Sermon at Parish Mass, Christ the King 2020

Ezekiel 34.11-16,20-24

Ephesians 1.15-23

Matthew 25.31-46

“Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!”, said the great and powerful Wizard of Oz. Except it turned out that the little man behind the curtain, working the levers and dials and fireworks, was the great and powerful Wizard of Oz. Appearances were deceptive. When the curtain was drawn aside by Toto the dog, Dorothy and her companions saw what was really going on behind the scenes. That unveiling became a moment of truth telling, and then of new beginnings. 

At the end of the Church’s year, on the Feast of Christ the King, and as we look towards Advent, we read those parts of scripture that are often called apocalypse. In common use, that means some great cataclysmic disaster. But in the Bible, the Greek word “apocalypse” means “unveiling”, a disclosure of the realities at work behind the appearances of world events. 

We think, too, at this time of year, about the second coming of Christ. The word we translate as “second coming” is parousia, which means “presence”. Not just any presence, but an intensified, royal, powerful presence, like a king appearing at a State occasion. 

Today’s Gospel reading is about that presence of Christ, his parousia, and about apocalypse, that is, the unveiling of what has been going on through history. It is the last public teaching of Jesus, the judgement of the nations. 

It is the nations of the whole world that gather before the throne of glory. Human society as a whole, not just individuals, comes under the judgment of Christ. And the basis of that judgement is whether or not the nations have been merciful. What is described are the works of mercy. Feeding the hungry, welcoming the stranger, clothing the naked, caring for the sick, visiting those in prison. The nations are not asked what gods they have worshipped, or whether they believed the correct things.

What is unveiled to the nations is that Christ has been the ultimate object of the works of mercy all along. Christ, the Word of creation, who hung on a cross for all to see, and now has ascended to fill all things, has always been there behind the story, and now is revealed as the standard and measure by which all things will be judged. 

It’s about seeing. The nations have not known this until this moment of unveiling, “Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger?” The Son of Man has been concealed behind the veil of ordinary events and ordinary people. But mercy has always been there right on the surface, always present, always possible. Always a choice that can be made. Judgement is simply the truth of things appearing as they really are, in the light of Christ, from whom all things come and to whom all things return. 

Those who have lived mercifully discover, even to their surprise, that they are blessed by the Father. In being merciful, they have ministered to Christ, even without knowing it, and in the final unveiling discover that this means they are inheritors of the Kingdom prepared from the foundation of the world.

Those who have refused to be merciful, however, discover that they are accursed, destined for the fire prepared for the devil and his angels. Which is surely a metaphor for what refusing mercy does to us, the misery of being consumed by hatred and the desire to cast out and destroy. 

Today’s Gospel may help us to understand the doctrine of the Second Coming of Christ more fully. As Ephesians tells us, Christ has not gone away. He is “the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all”. The Second Coming of Christ is both parousia and apocalypse, the unveiling of his royal presence that has been there all along. Christ appearing to the whole universe as he truly is: the one who fills all things, the origin, the meaning, and the end, of all our actions and choices. All things are then seen in their true perspective as they relate to Christ, who is their ultimate object.

Not just our actions and choices as individuals, but as nations, as human societies great and small. We have to organize ourselves in order to be merciful, or to choose not to be. We have to give our consent to the choices our society makes – or withhold it, and speak out. 

The choices are nothing complicated at all. Feed the hungry. In a nation of tremendous disparity of wealth where some children still starve in the school holidays. Welcome the stranger. Not just when they can stack up points for immigration status, but also when the stranger is in danger of drowning in the English Channel. Care for the sick, which many do heroically, but this time of pandemic reminds us that this means putting other people’s needs before our own convenience. Visiting those in prison means building a justice system that does not forget the possibility of redemption. Care for our planet, real action on climate change, because Christ is the Word of creation, and climate change disproportionately impacts the poorest nations.

Do we do this? Does our nation? To live according to mercy is also to come under Christ’s judgement. We are there in this picture, among the nations gathered before the throne. But, received in mercy, his judgement enables us to be truthful, to confess our sins, and to repent. The judgement of Christ should not bring us despair, but, rather, hope, because it is founded on mercy. 

The judgement of the nations is a story of the end, the final fulfilment when Christ will appear as the origin, meaning and end of all things. But it is a story told for the benefit of those who are not yet at the end. We are still in this in-between time, the time of mercy, the time of grace. All options are still open, all choices are still available. 

This is the time when we can learn to hear and tell the truth, so the truth will not surprise us when it is unveiled at the end. It is the time given to us to discover God’s mercy towards us in Jesus, and so repent of our sins, and learn to be merciful towards others ourselves. It is the time in which we can learn to see that Christ fills all things, Christ the King of the Universe, whose measure of judgement is mercy.

Sermon at Parish Mass, The Second Sunday before Advent, 15th November 2020

 

A Woodcut from Historiae celebriores Veteris Testamenti Iconibus representatae, 1712, taken from http://www.textweek.com/art/parables.htm. Via Wikimedia Commons.

 

Zephaniah 1.7,12-18

1 Thessalonians 5:1-11

Matthew 25.14-30

 

“The value of investments can fall as well as rise and you might lose the original amount invested.” So say the risk warnings, often in quite small print, on ads for investments and stock market apps. Investing, trade, business, all carry risk. But, as they say, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Risk gives the frisson to today’s Gospel reading. It is the second of the three last parables of Jesus. Last week, we heard the story of the wise and foolish virgins. This week, the parable of the Talents. Next week, the sheep and the goats.

With these three stories Jesus closes his teaching ministry. All three are about the sudden appearance of an authority figure who brings judgement and reward, to whom the characters in the story have to give an account. Are you ready? Have you done what you were told? How will your actions be judged?

But who is this authority figure, and what is his appearing? We can read these texts and think that they relate to some remote epoch that has nothing immediately to do with us, a “second coming of Christ” at the end of time. But the Greek word that is often translated as “second coming” is parousia, which means “presence”. It is an intensified kind of presence, formal and powerful. The appearance of a king at a state occasion is “parousia”.

So, then, what will the parousia, the presence, of Christ look like? According to Matthew’s account, Jesus tells these parables, his last teachings, “two days before the Passover”, that is, on Tuesday in Holy Week. In two days, Jesus will be betrayed, put on trial, and handed over to be crucified. The figure who is about to appear before the world is the Messiah, the Lord. And his authority will be shown to the world on the cross. The crucified Messiah is the Royal Presence, the parousia, which both judges and saves the world.

At the time that Jesus tells these parables, this is hidden from the disciples. They do not see the looming crisis, the shadow of the cross. Indeed, not until Jesus appears to them after his resurrection will they understand. Then, they will see how they were being prepared, and how they are now to live, in the time that is being judged and saved by the Presence of the Risen Victim.

These last parables need to be read with that sense of urgency, the impending revelation of the Son of Man, the one to whom all will give an account, on the cross. A sign of contradiction that will make many stumble.

Three slaves, then, are entrusted with their master’s property, each according to his ability. A considerable amount is given to them on trust: from one to five talents, a talent being a measure of gold worth about fifteen years’ wages for an ordinary labourer.

It is not, however, the amount of money, but what they do with it, that matters. Two go off and trade. That’s risky business. There is no guarantee of a good outcome, no security. But, they double their money, are entrusted with even more, and are invited into the joy of their master.

The third slave does what Jesus’ audience actually might have expected him to do: he buries the money to keep it safe. He was afraid of the master, but he was also trying to treat the gift he has received as his own possession, something that, if it was used, would be used up. All he can see is the risk of loss. The tragedy for him is that, in trying to turn a gift into a possession, he does indeed lose everything.

We are to read this story in the light of Jesus the risen Victim. Jesus is the one who risked not two or five talents, but everything. He is the one who gave up himself on the cross, in order to gain everything, by his death saving the whole world. And this is his joy, the joy of the Master. Hebrews says, “for the sake of the joy that was set before him [he] endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God”.

The slaves entrusted with their master’s business are to be like their master, risking everything for the sake of his joy. This is the risky business of the Church in this time after the Resurrection, this time that is being judged and saved by the Presence of the Risen Victim.

The Church’s task of evangelism, being good news, is not about snatching individual souls from the wreck of a doomed world into the safety of a holy club. It is both more risky, and more joyful, than that. Evangelism was once described by the Pope’s Preacher, Fr Raniero Cantalamessa, like this:

“Christian evangelization is not a conquest, not propaganda; it is the gift of God to the world in his Son Jesus. It is to give the Head [Jesus] the joy of feeling life flow from his heart towards his body, to the point of giving life to its most distant limbs.”

This is the joy of the Master, the joy for which he risked everything on the cross. If we try to keep the Church as a pure sect of the saved, walled off and safe from the dark and sinful world around us, then we end up like the slave who buried his talent in the ground. Not risking anything, not gaining anything, shutting out the possibility of entering into the Master’s joy.

The great gift of love is given to us, to be given away. Just as Jesus gave up everything out of love for the world, giving away everything to the furthest extent, to gain everything and so to enter into his joy. Love, the Love of the Master, is given to be risked and expended. Not hidden away and kept safe. You can’t do that with love. If you try, it stops being love.

The parable of the talents tells us what the task of disciples is, in this time that is being judged and saved by the Presence of the Risen Victim. Risk, because the gift we are given is love, to be expended. Joy, because by doing so the Master’s love flows out and brings life to the most distant limbs.

That is our task in this present time. The last of the parables of Jesus is about the ultimate value and meaning of this time. That is the story of the sheep and the goats, and we will hear that next week.

Sermon at Parish Mass Dedication Festival, 25th October 2020

 

1 Kings 8.22–30
Hebrews 12.18–24
Matthew 21.12–16

 

“Like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” – 1 Peter 2.5. The readings given to us for our Dedication Festival, and also, this year, for our annual meeting, give us three key messages about what it means to be built as living stones into a spiritual house.

Firstly, we are to be a community of welcome and inclusion. When Jesus entered the Temple and turned over the tables of the money changers, that was the action of a prophet. Instead of being a house of prayer for all nations, the Temple had become a robbers’ den. But, we are told, after Jesus had driven out the money changers, the blind and the lame had come to him in the temple and he healed them.

Now, according to the purity laws, the blind and the lame weren’t allowed in the temple, but here they are anyway. Jesus is showing what the Temple really should be about, the place where God is present and accessible for all people to heal and restore them. The corrupt money changers are driven out, those who should be in the temple are welcomed in. They come to Jesus anyway, and the religious authorities, who want to retain control, can’t do anything about it.

As our readings and the liturgy remind us today, this building, this house of prayer, is an outward sign of true Temple of God, which is a living temple, formed of all those whom Jesus is drawing to himself. He establishes a living temple in which there is no barrier to inclusion and welcome.

This is the first message to us as a Church: we are to ensure that there is no barrier to welcome and inclusion. We are to welcome all those whom Jesus is calling to himself. Before the pandemic we had been thinking about new ways of welcoming people, and discerning where we needed to become more inclusive. We will pick this up again as we adjust to this “new normal”.

The second insight is that we are to be a community committed to justice and the transformation of the world, when the experience of so many people is exile and alienation.

We heard today part of Solomon’s prayer of dedication of the Temple, as it is imagined in the first book of Kings. In fact 1 Kings was written many centuries after Solomon, and his prayer reflects the experiences of Israel in that intervening time. In his prayer, Solomon goes on to ask that the Temple will always be the place where God hears the prayers of his people, even if they have been defeated by enemies, or there is drought or famine. He prays that foreigners, too, will have their prayers answered there. And even when God’s people are carried into exile far away, he prays that they can still turn to the Temple in their hearts and minds, and be heard.

Exile is a persistent theme in the Bible. The historical exile of the Jewish people in Babylon inspires much of the prayer and reflection, the lament and the praise, of the Old Testament. But it’s set in a bigger story of exile, humanity driven out from Eden, wandering on the face of the earth, seeking a true homeland that only appears at the end of the Bible, when the City of God appears from heaven for all the nations to be gathered in.

And exile, too, haunts our world. Refugees and migrants seeking a homeland. The sense of alienation and disempowerment, that afflicts so many in our society. It is true, as the Bible says, that here we are strangers and pilgrims, seeking a better country, the City that is to come. But it is also true, as Jeremiah says to the exiles in Babylon, that we are to seek the welfare of the city of our exile, to make it a good place to live in.

So the second message for us is that the Church, the living temple of Christ, is to be a refuge and a strength in this time of exile, known as somewhere where God is always present to hear, to save. The Church is called to contribute to the welfare of this present age, to be a voice for the voiceless, a presence to help build a fairer and more just world.

The third insight for us is from the reading from Hebrews, which tells us that we have come to what cannot be seen, the living kingdom of God.

Hebrews is all about signs and types, shadowy things, giving way to the reality they represent. The sacrifices and rituals of the old law are fulfilled in Christ. He initiates the new covenant in his own blood, the Eucharistic cup which is his life for the world. When we gather at the altar we are joining in Christ’s worship of the Father, which is why we can say that we join with angels and archangels and the whole company of heaven, not visible to our senses, but the greater reality of which the Eucharist on earth is the sign.

But because we have come to what cannot be seen, Hebrews calls us to stay faithful. The first two insights for us were about what the Church does in the world: making inclusion and welcome, building a juster and fairer world. The third word is about what the Church is, the Body of Christ, the Eucharistic community living from his life.

This is the heart of the Church. If the Church becomes just a social enterprise, a human activity, then it withers and dies. “Cut off from me, you can do nothing”, says the Lord. Transformation comes from Christ, and begins with us. So above all we must be faithful and persistent, in worship and sacrament, to draw strength from what the Church is in Christ, for the tasks that the Church is called to do.

When we gather for the Eucharist we come to what we cannot see, but do believe, the living Kingdom of God, the thousands of angels and the saints made perfect. We are to persist, and stay faithful, in that heart of our life and worship. Confidence in our faith, in our worshipping tradition, in being living stones built into a spiritual house acceptable to God, that is where we will find the confidence to do, to welcome, to include, and to transform.