A reflection for the 4th Sunday, Lent, Year C
First Reading: Joshua 5:9, 10-12 (or 1 Samuel 16: 1, 6-7, 10-13)
Psalm: 34 “Taste and see that the Lord is good” (or 23 “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want”)
2nd Reading 2 Corinthians 5:17-21 (or Ephesians 5:8-14)
Gospel: Luke 15:1-3, 11-32 (or John 9:1-41)
“He longed to fill his belly with the food of the pigs.” That makes me sad. But not because there are people in the world today that are that hungry – children that are this hungry; people who live in darkness, but because all of us, at some level, are that hungry. We are all hungry, we all need to be satisfied. We are all in darkness and need to see; we all hunger for truth. This is one of the deepest longings of the human heart.
I think that’s what we’re seeing happening today. Pope Benedict announced that he was retiring almost four weeks ago and every day, on every major news network, there has been something about the Church: CBS, CNN, ABC, BBC and in Canada, CTV, shows like Canada AM; City TV, CP24, CBC TV and Radio; every day have some segment about the Church. Sure they want to talk about sex scandals and women’s ordination, but even when they speak about those issues, the coverage has been fairly positive. They’ve had young Catholics, who love the Church talk about their experiences – this is very positive. And did you see Peter Mansbridge’s interview on the National with Cardinal Marc Ouellet? It’s very positive coverage. And that’s because people are hungry and people are in darkness. And people know deep down inside that what the world offers is not food and is not light – it’s not the fullness of truth. And, I think that they sense that the Church can offer us Truth. But society doesn’t give us permission to talk about Church and God. Sure we can ask the big questions, who am I? Why Am I here? What’s the purpose of my life? from a philosophical point of view, but we definitely cannot talk about Church and we feel that we cannot talk about Jesus.
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According to Vatican.va there are 117 cardinal electors. 107 countries have only one cardinal and 10 countries have more than one cardinal: Both Canada and Mexico have 3; Poland and France have four each. India, Spain and Brazil have five each. Germany has six cardinals and the United States has eleven.
Italy has 28.
Let me repeat that – Italy has 28. Actually, Italy has 49 cardinals, except that only 28 of them are under 80 years old.
Now, I know that for many centuries the Church was Italy and there is much historic importance to many dioceses in Italy, but seriously, why are there so many Italian cardinals?
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A reflection for the 5th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C
First Reading: Isaiah 6:1-2; 3-8
2nd Reading 1 Corinthians 15:1-11
Gospel: Luke 5:1-11
Everyone gets THE Call. Isaiah got the call. So did Paul. Peter got the call. Haven’t you? I think the problem is that, either we don’t think we’re going to get called- we think that it’s only for prophets and apostles and saints – and so we’re not expecting the call. Or, even if we think that we may get the call, we don’t know how to recognise it, ‘cause we’re looking for something else; expecting something else. But these three “call” stories from today give us a few clues that will help us recognise the call when it comes.
First, the call doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It doesn’t happen out of context. We have to first have an encounter with God. Isaiah has a vision of God. He sees God in the temple, sitting on a throne in his majesty. There are angles flying around – seraphs, singing “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts” (that’s what we try to re-create every Sunday). Then an angel touches Isaiah’s mouth with a burning coal. That’s an experience of the divine. Isaiah has an experience of the divine, before he is called.
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A few weeks ago, during a homily, I suggested that we should take the opportunity of this Year of Faith to do what the Holy Father has proposed: That we learn about our Faith; that we live our Faith and that we share our Faith. Soon after, I thought, ‘why don’t we make this a challenge?’ And so began the Great Year of Faith Challenge (#faithchallenge). Every week starting this week I will be posting a new challenge, to help us learn about, live and share our faith. You can visit my Facebook page or follow me on Twitter to learn more and to check out the weekly challenges.
The first challenge has to do with finding a quote from a Saint and using it to pray with every day. And so I have spent the week with a keen awareness of what a Saint may have said – but with a new sensitivity. It is no longer, “that’s a nice quote,” but “these are truly words to live by.”
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deacon pedro 