note: in response to my notes from last week, a reader asked who is the "we" who believes that the conception of Jesus took place when Mary said "YES" to God. It is the Catholic Church which, for that reason, assigns the date of March 25 (nine months before Christmas) as the feast of the Annunciation.
Gospel, Luke 2:22-40 According to Mosaic law (Leviticus 12:2-6), after giving birth to a male child, a woman was considered “unclean” for seven days. On the eighth day the child was to be circumcised. Then the mother spent 33 more days of ritual impurity during which time she was not permitted to touch anything sacred or enter the temple in Jerusalem. This impurity was in no way associated with seeing sex or childbirth as evil. It was, rather, related to the flow of blood which takes place in childbirth. Being in contact with blood, which belonged to God as the divine means of giving life, made one ritually impure. The waiting period before returning to physical contact with things sacred was a form of respect for having touched what belongs to God. At the end of the forty days, the woman was to offer a sacrifice of a lamb and a pigeon if the family could afford it, or two pigeons if they were poor.
It is curious that Luke would not only mention Anna’s name but her father’s name and tribe as well. We can presume that such information had special meaning to Luke and his audience or he would not have included it. The territory of the tribe of Asher was the farthest north of the twelve tribes and, therefore, the one closest to the Greek - Gentile communities to whom Luke’s gospel was addressed. Anna and Simeon were both devout and well along in years, two things that, for Luke’s readers, gave extra weight to their witness about Jesus.
Reading 1, Sirach 3:2-6, 12-14 This book is named after the author’s grandfather Sirach (50:27): “Wise instruction, appropriate proverbs, I have written in this book, I, Jesus, son of Eleazar, son of Sirach, as they gushed forth from my heart’s understanding.” Wisdom, the accumulated experience of how to make wise decisions, was distilled into wise sayings or proverbs to be memorized and applied at the appropriate moment. This held true even when I was going to school, being taught that “a stitch in time saves nine” or “don’t cry over spilled milk”. I picture this Jesus as having sat at the feet of his grandfather for hours, learning from him the wisdom garnered through all his years. Years later, having valued what he learned from his grandfather and father, he decided to put it down in writing to help other people make wise decisions, as he says in 50:29: “If he puts them into practice, he can cope with anything.” Through his writing we have a clear impression of how much the author loved and respected his parents and grandparents. It is believed he lived in Jerusalem and wrote in Hebrew between 200 and 175 B.C. The text was later translated into Greek by his grandson (two more generations of wisdom being passed down from father to son!) who added a foreword which is a beautiful read in itself. Until the end of the 19th century, the book was only known in Greek and other translations. Since that time a number of ancient manuscripts, one predating the Christian era, have been found in the original Hebrew. Sirach was used so extensively for moral teaching in the early Christian Church that it became known as “Liber Ecclesiasticus” or “Church Book” until the post-Vatican era.
Reading II, Colossians 3:12-17 Colossae was a city in the interior of Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey) about a five-day’s journey from Ephesus. The Christian community there met at the home of a wealthy sheep-rancher named Philemon. The letter to the Colossians was personally delivered to Philemon, along with the letter bearing his name, by Tychicus, a member of Paul’s team in Rome who had been charged to safely return the runaway slave Onesimus to Philemon. Stopping at Ephesus on the way, Tychicus had delivered the letter to the Ephesians, a general letter intended for all the churches in the region. Since all three letters were probably written within a week or so in preparation for Tychicus’ journey, it is interesting to read them together to see how they complement one another. Although Paul probably never visited Colossae, he was certainly kept up to date on what was happening there as well as in other communities which he had founded either directly or indirectly. Since Paul wrote in response to what he was hearing, as is common for most letter writers, one can read into this passage that Paul had heard about some family issues in Colossae which needed attention.
Fr. Dempsey previously stated:
"We believe that the conception of Jesus in the womb of Mary took place at the moment she said “Yes” to God."
So I asked who this 'we' is. Fr. Dempsey replied that by 'we' he means 'the Catholic Church'.
In other words, for Fr. Dempsey 'the Catholic Church' doesn't include church-going Catholics. For Fr. Dempsey, 'the Catholic Church' = 'the Magisterium of the Catholic Church'.
If you poll people at St. Dominic's, asking them whether they constitute part of 'the Catholic Church', I think you will learn that Fr. Dempsey's viewpoint is exceedingly rare, among parishioners.
Posted by: Gavin | December 28, 2008 at 01:32 PM