ALL SAINTS MARGARET STREET

Trinity II – High Mass – Year B

Fr Ivan Aquilina

The problem is that today’s Gospel story is not preachable. It is not preachable as it is only liveable. And it is liveable in so many different planes that talking about it in a generic way is obscuring it rather than let it work in us. So the temptation I face is to speak to you about my own experience of the liveability of this story. But the homily on Sunday is not and should not be about me; it is about making present and afresh the deposit of our faith not my faith, if there is any such thing as my faith.

This story is liveable in many planes. We live this story individually. We live this story as the Margaret Street Community. We live this story as the Church in London, also as the Church in England and above all as the Church throughout the world, present and past. We interconnect between one and the other. It is the story of us as people of God. So it is very difficult if not unjust to pin it down to some reflections as all experiences of this story are valid.

However it is possible and helpful to elevate some precious stones from this immense treasure and admire them together.

They took Jesus on the boat just as he was. Just as he was. This is a phrase thrown in which is not caught up or used to support another part of the story. Biblical scholars have a lot to say about it as do Spiritual Masters. Biblical scholars say that this story was committed to its written form after being retold by many people in different places. Some say that this story was ever so popular with the troubled tiny Christian community and most probably was a story repeated by Christians at the time of their martyrdom, in this story we, the Church, find strength. This verse is a relic that was part of the original story but the rest of this verse, what they meant by “just as he was” is now completely lost. But it is providential that it is there as it reveals the popularity and love for this story.

Spiritual Masters say that Jesus responded to a situation or a call “just as he was”. To answer his call and go in the boat Jesus left everything, he did not look back to take comfort stuff with him. This shows that we are to respond to our call “just as we are” and not as we fancy that we might be, with what is and not with what might have been. Obviously this is just the tip of the iceberg of studies on this verse but time is limited and we all need to go and have lunch, eventually.

A great storm of wind arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. This second gem I want to look at today is one that we tend to oversee. It is much more exciting to get to the juicy headline bit and see Jesus stilling the tempest. Sticking out the tempest is not an eye catching headline, stilling the storm is. But our experience of this story and the weight of this story is not living happily ever after, but it is about our behaviour during the storm. We are constantly tossed about by our surrounding storms, as individuals, in relationships, as community, as part of the larger ecclesial family. We suffer the storms that come from within the Church and from outside and sometimes storms which we have sown and cultivated in less guarded moments. Tossed about by these scary and mighty waves we look at Jesus and he is here, but he is silent, he is asleep. How many times have we asked why he remains asleep during these last two thousand years and during our lifetime? We need to be careful that our questions are not words without knowledge as condemned by the Book of Job in our first reading; though it seems that today there is a market for words without knowledge. Tossed by the surrounding storms will be our experience, will be our context in which to win the world, in which, again in the words of Job we: “gird our loins like a man…” In the thick of the storm our response is that offered by Paul in our second reading, we go through life by purity, knowledge, forbearance, kindness, the Holy Spirit and genuine love; in truth and righteousness we are armed with the power of God.

In this way we can leave our sweet Master asleep, and our actions will be louder than His voice in crying: “Peace! Be still!” And when he wakes up he will be pleased with our courage and our faith, with our stillness and peace.