32nd Sunday B

Jeff Bagnall • 30 October 2024

The first reading ( 1 Kings 17:10-16 ) is from a group of books in the Bible called History. History writing is always subjective and selective, as the author or editor wants to make some point or other; stories and anecdotes are retold to fit in with what the writers or editors think and want to tell their readers. The story we read today is to illustrate how God deals with people; Elijah His prophet had to announce the drought on the land as God’s response to the peoples’ unfaithfulness, but he himself would be cared for by God through a good-living woman whom God would reward appropriately. We could speculate what tale is behind this and how it got into this history, and it may help us get something of the message, but more important is what it now says to us. It is a message about God’s care for those who are chosen by him and for those who care for their fellow human beings whatever their situation is; and it says something about the ‘natural’ disasters that might be caused by human misuse of earth’s resources.

The second reading ( Hebrews 9:24-28 ) continues the thoughts about the Jewish Temple priesthood and the role of Christ in our salvation. It is an exposition of the relationship between the time and activity of Jesus with the period before His coming and the fulfilling of His human life – the difference between the Jewish situation and that of the Christians; the former is like a shadow and the latter is the real thing itself. So there is just one death to seal the covenant (the agreement between God and people) instead of regular sacrifices by different priests; the old covenant is replaced by the New Testament era. There is now hope for those who die, of forgiveness and life with God after death, secured by the entry of Jesus as one of us into heaven whence He came. Once the Jewish Temple was destroyed in the year 70 AD their religion left behind all this activity of sacrifice and benefitted from the change; but a Christian’s sacrifice should be the way one lives for others – not a death but a way of life!

The third reading ( Mark 12:38-44 ) expresses the Christian teaching about the style of life one should have, and its driving force. So Mark tells of Jesus speaking against those Scribes who gad about in fine attire, seek the admiration of people and honour amongst others, who take advantage of the defenseless and perform elaborate prayers. But Mark doesn’t mean this to apply to all Scribes for he has written just before this how Jesus praised one of them (the gospel for the 31 st Sunday cycle B). But Mark’s story is drawing towards the end of Jesus’ life and it is becoming more urgent for certain points to be made. Hence Jesus goes on to praise a demur and self-effacing approach with minimal material value yet expressing a genuine and generous religious attitude; He goes on to contrast the supposedly religious experts and officials with a financially poor yet spiritually devout widow. This expresses in practical terms what was expressed more theoretically the the reading we had from the letter to the Hebrews.

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

The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 5 June 2026

The first five books of the Bible are called the Pentateuch, which comes from the Greek words for five and for scroll; together these books are called the Law, particularly in the Jewish religion. The last of these five books is called Deuteronomy, which comes from the Greek words for second and for law, because this book is like a summing up of the laws and experiences of the previous books of the Law. It is chiefly a story of the relationship between God and the people; he saves and looks after them time and again in wonderful ways, they repeatedly complain and let Him down – it’s the story of our lives too, perhaps. The verses we have today focus on the manna, which they received as a gift from God when they found themselves in the desert with no knowledge of how to survive there and hence made a complaint against God for leading them there through Moses. Manna was seen as miraculous food that was the gift of life for them from God even though they were not deserving. From this it is clear how this is related to the sacrament of Communion.

The Mosst Holy Trinity - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 28 May 2026

Exodus is the second book of the Bible; it is based on and around the story of slaves escaping from their oppression in Egypt and travelling through the hostile desert under the leadership of Moses; and it was in this process that a relationship was built up between them and the one God who would be theirs from then on forever; it was the God with the mysterious name of Yahweh, meaning something like ‘I am who is.’ This basic oral account over time gained a great number of elaborations and additions before it settled into the written form in the Bible that has now been more or less unaltered for about two and a half thousand years. In our extract for today’s first reading we hear of this aloof and even fearful God condescending to meet with Moses the people’s leader on the heights of the sacred Mount Sinai. This God then announces himself (always referred to in this personal way) as kind and forgiving, despite the unfaithfulness of the people whose God He is. Moses is encouraged by this revelation and feels enabled to respond on behalf of the people he leads, with worship and prayer for blessing and forgiveness. It is this threefold pattern in this section of the Exodus story that is seen by Christians to suit this day’s Feast of the Trinity – the threefold pattern of God the aloof, the one who shows Himself and the one who enables an appropriate response.