When asked about the upcoming feast, Jesus sends His disciples, with a very detailed set of directions, including who they will meet, what they should say and what they will be shown.  Perhaps He is trying to let them see that what is about to unfold has been well prepared for.  At the meal, Jesus both takes and gives thanks for the bread and the cup of wine.  He acts and then speaks the words of one who is actively engaged in His own destiny.  He connects bread and cup with His broken body and His poured out blood.  He unites dining with dying, Eucharist with crucifixion.  Notice too, that even though there are only a few at the table, He spreads the cloth to include 'many'.  This is a meal that strengthens the bonds of love between disciples, the One who will not be held by death, and their Father in Heaven. 
 
A few weeks ago I turned 60!  From this place I notice how younger people, the twenty and thirty somethings, struggle with the questions of who  to  be  with  and  what  to  do  with  their lives.  They  live  in  a  more challenging and complex world than I did at their age.  In that world, they journey from mountains to valleys with amazing speed! They are thrown from clarity to confusion in a heartbeat. I marvel at their faith and how resilient they are. I worry too about how vulnerable they are.  They return  again  and  again  to  the  challenges  of  companionship  and meaningful  work.   Just  like  us  'oldies',  they  long  to  find  people  and places to whom they can give themselves.  They want to break their 
bodies and pour out their life blood.  And when this is not happening, they know something is missing. 
 
We might say they are trying, in their own way, to answer the call to sacrifice.  Sacrifice is the work of making  life  better,  or  holy,  by  giving  something  back.   Da  Free  John,  in  his  "Scientific  Proof  of  the Existence of God Will Soon Be Announced by the White House", has written (p.33-34) 'Those who cling to one or other religious or spiritual way must realise that the foundation of all such ways is the disposition of sacrifice - not of self-preservation or of immunity to life.... This must be expressed in a new, free, sober and truly compassionate disposition ... which freely anoints the world with help and intelligent consideration.  Therefore ... let us give ourselves up so that each temple ... may become a temporary altar of self-giving into the mystery that pervades us.' 
 
Catholics, of course, have been promoting this for centuries.  Jesus command to 'Do this in memory of Me', is wrapped in a new Wisdom.  Every word and every gesture in the last supper are a clarion call to gather up our lives and act with compassion.  Our lives are a gift but they are not our own.  They are given to us by God moment by moment.  Holding fast to this truth increases our gratitude. Gratitude fills us up from the inside.  Once filled, we overflow.  The life freely given becomes the life we seek to freely give away. 
 
On this great Feast, I encourage a new and deeper consideration of and meditation on the Eucharist.  I believe  this  can  make  us  smarter  and  more  effective  at  sacrificing,  to  which  we  are  naturally disposed.   The  words  and  the  gestures  of  Jesus  invite  us  to  hold together transcendence, gratitude and sacrifice.   We  need  all  three  for  full  living.   If  we  cling  only  to transcendence we run the risk of becoming aloof and uninvolved in the suffering of others.  Never truly 'in' the life we are living.  If gratitude does not move us to sacrifice, we might count our blessings in a way  that  separates  us  from  others.   If  we  try  to  sacrifice  without  gratitude  we  might  become 
resentful.  We pour ourselves out  till  we  are  running in  empty.   So,  we short circuit and stop giving ourselves away.  We might tell ourselves that we have finally wised up.  But the only Wisdom worth remembering,  is the one  which invites us to re-enter the  company of the One who knows all about breaking and pouring.  In gratitude we can return to this place again and again to draw strength for the journey.

​If we ponder the beauty of Rublevs Icon of the Trinity, one of the things 
we  might see  is  that  the 'Three'  are  sitting  at a  table  with  an  empty 
space.  They are offering hospitality to anyone who would like to sit with 
them and share their banquet.  It also reminds me of the answer of the 
messenger, who, when asked by the Great King (Luke,3) threw a party, 
how he managed to persuade people to come, answered, "I told them 
that there is a feast for all who are willing to feast with all."  This made 
the king roar with laughter.  It is only a small step from hospitality to 
holiness after all. 
 
In Franco Zeffirelli's Jesus of Nazareth, the man who was the scheming 
architect behind Jesus execution enters the empty tomb, looks around 
and,  in  a  resigned  voice  announces  to  no-one  but  himself,  'Now  it 
begins.'   A disciple might say, 'Now it continues.'  The mountain where 
they meet the Risen Lord is in Galilee.  It is the same place where he 
taught the spectacular sermon on the mount.  It is this teaching that the 
disciples are commissioned to bring to the nations.  Jesus is handing it 
on and it will go on in a new way. 
 
Notice that not everyone was convinced.  The Twelve have become eleven and some of these are filled with 
doubt.  Can they trust Him to be who He says He is?  In the Gospel of St. Luke and Saint John, Jesus shows 
them His wounds as proof.  But this does not happen in St. Matthews Gospel.  Instead Jesus moves towards 
them with the words, "All authority in heaven and on earth have been given to me.'  The Father has vindicated 
the Beloved Son and the Message He proclaims.  Even the death of the Beloved Son is part of the plan.  All 
competition is set aside. Thereafter, they are commissioned to go, to baptise and to teach. They are to go to 
all nations because the Father is a universal reality and not bound to one house.  They are to invite people 
into a new community which has Jesus as its centre.  Jesus, the Beloved Son of the Father is to be openly 
revealed, proclaimed and situated between the Father and the Spirit.  He is with them always. He can never 
be lost.  The commission of the disciples is to invite everyone into this new community.  They take their place 
at loves table and to do so till the end of time! 
 
The Holiness of the Most Holy Trinity is revealed as endless hospitality.  For me, one of the easiest ways to 
begin deepening our understanding of what this might mean is this.  The guiding principle of all Catholic 
Social  Teaching  is  the  eternal  dignity  of  the  human  person.   This  means  that  everyone  is  treated  with 
respect.  It does not matter where they come from, what they own or what they have done.  Their dignity is 
inviolate and does not come and go or fade with circumstance.   The Dignity of the Person is consulted again 
and again whenever decisions are made about the big questions of life.  This principle rests on the revelation 
that we are made in the image and likeness of God.   But since we are made in the image and likeness of 
the Trinity, who we are might be much more than we ever imagined ourselves to be!  In the Trinity, the gift 
of Self is so complete that it makes the three One.  This offers a beautiful vision for human life.  But it is not 
how we are used to thinking about ourselves.   
 
We think we are closed captions who face individual triumphs or disasters.  We seem to be in competition 
for power over others or for a temporary hold on larger territory. Our dignity is always threatened by the 
stupidity or cruelty of others who have misread their essential beauty.  But.  If we could see our dignity not 
as mine but as ours everything changes.  It is love and our loving activity that now defines us as persons.  It 
is love and loving activity that becomes the primary interpretation of all creation. 
 
When we ponder the Trinity in this way it stirs a curiosity in us that is worth pursuing.  Instinctively, we sense 
the Truth of it.  Finally, we can escape the prison of individualism and all the misery that brings.  We can step 
into the heart of a loving community which is God's first gift to us and which we now help grow

It is the first day of the week.  A new creation is unfolding.  It is evening, but earlier the Beloved Disciple and Mary of Magdala realise that Jesus is now with his Father.  Now, His disciples discover that He is also with them.  In His Ascension he is with God, and in His resurrection, He is with them.  He is the bridge connecting earth with heaven.  He is the new mediator between God and Humanity.  Still, this is what He has always been, and what He will always be. 
 
The big difference now is that the Risen Jesus cannot be locked out.  He manifests Himself as Presence casting out fear. His gift is the gift of Peace.  In a world where what is given one moment is taken away by the next, Jesus remains steady.  He cannot halt the chaos, but He is present within it, calming the heart, bringing Peace. 
 
The  Risen  One  is  still  wounded.   He  shows  his  wounds  to  His disciples.  By doing this He is inviting them to dive to the depths of what is revealed.  How are disciples meant to read these signs?  The Beloved Son is One with the Father.  But this is no private affair.  Their love flows outwards bringing life to all who ask to be caught up in it. The crucifixion is the supreme hour of His Glory.  It is the time and the place when Gods life  and  love  are  most  powerfully  visible,  available  and  present.  The throes of death reveal the greater flow of life.  The most beautiful images of this are the holes that Love have made on Him.  As his side is lanced, blood  and  water  gush  forth,  a  universal  sign  of  new  birth.   The  open wounds  in  hands,  feet  and  side  are  channels  that  make  His  interior  life  with  his  Father available.  This is what it means to see the Lord.  The mediation of the love that lays down its life for His friends is the truth that fills them with gratitude and joy.  The joy that floods them cannot be taken away any more than the peace which has been given to them. 
 
But Peace is offered a second time.  The Beloved Disciple had to look twice into the tomb before he came  to  belief.   Mary  of  Magdala  had  to  turn  twice  before  she  recognised  the  gardener  as  her Teacher.  Now all the disciples of Jesus hear Him speak of Peace for a second time. The first time it was spoken to expel fear. The second time it is spoken it is to confer the power of mission.  What is received must be passed on.  Disciples must be life givers.  They can only be Life givers if two things happen. 
 
First, they must receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.  Just as God breathed life into the nostrils of Adam who became a living soul, the Risen Lord breathes into His disciples who become a new creation, who live by the breath of God.  The Spirit brings an end to chaos, creates community and heals what is broken.  The Spirit is the great bearer of the forgiveness of sins.  There is nothing more horrible.  There is no higher priority for the disciples of Jesus, and for the Community of the Church, 
than to end the separation that exists between God and His Creation, and between sisters and brothers.  Community will not grow without forgiveness.  This is our greatest responsibility.  If we hold onto the sins that separate there will be no community.  If we let go of these sins, community will flourish. 
 
There are many layers of meaning in today's Gospel which we must explore inside and outside of time.  But is it clear that the Holy Spirit is given to us, in our thirst, to empower us to recreate the world.  This is the power of the resurrection of Jesus - freedom from fear, the freedom to heal what has been torn apart, the freedom to build community.

Can love be compared to water?  In this sense it can.  It is hard to slake our thirst when water arrives in an 'on and off' way at our tap.  No one thrives when love is not constant.  All the evidence suggests that we are the best we can be when there is a steady supply of love flowing into our lives.  This is true on a simply human level.  It is equally true when we encounter Sacred Love.  There is a love which is uniquely revealed by Jesus.  We do not have to search for it as if He hadn't already found us.  To this steady stream of love, He adds some simple rules.   
 
Once upon a time there was a king riding in a coach on a rainy day.  He  sees  a  poor  person  dragging  themselves  through  the muddy road and stops and offers them a lift.  But the traveller does not have much trust.  "What will it cost me?" They ask. "Only that you accept it." The king replies. Simple rule number one then, is knowing how to receive the love that is on offer.  And, yes, there is  a  catch.   Once  the  offer  of  love  has  been  accepted  a  chain reaction is started. The one who is loved can only bring that love to joyful completion by passing it on.  We might say we can only fully understand what we have received when we give it away. 
 
If we could just grasp this simple truth, that we are links in a love chain from the Father to Jesus, from Jesus to us, from us to each other and back again.  There is no need to grab, hold or possess love as if it was scarce. His word on love moves us from anxiety to holy communion.  If we understand this, we have understood what Jesus is all about.  And if we know what Jesus is about, we know what  His  Father  is  about.   The  world  of  masters  and  servants 
collapses and gives way to communities of effortless friendship.  In fact, disciples of Jesus have been chosen for this very purpose. 
 
Can we tell ourselves the story that Jesus tells and that he wants us to tell to others?  Can we see ourselves as powerful links in this love chain?  Sometimes the greatest stumbling block for this is that the teaching of Jesus cannot get past the voices in our heads.  You know the ones I mean.  The negative self-talk. The tendency to focus on the times when we were hurt.  The antidote to this is to think more positively and focus on those who left us treasured memories of love in our hearts. 
 
James Mackey, in his 'Jesus the Man and the Myth ' suggests a way forward. "In the end, the only way to give people the experience .... of being themselves, Grace and treasure is to treat them as treasure and be gracious to them.  The sun may indeed rise in the evil and the good, and the same rain refresh the just and the unjust.  But the lesson will likely be lost on me unless  the  warmth  of  another  person  envelops  me,  unless  some  other  human  person refreshes the weariness of my defeated days.  I will simply not feel my own life, my own self, as Grace or gift of God, unless someone values me." (p.107) 
 
Mackeys  insight  is  that  every  personal  experience  of  authentic  love  opens  a  window  on  our understanding of God's infinite love.  So we can become sacramental carriers of such love.  It does not matter how we enter the love chain.  It only matters that we enter in.

Some people from Greece have arrived for the festival and have asked to 'see' Jesus.  But this is more than a casual meeting. To 'see' Jesus is to enter into a profound revelation.  In Saint John's Gospel, Jesus must be 'lifted up', (Jn, 3.14) crucified in order to be seen.  For Jesus, the arrival of these Greeks is a sign that the time of universal revelation is at hand.  The Beloved Son of God has come for all people.   Yet, the way that He shows himself is paradoxical.  The image of the single grain of wheat  that  falls  on  the  ground  and  dies  in  order  to  grow  into  'much  fruit'  (v.24)  provides  the  key  to  understanding  this paradox.  For Jesus, death is never seen as a loss.  It is only the beginning of a time of change that will yield greater results than an individual life. 
 
Jesus  will  become  more  through  death,  not  less.   In  death  he  will become  universally  available.   Closer  to  us  than  we  are  to ourselves.   This  revelation  contains  crucial  instructions  for  His disciples.  It illuminates a universal spiritual process.  They are asked to see it and embrace it.  If we identify ourselves as individuals with 
separate lives, we will lose that life. Death will eventually take it from us. But if we do not identify as individuals with separate lives, the death of that life becomes a gateway into transformation. There is no real loss here, only a crossing over to eternity.  The death, resurrection and ascension  of  Jesus  will  make  this  truth  clear.   But  still  He  has  to navigate the anxiety which precedes loss.  He does this by turning to His Abba in prayer.  His prayer is answered immediately because it is aligned with the Fathers will.  It is to the glory of the Father to bring 
greater  life  out  of  lesser  death.   This  is  what  God  has  always done.   This  is  what  God  has  been  doing  through  His  Beloved Son.  This is what God will continue to do through His disciples.  Death has held sway until now but now it's reign of terror is ended.  Jesus' death will not entail the universal fate of going down into the earth.  In His death He will be 'lifted up from the earth'. (v.32). It is this kind of dying, as a transforming process, that will attract people to Jesus.  Death as extinction will bow to death as exaltation.  This will be the kind of death Jesus will die and thus will draw all people to Himself. 
 
Wheat  falls,  acorns  crack,  and  cocoons  split,  bringing  bread,  oak  trees  and  butterflies.   Seeing  death  as  a  transition  is essential for any disciple of Jesus.  In his poem, 'Holy Longing', Goethe has written, 
 
As long as you haven't experienced 
this: to die and so to grow, 
You are only a troubled guest 
On the dark earth. 
 
If this is true, perhaps we should be practicing how to die to ourselves on a regular basis!  Here is a little story in this theme. 
 
Once upon a time, a rich and generous man would freely give gold coins to various groups of people.  One day it would be widows, another day the less able, another day poor students.  The only request he made was that they should wait in silence for the gift to be given. 
 
When it was the day for lawyers, one pleaded his cause with gusto.  The rich man simply passed by.  The next day was the turn of the lame, so the lawyer put splints on his legs and posed as such.  The rich man recognised him and passed by.  The next day, the lawyer disguised himself as a widow, but he didn't fool the rich man who just passed him by. 
 
So the lawyer found an undertaker and concocted a plan that he would be wrapped in a shroud and placed in the path of the rich man.  Surely he would throw some gold coins on the shroud for a proper burial.  Afterwards, the lawyer and the undertaker would split the proceeds. 
 
The rich man did throw gold coins on the shroud.  The lawyers hand shot out and grabbed the coins. Then he jumped up and triumphantly proclaimed that he had deceived and beaten the rich man. "Do you see how, at last, I have received from your kindness?'   'Yes', said the rich man, 'but first you had to die'. 
 
We must die to the schemer and become the receiver.  It is the posture of contemplative silence which allows us to receive the gold that the rich and generous man is giving.  As Rumi says,      
 
" The mystery of die before you die is this: 
that the gifts come after your dying and not before. 
Except for dying, you artful schemer, 
no other skill impresses God". ​

When death bites, it hurts.  The Beloved Son of God comes from above and becomes death, death on a cross.  If, when we see Him and believe in Him, Eternal Life will flow into us.  This is the wonder of it all.  That Eternal Life appears at the exact moment when human life is failing and carries us through the loss of all that we know.  Eternal Life suffuses and carries us to the other side of what we cannot yet see. This truth is grasped by looking on the crucified One, who transfigures death into the servant of life. 
 
And there is more! In Christ there is no condemnation!  This is the truth.  It is, if you like, the highest truth, or the revelation of the One who is behind all that His Beloved Son does.  Our lives are a mystery to us and we are sustained by what we cannot really understand.  But we are led to the truth that the ground on which we stand sings of the self-giving love of the Father who is dedicated to human fulfilment.  This is what Dante calls, 'the Love which moves the sun and the other stars'.(Paradiso, 33.145) 
 
The Beloved Son is sent by this Love, who cannot bear to see 
His  creation  being  unravelled  by  death.   The  Son  brings  life 
without  end.   He  does  not  seek  condemnation  but 
Salvation.  God's judgement is love and life. If we accept this gift, 
condemnation cannot touch us.  But if we refuse the gift we are 
undone.   Perhaps  this is  why,  when  we  are  drawing  closer to 
God, and the light of Love begins to shine more brightly in us, 
there is a risk that when we see the full horror of sin we might 
want  to  cover  ourselves  in  darkness  again.   But  the  Light  of 
Mercy suggests another direction. A direction which begins with 
gratitude for the Grace of God which is, and always has been, 
the source of all the good we have done. 
​A choice which keeps choosing to move more deeply into the light. 
 
When we hear the Good News that in Christ there is no condemnation we might not believe it.  We are so used to being judged - and condemned - by people.  Are we not always being put on the scales, weighed in the balance and found wanting?  We even do it to ourselves!  Husbands, wives, parents and children do it. Bosses, work colleagues, neighbours and friends have mastered the look that lets us know we are not quite good enough.  So when we hear that God has abandoned judgment and condemnation in favour of Love, we may have to work on ourselves to let this Truth come home.  Having done that, there is no sense of being off the hook.  We are, but we are now on another one.  The light of Love will reveal to us how we ourselves might live in the twilight zone of sin and the judgement and condemnation of others.  
 
In the beautiful Parable of St. John's Gospel 8.6, Jesus bends down to write in the sand, deliberately evoking a memory of undeserved forgiveness in Exodus 31.18 where God gives Moses a masterclass in Mercy.  The Pharisees claim that their only motivation for stoning the woman is faithfulness to the teaching of Moses.  But Jesus, the  true  interpreter of Moses,  wants  them  to  drop  their  cover story and  be  searingly  honest  with themselves about why they are really there.  He gives them a chance to come into the light.  But they will not take it.  They have been casting the stones of judgement and condemnation for a long time and old habits are hardest to break.  The invitation to come into the light is no match for the comfort of darkness.  One by one, they move away from the Light.  And this preference for darkness has become a free choice for self-condemnation. 
 
It is a strange truth that preferring darkness is easier than we might think.  We do not always recognise our habitual ways of relating as darkness, so first we have to see it for what it really is.  Only with the arrival of the Light does the racist, sexist, classist and separatist character of our thinking become clear.  It is easier to create a cover story for our bad behaviour than to engage in painful self-examination.  Other people seem eager to buy into our cover story and join us in our self-deceit.  They are happy to not look at what we will not look, at as long as we agree to return the favour.  The light is not welcome.  It calls for a decision to change.  Perhaps this is why some prefer the darkness.  In this fourth week of Lent, let's pray that this is not us! 

​To some people, the Gospel story for the Third Sunday of Lent, unfolds in the Temple in Jerusalem.  But 
Jesus has another name for this building.  He calls it, 'My Father's House' (v14). We can see the problem.  If 
the building is a Temple, there is business to be done and deals to be struck.  Here, worship is a commercial 
venture.   Exchange  is  the  name  of  the  game.  Worshippers  give  God  something  and  God  gives  them 
something.  The basic exchange is flexible enough for all the versions of, "You scratch my back and I'll 
scratch yours."  And if you can offer an animal without blemish, you go to the front of the queue.  The mindset 
of the marketplace so fills the Temple that it has become a place for making deals with God. 
 
Jesus’ Father is not a deal maker.  He does no exchange favours or forgiveness for sacrifices.  The Father 
is Free and the flow of Love from His Heart cannot be bought, bartered, bargained for or gained  with a 
bribe.  Hard cash and animals are useless to those who know they are in the Fathers House.  So, you set 
the animals free and you chase out the cash converters.  They may be needed in the Temple but they are 
not needed in 'My Father’s House' (v.16). What is more, when Jesus entered into a conversation with a 
woman who came to draw water at a well, He tells her that the building itself isn't necessary. (Jn 4:23-24) 
Worship can unfold right where we are.  We don't have to move towards anything.  Anyone who asks for the 
gift of the Holy Spirit and is moved by the Spirit is worshipping The Father!  Since Jesus is the fullness of 
Grace  and  Truth  from  whom  all  receive  the  Spirit,  (Jn  1:14,16)  His  presence  stirs  up  a  sense  of  the 
Sacred.  Jesus may be doing more than a clearance of the Temple, He may be replacing it! 
 
This isn't going to be well received by the Temple Authorities.  What Jesus has done is dangerous.  His zeal 
will consume Him and it will provoke conflict.  He will be consumed by the anger of others who profit from 
Temple commerce.  They arrive on time and they know that His cleansing actions and words can belong 
only to the Messiah.  So they ask for a sign of authenticity, a miracle or two might do.  But what He offers 
only  baffles  them.   They  take  literally  what  is  offered  symbolically.   They  cannot  see  the  spiritual 
revelation.  So Jesus says, 'Destroy this Temple - His Body - the dwelling place of God - and by the power 
and presence of God he will rise again because of His communion with His Father.  Their malice and violence 
will only reveal more of the Fathers face.  But the sign they seek is a sign they cannot read. 
 
So let's go back to our favourite pastime - deal making.  It isn't hard 
to see how an activity that is so embedded in our lives could be 
carried into our spiritual lives.  How do we get what we want from 
God and how does God get what He wants from us?  We think we 
have to bargain with the Father to get what we want.  This is more 
than  a  little  theological  error.   It  is  a  huge  obstacle  to  any  real 
spiritual development.  And it can turn ugly when so called religious 
'elitists' set themselves up as brokers of the deal.  Jesus rejects this 
approach. "Beware of the scribes who ... devour widows’ houses 
and  for  the  sake  of  appearance  say  long  prayers"  (Mk  12:38). 
These  intermediaries  are  being  paid  to  pray  to  God  for  poor 
widows.  It is an unscrupulous manipulation by callous people.  But 
the  sad  truth  is  that  it  is  easier  to  destroy  the  Temple  than  to 
eradicate the deal making God. 
 
In the film, "A House of Sand and Fog", the son of an Islamic man is shot.  His distraught father instinctively 
begins to pray for him.  He says to God, "If you let my son live, I will lay in the park, put bird seed in my eyes, 
and let the birds eat out my eyes". The deal emerges from the depth of his suffering and wells up to the heart 
that he shares with all people. Stress, hurt and tragedy bring it out of hiding.  For most of us it is hard to move 
beyond the deal making default.  Or perhaps the Father of Jesus who is often not at home with images of 
buying and selling, is at home when we are grateful for the gift of life and serve life in any way we can.  We 
can receive and give, and when both make us truly happy, we can be said to be at play in God's Temple.  In 
fact, we have been admitted to the 'Holy of Holies' (Heb 9:3).   Here, our 'sacrifice' mingles with the divine 
'sacrifice' which makes life holy by pouring Himself out.  The challenge and the gift is not in making a good 
deal, but in getting beyond deals and into .................