Matthew 4:12-17, 23-25

We can be easily swept along by the world's philosophical answers to life's fundamental questions.  The media often presents experts who proffer their answers to these, and we may feel lost in a world that is full of instant answers and strong opinions!  However, when we conform our attitudes to the truth of the Gospel and Jesus' teaching we can be confident that we are living a life that is pleasing to God.  Christ came into the world to set us free from futility and emptiness.

The way of Christ is simple: we believe in Jesus and love one another (v. 23).   When we allow the truth of the Gospel to reveal Jesus, we experience an interior attraction to his teaching.  The Spirit transforms us to be more Christ-like, and penetrates our hearts with the truth about ourselves and gives us the courage to admit how we have been unfaithful, marred God's image and tainted our relationship with him. We can enter into life-giving dialogue with the Spirit in which we speak, listen and express ourselves trustfully with the joy of being welcomed, accepted, forgiven and restored.

The Spirit knows our hearts and wants us to have confidence in his power to renew us.  The command to love one another would be impossible to fulfil were we to rely on ourselves; we need God's love, help and support. When we welcome the Spirit as our teacher and guide, he will come without our knowing how, without our being aware of how it happens. But we will find him dwelling within, speaking to us and counselling us on what we must do. If we are sorrowful he will comfort us in our affliction. The flame of his love will burn in us and we will love God and our brothers and sisters with a love that is encouraging, warm and constant.

Come, Holy Spirit! I welcome you in a new way into my lịfe today. Show me the attitudes and opinions that close my heart to your gentle persuasion. Help me to be aware of your presence that always consoles, enlightens, refreshes and directs. I believe that every wall of fear, confusion and temptation must yield before your truth and love.

1 John 22–46 • Psalm 27–8, 10–11 • Matthew 4:12–1, 23–25

Jesus was amazed at the centurion's faith. Nowhere in Israel had he found such faith as in this Gentile, a representative of a hated foreign oppressor. What was it in the centurion's behaviour that so impressed the Lord? The disposition with which he approached Jesus can be summed up in two words: faith and humility. He had complete confidence in Jesus's ability to heal his servant, and he was so humble that he did not consider himself worthy to have Jesus come into his house.

What did the centurion see in Jesus that gave him such faith, when many of the Jewish leaders were not open to Jesus's message? He was a man in authority and recognised Jesus’s absolute authority over sickness and evil. But this was not just his own shrewdness; only the work of God's grace in his heart could have brought him to such a position of faith.

It's with these same two attitudes that we should approach Jesus during this season of Advent. We need to be humble enough to see our weaknesses and neediness, and we should have complete faith in the power of Jesus to heal us and cleanse us from our sins. So perfectly do the centurion's words sum up the way we should approach Jesus that they have been incorporated into the liturgy. We say them just before our most important encounter with Christ, our reception of his body and blood. Advent is a time when we prepare for the coming of Christ into our lives in a special way, and we can take these words to heart as we begin this season.

The same is true for us: only God can bring us to see who Jesus really is and our need for him, and we must be open to his work within us. If we approach Jesus with faith and humility this Advent, inviting him into our lives, we shall find that he will work powerfully within us and give us far more than we imagined. Let us be expectant that he will do great things for us in the coming weeks.

Lord Jesus, we are not worthy to receive you, but we know that if you say the word we shall be healed.

lsaiah 2:1-5 • Psalm 121(122):1-9 • Matthew 8:5-11

A slightly different account of today's Parable of the Talents appears in Matthew's Gospel (see 25:14-30).  Matthew mentions only three servants, whereas Luke has ten, and there is a substantial difference between the sums of money involved.  Furthermore, in Luke's version the servants are given an equal amount, whereas in Matthew's a differentiation is made.

Luke is explicit about Jesus’s motive in telling his parable.  As verse 11 makes clear, he wants the people to understand that the fact that he is approaching Jerusalem doesn’t mean that the kingdom is is close at hand.  The man of noble birth must go away “into a far country to receive a kingdom and then return” (v. 12).

In the meantime, his servants are given responsibilities that they must fulfil. The servants – in other words, we as disciples – are not to put their feet up (so to speak), relax and rest on their laurels.  Instead, they are to devote their lives to the building up of God's kingdom on earth (see Acts 1:8-11).

The bottom line of the parable is that from those who are given much, much is expected.  The servants who produce a return from what they are given respect their master and understand his importance as king. On the other hand, the servant who fails to provide a return has a faulty or disordered understanding of his master, fearing him and seeing him as  “ . . . a hard man. You take up what you did not lay down, and reap what you did not sow” (v. 21).

We who have been blessed with so many graces must produce much in return. If we cultivate a healthy understanding of who God is, we will produce a rich harvest.  If, however, we have a misguided or wrong understanding of God, and see him as judgemental, harsh, unforgiving, unloving, etc . . ., our return will be small.

Lord God, may I serve you with all of my heart, soul and strength, and produce the fruits of the Holy Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

2 Maccabees 7:1, 20–31 • Psalm 16(17): 1, 5–8, 15 • Luke 19: 11–28

Luke 12:1–7 • St Teresa of Ávila (Memoria!)

Fear of God is not a virtue we often come across nowadays, but it was cherished by the ancients and seen as the beginning of wisdom. This great virtue needs to be recovered in our own time and lives.

What does it mean to fear God? Consider that he – who governs the sun, moon, oceans, earth, stars and cosmos – also knows when a mere sparrow falls down. Consider that the power of the Almighty – revealed in tumultuous waves or the shifting of tectonic plates – is also the One who counts all of the hairs on our heads. God is worthy to be both loved and feared.

We are called to fear God, which leads to a reverence for our neighbour. St Teresa of Avila points us in the right direction. She was a great woman of prayer, and was so full of the life of God that she would often lose consciousness of herself and become 'one' with God. This mystical union is the highest form of existence, and indicates our infinite value. In his Letter to the Ephesians, Paul speaks of living to the 'praise of his glory' (1:14). Our destiny is therefore for us to be brimming with God's fullness.

For St Teresa, the “Way to Perfection” – as she described the union with God – was not possible without taking up the cross in a life of prayer and penance. 

She was also very human. Once, when her coach overturned and landed in the mud, she questioned: “Lord, why did you do that to me?" On hearing the reply, “That is what I do to all my friends”, she retorted, “It is not surprising then, Lord, that you have so few of them!"

We may think that the mystical life is unachievable for us. But as a Doctor (i.e. Teacher) of the Church, St Teresa guides and inspires our prayer life, so that we eventually come to be united with God, to the praise of his glory!

We can only learn to know ourselves and do what we can - namely, surrender our will and fulfil God's will in us.' (St Teresa of Ávila)

Romans 4:1–8 • Psalm 31(32):1–2, 5, 11 • Luke 12:1-7

 Photo by Zoltan Tasi on Unsplash

Matthew 18:1-5, 10

Today we celebrate the feast of the Guardian Angels. The Catechism of the Catholic Church says: “From its beginning until death, human life is surrounded by their watchful care and intercession.  Beside each believer stands an angel as protector and shepherd leading him to life. Already here on earth the Christian life shares by faith in the blessed company of angels and persons united in God” (para. 336).

Are you comfortable with this teaching? Do you think it's a spiritual reality that is relevant to our daily lives? For sure, in our post-modern and post-Christian society, belief in angels and their opposite, demons, can be – for many – hard to accept and embrace. The Church, however, has always stood firm in its affirmation of this doctrine of faith because angels have been present since creation and throughout the history of salvation.

Therefore, when confronted with aspects of our faith that we find hard to accept, we are encouraged by Jesus to adopt the disposition of a child (Matt. 18:4). What does this mean? After all – as every parent and guardian knows – children do not always display the qualities of a saint, which is why they need their parents. And also, as is self-evident, the nature of life is to grow and mature into adulthood. When we were children, we thought and acted like children, but now as adults we think and act like adults (see 1 Cor. 13:11). Jesus, of course, is referring to a fundamental disposition in children: an openness, a trust, an innocence, which, when adopted by Christians, becomes the impulse of faith which puts all their hope and trust in God.

Greatness then, as far as the kingdom of heaven is concerned, is to do with the heart and our interior disposition. The child of faith in us can easily and readily accept that we and all believers have a guardian angel. Armed with this attitude we pray to our angel, asking for every spiritual blessing and for a pouring out of God's grace upon our lives.

'Angel of God, my guardian dear, 

to whom God's love commits me here,

ever this day, be at my side, 

to light and guard, rule and guide. Amen.

Baruch 4:5–12, 27-29 • Psalm 68(69):33–37 • Proper of Saints: Matthew 18:1–5, 10