On Mothering - An evensong homily

 Rich though this evening’s scripture readings are, I want to draw our attention tonight to things maternal, after all one of the (many) titles of this Sunday – fourth Sunday of Lent, Laetare Sunday, Refreshment Sunday – is Mothering Sunday.

Evensong is a good time to reflect on this theme, not in the way the card shops and advertising pitches it, but to go deeper into the origins of Mothering Sunday as a thoroughly Christian practice that originates in our relationship with our mother, the Church.

Unfortunately, Mothering Sunday has been shared by the Church with the wider culture and, over time, in that culture has mutated before re-entering the host organism, the Church, in a somewhat damaging way.

Mothering Sunday cherishes and values mothers, but not with all the attendant pressure of ‘best mum in the world’ which, in my experience, makes most mothers tremble under the weight of expectation, because most mothers know moments of tired frustration, at all ages and stages in the upbringing of children.

At the same time of trumpeting ‘best mum in the world’, secular culture is finding motherhood more and more difficult.

It is hard now to say out loud that motherhood is a task only women can undertake; and to celebrate what a wonder and mystery that it is.

That in no way judges women who are not mothers, or piles pressure on women who might never be, but it is to acknowledge and thank women for the maternal gift and capacity that they have.

Now is a good time to say, thank you to those women whose vocation has been to bear children, bring them into this world and nurture them.

Those children have been born to the praise and glory of their maker, by which I mean their Father in heaven, not simply their earthly mother, and earthly father.

From this we also see, without diluting motherhood, that the whole church has a maternal character.

After all, she is the Bride of Christ, and therefore is a recipient of a gift, that is not generated by her, but that takes her to bring to fruition.

The spiritual disposition of the Christian – female and male – is to be a recipient of the gift and seed of God, and to nurture and bring that gift to birth.

The Christian birth is baptism, and the origin of Mothering Sunday was to return to the place of baptism, one’s mother church, at which one was born as a Christian.

That’s why sometimes the font, the place of baptism, is termed, ‘the womb of the Church’.

The whole church – female and male – is involved in the birthing and nurturing of new Christians, born again by water and by Spirit.

So why then is Evensong a good time to reflect on this?

First it is at Evensong that the canticle of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Magnificat is sung.

This takes us to the heart of the joy of this mother.

Mary’s Magnificat is prompted by her cousin Elizabeth’s question:

And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?  (Luke 1.43)

Mary’s joy and trust in the Lord, the giver of the gift, is unrestrained as she magnifies his presence in her life.

Magnification both expands and intensifies.

God becomes greater in her life; God becomes more intense in her life.

This is why Mary is termed Mother of the Church for she pioneers the greatness and intensity of God in the life of the Church.

It is also because at the evening hour, as the sun is about to set, that we read:

²⁶ When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” ²⁷ Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home. (John 19.26,27)

Mary is the mother of the disciple, not through biology, but through being prepared to accept and receive him.

And she in turn becomes a gift to him.

At the close of the day we might very well give thanks for the woman who carried each one of us in her womb, gave of herself to feed and nurture us and continues to share our lives.

May we now make our prayer, meditating on the Mother who stood patiently at the Cross of her Son using the words of the Stabat Mater hymn:

 

At the Cross her station keeping,

stood the mournful Mother weeping,

close to her Son to the last.

 

Through her heart, His sorrow sharing,

all His bitter anguish bearing,

now at length the sword has passed.

 

O how sad and sore distressed

was that Mother, highly blest,

of the sole-begotten One.

 

Christ above in torment hangs,

she beneath beholds the pangs

of her dying glorious Son.

 

Is there one who would not weep,

whelmed in miseries so deep,

Christ’s dear Mother to behold?

 

Can the human heart refrain

from partaking in her pain,

in that Mother’s pain untold?

 

Translation by Edward Caswall, Lyra Catholica (1849)

 

We have eyes: can we see?

 1 Samuel 16:1b, 6-7, 10-13a David is anointed king of Israel

Ephesians 5:8-14 ‘Arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.’

John 9:1, 6-9, 13-17, 34-38 ‘He went and washed and received his sight.’

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Today’s gospel is a beautiful and powerful passage of the man born blind whose sight is restored.

It’s part of a longer passage – John 9.1-41 - with more rich detail within it.

This morning let’s focus on this restoration of sight, what it meant for that man, and apply this to how we see, or fail to see, and what this looks like in our lives.

First let’s draw out some intriguing and striking details.

Jesus’ action of taking dust and mixing it with saliva to make mud: what’s going on there?

It alludes to Adam being created from the dust of the ground, Jesus was demonstrating that He is the same God who created humanity in the beginning, and now he is performing in this man’s life a new creative act.

And the saliva? This was thought, in the time of Jesus, to have healing properties.

That’s not so bonkers if you think that if you cut your finger, for example, you instinctively put it to your mouth and suck it

The pool of Siloam, which means ‘sent’.

There are two dimensions to this man’s healing: a physical one, that’s why mud and washing in the waters is involved and a spiritual one the man is ‘sent’ to the pool and then sent from there as an eye-witness, excuse the pun, of what Jesus had done for him, whih man

So for us then this is about Christ’s capacity to heal and restore the body and also to give us spiritual sight too.

And this sight and vision of God is revealed at the pool of baptism, from which we too are sent to be witnesses to the goodness of God.

This gospel reading is, in one sense, as meditation on one of the opening verses of St John’s Gospel: ‘And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.’ (John 1.14)

This is what you could call embodied spiritual seeing.

This theme of seeing, or as the Gospels often put it, ‘beholding’ is really important: ‘Behold – see – the Lamb of God’.

Thoams says until I see the marks in his hands…

Christianity is not just spiritual it’s physical too with Thomas’; seeing is his touching and placing his hands in those sacred wounds.

We live in a world where the material, things you can touch, measure and evaluate are the things given value and prominence over and above things that cannot.

The Christian life – prayer, study of the scriptures and sacramental worship – trains and forms us to see beyond what is on the surface, or just the measurable things.

I don’t know if you have come across the ‘Invisible Gorilla’ experiment?

It was a psychological experiment to explore what the researchers called ‘inattentional blindness’, i.e. not seeing something right in front of your eyes.

In the experiment participants were shown a video of two teams of people—one wearing white shirts and the other wearing black shirts—moving around and passing basketballs.

The viewers were instructed to count the number of passes made by the team wearing white shirts.

Then, about 30 seconds into the video, a person wearing a full-body gorilla suit walked into the middle of the scene, stopped, faced the camera, thumping his chest, and then walked off.

In the experiment about 50% of the participants failed to notice the gorilla!

The researchers concluded that when people are deeply focused on a difficult, attention-demanding task, they tend to experience ‘inattentional blindness,’ failing to see unexpected objects or events even when they appear directly in their line of sight.

So what are we missing?

What is our spiritual ‘inattentional blindness’?

What does the story of the man born blind whose sight is restored tell us we need to see?

The psalms and prophets Isaiah warns about idols, ‘who have eyes but cannot see’.

The man’s eyes are fully opened to who Jesus is and his power to heal.

Here’s the moment when his seeing is properly revealed:

Jesus said, ‘Do you believe in the Son of Man?’ The man born blind answered, ‘And who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?’ Jesus said to him, ‘You have seen him, and it is he who is speaking to you.’ He said, ‘Lord, I believe’, and he worshipped him.

Wow!

What vision and sight he is given, what a response!

May we, who were led to the pool of baptism, and washed in the restoring waters, continue to have the spiritual insight to see Jesus Christ as ‘our Lord and our God’.

May we see Christ in our neighbour: ‘Lord, when was it we saw you cold, hungry, naked, sick or in prison?’

And when a piece of bread, or that’s what it appears in material terms, placed on our hands, may we have the insight to see as Jesus promised, ‘for it is His Body.

On this Mothering Sunday we might also reflect that it is a wonderful thing that when a mother holds her baby in her arms and at her breast, it is the perfect distance, in terms of the child’s development and the mother’s wellbeing, for that child to see and know her mother for safety and peace.

May the Lord hold us so that we can see him and know him and, in seeing and knowing (for true knowing is insight) may we be sent in his name, so that others may behold, may see, his glory.

Amen.

Strength and Courage in Faith

 Joshua 1:1–9; Ephesians 6:10–20

This church is a proud possessor of two medieval helmets, until recently displayed in the Museum of London. They are part of funerary armour, the decoration of the tomb of a nobleman or knight to show his rank. Helmet and armour – protective clothing - are not just a thing of knights on chargers, but a feature of warfare up to our own day.

Tonight our readings lead us from the physical protection of armour, to the spiritual protection of the ‘whole armour of God’ in the spiritual battles we fight as we find strength and courage in the Lord.

And Lent is a good season to do this in, because it is a season of reflection, repentance, and renewal - it is a journey that invites us to examine our hearts, to strip away distractions, and to draw closer to God.

In our first reading from the book of Joshua the Israelites poised on the threshold of the Promised Land. Moses, their revered leader, has died, and Joshua stands before a daunting task. God’s command to Joshua is clear: ‘Be strong and courageous.’ Not once, but three times, God repeats this charge, knowing the weight of fear and uncertainty that can settle in the hearts of His people. Joshua is told, ‘Do not be frightened, or dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.’

For Joshua, courage was not merely a matter of personal resolve or bravado. It was anchored in the faithfulness of God - His promises, His presence, and His Word. Joshua is instructed to meditate on the Book of the Law day and night, to let God’s Word shape his actions and decisions. This is the foundation of true strength: a life rooted in relationship with God, nourished by His guidance, and sustained by His presence.

As we journey through Lent, we too may face challenges that shake our sense of security. Perhaps there are anxieties about the future, regrets from the past, or struggles in the present that weigh heavily on our spirits. The call to ‘be strong and courageous’ is not a demand to ignore our fears, but an invitation to trust that God is with us in every circumstance. It is an assurance that His grace empowers us to step forward, even when the way is unclear.

St Paul picks up on a similar theme, to a Church that both faces physical martyrdom and spiritual attack. He urges those early Christians to ‘be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power.’ He reminds them that their battle is not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual forces that seek to undermine faith, hope, and love. Paul’s description of the ‘armour of God’ is vivid and practical: the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit - which is the Word of God. These are not mere metaphors, but vital tools for living faithfully in a world fraught with temptation and adversity.

In Lent, the call to put on the armour of God is particularly resonant. As we fast, pray, and give, we are invited to clothe ourselves with Christ - to lay aside distractions and fix our hearts on Him. Truth protects us from deception; righteousness shields us from shame; faith defends us against doubt; salvation guards our hearts; and the Word of God equips us to stand firm. Prayer, Paul tells us, is essential - ‘pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.’ Through prayer, we draw strength from the One who has overcome the world.

The message of both Joshua and Paul is not simply to be strong, but to be strong in the Lord. As the psalm says, ‘The Lord is my strength and my salvation, whom then shall I fear’ (Psalm 27.1) Strength and courage are God’s gifts, cultivated in the soil of faith and nurtured by His Spirit. As we surrender our weaknesses and anxieties to Him, we find ourselves transformed, able to face the unknown with hope, to resist evil with conviction, and to love others with compassion.

This Lent, let us heed God’s call: Be strong and courageous. Let us meditate on His Word, arm ourselves with His truth, and pray with perseverance. Whether we stand at the edge of new beginnings or confront struggles that test our resolve, we can trust that the Lord our God is with us wherever we go. May we journey through Lent strengthened by His presence, equipped for every challenge, and inspired to be a people of faith, hope, and love.

Let us pray:

Heavenly Father, as you spoke to Joshua, encouraging him to be strong and courageous, we pray for your steadfast spirit to dwell within us. Grant us the strength to face every challenge with unwavering faith, knowing that you are with us wherever we go. As we begin this new week with its promise and challenge, clothe us with the full armour of God, so that we may stand firm against all trials and temptations. Let truth, righteousness, peace, faith, and salvation guard our hearts and minds, and may your Word be our guiding light. Help us to pray earnestly and remain watchful, trusting in your promises and walking boldly in your love. Amen.

So let us bind ourselves to the strong name of the Trinity as we pray the Grace.

The grace…

Our deepest desires

 Exodus 17:3-7 Give us water to drink

Romans 5:1-2, 5-8 Love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

John 4:5-15, 19b-26, 39a, 40-42 ‘A spring of water welling up to eternal life.’

 

‘God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us’. (Romans 5.5)

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God’s love, like water, flows abundantly, and St Paul tells us that this love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

That verse is a very good summary of where the first reading from Exodus the Gospel reading of Jesus’ encounter with the woman at the well lead us.

Both readings speak of the human desire for both physical water and drinking deeply from spiritual wellsprings.

Psalm 63 expresses it beautifully:

O God, you are my God; eagerly I seek you;

my soul is athirst for you.

My flesh also faints for you,

as in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water. (Psalm 63.1-2)

This desire for God is the deepest human thirst.

The prophet Isaiah nails it when he says, ‘drink deeply from the wells of salvation.’ (Isaiah 12:3)

That’s not what the Israelites are ready to do in the wilderness.

Yes, they are in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water; and not surprisingly they are thirsty.

But then they also make it a spiritual matter; they grumble to Moses about their thirst and even that they would rather have stayed slaves in Egypt.

That is the human condition, our flawed spiritual condition!

It’s as if we would rather drink from stagnant, brackish and even contaminated wells than the water that refreshes us at the very deepest level.

It’s when we start to rely on things that don’t truly quench our deepest thirst.

The exodus from Egypt delivered the Israelites from slavery to freedom, yet they say they would rather return than be physically thirsty.

It’s as if they drank from a firehose, as the phrase puts it.

Drinking from a firehose is a great image of having so much water that just can’t be drunk because it is coming so quickly.

The Israelites drank in the liberation God gave but lacked the spiritual insight to see what they were learning; they had the chance to learn to depend on God even in barren times, but they weren’t prepared to learn the lesson.

We do better when we sip little and often.

That itself is a good spiritual lesson in this season of Lent.

The woman at the well is ready to do that, and she is not an Israelite, she is a Samaritan, so not part of the Covenant with the God of Israel.

But the Covenant with Israel is not a fence to deny others a relationship with God, but an invitation in Christ to other people to be drawn in.

It’s like the sheep farmers of Australia who, it is said, keep their sheep close at hand not by fencing them in but by sinking wells to which the flocks are drawn.

So this woman comes to a physical well, and ends up drinking from the deepest life-giving spiritual one.

There is no firehose here.

Jesus enables her to takes sips of growth and refreshment, and she learns more about herself and she sees the value to draw others to this well: ‘come,’ she says, ‘see a man who told me all that I ever did.

She is refreshed and gets new insight about herself.

She learns what it means to say, ‘God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us’.

The Spirit of God touches the deepest needs and desires of the human heart.

What we explore with this woman, is the nature of the deepest human desire.

What will refresh and sustain when all the frippery is stripped away, passing pleasures and things we think will satisfy, that we think will save us, that we think smooth our lives?

It’s not technology; it’s not superficial relationships; it’s not food; it’s not money.

The universal human desire is to be loved; loved faithfully, unconditionally and with total commitment.

That desire to be loved is accompanied by the need for goodness, beauty and truth to help us keep our bearings.

‘God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us’.

The woman at the well, we learn from the Gospel, has not known faithful, unconditional, committed love.

It transpires that she has had five husbands; that is not a measure of unconditional, committed and faithful love.

What’s she been seeking, what is it, why is it that she doesn’t find refreshment that quenches the depths of her heart?

Christ doesn’t dwell on her past, a past marked by disordered relationships and infidelity.

Instead, in each sip by sip of his wisdom and love, she recognises in Jesus the true husband of her soul; she comes to know the love of her heavenly Father: ‘God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us’.

So, these scriptures invite us to drink afresh from the wells of salvation, of which we first sipped in baptism and that we drink in throughout our lives in a life of prayer, reading of scripture, receiving the Sacrament.

She met him at a well; we meet him at the font, and we are invited into that relationship of worship ‘in spirit and in truth’ as God’s love [is] poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

The late Pope Benedict draws this together beautifully:

Thanks to the meeting with Jesus Christ and to the gift of the Holy Spirit, the human being’s faith attains fulfilment, as a response to the fullness of God’s revelation. Each one of us can identify with the Samaritan woman: Jesus is waiting for us, especially in this Season of Lent, to speak to our hearts, to my heart. Let us pause a moment in silence, in our room or in a church or in a separate place. Let us listen to his voice which tells us “If you knew the gift of God…”. (Benedict XVI - Angelus, 27 March 2011)

Let us pray:

Lord Jesus, we desire you;

good Lord Jesus, help us to want

to desire you more and more.

Show us the Father’s love

and pour the Spirit afresh into our hearts.

Amen.

Knowing what to ask the Lord

 Matthew 20:17-28 ‘‘You do not know what you are asking.’

The Lord said, ‘You do not know what you are asking.’

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Jesus is very clear with the mother of the sons of Zebedee.

You do not know what you are asking.

For our spiritual growth… that is a really important point.

We can ask the Lord what we like, the desires of our hearts, but we also have to be aware that sometimes we do not know what we are asking.

Sometimes we ask for that which will add to our prestige in the world’s terms, and even in the eyes of the Church or fellow Christians, but if it is from our own vanity then it will not be heard, for we do not know what we are asking.

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Mothers are passionate intercessors for their children, and so they should be, but they have to know for what they are asking.

There is mother who indignantly visits her child’s school to protest at an perceived injustice against her child: he didn’t get 10 out of 10 - but it may just be because he just hadn’t worked hard enough.

We have to know what we are asking.

Less trivially, the Lord cannot fail to hear the heartfelt cry of the mother whose child has died or been killed: her cries echo that of Rachel weeping for her children, and is an act of intercession to God. (cf Jeremiah 31:15 and Matthew 2:18)

So the mother of the sons of Zebedee comes before the Lord and her posture is one of intercession, she kneels before him and makes her request.

And what is she asking?

James and John, her boys, had been on the mountain of Transfiguration.

Perhaps that’s where they got the idea of sitting one at Christ’s right hand and one at his left in the kingdom.

After all, that’s how they had seen Moses and Elijah on the holy mountain.

To be in proximity to such a vision of glory, the chance to sit at the top table of the kingdom is captivating and attractive, and what mother would not want her sons to have something of that?

She wants, like all mothers and fathers, the very best for her children; the problem is that she sees the highest good in terms of the rewards and prestige of the world.

And so much the better if that is reflected in heaven too.

So she does not know what she is asking, nor do her sons, and, so often, nor do we.

She hadn’t been listening to Jesus, and nor had her sons: do we?

She and they want glory on their terms, not Christ’s: what do you want?

Jesus describes what awaits him in Jerusalem, and it is not heading up a glorious new regime, having overcome the chief priests and scribes and the Gentile Romans, if that is what James and John thought was coming: rather it is the way of the cross.

Do you have any idea what it is to ‘drink of the cup that I am to drink?’(v22)

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There is another mother who is an intercessor, and a powerful one at that.

Forty days after the birth of her Son, the way of the cross was revealed to her: her Son would be the cause of the rising and falling of many in Israel, and a sign to be opposed: and a sword would pierce through her own soul too (Luke 2.34-35)

That she embraced, as she had in her fiat: ‘be it unto me according to thy word.’ (Luke 1.38)

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So, at the foot of the cross we find the Blessed Mother standing with the Beloved Disciple - one of them on the right and one on the left of Jesus, not in the way James and John pictured - as Mary’s Son drank the cup of suffering.

The radical openness of this Lady of Sorrows to the will of God enables her to be an intercessor for us, as surely as she always points us to Jesus and his purpose: ‘do whatever he tells you.’

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Two others were on the right and left of the cross of Jesus, two criminals, rightly condemned for their offences, as one of them confesses. (Luke 23.41)

The two criminals also hold up to us the question of how we will find a place in the kingdom, with our suffering offered up to be transformed by Christ.

Like one criminal, we can mock and deride, embittered that our efforts at earthly glory have failed, or, with the penitent thief, we can cast ourselves on the Lord’s mercy and cry, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’ (Luke 23.39,42)

That’s someone who knew what he was asking for.

In the way of Jesus there is no short cut to the glory of the kingdom, but walking the way of the cross we find it to be none other than the way to that Kingdom of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit,’ (Romans 4.17) and we hear his words, ‘truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.’ (Luke 23.43)

Seeing only Jesus

Genesis 12:1-4a The call of Abram, the father of the people of God.

2 Timothy 1:8b-10 God calls and enlightens us.

Matthew 17:1-9 ‘His face shone like the sun.’

 

‘Rise, and have no fear.’ And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one, but Jesus only.

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Today’s gospel is both glorious and tender, rich in scriptural echoes and resonances.

The glory is evident.

Having led Peter, James and John, the inner circle of the Twelve, up a high mountain Jesus is transfigured: that is to say his outer form and appearance changes from the ordinary to the extraordinary, the natural to the supernatural, the humanity of Jesus shines with his heavenly and divine light.

Peter, James and John glimpse into heaven’s light and heaven’s time.

The heavens are torn open, just as a Jesus’ baptism, and like at Jesus’ baptism the Father declares that this is his beloved Son, with whom he is well pleased: this is ‘heaven in ordinarie.’ (George Herbert)

This is heavenly time because Moses and Elijah, long dead, are also present, ‘For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday, which passes like a watch in the night,’ as the psalm reminds us. (Psalm 90.4).

The mountain signifies the touching of earth and heaven, of things mundane and things heavenly, and of our highest aspirations Godward.

The figures of Moses and Elijah speak of the first Covenant God has with his people: Moses representing the Law of the Lord and Elijah the prophets.

They flank Jesus who is the personification of the New Covenant, through whom, in the words of our second reading God, ‘abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.’ (2 Timothy 1.10)

Peter’s response is beautiful.

In suggesting making the three tents he is not being silly or naïve, he is drawing on deep scriptural echoes from the Old Testament.

Our first reading spoke of Abram, who is renamed Abraham.

The promise he is given to be a great nation is intimately associated with tents.

He was nomadic, moving on at God’s prompting, pitching his tents on the way.

It is at the oaks of Mamre (Genesis 18) that three angelic visitors come to his tent to whom he gives hospitality.

Peter sees three heavenly figures in Jesus , Moses and Elijah and wishes to offer them the hospitality of the tent as shelter.

Peter also knows that in the book of Exodus the divine glory moves with the people of Israel in a tent, also known as a tabernacle, as God moves nomadically through the wilderness with his people, a tabernacle which becomes the prototype for the Temple in Jerusalem, the place where God’s glory resides.

What Peter is learning, as we are too, is that God’s glory resides in the person of Jesus Christ, who himself tabernacles, dwells, with us his Pilgrim People: he is the fullness of divine glory; he is the Temple and the tabernacle.

So the Transfiguration of Jesus, which is portrayed in the centre of our great East Window, above the scene of the crucifixion, is about glory, the divine glory revealed in and shining through the Divine Son, Jesus Christ.

Sometimes, though, glory is too much, too overwhelming.

And that is where the tenderness of Jesus comes to us.

Peter, James and John hear the voice of the Father, unmediated, directly speaking from heaven, and they are terrified and fall on their faces.

We’re invited to reflect on our own response to God’s glory and to God’s word.

It is both beautiful and awful, in the sense of being full of awe.

This is where the notion of holy fear is important.

Sometimes we feel we cannot come near the holiness of God, surely God is too remote, too high and mighty, King of kings and Lord of lords for us to come near.

A proper response knowing our human inadequacy in the face of God is to fall, prostrate before him.

Peter, James and John have fallen to the ground in terror – they know the Old Testament accounts of the man Uzzah who died simply by touching the Ark of the Covenant. (2 Samuel 6.6–7, 1 Chronicles 13.9–10)

And yet we see, in Jesus, the divine tenderness.

He is, in the title of our recommended Lent Book this year, ‘Jesus our refuge.’

The Good Jesus, the kindly Jesus: who is beauty in all its brilliance, goodness in all its grace and truth in all its power, says ‘Rise, and have no fear.’

When you fall flat on your face – emotionally, spiritually, physically – as awestruck, or in weakness, or in fear, feel the touch of Jesus on your shoulder to stir you; hear his gentle whisper, ‘Rise. Have no fear.’

When we feel the tender touch and hear the tender voice of Jesus then, like Peter, James and John we can indeed rise and fix our eyes only on him.

One of the beautiful devotional exercises of the Church is prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, the consecrated bread of the Eucharist, which is kept in this church, like many, in a place known as the ‘tabernacle’.

Ours is in the St Nicholas Chapel, shrouded by a curtain with the light of a candle perpetually lit before it, signifying the presence and light of Christ.

There is a beautiful story of a priest known as the Curé d’Ars, St. John Maria Vianney, who went into his church and found an old farmer kneeling there in front of the tabernacle.

The priest asked him what he was doing, to which the man humbly responded, ‘Nothing, I look at Him, and He looks at me.’

That man was simply adoring the glory of the tender Lord Jesus.

We meet Jesus in the scriptures – the word of the Lord – in prayer and above all when we lift our eyes in adoration, when we see his body broken and blood outpoured, as did the disciples on the road to Emmaus.

Today, in this Eucharist we receive the fullness of the glory of God placed on our hands.

When you hear the words ‘this is my body’, ‘this is my blood’ and see the host and the chalice elevated, raised up, you yourself are on the holy mountain.

At that moment lift up your eyes, and yes, have holy fear - for you behold in bread and wine the King of kings and Lord of lords - but also know the presence of the tender Jesus, who himself was raised from the dead, and now raises and exalts you.

May we behold his glory, the glory of the transfigured, crucified, risen and ascended Lord.

And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one, but Jesus only.

 

But I say to you... Going beyond the basics

 Sirach 15.15-20 ‘He has not commanded anyone to be ungodly.’

1 Corinthians 2.6-10 ‘A wisdom God decreed before the ages for our glory.’

Matthew 5.20-22a,27-28,33-34a,37 ’It was said to those of old; but I say to you.’

 

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Today’s gospel reading is pretty punchy.

Perhaps sometimes we hear this sort of Gospel passage and wonder where the message of love and kindness is to be found, isn’t this all a bit harsh and too strong?

There are two responses to that.

First, the love, mercy and faithfulness of God pervades the whole of scripture.

Bear in mind too that these verses are part of the Sermon on the Mount which contains the Beatitudes and the gentleness of that part of the message.

Perhaps what we’re getting in these verses is ‘tough love’; not the ‘gentle parenting’ that has become all the rage.

That takes us to the second response.

Don’t mistake being loving for being unchallenging: sometimes it is more loving to challenge.

If we’re looking for the ‘all you need is love’ message, what we find here is the challenge to love in a way that is more than just avoiding doing bad things.

It’s not good enough not to murder, not to commit adultery or not to swear an oath.

The spiritual life, coming closer to the way of Jesus, is made real by taming the angry self within; by averting the lustful gaze, by stopping beating around the bush so as to speak honestly.

St Thomas Aquinas, the medieval priest and theologian, describes love as willing the good other, for the sake of the other.

In other words, love of my neighbour is simply for their sake, just because they are there, not because of what I can get out of them; the other person is not a product or an object, but truly a person, someone made in the image of God.

So, if a Gospel reading like today’s gets under your skin that’s good: good, because it is moving your heart.

Something really important is going on here.

The Trappist monk, Thomas Merton, writing in the 1970s, develops Thomas Aquinas’ words wrote about treating people as persons not objects. Merton says:

Love is only possible between persons as persons. That is to say, if I love you, I must love you as a person not a thing. When we love another as an object, we refuse or fail to pass over into the realm of their spiritual reality, their personal identity… We have to love them for what they are in themselves, and not for what they are to us. (Thomas Merton, The Power and Meaning of Love)

Merton suggests that being able to love others in the way Christ loves them means we are the ones who need to be transformed.

That’s when Jesus says, ‘but I say to you…’

So, when we are angry with someone we de-personalise them by making them into a problem that corrodes our hearts.

When we look lustfully on someone we are making them an object, desiring them in a way that diminishes them and corrodes our hearts.

When we swear on something other than our own integrity then we are dodging our responsibility to treat someone as a person not an object.

This flies so much in the face of the culture we see around us.

We’re fed anger, lust and deceit all the time in the media, be that legacy media or social media, in public life, in art and film.

So we’re asked to reflect:

·       What is it in me that makes me angry with so and so? What’s that doing to my heart?

·       What is it in me that makes me look lustfully at someone? Now, the answer might be, ‘isn’t that obvious’ (nudge, nudge, wink, wink) but by looking lustfully I have declared in my heart that that person is an object of my desire, not a person to be honoured.

·       What is it that gets in my way of simply saying ‘yes’ or ‘no’ and meaning it? Who am I kidding? I am just protecting myself.

Jesus is certainly setting a high bar, ‘you have heard it said…but I say to you…’

The world, I think, can agree murder is bad; perhaps the jury is out nowadays on how devastating adultery is to a wronged spouse, and certainly children of a marriage; and as for honesty, well if you can get what you need by telling some porkies, good luck to you.

‘You have heard it said’: it seems many people haven’t heard that.

And even if everyone agreed with the Law of Moses about murder, adultery, oaths and keeping your word, Jesus calls us deeper.

‘Put out into the deep’ he says to Peter elsewhere.

Take the risk to recalibrate your life; pattern your life after the one who, faced violence with strength, who treated men and women with the dignity of being persons made in God’s image and growing into God’s likeness, who spoke plainly and truthfully, even though that was not received well.

Here’s the way to the wise living St Paul talks about. Bonkers to the world rejected by the rulers of this age, but revealed in the Lord of glory by the Spirit who searches everything.

May we be schooled, as we celebrate this Eucharist, into the ways of the love of Jesus Christ fashioning our lives into his, transformed into his glory.