Sunday Reflection with Fr Robin Gibbons - 5 August 2018

Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time -

Jesus answered and said to them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent."
"For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world." (Jn 6:29.33)

How do we distinguish what is truthful reporting amidst the maelstrom of media noise, coming from all sorts of places, Twitter, Facebook, newspapers, TV etc. - all crowding out and distorting the various methods of human communication? Discerning people, trained in sifting out accurate and truthful facts, are able to work out what is simply sensationalism, distorted and biased reporting, as well as the court of personal opinion. But it is a huge problem given the dangerous populism of terms such as 'fake news' and the media as 'enemy of the people'. To follow that route is dangerous indeed.

Those of us who are Christians bear the Cross of 'responsibility' for what we say and do, Jesus himself warns about us giving scandal to others or worse still leading others astray. We are all guilty of doing so at times, to be a person who is truthful and honourable is not a given, we have to be taught and learn the ways of righteousness. It demands from us a daily response to that persistent call of the Gospel, 'Repent and believe in the Good News',

`This week the blogosphere and' twitterati' have been buzzing with comments about the Pope's approach to changing the Churches teaching on Capital Punishment. Quite frankly many of them have been in themselves scandalous, attacking the Pope openly, without, quite obviously knowing all the facts. There are critical and frankly nasty demands that their 'truth' be restored and the Magisterium (which of course is a red herring because they never explain what that means) upheld.

It is truly very disturbing to see how the issue of Capital Punishment has become for some a first order tenet of faith. In a country that has long abolished its use, I for one hope we never bring it back, I cannot see what this has to do with my own faith, but perhaps John Henry Newman might place us back on course, warning us: "We can believe what we choose. We are answerable for what we choose to believe". Faith is not a series of choices; it is an encounter with the mystery of Christ amongst us. It is not about certainty in this world, rather hope and trust in the one who gives us life.

Maybe we all need to take a break! As Newman also reminds us: 'To live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often'. It is also, as the Gospel of John tells us, about belief in Jesus the Christ. To believe in Him is to take a big risk that the comfortable world which we create for ourselves may actually change and transform before us, challenge us with looking to our own hearts and motivations, to ask of the Holy Spirit the gift of compassionate and merciful love.

Jesus tells us he is the bread of life! Ask yourself this question, what does that food mean for me? I hope you will partly answer with an image of nourishment and growth. If we truly accept the gift of Christ's bread, not only in the Eucharist but in his nourishing word and encounter with his body, the People of God, then there is no option but to have the humility of being an adolescent in the faith, reminding ourselves we are not yet fully grown in Christ, that we do not have the totality of truth, but we have Jesus who is the Truth, the Way and the `Life. May the bread of life, the manna of heaven, strengthen us and form us in truth so we may live out, not the gloomy news, but the Good News of salvation!

Lectio Divina

John Henry Newman

"Let us put ourselves into His hands, and not be startled though He leads us by a strange way, a mirabilis via, as the Church speaks. Let us be sure He will lead us right, that He will bring us to that which is, not indeed what we think best, nor what is best for another, but what is best for us."

Alexander Schmemann.
From The Eucharist: Sacrament of the Kingdom.

"The Purpose of the Eucharist lies not in the change of the bread and wine, but in the partaking of Christ, who has become our food, our life, the manifestation of the Church as the body of Christ'.

Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini
From address to the 43rd Plenary Assembly of the Italian Bishops' Conference in May 1997

"In these weeks of encounter, reading, listening and discussions, I have rediscovered a great truth, understood and completed with new knowledge - I need Jesus. He is the way for me, truth, life, bread and light. Without him I would be lost, in him and through him my life gains infinite worth, my daily actions become jewels of mysterious eternal beauty. What is so beautiful about it is that it comes to me spontaneously from the heart, thanks to your thoughts, Eminence, as if this truth had been slumbering, only waiting to be awoken. Now I know that the truths of my religion are not speculations of my intellect, but realities which are closely linked to my heart, my human nature. Now I no longer feel alone, I know that Jesus is with me, I know that I can find in Holy Scripture, in the magisterium of the Church, answers to my deepest needs"