More Than Just Memory, More Than A Memorial

There is an insight in the Mishnah (the rabbinic commentaries on the Torah from the centuries around and after Jesus' time) that it was not just the "Moses Generation" that trekked out of Egypt and across the Red Sea, but in truth every Israelite after them did so as well. The passage reads:

The tanna of the mishna further states: In each and every generation a person must view himself as though he personally left Egypt, as it is stated: “And you shall tell your son on that day, saying: It is because of this which the Lord did for me when I came forth out of Egypt” (Exodus 13:8). In every generation, each person must say: “This which the Lord did for me,” and not: “This which the Lord did for my forefathers.” The mishna continues with the text of the Haggadah. Therefore we are obligated to thank, praise, glorify, extol, exalt, honor, bless, revere, and laud the One who performed for our forefathers and for us all these miracles: He took us out from slavery to freedom, from sorrow to joy, from mourning to a Festival, from darkness to a great light, and from enslavement to redemption. And we will say before Him: Halleluya.

This is the rabbinic line of thought that animates St. Paul in today's 2nd Reading, and that he and his close associate, St. Luke, will develop further in the Christian idea of an anamnēsis, which translates the Hebrew zikkaron— a lasting remembrance, an eternal memorial.

Click here to listen to the homily for the 3rd Sunday of Lent.

The Battle in the Desert, According to Luke

This homily is from 1st Sunday of Lent, so it's a little bit late. Luke is good at painting the big picture, and is good at foreshadowing. In the 1st Week he talked about how the Devil departed from Jesus...for a time. And then in the 2nd Week, he describes Jesus as speaking to Moses and Elijah about "the exodus that he was going to accomplish in Jerusalem." With both, Luke points our eyes toward Holy Week. 

Listen to the homily from the 1st Week of Lent.

The Hardest Things Jesus Asks

In the previous posted homily, we focused on what is the foundational Christian belief. This week the Gospel contains something more like Jesus' core Christian expectation. Or at least the one that would set his followers apart the most.

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The Foundational Statement of Christianity

It's 1st Corinthians 15:3ff, in case you're wondering. Everything else builds off that.

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1st Corinthians and the Anatomy of Christ's Body

"Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers?" No, said St. Paul, but somebody has to be. Paul's famous use of a physical human body to describe the mystical Body of Christ is the perfect metaphor for us to recognize that we need different callings within the Church, that we should judge down neither ourselves nor others for our callings, and that we should reflect on how we fit, through humility and discernment. 

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Reflecting on the "Gloria In Excelsis Deo"

January 1st is dedicated to Mary under her title of "Mother of God", but it is also the Octave Day of Christmas—the same "notes" of Christmas Day, harmonizing in a different key.

The last major section of the homily (starting at 11m 45s) may benefit from a visual aid to go along with the audio. [Click here to listen]

The usual layout of this section (in English and Latin) is as 3 couplets:

    You take away the sins of the world · Have mercy on us                       A·B

    You take away the sins of the world · Receive our prayer                      A·C

    You are seated at the right hand of the Father · Have mercy on us     D·B

But if you include the next part, the three "you alone are..." and read it as a 3x3 (like the Kyrie always was for over a thousand years, both East and West), you get something else:

    You take away the sins... · Have mercy on us · You take away the sins...

    Receive our prayer · You are seated at the right hand... · Have mercy on us

    You alone are holy one · You alone are the Lord · You alone are the most high

And this is how the Greek versions of the text lay out those first six phrases too: as 2 sets of 3, not 3 pairs of 2. (Though, admittedly the Greek text has only the first two "alone" titles— holy one and Lord.)

 

 

4th Advent Sunday: Hebrews on Christmas

This was from the 4th Sunday of Advent, but is about Christmas itself.

Play audio here.