One of the many perverse events of the French Revolution was its regular public executions, at which crowds would gather to watch and cheer. A famous exception was the execution of the sixteen Carmelite sisters of Compiegne, when the crowd reportedly watched in silence. They seemed to realise that something truly horrific was happening, as they watched the sisters praying, singing, and kissing the statue of Our Lady, before they went up the scaffold to the guillotine. It is n

In these first weeks of Easter we see the paschal candle in all its glory. Taller than it will be as the year goes by, during Eastertide it is lit at all Masses, and until Pentecost it is always placed in a prominent place near the altar or ambo. Go up close to the candle and you will see the sign of the cross either carved into it or painted onto it. You will see the calendar year, and the Greek alpha and the omega, showing that Christ is the beginning and end of all history

What does Resurrection mean? At this moment in our world there is, no doubt, the feeling that death and destruction are more apparent than the focus of the religious festivity we celebrate at Easter. What does resurrection mean then in the face of war, death, destruction, the cost-of-living crisis, and the spectre of our country possibly running out of fuel? The response to the historic problem of human suffering and disappointment can take only two paths. The first is that o

This evening, the Solemn Vigil of the Sunday of the Most Holy Resurrection of the Lord, we are at the very centre, the very heart of the faith, the prayer, and the life of the Church, the assembly of all those who by faith are incorporated into Christ. Easter Sunday is the feast of feasts. The first Christian communities had only one annual feast, Easter Sunday, which was echoed in all of the other Sundays of the year – each Sunday is first and foremost a celebration of the r

Jesus was crucified during the feast of Passover. Christians have always known this, and just in case anyone forgets, John slips a little reminder into his telling of the Passion: the priests were unwilling to enter the Praetorium lest they defile themselves and become unable to celebrate the Passover. At first sight, however, John does not seem to take up Passover themes in his Passion narrative, except perhaps at the very end, his remark that not a bone of Jesus was broken

In tonight’s Gospel, which is taken from John, and in our liturgy tonight, we join Jesus and the Apostles at the Last Supper. We know from the other Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, that the Lord also instituted the Eucharist at this meal. This act anticipated his Passion, where he, the perfect priest, offered himself, the perfect victim, on the altar of the cross, for the forgiveness of sins. It is this one perfect sacrifice which is re-presented at each and every Mass. Thu

As St Paul writes to the Philippians, the Passion is the great act of humility of Jesus, who is the Son of God, true God from true God. Jesus, carrying his Cross, takes on himself the role of the suffering servant of the Book of Isaiah, that of the lone psalmist apparently abandoned by God. But as Jesus goes to his Passion and death on the Cross, he doesn’t go alone. Jesus is with his disciples and sends his disciples to a certain man to borrow his donkeys. Thus, this man com

Lent already has a certain sobriety, a certain restraint, a certain call to repentance. But now something intensifies. The crosses are veiled. The images are covered. The Church seems to withdraw even what is familiar and consoling, as if to say: now we must walk more closely with Christ into the shadow of His Passion. It is striking that at this threshold the Gospel gives us the raising of Lazarus. At first sight, it is a Gospel full of grief, delay, tears, and death. But in

In the long aftermath of his healing, the man who’d been born blind testifies to Jesus before he sees him.  And that's how it is with every one of us: we witness to Jesus by what we say and do long before, it seems, we get to see him face-to-face. That witness precedes sight, that testimony comes before certainty, speaks to us about the minimums needed to become Christian.  It's not necessary that all questions are answered or that all doubts have been dispelled.  We certainl

I would love to know where this woman at the well ended up. As we become familiar with the Gospel stories it is natural that we should be interested in what the characters did and how they lived for the rest of their lives. This is especially so for the Samaritan woman, because this is the longest conversation that Jesus has with any one person in the Gospels. That is not to say, though, that it was a long conversation. Perhaps they only spoke for a few minutes. But in that e

The mystery of the transfiguration is something I have always liked to meditate on. This episode in Jesus' life draws us into the secret life of Christ. Sometimes it is a privilege to be told a secret. We feel that we can be trusted and that we are in some way perhaps esteemed in that person's opinion. Here today in our gospel reading Jesus tells us a secret about himself.   The transfiguration conveys to us two particular aspects of Christ's life, aspects that are integral t

Temptation works on us because there is truth in it.  Temptation doesn't work for us because there is not enough truth in it.  There is, in temptation, a lie which has been put alongside the truth, to make it plausible and desirable.  We’ll accept the lie if we only see the truth it’s attached to.  So, if we separate out the truth from the lie in any idea we have, then we shall discover the temptation and more often avoid sin. To see how this works in practice, we can take th

We can all recall passages where Jesus calls the Pharisees “hypocrites,” and he uses even stronger names such as “brood of vipers” and “whitened sepulchres.” In today’s Gospel, however, Jesus warns us against name-calling, You have heard how it was said, “Thou shalt not kill,” and anyone who does kill shall answer for it before the court. But I say this to you. Anyone who is angry with his brother shall answer for it before the court. Anyone who calls his brother fool will an

Last Sunday, we heard the beginning of the part of Matthew’s Gospel called the Sermon on the Mount. This sermon takes place in chapters five, six, and seven of this Gospel. St Augustine wrote a profound commentary on this sermon, and in the first lines of this commentary he describes it as “a perfect standard of the Christian life”. In a very real sense, this part of Jesus’s teaching provides us with a perfect guide regarding what it means to be a follower of Christ, that is,

In today’s opening prayer, we ask that we may “honour God with all our mind, and love everyone in truth of heart.” This sounds routine, living the two great commandments of Jesus, loving God above all, and our neighbour as ourselves. Yet it is hard to do, because to do it involves dragging our mind away from ourselves. Likewise, we ask in our prayer that we may love everyone in truth of heart. The truth of heart that the prayer is talking about comes from a genuine attention

There are moments in history when everything changes, yet almost no one realises it at the time. Life seems merely to continue—until, later on, we look back and see that a door had closed forever and another had opened, irreversibly. Saint Matthew presents just such a moment at the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry. “When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee” (Mt 4:12). At first glance, it seems like a simple narrative transition. In reality, it

The prophet Isaiah sees a new vocation for Israel. Having been the servant of God, Israel is now also to become the light of the nations. But what does that mean in practice? Does it mean that the remarkable perseverance of Israel will be held up for the nations to see and admire? Will the nations now at last pay attention to the tiny nation of Israel because it is now clear that they have the might of God on their side? These sectarian thoughts do not cohere with all els

The sight of a queue for confession can provoke exasperation and anxiety in a penitent. How long will I be waiting for? Will there be time for the priest to hear my confession, as well as the twenty people ahead of me in the queue? As a penitent, I am familiar with these emotions. As a confessor, though, I suggest that a queue for confession is one of the more edifying sights there is (certainly it’s one of the most edifying queues there is). It is an expression from the peni

‘Epiphany’ is a Greek word which means something like ‘manifestation of divinity’. Traditionally, it has been linked to three events in Jesus’s life: the adoration of the Magi, which we hear described in today’s Gospel; Jesus’s baptism in the Jordan, which we will celebrate next Sunday; and his first recorded miracle at the wedding feast at Cana. Each of these events is an epiphany, because, in each one, Jesus is revealed as more than simply a human being—in them, his divinit

Like the others feasts and celebrations that make up the Christmas season, the remembrance of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph gives us another opportunity to reflect on the meaning of the incarnation whereby the Eternal Word of God, the Son of God, who is God, came to live among us – and not just to live among us but to live among us as one of us and for all of us. In working the miracle of the Word made flesh God chose to become part of a human family, not just sym