Homily for August 12, 2012, 19th Sunday B. Fr Joseph T. Nolan
The readings from Mark have ended and the sizable replacements
come from John. But John is strikingly different from the other
gospels; it’s important to explore those differences and I will do that
briefly now. You will not find any parables in this gospel, nor the
Sermon on the Mount, and no reference to the metaphor Jesus used so
often: the kingdom or reign of God. There are no exorcisms. There is
not even an account of the Ascension or the events of Pentecost. The
most startling and puzzling differences are the frequent passages
where Jesus talks as if he is God. Well, isn’t he? Of course – the most
solemn of councils declared that he is both human and divine. But that
knowledge did not come easily to the Jewish followers of Jesus. When it
does, with the help of the Holy Spirit and the astonishing fact of his
resurrection, they write this unique gospel two or three generations
later, and they begin with the prologue that calls him the Word – the
Word that was with God, the Word that was God. Go memorize the
Prologue, the first 14 verses of John’s gospel – it is better than any
catechism.
And what is the view of Jesus that John wishes to give us? This above
all: he was raised from the dead, and is divine. They present him as
someone who speaks freely of God. “Only the one who is from God has
seen the Father.” They even dare to give him the famous words, I AM.
“Before Abraham ever came to be, I AM.” Or today, “ I AM the
bread of life, I AM the living bread come down from heaven.” That
bread is both the word of God and the sacramental body of Jesus. How
does all this square with the view approved by Rome that Jesus did not
know of his divinity, that while he had superior knowledge and
extraordinary gifts, he went through life like other humans, learning by
trial and error, going to school, apprenticed to a trade? In other words,
he was fully human. We also believe that he was – is – fully divine.
What we read from John in the long discourses and the big miracle
stories (think of Cana, the man born blind, the raising of Lazarus) is the
memory of events passed on in the oral tradition, and much reflecting
or theologizing on them by John and his followers. At times the text,
especially the long discourses, are confusing, coming from a group.
What is going on? Probably a mixture of sayings by Jesus, plus some
events that actually happened, and statements, aided by the Spirit of
Truth, from his followers. We now call the group “the Johannine
community” - a term once reserved for academics; all it means is a
group of believers, or several of them, who looked to John as their
leader and who either helped him write this gospel or added to it after
the one they called the Beloved Disciple had died. When we puzzle over
the long speeches—any English teacher would say they lack unity-- one
is started to discover that often they put the words in Jesus’ mouth as if
he was speaking.
It was a way of authenticating the message, a method
that would be criticized now. But we do accept this with speechwriters
for important people, and we have no choice but to go along with it in
the gospels. It is disconcerting – we would like to know exactly what
Jesus said. But it is equally important to know what the first Christians
believed.
None of this is my own theory! The great biblical scholar in our time
was Fr Raymond Brown; his three volumes on John are unsurpassed –
and approved. When you finish them, go on to his great work on the
Passion narratives. Then his definitive study of Luke and Matthew and
the nativity of Jesus.
What did these first century Christians, the community of John, hold as
their belief? The divinity of Christ, as we noted. They even give us the
remarkable statement, “I am the Way, the truth and the Life.” We are
invited to walk that way, know that truth, share that life. The starting
point is through faith: opening one’s self to God’s teaching. And
through love—the love of God, the world, and each other. Each of
these occasions is a graced moment. God desires us even more than we
desire God. As another John wrote in one of his letters, “God is greater
than our hearts.”
What else do we hear? The same message that comes from Paul: “If
anyone believes in me, I will raise him up on the last day.” But that
refers to the last judgment, the end of the world, the final vindication of
God’s plan which for everyone, except fundamentalists, seems far in the
future. (And it is, unless we destroy the world in the two ways
dangerously open to us.) “I will raise him up on the last day.” Doesn’t
that conflict with church teaching that we are raised up on the day we
die, that there is a particular as well as a general judgment? Yes, but
early Christians follow the Jewish belief only in a final judgment. The
full doctrine of resurrection forms slowly and goes beyond Jewish
thinking. Jesus is the unique example that God can overcome death,
and hold out the promise of our own. “Heaven now” is held by the
church as well as “heaven later.”
If Jesus is not divine as well as human, he is no more than a great
teacher. If the resurrection is not true, St. Paul says we are the most
miserable of creatures. Some would argue that the community of John
magnify the human Jesus out of proportion; their writing is what
theologians now call high Christology. But there is a much better view
that comes from Christian faith. We believe that the Holy Spirit guides
us to discover and hold fast to the truth, or revelation. It is God who
helps us to believe in God, and all that God has revealed, especially the
divine love for us. Luke’s gospel is full of the Holy Spirit but the
references to the same spirit in John are very important. At the end of
the first century the Christians were thinking—as we do today—that
the final return of Jesus and the climax of history was no longer around
the corner. So where was the risen Christ—in heaven? Yes, but they
wished to share two great insights, to emphasize what had been vaguely
held before: Jesus is present now. In each of us. Spirit and love, as well
as faith, are the ways this becomes possible.