5th Tuesday of Lent 15th March 2016
“What I say is what the Father has taught me; the One who sent me is with me, and has not left me to myself, for I always do what pleases him.”
Nb.21,4b-9 Ps.101 Jn.8,21-30
"Jesus said to them again : ’I am going away; you will look for me and you will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come.’
So the Jews said to one another, ’Is he going to kill himself, for he says ’Where I am going, you cannot come?’
Jesus went on : ’You are from below, I am from above.You are of this world ; I am not of this world."
What depth this page does give to our daily life; it invites us to take a lofty distance, ’to be above’, to live things ’from above’.
When we marvel at something or someone, this gives us life, it leads us to knowledge about tem or about something. Our faith begins and ends with a taste of marvel, as we enter into the time when our gaze is turned upwards to the Father. Our gaze on Christ, raised up on the Cross, lifts us up to the Resurrection.
Jesus never stops telling us that God’s mystery is one of Love. But still, we are just like the people of Israel who, when deported to Egypt, continued to recriminate against God.
This ’material’ slavery is the sign of a deeper slavery : the slavery of sin.
The Gospel tells us that when Jesus was already dead and still on the Cross the soldier drew near, opened up his side with a spear, and Blood and Water flowed from it.
Whilst on earth, Jesus did nothing but good, in the gentleness and tenderness of God.
Faced with the hardness of heart of those who took hold of the Law and who believed they served God by contesting, Jesus said, ’I am going away, you will look for me and you shall die in your sin.’
If we hear Jesus’ message of Love, peace and gentleness, we are already taking a step to be already healed.
"So they said to him : ’Who are you?’
Jesus answered ’What I have told you from the outset? About you I have much to say and much to judge; but the one who sent me is true, and what I declare to the world I have learnt from him; but the one who sent me is true, and what I declare to the world I have learnt from him.“They did not recognise that he was talking to them about the Father.”
Jesus’ Heart is wounded by these Jews who do not understand His words.
However, our Passover is a work that is something much more marvellous than the act of Creation which came about at the beginning of the world.
To reach a state of marvel we need to pass through a turning away of our gaze from ourselves so as to join the reality of our world and the reality of our Salvation.
Mary is present when Jesus is in the weak state of agony, it is here that Jesus joins us in our own weakness.
Mary will again be present when her Son will be crucified for us.
When Jesus is put to death and saves us by His cross, Mary perceives the combat Jesus is going through for his people. She suffers from the violence and hatred for her son, for Him, the Only Son of the Father!
It breaks her heart : ’God is Love’, but this Love can only be received through a desire and a waiting.
’Blood and water flowed from his side’.
This Blood and Water are symbols for Baptism and the Eucharist. The Church is born by the bath of Baptism born from the pierced side of Jesus. Christ formed the Church out of his side, as he formed Eve from Adam’s side.
Jesus frees humanity from the slavery of the liar, the deceitful one, so that it may find once more the thirst of the Living God.
"So Jesus said :
’When you have lifted up the Son of man, then you will know that I am He and that I do nothing of my own accord. What I say is what the Father has
taught me; he who sent me is with me, and has not left me to myself, for I always do what pleases him.“As he was saying this, many came to believe in Him.”
To nourish our daily life from the Cross makes of us true Christians and this is what the supreme marvel is.
If Jesus’ Passion affects us, we want to imitate it by bearing our crosses with Him.
Therese of Lisieux, wrote in a letter to her sister Céline : ’See his adorable Face!..See His eyes that have bee n extinguished and how wounded they are!…See his wounds…Look at Jesus in His Face…Here, you shall see just how much He loves us.’
Jesus’ Coming offers us this deliverance : the Lord bent down from Heaven, hearing the captives’ complaint. His intent is to deliver His People from death.
God allows himself to be touched by the vulnerability in his creature. He will become the One going through agony wanting to join our condition and to get us out of our distress.
Mary believed in Him, she allowed herself to be touched by God; she cried out her thirst for love, her thirst to be loved.
Humanity itself can become one in God, everything it has received comes from Him, and our future is in God. Christ unites His Bride to the Church by giving her the food from which she has been born, His Risen Body.
Just as the woman engenders from her own blood and feeds her children with her own milk, so it is that Christ is constantly nourishing the one(us, his bride) he gave birth to with His Body and Blood.
We ask for the grace to join the goodness of Jesus’ Heart.
5th Tuesday of Lent 15th March 2016
“What I say is what the Father has taught me; the One who sent me is with me, and has not left me to myself, for I always do what pleases him.”
Nb.21,4b-9 Ps.101 Jn.8,21-30
"Jesus said to them again : ’I am going away; you will look for me and you will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come.’
So the Jews said to one another, ’Is he going to kill himself, for he says ’Where I am going, you cannot come?’
Jesus went on : ’You are from below, I am from above.You are of this world ; I am not of this world."
What depth this page does give to our daily life; it invites us to take a lofty distance, ’to be above’, to live things ’from above’.
When we marvel at something or someone, this gives us life, it leads us to knowledge about tem or about something. Our faith begins and ends with a taste of marvel, as we enter into the time when our gaze is turned upwards to the Father. Our gaze on Christ, raised up on the Cross, lifts us up to the Resurrection.
Jesus never stops telling us that God’s mystery is one of Love. But still, we are just like the people of Israel who, when deported to Egypt, continued to recriminate against God.
This ’material’ slavery is the sign of a deeper slavery : the slavery of sin.
The Gospel tells us that when Jesus was already dead and still on the Cross the soldier drew near, opened up his side with a spear, and Blood and Water flowed from it.
Whilst on earth, Jesus did nothing but good, in the gentleness and tenderness of God.
Faced with the hardness of heart of those who took hold of the Law and who believed they served God by contesting, Jesus said, ’I am going away, you will look for me and you shall die in your sin.’
If we hear Jesus’ message of Love, peace and gentleness, we are already taking a step to be already healed.
"So they said to him : ’Who are you?’
Jesus answered ’What I have told you from the outset? About you I have much to say and much to judge; but the one who sent me is true, and what I declare to the world I have learnt from him; but the one who sent me is true, and what I declare to the world I have learnt from him.“They did not recognise that he was talking to them about the Father.”
Jesus’ Heart is wounded by these Jews who do not understand His words.
However, our Passover is a work that is something much more marvellous than the act of Creation which came about at the beginning of the world.
To reach a state of marvel we need to pass through a turning away of our gaze from ourselves so as to join the reality of our world and the reality of our Salvation.
Mary is present when Jesus is in the weak state of agony, it is here that Jesus joins us in our own weakness.
Mary will again be present when her Son will be crucified for us.
When Jesus is put to death and saves us by His cross, Mary perceives the combat Jesus is going through for his people. She suffers from the violence and hatred for her son, for Him, the Only Son of the Father!
It breaks her heart : ’God is Love’, but this Love can only be received through a desire and a waiting.
’Blood and water flowed from his side’.
This Blood and Water are symbols for Baptism and the Eucharist. The Church is born by the bath of Baptism born from the pierced side of Jesus. Christ formed the Church out of his side, as he formed Eve from Adam’s side.
Jesus frees humanity from the slavery of the liar, the deceitful one, so that it may find once more the thirst of the Living God.
"So Jesus said :
’When you have lifted up the Son of man, then you will know that I am He and that I do nothing of my own accord. What I say is what the Father has
taught me; he who sent me is with me, and has not left me to myself, for I always do what pleases him.“As he was saying this, many came to believe in Him.”
To nourish our daily life from the Cross makes of us true Christians and this is what the supreme marvel is.
If Jesus’ Passion affects us, we want to imitate it by bearing our crosses with Him.
Therese of Lisieux, wrote in a letter to her sister Céline : ’See his adorable Face!..See His eyes that have bee n extinguished and how wounded they are!…See his wounds…Look at Jesus in His Face…Here, you shall see just how much He loves us.’
Jesus’ Coming offers us this deliverance : the Lord bent down from Heaven, hearing the captives’ complaint. His intent is to deliver His People from death.
God allows himself to be touched by the vulnerability in his creature. He will become the One going through agony wanting to join our condition and to get us out of our distress.
Mary believed in Him, she allowed herself to be touched by God; she cried out her thirst for love, her thirst to be loved.
Humanity itself can become one in God, everything it has received comes from Him, and our future is in God. Christ unites His Bride to the Church by giving her the food from which she has been born, His Risen Body.
Just as the woman engenders from her own blood and feeds her children with her own milk, so it is that Christ is constantly nourishing the one(us, his bride) he gave birth to with His Body and Blood.
We ask for the grace to join the goodness of Jesus’ Heart.
TUESDAY of the 5th Week of Lent, year B
“Again Jesus said to them : ’I am going away; you will look for ma and you will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come. ’ So the Jews said to one another, ’Is he going to kill himself, that he says ’Where I am going, you cannot come. ? ’Jesus went on : You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world.”
Jesus never stops saying that the mystery of God is one of Love, but the Jews remain in a state of misunderstanding when it comes to dealing with Jesus. The people of Israel deported into Egypt and undergone a harsh slavery and once freed they had continue to recriminate against God. This “materiel” slavery was the sign of a slavery much deeper, the slave of sin. This misunderstanding due t a closing in on oneself lasts still today in many people especially in those who ar suffering and do not welcome him. Yet Jesus does only good in gentleness and in the Tenderness of God, and this before the hardness of heart of theses who had taken hold of the Law and believe that they serve God when in contestation. ’I am going away’ says Jesus, ’ you shall seek me but shall die in your sin.’ Hearing the message of Jesus, His Love, peace and gentleness is already a step to being healed. But how hard it is to hear the most incredible secret, that of God’s Infinite Love!
"So they said to him, ’Who are you?’ Jesus answered, ’What I have told you from the outset. About you I have much to say and much to judge; but the one who sent me is true, and what I declare to the world I have learnt from him.They did not recognize that he was talking to them about the Father.’
Yet God has freed his people, leading Moses for him to be purified in the desert. But here again we see him recriminate against God! Accusing God as though he
wanted to hurt him. There is something impossible to understand between this language of this people with their hardened neck, hardened hearts, and the message of Love of the Heart of Jesus who is gentle and compassionate. Fortunately Mary will be there when Jesus will be weak and in agony so as to join us in our weakness, she will be present to her crucified Son for us. There for Jesus who will be condemned to death and who saves us by His Cross. Mary perceives this combat that si Jesus’ for his people she violence and hatred against her Son the Only Son of the Father! Her heart is broken. “God is Love.” but this love can only be received through a desire, an expectation, Jesus wants to free humanity from the slavery of the liar so that it becomes itself, that it may find once more the thirst for God so as to become free once more.
“so Jesus daid, ’When you have lifted up the Son of man, then you will know that I am He and that I do nothing of my own accord? What I say is what the Father has taught me; he who sent me is with me, and has not left me to myself, for I always do what pleases Him.’ As he was saying this, many came to believe in Him.”
Outside of God, humanity cannot become itself. Everything it has received comes from Him, its future lies in God, the Saviour. The Most High, the Most Holy One, looke dat the earth to deliver captives and free those who were condemned to death. The coming of Jesus announces this deliverance : the Lord bent down from Heaven.He hears the complaint of those in capture, he wants to free his people from death. God lets Himself be touched by then vulnerability of his creature, in Jesus He will become this tiny little child, sharing humanity, the one in agony who wants to join humanity and get it out of its distress. Crucified, Jesus will always be ’I am ’ int his poverty that is nothing but Love. Mary is the first to have believed in Him, she let herself be touched by god, she was the first to cry out her thirst for love, her thirst to be loved.