1st Advent Sunday Cycle C

Jeff Bagnall • 23 November 2024

The first Reading is from the Book of Jeremiah in the Jewish Bible which Christians call the Old Testament. However the passage ( chapter 33:14-16) is actually not found in the Greek version of the Bible (known as the Septuagint often written as LXX) which was probably based on an earlier edition of the Book of Jeremiah and it is mostly the same wording as Jeremiah 23:5f. Although Jeremiah operated in the 7th century BC, this bit was added in the following century when the Jews had practically lost their land to the Babylonians and needed an upbeat message of hope, grounded, as always, on the belief in the faithfulness of God to His original promises to them. They referred to this quality of God as His righteousness. So the message of the prophet was that there will be a king, a branch of this royal House of David, who will be righteous and who will rightly be called ‘the Lord is my integrity,’ words which in Hebrew are the name Zedekiah, the name of a king who “did evil in the sight of the Lord” (2 Kings 24:19ff).

The Second reading is part of Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians ( chapter 3:12 to 4:2) after hearing from his friend Timothy that the Christians there were doing alright. He had established the church there particularly among the underprivileged, and it was they who smuggled him out hastily when the authorities became suspicious of his rapid and sizeable success. So with good news from Timothy he is able to write encouragingly to them. These early Christians were expecting the second coming of Christ at any moment and so this was both a reason for joy and for encouragement in good living according to the will and teachings of Jesus, which Paul had originally conveyed to them.

The gospel from which we generally read in this third year of the cycle of three (it is part of the Common Lectionary which many Christian denominations use) is from Luke. It is a passage ( chapter 21:25-36 passim) which Luke has probably seen in Mark’s gospel; Mark was written earlier about the time of the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, an event which was quite a shattering catastrophe especially for the Jews and Jewish Christians but this disaster gave a newness of life to many Jewish believers. Two decades later, Luke still refers to disasters as a way to encourage the Christians, assuming they are faithful, to expect the Coming of Christ as a cosmically dramatic occasion. For people in those days, as for us today, the movement of the sun, the moon and the stars was quite predictable, unlike the weather and the political situation, and so the deviation of these from their normal paths was a good symbol for the remarkable future event of the coming of Christ in glory and the fulfilment of the kingdom of God.

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

21st Sunday in Ordinary Time - 2026 - Year A

by Jeff Bagnall • 19 August 2026

During the time of the prophet Isaiah, the kingdom of Judah was threatened by the Assyrian empire from the east. Isaiah had recommended trusting in God to save the people and God would be with them. But the king and leaders didn’t see it this way, they felt they would loose, and forfeit their privileged positions, if not their lives. They made some sort of a pact with the emperor of Assyria so that Jerusalem was spared, although the rest of the country was invaded. So Isaiah, as we read today , reprimand Shebna the royal steward, and announced a replacement, who will be the leader to make decisions in the future; he will have the symbols of office, the sash, the robe, the key to the ordering of the country’s affairs, and will keep them safe like the peg for a tent. This passage seems to be in the mind of Matthew when he writes of Peter receiving the leadership office in our gospel reading. But the historical events behind it challenge us severely in our relationship with our world and with God, just as the sermon on the mount in the New Testament does: if anyone wants your shirt give them your coat as well, if anyone strikes you turn the other cheek, love you enemies… (see Matthew 5:38-48).

Feast of the Assumption - Year A

14 August 2026

There was much apocalyptic literature in the centuries before and after Christ – among the Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Persian and even Indian literature. This literature which is about the development in the world of disasters and troubles expressed in dramatic stories, included those of evil ‘influences’ seeking to destroy the next ruler born to a chosen woman to be mother of the future ruler. Some form of these apocalyptic stories were part of Jewish literature – as also the book of Revelation in the N.T. which used to be called the Apocalypse in Catholic bibles, because of its similarity to such literature. Our first reading (from Revelations 12:1-6 ) for the Catholic feast of the Assumption includes an adaptation of this mythic scenario to the situation of Christianity under Roman persecution in the 1st century to encourage believers in Jesus and his resurrection – a faith that secures them safety in heaven, but how the rest of us, still living in our world, are still threatened by evil. The story could bring to mind the Assumption of Mary into heaven – waiting with Christ for the rest of us after our struggles against the evil forces in our world. There are ‘secular’ stories of old about such sort of events.