28th Sunday B

Jeff Bagnall • 4 October 2024

The first reading is from the Book of Wisdom. We had a reading from this book on the 25 th Sunday of Ordinary Time and comments there explained something about the book in general and the first 5 chapters in particular. The books that are in the Christian bible are called canonical (from the Greek κανων meaning rule or standard), because they are approved by the Church as giving reliable teaching about God and how we should live. However, non-Catholic Christians generally don’t recognise the Book of Wisdom as belonging to this group, as it was only regarded as special by the Jews living outwith Israel. For this reason it is regarded as of secondary value and is called deutero-canonical. The passage we have today ( 7:7-11) is all about the gift of true wisdom which Solomon prayed for and from which we learn how true wisdom surpasses many things that might tempt us. The name ‘Sophie’ comes from the Greek for wisdom which is personified as a lady.

The second reading is just two verses from the Book of Hebrews ( 4:12f). The author of the letter to the Hebrews as a knowledgeable and thoughtful Christian in the first century after Christ, has taken historical events and theological ideas from the Old Testament and used them to express his religious ideas . In the unit that is our short reading he begins with the relevance and vitality of the word of God, referring ambiguously between the words of the Hebrew Scriptures that he knows so well and Jesus Christ the very Word of God incarnate into our world: literally “Living indeed (is) the word of God and effective…” This Christ is dynamically challenging to the way of life that we lead: “sharper than any two-edged sword”; not just to the way that we live in this secular society: “penetrating into (the) division of soul and spirit” but also sensitive to the inner thoughts and intentions that we have: “judging of thoughts and heart’s intentions”. And it is to Him that we have to give a report, literally “the word,” thus rounding off this poetic passage with the word word with which he began. The writer must think that the convert Jews whom he addresses are getting lax even by the standard of the Wisdom in their Book of that name; so he speaks of the wise word of God that strikes at their inner attitudes (and seems to find them wanting).

The third reading is a unit from the gospel of Mark ( 10:17-30) as his account draws towards the final days of Jesus in Jerusalem. He is wanting to focus the reader more on the essential core attitude of being a follower of Christ, telling us how Jesus tries to bring his disciples to some sort of understanding. The unit is not difficult in itself but two points might be noticeable. The man seeking advice from Jesus refers to him as “Good teacher.” We live in a time when there has been some sorting out of the language we might use about God in relation to the three Persons of the Trinity and to the divinity of Christ; so that when Mark writes that Jesus replies “No one is good but God,” we are given cause for pause. Matthew, when copying this story into his gospel avoids this difficulty altogether with “Then someone came to him and said, ‘Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?’ And he said to him, ‘Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good…” (Matthew 19:16f). We are reminded by this that the revelation of the Incarnation and of the Trinity presents us with a mystery that only through the centuries has come to be expressed in what we think of as precise and clear wording. In addition to being reminded of this mystery we might also be surprised by Jesus referring to the disciples as children. It was, we are told, fairly normal for a Jewish teacher to refer to his ‘students’ in this way, but it can also remind us of our relationship with God in Christ, as disciples – people not only struggling to understand, but also to follow in the way that we live.

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

28th Sunday in Ordinary Time - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 8 October 2026

The first reading is a very upbeat announcement of the good times that the Lord will bring about for all nations. This is not just about the freedom of the Jews who have been in captivity, but it is a universal message of good times, with plenty of all the fruits of the earth and no fear of troubles. The destruction of death might be seen by Christians as the announcement of life after death, but when this message was first delivered, probably in the 6 th century BC, it meant no more will enemies kill each other. All these wonderful gifts from God are, however, delivered to all peoples “on this mountain,” a phrase that initially refers to the city of Jerusalem which is centred upon and around a prominent hill in the countryside; though the phrase was used symbolically to refer to all the people of Israel. So we see in this passage the basis for a future view of what God will do for all people on earth, but with the restriction of it being centred on the people of Israel; it is the vision of a prophet who sees the future darkly, reading it from the worldly state of affairs that he interprets from the standpoint of his assured belief that his is also the god of those who share his faith. We know ourselves that many of us Christians are caught in similar limitations in our vision of God’s relationship with the whole world and its people.

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.