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Sunday Reflection with Fr Robin Gibbons - 8 April 2018


Second Sunday of Easter - "In this way we know that we love the children of God when we love God and obey his commandments. For the love of God is this, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome, for whoever is begotten by God conquers the world. And the victory that conquers the world is our faith. Who [indeed] is the victor over the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?" (I Jn 5: 2-5)

Was there ever a golden age in Christianity? The passages about the early practices of the community found in the book of Acts have an idealized quality; "The community of believers was of one heart and mind, and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they had everything in common" (Acts 4:32)

They certainly reflect the teaching of Jesus about material possessions and are certainly an ideal fulfillment of the commandment to love our neighbours but difficult to live out fully.

The great Jesuit liturgist, Archimandrite Robert Taft, once wrote a helpful comment for those persons that kept on looking back to a 'golden age in worship': as he often pointed out, "the past is always instructive, never normative", for Taft as for us liturgy is part of a living tradition, handed down the ages "not as an inert treasure, but as a dynamic inner life". His quote gives me a lot of hope especially with the tensions we keep finding within Christianity today, for it brings me out of a closed space, takes me away from too much self-introspection and opens me out to the breath and wind of the Holy Spirit.

This is part of our Easter vocation, to get out and proclaim the mercy and love of God through Christ NOW! This is what we discover in John's story of Thomas, frightened, hidden closed apostles, afraid of what is to come, when suddenly, breaking down the barriers of space and time, Jesus comes amongst them, not to console and comfort but to enliven "[Jesus] said to them again,l "Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you." (Jn 20:21). This peace is a dynamic gift, filling us with the Spirit so that we may move out of our narrow horizons and live out our faith confident in the victory of Christ, putting our trust in him.

That's why I find Pope Francis' ministry a great, but refreshing challenge for all Christians (not just Catholics), because as Robert Taft's quote reminds us, the Church is not a museum piece but a living community with responsibility not only for each other but for all living creatures and our little blue planet. What we need to do more of is build up the 'quality of mercy', that is by loving God and the children of God.

Lectio, The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene I [The quality of mercy is not strained] William Shakespeare, 1564 - 1616

The quality of mercy is not strained; It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes: 'T is mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown: His sceptre shows the force of temporal power, The attribute to awe and majesty, Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings; But mercy is above this sceptred sway; It is enthronèd in the hearts of kings, It is an attribute to God himself; And earthly power doth then show likest God's When mercy seasons justice.

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