{"id":1057,"date":"2020-03-25T08:38:32","date_gmt":"2020-03-25T08:38:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/?p=1057"},"modified":"2020-03-25T08:38:32","modified_gmt":"2020-03-25T08:38:32","slug":"29-march-2020-a-fifth-sunday-of-lent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sundayscriptureonline.com\/?p=1057","title":{"rendered":"29 March 2020 (A) Fifth Sunday of Lent"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A. The bible<\/em> as Guide in Life and Liturgy (Sunday Readings)<\/em><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

B.\nReflection & Dialogue:<\/em><\/strong> The power of the Holy Spirit and of grace within us is\nstronger that our human weakness.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

 The Bible as\nGuide in Life and Liturgy (Sunday Readings).\n<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

First Reading<\/em> (Ezekiel 37:12-14). I shall put my spirit in you, and you will live.<\/em> In this reading we\nhave part of the vision which the prophet Ezekiel had during the Jewish exile\nin Babylon in\nthe sixth century B.C. The exiles were saying: \u201cOur bones are dried up, our\nhope is lost; we cut off completely\u201d. The Temple\nhad been burnt to the ground, the Holy City of Jerusalem destroyed and Judah\ndevastated. Metaphorically speaking the people were, so to speak, as good as\ndead, buried, in the grave. In this present reading God says to them that such\nis not the case. He is going to open their graves, to raise their corpses from\nthe graves, put a new living spirit within them, thus giving a new life to this\ndespondent people, with the promise to return them to their native soil of Judah.\nThe text speaks of the resurrection of the people of Judah in exile, from the death of\ndespair to new life. Bodily resurrection of the individual is not envisaged. This\nbelief will become clear in Israel\nonly about the year 200 B.C.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Responsorial\nPsalm <\/em>(Psalm 129[130]).\nWith the Lord there is mercy and fullness\nof redemption.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Second\nReading <\/em>(Romans\n8:8-11). The Spirit of him who raised\nJesus from the dead is living in you. <\/em>The opening verses of this reading are\nrendered more literally in The New\nRevised Standard Version<\/em>, in conformity with the Greek original, as\nfollows: \u201cThose who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the\nflesh but in the Spirit (or: spirit, with a small s), since the Spirit of God\ndwells in you\u201d. Paul makes a contrast between the \u201cflesh\u201d and the \u201cSpirit\u201d (or\n\u201cspirit\u201d, with small \u201cs\u201d if the Holy Spirit is not intended). By \u201cflesh\u201d he\nmeans the body, weak human nature, and the mind or mindset that is contrary to\nGod and the divine, and is inclined towards sin. The sense comes across in the\ndifferent wording of an earlier (1967) edition the Jerusalem Bible<\/em>: \u201cPeople who are interested only in unspiritual\nthings can never be pleasing to God. Your interests, however, are not in the\nunspiritual, but the spiritual, since the Spirit of God has made his home in\nyou\u201d, a rendering somewhat modified in the later (1985) edition of that same\nrendering, as: \u201cThose who live by their natural inclinations can never be\npleasing to God\u201d. Those who live by the \u201cflesh\u201d, in Paul\u2019s sense of the word,\nthose interested only in unspiritual things, those who live by their natural\ninclinations, cannot please God. It is different with believers who have the\nSpirit of God dwelling in them, the Spirit that gives new life. As Paul will\nsay a few verses after this present reading (8:14): \u201cAll who are led by the\nSpirit of God are children of God\u201d. Paul envisages the body dead because of\nsin, dead because it is destined for physical death, and is an instrument for sin.\nBut within that same body there is another force, a power towards life, which\npower is the Holy Spirit given to those who have been justified through faith\nin Jesus Christ. God the Father, by his almighty power, raised Jesus from the\ndead, and the Spirit of that same Father dwells in believers, a pledge that\nGod, through that same Spirit, will give life to the moral bodies of believers,\nspiritual life here on earth and the fullness of life in the hereafter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Gospel <\/em>(John 11:1-45). I am the resurrection\nand the life.<\/em> This lengthy Gospel reading is in line with what we have read\nin the Lectionary texts over the past two Sundays, readings all from the Gospel\nof John, texts in which Jesus avails of a human occurrence to explain aspects\nof the mystery that is his own person and mission. Thus we have the episode of\nthe Samaritan woman and the well of Jacob, symbolising the water that he was to\ngive (the Holy Spirit); the curing of the man born blind, and Jesus as the\nlight of the world, and today the raising of Lazars and Jesus as the\nresurrection and the life. Jesus was friendly with the family of Bethany (Mary,\nMartha and Lazarus), Bethany a village about three kilometres from Jerusalem. On hearing of\nLazarus\u2019s illness Jesus said that this sickness would not end in death but in\nGod\u2019s glory, and that through it the Son of God (that is, Jesus himself) would\nbe glorified. He does not go to Lazarus immediately, but allows him to die.\nLazarus had been dead already four days when Jesus reaches his tomb. Jesus told\nMartha that her brother Lazarus would rise again, at which words Martha makes a\nprofession of faith in the resurrection, but at the last day. This leads to\nJesus\u2019 reply, which is the high point\nof the narrative: \u201cI am the resurrection and the life. If anyone believes in\nme, even though he dies he will live, and whoever lives and believes in me will\nnever die\u201d. This leads to a profession of faith by Martha in Jesus as the\nChrist (the Messiah) and the Son of God. There are also a number of other\npoints made in the lengthy reading which we need not enter into here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

B.\nReflection & Dialogue<\/em><\/strong>: The power of the Holy Spirit and of grace within us is\nstronger that our human weakness.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sometimes\nJesus is accused of having had little understanding of the weakness of human\nnature, as for instance in his total ban on divorce. In one sense the mission\nhe gave to his followers to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth\nwas also a difficult one. The early Church understood this mission exactly as Jesus\nhad intended it. The Church, the Christian community, in its teaching and in\nits following of the Gospel, was to be a new light for the surrounding pagan\nworld. Writing to the Corinthians Paul well describes this noble mission, as\nwell as the human weakness of those who bear witness to it (2 Corinthians\n4:6-7): \u201cFor its is the God who said, \u2018Let light shine out of darkness\u2019, who\nhas shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God\nin the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that itmay be made clear that this\nextraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us\u201d. Similarly, when writing\nto the Philippians (2:12-13), he reminds them how Christ humbled himself,\ntaking on the form of a slave, going on to exhort them to work out their\nsalvation in fear and trembling, because the work of salvation is a cooperation\nbetween the believer and God, and it is God who is at work in believers\nenabling them both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Salvation is not\njust through human endeavour. In the letter to the Romans, as is clear from today\u2019s\nsecond reading, Paul lays stress on the weakness of human nature and its\ninclination to sin, but only to highlight Christ\u2019s victory over sin and its\ndeadly power, a victory of the Holy Spirit over human weakness. Where sin\nincreased there grace abounded all the more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            Turning from Paul to our own day,\nthe Church is often criticised for its numerous rules, as if rules were\neverything. Such a criticism if often justified, but sometimes the censures are\ndirected not against specifically Church rules as such but directives which are\npart of the teaching of Christ and of the Gospel. In this case, when it is a\nmatter of the message of the Gospel being proclaimed by the Church, what is\ninvolved is not the rules as such but these as part of the Christian way of\nlife, a life to be lived under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and with the\ngrace of God. The life of the Church, even given its human limitations, cannot\nbe understood without the dimension of the Church as part of the mystery of\nsalvation being taken into account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            Among a number of Catholics today\nthere probably is an element of Pelagianism, which really never left the\nChurch. What is meant here by Pelagianism is the reliance on the power of human\nnature alone, unaided by grace, to live the moral Christian life. Christian\nliving requires recognition of human weakness, of the inclination to sin, and\nof the need of God\u2019s grace. It calls for humility and for prayer to recognise\nwhat God\u2019s will is in given circumstances and for the strength to act\naccordingly. Paul stresses this point again and again, and we would do well\ntoday to listen to his voice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            With regard to dialogue with the\nworld of our own day, with its occasional calls for reform in the Church and\nsuch like: the reforms in question at times are in matters relating to Catholic\nteaching which is considered out of date, not in conformity with perceived\nvalues of our day, or with human freedom as perceived in a secular society.  In the discussion of such questions, points\nmade above could usefully be borne in mind, centring around the light of the\nGospel, the power of the Holy Spirit and of grace.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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