20th Sunday In Ordinary Time - 2025 - Year C

Jeff Bagnall • 15 August 2025

The first reading is verses taken from from Jeremiah . The man of this name was a prophet round about 600 BC, with a very difficult message to deliver but nonetheless a necessary truth. Because the people in general had abandoned their faith and were worshipping false gods, Jeremiah had to say that they would be punished and eventually this was to be their defeat and the capture of many of them and their exile in Babylon. Obviously people were not pleased with this message and Jeremiah was often threatened and sometimes even imprisoned, and all for just doing what God wanted of him – telling them of their forthcoming downfall. Today’s extract is about one such incident. It makes better sense to read from the beginning of the Chapter rather than the extract in the lectionary (verses 4-6 and 8-10), although then one encounters a number of names perhaps difficult to pronounce. The psalm that follows seems appropriate for Jeremiah’s plight.

The second reading from Hebrews ( 12:1-4 ) comes after last week’s reading which was about faith, with outlines of examples of Old Testament characters who showed great faith, thinking they realised what God’s will was and set out to make it real. In this week’s reading Jesus is held up as the paragon of faith in the life that He led, but climactically in the manner of His death. Like Jeremiah in the first reading, Jesus’ message may have been shocking to many people – we only have records of it from those who saw the positive side of it; but it must have come across as very disruptive and critical, particularly to the leaders of a society which focused on wealth, power and the externals of living out religion. So He is the prime example for us, the hero who encourages and thus enables us to live our lives of faith.

The gospel we have for today ( Luke 12:49-53 ) follows naturally the previous ones, because of the drastic situation that it talks about using the words fire and baptism to describe these experiences. It may relate to the recorded announcement by the Baptist that Jesus would bring a new baptism of Spirit and fire. The divisions that Jesus is said to foretell in this reading are serious splits within families and between generations; it is not something which we experience or at least not so extremely, as is predicted. For early Christians at the time Luke is writing (about 70 AD) being a Christian was often risky and caused family splits and opposition from one’s society; the words Luke uses here might be influenced by these experiences.

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Jeff Bagnall was a lecturer for many years at Craiglockhart College teaching RE to many future Catholic Primary teachers.

27th Sunday in Ordinary Time - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 30 September 2026

In the first reading we have a very good illustration of a successful approach to delivering bad news when you are a prophet and that is your job. The book of Isaiah has been heavily edited, and our reading from chapter 5 is very likely the first public appearance of the prophet. If you want the crowd to listen to you, you don’t want to be known as a prophet of doom. So Isaiah draws a crowd by saying he is going to sing a song, like a street busker setting up his spot. It’s a song, he says, about his friend; it’s told as though it is about a man setting up a new vineyard, but it is really about unrequited love. He did everything one should for the vineyard to be successful, but it just produced (literally) stinking grapes. The friend then questions the crowd: “is there anything more I could have done?” And he tells them he is going to completely wreck the area and make it a wasteland. Then, when the crowd has grown and is listening intently, like a punch-line the prophet announces: “this song is about the Lord and you Israel!” The image of the vineyard became quite popular in the sayings of prophets and even among the people themselves; one of their hymns is the psalm that follows the reading for today.

25th Sunday In Ordinary Time - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 18 September 2026

The first reading is part of a heart-warming poem. It was written about the time that the people were going to be released from captivity by a friendly emperor, Cyrus. It attributes this release to the love of God, who has a special relationship of love for people, a relationship traditionally called a covenant. It is a two-way agreement: God will look after the people, and the people will live in a way pleasing to God. But the agreement is not conditional; it is not like God saying ‘if you keep my commandments I will be your protector and god;’ it is unconditional on God’s side: ‘I will be your God, so you will be my people however you respond to me.’ In the part of the poem we read today, the prophet is announcing to the people, God’s call to them; it is a call to give up any wickedness and turn their lives towards Him. But the prophet is also emphasising that God’s ways are mysterious, for He does not depend on the people behaving well for Him to love them and to be their God; there is no way they can deserve or merit God’s love, it is generous, free and everlasting. The extract is chosen for this contrast between God’s ways and ours, an idea taken up in the Gospel reading for today.