Sunday Mass for the 30th Sunday Ordinary time 2020 - Year A

Welcome to St. Ignatius Chapel. Today we celebrate the 30th Sunday of Ordinary Time. Our celebrant today is Jesuit Fr. Bruce Botha SJ. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. [Amen.] The Lord be with you. [And with your spirit.] As always we gather in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, celebrating his love for us. So we rejoice; give him thanks; but also we’re aware of our own woundedness; sometimes we hurt other people, in what we say or what we do, we ask the Lord to forgive us. You came to heal the contrite of heart, Lord, have mercy. [Lord, have mercy.

] 01:28 - You came to bind up our wounds and to forgive our sins: Christ, have mercy. [Christ, have mercy.] You came that we might have a new and abundant life: Lord, have mercy. [Lord, have mercy.] And may almighty God have mercy on us, may he forgive us our sins and bring us to a new and everlasting covenant. [Amen.] And now let us give glory to God. Glory to God in the highest, and on earth, peace to people of good will. We praise you, we bless you, we adore you, we glorify you, we give you thanks for your great glory, Lord God, heavenly King, O God, almighty Father.

02:15 - Lord Jesus Christ, Only Begotten Son, Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us; you take away the sins of the world, receive our prayer; you are seated at the right hand of the Father, have mercy on us. For you alone are the Holy One, you alone are the Lord, you alone are the Most High, Jesus Christ, with the Holy Spirit, in the glory of God the Father. [Amen.] Let us pray: Almighty ever-living God, increase our faith, hope and love, and make us love what you command, so that we may merit what you promise. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. [Amen.] A reading from the Book of Exodus. Thus says the Lord: “You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.

03:38 - You shall not afflict any widow or orphan. If you do afflict them, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry; and my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless. “If you lend money to any of my people with you who is poor, you shall not be to him a creditor, and you shall not exact interest from him. If ever you take your neighbour’s garment in pledge, you shall restore it to him before the sun goes down, for that is his only covering, it is his mantle for his body; in what else shall he sleep? And if he cries to me, I will hear, for I am compassionate.” The word of the Lord. [Thanks be to God.] The response: I love you, LORD, my strength. [I love you, LORD, my strength.

] 04:46 - I love you, LORD, my strength; O LORD, my rock, my fortress, my saviour; [I love you, LORD, my strength.] My God, my rock where I take refuge; my shield, my saving strength, my stronghold. I cry out, “Praised be the LORD!” and see, I am saved from my foes. [I love you, LORD, my strength.] The LORD lives, and blest be my Rock! May the God of my salvation be exalted. The LORD gives great victories to his king, and shows merciful love for his anointed. [I love you, LORD, my strength.

] 05:44 - A reading from the 1st Letter of St Paul to the Thessalonians. Brethren: You know what kind of men we proved to be among you for your sake. And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you received the word in much affliction, with joy inspired by the Holy Spirit; so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need not say anything. For they themselves report concerning us what a welcome we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols, to serve a living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come. The word of the Lord. [Thanks be to God.

] 07:01 - Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! If a man loves me, he will keep my word, says the Lord, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him. Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! The Lord be with you. [And with your spirit] A reading from the holy Gospel according to Matthew. [Glory to you, O Lord.] At that time: when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, they came together. One of them, a lawyer, asked him a question, to test him.

08:18 - “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbour as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.” This is the Gospel of the Lord. [Praise to you, Lord, Jesus Christ.] The greatest command is clear: “You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart.” The second greatest commandment is equally clear: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.

” 09:18 - What is not clear, perhaps, is exactly what these commandments mean. I would like us to reflect today on what it means to love, and who it is that we are expected to love? Jesus is joining together these two commandments, both chosen from the Hebrew Scriptures, in an attempt to clarify at least to some extent what it means to love God: one way that we humans express our love for God is by loving our neighbour. But who is our neighbour, and what does it mean to love? It is worth remembering that in the time of Jesus, our Mediterranean ancestors were strongly group focused. The group was family, village, clan, neighbourhood or maybe a particular faction that you might join, like the twelve Apostles, or the Pharisees and so on. The group gave a sense of identity, a sense of belonging, and it gave advice for actions to be taken or avoided.

10:36 - The group was an external conscience exerting enormous pressure on its individual members. In this context, love and hate are best understood as group attachment or detachment. How engaged are you with the group, or how disengaged? The major feeling in love and hate is a feeling of belonging or not belonging. And so to love God with all one’s heart means to be totally attached to God. To love neighbour as self is to be as totally attached to the people in one’s neighbourhood or immediate circle of friends (e.g.

, one’s fellow Israelites) as it is to one’s own 11:34 - family. And so to “hate one’s mother or father,” and others as Luke’s Jesus (Lk 14:26) requires of his followers means one must detach oneself from the family and join the Jesus group. Paul, when speaking of faith, hope, and love, says that the greatest of these is love, or to put it a little differently, the most important thing is the attachment to the group, the group of Jesus. The group-attachment aspect of love poses a challenge to the individualism of our modern society, and to our own self-centred and selfish lives. According to Jesus it seems as though we cannot be truly living a life of love unless we are part of and committed to something greater than ourselves.

12:41 - Something like the Church family we are all invited to be part of. The Gospel today was preceded by a passage from Exodus about treating justly the most vulnerable people in society. So when we read Exodus and the Gospel together, we are being shown that our call to love is a call to be attached to people beyond our comfort zone, we are called to expand the boundaries of our love. And the implication is that loving our neighbour means more than being kind to our friends and relatives, or the person who lives right next door. Loving one’s neighbour means doing right by any widow or orphan: seeing that the hungry are fed and the homeless are sheltered, the poor have their basic needs met, and the unemployed do not suffer from want, the young are educated and the old are cared for, that those who are different from us do not encounter marginalisation or discrimination.

14:02 - To whom, or to what are you attached? Who have you excluded or included in your circle of belonging? Has your COVID-19 experiences made you more attached to God and neighbour, or less attached? These are the rather uncomfortable questions that Jesus leaves us to ponder. We now use the Apostle’s Creed to profess our faith. I believe in one God, the Father almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried; he descended into hell; on the third day he rose again from the dead; he ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty; from there he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. [Amen.] Let us now bring our prayers, our hopes, our needs and our desires for the world to the Lord.

16:17 - We pray for the Church, that we may proclaim the fullness of the Gospel with our words and with our lives, and bring the light of Christ to the world. Lord Hear us. [Lord, graciously hear us.] We pray for those who suffer the effects of violence: the vulnerable, the weak, the disadvantaged, the unborn, the elderly and the poor, that through the power of the Cross, we may conquer hatred with love and pride with patience. Lord Hear us. [Lord, graciously hear us.] We pray for all of our Parish communities, wherever they are in the world, that the lost may find in us a place of welcome and belonging. Lord Hear us. [Lord, graciously hear us.] We pray for our country and for our government, that all South Africans may seek the common good and that our government will enforce the rule of law and end the scourge of corruption. Lord Hear us. [Lord, graciously hear us.] Lord God, hear these prayers and the unspoken prayers of our hearts, for we ask them in faith through Christ our Lord. [Amen.

] 18:35 - Blessed are you, Lord God of all creation, through your goodness we have this bread to offer: fruit of the earth and work of human hands, it will become for us the bread of life. [Blessed be God for ever.] By the mingling of this water and wine may we come to share in the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity. Blessed are you, Lord God of all creation, for through your goodness we have this wine to offer: fruit of the vine, and work of human hands, it will become for us our spiritual drink. [Blessed be God for ever.] Lord wash away my iniquities and cleanse me from my sin. Pray now, brothers and sisters, that these gifts that we bring will be acceptable to God, our almighty Father.

19:26 - [May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands for the praise and glory of God’s name, for our good and the good of all God’s holy Church.] Look, we pray, O Lord, on the offerings we make to your majesty, that whatever is done by us in your service may be directed above all to your glory. We ask this through Christ our Lord. [Amen] The Lord be with you [And with your spirit.] Lift up your hearts. [We lift them up to the Lord.] Let us give thanks to the Lord our God. [It is right and just.] It is truly right and just, our duty and our salvation, always and everywhere to give you thanks, Father of mercies and faithful God. For you have given us Jesus Christ, your Son, as our Lord and Redeemer.

20:20 - He always showed compassion for children and for the poor, for the sick and for sinners, and he became a neighbour to the oppressed and the afflicted. By word and deed he announced to the world that you are our Father and that you care for all your sons and daughters. And so, with all the Angels and Saints, we exalt and bless your name and we sing the hymn of your glory, as without end we acclaim: Holy, Holy, Holy [Lord God of hosts. Heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.] You are indeed Holy and to be glorified, O God, who love the human race and who always walks with us on the journey of life.

21:15 - Blessed indeed is your Son, present here in our midst when we are gathered by his love and as He once did for his disciples, so he now does for us, he opens the Scriptures and he breaks the bread. Therefore, Father most merciful, we ask that you send forth your Holy Spirit to sanctify these gifts of bread and wine, that they may become for us the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. On the day before he was to suffer, on the night of the Last Supper, he took bread and said the blessing, he broke the bread and then he gave it to his disciples, saying: TAKE THIS, ALL OF YOU, AND EAT OF IT, THIS IS MY BODY, WHICH WILL BE GIVEN UP FOR YOU. When Supper was ended he took the cup filled with wine, and then giving you thanks and praise, he gave the cup to his disciples, saying: TAKE THIS, ALL OF YOU, AND DRINK FROM IT, THIS IS THE CUP OF MY BLOOD, THE BLOOD OF THE NEW AND EVERLASTING COVENANT, IT WILL BE POURED OUT FOR YOU AND FOR ALL SO THAT SINS MAY BE FORGIVEN. DO THIS IN MEMORY OF ME. Let us now proclaim the mystery of our faith.

22:52 - We proclaim your Death, O Lord, and profess your Resurrection until you come again. Therefore, holy Father, as we celebrate the memorial of Christ your Son, our Saviour, whom you led through his Passion and Death on the Cross to the glory of the Resurrection, and whom you have seated at your right hand, we proclaim the work of your love until he comes again and we offer you the Bread of life and the Cup of blessing. Look with favour on the offering of your Church, in which we show forth the paschal Sacrifice of Christ that has been handed on to us; grant that, by the power of the Spirit of your love, we may be counted now and until the day of eternity among the members of your Son, in whose Body and Blood we have communion. Bring your Church, O Lord, to perfect faith and love, together with Francis our Pope, with Buti Tlhagale our Bishop, Duncan Tsoke his assistant, with all Bishops, Priests and Deacons, and the entire people you have made your own. Open our eyes to the needs of our brothers and sisters; inspire in us words and actions to comfort those who labour and are burdened.

24:19 - Make us serve them truly, just as Christ did, and as he commands us to do. And may your Church stand as a living witness to truth and freedom, to peace and justice, that all people may be raised up to a new hope. Remember our brothers and sisters who have fallen asleep in the peace of your Christ, and all the dead, whose faith you alone have known. Admit them to rejoice in the light of your presence, and in the resurrection give them the fullness of life. Grant also to us, when our own earthly pilgrimage is done, that we may come to an eternal dwelling place and live with you for ever; there, in communion with the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, with the Apostles and Martyrs, with Saint Ignatius of Loyola and with all the Saints, we shall praise and exalt you through Jesus Christ, your Son.

25:21 - For it is through him, with him, in him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, that all glory and honour is yours, Almighty Father, for ever and ever. [Amen.] At the Saviour’s command and formed by divine teaching, we dare to pray: Our Father, [who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name; thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.] Deliver us, Lord, we pray, from every evil, and grant us peace in our day. By the help of your mercy, may we be always free from sin and safe from all needless anxiety, as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Saviour, Jesus Christ.

26:34 - [For the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours now and for ever.] Lord Jesus Christ, you said to your Apostles: I leave you Peace, my peace I give you, look not on our sin, but on the faith of your Church, and grant us the peace and the unity of your Kingdom, where you live and reign for ever and ever. [Amen.] The peace of the Lord be with you always. [And with your spirit.] Lamb of God, [you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us. Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.

27:26 - Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, grant us peace.] So behold the Lamb of God, Behold the One who takes away the sins of the world. How happy are we who are called to the supper of the Lamb. [Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.] Although you cannot receive physical communion with us now, we invite you into a moment of spiritual communion. The great medieval theologian, St.

Thomas Aquinas, defined spiritual communion as: “an 28:18 - ardent desire to receive Jesus in the Holy Sacrament”, and “a loving embrace as though we had already received him.” His words are echoed by the great mystic, and fellow doctor of the church, St. Teresa of Avila, who wrote: “When you do not receive Communion, and do not attend Mass, you can make a spiritual communion which is a most beneficial practice. By it, the love of God will be greatly impressed on you.” At this moment we invite you to focus on Christ, and your longing for union with him.

28:57 - Express your desire to feel his grace coursing through you, giving you strength and courage, particularly in these difficult times. In your desiring union you are united with us, and to Christ. In this moment we experience the reality that is already here. Now let us pray: May your Sacraments, O Lord, perfect in us what lies within them, that what we now celebrate in signs we may one day possess in truth. We ask this through Christ our Lord. [Amen.] The Lord be with you. [And with your spirit.] May almighty God bless you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. [Amen.

] 31:24 - Go now in peace, giving God glory with your lives. [Thanks be to God.] .