Sermons
November 27, 2016 - First Sunday in Advent
We have again reached the threshold of a new liturgical year. The new liturgical year begins with the time of Advent, the preparation for Christmas. It's a time of transition – from something old towards something new. Transitions are always uncertain and demanding times – we just have to look at Washington D.C. and the transition that takes place there. Times where the old things are no longer valid and where the new things are not yet known. Transitions are giving you a feeling of uncertainty, of ambiguity, of hesitation. But we are not forced to remain passive; we can make use of times of transition so that they help us on our way, so that they bear fruit for our lives and for the lives of others. Advent is one of these times – it prepares a breakthrough from darkness to light, from emptiness to life. Those coming weeks are marked by liturgies with very beautiful biblical texts. They invite us to believe in God who is the lover of life, they invite us to celebrate God's promise of life for us. The first reading we just heard from the prophet Isaiah speaks of our longing for life, for “shalom”, for this harmony between the creation and its creator. How do we prepare ourselves for Christmas? In former centuries, people knew how to fill these times of preparation with fasting, praying and good deeds. We kind of have lost this link between the big feast and the inner preparation it requires. The outer, the commercial preparation took the place of the inner preparation. And we are in danger of living what the gospel describes (Matthew 24, 37-44). We are so busy with our own plans, we are trusting in our own efforts, so that we forget our link to God that penetrates our whole life. We are no longer vigilant for God's presence in our world, in our life. The gospel speaks with strong images: the image of being abandoned, of being left behind, of being dumped, and the image of being accepted, of being invited to take part in something big that God offers us. We long to be accepted, to be taken along. And the gospel says that it is not what we do that makes us accepted and loved, but that it is our inner attitude that makes us accepted and loved by God: an attitude marked by loving attentiveness, looking for God, feeling God in our life and in the lives of others. Advent is rich with symbols that can help us to find a new direction for our lives: - the symbolism of light in the darkness of winter. This light brings us comfort and warmth, a cozy atmosphere in which we can think and reflect like in front of an open fireplace; Advent is a time of waiting or better: a time of expecting, a time where we can interrupt our routines so as to be open for the new things that may come; Advent is a time where we can ask ourselves: what does it mean for my life that God becomes one of us? This may change my life and its structures; this may change my relation to God, to others, to myself; Advent has the symbol of the way – we are invited to make ourselves on the way. To make an effort to leave our comfort zones, to leave the well-trodden ways, to try new ways, new ways towards God, towards the others, towards ourselves. Advent is an opportunity – a chance to interrupt, to try something new, to risk something. This is the message of Advent for me: we can break our routine, we can break the circles, the often-vicious circles in which we find ourselves, we can find healing of our inner enslavement and dependence – if we open ourselves for what Advent prepares: the fact that God becomes one of us. The ground on which and upon which we live may be hardened and impermeable – Advent might open it, might offer the chance that this infertile ground offers new life again – for us and for those we love.
Fr. Wolfgang Felber SJ
November 20, 2016
In most countries kings are part of history but nobody wants them back. The first settlers in America fled to the “New World” because kings persecuted them in their home country. Germans do not have fond memories of Kaiser Wilhelm, a pompous and power seeking monarch who was co-responsible for the First World War. Since their revolution the French are staunch defenders of republic rule. The British are those who still have an emotional attachment to their royal house. Should we then modernise the notion of kingship and call Jesus our President. That hardly makes sense. The readings of today’s liturgy lead us step by step into a totally different vision of what we mean when we call Jesus our king and Lord. The first reading recalls the anointing of David as king over Israel who became the greatest leader of his people. His successors proved a rather poor lot: power-hungry, oppressive men, making deadly political alliances. Most of them were also godless people, not in the least interested in the covenant with Yahweh, the God of Israel. Small wonder that the people of Israel longed for the return of the golden age of David. They dreamt of a Messiah coming from the house of David who would return Israel to its former glory. When they witnessed the extra-ordinary powers of Jesus, healing the sick, raising the dead, feeding a huge crowd of hungry people, the hope dawned that he might be the Messiah and they wanted to make him their king. But Jesus refused any kind of political kingship and went his way. It is also quite possible that Judas was motivated by a similar idea when he decided to betray Jesus. He wanted to put him in a situation where at last he was forced to use his powers and start of political liberation movement. When Jesus refused any form of violence, Judas despaired. Jesus refused to conform to people’s expectations for a new king. What kind of king then did he want to be? We find the answer in two instances of the story of his passion and death. The first moment of revelation of Jesus’ view of kingship is the confrontation with his judge: the military governor of Palestine, Pontius Pilate. He wanted to intimidate Jesus by reminding him that he has power of life and death. Jesus’ answer: You have no power at all over me, because my kingdom is not of this world. We associate kingship with power and authority, with control and domination over others. Jesus’ vision is totally different from what anybody can imagine. In the final revelation of Jesus’ kingship, we see him nailed to a cross like the worst criminal between two other convicted criminals and above his head a sign: Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews, both a cruel mockery and a profound truth. He seems totally powerless, unable even to move. And yet, in him is an incredible power, the power of love, a love so pure, so strong that remains untouched by any hatred, any cruelty, any suffering, an even by death. Jesus is the “King of love on Calvary”, as we sang in the beginning of mass. This transforming power of love and mercy changed the heart of one of the criminals who wants to become part of that kingdom of Jesus, that place where only love rules. He dies in peace in the hope of paradise. The other refuses that offers. Like the leaders of Israel wants Jesus to come down from the cross to prove his power as a political messiah. He dies in despair. Till to today people cheer political or religious Messiah-leaders who promise to bring about a better world by force and violence. Are we ready to accept a king whose only weapon is love?
Fr. Wolfgang Schonecke MAfr
November 6, 2016
Do you see the link between the first reading from the Old Testament and the gospel? It is evidently the fact that the two readings speak of "seven brothers". But there is a second aspect: the authors of both readings belief in an afterlife. As Christians, we believe in a life beyond this one - and we often presume that all the biblical authors did also. Yes, our Christian authors do – of course they do as they have experienced the risen Jesus. But only a few of the writers of the Hebrew Scriptures, of the Old Testament do believe in an afterlife. Such a concept doesn’t enter Jewish thought until a little over 100 years before Jesus’ birth. For instance, nowhere in the Torah – in the Bible's first five books – does anyone refer to an afterlife as we know it. This led Christian theologians to a somewhat bizarre idea: They said that “the gates of heaven were closed” after Adam and Eve ate from the forbidden tree. These early Christian theologians did not realize that concepts of “heaven” only evolved centuries after the two Genesis creation myths were composed. And these theologians presumed that the sacred Torah writers didn’t mention “heaven” because people couldn’t get into heaven. Then, in the century before Jesus’ birth, Pharisees began to develop a new idea: They said that those who formed a relationship with Yahweh in this life would carry and deepen that relationship into the next life. But in spite of this, a large number of Jews still maintained that this life on earth was the only life we would ever experience. And so, Jesus had little to offer to anyone who was determined to live in the past - like the Sadducees. The question of the Sadducees is logical: "In the resurrection whose wife will she be?" – the widow of seven brothers… Jesus first responds to the question of the Sadducees by assuring them that eternal life won't be an eternal extension of this life. Those who attain that existence, that eternal life, that “afterlife” "neither marry nor are given in marriage." We are dealing with something we have yet to experience in the way we will experience it. For this new experience, I found a good illustration when I prepared this homily: Just as our existence outside of the mother’s womb is dramatically different from our existence as a fetus inside the womb, so heaven will be dramatically different from this earthly existence. So, this was the first answer: eternal life won't be an eternal extension of this life. The second part of the answer: Jesus knew that the Bible of the Sadducees comprises only the Torah – the first five books of the Old Testament (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy). This is the reason Jesus argues from one of these five books. And Jesus refers to Exodus 3 - Moses encounters Yahweh in a burning bush. And he focuses on how God identifies himself as God. God says: "I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." Jesus uses a tricky, rhetorical argumentation: if those three patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are not still alive when Yahweh talks to Moses, then Yahweh would say, "I was the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" – but God says: "I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." And the scene with Moses happened 500 years after the death of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. So, this is the argumentation of Jesus: there must be a heaven if, at the time of Moses, these three pillars of Judaism continue to relate to God. Very philosophical? Maybe! But Jesus' key argument comes at the end: "God is not God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive." God's true followers continually grow in their understanding and experience of what it means to be alive in God. Jesus presumes this evolution is an essential part of faith. Jesus adds another dimension to our life in God: our dying and rising makes us one with him not only in heaven, but also now here on this earth. Jesus is "directing our hearts" in both of these experiences – in the afterlife and in the life, here on earth. We sometimes say we are expected to learn new ways to die with Jesus, to commit ourselves to others, to take up hardships. But we are also expected to constantly invent and find new ways to live with Jesus, to live the fullness of life, to live a life in abundance, to enjoy our life here on earth.
Fr. Wolfgang Felber SJ