My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that
you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound
reverence. I ask you for pardon of my sins
and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful.
My mother, Immaculate St Joseph, my father and Lord, my guardian
Angel and deceit. Well, as we moved through Lent,
the Sundays of Lent are kind of milestones along the way and the
Gospel of of each Sunday is kind of important.
So we're going to look at the Gospel of next Sunday's Mass,
the third Sunday of Lent, which is that encounter between the
Samaritan woman and Jesus. And just one particular aspect
of it is that and everybody there involved, the main
characters, they really are all pretty much witnesses beginning
with Jesus himself and speaking with this woman when our Lord
speaks about, she asked him, give me a drink.
And the dialogue goes on and and Jesus really says to her, if if
you only knew what God is offering and who it is that is
saying to you, give me a drink, you would have been the one to
ask and he would have given you living water.
Our Lord is talking about in right through the Gospel with
this woman reading his own experience of the Father.
Jesus is invariably talking about this his personal his
personal testimony is a war and in in dialoguing with this
woman. It's there's no theory, nothing
wrong with theory, but it is it his, his personal testimony as
where in the Gospel of Saint John, Jesus says we speak of
what we know and we testify to what we have seen.
And that's so true in the very first place of you, Lord, that
everything that you're speaking about in the Gospel is your
personal experience of your father.
I mean, from all eternity, which is really quite amazing.
From all eternity, the experience of the Son with the
Father. There's nothing like the Father
is, is what Jesus is saying again and again and again.
I want you to have the same relationship with the Father as
I have and kind of culminates then after the resurrection with
our Lord giving that instruction to Mary maiden and go to the
brethren and tell them I'm going to my Father and your father.
And so we're thinking of ourselves also and and our own
apostolate and our own apostolate is is no different
from this that it is We speak of what we know and we testify to
what we have seen. Ultimately our apostolate is
really very personal and it's very much in one way or another.
Testimony is not theory and we see it in in this woman.
Then after her, it's a long dialogue and it's a it's, it's a
little bit tortuous in places because this woman is not, is
not very open at the beginning to what what you'd order saying.
And then with the whole theme of her little collection of
husbands comes up, she she backs off and she gets she gets all
theoretical at that point. Actually, she kind of quick
kicks to touch, then she starts talking theory, liturgical
theory I suppose, but it ends up with her completely won over by
Jesus and running off then to the local den, leaving her jar
of watery. Significantly, there's just one
thing now that's on her mind and that is to give testimony and
she goes off and to the villagers come and see a man who
told me everything I have ever done.
Could he be the Christ? She's amazed and they can see
it. They can see it in her also the
the very fact that this woman who was a little bit of a social
outcast to get the impression for various reasons in the in
the dialogue. And there she is kind of kind of
humbly as well, saying to them, you know, he told me everything
I ever did. And we all know what that is, as
if she's saying that we all know what I kind of that, that you
guys probably talk about nothing else and everything that I'm up
to. But this guy knew it all and he
told me everything. And they, of course, they,
they're, they're won over by her testimony.
Many of the Samaritans from that town began to believe in him
because of the word of the woman who testified.
He told me everything I have done.
So they see they see the genuineness of her testimony.
They see the you know, there's this is something they know her
well. This is something very real.
This lady is not crazy and and the testimony is very powerful.
And so it does actually lead them to believe in our Lord and
of course then to go out to encounter you Jesus directly.
And I was going to think about this whole business of come,
come and think about this was in, in Sweden last last Friday.
I, I was giving a talk in Malmo to a bunch of, you know, a
lovely big bunch actually of, of young guys and girls in their
20s to 30s with someone younger. And this guy was one of these
younger ones, he's 17. And and amongst them, this guy
guy, Swedish guy also the, the several Swedish fellows who are,
who are converting. And I was talking to several of
them and hearing their, their stories.
Why, why are they converting? But this kind of story was that
maybe when he was 14 or 15, he began to have, sorry, he was
brought up in atheists, completely atheistic background
parents, which are just 100% atheists and never very bohemian
of bringing the sense of, well, there's nothing.
And we're not worried about any of that kind of stuff.
And around the age of 1415, he began to have panic attacks and
and his panic attacks were essentially around the question
of what is the meaning of all this?
Why am I here? What happened to me after I die?
Amazing. And, and this really, these
questions were so powerful that they were producing in him these
panic attacks and the kind of funny kind of thing, you know,
there is a, a teenage Swede atheist background and
completely, and you're kind of kind of might think, well, I
forgot about that. He couldn't care less.
He couldn't care less about all these kind of spiritual topics.
Well, he could he, he, he cared an awful lot.
And so much so that it was producing in him this tremendous
sense of panic, which is very valid.
In fact, you know, if we're just, if our life is completely
meaningless, well start panicking because what a, what a
disaster. And anyway, then he decided he
had to, he had to kind of get a religious solution to what this
was all about. And it was very like 2 of the
others that I was talking to. In fact, after that, the talk I
gave, they were kind of systematically going through the
religions and, and very in a, in a very serious way as well.
And because the others were saying they'd gone through the
the various religions and they were they were kind of now as
Orthodox Catholicism and Roman Catholicism.
That kind of boiled it down to it must be one of these two.
Like there was kind of the phase they were in.
But this guy began studying Islam and he quickly discarded
that because of all the violence he'd have to Judaism.
He wasn't impressed by all the infighting that he kind of
interesting to really kind of detached study just online or
whatever. But but I mean, he thought there
was a lot of infighting and maybe that kind of brought him
to Lutheranism and the local, the local Lutheran Church.
And well, he was able to pop in to visit a church and, and it
was sent me. There was something there and he
got talking. Then he started studying the
Bible, got talking to the Lutheran pastor, a lady with a
view to getting baptised. But he had a number of questions
because then he from his studies, he said, what you, you,
you, you here in the Lutheran Church, you allow a gay
marriage, but that's that's really non that's really con
That kind of thing is condemned in in in the New Testament.
And she was saying, well, you know, we've kind of moved with
the times. And there was another thing.
Similarly, whatever, whatever it was another thing.
And and again he was saying, well, you know, that's, that's
not really, it's kind of countered by the Bible.
And, and she was saying the same thing.
But anyway, he got, he decided to get baptised and, and so she
just baptised him there and then.
But in fact, he said to her, I want the proper words.
I want you to say baptised in the name of the Father Son.
He knew that, you know, there could be an Evan of baptism.
He wanted Evan of baptism, but he wasn't completely happy.
And then he popped into a Catholic Church and I don't know
if he went several times to Mass or the Catholic Church, but
anywhere one of the girls who goes along with these Friday
evening talks that I was at, she saw him at Mass and she, she
realised she hadn't seen him there before.
When he was leaving Mass. She basically grabbed him.
Hey, haven't seen you before. Are you a Catholic?
Yeah. So anyway, so she basically took
him under her wing and and now he's getting certainly in
preparation for baptism. But what really struck me about
this fan of was when he when he studies these things, he's not
keeping it under his hat. So he's very, he's he, he with
his friends, he shares all these things.
So one of the things he recently was studying was the Eucharistic
miracles. And, and he, he was saying to,
well, somebody was telling me about him.
He was saying the Eucharistic miracles.
This is insane. Or was this lying?
This is insane. In other words, this is just so
incredible. And so he's going to his friends
and saying, you have to look at this, look at these miracles.
And not only that, but also his atheistic parents.
I don't know what how much impact he's in my could could be
having a tremendous impact. I'm sure he sure he is.
And his siblings as well, older, older siblings.
And he's going and he's telling them, look at all this.
And I was kind of strict with that because I think, gosh,
that's really testimony. That's really testimony.
Do I give testimony like that and do I share, you know, when I
see these things and like the Eucharistic miracles?
This is insane in a good sense. This is insane.
This is incredible. And he's, and he and he's not
shy then about going along and sharing this with friends,
siblings and his own parents. This is insane.
So what about us? In a sense, we may, I'm sure
this guy, and he's obviously living in a very atheistic
milieu. There wouldn't be any Catholics,
I'm sure, in his school, certainly in his whole family,
family circle, he's the only one.
He's the only one. And an awful lot could depend on
a guy like that. And it depend on his witness, a
bit like the smart woman going to the village.
She is the cause of the conversion of the village
because of her testimony. And so a guy like this, you who
who knows how much depends on his testimony of this 17 year
old Swedish boy and his discovery and his his lack of
human respect. He just and kind of you get the
impression he's saying, how could you not share this?
This is the answer to all my panic attacks.
It's all here. You know, it's a whole world
and, and, and we, on the other hand, might not, might be very,
kind of very standoffish about giving testimony.
OK, It's not that we have to be stupid about it, but but neither
can we be too clever about it. And, and, and, and therefore not
give testimony and just, Oh well, no, people don't, they're
not ready for that and all that kind of stuff To these the, the,
the, the, the men and women in her village are totally taken by
her testimony, even though this woman is the woman with no great
reputation in the town. And they're totally taken.
And then they go off and for themselves, they find you, Lord,
and they say to her, we no longer believe because of your
word. For we have heard for ourselves,
we know that this is truly the saviour of the world.
Maybe there's a way of thanking her, in fact, for our testimony
and saying you're dead right, you're dead right, and thank you
for giving us your testimony 'cause if you didn't, where
would we be? And so for ourselves, this
wanting to bring people to our Lord and even, you know, in the
sense of wanting not to bring people to ourselves, I think of
our friendships. You know, I love great to have
friends, but in a certain sense, we could be a little bit, you
know, kind of feel well, they're a friend now that's great.
But we don't we don't bring them to our Lord.
We don't pass them on to our Lord.
We're kind of happy that they they're just my friend and that
we don't, we don't as this woman does, kind of bring them along
to Jesus or this this Swedish fellow, the 17 year old's doing.
You know, you're not happy that well, my friends like me.
No, I want them to like Jesus. I want them to discover Jesus.
Saint Jose Maria hearing confessions.
You'll be very careful about people getting kind of attached
to him because obviously with his his personality, it would be
very easy to get attached to Santos and Maria.
But this thing that he used to say from time to time with, with
people going to him for confession, today you don't come
to confession with me, go to somebody else.
We won't get a kind of hard thing to say, maybe kind of hard
to hear. But just him realising not that
this is this is from they're coming to me for me, not for
Christ. And so tremendous firmness of
Saint Joseph. I'm sure he did it in a very
nice way. I kind of twinkled in his eye.
But still, you know, it's not about coming to me.
And I think we could maybe apply that again to ourselves about,
you know, thinking of, of, of not confession, but thinking of
our friendships. And, and because it's true, you
know, we're, we know that the friendship gives us a tremendous
capacity to, to say things to people And, and you know, you
can do anything with friendship, but our friendship shouldn't
stop with us in principle. Obviously we do.
We can't determine what, what people will will think or do,
But there is this kind of, there is a bit of a danger for us of
well, well, as long as they're a friend of mine, that's it.
No, we Lord, we want to bring them to you.
Saint John, this Gospel we're looking at, He's the one who is
in who gives probably the the most beautiful account of
testimony in his letter, first letter, the very beginning, that
which was from the beginning which we have heard, which we
have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched
with our hands concerning the word of life.
We proclaim also to you the very beautiful, particularly coming
from Saint, Saint John, who's the most, you could almost say
hands on of all the apostles, The one who lays his hand on
your breast, Jesus during the Last Supper, the one who all the
other apostles know is so close to Jesus that Jesus has a
particular affection for you. And he looks at Jesus and he
hears him and touches him with his hands and him saying, this
is what we're talking about. There's no theory.
There's a tremendous theology in St.
John's Gospel, obviously. And and he's the eagle.
I mean, he soars up to the heights.
And yet it all begins with him, what he's heard personally, the
tone of voice of Jesus, what he's seen with in you, Lord
touching, touching you. And so again, thinking of
ourselves in the testimony, and you could say, you know, our
testimony can't really be any richer than our personal
experience. And maybe that's why, you know,
Saint John's Gospel is precisely the gospel that soars above the
other three, with all due respect to the other three
gospels. But you know, he's really soars.
And maybe that's precisely because his experience of Christ
is the most profound, perhaps of all the apostles.
His experience is so intense, so personal, and his reflection on
it. And so, again, ourselves, you
know, that the depth of our experience of Christ would be
the measure of our apostle. I'm sure you have the feeling
sometimes, you know, you head off into the morning traffic,
you know, Azure Brekki. You've also had mass.
You've also had 1/2 an hour of prayer.
And again, I presume we all have the same kind of sensation.
I have been with Jesus for a good solid hour this morning.
He's been in my body as we head off.
You know, a bit like a feel. I don't know.
You just had an amazing, an amazing experience.
I don't know if, if, if you met the Pope, I met John Paul too.
And, and certainly afterwards you kind of feel you're kind of
radioactive. Hey, I, you know, I've met the
Pope. I've been with the Pope as you
head off back into, you know, in that case with Rome, you know,
I, I've been with the Pope and, and I kind of think perhaps we
should, that should be maybe even a stronger sensation with
this as we're surrounded by all these people who, well, some of
them might have had this, this experience, but very, very, very
few as you're heading by by people and you're walking by
them, none of this kind of superior thing, but just this
kind of encounter. I have been with Jesus for this
time this morning. I've received him.
I've I've conversed with him this hour and I'm heading over
never in the traffic. I'm not with you.
And that should, I don't know, I don't know that we can, you
know, stop people on on the bus. You know, you know something.
I've just been with Jesus, you know, for an hour this morning.
That might raise eyebrows for sure.
But still, you know, maybe some people would be capable of doing
it, speaking those terms. But certainly at least it gives
us the sensation. I have something to really give
witness about. This is not normal as that
Swedish fellow would say. This is insane.
I've been with the Lord, I've
been speaking to him and that is our hands on personal
experience. Which in one way, again, the
more intense that is, the more real it is, I think then the
more real the desire to give testimony, to speak about this
in one way or another that we, we, that we, we have to share
this with people. The, the intensity, the
amazement. Again, this is insane.
Is, is a lovely line because you can see it really sums up in a
very teenage way the intensity of the amazement.
This is insane. And we're just gonna a kind of
lovely phrase in a way, this is insane.
This is so amazing. And that if we perhaps await a
more intense experience of that, we too then would be like this
guy with his parents, with his friends, with his siblings.
We just think you have to, you have to hear this.
Remember once being the recipient a little bit of that.
A friend of mine who'd gone to confession, he's in in Rockbrook
School. I hadn't been in quite in quite
some time and he comes out. He comes out and and and I was
waiting for him. No intention, but he comes out
and he's so impressed by it. So impressed partly he used to
confess was Father Hanan, who was a real St but he's so
impressed. He pushed me into the box and
physically got me in. You're going in.
No, I'm not, you're going in and that and that was kind of a
similar kind of thing. Testament.
If I was to go in first, though, that wouldn't have happened.
He was coming out and he had, you know, he'd been there for 5
minutes, whatever it was, and he was saying you are going in a
very, very beautiful in a way, and a very, you know, real and
true friendship in, at least for Paul, the 6th Evangelion
Nunciandi is this famous line which John Paul too quoted an
awful lot. Modern man listens more
willingly to witnesses than to teachers.
And if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are
witnesses. You're amazing.
Just an observation. People teaching.
Yeah. But witnesses.
And you have that, you know, a lot of kind of Catholic events
or maybe of Christian events in general, you know, you get a lot
of witness. This guy is giving his
testimony. This girl is giving her witness.
And some of them are really, I suppose most of them are really
impressive. And people do listen, you know,
maybe somebody giving a talk, a theological lecture, well,
boring. And then the guy gets up and
gives testimony. Well, this is my story.
And people sit on it was very nice.
And I suppose we have to have this sense also that people are
waiting. They're observing again, like
these Swedes that I was talking to on Friday night that that
they, they too, anyway, that I was talking to in more detail
were saying, umm, you know how they'd gone through the
different religions very like this other fellow and that now
they were kind of working out, you know, orthodox Catholic, but
they were, and they were observing everything.
You can see that they were observing this Friday night, uh,
group that, that was there in the Paris, Paris in Malibu.
Umm, somebody spoke about somebody in Villa Terry.
It was a couple of years ago. They spoke about a visit of a
number of Japanese diplomats. I think they were who living,
who were living in Rome. They've been there quite a while
and there were, there were friends and they were coming to
visit Villa Terry and the crypt and they were down.
I don't know if they'd heard about it.
They were not, they were not Christians.
And this person who was showing them around asked them, were
they, were they interested in the faith in Catholicism?
And one of them said in a very maybe Japanese way, we are in
the observation phase. So and you could kind of think,
well, maybe some friends of ours are in the observation phase
with us. They're working it out.
Is this, is this the, is this what I'm looking for?
Is this the truth, this person, what she lives out?
Is she happy? Number one, is she happy?
And what does she say? And can I speak to her?
I suppose, can I speak to her about these things?
Is she happy to speak about her faith?
Well, we are, we are plunk in the middle of Lent and and I
kind of think when we look at prayer, fasting almsgiving, that
the most real and practical almsgiving we have to do is the
alms giving of apostolate. I think that that's not just to
save ourselves money and Oh no, I'm giving faith.
I don't have to give money. It is the greatest alms we have.
And because in this we're kind of we are, we are hyper wealthy
in in terms of our experience again, an hour with you this
morning. Jesus, we are, you know, in the
palace, we are the Super wealthy and this is what we have to give
very like Saint Peter in the Acts of the Apostles to that
beggar sitting beside one of the gates into the temple begging
for money, the blind beggar and, and Peter says to him, I have no
silver and gold, but what I have I give you in the name of Jesus
Christ of Nazareth, rise and walk.
What I have I give you. And I and I think that's our
real, that's our arms. What I have, I give you and the
great arms that I have is my personal experience of Jesus
Christ, my personal experience of the faith of the church in
its, you know, multitude of dimensions, all kinds of, and
some people, you know, more interested in one domain of the
artistic dimension or others theological dimension or others,
I don't know, experiencing fraternity dimension, whatever
it might be. But we are certainly, we're
certainly so wealthy and this is something which is the arms
really that we have to give. And as it was more overlent, it
should be something in our mind more overlent.
And perhaps also because this is a period when when people, young
people maybe in particular, kind of more thinking more the grace
is there. This is the time of intense
grace. There's more grace that God is
moving souls, maybe like this young fellow having his panic
attacks. What is it all about?
What is the meaning of all this? And, and, and furthermore, in
giving these arms, as Pope John Paul 2 says, the faith is
strengthened when it is given to others.
The more we give these arms, the more we have, the more we give
our faith away, the more we have it, which is very nice.
So it's, it's, there's no diminishing returns.
This is the more you give the more you have anyway.
So let's be asking our our Lord these days of Lent to help us
maybe to breakthrough whatever these barriers are that stop us
giving witness to stop us giving testimony of our faith.
OK, maybe we're a experience or whatever we think people are not
interested. I think people certainly of a
Swedish 17 year old is interested and and the other
guys were just as way out and they were there and and an
Albanian Muslim was another guy who's getting baptised at at
Easter. Also Malmo amazing stories.
I say, well, Lord, that I would be ready to give my witness to
whoever it is and we can turn to Our Lady Queen of Apostles and
and help us to be, especially over this land, particularly
Apostolic. I give you thanks to my God for
the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations you
have communicated to me in this meditation.
I ask you for help to put them into effect.
My mother, Immaculate St Joseph, my father, Lord, my guardian
Angel, intercede.