The greatest story

Lord, let your mercy be on us

as we place our trust in you

Ps 32:22

We are part of an extraordinary story that reaches back into pre-history. At various moments in this story, events occurred that were so significant, that they were passed on, in very fine detail, to generation after generation by word of mouth. As writing developed, these stories were drawn into the written record. The reverence given these words set them aside as venerable and honourable. In time they entered the sacred canon of the Hebrew Scriptures.

The message that was imprinted on the Hebrew mind and consciousness was that God had an abiding interest in – and concern for – humanity. Their experience told them that God loved them and wanted them to be in close relationship with him. The story they recorded related humanity’s somewhat sorry attempts to maintain that relationship. But it also reminded them that whenever humanity fell short, God provided even more generously – sending the Patriarchs, kings and prophets. Then, in his own time, he sent Jesus. In Jesus, the message affirmed God’s love and the call to return to God, the call to a change of heart.

The church itself has not always done so well, and it too has had to listen and re-listen to the stories and message of its forebears. New prophets, new patriarchs and saints were sent to challenge the wayward and call it them to fidelity.

There is a point, somewhere in the future, at which we Christians anticipate that our relationship with God will be set right once and for all, where the full meaning of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection will make sense and accomplish all that was promised.

We are privileged to be the spiritual descendants of Abraham, to be sharers in God's grace, 'already been granted to us, in Christ Jesus, before the beginning of time' (2 Timothy 1:9). It is our story too. And we too are called to account for ourselves before the Lord, for our own brokenness, for our own shortcomings, for our lack or loss of commitment, for forgetfulness, for jealousy and impatience, for our desire for more of everything, for our offhanded slights of others.

Knowing the sacred stories of our faith is to be able to step into the panorama where God walks with his creatures and where we may even come to know - with the help of the Spirit - the mind of God (1 Corinthians 2:11). Read the scriptures and the call to metanoia will be overwhelming.

Our Lenten readings this week retell the call of Abraham (Genesis 12:1-4), the saving power of Jesus (Timothy 1:8-10) and the Transfiguration (Matthew 17:1-9). Psalm 32 is a most fitting response and whose beautiful and powerful antiphon, Lord let your mercy be on us, as we place our trust in you is our prayer and our plea this day. Our God is calling us home.

Peter Douglas

TOO MUCH EXCESS!

by Kevin Bates SM

Comedian and sometime quirky social commentator H G Nelson had as one of his mantras: “When too much fun is never enough”. In his own way he was taking the mickey out of a restless culture that is never satisfied with what it has. The longing for what is around the next corner shapes so much of our society and we all run the risk of taking it as a given.

The boot’s been on the other foot these past months as this restless culture has been subjected to the restlessness of nature with its own version of excess

Huge bushfires, some lasting for 174 and 204 days among many others, gave us a fearsome taste of nature’s own excess. There were lives lost, properties destroyed, communities decimated and wildlife destroyed by the unimaginable power of the raging fires.

Smoke covered Melbourne, Canberra, Sydney, Brisbane and parts in-between, causing health concerns and making life very uncomfortable even for people not involved directly in battling the fires. Nature’s excess made us all shrink in size!

Then came the longed-for rain, not in gentle showers but in the form of “catastrophic” wind and storms. It filled up our dams, flooded our neighbourhoods and disrupted our power supplies. Once again nature’s excessive force had its way with us.

While grateful for the rain, we didn’t enjoy the excessive power of nature much which rendered us powerless and out of control. Nature’s expressions of excess didn’t sit well with us. We didn’t own or control them and we were not comfortable.

In times more normal for us, we are in the driver’s seat and we are the ones who develop our own culture of excess. We think of this as good and satisfactory and sometimes with little thought for the consequences.

One woman writer whose name escapes me, recently noted that if everyone lived at the standard that she was enjoying, we would need four and a half earths.

Just as we felt overwhelmed by the fire, smoke and storms, we can well imagine how most people in the world feel when they look at our wealth and our “lifestyle” as we like to call it. Our excessive wealth creates confusion, fear, envy and a feeling of powerlessness from which there seems no escape.

Before we bash ourselves up too much about this, we can note that the world has probably always been pretty much this way.

Here are a couple of great saints from the early Church to bring our reflection to a close and to give us food for thought:

"The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry man, the coat hanging unused in your closet belongs to the man who needs it; the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the man who has no shoes, the money which you put in the bank belongs to the poor. You do wrong to everyone you could help but fail to help. St. Basil, 330-379

"Do you wish to honour the body of Christ? Do not despise him when he is naked. Do not honour him here in the church building with silks, only to neglect him outside, when he is suffering from cold and from nakedness. For he who said, 'This is my Body' is the same who said 'you saw me, a hungry man, and you did not give me to eat'. Of what use is it to load the table of Christ? Feed the hungry and then come and decorate the table. You are making a golden chalice and you do not give a cup of cold water? The Temple of your afflicted brother's body is more precious than this temple. (The church building). The Body of Christ becomes for you an altar. It is more holy than the altar of stone on which you celebrate the holy sacrifice. You are able to contemplate this altar everywhere, in the markets and in the open squares." St. John Chrysostom, 349-407

May our excess be one of love, justice and abundant grace.

Father Kevin SM

Kevin is parish priest at Holy Name of Mary Parish in Hunters Hill, NSW. He is a very well known composer, singer, retreat master and theologian.