20150328 GIVING UP ONE’S LIFE SO THAT OTHERS MAY LIVE
Readings at Mass
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First reading
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Ezekiel 37:21-28
©
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The Lord says this: ‘I
am going to take the sons of Israel from the nations where they have gone. I
shall gather them together from everywhere and bring them home to their own
soil. I shall make them into one nation in my own land and on the mountains of
Israel, and one king is to be king of them all; they will no longer form two
nations, nor be two separate kingdoms. They will no longer defile themselves
with their idols and their filthy practices and all their sins. I shall rescue
them from all the betrayals they have been guilty of; I shall cleanse them;
they shall be my people and I will be their God. My servant David will reign
over them, one shepherd for all; they will follow my observances, respect my
laws and practise them. They will live in the land that I gave my servant
Jacob, the land in which your ancestors lived. They will live in it, they,
their children, their children’s children, for ever. David my servant is to be
their prince for ever. I shall make a covenant of peace with them, an eternal
covenant with them. I shall resettle them and increase them; I shall settle my
sanctuary among them for ever. I shall make my home above them; I will be their
God, they shall be my people. And the nations will learn that I am the Lord,
the sanctifier of Israel, when my sanctuary is with them for ever.’
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Canticle
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Jeremiah
31:10-13 ©
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The Lord will
guard us as a shepherd guards his flock.
O nations, hear the
word of the Lord,
proclaim
it to the far-off coasts.
Say: ‘He who
scattered Israel will gather him
and guard
him as a shepherd guards his flock.’
The Lord will
guard us as a shepherd guards his flock.
For the Lord has
ransomed Jacob,
has saved
him from an overpowering hand.
They will come and
shout for joy on Mount Zion,
they will
stream to the blessings of the Lord.
The Lord will
guard us as a shepherd guards his flock.
Then the young girls
will rejoice and dance,
the men,
young and old, will be glad.
I will turn their
mourning into joy,
I will
console them, give gladness for grief.
The Lord will guard
us as a shepherd guards his flock.
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Gospel
Acclamation
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Ezk18:31
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Praise to you, O
Christ, king of eternal glory!
Shake off all your
sins – it is the Lord who speaks –
and make yourselves a
new heart and a new spirit.
Praise to you, O
Christ, king of eternal glory!
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Or
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Jn3:16
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Praise to you, O
Christ, king of eternal glory!
God loved the world
so much that he gave his only Son:
everyone who believes
in him has eternal life.
Praise to you, O
Christ, king of eternal glory!
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Gospel
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John 11:45-56 ©
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Many of the Jews who
had come to visit Mary and had seen what Jesus did believed in him, but some of
them went to tell the Pharisees what Jesus had done. Then the chief priests and
Pharisees called a meeting. ‘Here is this man working all these signs’ they
said ‘and what action are we taking? If we let him go on in this way everybody
will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy the Holy Place and
our nation.’ One of them, Caiaphas, the high priest that year, said, ‘You do
not seem to have grasped the situation at all; you fail to see that it is
better for one man to die for the people, than for the whole nation to be
destroyed.’ He did not speak in his own person, it was as high priest that he
made this prophecy that Jesus was to die for the nation – and not for the
nation only, but to gather together in unity the scattered children of God.
From that day they were determined to kill him. So Jesus no longer went about
openly among the Jews, but left the district for a town called Ephraim, in the
country bordering on the desert, and stayed there with his disciples.
The
Jewish Passover drew near, and many of the country people who had gone up to
Jerusalem to purify themselves looked out for Jesus, saying to one another as
they stood about in the Temple, ‘What do you think? Will he come to the
festival or not?’
GIVING
UP ONE’S LIFE SO THAT OTHERS MAY LIVE
SCRIPTURE
READINGS: EZEKIEL 37:21-28; JOHN 11:45-56
What is God’s plan for
humanity? His
desire is that we all be one with Him in love and unity so that we will also be
one in love with each other. His dream is that we all will share in His
life of love and joy, which is one of communion with Him and with all of
humanity and indeed the whole of creation. After all, God is love and we
are created for only one purpose, love! Yet the tragedy of humanity is
that we are so divided among ourselves. We fight and kill each
other. Everyone wants to live at the expense of others. No
one wants to die. Not only that, everyone wants to be better than
others. We compete for more of our share of this world’s goods, power,
influence, wealth and prestige. It is a state of the survival of the
fittest. So humanity has become ruthless, merciless, competitive,
unscrupulous, always out to win, if necessary by killing or by unfair
means. Such is the sorry condition of humanity, a people that has sunk so
low that we are no longer able to enjoy peace, love and unity in our lives.
Indeed, this was the same
situation of the Israelites and the Jews. They too were chosen to be
the People of God. They were liberated from the slavery of the
Egyptians. They were constituted as a Nation when they were then a
sprawling and motley crowd of individuals. They were given the Covenant
and the wisdom of God’s Laws to guide them to live a righteous life, a life of
equality, justice and compassion. Such was the love of God for His chosen
people. But instead of living according to the Covenantal Laws, they
disobeyed God. Most of all, they abandoned God for the idols of their
lives, the false gods of the pagans, the worship of power and wealth.
Instead of relying solely on God who is their deliverer, they turned to human
powers or the foreign gods.
When man cuts himself
from God, the consequence is that his life becomes one of total
alienation. He
now lives for himself. He lives for this world only as he has no other
world. He lives for this life because there is no other life.
He lives in fear of everyone, and most of all, the fear of death and
annihilation. This insecurity ironically pushes him to acquire more power
and wealth, living under the illusion that if he has more, his life would be
made more secure. Alas, he lives in self-deception. He lives
in constant threat of his existence. He has no peace and no love.
He might be admired and feared but not loved. He lives a lonely,
miserable and unfulfilled life. The greatest loss is that he might even
lose eternal life forever. This was the case with the Israelites. They
became divided among themselves, separated into the Northern and Southern
Kingdom. Divided within, they eventually fell to the foreign powers
surrounding them. All this happened because they were not faithful to God
and His Covenant.
Thanks to God’s mercy,
through the Prophet Ezekiel, He promised that He would once again gather
them back together under one flock and one shepherd. The Lord says
this: “I am going to take the sons of Israel from the nations where they have
gone. I shall gather them together from everywhere and bring them home to their
own soil. I shall make them into one nation in my own land and on the mountains
of Israel, and one king is to be king of them all; they will no longer form two
nations, nor be two separate kingdoms.”
But how would this be
brought about? God
assured them that He would send His servant, David, to bring them back together
once again. “He will reign over them, one shepherd for all; they will
follow my observances, respect my laws and practise them. They will live in the
land that I gave my servant Jacob, the land in which your ancestors lived. They
will live in it, they, their children, their children’s children, forever. I
shall make a covenant of peace with them, an eternal covenant with them. I
shall resettle them and increase them; I shall settle my sanctuary among them
forever. I shall make my home above them; I will be their God, they shall be my
people. And the nations will learn that I am the Lord the sanctifier of Israel,
when my sanctuary is with them forever.” How consoling is this promise
from God! God not only “shall rescue them from all the betrayals they
have been guilty of” but that He “shall cleanse them” and they shall be His
people and He will be their God. How gracious is our God, that He
would take it upon Himself to purify us of all our idols and filthy practices
and our sins! He would even deign to make His sanctuary in us and
we will live in His Kingdom forever. This is simply unimaginable.
This wish is too good to be true, not just for the Israelites who were given
this prophecy but even for us today! But is this real? Can we
believe it? Do we dare to believe it?
Of course it is! This
prophecy is fulfilled in Christ, our King and our Saviour. As the
gospel tells us, He would be the one to die for the nation. Unwittingly,
Caiaphas, the high priest prophesied this event without understanding the
theological significance of it when he said: “it is better for one man to die
for the people, than for the whole nation to be destroyed”. Of course he said
it in the context of political survival. However, the evangelist offers
us a commentary that the prophecy of Jesus’ death is not just for the good of
the nation “but to gather together in unity the scattered children of God.”
Truly, with Christ’s
death, He brought about the unity of mankind, for He reconciled man with God
and man with each other. Christ is the cause of our unity. The
salvific effects of His death brought about the New People of God, fulfilling
the prophecies made by the prophets. In His death on the Cross, He
revealed to us the Father’s unconditional mercy and forgiveness for all of
humanity. In His suffering, we see the love of God, not just made flesh
at His incarnation, but the visible love of God in action in the giving up of
His life and His identification with us in our sins. Lifted up on the
cross, He drew all men to Himself. In His resurrection, He showed that
sin and death no longer has power over us but that life is the last word.
His victory over death conquers every fear of death. And after the
Ascension at Pentecost, He poured forth His Spirit upon us all, thereby making
us the New People of God, the New Israel, His own Body, His Church and the
Sacrament of salvation and unity of the Human Race.
But all this happened
only because Christ did not live for Himself but for His Father and for us
all. We too are called to be like Jesus. If we want to promote
unity, peace and love within our family, Church, society and the world, then we
must no longer live for ourselves but for Him who has given up His life for us
all. In St Paul’s words, “This is because the love of Christ overwhelms
when we reflect that if one man has died for all, then all men should be dead;
and the reason he died for all was so that living men should live no longer for
themselves, but for him who died and was raised to life for them.” So
this obligation is abundantly clear for us all, that the only way to live is to
die for God and for others. When we die to ourselves so that others might
live, we live fully the life of God. Again we are reminded of the words
of Jesus when He said, “Unless a grain of wheat falls on the ground and dies,
it remains a single grain; but if it dies, it yields a rich harvest.” (Jn
12:24-25)
We are at the threshold of
our entry into the most Holy Week of the Church’s liturgical
calendar. The Church has been inviting us to die to ourselves
through prayer, penance and almsgiving. But all these spiritual
exercises are only a prelude to the ultimate calling to share the fullness of
His Paschal Mystery by dying to self for others. Will you die for others
so that they might live? As parents, your vocation is to die for your
children so that they might live. Spouse must die for their spouse so
that he or she will live. Teachers must die for their students so that
they will grow to full maturity in wisdom and knowledge. Students must
die to their selfishness and laziness so that they can live for humanity in
future. Each one in his or her own way must remember this, namely that
“it is better for one man to die for the people, than for the whole nation to
be destroyed.” Are you ready to die for God’s people so that they might
live? This is the question that you must answer today. Exchange
your selfish and self-centered life for a life of self-giving so that you can
transform the darkness of the pain of this world into the life and joy of
Easter.
WRITTEN BY THE MOST REV
WILLIAM GOH
ARCHBISHOP
OF SINGAPORE
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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