Message of Abbot Paul - Monday - 13th May 2024

​On this feast of Our Lady of Fatima, we continue to pray for peace with justice between Palestine and Israel and for an end to the destruction and killing. Let us also remember other parts of the world, especially Ukraine and Sudan, where conflict, war and acts of terrorism take place on a daily basis. These areas have dropped out of the headlines, but the suffering and injustice go on unabated and world leaders seem helpless to improve or change the situation. All thousands of children have ever known in their short lives is violence, bloodshed and death. This cannot be right or acceptable.

 

​According to John, it is at the Last Supper, during his farewell discourse, that the disciples finally proclaim their faith in Jesus and acknowledge him to be the Son of God. This is what we hear in today’s Gospel reading, (Jn 16: 29-33). It is because Jesus is speaking plainly to them and no longer in metaphors that they are able to say, “We believe that you came from God.” He replies:

​​“Do you believe at last?

Listen; the time will come – in fact it has come already –

when you will be scattered,

each going his own way and leaving me alone.

And yet I am not alone,

because the Father is with me.”

We read these words in the context of his Ascension, but they are pronounced on the eve of his Crucifixion and Death. It is true that Jesus foretold perfectly what was to happen when he was arrested and tried by the high priests. The disciples did scatter and leave him alone to face his Passion, yet we know that the Father was always with him. Jesus had told them, “I and the Father are one.” Yet Jesus does not speak harshly, nor does he reprimand them, in fact, quite the opposite.

“I have told you all this

so that you may find peace in me.

In the world you will have trouble,

but be brave: I have conquered the world.”

They are to find peace in his suffering and death, in the shedding of his blood. On Easter Day, when he appeared to his disciples in the upper room, he says, “Peace be with you,” showing them the wounds in his hands and his side. They are to find courage in the fact that he has conquered all that is evil and through his Death and Resurrection vanquished sin and death. May we find that same courage. Amen.