Advent – God and crooked lines

The 17^th December heralds in a new phase of the Advent liturgy.  It is a time of heightened expectations expressed in the drama of the great anticipation. 

This time has its own special antiphons for the Breviary and in particular the great O Antiphons which are also reflected in the liturgy of the Eucharist for these days.  These antiphons have been set to some of the most beautiful music we have.

I wrote about these antiphons here https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/32037454/116632818796573691 .  They reflect the longing and hope of Israel which were fulfilled in Jesus.

The Gospel reading for the 17^th that ushers in this period is the genealogy of Jesus Christ according to Matthew (Mt 1:1-17).  This text is so important it is also read at the Vigil of Christmas.  

So, what is it about a list of names?

In the culture of Israel and the Jews of the first Christian communities, genealogy tells us who that person is.  It is their identity; their credentials.  Matthew’s community would be familiar with this from their Jewish heritage.  They would have known each of these ancestors.

Matthew divides the generations into three parts of fourteen ancestors.  Mostly, men are named but there are four women who are significant.

This list of names of patriarchs and kings who were leaders of Israel, were called by God to serve their people.  Some did well others didn’t.  We have the patriarch Abraham and his dynasty of Isaac and Jacob and their descendants; Boaz, a wealthy landowner becomes the husband of Ruth and ancestor of King David who became the measure against which all kings were gauged.

Yet these men were imperfect.  Abraham was more than willing to slaughter his son at God’s behest; he was devious in passing his wife Sarah off as his sister to save himself; he expelled his concubine Hagar and her child to fend for themselves. 

Isaac, like his father passed his wife Rebekah off as his sister and he is tricked into giving his blessing to Jacob the younger son.

Jacob was devious in tricking his father and certainly no model of parenting as his favouritism towards Joseph led to his brothers hating him and trying to kill him.  Instead, Joseph was sold as a slave.  Fortunately for this dysfunctional family, Joseph rose to power in Egypt and gave them shelter.

This brings us to the women in the genealogy.  Judah is one of Jacob’s sons.  Tamar was his daughter-in-law but both her husbands died.  Judah refused to have her marry the third son and sent her away.  She dressed as a prostitute by the roadside and from her liaison with Judah became pregnant.  When Judah found out he ordered her put to death.  However, Tamar had items which he had given her and produced these, thus saving her life.  Judah admitted his liaison and brought her back into the family.

Tamar is considered a heroine because under the levirate marriage laws, the son she bore would continue the dynasty of her deceased husband.  By refusing to have his third son marry Tamar he broke this significant custom.

Rahab was a prostitute in Jericho when Israel was entering the promised land.  She helped Joshua’s spies escape from Jericho.  After Jericho fell, it is said that only Rahab and her family were spared.  In certain texts, Rahab married Joshua.

Ruth, was a Moabite, a race hated by Israelites.  It is a beautiful story (The Book of Ruth) of fidelity to Naomi, her mother-in-law and to her deceased husband.  Ruth eventually marries Boaz and they become the grandparents of David.  Again the levirate marriage customs formed part of the story.

The fourth woman, goes unnamed in the genealogy but we know her as Bathsheba.  She is powerless against the authority of the king. King David sees her bathing and desires her to the point that he arranges for her husband Uriah to be killed in battle.  We have this king who is one ‘after God’s heart’, an adulterer and a murderer.

It is unusual for women to be named in a genealogy but each of these women is considered a heroine in Israel.  They had questionable reputations and put themselves at risk.  Through them, the line of the Messiah is ensured.  Mary is the only other woman mentioned in Matthew’s genealogy and she too stands in line with these heroines.

These men and women in Jesus’ genealogy stand out as at times devious, foolish, venal, victims, outsiders (think of Ruth the Moabite and Rahab the Jericho prostitute).  At the same time, they are God’s beloved through whom God patiently weaves the threads of salvation history. 

They weren’t perfect individuals. The Scriptures do no shy away from recounting their failures. In the midst of the complexities of human life, they stayed faithful to the Holy One who blessed them, called them to repentance and through them the desires of Israel were fulfilled.  They are the line of the messiah.

I take consolation from this genealogy.  The Holy One is patient, chooses us as we are and invites us to allow ourselves to grow into wholeness.  We are part of the great story of salvation history that Jesus’ ancestors lived. 

If we wait until we are perfect or until circumstances are perfect, we have missed the whole point of Incarnation – that God is with us.

This is the key to understanding this history given by Matthew.  He begins and ends the Gospel with ‘God with us’.  He adds to Isaiah 7:14 – Jesus’ name ‘Emmanuel’ is explained as ‘God with us’.  Matthew ends the Gospel with Jesus in Galilee sending out his disciples to make disciples of all nations with the promise ‘I am with you all days, until the end of the age’ (Mt 28:20)

As my mother used to say, ‘God writes straight on crooked lines’.

All I can say is, ‘Thank goodness’.

 

Advent is here! 

Advent is my favourite liturgical season with the profound poetry of Isaiah (mainly) which we Christians read as the coming and the Reign of God.  We see Isaiah’s words in the Gospel texts that tell us that these promises are enfleshed in Jesus and will come to fruition when the Parousia, the final day arrives when ‘Christ will be all in all’.

So, the liturgy talks about the coming of Christ in human flesh and the final fulfilment.

However, what happens in between?  What do we, God’s missionary disciples, the Body of Christ here and now make of them?

The promises

Until 16^th December, the texts of the first readings, both weekdays and Sundays, make great promises about this time:

Swords will be turned into ploughshares

No more training for war

We will walk in the light of the Lord

The wolf lives with the lamb

There will be no more weeping because God will hear our cry

Every tear will be wiped away

There will be an abundance of food

The deaf will hear and the lowly rejoice

Tyrants will be no more

We will be consoled because sin will be no more (p23)

 

The Anointed One and the Anointed Ones

When that first community read Isaiah in the light of the Incarnation, they saw the promises fulfilled in Jesus’ life summed up in Isaiah 11

A spirit of wisdom and insight,

A spirit of counsel and power

A spirit of knowledge and of fear of the Lord….

He does not judge be appearances,

He gives no verdict on hearsay,

But judges the wretched with integrity,

And with equity gives a verdict for the poor in the land.

His word is a rod that strikes the ruthless,

His sentences bring death to the wicked.

Integrity is the loincloth round his waist,

Faithfulness the belt about his hips.

 

However, for us, baptised into the Body of Christ, they are also the qualities of the missionary disciple for we are the living presence of Christ in whom the Reign of God is fulfilled.  This is our mission. This is our great dignity.  These great poems of Advent are also about our identity. 

We have been entrusted with peacemaking, justice doing, relief for the poor, freedom for captives….  Precisely because we are the living face of this Jesus, the Anointed one, Incarnate and Risen.

It may sound too large for us humans who often muddle along.  Too big for ordinary people.  Yet this high calling is grounded in our daily encounters.  Each time we treat someone with respect, recognise in another our sister or brother, forgive, speak for those voiceless, bring relief to those suffering no matter how small our ways, they send ripples out to who knows where.

As we live these gifts daily in the community of faith, we create places of fraternal friendship and welcome.  We transform the world.

Conversion

The texts of Advent call us to repentance, conversion – ‘If you had been alert to my commandments your happiness would have been like a river….’ (Is 48:17-19).  We are asked to turn to the Holy One and be saved.  From what? 

We cannot enter into the joy of the Holy unless we care for all those God asks us to care.  We shut ourselves out but the Holy One waits for us.

Personally, I think we need to turn from limitations of mind and heart to embrace the extraordinary dignity and mission God has gifted us with. Our prayer and our actions embrace both our neighbour and the world. The great Rabbi, Abraham Heschel wrote that we are the shape of God in human history.

If there is one thing this pandemic has brought home to me is that we survive only when we see our lives as a network of relationships with all humankind and all creation.  To wear a mask is not only to protect ourselves but it is an act of love for others – people we may never know.  We wash hands, keep distance and isolate ourselves, for those we love but also for those we may never know.  This is redeeming friendship.  What Pope Francis in Fratelli tutti calls ‘fraternal friendship’.

The contagion of the virus made me think about how close all our encounters are, whether they be human or with the rest of creation.  We share breath when we speak, we share DNA, we share the air we breathe.  We saw pollution levels drop and wildlife return to the cities. We most truly are related on a deep level of God’s creation. 

The conversion Advent asks of us is to be converted from exclusive individualism to community knowing ourselves to be sisters and brothers.  It asks us to expand our horizons to include the whole world; to expand the circle of love to people who are poor, hungry, alone, lost, despised, the stranger; to act with justice and honesty in all one’s interactions with people and all creation. 

This conversion of Advent is a daily movement to see as God sees, to love as the Holy One loves.  To see as the God of Jesus sees.  Our truth is that we live in a network of relationships with all creation.  The Triune God so loved the world that the Second Person entered into creation to be its glory, crown and redeemer. 

As the Holy One says, ‘with an excess of love I will take you back’ (Is 54:1-10). Daily, momentary conversion God embraces us.

Of course, this is all God’s doing, the Spirit inspiring us.  We have the promise, ‘…my love for you will never leave you and my covenant of peace with you will never be shaken says the Lord who takes pity on you. (Is 54:10). 

To answer my question, ‘what happens in between’? Christ comes to us to transform us into his likeness and in turn our faithful acts of love make this visible.

‘We have promised great things to God

and

God has promised even greater things to us’

St Francis of Assisi

 

The Canticle of the Creatures

Recently I needed to prepare an introduction to St Francis’ Canticle of the Creatures.  The Canticle was to be the prayer opening to a talk on Laudato si given by Peter Arndt, Executive Office, Catholic Justice and Peace Commission, Brisbane.

Introduction to the Canticle

The title of Pope Francis’ encyclical, Laudato si is taken from The Canticle of the Creatures by St Francis of Assisi.

It is thought to be the first hymn ever written in ‘Italian’ i.e. in the Umbrian dialect.

First of all, a word on the Umbrian word ‘per’ usually translated ‘through’ or ‘for’.  It is ambiguous as it can mean through, in, for or with.  So, the Canticle is praise of God through, in, for, with all creation.

The Canticle can sometimes be perceived as a sentimental, romantic hymn to creation.  This is to misunderstand it.

The Canticle arose from St Francis’ profound mystical relationship with the Divine incarnate in Jesus - ‘the Lord of Glory who became our brother’.  He is Friar Jesus, our brother.  He is at the same time the Divine Word through whom all things were created, thus Francis’ reverence for the brotherhood and sisterhood of all creation rests in Jesus who became one of us.

Creation is the primary revelation of Divine creative love and in Jesus’ flesh-taking this creative Parenthood of God is made visible.  So, we and all that is created are sisters and brothers through the Parenthood of the Father and the flesh-taking of the Word in the creative power of the Spirit.

Francis wrote the Canticle over a period of time.

The first verses were written in 1224/5 when he was living in a darkened hut in the grounds of St Clare’s monastery, San Damiano where he was being cared for by Clare and her sisters.  Francis was blind and in pain from having his eyes cauterised.  From time to time the hut was infested with mice. 

From this darkness the verses of praise burst forth.

The second part was written to broker peace between the Mayor of Assisi and the Bishop.  Their sworn hatred for each other developed into violent factions in the city.  Francis wrote the verses about forgiveness and sent his friars to sing it asking the Mayor and Bishop to ‘listen carefully’.  Peace was restored.

The verse welcoming Sister Death was written at the Portiuncula around 3 October 1226 as Francis lay dying.  He asked to be placed naked on the ground so he could meet the God he loved in total poverty as did Jesus.  Surrounded by the friars and Lady Jacopa di Settisoli, he dictated these verses and asked his brothers to sing Canticle.

It is written by eyewitnesses that Francis died singing.  It is said that when he died, though it was night, the larks of Umbria flew into the sky and sang.

So, the Canticle celebrates the mystical insight into the Divine and all creation.  It is about faith, gratitude, wonder at the gift of the Holy One who became one of us.  It is sings of the deep relational truth of creation and so how to live.

Often science has to catch up with the mystics.

The Canticle

Most High, all powerful, good Lord, 
Yours are the praises, the glory, the honour, 
and all blessing.

To You alone, Most High, do they belong, 
and no one is worthy to mention Your name.

Be praised, my Lord, through all your creatures, 
especially through my lord Brother Sun, 
who brings the day; and you give light through him. 
And he is beautiful and radiant in all his splendour! 
Of you, Most High, he bears the likeness.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Sister Moon 
and the stars, in heaven you formed them 
clear and precious and beautiful.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Brother Wind, 
and through the air, cloudy and serene, 
and every kind of weather through which 
You give sustenance to Your creatures.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Sister Water,
which is very useful and humble and precious and chaste.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Brother Fire, 
through whom you light the night and he is beautiful 
and playful and robust and strong.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Sister Mother Earth, 
who sustains us and governs us and who produces 
varied fruits with coloured flowers and herbs.