FOURTH SUNDAY OF LENT  - 2018

The readings today invite us to look into our heart, and see how is our Lenten journey going. 

Truly that conversion is a matter of our entire life, but the church offers us some especial times, in which it may help us, as a community, to walk toward the Lord, to renew our enthusiasm and our mutual love. 

 

FIRST READING: Chr 36:14-16. 19-23.

Ø  The people of Israel represented by their leaders have accumulated sin over sin, infidelity over infidelity.  

Ø  The prophets that God has sent them have invited the people to conversion, to change their ways, to be faithful, but all had been in vain. 

Ø  A powerful king of a great nation: Babylon has defeated them and taken them as prisoners to exile. The text says that it is God who has done this, this is the way the people of the bible understood life, for them good and bad came from God.  

Ø  If we reflect on this we will realize that what was happening to the people is the consequence of their actions, of their behavior: they lived as if God did not exist, as if the Law had not been given to them for their happiness and freedom.  

Ø  And in the same way that a powerful king took them to exile, another powerful king gave them the permission to go back to their country, to rebuild it and the temple as well.  

Ø  What are our infidelities to the love of our God and savior? 

Ø  What are the difficult moments in our life, and what caused them?  

Ø  What are the happy moments which we have experienced, and what caused them?  

Ø  Have we been able to acknowledge in our life the loving and provident presence of our Father? 

RESPONSORIAL PSALM:   Ps  138:1-2,3,4-5,6

This is the psalm of those exiled in Babylon who remember their beloved country.  

«  Far away from their country the Israelites remember their country and weep.  

«  Their oppressors make fun of them and ask them to sing their sacred songs to entertain them. 

«  But, how can they sing a canticle of God in a foreign land, a land of gentiles?  

«  If we were capable of profaning our love to God, may we become mute and paralyzed.

R. (6ab) Let my tongue be silenced, if I ever forget you!
By the streams of Babylon
we sat and wept
when we remembered Zion.
On the aspens of that land
we hung up our harps.
R. Let my tongue be silenced, if I ever forget you!
For there our captors asked of us
the lyrics of our songs,
And our despoilers urged us to be joyous:
“Sing for us the songs of Zion!”
R. Let my tongue be silenced, if I ever forget you!
How could we sing a song of the LORD
in a foreign land?
If I forget you, Jerusalem,
may my right hand be forgotten!
R. Let my tongue be silenced, if I ever forget you!
May my tongue cleave to my palate
if I remember you not,
If I place not Jerusalem
ahead of my joy.
R. Let my tongue be silenced, if I ever forget you    

GOSPEL:  JOHN 3: 14-21

      The reading is taken from the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus. 

      Nicodemus is a Pharisee who is in the Sanhedrin, the religious government of the people of Israel. 

      In the Gospel of John each character represents a given human group. 

      Nicodemus represents the Jewish religion closed to the newness of the Messiah. 

      John the Baptist on the contrary represents the Jewish religion opened to that newness which Jesus brings to the world. 

      Nicodemus is a historical person, but the conversation with all its details is a composition of the evangelist. 

      Let us go back to Nicodemus  

o   In the passage before today’s reading Nicodemus is surprised and does not understand how one can be born again. Does he really need to be born again to be able to accept   Jesus as the Messiah?  

o   Jesus tells him that as the bronze serpent was lifted up in the desert, and all those who looked at it were healed, thus the Son of man will be lifted up, and who believes in him (= look at the serpent in the desert) will have eternal life.  

o   John continues to narrate the conversation  

§  God loves so much the world, created by him, that he has sent his Son.  

§  The Son has come not to condemn but to save the world. 

§  The separation between saved and condemned is faith (in the desert it was to look at the bronze serpent)  

§  There is a constant trial in this world: the light has come to the world, but men have preferred darkness. 

§  Because who does evil looks for darkness, and who does good comes to the light. 

o   The main dimension in the gospel of John has a vertical orientation.  

§  The cross of Jesus on Mount Calvary has this vertical orientation toward the sky, toward heaven. 

§  This cross makes the division between the two sides of the mountain. 

§  On one side are all those who accept and acknowledge him Christ Jesus as the Messiah and thus follow and come to the light.  

§  On the other side are all those who avoid the light and seek darkness, close themselves to the Messiah, do not accept the salvation which Christ Jesus offers us.    

SECOND READING:   Eph 2:4-10

ü  God is rich in mercy, someone has said that the only thing that God knows how to do is to love and to be compassionate. 

ü  God gave us life in Christ when we were dead due to our sins

ü  He raised us up, in Christ.

ü  All of this for pure love, pure gift, through faith all those wonders that God does can be ours. 

ü  It is neither our doing, nor a recompense for what we might have done, IT IS GOD’S GIFT, thus no one can boast.  

ü  We are his masterpiece, created in Christ Jesus, to lead us to a life of good deeds. A life  which he has prepared for us.    

BIBLIOGRAPHY  

CLARET, ST. ANTHONY MARY CLARET,  Autobiography.

CASTRO SÁNCHEZ, Secundino. Evangelio de Juan, compendio exegético-existencial, 2da. Edición. Comillas, Madrid 2001.

LA BIBLIA DE NUESTRO PUEBLO, comentarios de Luis Alonso Schökel. Misioneros Claretianos, 2010.

PARIS, MARIA ANTONIA, Autobiography.

RAVASI, GIANFRANCO. Según las Escrituras.  Doble Comentario de las lecturas del domingo. Año B.  San Pablo, Bogotá,Colombia 2005.

Our Lord was very pleased with this act of humiliation that he infused in me since my first years and the next day He deigned to wipe my tears because very in the morning they called me to the parlor for my confessor, Rev. Fr. Currius sent by the archbishop had told him that he was commanding me in virtue of holy obedience to tell him if I like it as it was  or it was necessary to add or to remove something. God has always consoled my soul according to my taste, that supplication which was directed by the finger of God. María Antonia París, Foundress of the Claretian Missionary Sisters, Autobiography 208.

 I remained in the capital, where I inaugurated the pastoral visitation, starting in the cathedral and then going through the parishes  Every day administered the Sacrament of Confirmation. There were a great many to be confirmed, and so, to avoid confusion, I had some forms printed and distributed the right quantity of them to the rectories the day before confirmations. These forms were then filled in with such data as the names of those to be confirmed, their parents, and their sponsors. This helped avoid confusion and crowding and made it easier to record the data later with greater accuracy and leisure. I always followed this procedure, and it worked quite well with all those I confirmed – and that came to no less than 300,000 persons during my stay of six years and two months on the island. St. Anthony Mary Claret, Founder of the Claretian Missionary Sisters. Autobiography 515