3rd Sunday of Advent B

Jeff Bagnall • 15 December 2023

The first reading is from Isaiah chapter 61. As Israel’s long history progressed, even from the time of Abraham, leaders kept being chosen and supported by God, and when it came to Kings their appointment was confirmed by anointing. Then when times were difficult for the nation, people began to expect that God would send an anointed one who would bring them to their fullness and their dream of success. The history of the people tells us ( Ezra 1:1ff ) that their captivity in Babylon ended through the emperor Cyrus, chosen by God to send the people back to their homeland. Our first reading for today comprises two stanzas from a poem in the book of Isaiah from about this time (530 BC). The first could well be the voice of such a chosen liberator, though we might see it as also being appropriate to be expressed by Christ Himself. The word Christ means anointed and the Spirit of God is with the anointed one. This chosen one (whether we think it is Cyrus, or anticipating Christ) has good news to deliver – the word Gospel literally means good news. It is to announce the day everything will be put right, a vindication that is sometimes translated as vengeance (for the Jews would likely have thought of retribution on their enemies). The next stanza that we read is probably the thoughts of Jerusalem personified for the inhabitants of the city and its surrounds; it sings of rejoicing in the restored glory of the building and of their society in themselves and in relation to their enemies. This stanza can remind us that we should rejoice at the things that God has done for us in Christ.

In the second reading Paul writes to the Thessalonians from Corinth and has received news from Timothy that the Christians in Thessalonica, which he had to leave hastily, are doing well. He writes to give them some advice and to praise their success. Our reading is almost the end of this letter, dated about 50 AD. Christ wants His followers to be upbeat, to pray for things they want and anyway to always thank God for all His blessings. The community there seems to have quite a few ‘prophets;’ They are people, male or female, who feel moved by the Spirit to make pronouncements and public prayers. Some in the community dislike this activity, but Paul says you need to judge what they say and accept what you know to be right and good and reject the rest. He ends by praying for them – it's good for people to know when they are being prayed for! 'May you be entirely blameless', he prays, using the phrase ‘body, soul and spirit.’ Be ready for the advent of Christ, he prays, which the early Christians thought might be quite soon.

The gospel is from John, a Gospel written much later than the other three and which had to address issues that were developing in the church at the time. One of these was an exaggerated adulation of John the Baptist by some supposed Christians. After all John had been a very impressive character, attracting crowds out into the desert to recommit themselves to God in a ceremony of baptism similar to ones for people taking on an entirely new religious belief and practice. In many ways his extravagantly ascetic life and dramatic death at the hands of Herod, were more impressive than the generally compassionate preaching and lifestyle of Jesus. So at the beginning of this Gospel the position of John in Christian belief is clarified in the reading we have today. Positively, John is the one announcing good news as in the other gospels which also quote the passage from Isaiah used in last week’s readings. Here it is quite clear that John is not the one, not the light, but just a servant preparing his way. Even today we can sometimes have an image of our saviour which attracts us, rather than elevates and challenges; we need, perhaps to rethink and recommit ourselves.

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

33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time - 2025 - Year C

4 November 2025

The first reading is from the last section of the book of Malachi. In the Hebrew this is Chapter 3, but in the Greek version it is Chapter 4. Cyrus, the king of Persia who became the ruler of Babylon in the 6th century BC, had high ideals for society and a policy of returning deportees back to their homelands. We know of this from the Cyrus cylinder which was discovered in 1869 in the ruins of the city of Babylon and is in the British Museum. In the Bible, the book of Isaiah the prophet interpreted this return to their own land as brought about by their God through Cyrus. But those who returned were not all as good living as they should be and so, in the book of Malachi, we hear today of God’s punishment upon them, but for those who are good or repent, God will come “with healing in his wings.”

31st in Ordinary Time - 2025 - Year C

22 October 2025

The first reading is from the book Wisdom ( 11:22-12:3 ). This book was written less than a century before the birth of Jesus. It came from someone in the Jewish community in Alexandria in Egypt. Jews at the time were not just in the promised land and were quite aware of the ways of thinking in the wider community about life, gods and associated mysteries. The book of Wisdom is in Greek and its ideas are a development of earlier Jewish ideas, absorbing more contemporary notions from this wider community in which they lived. And so wisdom is very important; it is used by them to refer God Himself and their idea of life now extended to even life after death which was not previously held by Jews. Our reading exemplifies the literary quality of the thoughts poetically expressed in a theology of the relationship of God with the failings of humanity and the development of creation. The second reading is from 2 Thess 1:11-2:2 . The two letters to the Thessalonians are the first surviving documents about Jesus that we have – the oldest writings in the New Testament – prior to the gospels that tell of the life of Jesus. Paul was a learned Rabbi in the Jewish community living away from the Jewish enclave in the Roman empire. The story in Acts of him being quite against Jews becoming followers of Jesus is quite reliable. However, this learned man later became a Christian and worked mostly in Roman communities making converts of Jews but especially of Gentiles. He had established a community in Thessalonica but the Jewish synagogue there was not receptive of his message that God was happy with Gentiles, so a mainly Gentile community of followers of Jesus was established away from the synagogue. However after he moved on from his short stay there, he wants and needs to writes to them from prison. It seems from the text we have that he may have given them a wrong idea of God’s being present to them even now and this being the time of the fulfilment of God’s plan for creation. Some of them had given up their regular work and way of life and were just waiting for the End-time to come. And someone may have encouraged them with this view. So Paul has to tell them to get back to regular life – as good followers of Jesus – the final End has not yet come. We are reminded by this that Christianity is constantly developing an understanding of life and creation, and we should be warned not to be so certain of what are basically mysteries – a danger the church has always suffered from.