NOVEMBER 15, 2015
Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time
R E AD I NG 1 D N 12 :1 -3
R E SP O NS O RI AL P S ALM PS 16 :5, 8, 9 -1 0, 1 1
R. (1) You are my inheritance, O Lord!
R E AD I NG 2 HE B 10 :11 -14 , 1 8
G O S PE L M K 13 :24 -32
Jesus said to his disciples:
you know that summer is near.
"In those days after that tribulation
In the same way, when you see these things
the sun will be darkened,
happening,
and the moon will not give its light,
know that he is near, at the gates.
and the stars will be falling from the sky,
Amen, I say to you,
and the powers in the heavens will be shaken.
this generation will not pass away
"And then they will see 'the Son of Man coming in the
until all these things have taken place.
clouds'
Heaven and earth will pass away,
with great power and glory,
but my words will not pass away.
and then he will send out the angels
"But of that day or hour, no one knows,
and gather his elect from the four winds,
neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only
from the end of the earth to the end of the sky.
the Father."
"Learn a lesson from the fig tree.
When its branch becomes tender and sprouts leaves,
HOMILY:
Inside the Bataclan: “It seemed like an eternity. I saw my final hour unfurl before me, I
thought this was the end.” http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/13/eyewitnessaccounts-paris-attacks
Julian Pearce, a journalist . . . was inside the Bataclan [Concert Hall] . . . a popular and renowned
concert venue, during the attack. He told France Inter that two or three people – not wearing
face masks – opened fire on the crowd with automatic weapons, possibly kalashnikovs. He said
the shootings lasted 10 to 15 minutes – long enough for the assailants to reload their weapons
two or three times. Pearce told CNN he heard nothing from the shooters, just the screams of the
crowd. However, another witness, who was at the Bataclan with his mother, told . . . that he
heard the assailants screaming “Allahu Akbar” while shooting inside the crowd.
“It was carnage,” Marc Coupris, 57, told the Guardian [newspaper], still shaking after being
freed from being held hostage at the Bataclan. . . . “It looked like a battlefield, there was blood
everywhere, there were bodies everywhere. I was at the far side of the hall when shooting began.
There seemed to be at least two gunmen. They shot from the balcony. Everyone scrabbled to the
ground. I was on the ground with a man on top of me and another one beside me up against a
wall. We just stayed still like that. At first we kept quiet. I don’t know how long we stayed like
that, it seemed like an eternity. I saw my final hour unfurl before me, I thought this was the end. I
thought I’m finished, I’m finished. I was terrified. We must all have thought the same.
Eventually, when a few . . . [police officers] came in slowly we began to look up and there was
blood absolutely everywhere. The police told us to run.” 87 were killed in the concert hall.
What sense are we to make of this senseless evil? As it turns out, we can make no sense of it—
our Lord will have to do that. It is this very act—bringing sense of out the senseless, that is on
vivid, apocalyptic display, in today’s gospel passage. The passage, from Mark 13, begins “In
those days, after that tribulation…” and then, three verses later, concludes, “with great power and
glory. . . he will send out the angels and gather his elect from the four winds...”
Hidden behind this verse are rich agricultural images, just perfect for us Iowans. “The
tribulation” (in the original Greek Θλιψιν (thlipsin)), has roots in the Latin word tribulum, a tool
used in the pulverization of crops in the process of threshing, when the plant is torn to bits,
thrashed so that the seeds might be separated from the plant. The scripture’s agricultural
allusions continue when sense and order come out of this process of threshing, this tribulation,
when the Lord sends out his harvesters, the angels, to gather the elect. The tribulation has ended;
now the Lord of the harvest brings order and sense by an act of gathering, an act of harvesting
the elect into God’s eternal kingdom of mercy at the end of time.
Paris certainly has experienced a tribulation, a decimating thrashing of violence that has left
many to think, as the witness said, that life as they knew it was finished, that it was the final
hour, the end of their way of life. In such a stupor, we can make no sense. Only the Lord of the
Harvest can do this.
There is a highly ironic photograph across the French newspapers, that of armed guards on patrol
in front of Paris’ famous Notre Dame Cathedral. While the vigilance before this great Christian
cathedral is understandable when confronted with the acts of the jihadist ISIS terrorists, in
another sense, a true and lasting sense, our faith might see that the power WITHIN the Cathedral,
the Lord of Eternity, is the single power that cannot be defeated by this life’s tribulations. In the
end, Tribulation needs protection from the Almighty and not vice versa! For, as St. Peter
famously said to Jesus, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of the eternal life.
We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.” In that
Cathedral is the only power, we believe, that can defeat definitively life’s trials and tribulation.
The tribulations of Paris in this last day are, sadly, representative of a larger trials that thresh all
of humanity. We have all been thrashed by life, in many and varied ways. In the face of this, to
whom shall we go? Let us come to the Lord of the Harvest, our savior, who is ready at this table
to gather us and all of humanity into his eternal kingdom of peace. All we can do is cry out:
Come, Lord Jesus: end the tribulation with your great harvest of peace. Bring sense out of the
senseless. To whom else can we go? For you alone have the words of life. You are this world’s
only hope. Let us come and receive hope.