17th Sunday of Year B, 2018

May the Eucharistic celebration of today enable you to appreciate God’s care for you and make you to be instrument of God’s providence to your sisters and brothers in need. Happy Sunday! +John I. Okoye

The DOCTRINE AND FAITH

(2 Kings 4, 42-44; Ephesians 4, 1-6; John 6, 1-15: 17^th Sunday of Year B, 2018

         In the gospel reading of this Sunday we are presented with the narrative of the multiplication of loaves. This story is anticipated in the first reading which recounts a similar episode in the life of the prophet Elisha. An unnamed man brings the first fruits of the crop. First fruits were offered to God because they were considered the best and freshest—that portion of the produce that contained the most vibrant force of life. The man comes from Baal-shalishah, a place named for and probably devoted to Baal, the Canaanite god of fertility. It should be noted that he does not offer his crops to this particular deity, but he brings them to the man of God. Most likely the man brought the loaves and the grain either to be offered to God or to serve as shewbread, or bread of the presence, which was kept at the shrine for a time and then eaten by those who served there. Elisha directed that the bread and grain be given to the people who had gathered. Those who ministered at the shrine objected, but Elisha insisted, and his insistence overrode their objection. The miracle is remarkable. One hundred men were fed by a mere twenty loaves. This miracle reveals the bounteous generosity of God.

The narrative in the gospel story shows how Jesus fed the crowds that followed him from place to place. However, they followed Jesus less out of faith than out of the hope that they might witness the performance of some marvel or even, if they were so fortunate, that they might be the beneficiaries of one. There is no indication they came to hear his teaching, and in this particular passage Jesus does not teach. The focus here is on his wondrous power. Unlike most of the miracles of Jesus, this one was not a response to an expressed need. Jesus feeds the people, but the text does not say they were hungry. There was a much deeper reason for this miracle. Jesus took the barley loaves, gave thanks, distributed them, and then did the same with the fish. The Eucharistic allusions here are obvious. Once again the crowds were overwhelmed by Jesus. They had followed him to the other side of the lake in order to witness his exceptional power. They were not disappointed. However, they now recognise him as more than a wonder-worker. He is the long-awaited prophet like Moses (cf. Deut 15, 18), the one who would usher in the messianic age.

This Sunday’s readings invite us to reflect on the mysterious and magnanimous power of God that meets the basic need of people, which is survival. This gift is not only for the individual; it is the community that survives. Both the first reading and the Gospel passage remind us that, though we do have a responsibility to care for ourselves and for each other, it is really God who provides for us. We live in a world that feeds us and shelters us and supplies us with everything we need to grow and to thrive, and all of this comes to us from the hand of God. It is usually when we are in desperate straits (problems) that we become painfully conscious of our dependence on God, but this dependence is there all the time. God does not merely intervene when we are helpless; God’s providence is operating in our lives at all times. Both readings also underscore a second characteristic of this providence. Besides being constant, it is extravagant. God gives us more than we need. The earth is prodigal in its generosity. It yields food in abundance—food for our bodies and also food for our spirits. The soil is rich, the rains make it productive. We are warmed by the sun and cooled by breezes—all for our enjoyment and pleasure. God gives us everything we need to survive. God gives us food in due season and satisfies the desire of every living thing.

Even though providence is all God’s doing, there is, however, a human side to it in the sense that God wills that man cooperates with him as secondary causes to bring about the full realization of his will and providence.  The Catechism puts it succinctly: “God is the sovereign master of his plan. But to carry it out he also makes use of his creature’s cooperation.  This is not a sign of weakness, but rather a token of almighty God’s greatness and goodness.  For God grants his creatures not only their existence, but also the dignity of acting on their own, of being causes and principles for each other, and thus of cooperating in the accomplishment of his plan” (CCC 306). The man from Baal-shalishah in the first reading of today and the small boy in the gospel offered what they had, which were in turn, miraculously multiplied to feed the people. They became willful cooperators to bring about the realization of divine providence.  Today, God continues to give us the privilege of becoming secondary causes of the solicitude of Divine Providence. The choice is ours: to either cooperate with God’s benevolence by bringing up the little we have so that others can benefit from it and experience God’s loving care; or to keep that which we have to ourselves selfishly and refuse to make it available. Selfishness is the root cause of all the evils we have in our society; be it moral, or physical. Selfishness has to be substituted by the spirit of solidarity and sacrificial love for the neighbour in need. By eschewing selfishness and embracing solidarity we would be pitching camp alongside the solicitude of Divine Providence. But, if however, we fully choose to remain in the side of selfishness, we can never put a stop to Divine Providence. It is just that we lose the opportunity and privilege to share in the realization of Divine Providence when selfishness, covetousness, avarice and the like prevent us from opening our hands and letting others share what we have.

Living in a society that cherishes the individual and even promotes individualism, we may sometimes undervalue the communal dimension of life. While God certainly cares passionately for each one of us (not even a sparrow falls without God knowing it), God’s concern is for the whole people. In both readings the bread was distributed among the entire crowd. Narrow individualism can sometimes blind us to the fact that we are first and foremost members of a people. We would never have seen the light of day, we would not endure or develop, without others. As unique as we may be, we are a unique expression of a communal reality. God created a race; God formed a people; Jesus died for the world. By the grace of God, we belong to the community. It is not enough that we belong; it is not enough that our needs are satisfied. As members of the people of God, we are called to a manner of living that is noble and selfless. We are to live with each other in humility, and gentleness, with patience. We are to bear with one another in love. We are one with one other not merely because we belong to the same species but because we have been born to a new life in baptism. We all live by the same Spirit of Jesus; we are all united through the bond of God’s love. The bread we receive from the hand of God is more than mere barley loaves. It is the bread of full life, life in all its dimensions, life in Christ. Therefore as we participate in the Eucharistic celebration of today, let us pray that the good Lord may bestow us with his graces  that will enable us appreciate his divine care and make us participate actively in his providence for our communities and for our fellow sisters and brothers especially those in any type of need.Happy Sunday! + John I. Okoye

 (GRAPHICS  BY CHARLES OKEY. CHUKWUBIKE)

DOCTRINE AND FAITH : 22nd Sunday of the Year, Sunday22: Year B)

(Deut 4,1-2,6-8; James 1,17-18,21-22,27; Mark 7,1-8,14-15,21 - 23: 22^nd Sunday of the Year, Sunday22: Year B)

In the Old Testament Theology, a necessary link exists between the quest for life and faithfulness to the law of Yahweh. It is the latter that guarantees the former. In today's first reading, Moses put this very clearly before the Israelites. He enjoined them to be faithful to the laws of the Lord which he placed before them so that they might have life and possess the land. In addition to the guarantee of life which fidelity to the law of the Lord would give, it would also be an indication of the depth of wisdom of the people. He said, "Keep them, observe them, and they will demonstrate to the peoples your wisdom and understanding".

St. James took up this same issue of finding life through fidelity to the demands of the law of the Lord in today's second reading. Consistent, with the Old Testament theology, he was convinced that submitting to the demands of the word of God necessarily brings life. On this issue, he was quite emphatic: "Accept and submit to the Word which has been planted in you and can save your souls. But you must do what the word tells you, and not just listen to it and deceive yourselves ".

In the gospel today, Jesus chided the Pharisees and Scribes for their hypocrisy. They pretended to be very zealous for the religious laws and customs. However, Jesus looked beyond their external observances to condemn their lack of sincere worship. He had this terse statement for them: "You put aside the commandment of God to cling to human traditions ". In essence, true religion is not about the externalities. Observance of religious customs and rites are meaningless without the readiness to allow the demands of the word of God and the divine law to transform one's life. It is in the latter that true religion is found.

In our lives as Christians, we need to discover the wisdom embedded in the commandments of the Lord. They are not just legal codes to be formally observed to avoid punishment. In them, we rather find practical guide to a good and purposeful living. The litmus test of the depth of the Christian life, therefore; lies in the extent to which the commandments of the Lord determine our actions and system of value. When this link is missing, our religion lacks depth and runs the risk of becoming pretentious and empty ritual. When this happens we would be honouring God with our lips and not Our hearts and we would be far away from God. This would be hypocrisy.

Hypocrisy is an evil, dangerous snare that can take root and nest itself in our comportment as Christians. It pushes us to pretend to be better Christians than we are, to cultivate in our religious living exteriority more than interiority, to pay more attention to formalisms of religion than to the substance of it, and sometimes going ^thereby, against the commandment of God on justice, love of needy neighbour, honesty of life, and moral rectitude. This is probably why we scandalize the non-Christians and remain a hindrance to their conversion as they do not see the life of a true Christian in us. Rather, what is manifest is the disharmony between what we believe and what we do; a violent contrast between faith and life. What do we do so as not to be hypocrites? The readings of today leave us with some directives. The gospel enjoins us to purity our hearts, make our intentions straight, eradicate from our hearts all those things that are in disharmony and in contrast with the will of God:For it is from within, from men's heart, that evil intentions emerge... We need to put our hearts in order. In the second place, as Moses teaches in the book of Deuteronomy, we have to conduct our lives according to the commandment of God and put into practice the word of God that we listen to every day. St James takes up this theme in the second reading of today. We are not to be onlylisteners to the word of God but also doers of the word of God. The word of God is both dianoetic(imparts knowledge) and dynamic (transforms). When we listen to the word of God it indicates to us what God would want us to do (dianoetic quality of the word of God) and at the same time it transforms our lives (the dynamic quality of the word of God). Transformation of our lives is the end result of listening and adhering to the word of God. Once our lives are transformed to be in conformity with the mind of Christ, hypocrisy will be a far cry from us. Thirdly, to avoid a life of hypocrisy and live as authentic Christian live have to pay attention to the poor and very weak ones among us, (the sick, the abandoned, the elderly ones, the lonely, the handicapped, the homeless, and beggars) and come to assuage both their material, moral and spiritual needs. Also we cannot call ourselves good Christians and declare ourselves in favour of divorce, abortion; practice dishonesty and cheat in business, transgress justice, manifest all sorts of selfishness in our families and in the society. May we therefore ,pray that the word of God we listen to will transform our lives to resemble that of our Lord Jesus Christ, the son of God. Happy Sunday! +John I. Okoye

20th Sunday of Ordinary Time Year B 2015

DOCTRINE AND FAITH
(Proverbs 9,1-6; Ephesians 5,15-20; John 6,51-58:  20^th Sunday of Ordinary Time Year B 2015)

No other teaching of Jesus met with stiff opposition from the Jews as the pronouncements he made about his body and blood being real food and real drink respectively.  That was one teaching Jesus gave with repeated emphasis as we see in John’s gospel.  The more the Jews expressed their displeasure with and rejection of the teaching, the more Jesus insisted on it with added emphasis: “I tell you most solemnly, if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you will not have life in you”. In the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, the Church guards this gift jealously and continues to present it to the faithful as sure means of eternal salvation. So central is the Eucharist in Christian Theology that the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council described it as ‘the source and summit of the Christian life’.  It is a sacrament and the greatest gift Christ gave to us – the gift of himself, whole and entire.  It is the memorial of the sacrifice at Calvary, the real presence of Christ among us and above all, a sacred meal which assures us of life.  In the magnificent antiphon of the feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, the Church could not conceal her amazement at this wonderful gift as these words reveal: “Oh Sacred Banquet in which we partake of Christ: his sufferings are remembered, our minds are filled with his grace and we receive a pledge of the glory that is to be ours”.

In the first reading today, Wisdom makes a clarion call: ‘Come and eat my bread, drink the wine I have prepared’.  In the gospel, our Lord Jesus Christ who is Wisdom par excellence makes an invitation that is also an emphatic command: “If you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you will not have life in you”.  This is a command issuing from an overwhelming love. To ensure that we fully and intimately share in his life, Jesus invites us to feed on his very flesh and blood.  Flesh and blood is a biblical expression to indicate a person in his entirety; here the person of Christ. Therefore, in the Eucharist, Jesus gave us his entire personality as a real gift, even though mysteriously, in the fullness of his humanity and divinity; he donates himself so that we may nourish ourselves from Him. When we nourish ourselves from the flesh and blood of Christ, a communion of life is effected, a profound and vital union between us and Jesus, already in this life. What is more, the divine life which is in God, the Father, is transmitted into our souls through our union with Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. The soul is, thereby, introduced into the divine life of the Blessed Trinity. Nourishing oneself with the flesh and blood of Christ capacitates one not to fear death and helps one fix one’s mind on eternal life relying on the promise of Jesus that he would raise him/her on the last day.

The Eucharist, is a gift for which we must, always and everywhere give thanks to God. The best way we can appreciate the immensity of love Jesus showed us in the gift of his Body and Blood is to respond to this invitation with love and devotion, partake of this holy meal always and allow it to transform our lives. It would be a contradiction to feed on Life Himself without becoming fully alive and sharing this life with others.  The worst of it all would be to treat this wonderful gift of love with indifference or cold response as many do today.  For those who have lost touch with this sacrament altogether, let the words of Christ today serve as a reawakening: “If you do not eat the flesh… and drink his blood, you will not have life in you”. May we therefore, pray in this Eucharistic celebration that through the Holy Communion we receive, we may be profoundly and intimately united with Jesus Christ who donates his flesh and blood for our nourishment in this life and for eternal life in the next. Happy Sunday! +John I. Okoye 
(graphics by blogger : )