The new liturgical year begins on Advent 1 with the Gospel of Luke—the gospel for Year C. Luke writes for a missionary-challenged faith community in a multicultural and diverse Greco-Roman world. In this season of Advent, we look back over the year that has been and forward to the one that is about to unfold. We prepare for the eschatological coming of Jesus specifically in the final Sundays of Advent and celebrate his birth. As indicated below, the birth of this child on 24–25 December is explicitly theological and ecological. Luke’s story celebrates God’s beloved disposition upon all beings of our planet, revealed in Jesus’ birth. This is the essential truth and mystery in the angelic chorus sung to the shepherds and in the repeated sign, of Jesus ‘wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger’. Jesus’ presence in a manger (a product of planet earth), surrounded with earth’s cloth, highlights Jesus as earth’s child. Ecological implications to celebrate with our planet flow from this and provide a wonderful opportunity to reflect on Jesus’ birth in the light of Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato si’.
Theme—alertness
Advent initially encourages us to be sensitive to the many ways God comes to us. This coming happens mostly unexpectedly, and especially in pain, suffering and death. This first celebration of our new liturgical year invites us to ponder God’s presence to us in all these different ways.
Theme—God’s delight
The advent of Jesus, soon to be born among us, reveals God’s delight for creation and humanity. Jesus’ birth involves the whole of creation, which God has blessed. This powerful theme has profound ecological implications for faith communities that seek to ponder the implications of Francis’ encyclical Laudato si’. Jesus’ birth commits us to this planet and invites us to celebrate our world with lives that are good, holy and blessed.
Theme—joy and conversion
These two themes (joy in Zephaniah and Philippians; conversion in Luke) are powerful and appropriate on the eve of our Christmas celebrations. Joy is God’s gift in the midst of life’s struggles; not simply the ever-smiling Christian immune to what is happening. The kind of conversion suggested by John the Baptist is an openness to be touched and guided by God. It has practical, personal and social implications for how we live out these days in preparing for Jesus’ birth.
Theme—smallness
Micah and Luke reveal that God’s attention is focussed on the insignificant and unknown. Israel’s smallest tribe is praised; Mary a village woman is blessed. Who in our communities are God’s ‘little people’, revealing something of God’s presence to us?
Theme—God’s welcome
So many will crowd into our churches this night. All seek to hear a word of hope and encouragement. In the birth of a child, God is imaged as helpless, childlike and welcoming. Mistaken notions of God as vindictive or vengeful are completely overturned. This affects the way we see our world and God’s embrace of us.
Theme—hope
So many will crowd into our churches this day, as at midnight Mass. All seek to hear a word of hope and encouragement. The readings powerfully provide the opportunity to celebrate a God revealed in a child, seeking to console and tenderly walk with us throughout the rest of our year and lives.
Rev. Dr Michael Trainor AM is a lecturer at Catholic Theological College and is a member of the Department of Biblical Studies. He lectures on the Book of Revelation at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. He holds a Master of Arts in Biblical Literature and Languages from the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, USA, a Masters of Education from Boston College in Boston, USA, and a doctorate in Theology from the Melbourne College of Divinity.
'May your minds be remade and your whole nature thus transformed.'
—Romans 12:2
Conversion is at the heart of all authentic religious experience. Inauthentic religious experience denotes a use of religion—Scripture, ritual, belief or collective identity—that effectively blocks the transformation process that is initiated when consciousness opens to God as source and ground of being. Instead of transformation, the misapplication of religious experience, which is often politically or psychologically driven, produces stagnation or rigidity and consolidates the ego’s fearful resistance to change. Prayer, which is also at the heart of all religion, can therefore be more—or less —authentic, and the test of prayer will be whether it leads to an ongoing conversion or to a progressive paralysis of the self.
A prisoner in an Australian penitentiary put this to me very memorably once at a meditation group I was visiting in the prison when she said, ‘I was really in prison before I came to this place.’ Under the most inauspicious of conditions and in the most dehumanising of social contexts, the miracle of conversion, a pure religious experience, had happened in her, and this was made possible because she had learned there for the first time what prayer really involves.
Before we explore further this connection between prayer and conversion, it would be helpful to explain in what sense I am not using the word conversion. After centuries of missionary effort, the word has acquired a flavour that is repugnant to many. In India, for example, it is forbidden by law to try to convert others to a different religion. This is not meant as a restriction on religious liberty but as a defence of the vulnerable poor from the influence of powerful religious lobbies. Conversion, then, can mean simply the redefinition of one’s religious identity (‘I am becoming a Catholic’ or ‘I have switched to Buddhism’). Religion—or its absence—is an important aspect of one’s personal identity, of course, and to some degree we have the freedom and power to change it at will. More insidious is the use of force or other undue influence, such as the material bribery often used by some evangelical groups, to make people convert. The Dalai Lama advises his huge Western audiences not to change their religion but to rediscover their own, although he adds that people have the right to move into another tradition should they so choose. His point is that people often underestimate the depth and ramifications of using that right. He puts it succinctly when he says that to change your religion is at least as far-reaching a decision as changing your language.
In an age of cultural pluralism, and with the progressive weakening of Christian institutional authority in Western society, religious identity has been reformulated for many as a choice affecting lifestyle and personal identity. Even those who defend a less liberal religious position that challenges this element of ‘freedom’ in determining one’s faith have themselves chosen the position they defend. The Church may protest at ‘buffet Catholics’—people who pick and choose what they want from the tradition—but the nature of religious authority and identity has indisputably shifted. When a right-wing Catholic accuses a liberal Catholic of not being a ‘good’ or ‘true’ Catholic, the liberal is likely to respond, in true liberal fashion, ‘Well that’s your opinion and you're entitled to it but I am not going away.’ Conflicting identities have, as St Benedict understood, to find ways of coexisting in the same house. The solution to this problem will be in deepening the conversion process, not in trying to reverse it.
Conversion is, in other words, about identity. But identity is a more subtle and interesting question today than it has ever been before. People have received an unprecedented infusion of new personal authority to claim an identity that could have been denied them or removed from them before. As a result of this, the revolution in the nature of religious authority in society has highlighted the deeper significance of conversion. The missionaries’ role is now understood to be to preach the Word but to leave the ‘work of conversion’ to the Holy Spirit. This represents an immense enlargement of freedom in missionary endeavour, even though it inevitably causes confusion of identity and purpose for many in the process of transition. In other words, those who were once confident that their job was to convert others have been propelled, themselves, into a conversion experience that is at least as radical and revolutionary as that of Saul of Tarsus.
Christians are increasingly accepting of the idea that conversion is not just about changing your religion or about external conformity within it. If conformity is important—as it is to some extent—then it is, to begin with, about conforming oneself to the true nature of one’s soul—to oneself as a child of God, not merely as a product of our culture. The ‘crisis of religion’, the pluralism of society and the relativisation of personal identity in an age of cyber-intimacy have not surprisingly led to a new flowering of the contemplative dimension of religion. Authenticity of religious experience—realising personal identity in a culture that constantly threatens to absorb, refashion and mass-produce it—and handling the burden of choice in a pluralist world have made prayer an issue of central importance to the future of religion, and even to the environmental survival of the planet.
The woman prisoner I mentioned above experienced the reprocessing of her identity that prisons and other total institutions can do so well. What she lost, however, was an identity that needed to be lost: a dysfunctional, anguished, violent self that was in continuous conflict with her true identity. In the Letter to the Romans, Paul describes this as the old self living according to the flesh. It would be wrong to interpret this as referring to self-indulgence and decadence. Sin in this letter is described in terms of self-division and alienation, not just doing what you want. Indeed, Paul specifically describes it as not doing what you want and instead doing what you don’t want to do. Sin is better illustrated by the model of addiction, therefore, than by that of sexual indulgence. Even St Augustine said that most sins are committed in pain and grief of soul.
In this perspective, conversion is not dependent on a process arising from the institutionalisation of sin that was one of the consequences of the Church’s establishment as a centralised religious authority. Quite the reverse, it is the process of healing the primal wound of division and duality in the self—original sin. Authentic religious awakening transcends the guilt built into the legalised conception of sin and allows us to recognise the abundant flow of grace in our lives and in the cosmos. The circumstances that bring about this awakening are many and mysterious and involve spontaneous timing and apparent chance as much as individual will and effort. But whatever initiates the process of conversion, a new understanding and experience of prayer will inevitably result. Maybe a person feels a vague impulse to ‘go deeper’ in their spiritual life. Maybe she feels the need to assert her personal identity within a context that has suppressed it for her. Maybe what is good and holy in another tradition awakens a religious experience of love hitherto unknown in one’s own faith. Maybe a major loss or mere ageing brings on a crisis of personal meaning. However it happens, the conversion process is triggered and the action of grace begins to get established in a person’s inner and outer worlds. It can be terribly inconvenient and profoundly disturbing. But it has to be accepted just as it is. We do not lightly tell the doctor what treatment to prescribe. We do not control the timetable of our deeper development in self-knowledge. Each case and each chapter in the case history is unique. Such is the fecundity of God’s creation. ‘There is no law dealing with such things as these,’ says St Paul (Galatians 5.23).
Conversion, then, is the ultimately personal experience, and yet it reformulates our sense of identity in belonging to community. The bridge-experience is prayer. When conversion—the metanoia of a total change of mind, not just taking on a new label—has been accepted, the contemplative dimension has also been awakened. This is now happening to more individuals than ever before, and it accounts for the phenomenon of the mystical awakening in the Church in our troubled times. Conversion and contemplation are inseparable, and this simple conjunction defines authentic religious experience and the whole message and tone of the New Testament.
Prayer, as Jesus, explicitly taught, therefore belongs to and happens in the ‘heart’, the deepest identity of the person, not in externals. It is not limited to petition, because God ‘knows our needs before we ask’. It requires the laying aside of anxiety. It demands mindfulness and attention. Prayer is about living fully in the present. This new experience and understanding of prayer is initiated by the process of conversion that is simply the unpredictable and uncontrollable effect of God’s grace in each life. Because conversion never ends, as St Benedict understood when he made the monk take a vow to ongoing ‘conversion of life’, the Church’s great and ancient teaching that contemplation is the goal of human life makes perfect and illuminating sense.
Rev. Laurence Freeman OSB is the Director, World Community for Christian Meditation, an ecumenical, contemplative community dedicated to teaching meditation. This article was first published in The Summit in 2006.
Micah 5:1–4
He will stand and feed his flock with the power of the Lord.
Psalm 79 (80):2–3, 15–16, 18–19
R. Lord, make us turn to you; let us see your face and we shall be saved.
Hebrews 10:5–10
God, here I am! I am coming to obey your will.
Luke 1:38
I am the servant of the Lord: may his will for me be done.
Luke 1:39–45
Why should I be honoured with a visit from the mother of my Lord?
By the Fourth Sunday of Advent Christmas is very near. The mood of the liturgy shifts from the intense calls to conversion to a focus on the events immediately surrounding the birth of Jesus, a shift highlighted in the second preface for the Advent season.
—Homiletic Directory, §96
We are now well into the second part of Advent as we gather for Mass today. We are recounting the events that precede and lead to the birth of our Saviour, and these events cannot be related without reference to the full paschal mystery of Christ. We know that the one born in the crib is the paschal lamb who died and rose for our salvation. So, we are invited to be ‘watchful in prayer and exultant in his praise’. We look to our musicians to carry this call in the music they provide for us this Sunday.
‘Behold, a Virgin shall conceive and bear a son; and his name will be called Emmanuel.’
—communion antiphon
Zephaniah 3:14–18
The Lord, the king of Israel, is in your midst.
Isaiah 12
R. Cry out with joy and gladness: for among you is the great and Holy One of Israel.
Philippians 4:4–7
The Lord is very near.
Isaiah 61:1 (Luke 4:18)
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me; he sent me to bring Good News to the poor.
Luke 3:10–18
‘Someone is coming who will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.’
The unique nature of the homily is captured well in St. Luke’s account of Christ’s preaching in the synagogue of Nazareth (cf. Lk 4:16–30). After reading a passage from the Prophet Isaiah he handed the scroll back to the attendant and began, ‘Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’
—Homiletic Directory, §4
The homily does not stand alone as an instruction; it is a very act of worship. It calls us to recognise the presence of Christ in our midst and to respond to him by our faith. The Word proclaimed awaits our faith-filled response, so that he may bring new life to our world. Our homilist calls us to link the Word proclaimed with our lives, so that we may give Christ the opportunity to continue working in our world today.
‘Say to the faint of heart: Be strong and do not fear. Behold, our God will come, and he will save us.’
—communion antiphon
Baruch 5:1–9
God means to show your splendour to every nation.
Psalm 125 (126)
R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
Philippians 1:4–6, 8–11
May you become pure and blameless in preparation for the day of Christ.
Luke 3:4, 6
Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths: all people shall see the salvation of God.
Luke 3:1–6
The call of John the Baptist.
God speaks to us in many ways: through the events in our lives, through our personal study of Scripture, in times of quiet prayer. But the liturgy is a privileged setting because it is there that we listen to God’s Word as part of the celebration that culminates in the sacrificial offering of Christ to the eternal Father.
—Homilectic Directory, §4
Every moment of living can be an encounter with the Divine if our hearts are attentive to God’s presence. We come to our Sunday celebration to deepen this attentive awareness of God’s presence and action in our lives. We come especially to be formed by God’s word and to offer the sacrifice of our faithful Christian living upon the altar of this celebration; we do this so that we may be graced by consecration to be caught up into the very sacrifice of Christ.
‘Jerusalem, arise and stand upon the heights, and behold the joy which comes to you from God.’
—communion antiphon
Jeremiah 33:14–16
I will make a virtuous Branch grow for David.
Psalm 24 (25):4–5, 8–9, 10, 14
R. To you, O Lord, I lift my soul.
1 Thessalonians 3:12–4:2
May you be blameless when our Lord Jesus Christ comes again.
Psalm 84:8
Lord, show us your mercy and love, and grant us your salvation.
Luke 21:25–28, 34–36
That day will be sprung on you suddenly, like a trap.
At the beginning of the Advent season, the Church calls to mind St. Bernard’s teaching that between Christ’s two visible comings, in history and at the end of time, there is an invisible coming here and now.
Homilectic Directory, §79
We begin again the journey of Advent, reminded that during this time, we will focus on the events of Jesus’ coming with an awareness of the final coming of Christ in judgment. However, we are reminded that Jesus' coming is also a daily event in our lives of faith, which we experience as we listen to God’s word and transform it into action in our lives. Our blessed Mother of God was affirmed as the bearer of Christ; yet, Christ himself also reminds us that, like Mary, we are called to focus on his word, and that we are blessed by our willingness to transform the word we hear into action.
‘The Lord will bestow his bounty, and our earth shall yield its increase.’
communion antiphon
Jerusalem Bible © 1966 by Darton, Longman & Todd Ltd and Doubleday & Company Inc.
‘Are you the king of the Jews?’ Pilate asked. Jesus replied, ‘Do you ask this of your own accord, or have others spoken to you about me?’ Pilate answered, ‘Am I a Jew? It is your own people and the chief priests who have handed you over to me: what have you done?’ Jesus replied, ‘Mine is not a kingdom of this world; if my kingdom were of this world, my men would have fought to prevent my being surrendered to the Jews. But my kingdom is not of this kind.’ ‘So you are a king then?’ said Pilate. ‘It is you who say it’ answered Jesus. ‘Yes, I am a king. I was born for this, I came into the world for this: to bear witness to the truth; and all who are on the side of truth listen to my voice.’
(John 18:33–37)
Points of interest and Catholic lore
Many of the readings from Mark’s Gospel that we have encountered over past weeks focus on the misunderstanding the disciples have about the nature of the kingdom that Jesus proclaims. They remain locked into an earthly understanding of political power. In this text from John, Jesus makes very explicit that this is not the case. His kingdom is not of this world! Pilate pushes the point in order to trap him into an admission of guilt: ‘So you are a king then?’ Jesus’ kingship, however, is not to be bound by earthly understandings. He is indeed a king, but he exercises his kingship by making known the love of God. For this purpose alone he came into the world: to bear witness to the truth that ‘God so loved the world that he gave his only son’ (John 3:16). It is for the world and all humanity that Christ died, so we should avoid the mistake of thinking that Christ’s kingdom is in some way unreal or anchored in the clouds.
While it is not of this world, it is most definitely anchored in this world. All Christians are challenged to help bring this kingdom to fulfillment here and now. ‘Thy kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven.’ It is in the lives and hearts of ordinary people and the societies they build that Christ’s kingdom lives and awaits completion. We too must bear witness to this truth.
Opportunties for group discussion and personal prayer
A closer look at the Scripture of the day, to see how it makes more explicit God's word to us through the teachings of Jesus Christ
The feast of Christ the King is a relatively new one in the church calendar. It was established in 1925 by Pope Pius XI after the world had experienced the horrors of World War I and been shocked at the brutality and destruction of that conflict between so-called civilised and Christian nations. The role of the Church in social and cultural life was diminishing, and there was greater separation of church and state. This feast sought to confront growing secularism head on. Since Vatican II, the Church has seen itself in a new dialogue with the world, and this feast now more strongly reflects upon the nature of Christ’s kingship.
The absolute composure and assurance of Jesus in this text are contrasted with the defensiveness of Pilate, who is locked into an earthly and political understanding of kingdom. For Jesus, real power lies in the redemptive love of the Father and his own redemptive self-giving.
Practical ideas for group leaders to employ in connecting Scripture and daily life, with suggestions for music and environment
• You could invite older members of the community to reflect on how they have seen the Church and its practices change over the last fifty years.
• Use an image of the exultant Christ or a raised cross as a focus for prayer. A suitable song could be ‘Christ is the king’ (GA 389). Conclude with the prayer of exorcism in RCIA at §94G.
As we emerge from COVID, and as we reflect as a community on the experiences of the past two years, two special Masses will be celebrated by Archbishop Peter A Comensoli in May to recognise and remember some of those whose lives have been especially affected by the pandemic.
Employees in the aged- and health-care service sectors are invited to attend this Mass at St Patrick’s Cathedral, with hospitality to follow.
Parishes are also encouraged to mark this event in their own communities by focusing prayerfully on the contributions and the needs of aged- and health-care workers during their own Masses on the weekend of 30 April and 1 May.
We pray for all those in our health- and aged-care systems who bring comfort and healing to the sick, the frail and the dying. May God protect and uphold them in their important work, and may they be encouraged and well supported in their calling to serve the most vulnerable among us.
Lord, hear us.
Lord, hear our prayer.
We pray especially today for all those in our health- and aged-care systems who are suffering from trauma or burnout in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the added demands that this crisis has placed on them. May our God of peace and mercy bring healing to the healers, meeting them in their deepest need.
Lord, hear us.
Lord, hear our prayer.
Blessed are you, Lord, God of mercy,
Who through your Son gave us a marvelous example of charity
and the great commandment of love for one another.
Send down your blessings on these your servants,
who so generously devote themselves to helping others.
When they are called on in times of need,
let them faithfully serve you in their neighbour.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
As we emerge from COVID, and as we reflect as a community on the experiences of the past two years, Archbishop Peter A Comensoli will celebrate a special Mass at St Patricks Cathedral at 11am on Sunday 1 May to recognise and remember all those who serve our community in the health- and aged-care systems.
Employees in the aged- and health-care service sectors are invited to attend this Mass, with hospitality to follow.
We will be marking this event in our own parish during Masses on the weekend of 30 April and 1 May by focusing prayerfully on the contributions and the needs of aged- and health-care workers.
‘He will wipe away all tears from their eyes; death will be no more, and sadness and crying and pain will be no more. The first things have passed away.’
—Revelation 21:4
In recognition of the significant impact of COVID in our families and communities, Archbishop Peter will celebrate a memorial Mass at St Patrick’s Cathedral on Sunday 22 May for all those who have died during the COVID pandemic (including but not limited to those who have died from COVID). This Mass will be offered for all the departed who could not be mourned properly or whose lives could not be celebrated suitably because of pandemic restrictions.
You are invited to submit the name(s) of those you would like remembered during the Mass by filling out the following form. The names will be placed in a basket, which will be placed at the base of the altar, to be prayed for during all Masses over the weekend of 21–22 May.
Parishes are also encouraged to mark this event in their own communities during their Masses on the weekend of 21–22 May by focusing prayerfully on those who died during COVID.
We pray for the sick of our parish and for all who have asked for our prayers.
We pray for those whose anniversaries we remember at this time and all those who have died recently. We pray especially today, across our Archdiocese, for all those who have died during the COVID-19 pandemic. May they know fullness of eternal life in God’s kingdom.
Lord, hear us.
Lord, hear our prayer.
We pray for the families and friends of all those who have lost their lives during the pandemic, and especially for those who were unable to be with their loved ones as they died, or who have been unable to gather in person at funerals because of COVID restrictions. May our God of grace and compassion be close to them in their grief, and may they find meaningful ways to remember and honour the lives of those they have lost.
Lord, hear us.
Lord, hear our prayer.
In recognition of the significant impact of COVID in our families and communities, Archbishop Peter A Comensoli will celebrate a memorial Mass at St Patrick’s Cathedral on Sunday 22 May for all those who have died during the COVID pandemic (including but not limited to those who have died from COVID). This Mass will be offered for all the departed who could not be mourned properly or whose lives could not be celebrated suitably because of pandemic restrictions.
You can submit names of those you would like remembered at this Mass via the following link:
www.surveymonkey.com/r/GZKP7QF
We will be marking this event in our own parish during Masses on the weekend of 21 and 22 May by remembering and celebrating the lives of those within our own community who have died during COVID.
Jeremiah 1:4–5, 17–19
‘I have appointed you prophet to the nations.’
Psalm 70(71):1–6, 15, 17
R. I will sing of your salvation.
1 Corinthians 12:31–13:13
The supremacy of charity.
Luke 4:18
The Lord sent me to bring Good News to the poor and freedom to prisoners.
Luke 4:21–30
No prophet is ever accepted in his own country.
Places should be arranged with appropriate care for the faithful so that they are able to participate in the sacred celebrations visually and spiritually, in the proper manner. It is expedient for benches or seats usually to be provided for their use. The custom of reserving seats for private persons, however, is to be rejected.
—General Instruction of the Roman Missal, §311
The faithful must be placed so that they can exercise their priestly roles during the celebration of the Mass. Their roles involve assembling as the one holy people of God and listening attentively to the Word proclaimed; making intercessions for the needs of the world; presenting gifts for the eucharistic sacrifice; and processing to the table of the Eucharist to be consecrated as God’s people. The design of the space must ensure that the faithful can exercise their right to participate in the liturgy.
‘Let your face shine on your servant. Save me in your merciful love. O Lord, let me never be put to shame, for I call on you.’
—communion antiphon
Luke’s gospel was probably written in Antioch and Syria in AD 80–90, a decade or two after the destruction of the temple by Roman forces. This was a time and place very different from our own, and a proper engagement with the gospel will always require cultural sensitivity. Unlike Matthew, who was writing for a Jewish community, Luke addresses a Gentile audience. Luke’s gospel is the first of two volumes by the same anonymous author, the second of which is the Book of Acts.
The gospels were written at a time when the church was expanding, and when the second coming was no longer regarded as imminent. The church was finally settling down to a life of prayer and work; it saw itself as living in a new age, under the power of the Holy Spirit.
All the gospels must be read first and foremost as theological narratives. They are portraits that have been shaped by the memories and understandings of the communities that produced them—‘faith documents’ rather than biographies or historical narratives as we might understand them now. The gospel narratives were originally intended to be read in their entirety, something that the liturgical cycle doesn’t readily allow, so you might like to take the time this Advent to read the Gospel of Luke as a whole (a task that should take 2–3 hours) in order to gain a better appreciation of its overarching message.
The gospels should also be read in the context of the early church’s concerns about false teaching. While Gnosticism promoted a docetic view of Christ—where Jesus only seemed to be human and didn’t really suffer or die—Luke defends the significance of the passion by insisting on Jesus’ reality and human particularity.
Christians were also entering a period of persecution at this time. Because the early Christians were often associated with Judaism, the Roman authorities sometimes perceived them as revolutionaries, so Luke is at pains to present Romans in a good light and to convey the message that Christians pose no threat to Rome.
We don’t know a lot about the author of Luke. The author relies on eyewitnesses, so it’s unlikely that he knew Jesus directly. Some writers identify him as a companion of Paul. He was certainly cultivated and literate, and familiar with the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures; it’s possible that he was not Jewish but a ‘God fearer’—a Gentile who was attracted to Judaism.
He wrote for a group of churches that were diverse in their composition. While they were mostly Gentile, they included both men and women, common people and the social elite, the poor and the wealthy.
Luke draws on three main sources in his gospel:
A number of events are unique to Luke’s account, including: the infancy narrative at the beginning; the parables of the good Samaritan and the lost sheep, lost coin and lost son; and the appearance stories and ascension at the end. Luke provides a prologue to state his purpose and to identify his patron, and also expands considerably on the journey to Jerusalem (chs 9–19), in what might be regarded as ‘the spine of the gospel’. The role of geography, and particularly Jerusalem, is significant, with the narrative moving towards and then out of Jerusalem—a city associated with Abraham, David, Solomon and the Babylonians, and the place where Jesus is rejected, raised and exalted, and where, at the beginning of Acts, the disciples are empowered for their ministry.
Luke outlines his purpose right at the outset, in the prologue, where he dedicates his account to ‘Theophilis’, which in Greek means ‘friend of God’. The purpose of Luke’s account is to proclaim the Good News. It is not concerned with proving whether these events happened; rather, its purpose is to give an account of what happened and what it means. It is concerned with the significance of Jesus.
Luke’s gospel conveys a concern for all humankind, and a particular care for the poor. It also focuses on ministry to and by women. The seeking out and saving of the lost is another recurring motif, as seen in the parables of the lost sheep, the lost coin and the lost (or prodigal) son.
The role of the Holy Spirit and the importance of prayer are also central to the gospel’s message—a message of joy and mercy.
The Gospel of Luke is interested in who Jesus is, and what he’s about. Luke’s Jesus is a charismatic figure. He is led by the Spirit, prays constantly and is obedient to God’s will. His humility is evident in his depiction as a poor wanderer, dependent on the hospitality of others. He is a gentle and compassionate saviour, but also strong and uncompromising towards those who collaborate to exploit others. He has come to bring good news to the poor.
Luke’s Jesus draws close to the poor, to sinners and to those who are marginalised or outcasts, such as lepers and tax-collectors. Luke uses the literary device of ‘reversal’ to emphasise this point, placing those who think they’re righteous on the outer, with sinners and outcasts becoming ‘the new righteous’. This is often conveyed most compellingly in parables such as the story of the prodigal son, parables that still challenge and speak powerfully to us today. As Ria Greene observes, ‘The mystery of sacred texts is that these words can speak profoundly to our experience in ways that we think nobody else can understand.’
Luke’s gospel includes many references to women that do not appear in the other gospels. Jesus breaches social barriers by reaching out to women, and by healing and freeing them. Women also play an important role in the ministry of Jesus. At a time when a woman’s influence was often confined to the domestic sphere, Luke presents us with women such as Martha, who owned her own home, and her sister Mary, who sits at Jesus’ feet, assuming the position of a disciple.
The Gospel of Luke can be thought of as a kind of manual for disciples. It teaches us to attend to the inner life, showing us how easily darkness can well up in those whose lives remain unexamined. As Ria Green observes, ‘Jesus gets people, but he doesn’t allow excuses.’ Luke’s gospel calls us to grow. It prepares us to be called and sent. While the disciples are sometimes shown to experience moments of great insight, they often fail to ‘get it’. But God doesn’t give up on them. Discipleship requires us to stick with it, despite our blindness, confusion and failure. The transformation is gradual. And, as Luke makes clear, we are transformed together, as a community, not just as individuals. In Luke, there are lots of stories where people are paired together in their discipleship.
The kingdom of God is vividly depicted and anticipated in Luke’s gospel as a realm of welcome and inclusion—a realm of joy, justice, peace, love and compassion. We are not there yet—we know what we are striving for, we know when we are missing it, when our lives fall short of this promise—but our very disappointment strengthens our yearning for it, and gives us a keener sense of all that God intends for us.
Jesus prays at significant moments throughout Luke’s gospel: he prays before he is baptised; he prays in the wilderness; he prays before choosing his disciples; he prays in Gethsemane. Many of the central figures of the infancy narrative also model a life of prayer and thanksgiving.
Another of the themes that receives particular attention in Luke is that of table fellowship. Jesus’ choice of dining companions is often provocative, drawing criticism from those who see his fellow diners as unworthy or unclean. When we look at the feeding stories, we should take note of when Jesus sits at table, who he sits with and the kinds of conversations he has, and then to ask ourselves, ‘Who are the people that Jesus would sit and eat with today?’ Jesus is presented as showing unconditional love to outcasts and those on the margins. But Luke also makes it clear that a meaningful relationship with Jesus is conditional: we need to respond to him.
The Good News in Luke’s gospel is for everyone. God’s saving love encompasses the whole of humanity, which is perhaps why Luke presents us with such a rich tapestry of characters. Their stories, as Ria notes, show us that ‘God is generous beyond measure … that God reverses human expectation and creates human possibilities in impossible situations.’
Some key characters and passages in Luke's infancy narrative prefigure and encapsulate the central themes of the whole gospel. These first few chapters provide a portrait of God’s plan for inclusive salvation, and nowhere more powerfully than in their depiction of Mary, a young unmarried woman of no special background or status, betrothed to Joseph, who nevertheless experiences a startling reversal of status when she is favoured and exalted by God. Her whole-hearted response to the angel’s message—a response of faithful obedience—is contrasted with Zechariah’s reaction of disbelief. She is depicted by Luke as the first disciple, staying with Jesus from the cradle to the cross.
The shepherds, considered by other Jews to be dishonest and unclean, are similarly marginalised and distrusted. And yet they are called to worship the infant Jesus, demonstrating Jesus’ special mission to the poor and outcast.
In a similar vein, Simeon recognises that the child Jesus has been born for everyone, declaring him ‘a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel’ (Luke 2:32). Significantly, Luke traces Jesus’ family tree all the way back to Adam, the father of all humanity, whereas Matthew only traces it back to Abraham.
Elizabeth’s story also disrupts clear social structures. Although she is a daughter of Aaron and married to a priest—which would usually confer a high status—her barrenness brings shame upon her and the suspicion of sinfulness. And yet God favours her too and reverses her circumstances.
Her meeting with Mary is an especially significant moment for these women. Both of them are experiencing unexpected pregnancies; both of them recognise God’s presence in the surprising events unfolding in their lives, and both respond with praise and joy. Their two individual stories and experiences are brought together in this moment, and in this instance of shared ‘theological reflection’, we glimpse a community of faith emerging. These two women come to share an understanding of God’s action in their lives, not just for their own benefit, but for the salvation of all humanity, presenting us with a rich model for theological reflection within the Church. Like Mary and Elizabeth, we are invited to bring our situation into dialogue with others’ and to make sense of this in light of what we know about God and what we expect of God. It is this kind of encounter that produces the canticles—the distinctive and prophetic songs of praise and joy that punctuate the beginning of Luke’s gospel and that point us towards the compassionate, disruptive, challenging saviour we will encounter as the narrative of Luke’s gospel unfolds.
Ria Greene has worked in Catholic education for more than twenty years, in both primary and secondary settings, with a specific focus on religious education and faith formation. She has also worked as a parish catechist and sacraments coordinator, and has completed further studies in religious education and theology. As part of a Master’s degree, Ria studied the Gospel of Luke, and has taught a religious studies class on the Gospel of Luke at St Bede’s College, where she is Deputy Principal.