Fr Aidan's Sermon 20th June 2004

For Luke in his gospel this is the turning point, the crossroads. Jesus has amazed and attracted people by his miraculous powers, by his healing powers, by the enchantment of his words, by the difference to the teachers they ordinarily had, the Pharisees and the Scribes. Completely different, an alternative and the crowds were buzzing. And so he says to his disciples, and Luke always puts a big headline, something very important because he mentions Jesus was at prayer and we always know that something important is going to happen in Luke.
"Who do they say I am?"
"Some Elijah, one of the prophets, John the Baptist".
"Who do you say I am?"
And Peter spoke up:"You are the Messiah, the one we have been waiting for, the Christ".
They have glimpsed the power of God, the presence of God in our Lord.
Then the turning point comes because the rest of Luke's gospel is teaching them what that involves and in some ways it is the opposite of what has happened at first. Jesus turns his back on the way he could have taken of celebrity, fame, power, glory; all those were open to him and he turned away from those in the desert; those temptations were there. That was one way he could have saved the world, astounded people by the power of God present on Earth, but that wasn't the way he chose. It wasn't what the Father wanted. Strangely enough it wasn't the best way. What Jesus did and what he does is he enters into what is common to every human being so that salvation is open to all. He grasps the common factor in every life, the humdrum, the ordinary, the suffering, the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, the sense of failure, of rejection, of suffering and death. And that is open to the whole of the human race. And those are the weapons he chooses to triumph, that is the way to salvation. The disciples found it very hard to learn that lesson and we find it just as hard, if not harder.

We live in an age where it's all celebrity. Big Brother and God knows what else. Who do we put before our children? Posh and Becks. We can't do that - we're chasing shadows. How many at the end of the season, these great footballers, well over 400 professional footballers are just given their cards; that was it, the end of their footballing life. Perhaps some of them only 19, 20, 21. All of them started off on the road to fame, to be another number 7 or 9 playing in the premier league and there's hundreds of them on the scrap heap every season.
Chasing shadows and yet constantly we're invited to chase shadows of celebrity and fame. And our Lord, thank God, says it is nothing to do with that, that is not the way of salvation.

It's interesting in this discussion in which we are invited to take part on family life, some of the responses coming. What do we do, we've got divorce, remarried people, the power to limit our families with ease; we've got all these things. That's what the world offers us; that's what's there. People say the church should move with the times and give in with these things. I think one thing our Lord is saying to us, to me and to you, he is saying very powerfully, what this life is about is hearing the call to follow Christ. So that's what each of us has to do, whatever our role in life, is to listen to the call of Christ, to follow him and that means that if we listen to that call and respond to it, it means that we are setting our face on becoming saints. That what we are called to be is holy, that first of all we have to seek intimate union with God, that's what this life is about, because it's what the next life is about. So the beginning of our eternal life has to take its pattern and model from the most of eternal life which we are going to live and most of eternal life we hope is going to be in intimate union with God. So we've got to start now. So our schools, our families, have to tell our children that what life is about is union with God. It's about holiness. It's only then when we decide to follow that life and that way that we can cope with all the daily cross, which our Lord calls it, taking up the cross every day and following him.

One of the most extraordinary things which our Lord says about following him is that marriage is for life, that if you get married that's it; if it breaks down, that's a life of solitude for you, single parent, no remarrying. That's a very hard saying to live in this world. Marriage is about cherishing life, about having children, about procreating, about being open to life. Humanae Vitae is still a very hard teaching. How on earth can anyone live out that without having decided the only thing in life is to be holy and to bolster our life with a daily prayer life, with a sacramental life, a vigorous sacramental life where we hunger for the Mass, for the sacraments; where we see the presence of God sacramentally in all the events of our lives, so that we see life through Christ's eyes. So that unless we start on that path of John of the Cross, of the great saints, of course all the rest, the teachings of Christ will sound out of joint, because it is out of joint with the times.

If we are going to follow him, then we have to lay down our lives and follow him. It's not laying down our Sundays for half an hour or an hour in the mornings and following him; it's our whole life. And that for us and for the apostles is a very difficult thing whether we're a priest or a father or a mother or a son or a daughter, whether we're married or single, then it's a very challenging thing to do, but it's offered to each and every one of us and that's what our lives are about. If we miss that, then we miss the whole point of why we are here and it's only when we've made that commitment to take up our cross and follow him, then the rest will fall in place. And we learn too, the other thing, that this is the Creator of the world, this is the person who loves me and invites me to follow him and has said "Learn off me my yolk is easy and my burden light". So it's only when we enter into the darkness and embrace it, then we can have that sureness that his yolk is easy and his burden light.

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