A Homily – Pentecost (Year B), A Holy
Day of Obligation
First
Reading – Genesis 11:1-9 ©
Psalm 32(33):10-15
Second Reading – Exodus 19:3-8,16-20
©
Canticle - Daniel
3:52-56
Third Reading – Ezekiel 37:1-14 ©
Psalm
106(107):2-9
Fourth Reading
– Joel 3:1-5 ©
Psalm
103(104):1-2,24,27-30,35
Fifth Reading
– Romans 8:22-27 ©
Gospel
Acclamation
The Gospel According to John
15:26-27,16:12-15 ©
(NJB)
Listen
The reading for today from The Book of Genesis
is the story of the beginning of agrarianism. It does not represent an accurate
historical recounting of the beginning of civilization, rather it is a
mythologized understanding about how cities came to built, and the development of
large agricultural centers.
The reading for today does however represent a
historical record of what the Israelites came to believe about how agrarian culture
was established, allowing larger and larger populations of people to be
supported, gathered into cities which were then fortified for their defense.
The narrative surrounding the construction of this first
“tower,” the tower of Babel, is also a story about the beginning of religion.
In Mesopotamia these towers were called ziggurats, and
they served a variety of purposes. They were granaries, they also functioned as
temples. They were under the management of the priestly cast, and from the top
of these towers ancient astronomers watched and recorded the movements of the
stars and planets through the heavens.
The reading for today functions almost like a fable,
it is a cautionary tale explaining how the development of agrarianism created
divisions among the people. In order to facilitate the construction of the tower
and the city around it, a division of labor ensued, and a caste system came to
be a permanent feature of agrarian life. People were separated into laborers,
merchants, priests and royals. As time passed these castes became increasingly
more rigid, and movement between them became nearly impossible for ordinary
people.
The moral of the story is not that God punished the
people by dividing their languages on account of their pride and vanity, or out
of some kind of fear that the people, if they were allowed to work together,
would come to represent a threat to God in heaven. Rather, it is a story of how
human beings are inclined to set themselves up as kings and queens, usurping
authority to themselves through the aegis of religion in order to enslaves the
people…which is what they did.
Consider the psalmist, who is correct in saying that
it is fitting to praise God. It is wise to trust in the counsel of God and to
have faith in God’s mercy. Do not however, expect God to rescue you from
danger, and you should not allow yourself to believe that God loves any one of
God’s children more than any other.
Be mindful.
God knows all things and understands all things. God’s
knowledge is not an abstract knowledge of the particular details belonging to individual
events. Rather, God understands our person, our choices, our lives even as we experience
and understand them ourselves, only with a clarity that we could never possess.
When you hear the call to faith you are being called
to trust in God’s plan for you, and to trust in God’s plan for creation.
Therefore, do not wait for salvation, salvation is already yours, God has
prepared us all for it, from the beginning of time…now go out and share the
good news.
Understand this.
We
must be diligent in our commitment to expose false theology. We cannot let our
imagination linger over fables and myths, allowing them to be understood as concrete
realities, without time naming them so.
If
we take these stories literally, we would have to uphold the tradition that
human beings need an intermediary, someone like Moses to pass messages back and
forth between human beings and the divine. We would have to accept the necessity
of the priesthood. We would have to accept the idea that God, the creator of the
universe, has chosen one tribe out of the whole world to represent God’s will
to the people. We would have to believe in the absolute necessity of ritual
washing before a person could be made acceptable to God. We would have to
accept the notion that only specific chosen people, priests of various orders,
are permitted by God to approach a sacred place and that God endorses the death
penalty for those who violate these rules and rubrics. We would have to accept
a myriad of beliefs concerning the function and nature of the blood-taboo. We
would have to accept the idea that it is unclean to be, or touch a woman, along
with some many other prohibitions and taboos that are rooted in un-truths that
as servants of the truth, we cannot accept.
Know
this!
We
are all the children of God, and God dwells in all of us, God speaks to us in
our heart of hearts.
We
do need to see God descending on the mountain, such an image is meant to be
taken metaphorically, allegorically, not literally.
Remember.
There
are no intermediaries, God speaks to us directly, male and female, Jew and
gentile. God is not a king or a lord, God does not come in pomp and
circumstance, blowing trumpets with tongues of fire, with drums and horns
marching in a parade.
God
speaks to us quietly with a voice that is loving and respectful of the inherent
dignity God has endowed each one of us with.
God does not require or even desire our praise and
exaltations, except insofar as those praises take the form of a mercyiful and
generous bearing toward one other.
God does not dwell in a temple; God is present in
all places, in everyone, to everyone.
God is not a king.
Serve God through the love and kindness you show one
another.
Consider the wisdom of Ezekial.
The
bounds of death are no impediment for divine grace. God will cross any
threshold to save God’s children, like the good shepherd going out into the
night to save the lost sheep.
Have
no fear for the present, all time belongs to God. Time is a tool of the divine,
it is a means for God to achieve God’s end. There is nothing done that cannot
be undone; have no fear.
This
is the meaning behind this reading from Ezekial.
Consider
the again the wisdom of the psalmist and let us affirm our trust in God’s goodness.
God made us in this
world. God made us free, and the world itself is free from divine coercion.
Remember.
All who call on God will be
saved; in the end every knee shall bend and every tongue confess their faith in
God.
The eternal God is the
first source and center of all things and beings, and the totality of created
order. The infinite God engenders all potentialities, and yet interferes with
none of them, and the entirety of what is moves according to God’s eternal
purpose.
Consider the wisdom of Paul:
It is wise and good to anticipate the coming of God.
It is wise and good to desire to be in the presence of God.
Anticipate that moment, relish it, cherish it but,
at the same time remain present to the people and mindful of the events that
are actually occurring in your life, shaping your relationships in your family
and your community.
When you are in prayer and your thoughts are
unformed, when your feelings are unclear and when no words come to your mind,
or when the words that do come are inappropriate for prayer; then be silent,
quiet your mind, still the murmurs in your heart, let go of the voices; be silent
and listen.
Let your prayer be one of listening.
Read
the Gospel for today and know this.
There
is no deception in God, no falsehood, no fabrication, no prevarication. Therefor
those who claim to speak for the divine must not lie or mislead, cover-up or
hide the truth from the people.
Know
this.
All
human beings are prone to error, but there is no error in God.
When
those who have ascended to positions of leadership in Christian communities use
deception to persuade you…reject that leadership.
Some
will commit errors because they are honestly confused, but many others commit
error that are willful; they lie to you while knowing that they are lying, and
they do it anyway; they do it for wealth, they do it for power, they do it to
hide from their shame.
Such
people have abandoned Jesus, perhaps not completely, but in their deliberate
deceptions they do.
Know
this!
We
have all forsaken God at one time or another, but God has never forsaken us, God
never will.
This
is the truth. Let it serve as the foundation of your faith.
First
Reading – Genesis 11:1-9 ©
The
Tower of Babel
Throughout
the earth men spoke the same language, with the same vocabulary. Now as they
moved eastwards they found a plain in the land of Shinar where they settled.
They said to one another, ‘Come, let us make bricks and bake them in the fire.’
(For stone they used bricks, and for mortar they used bitumen). ‘Come,’ they
said ‘let us build ourselves a town and a tower with its top reaching heaven.
Let us make a name for ourselves, so that we may not be scattered about the
whole earth.’
Now the Lord came down to see the town and
the tower that the sons of man had built. ‘So they are all a single people with
a single language!’ said the Lord. ‘This is but the start of their
undertakings! There will be nothing too hard for them to do. Come, let us go
down and confuse their language on the spot so that they can no longer
understand one another.’ The Lord scattered them thence over the whole face of
the earth, and they stopped building the town. It was named Babel therefore,
because there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth. It was from
there that the Lord scattered them over the whole face of the earth.
Psalm 32(33):10-15
The Lord provides
Praise is fitting for loyal hearts.
Rejoice in the Lord, you just:
it is good
for the upright to praise him.
Proclaim the Lord on the lyre,
play his
song on the ten-stringed harp.
Sing a new song to the Lord,
sing out
your cries of triumph,
for the word of the Lord is truly just,
and all his
actions are faithful.
The Lord loves justice and right judgement;
the earth is
full of his loving kindness.
By the Lord’s word the heavens were made,
and all
their array by the breath of his mouth.
He gathered the seas as if in a bag,
he stored up
the depths in his treasury.
Let every land fear the Lord,
let all the
world be awed at his presence.
For he spoke, and they came into being;
he
commanded, and they were made.
The Lord confounds the counsel of the nations,
throws the
thoughts of the peoples into confusion.
But the Lord’s own counsel stands firm for ever,
his thoughts
last for all generations.
Happy the nation whose lord is God,
the people
he has chosen as his inheritance.
The Lord looks down from the heavens
and sees all
the children of men.
From his dwelling-place he looks
upon all who
inhabit the earth.
He moulded each one of their hearts,
he
understands all that they do.
The king will not be saved by his forces;
the
abundance of his strength will not set the strong man free.
Do not trust a horse to save you,
whatever its
swiftness and strength.
For see, the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear
him,
upon those
who trust in his mercy,
hoping he will save their souls from death
and their
bodies from hunger.
Our souls praise the Lord,
for he is
our help and our protector,
for our hearts rejoice in him,
and we trust
in his holy name.
Lord, show us your loving kindness,
just as we
put our hope in you.
Second Reading – Exodus 19:3-8,16-20
©
Moses led the people out of the camp
to meet God
Moses went up to God, and the Lord called to him
from the mountain, saying, ‘Say this to the House of Jacob, declare this to the
sons of Israel:
‘“You
yourselves have seen what I did with the Egyptians, how I carried you on
eagle’s wings and brought you to myself. From this you know that now, if you
obey my voice and hold fast to my covenant, you of all the nations shall be my
very own, for all the earth is mine. I will count you a kingdom of priests, a
consecrated nation.”
‘Those are
the words you are to speak to the sons of Israel.’
So Moses
went and summoned the elders of the people, putting before them all that the
Lord had bidden him. Then all the people answered as one, ‘All that the Lord
has said, we will do.’
Now at
daybreak on the third day there were peals of thunder on the mountain and
lightning flashes, a dense cloud, and a loud trumpet blast, and inside the camp
all the people trembled. Then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet God;
and they stood at the bottom of the mountain. The mountain of Sinai was
entirely wrapped in smoke, because the Lord had descended on it in the form of
fire. Like smoke from a furnace the smoke went up, and the whole mountain shook
violently. Louder and louder grew the sound of the trumpet. Moses spoke, and
God answered him with peals of thunder. The Lord came down on the mountain of
Sinai, on the mountain top, and the Lord called Moses to the top of the
mountain.
Canticle - Daniel 3:52-56
Blessed are you, O Lord, the God of our ancestors,
praiseworthy and exalted above all forever; and blessed is your holy and
glorious name, praiseworthy and exalted above all for all ages.
Blessed are you in the temple of your holy glory,
praiseworthy and glorious above all forever.
Blessed are you on the throne of your kingdom,
praiseworthy and exalted above all forever.
Blessed are you who look into the depths from your
throne upon the cherubim, praiseworthy and exalted above all forever.
Blessed are you in the firmament of heaven,
praiseworthy and glorious forever.
Bless the Lord, all you works of the Lord, praise
and exalt him above all forever.
Third
Reading – Ezekiel 37:1-14 ©
A Vision of Israel's Death and Resurrection
The hand of the Lord was laid on me, and he carried
me away by the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of a valley, a
valley full of bones. He made me walk up and down among them. There were vast
quantities of these bones on the ground the whole length of the valley; and
they were quite dried up. He said to me, ‘Son of man, can these bones live?’ I
said, ‘You know, Lord.’ He said, ‘Prophesy over these bones. Say, “Dry bones,
hear the word of the Lord. The Lord says this to these bones: I am now going to
make the breath enter you, and you will live. I shall put sinews on you, I
shall make flesh grow on you, I shall cover you with skin and give you breath,
and you will live; and you will learn that I am the Lord.”’ I prophesied as I
had been ordered. While I was prophesying, there was a noise, a sound of
clattering; and the bones joined together. I looked, and saw that they were
covered with sinews; flesh was growing on them and skin was covering them, but
there was no breath in them. He said to me, ‘Prophesy to the breath; prophesy,
son of man. Say to the breath, “The Lord says this: Come from the four winds,
breath; breathe on these dead; let them live!”’ I prophesied as he had ordered
me, and the breath entered them; they came to life again and stood up on their
feet, a great, an immense army.
Then he
said, ‘Son of man, these bones are the whole House of Israel. They keep saying,
“Our bones are dried up, our hope has gone; we are as good as dead.” So
prophesy. Say to them, “The Lord says this: I am now going to open your graves;
I mean to raise you from your graves, my people, and lead you back to the soil
of Israel. And you will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and
raise you from your graves, my people. And I shall put my spirit in you, and
you will live, and I shall resettle you on your own soil; and you will know
that I, the Lord, have said and done this – it is the Lord who speaks.”’
Psalm
106(107):2-9
Let Them Thank
the Lord for His Love, for the Wonders He Does for Men
Alleluia.
Give thanks to the Lord,
for he is good,
for his kindness is for ever.
Let them say this, the
people the Lord has redeemed,
those whom he rescued from their enemies
whom he gathered together from all lands,
from east and west, from the north and the
south.
They wandered through
desert and wilderness,
they could find no way to a city they could
dwell in.
Their souls were weary
within them,
weary from hunger and thirst.
They cried to the Lord in
their trouble
and he rescued them from their distress.
He set them on the right
path
towards a city they could dwell in.
Let them give thanks to
the Lord for his kindness,
for the wonders he works for men:
the Lord, who feeds
hungry creatures
and gives water to the thirsty to drink.
They sat in the darkness
and shadow of death,
imprisoned in chains and in misery,
because they had rebelled
against the words of God
and spurned the counsels of the Most High.
He wore out their hearts
with labour:
they were weak, there was no-one to help.
They cried to the Lord in
their trouble
and he rescued them from their distress.
He led them out of the
darkness and shadow of death,
he shattered their chains.
Let them give thanks to
the Lord for his kindness,
for the wonders he works for men:
the Lord, who shatters
doors of bronze,
who breaks bars of iron.
The people were sick
because they transgressed,
afflicted because of their sins.
All food was distasteful
to them,
they were on the verge of death.
They cried to the Lord in
their trouble
and he rescued them from their distress.
He sent forth his word
and healed them,
delivered them from their ruin.
Let them give thanks to
the Lord for his kindness,
for the wonders he works for men:
Let them offer a
sacrifice of praise
and proclaim his works with rejoicing.
Those who go down to the
sea in ships,
those who trade across the great waters –
they have seen the works
of the Lord,
the wonders he performs in the deep.
He spoke, and a storm
arose,
and the waves of the sea rose up.
They rose up as far as
the heavens
and descended down to the depths:
the sailors’ hearts
melted from fear,
they staggered and reeled like drunkards,
terror drove them out of their minds.
But they cried to the
Lord in their trouble
and he rescued them from their distress.
He turned the storm into
a breeze
and silenced the waves.
They rejoiced at the
ending of the storm
and he led them to the port that they wanted.
Let them give thanks to
the Lord for his kindness,
for the wonders he works for men:
let them exalt him in the
assembly of the people,
give him praise in the council of the elders.
The Lord has turned
rivers into wilderness,
he has made well-watered lands into desert,
fruitful ground into salty waste
because of the evil of those who dwelt there.
But he has made
wilderness into ponds,
deserts into the sources of rivers,
he has called together
the hungry
and they have founded a city to dwell in.
They have sowed the
fields, planted the vines;
they grow and harvest their produce.
He has blessed them and
they have multiplied;
he does not let their cattle decrease.
But those others became
few and oppressed
through trouble, evil, and sorrow.
He poured his contempt on
their princes
and set them to wander the trackless waste.
But the poor he has saved
from their poverty
and their families grow numerous as sheep.
The upright shall see,
and be glad,
and all wickedness shall block up its mouth.
Whoever is wise will
remember these things
and understand the mercies of the Lord.
Fourth Reading
– Joel 3:1-5 ©
I
Will Pour Out My Spirit on All Mankind
Thus says the Lord:
‘I will pour out my
spirit on all mankind.
Your sons and daughters
shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men see
visions.
Even on the slaves, men
and women, will I pour out my spirit in those days.
I will display portents
in heaven and on earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke.’
The sun will be turned
into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the day of the Lord dawns,
that great and terrible
day.
All who call on the name
of the Lord will be saved, for on Mount Zion there will be some who have
escaped, as the Lord has said, and in Jerusalem some survivors whom the Lord
will call.
Psalm
103(104):1-2,24,27-30,35
Hymn to
God the Creator
Lord, My
God, How Great You are!
Alleluia.
Bless the Lord, my soul!
Lord, my God, how great you are!
You are robed in majesty
and splendour;
you are wrapped in light as in a cloak.
You stretch out the sky
like an awning,
you build your palace upon the waters.
You make the clouds your
chariot,
you walk upon the wings of the wind.
You make the breezes your
messengers,
you make burning fire your minister.
You set the earth upon
its foundation:
from age to age it will stand firm.
Deep oceans covered it
like a garment,
and the waters stood high above the
mountains;
but you rebuked them and
they fled;
at the sound of your thunder they fled in
terror.
They rise to the
mountains or sink to the valleys,
to the places you have decreed for them.
You have given them a
boundary they must not cross;
they will never come back to cover the earth.
You make springs arise to
feed the streams,
that flow in the midst of the mountains.
All the beasts of the
field will drink from them
and the wild asses will quench their thirst.
Above them will nest the
birds of the sky,
from among the branches their voices will
sound.
From your palace you
water the mountains,
and thus you give plenty to the earth.
You bring forth grass for
the cattle,
and plants for the service of man.
You bring forth bread
from the land,
and wine to make man’s heart rejoice.
Oil, to make the face
shine;
and bread to make man’s heart strong.
The trees of the Lord
have all that they need,
and the cedars of Lebanon, that he planted.
Small birds will nest
there,
and storks at the tops of the trees.
For wild goats there are
the high mountains;
the crags are a refuge for the coneys.
He made the moon so that
time could be measured;
the sun knows the hour of its setting.
You send shadows, and
night falls:
then all the beasts of the woods come out,
lion cubs roaring for
their prey,
asking God for their food.
When the sun rises they
come back together
to lie in their lairs;
man goes out to his
labour,
and works until evening.
How many are your works,
O Lord!
You have made all things in your wisdom,
and the earth is full of your creatures.
The sea is broad and
immense:
sea-creatures swim there, both small and
large,
too many to count.
Ships sail across it;
Leviathan lives there, the monster;
you made him to play with.
All of them look to you
to give them their food when they need it.
You give it to them, and
they gather;
you open your hand, they are filled with good
things.
But turn away, and they
are dismayed;
take away their breath, and they die,
once more they will turn into dust.
You will send forth your
breath, they will come to life;
you will renew the face of the earth.
Glory be to the Lord, for
ever;
let the Lord rejoice in his works.
He turns his gaze to the
earth, and it trembles;
he touches the mountains, and they smoke.
I will sing to the Lord
all my life;
as long as I exist, I will sing songs to God.
May my praises be
pleasing to him;
truly I will delight in the Lord.
Let sinners perish from
the earth,
let the wicked vanish from existence.
Bless the Lord, my soul!
Fifth Reading
– Romans 8:22-27 ©
The Spirit
Himself Expresses Our Plea in a Way that Could Never be Put into Words
From the beginning till
now the entire creation, as we know, has been groaning in one great act of
giving birth; and not only creation, but all of us who possess the first-fruits
of the Spirit, we too groan inwardly as we wait for our bodies to be set free.
For we must be content to hope that we shall be saved – our salvation is not in
sight, we should not have to be hoping for it if it were – but, as I say, we
must hope to be saved since we are not saved yet – it is something we must wait
for with patience.
The Spirit too comes to help us in our
weakness. For when we cannot choose words in order to pray properly, the Spirit
himself expresses our plea in a way that could never be put into words, and God
who knows everything in our hearts knows perfectly well what he means, and that
the pleas of the saints expressed by the Spirit are according to the mind of
God.
Gospel
Acclamation
Alleluia, alleluia!
Come, Holy Spirit, fill
the hearts of the faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love.
Alleluia!
The Gospel According to John
15:26-27,16:12-15 ©
The
Spirit of Truth Will Lead You to the Complete Truth
Jesus
said to his disciples:
‘When
the Advocate comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of
truth who issues from the Father, he will be my witness.
And
you too will be witnesses, because you have been with me from the outset.
‘I
still have many things to say to you but they would be too much for you now.
But
when the Spirit of truth comes he will lead you to the complete truth, since he
will not be speaking as from himself but will say only what he has learnt; and
he will tell you of the things to come.
He
will glorify me, since all he tells you will be taken from what is mine.
Everything
the Father has is mine; that is why I said:
All
he tells you will be taken from what is mine.’in my power to take it up again; and
this is the command I have been given by my Father.’
A Homily – Pentecost (Year B), A Holy
Day of Obligation
