(See also the Soul Food for Hungry Adult Communities, on this site, re World Hunger, the G8 summit, Desmond Tutu, Bono, Bill Gates, and many others in the ‘Enough Food for Everyone IF’ campaign. )

Dear Sinead, Mark, and Friends,

Ever been asked a direct question, that puts you on the spot? A question about where you stand? A question that make you think and make you decide, makes you come down on one side or the other? One that leaves you no wriggle room, no room for humming or hawing?

Sometimes when a person asks you that kind of question, it may come from that person’s need for a definite answer.

Well, here today we find Jesus with just that kind of need, and asking just that kind of direct question of the Twelve closest to him. He had been praying alone, and his disciples were nearby. Then he got up and came to them and asked them, straight out, ‘Who do the crowds say that I am?’ That was the opener. They mumbled and gave him various answers, but then came the direct question, to themselves. “But you, who do you say I am?’  Not the crowds any more,- but ‘you’. No wriggle room left here. Imagine yourself in the shoes (sandals) of any of the Twelve. Jesus saying to you, today ‘Who do you say I am?’

It was as if Jesus was really wondering where all this work of his was going. ‘Do they know who I am? Do they know what I am about? Do you know who I am and what I am about?’  If his closest followers didn’t know, then was he getting anywhere?

Good ol’ Simon Peter spoke up first,- as usual! He blurted out ‘You are the Christ of God’. In other words, you are the One Sent, the Chosen One, the Anointed One (‘Christ’ comes from ‘chrism’ meaning oil). You have been sent by God!

And Jesus was relieved! They were beginning to grasp that this Jesus of Nazareth, with whom they travelled the roads of Galilee, this human being was the One who was SENT. He was from God.

The Twelve were just beginning to grasp that Jesus was different, and was special. It took a good while longer,- in fact until after his appearance to them following his resurrection- that they remembered and believed the things he had said all along about himself,- ‘I am the Light of the world… I am the Way…I am the Truth…I am the Life’.  ‘Whoever sees me sees the Father!’ ‘I and the Father are one’.  ‘Before Abraham was, I am!’  (See footnote below about ‘I AM’)

And then, remember Thomas, the sceptical one, the doubting one, – the one member of the Twelve who missed out on that Easter Sunday and didn’t see Jesus? He just would not believe, he told the others, unless he could put his fingers into the wounds in the hands of Jesus, and put his hand into the wound in his side made by the soldier’s spear. And when Jesus appeared to them a week later, Jesus invited Thomas to come and put his fingers in the wounds, his hand into his side. And Thomas blurted out that great act of faith that has echoed down the twenty centuries since then, ‘My Lord and my God!’

Who do you say that I am? Peter had his answer. Thomas had his. Millions have had theirs. And now us,- ‘Who do you say that I am?’  The moment is now, the question is today, for us.

On Youtube, click on this to watch a ten minute presentation to a Young Alpha Course group, on ‘Who is Jesus?’  It might whet your appetite. It will address some of your questions.

‘What do my mates say?’ No! ‘What do I say?’- that’s the question.

I can’t answer it for you. Only you can look into the face of Jesus of Nazareth, for yourself.

‘Here’s lookin’ at you’, he says.

Thanks!

Fr. Seamus  (seamus.devittcssr@gmail.com)

A Footnote: ‘I AM’ was something that rang all sorts of bells for Jewish hearers, which is what the first hearers of Jesus were. ‘I AM’ reminded them of the beginning of the mission of the great prophet Moses, when he first encountered God. Moses was tending sheep, and he was up on the side of a mountain, in scrub land. He saw a bush on fire, but yet it was not consumed. He moved closer. Then he heard a voice saying to him ‘Take off your shoes, for the place you are on is holy’.  That began a conversation with ‘God’, the unspeakable One, the One with no Name. At the end, Moses asked this mysterious Presence ‘Who will I say sent me?’ And the voice answered: ‘tell them I AM sent you.’

‘Tell the I AM sent you’.  (Read the story for yourself in Exodus 3,verses 1 to 15)

And all through St. John’s Gospel, the same question is beneath the surface ‘Who is this Jesus?’ And again and again, Jesus uses the word ‘I AM’… I AM the light of the world, I AM the Good Shepherd, I AM the gate, I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life, I AM the resurrection. ‘Before Abraham was, I AM!’

Jesus is God among us,- the Word become flesh, who dwelt among us. He is the I AM. ‘God so loved the world that He sent his only Son.’ (John 3:16)

And that’s why the Gospel concludes (in its original conclusion) with the declaration of Thomas ‘My LORD and my GOD’.

SD

See Mass Readings for this Sunday: Reading 1: Zecheriah 12:10-11, 13:1.  Psalm 62:2-6,8-9;  Reading 2: Galatians  3:26-29.  Gospel: Luke 9:18-24.

What would the following have in common, this past week or two? Bill Gates, Bono, Desmond Tutu, Danny Boyle (Producer of the spectacular opening ceremony of the London Olympics 2012), Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster, Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury, and Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury? Add in Cafod,  Christian Aid, and various other Christian agencies.

Christian Charities gathered in Hyde Park for the Enough Food for Everyone IF campaign towards the G8 Summit this past week.

They were all joined in sending a message of solidarity to the G8 Summit, regarding hunger in the world, and the millions dying of hunger daily. It is part of the ‘Enough Food for Everyone IF Campaign’.  This campaign had a mass rally in Hyde Park in London, in the lead up to the G8 meeting.  Click here for more information.

This past week, there has been the so-called G8 summit taking place near Enniskillen in the North of Ireland. The leaders of 8 countries have gathered: Canada, U.S.A., Russia, Italy, France, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom. They are the leaders of eight nations. Have they remembered that we are all one, on this planet Earth? That humans have needs, that there are millions who are hungry because of policies followed? That people need work and dignity and freedom? Please God, the Holy Spirit of God has been working in their hearts and minds and deliberations, because we are only one planet and we all need each other. And we cannot leave it to leaders. Leaders are servants of the people of the world.

Click here if you want to learn more about the ‘Enough Food for Everyone IF campaign’. http://www.christianaid.org.uk/ActNow/if-enough-food/if.aspx

Wonder how this Sunday’s readings might challenge us about our lives and communities and countries, and the G8 summit?  You are invited to put your toe in the water of each reading, and see what the Lord is saying to you and to us all.

Can we see a thread through these readings, especially between the first, the Psalm,  and the Gospel? That seems to be frequently the pattern between the chosen readings for the Sunday.

• Reading 1: ‘They will look on the one whom they have pierced… When that day comes, a fountain will be opened for the house of David and the citizens of Jerusalem,- (a fountain) for sin and impurity.’
• Gospel: ‘The Son of Man is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders…and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day.’
• And the Psalm: ‘O God, you are my God, for you I long, for you my soul is thirsting. My body pines for you like a dry weary land without water. …For your love is better than life…My soul shall be filled as with a banquet.’

A thread can be seen between the piercing (of Christ’s side), the fountain for the whole people, the death and the resurrection of Jesus, and the longing, thirsting, pining, and the banquet for the soul.  And the hungers of the world! Enough Food for Everyone,-IF!

And this comes from the recognition of Who Christ Jesus is,- ‘Yes, but who do you say that I am?’  And when we, with Simon Peter, look deeply at this man, and when we declare with our lips and believe with our hearts that ‘You are the Christ of God’,- the One Anointed and sent by God to the world,- then the fountain opens for us, and our longing, thirsting and pining is filled ‘as with a banquet’.  We are then filled with the Spirit that was in the heart of Jesus, and who longs to fill our communities and world as well.

Trocaire Gathering for the 'Enough Food for Everyone IF' campaign. All one, IF !

And then, we renounce our own independent living, and we become one person with Christ -(Paul uses the word unus, not unum, in Latin, meaning one person, not one thing)- and as one person in Christ and with him, and with our sisters and brothers all over the world,  we too carry the cross of love and listening and obeying, even to dying to our selves for others.

Revisit now that second reading, Galatians 3:26-29: Galatians 3:26-29:   ‘All baptized in Christ, you have all clothed yourselves in Christ, and there are no more distinctions between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, but all of you are one person in Christ. You are all of you sons and daughters of God through faith in Christ Jesus.’

There’s a resevoir of meaning in each of the readings for this Sunday. We can only drink a little from it, but it may become like a fountain of living water that will flow in our hearts from then on (see John 7:37-38), and from our hearts and communities out into the hungry and thirsting world that we share with others who are one with us.

And it all comes back to ‘Who do you say that I am?’

Fr. Seamus.   seamus.devittcssr@gmail.com

Your comments are welcome.

SEE ALSO THE ‘SOUL FOOD FOR YOUNG ADULT COMMUNITIES’ on this site, for this Sunday.