Author: Justin

Fr Luke Macnamara OSB

Why celebrate Mary Mother of God, or Theotokos? It is because Mary is Mother of God, that we celebrate her immaculate conception, her birth, her presentation, the annunciation, the visitation, our Lady of sorrows, her immaculate heart, and the assumption. Mary’s role as Mother of God is the foundation for all other Marian feasts and central to understanding what God’s act of sending his son into the world to be born of her implies for us.

With the annunciation, God sends his son into the world to be born of
Mary. The womb of Mary becomes the ark of God’s presence, the
antechamber of Jesus’ entry into the world. The human family created in the image and likeness of God, is recreated by the union of the divine and human natures in Jesus. Through this union we receive the gift of divine adoption. We are no longer to be simply children of the earth, but children of God. How does this happen? God sends the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit that cries “Abba, Father.” Through Jesus’ coming into the world, we are no longer slaves but
heirs, members of God’s household. This Spirit of Jesus is expressed perhaps most fully when we pray to God, which we do at this Mass and later in Jesus’ own words: “our Father”, or “Abba”. The Spirit takes up residence in our hearts, and finds expression in worship, prayer, and love.

Mary might be a model for us. Through celebrating God’s choice of Mary to be mother of his Son, we also celebrate Mary’s acceptance, reflection, and cooperation through faith with this choice. We too quickly romanticise what this involved for Mary – statues or images rarely reflect any shock or surprise. Mary’s acceptance of God’s plan upturned her life. Nothing would be the same again for Mary or for humanity.

Mary started life as someone under suspicion. Her betrothed initially plans to separate from her. Later heavily pregnant, she must travel by foot to be registered. At Bethlehem, there is no room at the inn, and the child is delivered in a stable. Shepherds come with astonishing news of the choir of angels and their message. Mary’s faith, her yes to God, is nourished by her continued listening, observing and pondering with an attitude of faith the promise of peace through the calamities that befall her.

Many of us have lives marked by chaos, some of it self-inflicted, some of it caused by others. The response of Mary to the chaos was to continue to say yes to the Prince of Peace. Our favourite Marian prayer, the Hail Mary, recognises this “yes” and the blessing it brings, “blessed are you among women, and the blessed is the fruit of your womb.” The blessing prophesied in the book of Numbers, which culminates in peace, is now made available to the fruit of every womb. Mary, through your intercession as Mother of God, pray for us sinners and invoke, on this the world day of peace, the gift of your Son’s peace for us and for our world.

Fr Lino Moreira OSB

The author of the Letter to the Hebrews says that by faith Abraham and Sarah were given innumerable descendants (cf. Heb 11:11-12), and that equally by faith, Abraham, when put to the test, offered up his only son Isaac (cf. Heb 11:17). Bound up and placed on the altar of sacrifice, Isaac is clearly a prefiguration of Jesus Christ, and so the sacred author goes on to say that, figuratively speaking, Abraham – who was told not to raise his hand against the boy (cf. Gn 22:12) – received back his only son as someone whom God had raised from the dead (cf. Heb 11:19).

This story of the sacrifice of Isaac, narrated in chapter 22 of the Book of Genesis, is also the backdrop to the gospel we have just heard. St Luke says: ‘When the time came for their purification according to the Law of Moses, Mary and Joseph brought Jesus up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord’ (Lk 2:22). In this passage, the key word is ‘to present’, a translation of the Greek paristánai which also means ‘to offer’. What the Evangelist wants to emphasise is that, in the Temple at Jerusalem, Jesus was publicly handed over to God. He is both the Son of the Most High (cf. Lk 1:32) and the lamb spoken of by Abraham on the way to Mount Moriah (cf. Gn 22:12), and in the place where God meets his people, he was completely given over to his heavenly Father.
Hence the prophetic words uttered by Simeon who, along with Anna,
represents the faithful Israel: ‘Now, Lord, you are letting your servant go in peace according to your word, for my eyes have seen your salvation which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples; a light of revelation for the gentiles and glory for your people Israel’ (Lk 2:29-32). In these verses, sung daily by the Church at night prayer, Jesus is identified with the mysterious figure of the Suffering Servant whom the prophet Isaiah calls a light to the nations (Is 42:6; 49:6). Indeed, the child that Simeon took into his arms and blessed is the one chosen from all eternity to bring the light of God to the whole world. But in order to carry out his unique mission and see an offspring, the Servant has to give his life as a sin offering (cf. Is 53:10) – as the prophet Isaiah also points out. And so it is through the cross of his only-begotten Son
Jesus Christ, the Paschal Lamb, that God is going to fulfil the promise he made to Abraham: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of nations (Gen 17:4).

When Jesus was greeted by Simeon and Anna as the Lord’s Messiah (cf. Lk 2:26), his parents were amazed at what was being said about him (cf. Lk 2:33). Like Abraham in the distant past, Mary and Joseph showed an unshakable faith in God by offering him their only son on the very spot where, according to tradition, the binding of Isaac had taken place. However, as members of the people of God, they too had to listen to the voice of the Lord speaking through the Law and the Prophets to understand God’s actions and how his designs are fulfilled in the course of time. In short, it was through their attention to the word of God that Mary and Joseph were able to discover who their son was, and how their faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, as
well as their fidelity to the Law of Moses, had turned them into disciples and servants of the Messiah.

So Mary and Joseph teach us the dynamics of a true life of faith. If we
want to follow their son Jesus, the light of the world (cf. Jn 8:12), we need to put all our trust in the Lord and faithfully listen to his word, not as isolated individuals, but as members of the people of God who serve him day and night. Then the Risen Lord himself will explain to us the full meaning of what is written in the Law and the Prophets (cf. Lk 24:27), thereby making manifest the unique role each one of us is meant to play as a member of his family.

Check out the latest edition of the Glenstal Abbey Chronicle with news and views from the monks here: https://shorturl.at/ctuw2

Fr Senan Furlong OSB

Reframing a picture can transform it. Colours are seen in new light and details barely noticed come to the fore. Of course, the picture itself does not change, but the way we perceive it does. Just as a picture can look different when placed in a different frame, so can a life. So often, we frame our lives wrong, viewing people and events in unhelpful and distorted ways. Reframing offers new possibilities. While we cannot always change the circumstances in which we find ourselves, we can change the way we see them. Changing the frame can change the way we feel. Reframing can also change our response.

Christmas is about reframing. It’s about seeing in a new light: God, our families, our community, our world, ourselves. It’s also about changing our response. The readings of today’s Mass offer us new frames, new possibilities of seeing and responding. The first reading from the prophet Isaiah fashions a frame of encouragement and hope of
salvation. The long night of watching has ended. The lookouts on Jerusalem’s watchtowers peer into the distance and see God’s presence coming towards the city. God is returning to a ruined and desolate Jerusalem. It’s not a dream. It’s for real. Now is the time for these ruins to burst into song. But not only Jerusalem. All the ends of the earth, you and I, will see the salvation of our God.

The opening of the Letter to the Hebrews, which is today’s second reading, presents a frame of affirmation and promise of fulfilment. In times past God spoke in fragmentary and various ways through the prophets, but now in this, the final age, he has spoken through his Son. The new-born Jesus is the eternal Son of God, the radiant light of God’s glory. In Jesus, God has reached fully out to us. We can approach him with confidence.

Today’s gospel, the majestic Prologue to St John’s gospel, gives us a frame of wonder, of grace and truth. In the new-born Jesus, God has come to dwell among us. Full of grace and truth, Jesus is God’s ultimate word to us. The human face of Jesus is the revelation of the face of God. He has come to make us—his brothers and sisters—children of God.

We are God’s work of art but maybe we need to change the frame of the picture of our lives. Christmas is an invitation to do just that. Christmas reminds us that we are made in the image and likeness of God. This is what is most true of us, and what is most true of those we live with. The mystery we celebrate today, the birth of the Christ child, invites us to see the world through the eyes of God. To look upon one another and see what the Father sees: the image of his own beloved Son. Christ’s humanity is the much-needed frame of all human lives. In our broken world ‘where the Prince of Peace is once more rejected by the futile logic of war, and by the clash of arms’ we pray that the true Light coming into the world will pierce the darkness in human hearts. For love of us the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. May we welcome the Word into our lives and become children of God, reflecting the radiant light of his glory in our troubled world.

Abbot Brendan Coffey OSB

Christmas is very different in Bethlehem this year. The Christian Churches in the Holy Land have decided that the only celebrations in Bethlehem will be religious. No decorations, lights, trees or festivities of any kind. People are in mourning. This is the reality of Christmas 2023 in the land of Jesus’ birth, a sad miserable reality.

This Christmas we are called to go deeper. Tinsel, fairy lights, turkey and ham will not do it this year, not when people are suffering and dying in Ukraine, Israel and Gaza.

Today we like our religion to be like fast food—cheap and easy, something we don’t have to work too much for or think too much about. That’s not how a person becomes fit and healthy, neither is it how a person becomes wise and holy.

This year we must become a Bethlehem; the place where the Word was made flesh. Bethlehem means “house of bread,” and bread here means the Word of God. Bread strengthens the heart, the psalmist says and he wasn’t just talking about nutrition.

This Christmas Bethlehem and the Holy Land are drenched in blood; so how on earth can I find God in this catastrophe of human misery? Christmas teaches us that divinity is always where one least expects to find it. God is never predictable. By becoming Bethlehem we are reminded of the dignity of our humanity, even if we are living through a spectacle of barbarity and lack of humanity.

When Christ was born, Herod, the Roman puppet king, sent his soldiers to Bethlehem and they left behind them a scene of devastation. The Gospel of Matthew records this slaughter of the innocents. We usually airbrush out this part of the Christmas story, because it doesn’t sit well with the idyllic scene in the crib, but this is reality my friends.

The prophecy of Jeremiah still speaks to us tonight.

A voice was heard in Ramah,

lamenting and much weeping,

Rachel weeping for her children,

And she would not be comforted

Because they are no more.

Life is not always sweet and nice. Think of what happened on the streets of Dublin on 23^rd November. This is the world we have become. This is why it is so important to celebrate the real Christmas. To remind ourselves that war is an absolute evil. That violence is never the answer.

The famous conversation between Petrarch, a fourteenth century Renaissance man and humanist, and the madman, seems oddly appropriate tonight. The madman saw soldiers on the march and asked “where are they going?” Petrarch answered, “To the war.” The madman continued, “This war will have to end in peace someday, won’t it?” “Certainly”, said Petrarch. “Well then”, said the madman, “why not make peace at once before starting the war?”

Today we live in a world of fear. We fear life; we fear death, and everything in between. The antidote to our fear is the coming of Christ. The first words of Adam to God after the fall were “I was afraid.” The first words at the birth of Jesus are those of the angels to the shepherds, “Do not be afraid.” Despite everything, do not be afraid.

When the angels appeared to the shepherds, the Glory of the Lord enveloped them in light and that light brought them to the manger. If enough people become enveloped in this light, the world will change.

Fr Jarek Kurek OSB

Please note the following changes to the liturgical timetable during the Christmas period, including details of Confession times and the opening and closing of the guesthouse. Visitors are welcome to attend the liturgies which take place in the Abbey Church, and our friends around the world can join online via the webcam.

LITURGY TIMES

Sunday 24^th December

10am               Mass for the Fourth Sunday of Advent

6pm                 Vespers I

11.20pm          Vigil Office

12 midnight     Mass

Monday 25^th December

8am                 Lauds

10am               Mass (no music)

12 noon           Solemn Conventual Mass

5pm                 Vespers II

Tuesday 26^th December

7am                 Matins and Lauds

12.10pm          Mass

6pm                 Vespers

Wednesday 27^th to Saturday 30^th December

7am                 Matins and Lauds

12.10pm          Mass

6pm                 Vespers

8.35pm            Compline (or Office of the Resurrection on Saturday)

 Sunday 31^st December

7am                 Lauds

10am               Mass

12.35pm          Sext

6pm                 Vespers I

8.10pm            Vigil

Monday 1^st January

7am                 Lauds

12.10pm          Mass

6pm                 Vespers II

8.35pm            Compline

The normal liturgical timetable resumes on Tuesday 2^nd January.

CONFESSIONS

Saturday 23^rd December at 2pm, 3pm and 4pm in the Abbey Church.

GUESTHOUSE

Closes Thursday 21^st December and reopens on Friday 29^th December.

RECEPTION AND SHOP

There will be limited opening hours during the Christmas period. Please call ahead.

Fr Cuthbert Brennan OSB

This third Sunday of Advent is called Gaudete Sunday, from the Latin for joy but it’s hard to be joyful when the world seems so full of violence and fear. There are many wildernesses in our world today, the refugee crisis, the places of conflict, the environmental crisis and it is into these very spaces that we are invited to be heralds of joy. John the Baptist who we meet in the gospel this morning shows us how to live as someone who recognises and has a profound understanding of the joy of God and the hope of restoration that Jesus brings.

The gospel of John uses a different title for John the Baptist. He’s called a witness, a witness for the light. And the text this morning tells us more about who John wasn’t than who he was; he wasn’t the light. The religious leaders question John because they want to put him in some pigeonhole, they’re determined to place John in their preconception of what religion ought to be. They want to place John within their conventional expectations, they want to see him fit into their hopes for the future of Israel. No matter what they suggest,
Messiah, Elijah, a prophet, John’s answer is No, no, no, I’m not that, no! The only positive thing John says about himself is that he is a voice. “I am the voice crying in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord.”

I am God’s loudspeaker, I am the smell of coffee that wakes you up in the morning, I am that alarm bell in the school at 7.30 that shatters your sleep. I am the voice that has only one thing to tell you, the light is coming, “I am not the light. I’m a witness to the light, I’m a voice, I’m someone who points to the light, I’m somebody who tells you that the light is coming but I am not the light.”

To the religious experts who do what religious experts do, they define, classify, characterise and pigeon hole God, John tells them and us “You do not know, you cannot define, you do not know the light that is coming into the world, into the darkness.” At this point in our Advent journey we are told that our hopes will be fulfilled but not necessarily fulfilled as we expect, by the light that dawns to our darkness. Our expectations are going to be met but not in the way we expect. An important question to ask at his point in the Advent journey is “For what am I hoping for Christmas?” It’s an important question because, like some of those people who questioned John, we may miss something so fragile and mysterious as the Light of Christ if we are too full of our explanations, too full of our definitions and expectations.

For what are you hoping? Well, if you’re like a lot of people around here, maybe you’re not sure. What brought you to church on this third Sunday of Advent? Maybe you didn’t even know it was the third Sunday of Advent. Maybe, like the rest of us you are still searching for God. And John the Witness, says that’s ok. An open heart may be a lot better than one that is full of definitions and preconceptions, that there’s no room left for any light. This Sunday, with John, let us set aside our hopes and expectations and simply let the light dawn among us. Let us admit that we are in the dark and let us allow the light to enter our darkness.

When he began his ministry, one of the problems for Jesus was that people thought they knew how the Messiah should act and what the Messiah should say. And when Jesus didn’t do what they expected, they rejected him and crucified him. In these last days of Advent let us cultivate a receptivity for surprise, wonder, the shock of God who is not the God we thought we knew, and not even the God we thought we wanted. Let us be open to encountering God in the person of Jesus Christ this Christmas that we may stand as witnesses to the light, the light coming into the world, the light that the darkness of the world has not, despite over 2000 years, overcome.