Susanna because she refused to co-operate and yield to their adulterous desires. They concocted their plans and hell bound to destroy her. Susanna, as the poor always do chose to put her trust in God. The elders gave false evidence against her, and she was condemned to death, without hearing her side of the story.

Thank God for the spirit of Daniel, the wisdom of his judgement brought freedom to the poor woman and condemnation for the lustful old men. How many Daniels can we find today? If Daniel had not cried out in the face of injustice there would not have been a retrial, which exposed those treacherous old men.

The second story is that of Joseph, the dreamer, also in the Old Testament. The truth sometimes appears to remain hidden. Someday, however, it will come out. Joseph, as you very well know, was jailed on the false allegation of Portiphar's wife. She wanted to seduce him, but he would not allow himself to be dragged into sin. Joseph was willing to suffer so as to keep the high trust of his master. At God's time, however, Joseph was vindicated and his position elevated.

Remember also the story of the woman who was caught in adultery who was dragged before our Lord, Himself. As he wrote on the sand, Jesus asked a simple question that those without sin should cast the first stone. We are told that her accusers all disappeared one by one. I often thank God for this daughter of Eve as I often wonder what sentence she would have received if she were brought to us in today's Nigeria to give the sentence. Even with our Lord's example, would we not have been asking the accusers how dead they wanted the woman to be rather than trying to see justice done?. Would many of us not have proceeded and aimed stones at the places where deadly wounds would be inflicted on the woman, instead of asking for God's mercy for our own sins?. The accusers had an opportunity to haul stones on a sinner but they forgot that they too were guilty of even those public sins other people know about.  What happened to the man?

My dear friends, it is a great pity that many of us do not only keep quiet in the face of pervasive injustice but we also think that keeping sealed lips means charity to those in authority or those in power while speaking up is lack of appreciation of the positive points in leadership. When we look at the matter seriously however, keeping sealed lips is in reality a disservice to those in authority, it is a deliberate attempt to hide from them the truth until their consciences become further scared and worse tactics adopted. To speak the truth in the face of injustice is a service to humanity and helps to protect against an impending danger. 

Speaking in the face of injustice reminds me of the saying of one great philosopher Dante who once said that the hottest place in hell was reserved for those who, in the face of injustice, remain neutral. How many of us are always preparing hell for ourselves? Each and every one of us is challenged to react to injustice wherever it is found. We should not applaud or oppose what we do not know, simply because it is the majority opinion. Rather, we should make every effort to understand the issues at hand before we support or oppose them. Some of us mortgage our consciences and follow other people without knowing the details or reasons for the coloured picture one has of another person. Watch out when someone comes with gossips against another.

Let us not forget the immortal experience of one Rev Martin Noller during the Nazi era. This was the time when there was a great massacre of the Jews in Germany. Rev Noller said that the Germans came for the communists so I did not speak up because I was not a communist. They came for trade unionists, and I did not speak up because I was not a trade unionist. They came for Jews, and I did not speak up, because I was not a Jew. Then they came for Catholics, and I did not speak up because I was a Protestant. Finally they came for me, and there was no body to speak for me.  

FIFTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, B

Shaking Off the Dust of Failure
Amos 7:12-15
Ephesians 1:3-14
Mark 6:7-13

Since the creation of the world, God has never ceased to make Himself present among His people. He always used the Patriarchs, Kings, Prophets, Apostles, Priests and other ministers to make His presence felt in the world. In a special way, He is also making Himself present in the world through each and every one of us whom He has sent into the world.

In the first reading, we are presented with the verbal attack on Amos by the priest at Bethel called Amaziah. Amos’ oracle indicated an impending disaster that will befall the King and the people in the form of exile due to their dissociation from God. Amaziah who was more of a political priest accosted the prophet Amos and asked him to leave the land of Israel to Judah and earn his bread as a prophet there.

From the scenario, it is clear that religion at that moment was a commercial and political enterprise. Amaziah’s position as the (chief) priest at Bethel could have been at the instance of the political scheme of king Jeroboam who must have brought in people who will tell him what he wanted to hear. One can then imagine what the prophecy of Amos portends. From Amaziah we understand that Bethel (house of God; the site of Jacob’s dream (Gen.28:18-19)) was now seen as a royal sanctuary and national temple. The people at the time were seeing the worship of God as a mere religious observance not as a spiritual activity.

There is then a difference between religious observance and spiritual practice. It is in this sense that one can be religious without being spiritual. Religious observance includes, though not restricted to conventions like strict attention to time, context, rubrics, and other religious rituals that are external to the religion in question. On the other hand worship as a spiritual activity has to do with an inner disposition which connects the worshipper with the object of worship (Jn. 4:24). In spiritual worship of God we talk about faith, hope and love (1 Cor. 13:13).

In the gospel reading (Mk. 6:7-13), Jesus made himself more present among the people by sending his twelve apostles to them. Today, he has also sent you to the world as he did to the twelve. Your mandate remains the same with that of the twelve to evangelize the people and make things better for them but through various approaches as medical doctors, engineers, teachers, lawyers, priests, etc. He has given you the authority over every obstacle and has charged you with the responsibility of making the world a better place.
So how do you fulfill your mission to the world? How have you made the presence of Christ who has sent you into the world felt among His people? How have you contributed to the alleviation of people’s problems and made the world a better place to live? Do you work in a manner that depicts your collaboration to work for the good of humanity after the mind of Christ who went about doing good? Have you preached the Good News through your life style?

As a student, farmer, health worker, trader, priest, religious, seminarian, etc, what motivates your mission among the people of God? Are you like Amaziah in the first reading (Amos 7:12-15) who thinks that our mission or vocation is solely to earn money? Be disposed like Amos to see your work or vocation as a calling from God and so be disposed to co-operate with His divine will for humanity.

Beloved friends, no matter how difficult your calling or work may be or how despondent you may be, the second reading (Eph 1:3-14) assures you that God chose you to do that even before the world was made. For this reason, He chose us in Christ as His adopted sons and daughters. He gave us the free gift of His beloved through whom we receive forgiveness of sins and the riches of God’s graces. So be assured that you can always find help and grace from God through Jesus Christ when you are in need instead of taking undue advantage of your work/vocation.

The second reading reminds us of God’s graces available for us. Through these graces we all have been redeemed and we have to collaborate with these graces in helping our people appreciate and live out the Good News of salvation. The gospel reading reminds us of the missionary nature of our work. Do not expect the whole world to welcome us, let us be disposed for obstacles on the way which we shall surmount with the grace of God. Therefore, let us not be afraid. Let us not entertain the people but preach repentance. Let us also remember to keep behind all useless anxieties, worries and possessions that would distract us so that at the end, we come back with success stories.

What message do we take home this Sunday? 1) Just like Amos is chosen and sent to confront the idolatry of the people of Israel, you and I are chosen and sent to confront today’s worship of false gods. 2) Just as Jesus sends his apostles to proclaim repentance and to heal the sick, Jesus sends us into our communities to proclaim God’s  message of mercy, compassion and healing. 3) Material possessions should never become an obstacle to proclaiming the Gospel, because Christ who sends us will provide. In other words as disciples of Christ and minister in various services in the Church, we need to “travel light”; without material or spiritual baggage!

We must also realize that those who are being sent by Jesus today to preach are no longer the Twelve because they were gone already and have their mission accomplished. You know, it is the mission of the Church to preach. All of us are baptized as Catholic Christians and became members of this Church. Some are ordained to preach like us, priests, and others are not, but all of us, baptized Christians, are called to preach the gospel. And none of us is excused. Each one of us is commissioned to a ministry of love and justice by virtue of our baptism. Let us listen to these words of Vatican II’s Decree on the Laity: “Incorporated into Christ’s Mystical Body through baptism and strengthened by the power of the Holy through confirmation, the laity are assigned to the apostolate by the Lord Himself,” (no. 3). So what ever the kind of life, or profession or occupation you have now, you are sent out “to preach, teach, heal and witness to the Good news,” in short, you are sent to evangelize.

Today God is looking for Christians who are quiet enough to get the message from Him, brave enough to spread it and honest enough to live it. Please let us not hide ourselves because God, no matter how we hide ourselves from Him, sees us and finds us. Let us not play hide and seek. It is our vocation to preach, that is, to know Christ and to be like Him; to love Him and to love those who do not know Him and offer them the fruits of redemption.

Today we are called upon to receive the word of truth in our lives and not to replicate Amaziah. We are called upon to worship God in spirit and not like a mere religious obligation. We are called upon to reflect the missionary script given by our Lord Jesus to the apostles. Among other things we should know that if God has called, chosen and sent us, He will also provide for us. Thus there will be no need for struggling over material remunerations; they are distractions from the main purpose of our ministry and vocation as Christians.

There is also need to fight the Amaziah in us. This Amaziah comes in various shapes and shades. It stands for jealousy which is one of the viral attacks we face in our vocation. We should be able to accept the fact that we are differently gifted and should also appreciate and encourage one another. Amaziah also stands for materialism that is rocking the foundation of our ministry. Many are today more conscious of what will come to them than what will be gainful in the life of the people they minister to. This is the trend of our day and age where men of God live in mansions and drive exotic cars while the members of the church may not afford one modest meal. Yet they are persuaded to donate their last saving with the promise that God will make them suddenly rich. There is need for us to exterminate those destructive Amaziahs of selfishness and materialism in the ministry and incorporate the Amos that represents true mission as set out by our Lord Jesus Christ.

Fourteenth Sunday of the Year B

Ezekiel 2:2-5;
2 Cor 12:7-10
Mark 6:1-6

Mission and Challenges of a Prophet

 The Bible readings of today speak of the challenges that face a true prophet. First of  all a true prophet does not send himself. He is sent by God. He does not speak on his behalf but on behalf of the one who sent.  He or she is brave, courageous, truthful, and remains the conscience of his or her society, people and next door neighbor. Secondly, a prophet is human, and could even be weak in eloquence and stature.  Besides human weaknesses, he could be rejected by those he, or she is sent to evangelize. Thirdly, there may be many other forms of hardships and sufferings, a prophet must have to endure in the course of fulfilling his or her ministry.

In the case Ezekiel’s ministry captured in today’s first reading, he was sent as a human prophet to preach to the rebellious Israelites.  His prophetic humanity is made clear repeatedly in the entire book of Ezekiel where he is constantly addressed by God, as ‘the son of man” or “mortal,” about 93 times. That Ezekiel knew that he was human, mortal, son of man, imperfect helped him relied totally on the grace of God in his prophecy of hope and change of heart to the exiled community of Israel in Babylon.

In the Gospel reading (Mark 6:1-6) , Jesus also called himself a prophet. Having been insulted and rejected in his home town of Nazareth, Jesus said to himself, “a prophet is not without honor except in his native place among his own kin and his own house.” By calling himself a prophet Jesus recognizes his father who sent him to do his will: baptize the unbaptized, forgive sinners, teach courageously in the synagogue and healed the sick without charge. By calling himself a prophet,  in the likes of Jeremiah, Ezekiel and other Israel’s prophet, Jesus recognizes that human honor was immaterial to the mission that his father had sent him. In spite of his  hardships that span through the garden of Gethsameni and via delorosa and even to the cross(which we relived this afternoon in the Holy Land),  the spirit of the Lord was upon him (Luke 4:18), as he walked his way heroically to the calvary!

Saint Paul  in his mission to the Church in Corinth understood these challenges. In the 2nd reading Paul says, “a thorn in the flesh was given to me, to keep me from been too elated. Three times I begged the Lord about this, that it might leave me, but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” Throughout his missionary journeys, Paul, like Ezekiel, and Christ endured insults, hardships, rejections, persecutions, constraints and dishonor, for the sake of Christ.

How many of us today in our various places of ministries first of all would be humble to recognize that we are human,  weak and vunerable? How many realize that they are mere messengers, mortals, sons and daughters of men, like the prophet Ezekiel, or instruments in God’s hands?  Do dishonors, insults, persecutions and hardships, challenges stop us from doing  the good that must be done (love our neighbors,  be charitable and forgiving), or from  preaching the gospel that needs be preached?

Taking Ezekiel, Saint Paul and Christ our prophets, as our prophetic models of depature, may we recognize that there is that hidden divine strength in every seeming human weakness and dishonor we may face in the course of doing good,  evangelizing, or in the course of being faithfully and truly prophetic to our neighbors.

Jesus came to Nazareth no longer as a mere citizen of the town, but as the messiah with power and authority. He came to the familiar ground with quite unfamiliar arsenals. He came not as a wood carpenter, but as a spiritual carpenter; he did not come to repair broken tables, chairs and farm implements, he rather came to repair the lives of the people. He came as a fulfilment of the prophecy of Ezekiel in the First Reading (2:2-5) which promises the sending of a prophet among the rebels who turned against God. He came not only as Jesus (a common name at the time), but also as the Christ (the anointed one, a name that is peculiar). Our Lord Jesus Christ visited not as a member of the community but as its master, teacher and Lord. The rejection of Jesus today at his home town shows us the tension between familiarity and our faith practice. The rejection of Jesus has continued in our day and age though occurring in different ways and through various “Nazareths”.

Some have grown too familiar with the House of God that we often fail to remember the value and sacredness the House of God. Some of us have grown so familiar with our churches that we don’t mind making noise and engaging in gossips while the liturgy is going on. We have become so conversant with our churches that we don’t mind making and receiving calls, sending and receiving text messages while worship is going on.

Furthermore, some questions need to be answered: “Do we go to Church as a faith practice or as a mere familiar practice?” “Do we approach the sacraments as a faith practice of as a conventionally familiar practice?” Do we connect to the word of God in faith or as a familiar routine?”  We need to understand and underline the fact that our Lord was unable to do more works in Nazareth because of their lack of faith. The same experience is valid in our day and age. Jesus is ready to do more for you but the quality of your faith can make him do less or none at all. There is need for us to move away from Nazareth.

Nazareth here stands for doubt and faithlessness in God which gives rise to rejection of Jesus Christ. Nazareth here also stands for our inattention to God’s unlimited power in any circumstance in our lives. In Nazareth we will fail to see beyond the physical familiar grounds, in Nazareth we can only see Jesus as the mere carpenter of woods and not the spiritual carpenter of our souls.  The Nazareth in your life may be as mind boggling and as weakening as the cross St. Paul spoke about in the Second Reading of today (2 Cor.12:7-10). Often God may allows us like St. Paul to go through some crucibles (some thorns in the flesh) to make us not to get too familiar with and lose sight of God’s graces. Like unto St. Paul God is also telling us that His grace will be sufficient to lead us out of that Nazareth.