20200727 CREATIVE APPROACH IN COMMUNICATING THE GOOD NEWS
Readings at Mass
Liturgical Colour: Green.
First reading
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Jeremiah 13:1-11 ©
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Let this evil people become good for nothing
The Lord said this to me, ‘Go and buy a linen loincloth and put it round your waist. But do not dip it in water.’ And so, as the Lord had ordered, I bought a loincloth and put it round my waist. A second time the word of the Lord was spoken to me, ‘Take the loincloth that you have bought and are wearing round your waist; up! Go to the Euphrates and hide it in a hole in the rock.’ So I went and hid it near the Euphrates as the Lord had ordered me. Many days afterwards the Lord said to me, ‘Get up and go to the Euphrates and fetch the loincloth I ordered you to hide there.’ So I went to the Euphrates, and I searched, and I took the loincloth from the place where I had hidden it. The loincloth was spoilt, good for nothing. Then the word of the Lord was addressed to me, ‘Thus says the Lord: In the same way I will spoil the arrogance of Judah and Jerusalem. This evil people who refuse to listen to my words, who follow the dictates of their own hard hearts, who have followed alien gods, and served them and worshipped them, let them become like this loincloth, good for nothing. For just as a loincloth clings to a man’s waist, so I had intended the whole House of Judah to cling to me – it is the Lord who speaks – to be my people, my glory, my honour and my boast. But they have not listened.’
Responsorial Psalm
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Deuteronomy 32:18-21 ©
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You forget the God who fathered you.
You forget the Rock who begot you,
unmindful now of the God who fathered you.
The Lord has seen this, and in his anger
cast off his sons and his daughters.
You forget the God who fathered you.
‘I shall hide my face from them,’ he says
‘and see what becomes of them.
For they are a deceitful brood,
children with no loyalty in them.
You forget the God who fathered you.
‘They have roused me to jealousy with what is no god,
they have angered me with their beings of nothing;
I, then, will rouse them to jealousy with what is no people,
I will anger them with an empty-headed nation.’
You forget the God who fathered you.
Gospel Acclamation
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cf.2Th2:14
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Alleluia, alleluia!
Through the Good News God called us
to share the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Alleluia!
Or:
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James1:18
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Alleluia, alleluia!
By his own choice the Father made us his children
by the message of the truth,
so that we should be a sort of first-fruits
of all that he created.
Alleluia!
Gospel
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Matthew 13:31-35 ©
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The smallest of all seeds grows into the biggest shrub of all
Jesus put a parable before the crowds: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the biggest shrub of all and becomes a tree so that the birds of the air come and shelter in its branches.’
He told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like the yeast a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour till it was leavened all through.’
In all this Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables; indeed, he would never speak to them except in parables. This was to fulfil the prophecy:
I will speak to you in parables
and expound things hidden since the foundation of the world.
CREATIVE APPROACH IN COMMUNICATING THE GOOD NEWS
SCRIPTURE READINGS: [JER 13:1-11; DT 32:18-21; MT 13:31-35 ]
How can we proclaim the Good News effectively today? This is what the scripture readings invite us to consider. Very often, it is not only the content of the Good News that is important but also the way it is communicated. When we lack creativity in communicating the Good News, regardless how great our content might be, it would be not heard, understood, or even received.
One thing is certain; communicating truths is not always best transmitted in a discourse. This is because truth is not a concept or a word but an event. Pope Emeritus Benedict wrote, “Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.” (DCE, 1) This is even more valid when it comes to proclaiming the Good News, because we are not transmitting words, or doctrines but a person, Jesus the Christ. We are communicating our experience and encounter with the Jesus whom we declare as our Lord and Saviour.
Indeed, in the gospel, we find Jesus communicating the truths of God not through a discourse like the Jewish leaders. Rather, He communicated using language and examples from daily life. He did not use theological, legalistic and liturgical language to talk about God. In fact, He did not talk about God in the abstract. God was always linked with daily life. What Jesus sought to convey was His Abba experience. And this cannot be mediated through words alone but the listeners must be led to a personal experience of God.
To help people to enter into His experience of God, no words can describe it. Indeed, for those of us who have encountered something beautiful, whether an awesome sight of nature, a religious encounter, a miracle, words are too inadequate to describe our experience. Moreover, if we try to describe, those without a similar experience will find us rather delirious and perhaps weird. For this reason, Jesus used parables to convey His experience of God. The gospel ends by saying, “In all this Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables; indeed, he would never speak to them except in parables. This was to fulfil the prophecy: I will speak to you in parables and expound things hidden since the foundation of the world.”
What are parables? Parables are extended metaphors. They seek to help a person connect with another reality through what the person encounters in his or her daily life. In this way, he or she is given some points of reference that he or she can connect with. Parables are stories taken from daily life experiences. Often, they are told in such a way like most moral stories and jokes with a surprising twist at the end. Such stories are appealing because people can identify with the character and the event. In addition, because they usually have an expected ending, such stories jolt the listeners and make them wonder and ponder as they identify with the parable. It is for this reason that Jesus, unlike the scribes and Pharisees, chose the preferred parabolic way of communicating the truths about the God-experience. These parables charm the ordinary people because they could immediately relate with them, unlike a theological discourse using a legalistic language and an ecclesial language not used in daily life.
The two parables in today’s gospel are a case in point. Firstly, we have the parable of the mustard seed. Everyone knows how small the mustard is. However, when it grows, it becomes such a big tree. It is a wonder of creation that something so small could one day become so huge. When applied to life, it tells us that everything must follow the course of nature. We must be patient to allow the seed to grow. When we start a project or have a vision, we must learn to wait for the seed to develop. Some things take time. But when it grows, it will be beyond our human imagination. It is just like how Jesus started the Church with 12 apostles. Now we have 1.3 billion Catholics in the world and probably another 1 billion Protestants.
On another level, we are told that the tree gives shelter to the birds of the air. Again, it is a good reminder that the Church does not exist for herself but for the world. We are called to be a haven, a refuge for the wounded and the broken so that people can find hope, meaning and purpose in life. The Church does not exist for herself. The Church, as Jesus said, is not just for the healthy but for the sick. (cf Mk 2:17) We do not build ourselves into enclaves, taking care of our little Christian communities. This is too inward-looking, protectionist and parochial-minded. We have a duty to reach out and invite others into our community and later form new communities. This was what the apostles did. Wherever they went, they formed new communities. After establishing them and forming them, they moved to those places where the gospel had yet to be preached.
Similarly, the parable of the Yeast brings to consciousness the purpose of yeast. It is used as a stimulant. It is transforming. Yeast can be seen as something contaminated and unclean, as used by St Paul, “Do you not know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? Clean out the old yeast so that you may be a new batch, as you really are unleavened. For our paschal lamb, Christ, has been sacrificed. Therefore, let us celebrate the festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” (1 Cor 5:6-9)
However, in this case, the symbol of the yeast is used positively as a transforming agent. It is a reminder for the Christians who were then living as a minority to be courageous in transforming society. The Church does not exist just to keep the members pure and holy, uncontaminated by the world. On the contrary, as Pope Francis mandates, the Church must go out and soil her hands, be vulnerable, wounded and bruised by her involvement with the world. If we do not change society, then society will change us. There is no point lamenting what is happening in the world unless we light the candle. Wherever Christians are, they must act like transforming agents of change for the better.
Besides parables, there is yet another way to communicate the Good News effectively. This is through prophecy in drama. This was what God instructed Jeremiah to do, as we read in today’s first readings. This form of communication was often used by most of the prophets, e.g. Ezekiel and Hosea. In this form, the prophet was asked to act out in their own lives something that is visible and could be seen by people. But normally the actions they performed were out of the ordinary things that people do. This was the way to get their attention and cause them to ponder and raise questions.
In this case, Jeremiah was instructed by the Lord to buy a linen loincloth and put it round his waist. Then he was to hide it in a hole in the rock. The linen loincloth was something very intimate and close to the human body. It was like underwear. However, because it was hidden in the hole, the water seeped in and it became soiled and useless. So when the people questioned what Jeremiah did, the answer was clear. It was an illustration of the state of the people. They had become arrogant because they thought they were supposedly the chosen people of God. Instead of serving Him, they took the Lord for granted and failed to observe the commandments. The people were called to intimacy with the Lord but instead of clinging to Him, they worshipped false gods. Indeed, the Lord said, “For just as a loincloth clings to a man’s waist, so I had intended the whole House of Judah to cling to me to be my people, my glory, my honour and my boast. But they have not listened.”
In the light of what we said, today, we are challenged to find our own creative ways to communicate the Good News to the world. We must be ready for change and not stick to old traditional methods and language that no longer speak to our people, especially the young and those born in the digital age. The Good News cannot be fossilized but must be recreated anew, for that is what the Holy Spirit does. He comes to make all things new, not so much new things. Today, initiatives have been taken in our times to reach out to our people, using social media, instagram, facebook, twitter, you-tube, sharing testimonies of Catholics, music, cartoons, skits and dances. These are the ways the Good News can be made attractive to our contemporaries. Catholics must be more adventurous, resourceful, creative and proactive in presenting the gospel, using means that are effective, and clothing the gospel with the language of our day.
Written by The Most Rev William Goh, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All Rights Reserved.
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