So I send you: mission

Posted on April 7, 2015 by Friar Musings

Commentary. Meanwhile the disciples, still reeling from the events of the last three days, gather in the upper room. In Matthew 28:8, Mary Magdalene’s reaction to the encounter with Jesus was “fearful but overjoyed.” Perhaps this too is the experience of the disciples. All John tells us is that they were gathered together, hiding as it were, for fear of the Jews (v.19)

These are the disciples who scattered and fled at Jesus’ arrest, who stood at a distance from the cross, and in the case of Peter denied Jesus. These are disciples that upon seeing Jesus appear within the room would have likely experienced shame as they remembered all they had done and failed to do. Yet Jesus’ words are not words of recrimination or blame, his first resurrected words to the disciples as a group is “Peace be with you.” Continue reading →

So I send you: context

Posted on April 6, 2015 by Friar Musings

John 20:19-31 ¹⁹On the evening of that first day of the week, when the doors were locked, where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” ²⁰When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. ²¹(Jesus) said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” ²²And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the holy Spirit. ²³Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.” ²⁴Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. ²⁵So the other disciples said to him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nailmarks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.” ²⁶Now a week later his disciples were again inside and Thomas was with them. Jesus came, although the doors were locked, and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁷Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe.” ²⁸Thomas answered and said to him, “My Lord and my God!” ²⁹Jesus said to him, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” ³⁰Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of (his) disciples that are not written in this book. ³¹But these are written that you may (come to) believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through this belief you may have life in his name.

Continue reading →

An incomplete ending

Posted on April 5, 2015 by Friar Musings

This year in the cycle of liturgical years we are primarily using the Gospel of Mark for our Sunday readings. But then this particular Gospel is the shortest of the four canonical texts and so it requires “a little help” to fill in the whole of the year – especially during the long stretch of Ordinary Time between Pentecost and Advent. This year, as per normal for Year B in the cycle of readings, the 17th through the 20th Sundays or Ordinary Time is from the Gospel of John. Continue reading →

Cleansing the house: clarity

Posted on March 5, 2015 by Friar Musings

Clarity. ²¹But he was speaking about the temple of his body. ²²Therefore, when he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they came to believe the scripture and the word Jesus had spoken.

Verse 21 makes the second level of meaning of Jesus’ words is now made explicit. The Evangelist tells the reader that Jesus speaks of “the temple of his body.” Since for Judaism the Temple is the locus of God’s presence on earth, v. 21 suggests that Jesus’ body is now the locus of God. Verse 21 recalls 1:51 where the Son of Man replaces Jacob’s ladder as the locus of God’s interaction with the world. Continue reading →

Marriage and Resurrection

Posted on November 7, 2013 by Friar Musings

Salvation Has Come: Questions on Resurrection (continued)

But along the way…. Jesus makes a statement that perhaps needs a second look:

“The children of this age marry and remarry; but those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage.”

Does this mean that Christians shouldn’t get married and have children? First of all, Jesus makes a contrast between “this age” and “that age”. He has made similar distinctions earlier:

And the master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently. “For the children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light” (16:8).
He said to them, “Amen, I say to you, there is no one who has given up house or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God who will not receive (back) an overabundant return in this present age and eternal life in the age to come.” (18:29-30) Continue reading →

Who Interprets Faithfully?

Posted on November 6, 2013 by Friar Musings

Salvation Has Come: Questions on Resurrection (continued)

The Question. “Teacher, Moses wrote for us, ‘If someone’s brother dies leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother.’ ²⁹Now there were seven brothers; the first married a woman but died childless. ³⁰Then the second ³¹and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died childless. ³²Finally the woman also died. ³³Now at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had been married to her.”

The Sadducees are attempting to destroy Jesus’ credibility by raising the question of who interprets Moses faithfully, as they seek to demonstrate the alleged unreasonableness of faith in the resurrection of the dead, which Jesus shares. The starting point of the question concerns levirate marriage. Continue reading →

Sadducees and Resurrection

Posted on November 5, 2013 by Friar Musings

Salvation Has Come: Questions on Resurrection (continued)

Luke 20:28-40: ²⁷Some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection, came forward and put this question to him, ²⁸saying, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us, ‘If someone’s brother dies leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother.’ ²⁹Now there were seven brothers; the first married a woman but died childless. ³⁰Then the second ³¹and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died childless. ³²Finally the woman also died. ³³Now at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had been married to her.” ³⁴Jesus said to them, “The children of this age marry and remarry; ³⁵but those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. ³⁶They can no longer die, for they are like angels; and they are the children of God because they are the ones who will rise. ³⁷That the dead will rise even Moses made known in the passage about the bush, when he called ‘Lord’ the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; ³⁸and he is not God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive.” ³⁹Some of the scribes said in reply, “Teacher, you have answered well.” ⁴⁰And they no longer dared to ask him anything.

Commentary. In the opening verse Luke introduced the Sadducees and that they did not believe in the resurrection. Both of these ideas need some background Continue reading →

Salvation Has Come: Questions on Resurrection

Posted on November 4, 2013 by Friar Musings

Context. Last week’s gospel, the encounter with Zacchaeus, was the last personal encounter prior to Jesus’ arrival at Jerusalem. Since early in the summer Jesus has been traveling to Jerusalem (Luke 9:51) and now has finally arrived. Yet there is much that the Ordinary Time sequence passes over between the Sunday gospels Continue reading →

The Gospel of Luke – The Road to Emmaus

Posted on March 31, 2013 by Friar Musings

In Luke’ narrative there is no account of the Resurrection; there in only the empty tomb – which is not the source of faith for people in Luke’s rendering of the gospel. Rather, in Luke’s gospel it is the empty tomb and the encounter with the person of the Risen Jesus.

The empty tomb is what Jesus had said would happen “on the third day.” The event of its discovery points back to Jesus’ word. A word mostly fully realized later in the ‘breaking of the bread.”

^{Luke 24:13}Now that very day two of them were going to a village seven miles from Jerusalem called Emmaus,¹⁴and they were conversing about all the things that had occurred.¹⁵And it happened that while they were conversing and debating, Jesus himself drew near and walked with them,¹⁶but their eyes were prevented from recognizing him.¹⁷He asked them, “What are you discussing as you walk along?” They stopped, looking downcast.¹⁸One of them, named Cleopas, said to him in reply, “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know of the things that have taken place there in these days?”¹⁹And he replied to them, “What sort of things?” They said to him, “The things that happened to Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,²⁰how our chief priests and rulers both handed him over to a sentence of death and crucified him.²¹But we were hoping that he would be the one to redeem Israel; and besides all this, it is now the third day since this took place. Continue reading →

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