image-i-nations trésor

Palm Sunday, Year A – 2023

They watched, they observed, they noticed…
They listened, they wondered, they were puzzled…

“Who is this?…”

The passers by, the bystanders, the curious,
The leaders, too, of course,
They could not but ask themselves, ask one another:

“Who is this?…”

The crowd answered –
they had seen, they had heard, they had witnessed…

He is the one eating with sinners and tax collectors,
He is the one asking water from a Samaritan woman,
He is the one who fed a crowd of people with five loaves and two fishes,
He is the one who calmed a mighty storm on the lake of Tiberias,
He is the one who made his friends catch an amazing lot of fish,
He is the one who had his feet washed by a woman during a meal at Simon’s, the Pharisee,
He is the one who gave sight to a man born blind,
He is the one who made a man walk who had been a cripple for thirty-eight years,
He is the one who raised the daughter of Jairus, and the son of the widow of Naim,      
He is the one who claimed that, in God’s kingdom, the first will be last and the last will be first,
He is the one who told people, if they did not become like children, they would not enter God’s kingdom,
He is the one who affirmed that God is his Father,
He is the one who said we should call God ‘our Father’,
He is the one who taught that, unless we forgive one another, God will not forgive us.

He is the one… God in our midst… God one of us…

So unlike what people had waited for…
So far from what many imagined…
So different from our expectations…

SO MUCH LIKE GOD – God himself, indeed.

References of the gospel scenes:
Matthew 9:11   John 4:7   John 6:1-14   Matthew 4:39   Luke 5:4-11   Luke 7:36-50   John 9:1-38   John 5:1-17  Matthew 9:25-26   Luke 7:11-17   Matthew 20:16   Matthew 18:3   John 10:36   Matthew 6:9   Matthew 6:14-15  
 

Note: Another text is available on a different theme, in French at: https://image-i-nations.com/dimanche-des-rameaux-annee-a-2023/

 

Source: Image: The Poetry of R.E. Slater

 

Feast of the Holy Trinity, Year C – 2022

One day, I heard someone say with much conviction: “We must let God be God!”
Perhaps this is what today’s celebration is meant to remind us of: Let God be God…

Accept that God is…
so much greater than we can picture,
so much wiser than we can understand,
so much more powerful than we can realize,
so much more surprising, than we can imagine,
so much beyond all that our human mind can perceive…

Today’s feast of the Holy Trinity is the celebration that:

God is a Father relating in a unique way to his Son, a relationship lived within their common Spirit.
 
We cannot imagine, understand or realize this – no human being can.
But this statement must be corrected –
one human being has understood: Jesus, he who was truly one of us,
God-made-man, God-become-human.

While we do not understand God,
because of Jesus, through him, we share in God’s life.

As we are told in the 2nd reading, in the letter that Paul wrote to the Christians of Rome (Romans 5:1-5):

“God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, 
who has been given to us.”
 
This reveals the real meaning of what we believe,
of who God is,
and of what he has made us to be!

 

Note: Another reflection, on a different theme, is available in French at: https://image-i-nations.com/fete-de-la-sainte-trinite-annee-c-2022/

 

Source: Image: YouTube 

 

15th Sunday of Year B

Bible translations vary one from the other – some use rather strong language while others may opt for expressions with softer overtones.
I always find it interesting to read the same text in different translations; it can be quite enlightening.

Today’s 1st reading (15th Sunday of Year B – Amos 7:12-17), tells us of the prophet Amos’ vocation.
One text reads as follows: “The Lord called me away from my flock and told me, ‘Go…’ ”
Another says: “The Lord took me from my flock and told me, ‘Go…’ ”
Still another tells us: “The Lord seized me from my flock and told me, ‘Go…’ ”
 
“The Lord called…
The Lord, took…
The Lord seized…”
 
To be ‘seized’ by God is… quite an experience!
Some of you reading these lines could vouch for that…
It was something unexpected, perhaps, but you do remember the day, even the place, where it happened.
And, from then on, your life has not been the same again…

Such an intervention by God is not a reward.
It has not either the coronation of our efforts.
It is not the sign of some achievement or success on our part.
In fact, it often carries an implicit ‘warning’ that things may not be easy in the future.

The kind of warning Jesus gives his apostles as he sends them to people (today’s gospel: Mk.6:7-13).
Like Amos before them, they too may be rejected together with Go’s message they are bringing.

But being seized by God is a unique experience and goes beyond all that we could imagine or hope for!
It is worth all the hardships and the struggles.

Note: Another reflection is available in French on a different theme at: https://image-i-nations.com/15e-dimanche-de-lannee-b/

Source: Images: Ernest Angley Ministries   youtube.com
 

Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, Year A

Hungering for more…

Walking across the desert…
Food given as yet unknown…
Life beyond the present…
A body more than the flesh…

Hungering for more…

Something else, something more –
So much deeper, more satisfying, more enduring…

“The Lord led you in the wilderness to test you and know your inmost heart…
to test you and so make your future the happier.”   (Dt.8:2-3,14-16)
 
This is what today’s feast of the Body and Blood of the Lord evokes…
The bread – the Body – is meant for a com-union = a union with Him who wants our happiness –
something beyond all we could imagine or dream of.

“He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood
lives in me and I live in him.” (Jn.6:56)
 
THIS is… the MORE!…

Source: Images: shutterstock.com, renewaljournal.wordpress.com