The Birth of John the Baptist

-

Bob Geldof, Gary Barrlow, Elvis Presley, Her Majesty the Queen, Pope Bendict XVI, Wayne Ronney. As I read out this list of names I am sure that most of you could recognize them and put as it were a mental image of what they looked like. Names mean a lot to us for they define who we are and what we are. This is especially true in the times of Jesus. There would have been an expectation that Elizabeth and Zechariah would have chosen a family name and yet they chose John a name meaning “God’s precious gift.” A significant name when you remember that Elizabeth was barren. John this precious gift was to for tell the coming of the Messiah and this story of John we focus on in Advent.

So what does this story tell us about ourselves and our own journey? The first question that our parents are asked at our baptism is “What name do you give your child?” It is through this name that God knows us. We become his and part of his community.  We are named and taken into God’s loving community for just afterwards we are claimed by Christ by the making a sign of the cross on our forehead.

We are, all of us, absolutely known by God by name and at the end of our earthly lives he again calls us by name to be with him in heaven. How do we know we are known by God? We only have to listen to Jeremiah “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you” He knows us and loves us into being. We are his. We need only to accept and even if we don’t him, he waits for us patiently like the Father in the story of the Prodigal son.

We as people of God need to take responsibility with people’s names. For we can both build people up by using their names and also destroy by how we use it in the sight of other people. We have seen from God that to know a person’s name is very important. Let us use other’s names for affirmation rather than destruction and realise that each of us are born and known by God and therefore important.  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Year of Service

-
Image
  This last weekend I was able to look back with friends at the wonderful year I had with the Vincentian Volunteers. Looking back I can see that there are many elements to this year that have remained always with me. These I can now see and after reflection have shaped my life since this most formative year. From this year I went on to train for the priesthood and became a priest. After 16 years I left ministry and now try my best to live my Christian values and life in the world. In a recent upgrade to my CV I realised that my whole adult life has been in some sort of service to others and usually to the most vulnerable and those on the fringes of society. From working in Top Shop to ministry to the Hospital to the work I now do in education. This all stems from this year I had with the community and putting Love in action. Yes I have made mistakes on the way and my human frailty has been evident but this life was never going to easy and straight forward.  When I look back on that yea
Read more

Easter

-
Image
  Over the last few years I have had major issues with the Catholic Church. I think that my issue is the authority of the Church and how many clergy, not all, use and abuse their power and class the laity as stupid idiots. I can say this as for 16 years I was a priest and caught up in the system. When you're in the middle of it you can't aways see what is going on around you. I could not see what the Church as a structure was doing to peoples lives. Until I was out I realised that the Church and Im talking about the Catholic Church here is full up of repressed men who are scared of change scared of themselves and scared of the laity. Those who speak out especially clergy who want significant change are laughed at by others and classed as trouble makers. This includes Pope Francis himself who wants change but sometimes can't get it because of what he has inherited. It is an issue that has gone on your centuries.  This does not allow for a healthy functioning Church. There ne
Read more

What have we learnt? Covid and the last year.

-
Image
Over the last year since the start of the Covid pandemic there has been much in the press about the affects on society. We have seen that there are many people who are anxious, feel alone and worried about the future. So I looked on the Internet for the Christian response to the Pandemic. I was not surprised to see that there were many articles to suggest that the Christian Church as a whole has failed in this time.  In the first Lockdown the Churches were asked to close and there was no public worship. As the infection rate went down the Churches could open for private prayer. In the recent lockdown many places of worship have remained open although the infection rate being a lot higher. I have maybe been a thorn in peoples sides by asking why. I even wrote to the Cardinal  to ask him why. I argued that they should be left shut because of the demographic that tend to go. I got a standard reply back. When I looked in newsletters I read many times about how to give your collection and t
Read more