Sunday Reflection with Fr Robin Gibbons - 20 September 2020

Chagall Shofar

Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

The link between our first reading from Isaiah and the wonderful festival of Rosh Hashanah seems entirely apt if we immerse ourselves a little in the ancestral faith of Jesus, and so ours also. Just to fix our minds we need to remind ourselves that Rosh Hashanah means "head of the year" the Jewish New Year's Day, and is a two-day celebration marking the beginning of the Jewish High Holy Days each autumn.

The New Year inaugurates 10 days of repentance, (the Days of Awe). They lead into Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement,this festival is followed by Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles, which commemorates God protecting the Israelites as they wandered in the desert searching for the Promised Land.

So,if you and I pick up on these words of Isaiah, we shall enter our own 'days of awe' with our Jewish brothers and sisters, walking alongside them in the faith that we partly share and need to acknowledge a lot more:

* Seek the LORD while he may be found,
call upon him while he is near.
Let the wicked forsake their way,
and sinners their thoughts;
Let them turn to the LORD to find mercy;
to our God, who is generous in forgiving.'(Is 55:6,7)

I doubt if anybody amongst us does not have some sense of tiredness, maybe a despair at the recurrence of Covid 19 and the realisation that we shall never go back to what we thought as 'normal' before the outbreak. I put my neck on the line here and suggest that we clergy haven't yet taken on board the magnitude of this change, in fact most now seem to want a return to church going as it was in the beginning, but of course the virus has reminded us we are not in control and need to take heed of the scientists and medical advisors and change our present ways. In this scenario the stuff of martyrs is absolutely not those who put their (or others) lives at risk, but rather those who are conscious of the necessity of following the guidelines. Somehow we have not yet taken stock of what we are doing and what we need to do, so perhaps sharing in the feasts of our ancestors in faith may help us. We need a time to repent, really repent, we need a time to take stock of what we are doing, and we need to face up to a need for renewal at the heart of our faith lives.

As if on cue, our second reading from Philemon seems to have our present situation of weariness in mind , especially for those of us who are really struggling with the deprivations of the consolations of religion, services, community, singing, being together in worship, sacraments and so on, but also with the much deeper existential challenge of a God who hasn't appeared, as we would like, in this virus.

'I long to depart this life and be with Christ, [for] that is far better.Yet that I remain [in] the flesh is more necessary for your benefit'.(Phil 1:23,24)

We need to make these words part of this shared time, for there is far too much stress on a holiness which simply does not work. That came out in the inchoate and often ignorant rants about communion, and protection by the Holy Gifts from the consequences of not heeding the health regulations. Maybe in our 'Days of Awe' we might see as the Jewish Peoples' found in the Shoa, a new and tough insight, that we make God absent by our own deliberate banishing of God from science and rational thought, we make the evil, we let it happen, not the Most High. It's called responsibility, remaining in the flesh for other's benefit!

Jesus in the Gospel teaches us in stark terms about the absolute equality of love that God shares with each of us. We all get the same intensity, the same depth, the same 'denarius' of compassion and mercy, some, and I see myself honestly here, are those whose faith is often so lackadaisical that I miss my task, I become one of the last called into the vineyard, and yet I know now, that in enormous love the Holy One will give me the same amount of generosity as those who have been good, just and noble all their lives.

I am glad Rosh Hashanah has come now. It fits nicely with the feast of the Cross, that sign of victory over sin and death, that struggle we all face with our own destiny as children of God. Maybe we can make these words our focus this week:" Are you envious because I am generous?' Thus, the last will be first, and the first will be last." (Mt 20:15,16)

Lectio

Adom Olam

Lord Of The Üniverse
The Lord of the Universe who reigned
before anything was created.
When all was made by his will
He was acknowledged as King.
And when all shall end
He still all alone shall reign.
He was, He is,
and He shall be in glory.

And He is one, and there's no other,
to compare or join Him.
Without beginning, without end
and to Him belongs dominion and power.

And He is my G-d, my living G-d.
to Him I flee in time of grief,
and He is my miracle and my refuge,
who answers the day I shall call.

To Him I commit my spirit,

in the time of sleep and awakening,
even if my spirit leaves,
G-d is with me, I shall not fear.

Envy

"If you share secretly in the joy of someone you envy, you will be freed from your jealousy; and you will also be freed from your jealousy if you keep silent about the person you envy." + St Thalassios the Libyan, "On Love, Self-Control and Life in Accordance with the Intellect," 3.57

Fr Robin is an Eastern Rite Catholic Chaplain for Melkites in the UK. He is also an Ecumenical Canon of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. You can follow him on Twitter: @RobinGibbons2