Preaching Practice: 4th Sunday of Lent. YR B.

Coming thick and fast these preaching practice sessions! Here's the first draft for the 4th Sunday of Lent, Gospel Yr B. Should last for about 6 mins tops.

The 4th Sunday of Lent is a time to refresh ourselves a little. But my friends, in reality, there is little refreshment for those who must experience the sharpest end of the Government’s austerity measures. Today like many days, is a perpetual Lent for them, with no mid point of rejoicing or even a hopeful end in site.

Two years ago the Bishops published a document called Choosing the Common Good to present key themes in Catholic Social Teaching. The Bishops argue that social issues cannot be left only to Government to solve, but are the responsibility of all. The document was named after the foundational principle in CST known as the Common Good. By this principle is meant “the sum total of social conditions, which allow people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their fulfilment more fully and more easily’. Key elements are the equal dignity of all persons and the idea of solidarity, that sense that we are responsible for each other, that we really are, all in it together. That’s why we pray ‘Our Father’ and not ‘My Father.’ And this is why the inequalities of wealth in our society are an abomination and an affront to the Almighty God and Father of us all. What is his concern, must be ours.

It is important to highlight the Common Good at this time because, as Jesus says in the Gospel , “though the light has come into the world men have shown that they prefer darkness to the light because their deeds were evil.“

As Christians we must continually be on our watch that we have not become soft and part of 'the world,’ contaminated by its poisonous values, based on wealth, success at the expense of others, fame and celebrity. We must be on our guard that we have not become part of the darkness or live in a compromised hinterland of shadows, where we can get by, passively accepting the lies peddled about the poor, and not doing anything to resist the rhetoric or alleviate their suffering.

Only a couple of weeks ago a story appeared that did not seem to produce much outrage. It was a story released on the same day that the Occupy camp outside St Paul’s Cathedral was cleared, and concerned Barclays Bank. Barclays was ordered by the Treasury to pay half-a-billion pounds in tax, which it had tried to avoid. And this was after the bank had signed a code committing them not to engage in tax avoidance. Hypocrites and robbers of the poor! Is that the Common Good my friends? Is that an exercise in solidarity? Is that an example of human dignity at its best, to attempt to cheat the taxman out of a considerable sum of money that could be used for the gain of society at large? Jesus said, “men have shown they prefer darkness to the light.”

The recent eviction of the ‘Occupy’ camp at St Paul’s cathedral provides us with a useful prompt to examine consciences on this matter of the Common Good, especially during the Lenten season, to ensure that unwittingly we do not prefer the dark to the light or facilitate its spread. It is worthy of note that the eviction took place at night, the hours of darkness.

Archbishop Vincent has previously said that the protest had given a voice to concerns that the financial burden of attempts to tackle the deficit was being, "very unfairly felt and distributed". As an example of the urgency of the situation, in the UK, 4 million children - one in three - are currently living in poverty, one of the highest rates in the industrialised world. This is a shocking figure given the wealth of our nation and will be made worse, by the burden of stringent austerity measures.

At its core ‘Occupy’ was about fundamental matters of social justice, about the Common Good - a logical extension of the preaching of the Gospel. It’s message was clear: the system of governance in this country is loaded against the poor and stacked in the interests of the rich. This is not the politics of envy or class warfare my friends, but a simple critique from the perspective of the Common Good.

The Gospel message is subversive. The living Gospel of Jesus Christ takes this whole crazy- mad sinful world, so contrary to the will of the Father in its inequalities of wealth and opportunity, and turns it upside down putting it the right way up!

Therefore we, as Christ’s disciples should be less accepting of the inequalities that exist in society, especially if we are amongst the few who remain reasonably comfortable. That means taking a more questioning stance with the elites in this country, whether they are political, financial or other. We need to consider becoming more assertive in the public sphere as champions of the Common Good in bold and appropriate ways.

As Christians, let our guiding principle and measure for how society treats the poor, for whom God has a preference, always be the Common Good, so that we show we prefer the light to the darkness and that it is plainly seen that what we do is done in God.

Preaching practice: Homily Sunday Wk 7 Ordinary Time Yr B. What do you think?

We've got preaching workshops at our weekend Residential coming up. Here's my five minutes worth for the 7th Sunday of Ordinary Time Year B. Let me know what you think if you were on the pew-end...






As we approach Lent our liturgical prayer starts to take on a more penitential tone, in fitting with the liturgical season we are to enter on Ash Wednesday. Lent, is a time when we intensify our efforts at prayer, fasting and almsgiving to the poor. It is very easy to become somewhat sombre at the start of it and indeed for the duration of it. However, the readings we have heard this morning are filled with hope for our continuing liberation from the effects of sin.

Sin, those occasions of varying culpability when we fall short in our love of God and neighbour and at its most serious put ourselves at risk of eternal damnation. Rigthly we should despise our sins and resist the true sickness that is sin, present in us, but also present in the corrupt ways of the world. What is the economic crisis and all the other turmoil, hatred, rioting and unrest throughout the world, other than sin, spray-painted throughout the world by Satan?

But hear that collective message of hope in the readings, “No need to recall the past, I it is, who must blot out everything and not remember your sins.” ‘Lord, have mercy on me, heal my soul for I have sinned against you.’”However many the promises God made, the Yes to them all is in Jesus.”, “My child, your sins are forgiven.”

The resounding victory over sin and its paralysing effects is the loving forgiveness of God our Father, through his Son, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the true liberator, the only one who can free us from the paralysis of our personal sin and liberate this sinful world.

The Gospel reading demonstrates that Jesus did not come to fix our legs or other physical ailments. He came primarily to deal with root causes, not symptoms. Sin had contaminated the human race from the outset of its origin. This turning away from God is far more debilitating and deadly than physical pain and suffering.

Jesus came to bring us the healing of our relationship with God our Father through the forgiveness of our sins.

Notice that Jesus first forgives the paralytic man’s sins and then heals him of his paralysis. He heals him out of love, but also to demonstrate to the cynical scribes that truly he ( as only God can) can also forgive sin. A demonstration of his divine power.

The condition of the paralytic represents our spiritual condition, afflicted as we are with the contagion of sin, spiritually paralysed. If we examine our consciences at the end of any day we will surely recognise how constrained we are in rejecting evil decisively, failing to love God and our neighbour, whether family, friends, co-workers or others. Consequently this condition affects our sense of joy in living the Life in the Spirit. The condition gives rise to the sinful acts that we do.

We need the loving medicine of forgiveness that only Jesus Christ can give.

All the self-help books in the world are but dust in comparison to the living water of forgiveness that Jesus supplies.

Jesus is present to us in word and deed in the sacraments, just as much as he was in that crowded house in Capernaum. In the sacraments we hear him speak to us. Feel him touch us and change us. Therefore, just like the four friends of that paralytic we have to do what we have to do to get to Jesus to be healed. To have our sins blotted out. To hear him say to us, “My child your sins are forgiven.”

Surely, knowing the deadly effects of sin we’d have to be crazy not to want this?

The sacrament of reconciliation, confession, is available here every Saturday,as the ordinary means for the forgiveness of serious sin and as a devotional practice.

Come and hear Jesus say to you, “My child your sins are forgiven..get up.. and go off home.“

Shock troops of the New Evangelization: Permanent Deacons-to-be!

Here's a fine bunch of guys, even if I say so myself! The brethren gathered together are all my classmates in the southern diocese's Permanent Diaconate Formation Programme, based at St John's seminary, Wonersh
The formation programme is affiliated with St Mary's University College, Strawberry Hill, Twickenham, for the academic element of the formation process.

Here we all are just after graduating with our foundation degrees in Pastoral Ministry. Some of us (who want further brain damage!) will go on to top up the degree to a full BA honours in Theology & Religious Studies that means that there is a Long Essay (5000 words) and a Dissertation (10000 words) to complete in the semester after ordination.

Most of us are undertaking our final appraisals on which basis the formation teams will make their recommendations to the respective bishops for ordination...or maybe not! So, if I get the Call to Orders, July 21st at Westminster Cathedral should be the date for me.

In this picture we got all types destined for ordination as Catholic Permanent Deacons this summer. The Director of Professional Affairs at the ICAEW is in there, along with a hospital doctor, a professor of law at Cambridge, a director of public health, an accountant and someone let a health and safety consultant in as well! On the ends - Dr Peter Tyler Senior Lecturer in Pastoral Theology, adding a splash of colour and Rev Ashley Beck, Dean of Studies, for our clergy formation programme.

ORA PRO NOBIS!