Archive for January, 2006
Jesus has a wild streak – unruly and disturbing – and he seems to bring it out all about him. Especially when people are gathered for prayer.
I imagine every synagogue, every church, every gathering has its own hidden demons. I think we like them that way – hidden, silent, acceptable.
There are things we cannot talk about, issues that insist on silence, invisible line we won’t cross. And we limp along respectably because we couldn’t cope with the fire and the thunderstorm that might erupt if we did. It’s a compromise. A peaceful compromise Jesus disturbs. But look who actually breaks the silence! It takes an unclean spirit to speak for us – and what does it say? – ‘are you going to destroy us?’ The demon has more integrity than the congregation does – it tells it how it is – it sees the threat – the Holy One of God is here, here, and the silence cannot hold any longer – our hidden pact with silence is exposed and our dirty secrets are shrieking in our midst.
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January 29th, 2006
Here’s the photo to accompany my most recent homily. Click to see it full size.
January 26th, 2006
He might have blinding lights and inaudible voices to bring him to his knees but I have something Paul doesn’t have—a photograph of my conversion.Photo might follow if I can get the scanner to work! Here it is, just after dawn, in Venice, the summer of 1980, waiting to get into the Youth Hostel. I was desperate, at my lowest, loneliest ebb, an ardent atheist, sick to the stomach, feeling utterly alone in an empty universe, not seeing a way to get through the day. I knew I had to take the shot. A few minutes later I was sitting on cold marble at the back of a church, emptying from its morning mass, praying, turning to a God I didn’t believe in, for I’m not sure what… help surely, hope maybe, peace? I was undone when I found all three.
Now of course, once I was feeling better I forgot all about the embarrassing lapse and got on with the day, with life. And that might have been that, were it not for the photograph and the next ebbing of the inner tide, and the one after that…
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January 26th, 2006
Turbulent Cleric has a post that echoes some of the sentiments in the discussion of my previous post.
January 22nd, 2006
Channel 4 has recently screened a two-part documentary by Professor Richard Dawkins vigorously making his case for the irrational and pernicious nature of religion. Judging by the reviews in UK national newspapers (e.g., Guardian) even sympathetic critics considered Dawkins’ style and argument to be over the top.
The British Jesuits’ web page has a couple of responses by two Jesuit philosophers, Gerard Hughes of Campion Hall, Oxford University and Louis Caruana of Heythrop College, University of London.
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January 21st, 2006
George Bush is on the phone to Tony Blair — I wish I could do the accents: “Tony you wanted an exit strategy, we got an exit strategy. Forget all the democracy bullshit and rebuilding crap – what say we just duke it out mano a mano. One of them and one of us, hand to hand, clean fight, winner takes all. Work wonders for the budget deficit. Get the boys home early. Look good in the approval ratings. And think of what we could charge for the TV rights! Fight of the minell… fight of the milemiu … century.”
“George that’s a great idea. Wonderful! Trust you to come up with something so super. But who will we choose? We’d need the best. I can ask the SAS…”
“Tone, don’t you bother your pretty little head over it. I’ve got just the man.”
So the day comes and the world is watching – satellite, cable, internet (I’m afraid BBC lost out to Sky). Helicopters circle. The sun is at its height. Out steps the allied champion … trained in every martial art and killing technique, muscles on muscles, a dark look in his eyes and a swagger in his gait.
And no one to meet him. No opponent. Because of course it’s a fix, a foregone conclusion, who can stand against Sergeant Goliath and the world of power behind him. The band plays.
It’s the same the next day – the TV audience even larger, the marching bands louder, the hype at a fever pitch. Out steps Goliath, gleaming. No one to face him. No matter how much he taunts and insults the manhood of Iraq.
The pattern repeats itself … another day, another week, into another month. Until Day 40: the last chance. The audience, which had gotten bored and turned to Desperate Housewives, is back in force. This is the day. Out steps Goliath, from the security cordon bristling with guns. There’s George on one side, Tony on the other, dwarfed, exultant, holy in their military fatigues. Suddenly between them the hero is on his knees, then on his face. George and Tony gobsmacked. A hunk of rubble lying there, tossed by some scrawny Iraqi girl. The cameras even missed it.
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In only a few chapters of Mark, Jesus has gone from hero mobbed by adoring crowds to wanted man with a tongue too sharp for his own good. Mark asks the question of power. Who holds it? And how far will it go in its own defence? But above all – how weak do you have to be to defeat it?
January 19th, 2006
I always get tripped up, this being the year of Mark’s gospel, when John sticks his nose in like today. Just as I’m beginning to get my head round Mark’s Jesus, John’s version pops up—and they could hardly be more different.
Next Sunday we’ll have Mark’s version of today’s events—the calling of disciples—and it’s all peremptory demand and prompt response. He says ‘follow’—right out of the blue—and, God help them, they do. And we wonder what kind of a person could command that kind of response, what kind of charisma he must have had? And what kind of a person could leave all behind on an instant’s command?
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January 15th, 2006
More than the other gospels, Mark throws Jesus at us all of a sudden and all of a piece. Monday he appears from nowhere with his peremptory demands: repent, come, follow. Tuesday he is breaking Sabbath, silencing demons, impressing with an inner authority. And today, Wednesday, he heals, he silences and he seeks silence, and he prays. He prays and learns.
Who is this Jesus? If you only had these three days of Mark to go on who would you say he was?
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January 11th, 2006
The New Word is epistaxis — or plain old nose bleed to you and me. About 5pm on New Year’s Eve my nose decided to spring a leak and an hour later showed no signs of stopping so I and my Jesuit superior, Ian, spent the evening sitting in a selection of Casualties/A&Es/Emergency Rooms. He managed to get home just in time to see in 2006 (watching last summer’s cricket highlights on TV!) and I spent it with some friendly doctors and nurses. After much stuffing, tranquillising, sleeping, waiting, and eventually cauterising I made it back home this afternoon. Instructions to rest, not tie my shoe laces, take cold showers and eat cold food — well I exaggerate a little.
This was my first stay in hospital in my 47 years which is pretty good going. It would be even better if it were my last. Contrary to popular (UK) myth hospital food is edible, even quite nice.
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January 3rd, 2006