Before I said my first mass an old priest gave me two great pieces of advice.

"You know when the congregation is filled with optimists. After you have given a long series of announcements at the end of Mass and then you say, "and finally" - people take out their car keys!"

The second was, "Never underestimate the burdens people bring with them into the Church. Often we have little idea of the difficulties and pain our parishioners will be carrying."

I can only imagine the anxiety and burden some people carry to the Eucharist. Whatever it is, Jesus invites us to let go of it, if only for a while, and be at peace.

Now all this "come and rest a while" talk can be very pious and not sound all that in touch with reality.

The Gospel, however, came from the community of the Apostle Matthew and was probably written in Jerusalem about 45 years after Jesus' death. We know that this community experienced intense suffering and heavy burdens. They had been expelled from the Synagogue and were being martyred for their faith in Jesus Christ.

No wonder they held so strongly to the words, "Come to me all you who are weary and heavy burdened and I will give you rest". And they found consolation in Jesus' example, "take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart."

There have been times, however, when Christianity has been guilty of trying to spiritually wallpaper over some tough realities rather than preaching that God is our companion in facing up to whatever our reality is and dealing with it.

Our faith is not about praying away our problems or fears and wishing it were otherwise. Our faith means we have experienced the love of God in Jesus Christ so that we never carry our burdens alone. God is our companion and guide and as with every Christian community we are called to be the sort of place wherein we carry each other's burdens and rest with each other awhile.

What we celebrate here each Sunday is that God will have the last word, a just, joyous, loving and peaceful word, in this world and when we enter our final rest.

Jesus didn't come to us as a divine magician, waving a wand over our problems to wipe away all our tears. Rather, he accompanies us so he can show us that the gift of peace and a release from our life's burdens is often found in having the perspective to exercising the gift of right judgement. Making the best possible choices leads to the alleviation of our pain and difficulties.

This type of spiritual sanity reminds me of the story of the nun who was trying to be a trendy catechist with the communion class, and draw an analogy about how food is essential to life. She asked the class, "What's small and furry and eats nuts?" To which there was bemused silence. So Sister tried again. "What's small and furry and eats nuts?" There was now stony silence. Sister then picked out Billy and asked him for the answer. After several awkward moments, Billy tentatively replied, "Sister, I know the answer is supposed to be Jesus, because the answer to all your questions is always Jesus but, I got to tell you, it sounds like a bloody squirrel to me."

Sometimes the answer is not simply "Jesus". As we all know, for some of our difficulties, there is no spiritual quick fix. There is no cheap grace. The answer is not simply Jesus.

In confronting issues, however, it is necessary for spiritual and mental health to take time out, to be as gentle with ourselves as possible and to know that the burden of life is best shared with others.

We often never know the burdens others are carrying. Our prayer is that all of might know a moment's rest, the companionship of fellow travellers and the gift of Christ's peace. Richard Leonard, S.J.

A few years ago there was an English film entitled, "Secrets and Lies". It charted the story of a dysfunctional family who sat on terrible secrets and told many lies for decades.

Like many successful dramatic films, audiences flocked to see it, not only because of its compelling story, but also because it tapped into an important truth about family life as many of us live it.

When I was a boy I was often told that "what's said and done in the home, stays in the home." And to a degree, this is a good and loyal principle. There are, however, family secrets and lies that cause untold damage for generations because no one is allowed speak about them. Sexual abuse, domestic violence, suicide, incest, drug talking, alcoholism, theft, adoption and abortion are only some of the secrets and lies that many families sit on.

Jesus, however, tells us in today's Gospel that what you "say in the dark, tell in the light...what you whisper in darkness, shout from the housetops".

This doesn't mean that Christians tell everyone their personal business, but it does cut to the heart of what stunts spiritual and personal growth.

To the degree that something shameful remains buried, hidden and unhealed, then its power over us is increased. It remains the thing about which we can never speak. The bad spirit has a field day with this sort of stuff, feeding our fears and lowering our self-esteem.

In this regard some Christians make a false distinction between their spiritual and psychological lives. They hold that the exploration of one's personal history or emotional problems is self-indulgent or unimportant to how we live.

We all know people who, in the pursuit of emotional health, become obsessed by their own story, feelings, reactions and psychology. We also know others who never deal with the heavy hurts they seem to carry through the years, even though the pain of them seems to be as powerfully felt now as they were when they were inflicted upon them. Today's Gospel reminds us that there is a middle road between denying what should be acknowledged and dealt with, and being absorbed by it.

The Church, rightly, holds that the best psychological tools can bring out into the open memories and experiences that can be seen for what they are and dealt with. We just have to be sure that we don't get conned into believing that psychology and therapy is anything but a pit-stop in life, so that we can attend to the working order of our mental machinery, and importantly, get back on the road with everyone else. We can call in later for another pit stops if needs be.

Long before the therapist's office Christ enabled the Church to develop the Sacrament of Penance where we admit our most destructive behaviour and hear that we are forgiven and healed. At that moment the love of God is active in us drawing out what Christ wants in the light, spoken of, and healed.

Jesus invites all of us to find a person we respect and trust, and to end the tyranny of the power of secrets and lies. I promise you when you take this risk with the appropriate person, the presence of God won't be very far away either.

Richard Leonard, S.J.

After 16 Sundays celebrating Lent, Holy Week, Eastertide and then the four great feast days of Ascension, Pentecost, Trinity and the Body and Blood of the Lord, last week we returned to Sundays in Ordinary Time. I like Ordinary Time. It's the moment in the church's year, coming as it does out of the northern hemisphere's summer season, when we change gears and take life more gently. As the northern part of the world goes on summer holidays, the southern hemisphere, literally, cools its heels in winter.

What I like best about Ordinary Time is that it values the everyday, predictable routine that makes up most of our lives. If we had no Ordinary Time we would not be able to celebrate extraordinary feasts; we would be at fever pitch all the time. This would be unsustainable and unhelpful. So we settle into weeks of celebrating the quiet processes of our lives.

Every Sunday, however, we also celebrate the Lord's Resurrection, even in Ordinary Time. I like this even more. We often think Christ's Resurrection should be marked with great pomp or hallelujah choruses and yet on the Sundays in Ordinary Time we indicate that the Risen Christ can be found in moments we might think of as tedious, uneventful and humdrum.

This Sunday we are told that Christ came to call sinners, not the virtuous. Sin has many definitions: a quite helpful one is that 'sin is the behaviour we do which is most destructive, leading us away from God, alienating us from others and disabling us from reaching our full potential.' Seen in this light there is no such thing as a private sin without any consequences, because even if I am the only one who knows of my destructive behaviour then it changes me and alienates me from God and others. Every sin - personal, communal and social - has implications for us all.

One destructive behavior that we don't hear much about is the devaluing of the ordinary events of our lives. We can be so busy planning and looking for spectacular occasions we do not pay sufficient attention to the seemingly banal details of each day and to the relationships that form the foundations of our happiness. Turning the phrase, "the devil is in the detail" on its head, today's Ordinary Time Gospel indicates that Christ is in the details, calling us to pay attention to the here and now.

Today's Gospel indicates that Jesus doesn't want us to put on a show for him. He calls us as we are - sinners - and where we are - in the normal world in which we live. But his call offers a promise: we don't have to be trapped in the destructive behaviour that can mark our lives. We can, if we really want to, start again and reconstruct a better life transformed by his love.

May this Eucharist then be a quiet, gentle reminder that Christ's new life can be celebrated in the everyday routine of our hectic existence, a reminder that every day provides us with a choice to be converted by his love and live our ordinary lives to the full.

Richard Leonard, S.J.

Many years ago now, Pope John Paul II went to Lima, Peru. There he was met by a massive crowd of two million people. Instead of the usual greetings from the President and the Cardinal, two people from a shantytown stepped forward to the microphone. Their names were Irene and Viktor Charo. As the huge crowd went quiet, they begin to speak to the Pope.

"Holy Father, we are hungry, we are sick, we lack work, our children die before their time." "Yet we believe Holy Father, we believe in the God of life. And we hunger for bread." Before a hushed crowd, the Pope replied in his best Spanish. "You tell me you hunger for bread." "Yes, yes", the millions yelled in reply. "You tell me you hunger for God", said the Pope and again the crowd swelled with an emphatic "Yes! Yes!" "I want this hunger for God to remain; I want your hunger for bread to be satisfied."

The Pope then turned to the generals and the wealthy politicians gathered there - many of them devout Catholics - and said very starkly, "I won't simply say share what you have. I will say give it back. Give it back – it belongs to the poor."

As extraordinary as the Pope's words were that day, Jesus words about the Eucharist in today's Gospel are even more so. In the sixth chapter of John's Gospel many people were so horrified by the claims Jesus makes for the reality of his presence in the Eucharist, they stopped following him. John clearly links Jesus giving himself for the sake of God's kingdom and our redemption, with the communion we share with Him in every Mass.

When we receive the Risen Christ in communion it's not a symbol of his presence or a sign of his life to which we say 'Amen.' It is Christ who hosts us, who gives us himself so that we might be transformed into His image and likeness. In modern language Christ says to us at every Mass, "Here I am, broken and poured out in love for you. Take me. I'm one with you."

The danger with all gifts, and most especially with this gift, is that we can think it's just for us, an intimate moment between each of us and Christ. It is that, but it's also much more. St Augustine in a sermon on the Eucharist on the 9th August, 413 wrote that the Mass was about three things: goodness, unity and charity. Augustine taught that if we were not better people, working for unity and loving each other away from the Eucharist, it fails to achieve its purpose.

Hence, like the Pope in Peru, many people have linked the reception of the Bread of Life here with the giving of bread which sustains life away from here. On average in our world 26,000 die everyday of starvation. John F Kennedy observed in 1961, "The only thing standing between us and the elimination of hunger is our desire to see it." We could feed all the world's poor. We choose not to.

In a talk on the Eucharist, the then Jesuit General, Fr Pedro Arrupe said, "while there is hunger in the world then our Eucharists are incomplete." By that he didn't mean that when we gather for Mass anything is wrong. Rather he meant that when we gather around this holy table for this sacred meal while people still starve in the world, then something vital is lacking. There's an emptiness.

Yet it's an emptiness that invites us in. The God who comes to us at every Eucharist as real food is the same God that asks, "when I was hungry did you feed me?" This question says that just as God feeds us, so we too should and can feed each other.

May this feast of the Body and Blood of Christ give us the strength of our convictions. May the real food and drink we provide away from this sacred table prove to the world the power of the Eucharist to change us into a people that are good, unifying and loving. And may we not just share with the poor from our excesses, but give them back the food that is rightly theirs.

Richard Leonard, S.J.

I have a friend of mine who is a great lover of classical music. His knowledge of it is vast. He only needs to hear a few bars of most musical works and he confidently declares, "Mozart's Piano Concerto in A" or "Stravinsky's Rite of Spring". He's always right.

Another of his superfluous, but amusing gifts is to pick the singer. He can hear a soprano and declare it to be Callas, Te Kanawa or Sutherland. He knows which of the three Tenors is belting out that particular top C. Again, he's almost always right. What intrigues me about this gift is that he remembers the timbres of each voice, not just the famous ones, but some rather obscure soloists as well. It helps that he has listened to the sound of these voices for years. It's the same with recognising the voice of Christ – it comes with practice and exposure to it.

In our world there are a multitude of voices clamouring for attention. The loudest or the longest voices we hear are not always the wisest ones. Jesus invites us to attune our listening to the sound of his voice so that even if it is faintly heard amidst the noise, we can lift our heads, turn our gaze and walk towards it.

More than ever, there are some voices which entice us away from the Gospel. We are told that it is impossible to be happy unless we are wealthy. Impossible to be fulfilled unless we are sexually active with several partners. Impossible to be free unless we answer to no one.

And in this crowded marketplace the voice of Jesus keeps saying the same thing it's been saying for two thousand years. Happiness is found in sharing what we can with the poor, in being faithful and loving in all our relationships, and in surrendering our freedom to the service of His kingdom of justice and peace.

The problem is not that Jesus should yell more loudly, it is that at crucial moments in our lives, when we have to make important decisions, we often close our ears. We refuse to listen to any other voice except that one that reinforces the destructive decision we want to make. Jesus reminds us in today's Gospel that this choice can be a moment of death. What his call offers is life and life abundantly. But at various times we blot it out and tune our hearing elsewhere.

There are, however, at least two times in our lives when we respond immediately to the sound of a loving voice: as a baby and in old age. A parent's voice soothes and reassures a baby like no other. Look at how a screaming child calms down as a mother nurses it. And look at how a loved one's voice comforts and gives confidence to an older person when they're distressed or disoriented.

What wonderful images these very human moments provide in terms of hearing the voice of the Good Shepherd. At the moment of our death, in the midst of all the other sounds we hear as we leave this world we will hear Christ's voice - soothing, reassuring, comforting and confident. And, it's our prayer, that at that moment we will do what we have tried to do throughout our lives - we will walk straight toward it.

Now that will be life, and life abundantly.

Richard Leonard, S.J.

The plunging of an adult or an infant into the baptismal font three times is the most important moment in the baptismal ceremony, and meant to be the most moving one as well. Most of us understand that this action is associated with the Trinity. It is. But the more ancient association is with the three days Jesus lay in the tomb. This is one reason why the Church now encourages candidates for baptism to be fully immersed wherever practicable. The sprinkling of water over a catechumen's head just doesn't capture the drama which the ritual intends. But when we see a person take a breath, plunge under the water, and come up for air three times, we can powerfully see the identification between Jesus' time in the tomb and the person rising to new life in Christ.

The season of Lent has its origins in 3rd century Egypt where there was a commemoration of Jesus' forty days in the desert. In the 4th century these forty days were moved to their present location in the Church's calendar as the final preparation time for baptismal candidates at Easter, and by the 5th century these penitential and baptismal focuses came together as one season for all believers to observe. Even the word Lent, from the old English word lencten meaning Spring alerted Christians in the northern hemisphere that this season was linked to the waking of nature after the long sleep of winter. Lent is about waking up to see that light and life have come in Christ.

Over the centuries the Church has tended to place more emphasis on penance than baptism in the Lenten season. The Second Vatican Council, however, went back to the most ancient sources of this season, re-established the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults and encouraged us to see the link between our acts of penance and our ongoing conversion to Christ expressed in the baptismal promises made for us many years before.

On this last Sunday in Lent, Lazarus is given to us to help us think about the tombs in which we lie hidden and the life to which we are called. The bad spirit seduces most of us into having some form of secretive life. It might be a secret we can't tell, a sin we can't confess, or a memory we want to bury. At its worst it can be a lifestyle or a pattern of unethical behavior we have divorced from the rest of our lives. We may even con ourselves into believing that all of this is normal and "not so bad."

These tombs often look similar. They seem small on the surface, but as we get away with our secrets we bury ourselves in them more deeply. We jealously guard the entrance, displacing energy to defend our tombs and we're ashamed if anyone rolls away the stone and sees the mess inside.

But this Sunday Jesus stands at the entrance of our tombs and calls us out of them. We're asked to face down the bad spirit that keeps us locked in secrecy, to move away from shame, embrace repentance, recognize the price to be paid for being true to what's best in ourselves and we're invited to know the light and life of Christ's healing and forgiveness.

No one can pretend that this journey is easy, but it's what Lent is all about: the journey from the tomb of our own particular deaths, through penance to the new life of Easter. May the Eucharist allow us to see the Lord stand at our tomb and gently call us by name, "Come forth." And at his word may we be unbound and let go free.

Richard Leonard, S.J.

27th Sunday

Today's Gospel highlights what a different world Jesus and the earliest Christians lived in by comparison with us today. Jesus and Luke's community unquestionably believed in slavery. In all the Gospels Jesus regularly draws on the image of a slave to make points about duty, respect or responsibility. In other passages Jesus and St Paul advocate for the just treatment of slaves or servants. It was an institution in their world that they never questioned. They never told the slaves to make a bid for freedom. They never told Christian slave owners to set their slaves free.

Like society generally, the Church, for most of its history, followed this line. Much to our shame when the tide rightly turned against slavery in the 18th and 19th centuries, the Church was, generally, very slow to be converted to the emancipation movement and take a stand against the colonialism and racism that slavery enshrined. Our movement on the question of slavery is a wonderful study in the development of doctrine. Not all social realities that Jesus assumed in his day continue to be relevant to our world. It took Society 1800 years and the Church a bit longer still to see slavery for what it is – an assault on the children of God – both servant and master. It shows how we have to keep carefully discerning the movement of the Holy Spirit and God's guidance in the light of new thinking. The image of the slave in today's Gospel is invoked to underline our response to God's goodness. It is good to recall that the word "redemption" literally means, "buying back." It comes from the practice in the ancient world where there were two types of slaves - ones who were born or forced into slavery, usually for life, and others who paid off a debt or a crime by becoming a slave, usually for a period of time. The second type of slaves could be set free when someone else paid their debts, or the ransom their master now demanded for them was settled. They would, then, either be the slave of the purchaser, or set free completely. The metaphor came into Christian theology to describe how we, who are enslaved by our destructive behavior, gained a liberator in Christ who entered into a sinful world, subjected himself to its violence and death, to succeed in setting us free. Christ shows us that we do not have to live destructively anymore. Now claimed by the love of Christ, we are no longer slaves, but his friends, indeed through the redeeming work of Christ we have been welcomed into God's family. Our work for God, then, is totally disproportionate to the gifts we have been given. Holding, as we do, that life, creation, all talents and, in our case, security and peace are fruits of God's love, Jesus is right to highlight which side of the ledger is more generous. To serve God in the world, in response to his invitation, is a privilege. We share in his creativity, compassion, hospitality and care. And often, through us, others come to know God and make a judgment if Christian faith is sincere. As respondents to many surveys tell us, they may like who Jesus is and his teaching in the Gospel, but the stumbling block for their joining us is the way they see that faith lived out in the Church. May the Eucharist, then, give us a sense of the dignity we have by being called the servants or slaves, friends and family of Jesus Christ the Lord. Richard Leonard, S.J.

24th Sunday

A Bishop in a rural diocese was explaining to the confirmation class how he was the shepherd of the flock. Given that many of the children came from large sheep ranches he decided to draw on today's Gospel as an analogy for his pastoral leadership. "I care for all of you like the Good Shepherd," he said. The students seemed consoled. Warming up, the Bishop continued, "For instance, what would your fathers do if he lost one of his sheep?" The class was silent. The Bishop asked again. The students were confused. The Bishop got personal, "Michael what would your Dad do if he lost one of his sheep?" "Seeing we've 42,000 of them My Lord, he'd let that stupid bugger go!"

Sometimes the power of the Gospel needs a little help to become inculturated! If the Bishop had done his homework, and understood the economic unit a sheep represented in first century Palestine, he would have asked Michael about 420 missing sheep and got the answer he was after!

The Exodus reading and the Gospel from Luke could not provide a greater contrast in the images of God they present. Thank goodness we are children of the new covenant, intimates of the Good Shepherd.

The Lord in Exodus, by contrast, is vengeful; his destructive anger only changes because of Moses' intercession. The idea that God "gets us" through disasters, illness, misfortune and hardship is, tragically, still potent in Christian faith. At its worst it drives people away from the Good Shepherd who, by contrast, knows each of us by name, who will go to ridiculous lengths and risk everything to go after us and welcome us home. And just when we think we have left a vengeful God behind, it raises its ugly head.

A few weeks ago I met a devout Catholic couple in another city whose gay son has contracted HIV. His parents told me that they believed God sent this disease to their son as a result of his lifestyle. I wanted to weep at such terrible theology, not only because it cannot be reconciled with today's Gospel, but, also, when we follow this appalling line through, God's vengeance through HIV seems to have moved on from the gay community to heterosexual women and their children in sub-Saharan Africa. What did they ever do to be visited by such revenge?

There is a huge difference between God permitting evil in the world and God perpetrating such acts. For the record let's reaffirm that, although we can be become better people for living through suffering and supporting those in need, God cannot send evil and terrible things upon us, because in God there is no darkness.

Our God is like a Good Shepherd who searches day and night for the one who needs him most, and rejoices when he finds us.

None of us is coerced into Jesus' flock, we're not victims of the Good Shepherd, we choose to belong, or we go along another path. But throughout our life and through a myriad of people and ways Jesus seeks us out, so that we may find the way, the truth and the life.

May the Eucharist, then, enable us to let go of any residual belief that God is out to get us. May it sharpen our hearing to his call and help us to delight in his embrace. And may it embolden us, the Church, to act as the Good Shepherd acts, to risk everything to be foolishly loving and compassionate as we actively seek out those who most need to experience God's saving love in Jesus Christ the Lord.

Richard Leonard, S.J.

22nd Sunday

One of the most basic human responses to anything new is to ask, "What's in it for me?" We would like to think our motives are pure and our interests are for others, but there is often a nagging voice reminding us that selfish desires are never far from the surface. That said, we all know heroic individuals who care for sick spouses or children, who go to faraway places to give those in need their time and talent or who stay at home and do the same in their local neighborhood. That's what makes them heroic. There is nothing in it for them; they are drawn by bonds of love, faith or by a desire to create a better world.

There are at least two ways we can hear Jesus' words in today's gospel. The first is as a strong challenge about social justice.

National boundaries mean nothing to God. All people are equal in God's sight, so the banquet Jesus refers to has implications for how we share the riches with which we have been blessed with others in the world. The poor, crippled, lame and blind of our world are the majority of God's children who mainly live in the Third World. They are our brothers and sisters. At the banquet of life Christians are called to give priority to the needs of these people, not only because they have a just claim on our resources, but also because they can't do anything for us in return. They purify our motives. When we link our concern, time, talent, career, and money with these children of God, we tame that nagging question, "What's in it for me?" with a firm reply, "Very little--except God's justice."

A somewhat comforting angle to take on this gospel is more psychological. Many of us, when we come to God at any time, try to give ourselves a make-over so that we might be more acceptable to God. Today's Gospel reminds us that at Christ's banquet, however, it's not the poised and perfect who are most welcome, but the vulnerable. What does this mean for us who pray and celebrate the Eucharist? That God embraces those parts of us that are in greatest need of his love and healing--where we are poor, crippled, blind and lame.

We know this it is true because if Jesus is telling us to host the poor and broken at our tables, then as the perfect host he must do exactly the same with us at the Eucharistic meal as well.

When I was a child we referred to our finest clothes as our "Sunday best" and we wore them proudly to Mass. Not only did we look good, we acted the part as well. Everyone was on best behavior for the entire parish to see. Now, I have nothing against dressing with care and behaving well at Mass; it can be a sign of our self-respect, our courtesy toward others and our devotion to God. But is it truer that God cares about what's going on inside us. We can never hide from God, especially at the Eucharist, because we have been invited to be here, not as we would like to be, but as we are.

May the Eucharist, this taste of heaven's justice, give us renewed courage to think beyond our self and national interests, and show to others the hospitality of God that has been lavished on us. May we discover that where is faith is concerned, that the real answer to "What's in it for me?," is "More than we can ever hope or imagine."

Richard Leonard, S.J.

18th Sunday

We only have to look at so-called reality television to see just how far some of our compatriots will go to be famous, to be wealthy or to be part of the popular imagination. We should never be surprised when our media culture reflects this back to us. And by watching these programs, reading some newspapers and magazines, listening to the shock-jocks and buying the merchandise, we need to be aware that we are part of the problem, not part of the solution.

In today's Gospel Jesus tells us just how deadly riches and greed can be. Our own experience tells how right he is: think of how many children fight in the playground because everything they see "is mine"; the families who have fought over an estate; the number of friends who have fallen out over even small amounts of money; colleagues who no longer speak to each other because of a failed investment; and nations who have gone to war to get what their neighbors have.

The issue with money is not in having it, because money, and the health, education and welfare that flow from it, is a good thing whereas poverty is an evil that God wants wiped off the face of the earth. The problem is what we do with money and what it does to us. Some Christians think that just because they are financially comfortable from legitimate earnings, they do not have to take any responsibility for the world's poor who are often stereotyped as being lazy, war-mongering and irreligious. These images may justify not sharing more of the excess we have, but it does not remove the moral obligation Jesus demands of us today.

Of the world's 6 billion people, 1.2 billion of them live on $365 a year. We should try telling them they're lazy, war-mongering and irreligious! In an attempt to get rich quickly or to stay rich, most western countries gamble away ten to fifteen times more money than they give to third world development--money that might help foster markets with just wages, and so provide an incentive for work, curtail or prevent some wars and help develop democracy.

When faced with the enormity of the world's poverty, the bad spirit can convince us that it is so large, there is nothing that we can do about it. Not true. Every moment of consciousness and each act of goodness toward anyone anywhere is a victory for God's kingdom, and is God's will being done 'on earth as it is in heaven'.

No one can pretend, however, that throwing money around will solve the world's problems. Everyone who works on the front-line says that dignity is the biggest obstacle in the war on poverty. And dignity, as Jesus reminds us today, has very little to do with money or possessions. Each time we make a claim for our own dignity and we give dignity to people who do not even claim it for themselves, we contribute to the generous and just world Jesus wants. And sometimes that can be as easy as turning the channel on the radio or the TV.

Let's pray that we feel the sharp edge of today's Gospel and we accept its power to convert our hearts and minds. May we meet its challenges in regard to bestowing dignity upon the poor, and sharing our possessions with those who have a just claim on them.

Richard Leonard, S.J.

Did you know that Lincoln's Gettysburg address was 250 words long? The man before Lincoln spoke for over an hour. The man who followed Lincoln spoke for even longer. Today, no one remembers what they said. Lincoln's 2 ½ minutes, by contrast, changed the USA's history and the mentality of the western world.

This call to brevity is always a good challenge to preachers too! Luke's version of the Lord's Prayer, which has 38 words, is another example of how a few sentences have changed history.

Around 50 years after the death of Jesus, Luke's Gospel was most probably written for the Christian community in Antioch, which was the political and cultural capital of the Roman Province of Syria. There are six major themes running throughout this Gospel: prayer, hospitality, compassion, forgiveness, the common life and care for the outsider. Most of them are expressed in the 38 words of this prayer.

We declare that we belong to God in the most intimate of ways, as members of God's family, and therefore we belong to each other. We pray that God's Kingdom will come here and how, through our gratitude for God's generosity and forgiveness and so we can be saved from evil.

I think Christians should keep saying this prayer with great urgency. In most western countries today there are strong right-wing political movements who say they are for Christ or that they want our country to return to "Christian values." Many of their platforms and policies, however, are irreconcilable with the hospitality, forgiveness, compassion, common life and care for outsiders found in the Lord's Prayer.

It is so easy to allow our faith lives to become compartmentalized. For some, religious belief and practice fits into a nice little box that has no discernible influence on the rest of their lives. Coming to Church is a privatized affair. What we celebrate each Sunday is supposed to have an effect on all areas of our lives, every day. Though we can try to make ourselves feel better by turning religion into a weekly spiritual bonbon, that is not what Jesus and the martyrs of our faith gave their lives for.

Some Catholics argue that the Church's teaching should be more publicly proclaimed and obeyed. In its social teaching, the Church tells us that we should support political parties which best represent these key values in the Gospel. The Church has also taught us about refugees, immigration, gun control, violence, capital punishment and the rights of minority groups. All Catholics are called to hold true to this teaching as well as on doctrinal matters.

Some Catholics complain that the Church should not speak out on political issues. It is, however, the role of the Church to help people form their consciences and to declare what it sees as evil, sinful or harmful in society. Christ expects nothing less of all of us. And where the Church has not done this, history has judged it very harshly, as in the Church's relatively recent condemnation of slavery.

The old line goes, "Be careful what you pray because you might just get what you ask for."

Let's join then with all Christians and be worthy of the one prayer which unites us and, in the spirit of these 38 words, pray fervently that all people everywhere will become one--in Christ--and under our one Father in heaven.

Richard Leonard, S.J.