Saturday, February 25, 2017

First Sunday in Lent

Year A
First Sunday in Lent


Images

Preparing for Jesus sacrifice


Points to note

Lent is the preparation for the climax of the Church year.    There is a lot to cover for these six weeks (five if you exclude Palm Sunday, when the Passion story should be told).  As such, I am covering the topics for discussions over the three years. 

The first Sunday in Lent his year will be an introduction to Lent as in the penitential spirit to prepare for the Holy Week.  In Year B, I will discuss the point of our own sacrifice while Year C will focus on the idea of promises.


Liturgy

Explain that during the penitential season of Lent, we do not sing the Alleluia, which is normally reserved for joyous occasion.  Instead during Lent, we sing the Praise and Glory to God.

Acclamation before the Gospel
Praise to you, O Christ, king of eternal glory!
Man does not live on bread alone,
but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.
Praise to you, O Christ, king of eternal glory!

Gospel
Discuss with the children about the new season of the Christian calendar that we are entering.  This is available in the end panel of this leaflet & for a more complete explanation, at Soundbites about Lent and Easter

The Lord be with you.
All:   And also with your spirit.

A Reading from the Holy Gospel according to St Matthew
All:   Glory to you O Lord
(Mt 4:1-11)
Jesus was led by the Spirit out into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. He fasted for forty days and forty nights, after which he was very hungry, and the tempter came and said to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to turn into loaves.’ But he replied, ‘Scripture says:
Man does not live on bread alone
but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’
The devil then took him to the holy city and made him stand on the parapet of the Temple. ‘If you are the Son of God’ he said ‘throw yourself down; for scripture says:
He will put you in his angels’ charge,
and they will support you on their hands
in case you hurt your foot against a stone.’
Jesus said to him, ‘Scripture also says:
You must not put the Lord your God to the test.’
Next, taking him to a very high mountain, the devil showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour. ‘I will give you all these’ he said, ‘if you fall at my feet and worship me.’ Then Jesus replied, ‘Be off, Satan! For scripture says:
You must worship the Lord your God,
and serve him alone.’
Then the devil left him, and angels appeared and looked after him.

This is the Good News of the Lord


Dialogue

This discussion should be kept short as the bulk of the discussions take place before the reading.

Jesus was tempted for forty days and forty nights.  Can you think of any other stories in the Bible where the number forty turned up?  Noah's flood lasted for forty days; the Israelites wandered around the dessert for forty years; Moses spent forty days on Mount Sinai.  In each of these stories, there is an element of waiting or penitence.  That is why we have forty days of Lent.  You can run through some of the points in the end panel if not already discussed.

What was Jesus tempted for?  Food against hunger (the bread); Testing God (expecting angels to save him); Power (in exchange for all the kingdoms).  Explain that each of these three temptations has a deeper meaning:
·       Food represents wealth.  Do we get greedy for things that we don’t need like that beautiful dress when we have plenty, that new gadget because others have it?
·       Testing God means doubting him and others has asked to take care of us.  Do we always worry about bad things happening and not trusting that God will always let things happen for the best?
·       Power means we want to control people and make bad things happen to them.  Do we sometimes lie to get someone else into trouble or make people promise us things by sneaky means?
These are all the temptations similar to those that Jesus went through in the desert.  During Lent, God wants us to think about our temptations and at least for 40 days, not give in to them.  Not be greedy; Trust God; Do not lie or be sneaky.

End with inviting the children to commit to doing something concrete and specific to resist any of these temptations during Lent.




BEING IN LENT
Lent comes from an Old English word, which means spring.  It has the same Germanic root word as long, which denotes how the days lengthen in spring. There is great significance in this choice of the word.  Spring is seen as the season of renewal.  Trees that seem dead in winter bud and come back to life in spring.  Sheep have lambs in spring so that the little lambs will have the most time to grow before the onset of winter.  Spring, & Lent, are therefore the seasons of new life, the new life of Jesus that we will celebrate at Easter.
Lent lasts for forty days but if you count the days from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday, there are 46 days in all.  It is forty if you exclude the Sundays.  That is why, technically, we refer to the Sundays as Sundays in Lent and not Sundays of Lent.  The Church's official name for Lent is the Period of Forty Days.
During all of Lent, the church is stripped of all decorations, including flowers, banners, etc.  We also do not sing the joyous Alleluia at mass, being replaced by the Glory and Praise.  The Gloria is not sung, and only recited if there is a major feast.
In the past, there used to be a 17-day period of preparation before Ash Wednesday, a period of preparation for the period of preparation, you may say.  Today, that period of preparation is no longer religious but has become the carnival season. 
In Brazil, it could last 46 days to mirror the duration of Lent. The famous carnival is the one in Rio de Janiero.  That is held on a long weekend (Friday to Tuesday), during which everyone parties to their heart's content before they start their fasting and penitence in Lent.
The original carnival is the carnevale in Venice, which has just been recently revived.  That is where the meaning of the word comes from: carni (which means meat) and levare (which means put away).  Carnival, therefore, means goodbye to meat.  So, the next time you see the carnival in Rio, do you think those people are partying to say goodbye to meat?
Lent is also the final and intense period for catechumens preparing for baptism at Easter.  In fourth century Jerusalem, catechumens had to attend classes for three hours every day in Lent!  Today, they are presented to the congregation every Sunday in Lent to be scrutinised for their worthiness for baptism.  Traditionally, they prepare for the baptism with a six day fast and baptised Catholics join the fasting in solidarity with the catechumens.


Saturday, February 18, 2017

Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Year A
Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time


Concepts

Being worried


Points to note

Again, as with all the other readings on the Sermon on the Mount, the readings tend to fragment into many small messages and we will have to choose just one in order to have a more focussed discussion.

There are two primary messages here.  The first part centres around the line, “You cannot be the slave both of God and of money”.  Here the Greek word used for ‘money’ does not refer to cash but rather to material goods.  There are a lot of rich areas for discussion here.

The second centres around the line, “do not worry about tomorrow”.  Great care needs to be taken that we do not give the message that there is nothing we need to do as God will take care of everything.  Saying that we do not worry is more about saying that we leave the outcome of our efforts into God’s hands and his will be done.

I have chosen to focus on the second as the first message has been dealt with in other Sundays during the cycle.



Liturgy

Acclamation before the Gospel
Alleluia!  Alleluia!
Your word is truth, O Lord,
consecrate us in the truth.
Alleluia!

Gospel
Explain that we are still with the Sermon on the Mount.

The Lord be with you.
All:   And also with your spirit.

A Reading from the Holy Gospel according to St Matthew
All:   Glory to you O Lord
(Mt 6: 24-34)
Jesus said to his disciples, “No one can be the slave of two masters: he will either hate the first and love the second, or treat the first with respect and the second with scorn.  You cannot be the slave both of God and of money.

That is why I am telling you not to worry about your life and what you are to eat, not about your body and how you are to clothe it. Surely, life means more than food, and the body more than clothing!  Look at the birds in the sky. They do not sow or reap or gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not worth much more than they are?  Can any of you for all his worrying, add one single cubit to his span of life?  And why worry about clothing?  Think of the flowers growing in the fields; they never have to work or spin; yet I assure you that not even Solomon in all his regalia was robed like one of these.  Now if that is how God clothes the grass in the fields which is here today and thrown into the furnace tomorrow, will he not much more look after you, you men of little faith?  So do not worry, do not say, ‘What are we to eat? What are we to drink?  How are we to be clothed?’  It is the pagans who set their hearts on all these things.  Your heavenly Father knows you need them all.  Set your hearts on his kingdom first, and on his righteousness, and all these other things will be given to you as well.  So do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

This is the Word of the Lord


Dialogue

Have you seen when Mom or Dad gets worried?  How do people look or act when they are worried?   We could get some funny answers here.  What happens to you when you get worried?  Talk about the how stressed out they were.  Did they look unfriendly?  Did they do anything unfriendly?  Did they do or say anything nasty to anyone?

Do you think the effects on people when you get worried about things is nice?  Would people keep away from you when you get too worried?  Discuss how people around them respond when they get too stressed from the worry.  Did people avoid them?  What would you do about it if you have no friends after getting too worried?

What do you get worried about anyway?  Let the children talk of the things that they worry about.  Spend some time on this.  Highlight the especially more frivolous ones.  Probe each of these cases and see if any of these worries actually happened.  And if they did happen, did it make much of a difference?  Margaret Thatcher once said that 90% of the things we worry about did not happen and of those that did, we could cope with 90% of them.  This means that we worry 99% of the time for nothing.

What did you do when you get worried?  Did all the worrying make much of a difference?  There really isn’t much reason for us to worry.  If there is a problem, we should do something to prepare for it.  For example, if we are worried about the exams, we should study hard for it.  Once we have studied as much as we can do, there is not much difference on the outcome that worrying can do.  So, why worry.  I hope we are not worrying for the sake of worrying.  Are there people who worry about having nothing to worry about?

Once we have prepared as well as we can do, do we pray about it?  Do we pray before (or even instead of) doing our best to prepare (like studying) or should we pray after doing our best?  God wants us to go to him when there is nothing that we can do.  Discuss also whether God will take care of us if we go to him in prayer.

Saturday, February 11, 2017

Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Year A

LSW

children
Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time


Concepts

The opposite Christian


Points to note

The message from the Sermon on the Mount this week builds on the one last week.  Remember there were two messages last week and we only focussed on one.  The other one is dealt with in more detail here.  You may want to repeat the first part of last week reading, but remember only the first half.

This is not an easy reading to follow – even for adults, maybe especially for adults.  We are constantly reminded that the ways of the world are not ours but, really, the ways of the world are designed for those who live in the world.  They are sometimes necessary ways to protect ourselves against the dangers of the world we live in. 

How practical is it for us to adopt the Christian way that the world will not hesitate to exploit in a defenceless Christian?  Maybe we say that we as adults will know how to differentiate between the sensible and the idealistic parts of this message.  Is this passage all the more relevant today in a world where the Pope calls us to welcome the immigrant and the refugee even at great safety cost to ourselves and our communities?

On this practical point, we have to ensure that the children understand the balance: the last thing you want is parents coming after you for teaching the children to be insensible.  Perhaps we can focus on pacifism as a way to deal with people who have been difficult.  Pacifism has been a Christian principle from the earliest days.  Christians refused to serve in the army in those days.

On the more idealistic point, I will have to leave it to each of us to individually determine whether the reason we did not adopt ways of the Gospel is because the Gospel way is no longer relevant in the modern world or because we have compromised with the world in our weakness.


Liturgy

Acclamation before the Gospel
Alleluia!  Alleluia!
If anyone loves me he will keep my word,
and my Father will love him, and we shall come to him.
Alleluia!

Gospel
Explain that we are still with the Sermon on the Mount.

The Lord be with you.
All:   And also with your spirit.

A Reading from the Holy Gospel according to St Matthew
All:   Glory to you O Lord
(Mt 5: 38-48)
Jesus said to his disciples, “You have learnt how it was said: Eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth.  But I say this to you: offer the wicked man no resistance.  On the contrary, if anyone hits you on the right cheek, offer him the other as well; if a man takes you to law and would have your tunic, let him have your cloak as well.  And if anyone orders you to go one mile, go two miles with him.  Give to anyone who asks, and if anyone wants to borrow, do not turn away.

You have learnt how it was said: You must love your neighbour and hate your enemies. But I say this to you: love your neighbour and pray for those who persecute you; in this way you will be sons of your Father in heaven, for he causes his sun to rise on bad men as well as good, and his rain to fall on honest men and dishonest men alike.  For if you love those who love you, what right do you have to claim any credit?  Even the tax collectors do that much, do they not?  You must therefore be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

This is the Word of the Lord

 
Dialogue

Have you heard of Mahatma Gandhi?  Explain who Gandhi was.  He led the Indians to independence from the British using non-violent means.  Explain that the British imprisoned him but he refused to ask the people to fight.  He used strikes and peaceful marches as weapons.  But his greatest weapon was the British conscience.  He got the British to realise that violence was wrong and in the end the British backed down.

One of Gandhi’s famous sayings as “An eye for an eye makes the world go blind” when some of his followers urged him to retaliate against killings by the British Army.  Refer back to the reading Eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth.  Jesus explained that this was not the right way to behave.

Do you think it is easy not to retaliate?  What does it require? Self control, patience, faith and love. You must love yourself, love peace and love the person provoking you for you to be able to not retaliate.  Easy? 

Take the children through simple examples:  siblings who have taken toys or would not let you share theirs.  People who call you names in school.  People who taunt you into a fight.  How would the children respond?


How about bullies?  Have you met a bully?  Let the children talk about the bullies that they have met in school, etc.  Discuss how the children could deal with a bully without retaliating, following what Jesus has said.  Report to authorities.  Tell friends and families.  Stick together in a bigger group.  Ultimately, Jesus says make friends with the bully and understand him/her & help him/her mend his/her ways.