Reflecting on John 18: 33b-37

Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice. This is Jesus’ defense before Pilate, the man who will decide between his life, or death. And what does Pilate say in response? Truth. What is truth?

We don’t hear that chilling and cynical question because it’s the verse just outside the boundaries of today’s gospel. We’ll have to wait ‘til Good Friday to hear it, but it should give us pause when we do. In fact, that sentence is the oldest extant piece of the New Testament ever discovered. Can you imagine being a biblical archaeologist digging the dry Egyptian dirt, and finding THAT sentence, and, after analysis, learning that you had unearthed the oldest piece of the New Testament ever found?

It might be the oldest question in the hearts of the earliest Christians, or our hearts, too. Can Jesus be trusted? So many religious (and secular) ideas are competing for our hearts. Can we trust this crucified Messiah? The first-century followers of Jesus, especially his disciples who, out of terror of the Romans, abandoned Jesus to face Pilate alone, had to have asked this question themselves.

Yes, they’d been with him when he healed the man born blind, the hemorrhaging woman, the woman bent double, and so many more. They even watched him raise Jairus’ little twelve-year-old daughter from what appeared to be death. And now he was standing before Pilate, testifying to the Truth, and everyone on the side of Truth would listen to him until the end of the world. And yes, the martyrs, too.

We live in a day when the sophisticated agnostics among us believe that all truth is relative. Pilate would have been very comfortable with them.

What is your Truth?

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on Mark 13: 24-32

I am a fearful person. I’ve been too careful, too cautious. The world was certainly ending soon, and I wanted it to hurt as little as possible. Growing up, there were just enough prophets of doom around to keep me in a perpetual state of alarm. Some of their dire predictions have come true over time, but many have not. I confess that I chose fear over faith in every case.

It’s been three spins around the sun since we heard Mark’s terrifying apocalyptic account of the end times, but this time, I’m noticing something there all along, waiting for me to grab hold and reach safety.

It’s this: right after Mark portrays the terrible tribulations—stars falling from the sky, neither the sun nor moon giving any light—Jesus says, “Learn a lesson from the fig tree.” What is the lesson that all fruit-bearing trees have for us?

Check it out, they say. Come in closer. See the leaves that fell last winter? They were stamped down into the earth by rain and snow. The tiny insects came and decomposed the leaves. Some of that was released into the atmosphere, and other parts remained and nourished the soil. See those tiny buds? Uh-huh. Apples. Peaches. Figs. Just you wait.

Just you wait, friends. Take a lesson from the fig tree. The Divine Plan is never that we should be paralyzed by fear. I get that now. It’s embedded in the DNA of trees. God intends to give us “a future and a hope” (Jer. 29:11).

Oh, and here’s some other good news. The joy-filled Gospel of Luke is right around the corner.

How has a fearful heart stopped you from embracing a life of faith?

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on Mark 12: 38-33

This gospel reading is one of the thorniest in the whole lectionary, mainly because it can have several interpretations. One of them is that Jesus is NOT praising the widow for her immense sacrifice in giving all she has to the Temple treasury.

This might be the equivalent of a poor, unhoused person coming into Church, hearing a compelling homily about sacrificial giving, and coming forward to put his or her last penny into the collection basket.

Who wouldn’t want to shout to the ushers, “Give back every penny that unfortunate person just dropped in the basket! How will she eat today? Where will he sleep tonight? How dare we take from the poorest of the poor? They are the very ones for whom collection plates are meant.”

Is there any one of us who wouldn’t react that way to this imagined scenario? But not so the scribes. Sitting in their places of honor, they observe this dangerous gift on the part of the poor widow and do nothing to stop her.

Why is this donation dangerous? The word “widow” means one who is silent or unable to speak. That was the status of the widow. She has no voice and no one to speak for her.

This is why Jesus’ remark is not praise, but a LAMENT that this injustice is happening in front of the scribes, who certainly know the mandate—repeated FOUR TIMES in the Hebrew scriptures–to care for the widow, the orphan, and the alien in the land.

Care for the widow was the very reason for the Temple treasury. Jesus isn’t praising the widow. He’s lamenting that this travesty is happening right before them.

What do you think of this interpretation of today’s gospel?

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on Mark 12: 28b-34

What a reference letter! The unnamed scribe in today’s gospel hears Jesus say, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” He’s extraordinary, of course. Unlike his peers, this anonymous man has been listening with his whole heart, and soul, and mind. He’s not there to trip Jesus up, but to learn from him.

He affirms Jesus’ pairing of Deuteronomy 6: 4-5 (which he probably prayed that very morning, since it was required of every Hebrew male) with Leviticus 19:8 (about loving one’s neighbor as oneself). So, says Jesus, the greatest commandment has two parts, the first about loving God, the second about loving neighbor. The anonymous scribe, deeply touched, says, “Yes. That’s what I’ve figured out, too.”

It turns out that the kingdom of God isn’t very far at all. It’s right here, at the intersection of love of God and love of neighbor. And we step in and out of it all the time. You can feel your entrance into the kingdom when you participate in things that build community, and that forge peace. For me, that’s any time I get to volunteer for a Guns to Gardens event.

That’s where people bring their unwanted firearms to a designated spot and safely surrender them.

What happens next is stunning. Their unwanted weapons are forged by blacksmiths into garden tools! Their swords are turned into plowshares (Is. 2:4); scripture is fulfilled right there, in their participation in the kingdom.

What moments in your life are immersion in the kingdom? Taking care of grandchildren? Lending your life skills to parish committees? Seeking out an estranged friend? Look there! You are not far from the kingdom of God.

How many of the roles you play in life are solidly in God’s reign?

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on Jeremiah 31: 7-9

A few years ago, I had the life-changing experience of taking a Justice Matters class on Migration. The worst part was that, unlike my nightly discipline of shielding my eyes and ears when footage of the migrant boats came on the news, we actually had to watch the videos. If I think about it, I’ll cry, and my tears will just add to the rivers of tears shed for the millions of migrants who suffer every day in order to escape the terrors of home.

Imagine, then, the image that Jeremiah offers today. God will gather ALL who migrated out of their homelands, either in the chains of victorious armies, or from the chains of drought and famine.

God will gather them from the ends of the earth. They departed in tears—terrible, throat-choking tears—but they will return wrapped in the comfort and mercy of God.

Those who prayed for water as they left their homes will find streams and streams of it, and on level roads, not on top of treacherous hills and mountains. Jeremiah had clearly traveled with those who migrated out of Jerusalem under the sword of Nebuchadnezzar. He knew about the terrors of traveling outside the safety of home.

But here’s the best part: the pace of the travel was measured by the pace of the blind, the elderly, and the disabled. However slowly they needed to move, that would be how the entire caravan moved, companioning them. Think of the grace of everyone moving to the pace of mercy. Think of yourself, today, moving to the pace of mercy. How does that change your schedule?

Pray for the peace of all the troubled homelands.

How are you following Catholic Social Teaching regarding migration?

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on Mark 10: 35-45

Imagine this: it’s Thanksgiving dinner, and, at the table, you pour the wine for the toast. Each guest receives a portion commensurate with their age and status.

Uncle Jack brought his own alcohol to the party and is already on his fourth glass of wine. You pour him a small glass, knowing that he’ll come back, again and again.

On the other side of the table is your thirty-year-old son, recently out of rehab for his own alcohol problems. He’s been sober for four months. Weak with gratitude, he turns his glass over, indicating he will be declining alcohol. You smile and move on.

The kids, naturally, might get just a sip or two in their cups. It’s a delight for them to raise their cups with the grown-ups and offer a toast of thanks. The rest of the wine flows freely, filling the glasses of the adults, with, perhaps, the most generous serving going to the hosts who have provided the feast.

Jesus references this cultural situation when he asks the two brothers, James and John, if they can drink the cup that he will drink. Now this is a great honor, to drink from the largest portion, the cup of the Rabbi! Not only is it delicious, but it honors them above the others. Of course they can drink it!

And so it was. James was the first apostle to be martyred, in 44 AD.  John, after surviving several tortures, died of extreme old age in Ephesus. Their misunderstanding of what the “cup” meant was, after the resurrection, transformed into a radiant desire to share in Christ’s passion, so as to live with him in glory.

In what ways have you grown to desire to be “the least” in your life?

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on Wisdom 7: 7-11

My husband Ben has been out in his Man Cave a lot lately, measuring, sawing, nailing, and sanding. He seems quite content. I’ve even caught him humming when he comes in the door. I’m trying not to take it too personally. He’s building my coffin.

Mm-hmm. Ten months ago, we resolved to buy our funeral plots, plan our funerals, and build our coffins. I’m not sure why Ben started on MY coffin first, but as my funny father-in-law asked, “This isn’t a rush job, is it?” I’m overjoyed that it isn’t.

At this moment, life seems long. It’s about as happy a life as can be experienced on this side of heaven. But we’re trying to have Wisdom. We’re trying to take the ancient writer’s words to heart, whose “splendor never yields to sleep.”  We’ve both lived long enough to know that “all good things together” come to us when we pray for Wisdom, and “countless riches are at her hands.”

And so we are consciously and, I hope, prayerfully preparing for that day when nothing matters but the riches we have acquired in heaven. And then we will fall on the mercy of God, for we have come up so short of the gospel command to sell all and give to the poor, and of the Wisdom advice to love God more than “health or comeliness.”

We prayed for Wisdom, and then began to plan our funerals. We have lots of beloved family, and endlessly kind and loving friends. But we’re planning our funerals anyway, because, as Jimmy Stewart reminds us, the only thing we take to heaven is all the love we gave to others in this Wonderful Life.

How are you using Wisdom to live your life?

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on Gen. 2: 18-24

We get to talk about LOVE this week, my favorite topic. Genesis says that God even created woman from the rib of man so that the two might become one flesh. What a painful image! But we get the point.

Jesus stands by the Genesis account. When confronted with the issue of divorce, he reminds the Pharisees that God intends that women and men enjoy happy and fruitful lives together. Yes, today, divorce is everywhere, and no, I’ve never met a single person who had to endure a divorce who wasn’t ripped to shreds by it.

Of course, marriage in Jesus’ day bore little resemblance to our own. It was an economic arrangement, usually between members of the same clan, to provide progeny and, depending on the wealth of the bride’s father, financial profit for the groom, his father, and his brothers.

But St. Paul says an extraordinary thing in Ephesians 5:25: Husbands, love your wives. What? Was there love involved in the contract? There has to have been. Yes, the marriages were arranged, but even today, the arranged marriages that still take place around the world yield not only children but, often, enduring love. St. Paul understood that for the social contract to be successful, the two people had to look beyond the aggravations of day-to-day life and see the Divine in their union.

Speaking of the Divine, my favorite activity is watching parents with their kids. Is there any love like that? It perfectly images God’s love for us—unconditional and wildly out of proportion to what we can ever deserve. But this outrageous love keeps going on in every age. Such is the fruit of the Trinity becoming ONE FLESH with us.

Name some different things you’ve learned about love from the different relationships in your life.

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on James 5: 1-6

One of the hardest things to do in this ridiculous political climate is to actually listen to the opposing party with as open a mind as you can muster. I admit there have been a few moments in the debates when I thought the other side made a good point. I don’t dare say that out loud, though, for fear I’ll be torn to pieces by those who know better, who don’t tolerate fools, who hold the key to my acceptance into the cool club.

Isn’t that terrible, that even at this stage in my life, I can’t say out loud that I think the Spirit might be working in someone other than The Good Guys? But Eldad and Medad offer the Old Testament example—and there are many, come to think of it—of the Spirit flowing from two who weren’t at the Tent of Meeting, weren’t at the designated “holy place” at the designated time, just didn’t fit with the way we’ve told God to behave. And God behaved anyway!

That leads us to our last exposure to James’s letter for the next three years. WHEW. For five weeks, we’ve once again heard those powerful cries of the poor from James. We won’t hear from him again for three years. What will be different in our approach to how we live these next three years? Will it be business as usual, with our successful accumulation of wealth, being unwilling to hear the Spirit calling from the broken parts of our economy that exclude those who are poor?

Give us ears, oh God, to hear your Spirit, even where we least want it.

Who are the people in your life who unwittingly speak for the Spirit?

Kathy McGovern ©2024

Reflecting on James 3:16-4:3

Ah, desire. We know what that feels like. And it’s captured beautifully in the third chapter of the letter to James. Jealousy, selfish ambition, covetousness, envy…who hasn’t suffered these disordered desires? Envy, the book of Genesis makes clear, is the Original Sin. Cain was so envious of his brother Abel’s favorable offering to God that he murdered him! We get no explanation for WHY Abel’s sacrifice was found acceptable. Still, we can certainly hear today’s Wisdom passage in Cain’s murderous act: The wicked say: Let us beset the just one, because he is obnoxious to us.

Our first parents suffered envy so terribly that they willingly ate the forbidden fruit—probably imagined as a pomegranate, by the way, not the apple we often see in religious art—because they believed the Tempter’s Lie that it would make them like gods. They didn’t realize that they already lived like gods. Now, (the author of Genesis believed), we can all thank them as we wrestle with those relentless weeds in our gardens.

But here’s the good news, for you younger readers. It gets SO MUCH BETTER with age. As we get older, many of the envies that tormented us when we were young are long gone.  Life has sorted itself out, and, at least in my observance, elderly people are not still pining for their teenage heartthrob. At least I HOPE not!

But here’s where it gets really good. The Jewish faith believes that the heart is where we make our choices. We can CHOOSE against envy by CHOOSING not to want what the advertisers so passionately NEED us to want. This is a good thing to remember as we enter these pre-Christmas months.

How has desire made you unwise? How has wisdom calmed the desire for more?

(Thank you, Alice Camille, for these great questions from God’s Word is Alive) Kathy McGovern ©2024