21/10/2022

St Paul is totally possessed by the Lord, the One that is Father, Son and Holy Spirit revealed by the Incarnation. The One who is ever-greater than our human perception; the one who calls us all to be open to the Holy Spirit and become a Church which too is one and undivided in the Love God has lavished on us.

Jesus words in yesterday's Gospel, "I come to bring division", are in stark contrast to the joy in unity expressed by St Paul. Today Jesus bemoans the crowds lack of awareness of what they are witnessing. The people who have gathered to hear his words and hopefully witness a miracle do not know that he is God's final word to and within his creation. He is the "Son" sent by the owner and he knows that he will have to be face to face with sin and endure the agony that awaits him as man without God for he has completely emptied himself of the Divine and will have to endure the "three-days" torture and death "abandoned by God".

People have complained that the British only know how to talk about the weather. Jesus words about rain and temperature cannot be cited as a scriptural reference to justify that characteristic of an island race but it is a metaphor for how the trivial can be understood but the truly important "signs of the times" are missed. I believe that "the signs of the times" are still "Christ yesterday, today and for ever". 

Every one of us lives out of the lives of our forebearers and they too are children of our Father the Eternal One whose will it is that we should know love and serve to prepare ourselves for the death that is always a sign of our human times.

Dear Lord help me to live out the rest of my days in the "peace that passeth all understanding" and may my resolution not falter so that the strength of sin, which could be considered a "sign of today's times", is expelled by your grace freely shared with all sinners. May the prayers of Mary and all the Saints who are with you in the Church, one with us in the Holy Spirit be heard and may the grace that they receive be  with all mankind struggling to be with you who are truly "the sign of all times".